A Holiday Treat just for you!

With the holidays right around the corner and the year reaching its conclusion, what better to receive than none other but new Grounded updates and goodies! With plenty to unpack, lets take a look at A Holiday Treat just for you!

A Holiday Treat

We have a special gift prepared this holiday season.

All players during the month of December will be able to unlock the “Holiday Tree” and “Holiday Wreath” building recipes! These holiday recipes are purchasable unlocks in the Science Shop, as well as a new December Sign Set. On top of that, the “Holiday Tree” may also present random gifts to the player only during the month of December. We hope you enjoy this holiday season and we’re excited to have you check out what’s under the tree.

Please note that the recipes can only be purchased in the month of December, but you will be able to craft them year-round once you have acquired them. For those playing in Creative mode, you will have them unlocked permanently in your game if you load them in the month of December.

NEW FEATURES AND CHANGES

Additional Row of Backpack Inventory

The teens have discovered a hidden pocket in their backpacks. Players now have access to additional backpack space. How much space? A whole row of inventory space that allows you to carry more items while adventuring! We know how much the Grounded community wanted this and asked for it, so please fill your backpack with all the things you need.

Hot Pouch Update

On top of that, you can customize three different hot pouch settings. Players can customize three unique sets of hot pouches and swap through them while running around the yard. That way, you’ll always have what you need at your fingertips. Whether you’re out building or adventuring or just going through and having a grand old time with your friends, the hot pouch is there for you!

Zip It Up!

Introducing the ZIP.R! The ZIP.R utilizes Aphid power and a gear train to overcome the force of gravity. What’s that mean? You can go up ziplines! Ascend ziplines and traverse the backyard in ways you couldn’t before. You can decide which direction you would like to zip along the backyard.

The ZIP.R item can be found in a new room in the Oak lab that requires the Assistant Manager keycard. Once collected, the ZIP.R will be permanently unlocked for all players in the world.

NEW CRAFTING RECIPES AND FEATURES

Base Décor and More!

Looking to change things up at your base? Well, we have new building crafting recipes for you in store. Three new vases and three folding partitions are now available to craft, along with a beautiful grandfather clock that tells the real-time in the game. There’s even grass side table, which doubles as storage! Feel free to place the new Holiday Tree or a stuffed creature on top of it.

Now that we’ve mentioned stuffed creatures, we’ve got plenty of new ones to share. New stuffed insects and wall mounts are now available to craft, including the Moth and Spiny Water Flea. You can also use the new wall mounts to mark a foe. That’s right! Players can use the “Mark Foe” ability on any wall mounted bug trophy to give them a 15-minute damage buff against that creature. Go forth and fight back against those pesky creatures!

With all those new base items, you’re going to want to make room. Make much room with mushroom stairs, and its also available as mushroom half stairs if you don’t need the entire length. Not a fan of fungi? Grass half stairs have been added too. Be sure to check it out!

Light Colors

Time to lighten up your base! All lights that you build can be customized to any color of the rainbow using new Color and Saturation sliders. Change the color of the lights into a variety of different colors and adjust the brightness and saturation using the customization options. To top it all off, you can copy the setting of one light and then paste it onto all the other lights in your base to make things easy.

Pick Customization Options

Speaking of copying something, you can also copy a building’s customization options using the Pick control. The Pick control will copy building customizations for you to paste onto newly placed buildings. Need to recycle? No problem! Buildings now give back 100% of their resources when destroyed or recycled by the player.

We’re excited to have you try all the new crafting recipes and features that will help you build the ultimate base in the backyard.

QUALITY OF LIFE IMPROVEMENTS

Rise and Shine

One of the scariest things you can do in the backyard is fight in the dark, so we have changed the way sleeping works. Instead of just sleeping for eight hours and waking up in the dark, you will now sleep until 6:00 AM when the sun rises. That way, you’ll get an early start to your day in Grounded!

Overcooked

Killing creatures just got a bit tastier. When you kill a creature with a spicy weapon, instead of dropping the raw meat that they usually would, they will drop cooked meat. If you prefer your meat cured, salty weapons will cause creatures to drop jerky instead of raw meat. Fight the rawest battles and reward yourselves with a delicious meal.

Coolest Lab Addition

Remember to hydrate, hydrate, hydrate! That’s why we’ve added a new water cooler building to the labs. Now you can quench your thirst and discuss the most recent televised sporting events with your backyard roommates.

Mutation Changes

Another BIG thing we have updated are the bonuses you’ll receive for different combat mutations. Take a gander at our list of mutation changes below.

Depth of Field

You can now adjust the background depth of field blur. High, Medium, and Low options are available for the Depth of Field Blur setting. Not sure where to find it? Head on over to the Display tab in options. We hope this setting helps you see in a more comfortable way while exploring the backyard.

Other Adjustments

The “Nearby Storage” range has been doubled. We increased the range for storing capabilities, so you can be a little bit further from your chest to store things. To add, players can build from nearby chests and pallets at a more considerable distance than before! This will enable you to build much quicker and ultimately get you back into the game much faster.

Thrown items will show from further distances and always be on the screen. The thrown item markers have been adjusted so the chances of you losing something that you throw will be much lower. Just in case, we also made it so bows and crossbows can no longer be thrown. If you hit the default throw button while having those equipped, it will bring up the ammo radial instead.

If you like to use trail markers for everything but forget what they mean, here’s a game changer! Players now have the ability to name trail markers. While accessing the Icon Selector setting, you can add text as the first option. The text will be shown anywhere you can see the trail marker.

Another cool quality-of-life feature is that you can now toggle off and on your nameplate for everyone in your game. This will make hide and seek in the backyard a little bit trickier and make it more exciting to go out and attack your friends when they least expect it.

Let’s be honest, we all die in the backyard. With that said, we created an option that respawns you at the nearest field station on the death screen. You can still respawn at the kid case, but we wanted to give you the option to make things easy.

What about my backpack? We’ve got you! Players only drop resources from the backpack instead of everything in all difficulty modes and creative mode. Anything that you crafted will remain in your backpack, and you will only lose the resources you had when you die. You can still adjust the Backpack Items on Death settings in Custom mode when creating a game. In addition, the game lobby UI has been updated with a pop-up to better convey the different modes when creating a game instead of just a drop-down.

We hope all these updates help you survive and thrive in the backyard. For more information the 1.1.0 update, check out the Patch Notes down below!

A HOLIDAY TREAT

During the month of December, a few new unlocks will be purchasable at the Science Shop that will grant the “Holiday Tree” and “Holiday Wreath” building recipes as well as a new December Sign Set. The “Holiday Tree” may also present random gifts to the player only during the month of December (4-8 presents per night across all trees).

Note: While these unlocks can only be purchased at the Science Shop through the month of December, they will stay unlocked forever for your world if you have purchased them. Creative games will have these recipes unlocked permanently if loaded during the month of December.

NEW FEATURES

ADDITIONAL ROW OF BACKPACK INVENTORY

• The teens have discovered a hidden pocket in their Holding backpacks, providing an additional row of inventory space and allowing you to carry more items while adventuring.

ZIP.R (GO UP ZIPLINES UPGRADE)

• Ascend Ziplines and traverse them more quickly with this ingenious device from Wendell. The ZIP.R utilizes Aphid power and a gear train to overcome the force of gravity.
• The ZIP.R can be found in a new room in the Oak lab that requires the Assistant Manager keycard. Once collected, this new ability is permanently unlocked for all players.

BUILDING / CRAFTING QUALITY OF LIFE

Nearby Storage Range Increased

• The “Nearby Storage” range has been doubled from 10 centimeters to 20 centimeters.

Build From Nearby Chests

• Base buildings can be built using ingredients from nearby chests.

Build From Nearby Pallets

• Base buildings can be built using ingredients directly from nearby grass and stem pallets within a 40 centimeter range.

MULTIPLE HOTPOUCH BARS

• The HotPouch now supports 3 sets of favorites that you can swap through while running around the yard. Have more items and gear ready to quickly use or swap out.

NAMING TRAIL MARKERS

• Trail Markers can have text added to them. The text will be shown anywhere you can see the marker.

ADJUST DEPTH OF FIELD OPTION

• Players can change the background depth-of-field blur between High, Medium, and Low settings (High is the default).

WALL MOUNTED TROPHIES – MARK FOE ABILITY

• Players can “Mark Foe” on any wall mounted bug trophy to give them a 15-minute damage buff against that creature type.

COLORED LIGHTS

• All lights that you build can now be customized to any color of the rainbow using new Color and Saturation sliders.

NEW CONTENT

NEW BUILDINGS

New Base Buildings

• Mushroom Stairs
• Mushroom Half Stairs
• Grass Half Stairs
• Grass Side Table (acts as storage as well!)

New Vanity Buildings

• 3 Vases
• Koi Scale Chair
• 3 Folding Partitions

Additional Stuffed Bug Trophies

• Antlion
• Ladybird
• Black Ox Beetle
• Scarab
• Termite Worker
• Termite Soldier
• Termite King
• Moth
• Tick
• Black Widow
• Black Widowling
• Black Ant Worker
• Black Ant Soldier
• Fire Ant Worker
• Fire Ant Soldier
• Water Flea
• Spiny Water Flea
• Spiderling
• Gnat
• Infected Ladybug
• Infected Larva
• Ladybird Larva
• Diving Bell Spider
• Water Boatman
• Tadpole
• Roly Poly
• Stink Bug
• Green Shield Bug
• Broodmother
• Mantis

Additional Wall-Mounted Bug Trophies

• Antlion
• Gnat
• Weevil
• Ladybird
• Black Ox Beetle
• Scarab
• Termite Worker
• Termite Soldier
• Termite King
• Moth
• Tick
• Black Widow
• Black Widowling
• Black Ant Worker
• Black Ant Soldier
• Fire Ant Worker
• Fire Ant Soldier
• Water Flea
• Spiny Water Flea
• Spiderling
• Tiger Mosquito
• Infected Ladybug
• Infected Larva
• Ladybird Larva
• Diving Bell Spider
• Water Boatman
• Tadpole
• Roly Poly
• Stink Bug
• Green Shield Bug
• Mantis

New Trap

• Splinter Trap
  • Upgraded spike trap that deals double the damage. Made from Ash Cement, Splinters, and Lint Rope.

NEW POSE

• Added the “Power Up” pose to Armor Dummies and Photo Mode

OTHER QUALITY OF LIFE

• Each individual Storage building can be configured as included or excluded from Nearby Hot Deposit.
• Looking at a creature in PEEP.R mode that has already been PEEP’d will show you their card for quick access.
• Broken items will no longer unequip or drop in the world when destroyed. Equipped items that are broken will not appear on your character and you will not gain any of their effects.
• Buildings now give back 100% of their resources when destroyed or recycled by the player.
• Thrown items markers have been adjusted to show at further distances and to always stay on screen to make thrown items easier to find.
• Added a “Respawn at Nearest Field Station” button on the Death screen.
• When a creature that drops raw meat is killed with a spicy weapon, they will drop cooked meat instead of raw meat.
• When a creature that drops raw meat is killed with a salty weapon, they will drop jerky instead of raw meat.
• When sleeping, if your wakeup time was in the middle of the night, you now will wake up in the morning.
• You can now copy options from the customization window (such as lights) and paste them onto other, similar objects.
• Copying a building using the Pick control will copy its customizations to the newly placed buildings.
• Bows and Crossbows can no longer be thrown. The default throw button now brings up the ammo radial when using a bow or crossbow.

DIFFICULTY ADJUSTMENTS

• Dying now only drops natural resources in the death backpack, in all difficulty modes.
  • You no longer drop any crafted items when you die.
  • Durability damage on death increased from 5% to 10% in Medium difficulty (still 0% in Mild and 10% in Woah)
• When a player dies in the pond depths, their backpack will be teleported to the top of the pond.
• Dying in the pond from drowning will trigger a survival quest about crafting pond diving gear (if you have not already crafted it).
• Pets are now invincible by default in Mild difficulty.
• Adjusted the outside nighttime lighting to make it easier to see at night.

OTHER CHANGES / TUNING

AUDIO

• Audio for combat has been improved (including new block sounds).

COMBAT

• Charged Attacks
  • Damage of all charged attacks increased.
  • New animations for all charged attacks will better communicate when an attack is charging

• Blocking
  • You can now block with bows and crossbows.
  • Damage reduction provided by non-perfect blocks increased from 50% to 75%.
  • Blocking an attack will now consume stamina when blocking with anything instead of only when blocking with a shield.
  • Stamina regen rate is now increased by 25% while blocking instead of being decreased by 25%.

• Stinkbugs can now jump.

MUTATIONS

Weapon Mutations have been reworked from random procs to guaranteed bonuses. Additionally, each one grants a “mastery bonus” for hitting level 3 with that mutation.

• Dagger
  • OLD
    • 5/10/15% chance to apply bleed on hit.
    • Bleed for 100 damage over 10 seconds at all levels
  • NEW
    • 100% chance to apply bleed on every hit (non-stacking, but it reapplies and resets the duration)
    • Bleed for 30/50/75 damage over 5 seconds
    • Mastery Bonus: dagger hits reduce target’s bleed resist by 25%
• Axe
  • OLD
    • 5/8/10% chance to stagger an enemy on hit
  • NEW
    • 100% chance to reduce an enemy’s physical damage resistances (chopping, bashing, slashing, and stabbing) on hit
    • Damage Resist reduction scales up based on level of mutation to 10/15/20%
    • Mastery Bonus: Attacking with an axe applies a buff to the player that removes their non-exhausted stamina regen delay
• Hammer
  • OLD
    • 15/25/30% chance to slow enemy attack speed by 20%
  • NEW
    • 100% chance to slow enemy attack speed by 10/20/30%
    • Mastery Bonus: Hammers apply 50% more stun damage on all of their attacks
• Spear
  • OLD
    • 15/25/30% chance to lower enemy enemy damage resist by 20%
    • Thrown damage with spears increased by 10/20/30%
  • NEW
    • Thrown damage with spears increased by 10/20/30%
    • Attacking with a spear gives you a temporary buff that reflects 50/75/100% damage back to the enemy
    • Mastery Bonus: Charge attacks with spears deal 30% more damage
• Sword
  • OLD
    • 5/10/15% chance to lower stamina consumption for weapon swings by 20%
  • NEW
    • Hitting a creature with a sword lowers their attack damage by 10/20/30%
    • Mastery Bonus: Hitting an enemy with a sword gives you a temporary buff that lowers your exhaustion timer by 90%
• Club
  • OLD
    • 15/20/25% chance to enter Rage in combat
    • Rage increases damage by 20% at all levels
    • Rage prevents perfect block
  • NEW
    • 100% chance to enter Rage when hitting a creature with a club
    • Rage increases club damage by 15/20/25%
    • Rage prevents perfect block
    • Mastery Bonus: Regenerate 1 HP per second while in rage (scales with healing received buffs)
• Staff
  • OLD
    • 5/15/25% chance to proc an extra elemental effect based on the staff type
    • Spicy adds a burn effect for 50 damage over 5 seconds
    • Fresh adds a 30% movement slow for 5 seconds
    • Sour adds 10 additional stun damage
  • NEW
    • Adds the appropriate elemental effect to staff attacks 100% of the time
    • Spicy adds a burn effect for 25/50/75
    • Fresh adds a movement slow of 10/20/30
    • Sour adds 2/4/6 stun damage
    • Mastery Bonus: Attacks with staves apply a buff that reduces stamina cost of further staff attacks by 50%
• Bow
  • OLD
    • 5/10/15% chance to root an enemy for 2 seconds
  • NEW
    • Reduces stamina cost of sprinting after landing a bow attack by 50/75/100% for 5 seconds
    • Mastery Bonus: Elemental arrows apply their special effects
      • Spicy burns for 50 damage over 5 seconds
      • Fresh adds 30% movement slow for 5 seconds
      • Sour adds 10 additional stun damage
• Unarmed
  • OLD
    • 25/50/75% chance to increase unarmed damage dealt by 2% until combat ends. Stacks infinitely.
  • NEW
    • 100% chance to increase unarmed damage dealt by 1/1.5/2% until combat ends. Stacks infinitely.
    • Mastery Bonus: Every unarmed attack has a 75% chance to launch a follow up attack for half damage.
• The summon from the Mantsterious Stranger mutation no longer does friendly fire damage.

UI

• Each player can hide their own nameplate and map marker from the other players, using the visibility toggle on the legend entry in the Map screen.
• Game Mode selection in the game lobby is now in a standalone window with more information about the different modes, instead of just a dropdown.
• The Game Lobby UI has been updated.
• You can access the multiplayer text chat window while you have any other UI window open.
• HUD markers that display cm distance will only show it when directly looked at, to help reduce UI clutter.
• HUD markers will fade out when obscured by closer markers, to help reduce UI clutter.
• If many items of the same type are dropped in the same place, only one HUD marker will be shown for the whole pile.
• The Science Shop now shows you what tech chip each unlock came from (except recommended items, which all go to the “Recommended” group).
• Sign Sets in the Science Shop show you the sign images you will unlock before purchasing them.
• The profanity filter has been tweaked to fix certain false positives.
• Creature trophy buildings for the same class of creature are now grouped as material variants in the building radial.
• Pet inventories can no longer be accessed or used as Nearby Storage unless the pet is nearby.

WORLD

• Labs now contain “Water Coolers” where you can quench your thirst and discuss the most recent televised sports event with your coworkers.
• The secret locked door at the end of Black Ant Hill lab now better indicates how to open it.
• Removed shelves from Pond Lab biometric scanner room to clear up the line of sight to the scanner. Loot on these shelves has been moved to chests in the vicinity.
• Consumable items dropped in the world will despawn after two days.
• Added Data page entries for the Super MIX.Rs and a few other items found in the Upper Yard.
• A new tutorial quest will now trigger if you continue to drown before crafting any diving gear. The tutorial will guide players through making initial diving gear required to explore the pond.

OPTIMIZATION

• Reduced memory usage to fix memory-related crashes.
• Reduced CPU usage across the game.
• Reduced net bandwidth from having lots of dropped backpacks across the yard.
• Adjusted net config settings to prevent some occasional client disconnects when lots of buildings / backpacks are in a yard.

BUILDINGS

• Spike Strips no longer deal friendly fire damage.
• Spike Strips now deal 50 damage per hit instead of 40 damage.
• Fresh Storage recipe is found in the introductory lab before entering the Undershed area instead of in the final lab space after the Undershed area.

ARMOR AND WEAPONS

• Moth armor “Ranged Cut” effect chance to proc increased from 20% to 30%.
• Mantis armor “Cutman” effect damage increased from 15 per second to 20 per second.
• Activating the Dandelion Tuft right before hitting the ground will no longer prevent fall damage. Fall speed must be sufficiently slowed before hitting the ground for no damage to be taken.
• Added a new Tutorial Quest that will walk players through the process of upgrading weapons and armor when they find their first upgrade stone.

ACCESSIBILITY

• The Read To Me narration of the Game Lobby, OS, Resting, and Customization menus has been improved.
• The Read To Me narrator will renarrate the Building Radial when the player changes the building material.

BUG FIXES

• Fixed a crash that could occur when a creature performed a charge attack through clovers or grass.
• Fixed a random crash that could happen while generating navigation data for creatures.

Major Fixes

Crash Fixes

• Ants no longer gather excessive amounts of food in ant hills. They will stop when they feel they have a sufficient amount to feed themselves.
• Creatures should no longer get halfway stuck in the ground.
• BURG.L should no longer randomly go missing.
• If the audio log in the Haze Lab was missing on older saves and was never collected, it will show up now.
• Creatures will properly lose aggro after incapacitating a player instead of immediately retargeting them on revive regardless of where they are.

Other Fixes

• Creatures in the Sandbox no longer get stuck on cocktail umbrellas.
• Fixed some spots in the Mantis arena that the player was not supposed to be able to get to.
• Players can no longer trigger emote animations while attacking.
• Fixed a handful of world terrain visual issues.
• Music changes from entering a new biome will transition more cleanly.
• Various small audio fixes for sounds that weren’t playing or were playing incorrectly.
• Ladybugs will properly aggro players when hit by thrown two-handed weapons.
• Fixed memory leak in the Mantis boss fight.
• The Resource Scanner will no longer hitch when opened with a lot of items unlocked.
• Usernames with leading numbers will no longer become scrambled in certain contexts when playing in Arabic.
• Read To Me will no longer read conversation lines that are already voiced.
• The player can no longer connect ziplines to inappropriately angled target anchors.
• Fixed the Pond Biodome POI sometimes not unlocking.
• Sap Catchers can no longer be built on Fresh Storage.
• The game will no longer slow down when the player rapidly scrolls through building radial pages.
• Wall-mounted buildings can no longer be placed on turrets.
• Wall-mounted buildings can no longer be placed on stuffed flying creatures.
• Pets will no longer trigger inappropriate banter dialogue when player characters see them.
• Zipped haulable items will no longer float away when they contact a character.
• The player will no longer enter first-person perspective while zipping in some rare cases.
• The player will be correctly restored to their desired perspective after freeing themselves from multiple spider webs.
• Black Widow will no longer jump abnormally high.
• Thistle needles will no longer respawn immediately after loading a saved game.
• If a player disconnects while on a ladder, the ladder can now be recycled.
• Ingredients dropped from destroyed stuffed bees and gnats can now be picked up.
• A slight rebalance to the encounters in the Pond Lab has been made. Encounters with Taz.Ts and Arc.Rs will properly increase in difficulty as you progress deeper into the lab.

Phew, now that is quite a lot of treats for everyone this Holiday season! If you managed to make it through all the fantastic changes and additions coming – prepare yourself as it will not be long now until you can dive in!