Gaia Patch Notes — April 1, 2020
Aggregated from Steam, cross-tracked with Battle.net coverage on GamePatchNote.
Full 1.0 patch notes.
Underwater gameplay
* Depth of maps now reach 1'000 meters, up from the previous 50 meters
* Several new resources added: hardshell, pavonica, skymush, ballflower, starfish and 6 types of harvestable fish, such as salmon, koi and goldfish. These are found at different depths and have their own spawn rule. For example, skymush will only appear in the underwater mushroom mini-biome
* Several new items added:
- Fishsoup: allows you to breathe longer underwater and decreases oxygen loss rate
- Mosquito: an upgradable submersible that can reach all the way down to the ocean floor. Just like the rover, it will lose its integrity if bumping into things.
- The cooked versions of the 6 fish mentioned above
- Raw gold and raw diamond. These can only be found deep underwater and turned into gold and diamond at the forge.
- Lots and lots of new objects that form the underwater environment, such as sponges, seashells, azure stone, andalusite, granite rock, cthulhu trees and mushrooms. These only serve as decoration
* New fish added. Some are harvestable, some are not. All are passive.
Koi
Salmon
Bass
Dolphin
Amberjack
Biomechanical whale
Blue whale
Anarhichas
Radioactive anarhichas
Chelidonichthys
Muranea
Radioactive muranea
Demon seahorse
Seahorse
Tetraodontidae
Radioactive tetraodontidae
Tropical fish
Molidae
Demon molidae
Reelfish
Ray
Cuttlefish
Jellyfish
Goldfish
Demon fish
* Underwater mini-biomes. Astral will give you the location of these places if you happen to swim within a certain range of them, but only once.
- Mushroom place.
- Red corridor
* There is no combat underwater. This aspect of the game is purely for exploration and not really a necessity to completing the game
* Added 3 new techs related to the Mosquito upgrades.
New biomes
* Added 2 of each: desert, forest, grassland and arctic. The underwater of each new map is not affected by the biome.
Forest and grassland
The standard biomes of Gaia, the forest and grasslands maps contain every type of resource you need to thrive. The difference between them can be found in the number of trees present, as well as the kind of trees, and ground textures. The fauna also differs a bit. There are some animals you'll find in one map that you won't find in the other for example.
Desert
Deserts are mostly empty. You'll mostly find cactuses and ancient sites and some sparse rock formations. However, they do have oases, which contain a lot of life. You'll find bubbleroots, glowtubes and cucumbers, as well as lots of animal life. But that's about it. You'll have to do quite a bit of trading if you want to thrive in the desert.
Arctic
The arctic is completely barren, with only one (very convenient) rock formation near your spawn point. You won't be able to grow stuff at all due to the low temperatures, and there's nothing to harvest. But you might run into some arctic animals and predators. Though let's be honest, you'll probably die of thirst before you have to start worrying about predators. However, as noted before, the underwater is not affected by the biome type, so this biome will force you to spend a lot of time underwater, gathering starfish, shells and fishing in order to trade for all the other materials you need. This is by far the hardest maps you can play, so it's recommended only for experienced players.
Mechanics improvements
* There is a good chance that a trade ship could arrive in orbit every dozen or so minutes now, instead of every several hours. Trade ships now also have a higher chance of bringing items that you lack
* Raids will no longer trigger when you go far away from your base, unless the raid warning has already appeared.
* Made some adjustments to the stats of several items
* Made Astral a little more involved in the game
* You no longer need the multitool to harvest stuff, however, you'll be harvesting stuff 5 times slower than with a multitool
* Some items no longer drop on death. This includes the multitool, some ammo and clothing
* Caves have been removed from the game
* You can now click on your Tempest turrets to select them, instead of having to click and drag
* Made a few changes to the way fire spreads
* Vastly nerfed the wavy effect on far objects when temperatures are high
* Rain and overcast weather chances have been reduced
* Lots and lots of bug and glitch fixes. Thanks to everyone who reported them!