? Join Shyla, Obsidian's Social Media Manager, as she takes you on a journey into an uncharted area of the backyard: the Upper Yard. Explore new areas that have opened up, take a peep(.r) at some new features and changes, and get ready to meet your ten new neighbors, plus a royal guest!

For more information on Grounded, check out our channels:

New Areas to Explore!

The BBQ Spill

Thought the sandbox was sizzling hot? Just wait until you find yourself near the blistering coals of the spilled barbecue! But there are rewards to be found alongside the risks, so don your favorite Fresh gear and take a look!

The Termite Dungeon

Next to the shed is a pile of logs that also serves as a stronghold for a hive of termites. These new neighbors are especially nasty to trespassers, so beware when exploring their lair for untold loot!

And more places to explore around the shed!

New Crafting Content and Building Updates

Alongside these new areas, check out some new weapons, armor, and building options we've added!

...And a hot secret for you to uncover.

Plus, new flooring material from the burr(ly) weeds, and customization await any builders looking to add some flair and mood lighting to their abodes.

Peep(.R) our New Features!

The Peep.R

We heard you wanted zoom in and enhance, but we thought, "Why do we need a tool for this when we can just use our hands?" And thus, the Peep.R was born. Take a look from far away, mark points of interest for yourself and your allies, and don't worry about taking up another inventory space!

Resource Survey Stations

If you've ever found yourself unable to find a pebblet the one time you actually need one, just hop on over to your nearest field station and get your map to show you where you can find the nearest one! Keep in mind it will only show you items you have analyzed in areas you've already explored, though!

Custom Game Options and more!

Quality of Life Improvements

The voices of the community did not fall on deaf ears, and with this update, players will be able to craft multiple items and quickly store items they've found so you can get right back out there!

TEN New “Friends” (and one royal surprise)!

Not only has this update introduced the termites that have made their home in the yard, we also have TEN new friends you might encounter in the yard! Well, ten and an unexpected royal guest.

Check out some of your new backyard pals below, including the shiny scarab, the ladybird and its larva, and the incredibly solid black ox beetle. Explore the new areas (and a few old) to uncover more!

And More!

Check out the full list of changes in our patch notes below:

Patch Notes for Update 0.12.0

New Explorable Environments

BBQ Spill
Get ready for this sizzling hot area as you prepare to journey through the ashy wastelands of the BBQ Spill.
Shed Surroundings
Filled with plenty of items to explore and new creatures to encounter, we know you'll find plenty to do in this exciting new area.
Wood Pile
Traverse into the depths of woodpile, but beware, because as you lumber deeper down the halls you will quickly realize you are not alone.

New Bugs

11 New Additional Bugs

Termite
Soldier Termite
Ladybird Larva
Ladybird
Black Ox Beetle
Roly Poly (not sickly)
Green Shield Bug
Dust Mite
Scarab
Infected Wolf Spider
SECRET ROYALTY

New Crafting Content

Termite Axe (Tier 3)
Black Ox Hammer (Tier 3)
Termite Chest Armor
Splinter Arrows (Tier 3)
New (secret) Weapon
New set of base floors (Burr Weed)
Two new meals

New Features

Resource Survey Stations

Field Stations now have survey stations that can be operated to search for resources in the yard. After flipping the switch in the Hedge Lab, the surveyor system across the yard will become powered.

Surveyors are found at Field Stations.
Analyze resources to be able to survey for them.
Each survey station activated adds to the survey area across the yard.
Place a waypoint on the map where there's a high concentration of a specific resource you want to mark.
You can survey for any analyzed material, including insect parts!

Custom Game Options

Custom Game Options are a new way to fully customize your yard experience. If you select the custom game option from the lobby screen, you can adjust settings and make the yard your own:

Difficulty
All Recipes Unlocked and Free
Bugs Spawn
Bugs Ignore Players
Building Integrity
Quests
Player Damage
Friendly Fire
Pet Invincibility
Hunger/Thirst Drain
Stamina Drain
Equipment Durability
Food Spoiling
Menus Pause Game
Backpack Items on Death

Peep.R Mode

Peep Resonance is a SCA.B Executable feature turning your tiny hands into light wave amplifying chambers that bring the distance into focus. Peep off into the far reaches of the yard and drop player waypoint markers. These markers show up on your map and other players' screens for better team peeping and navigation around the yard!

Place a waypoint by looking at a spot in the yard and pressing a button.
Place a waypoint by opening the map and selecting a location to drop a waypoint.

Building Customization

There's a new menu to a selection of buildings which allows you to customize the look or behavior of the building.

Bounce Webs can be adjusted for angle and power.
Firefly Hanging Lantern, Sap Sconce, and Mold Sconce can be turned on and off, and adjusted for strength and color.
Armor Dummies can be posed with any of the poses usable in Photo Mode.

Improved Data Page

The Data tab in your SCA.B menu has been improved to better organize and show new information. Items and information will be categorized by where it came from or what it pertains to. You will also have entries and descriptions of all notably locations discovered in the game as well as know how many you are missing from each area.

Status Effect Display

Status Effects are now displayed with tooltips on the Backpack and Status screens. Active Status Effects will also be displayed on the HUD below the SCA.B display.

Additional Features

New Languages
- Turkish, Thai, Arabic, and Japanese.
Craft Many
- "Craft Many" button in the Crafting menu will allow you to craft 5 of something at a time.
Copy Placed Building
- You can quickly select a building blueprint to start placing down by walking up to an already placed building and hitting the "Copy" interact action. This way, you can quickly copy building blueprints without always needing to open up the building menus.
Storage Hot Deposit
- You can now "Hot Deposit" like items on storage buildings by holding Interact on them. "Hot Deposit" will automatically deposit any items in your inventory that match any items already in the storage container.
Achievements
- Added 8 New Achievements

Changes / Tuning

Systems

If players die with a bow equipped, the equipped ammo type will carry over when respawning.
You can now rest at any time of the day. You will rest for 8 hours and will not be able to rest again until you have been awake long enough to rest again.

Controls

Added "Level Camera on Sprint" option.
Many UI controls that were not previously rebindable in the options menu now are.

Mutations

Blademaster no longer repairs the durability of swords.
- Now reduces the stamina cost of the next several attacks when procced.
Javelineer no longer slows enemies.
- Now reduces enemy Damage Resist when procced.

Accessibility

Added "Wide Interaction" option, which allows the player to interact with objects without looking directly at them.
Several interfaces have had narration support added or improved.
Added "Read To Me Speed" option.
Various notifications are now narrated when shown.
Important narration such as quest notifications will not be interrupted by lower-priority narration.

Combat

Weapons now deal progressively more damage with each hit in a combo sequence.
- The first attack of a weapon combo does the least amount of damage
- Combo finishers deal the most amount of damage
- Overall DPS of a full combo is the same
- Specifically, instead of a 3-hit combo doing 100 → 100 → 100, now it'll deal 50 → 100 → 150
Hammers now have a 3-hit combo to utilize the above combo system changes.
All weapon types have had a damage curve pass to make sure they're in-line with each other.
Shields no longer slow down movement when blocking.
Reduced the movement penalty for moving backwards.
Crow arrows now apply a bleed DoT.
Fall damage no longer affects durability in any way.1

Building Health / Repair Tool

The attack input can be held to constantly trigger the repair action repeatedly while holding the repair tool.
The repair world icons are now replaced with a red outline around the buildings that need repair.
Building structure health values have been increased across the game.

Interface

You can assign similar tools that are at different upgrade levels / types to different slots on the Hot Pouch. For example, one slot can be a Spicy Pebble Axe while another slot is a Fresh Pebble Axe. Tools of the same upgrade level / type will be grouped to the same slot if you have more than one.
Players can now place a temporary waypoint on the Map UI.
Dropped item/arrow icons become less visible if the player is in combat to remove HUD clutter while fighting bugs.
Selected items in the storage UI will display what level upgrade they have if any.
Damage type icons shown when looking at harvestable objects now only show when the object is in range.
The Oven, Spinning Wheel, and Grinder show an icon over them when there are finished items ready to collect.
The Oven, Spinning Wheel, and Grinder have a quick "Take All" action you can do by holding Interact without needing to open the UI.

Weapon Upgrades

Weapons can now be upgraded to +9.
- +8 and +9 require a new upgrade material.
Damage and durability increase per level up has been reduced across the board.
Upgraded weapons will now require additional resources to repair.
Globs now cost 20% less shards to craft (1 less for candy, 2 less for quartzite and salt).

Doors

Base doors now properly save and load which direction the door was open.
Curved doors now only open in the outward direction.

Building General

Updated Smoothie Mixer art.
Triangular walls can no longer be walked on.

Building Placement

Buildings of the same shape are now grouped in the building radial. The building material can be changed with the "Next Building Material" control (default F key / Y button)
Structural buildings are no longer allowed to overlap unbuildable materials (plastic, glass, metal).
Large foliage such as grass and rocks will now block placement of certain non-structural buildings.

The Spinning Wheel and Grinder

The Spinning Wheel and Grinder UI's have been updated to work similar to the Oven UI to support more features:
- Pulling items from Nearby Storage works now.
- You will see a list of all recipes you can do at these buildings even without having said items to process.
- You can grind any Grass Planks or Weed Logs you are hauling into Plant Fiber.
- NOTE: To backwards support this with saves prior to 0.12, any items that are finished and not collected or currently being processed in the Spinning Wheel or Grinder will be lost the when loading a save prior to 0.12 for the first time.

Optimization

Improved CPU performance for hosts of multiplayer games. Improves framerate for host and experience for connected clients.

World/Resources

Grass blades drop planks with only a 20% drop rate when destroyed by explosives.
Grass blades break immediately when destroyed by explosives.

Creatures

Sickly Roly Polys no longer drop sickly parts. (Recipes have been adjusted to no require these)

Items

Using the Dandelion Tuft no longer requires stamina.
Crusty Roly Poly armor is no longer craftable.
- A complete crusty set can be found hidden around the yard instead.
Antlion armor is now considered Medium armor.
+25-50% durability for all weapons to compensate for higher repair costs.

Bug Fixes

Major Fixes

Creatures will stop clumping into certain areas when players are not around.
Arrows shot from the player should no longer occasionally come out delayed.
Player voices while wearing the Gas Mask will no longer cause audio corruption.

Crash Fixes

Fixed a crash related to flying creatures flying around.
Fixed a crash related to grid buildings.
Fixed a crash related to creature audio loading.

Game

The crafting interface can no longer become unresponsive to keys after pressing enter in the filter box.
The "See BURG.L about Milk Molars" quest properly triggers for the host in MP.

World

Pond breakers will now show a red indicator when powered but not yet reset.
Some assets that could not have buildings placed on them now can.
Building validity checks for very flat or narrow buildings are now more consistent.
You will no longer hear sizzle audio for players far from you who are taking Sizzle damage.

Items/Equipment/Resources

Roof Squared Corner will no longer change into Roof Corner after placing one.
Drying Berry Chunks on the Jerky Rack now credits "Artificer: Berry Leather" quests.
When slime molds are harvested, clients will see the correct number of remaining stalks in the cluster.
Two-handed weapons can no longer be auto-equipped on pickup when only holding a shield in your off-hand.
Aphids on the Roasting Spit are properly positioned on the spit.
Weapon Upgrades can be purchased for free in Creative mode or if "All Recipes unlocked and free" is checked in a custom game mode.
Smoothies can be purchased for free in Creative mode or if "All Recipes unlocked and free" is checked in a custom game mode.
Beefy smoothies can be crafted in Creative mode.

Pets

Clients will now see the pet Inventory prompt on their pet after rejoining a game in progress.
Pet Memorials will no longer forget the pet's name after being demolished.

UI

Fixed ultra-widescreen issues in a handful of UIs.

Bug Fixes - Steam Platform:

Fixed a crash on boot that could happen for some users.

Bug Fixes - Windows Store / Windows Gamepass Platform:

The 'Export Save' option in the save/load menu now shows the correct hotkey

Ominent Practical Technologies

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