Hello again everyone! June has passed quickly for us here, but so has our progress over the course of this month. We can’t wait to tell you about what we’ve been up to. Let's get straight into it.

Kentrosaurus TLC

With the Struthiomimus TLC released, we have next turned our attention to Kentrosaurus, the next dinosaur on our list for a TLC update. We've started on its first art updates already, and Kentrosaurus now has updated textures and proportions, with a handful of refreshed skins to really make it pop.

Like previous TLCs, this update will also bring a number of new abilities to Kentrosaurus, further defining its iconic playstyle while showing off a whole new side to this spined bleeder. Kentrosaurus will also benefit from the new directional attack mechanics we have recently completed, and many of its staple abilities such as its Tail Attack and Tail Swing will now be fully directional.

Aggressive Critters

While dinosaurs are the main focus of Path of Titans, we also know it's important to feel as though your dinosaur is part of an immersive and interactive ecosystem within the game. With this in mind, we have been hard at work revisiting our critter system and improving it in many ways.

There are two methods we are working on at this time: Territorial Burrows and Dynamically Spawning Critters.

Territorial Burrows

These burrows are similar to the ones currently found on Gondwa and Panjura. However, their inhabitants are territorial and if they detect a small creature coming too close to their burrow they will automatically dig up to the surface to chase them away. Be careful on your next trip through the forest, in case you accidentally stumble across an irritated Platyhystrix protecting its home!

Dynamically Spawning Critters

This is a feature we are very excited about. With a dynamically spawning critter system, critters will now appear across the map and wander around, without the need to dig them out of their burrows. This will also be combined with aggressive critters, meaning players may be minding their own business and suddenly come across a very angry critter that will bite and attack them. Of course, these critters will flee from the larger dinosaurs, but small dinosaurs or hatchlings will definitely be on their menu. This progress is especially exciting for us on the dev team, as this marks an important milestone for not only AI critters, but future dinosaur AI as well.

Dynamosuchus

Along with dynamically spawning aggressive critter AI, we are also introducing a brand new critter, the Dynamosuchus! This pseudosuchian was first described in 2020, and was found to have lived in Argentina during the mid-Triassic. Our design for this critter includes a row of scutes down its back, a mouth full of gnarly teeth, and brightly coloured scales. This land-croc is one of the larger critters in the game, and will be a dangerous foe to many of the smaller creatures or young dinosaurs on the Path of Titans roster.

Wadiasaurus

While Dynamosuchus is nearing completion, we are still interested in continuing to add more critter variety to Path of Titans. The next critter we are working on is the Wadiasaurus, a large dycnodont discovered in India that lived during the early-Triassic. This stocky creature is still early in development, but we do have some concept art to share with you below.

We hope you enjoyed this early look into some of our upcoming critters, and we look forward to bringing you even more variety in the future!

Optimizations

We have been making some additional improvements to game optimization this month as well. Alongside the optimisations to help with large groups of players that we covered in last month’s blog, we have also made further improvements to the dinosaur ragdoll and physics. With these changes, the game should no longer slow down when there are a lot of dead bodies on-screen, and will also run more smoothly when players interact with dinosaurs that have floppy tail physics, such as Megalania or Sarcosuchus.

As we wrap up another month of development, we want to thank you for your ongoing support and feedback as we work on the game! We also wanted to give you a heads up that the Extinction Skin Pack will be leaving the in-game store soon, so be sure to check it out if you are interested. Thanks for watching, and we'll see you next time!