Progress Update 9/13/2025

A solid week for the development team has passed! First, some progress on performance improvements, including a tweak to the cache system which should hopefully minimize the stuttering issues which would plague some players after they spawn. Additional progress has been made on the ECS switch, with our lead programmer reporting a relatively smooth conversion process; this should hopefully lead to further performance boosts.

Second, some of the first few refinements to the Microbe Stage have been implemented or are in progress. Hydrogen sulfide now causes damage upon contact unless you have sulfur-metabolising parts, adding a unique gameplay effect to a historically neglected gameplay option. Progress is also being made on our GitHub for numerous priority items - one of them including an auto-evo tweak which should made endosymbiosis candidates go extinct much less. A subtle graphical improvement has also been implemented: there is now ambient light in patches, making items in game look more unified with their environment.

Finally, some large discussions have been occurring on the development forums, primarily focused on optimizing various mechanics in the Microbe Stage.

The final update to the Microbe Stage is looking to be rather feature packed. We hope to maintain this momentum throughout the rest of this release cycle, and to deliver you a completed, engaging, and fun Microbe Stage by the end of this year!

Programming

• New DevBuild for our patrons: - Hydrogen sulfide clouds now deal damage to microbes that cannot metabolise them
  • Added a popup asking the player if they want to load a previous autosave if they die too many times in a row
  • Added ambient light reflections to game objects
  • Added tolerance values to the species fossilisation dialogue
  • Fixed disk cache not using background threads to save like it was supposed to. This hopefully fixes the random lag spikes that persisted a while after they started.
  • Fixed the checkbox to only show new tutorials not working correctly after a save was loaded (and all tutorials got enabled even when selected not to)
  • Made editor tabs show themselves as a safety fallback if tutorial is not active but the tabs are still hidden. This condition could be triggered when the tutorial was sequence broken.
  • Updated translations

Graphics

• There is now ambient lighting in the Microbe Stage's patches. This is most noticeable in the surface and hydrothermal vents.

Gameplay

• Thim's vision of Thrive has been posted on the development forums.
• Some discussion on the prospect of additional achievements.
• A simple review analysis of Thrive has been published on the forums.
• Further discussion on polishing the Microbe Stage.
• Further discussions on difficulty.
• More refined concepts on potential mechanics for the Multicellular Stage.
• Continued discussion on representing flora in the macroscopic world generator.

Sound

• Nothing substantial.

Theory

• Though unrelated directly to Thrive's development, a significant discovery has been made regarding possible evidence of ancient life on Mars! A more accessible source can be found in this link.

Outreach

• Nothing substantial.

Other

• Please welcome our newest game designer, Rathalos!