We are excited to share a comprehensive list of the major changes we've made to BitCraft Online since Alpha 3. Before diving into the details, we want to briefly reflect on the goals that guided our development focus during this cycle.

While our wishlist for BitCraft is nearly endless, we concentrated on the most critical areas based on player feedback.

Our Main Goals were:

• Address Core Systemic Issues: Implement or refine systems to resolve foundational problems surfaced during Alpha 3.
• Improve Player Experience: Eliminate the most frustrating "quit moments" by smoothing out pain points and usability hurdles.
• Enhance Content and Customization: Expand what players can do, build, and personalize to deepen engagement and extend playtime.

This is the longest we’ve gone between tests since the end of 2021 and we are really excited by what the team has accomplished in such a short time. We’ve organized the list of changes into three distinct categories:

1. Key New Features
2. Content and Gameplay Additions
3. Changes and Bugfixes

While this post contains a full list of all changes made, we will follow up with a more detailed write up on each Key New Feature in the coming days. If you want to be involved in choosing the order of the reveal for these Features, please go over to our Discord to vote! You can also stay up to date on the latest announcements for the game, including being the first to know about when our playtests.

Key New Features - Get Hyped!

World Regions System - BitCraft now supports multiple world regions (spatially partitioned servers). This unlocks near-infinite scaling of player count and world size.

Combat System Update - Core combat stats have been reworked to support progression, randomness, and better enemy scaling with new ratings for Accuracy, Evasion, Strength, and Armor.

Overhauled World Map - The map UI has been redesigned to support multiple regions and global empire tracking. With improved clarity and aesthetics you can now see more information about the whole world while still giving you a reason to explore.

Fast Travel System Restrictions - Players must now discover Waystones before use and spend Travel Energy, a new stamina-like system that balances long-distance movement to maintain convenience without disrupting the economy.

Town Marketplace Feature - A new town building that allows all players to buy, sell, and post trade orders in a centralized, easy-to-use system.

Skill Overhaul + Traveler Tasks - Non-profession skills now have dedicated travelers with personal tasks that reward XP and Hex Coins, supporting a more diverse economy and playstyle.

Pets - We are stoked that you all hit the 100k Wishlist reward for Pets. Now cosmetic pets will follow your character and come in many visual variants with different rarities to collect.

Overhauled Targeting System - Targeting now works on nearly all entities, making interactions with resources, buildings, NPCs, and players easier, cleaner, and faster.

Item Recovery System - Protects your items stored in public buildings from being lost if those buildings are removed or destroyed. Items can be reclaimed at recovery locations.

Owned Item Piles & Cargo System - Items dropped on the ground now retain ownership and are unified under one UI with shared despawn timers for clarity and fairness.

Rarity Upgrade System - Crafted tools, armor and weapons can now gain rarity levels, allowing high-end players to chase mythic items while fueling the economy with mid-tier gear.

Updated onboarding - Introducing new systems like Combat, Marketplace and each Traveler and their associated skill

Empire Flag System - Empires can now design their own emblem, which appears on buildings and character capes. This creates strong visual identity and cohesion across scales.

World Resource Visual Upgrade - Resources across all 10 tiers have received visual updates, including a color-coded tier system that improves clarity and world immersion.

Completely Redesigned Chat System - A new chat UI supports multiple tabs and new channels like settlement and empire chat, with plans for DMs in the future.

Big Performance improvements - Both client and server (Spacetime DB) have received

Content and Gameplay Additions

Added up to Final Tier 10 - 10 Tiers of core profession content including new resources, items and crafting stations for T7-10

Added 2 New Biomes - Explore the dense Jungle and mysterious Tarwoods to find new resources or build your settlement

Added 2 New Travelers: Ramparte & Alesi

Added New Monsters (and variants) spread across the many biomes.

Added New Huntable Animals - building up the variety of wildlife in the world.

Fully Customizable Key Bindings - All game controls can now be remapped to fit your preferred setup, improving accessibility and comfort.

Added Cape Cosmetic Slots - Players can now equip cosmetic capes (starting with empire flags), with more collectible capes to come.

Added New Deployables - unlock and Collect new deployables, including new advanced mounts and boats

Added Buildable Banks - Make it even easier for players to move into your town and help bolster your economy by giving them a place to store their items easily.

Added a new “Wonder” resource to the world - Acts as a landmark and a source of rare useful items.

Changes, Improvements and Bugfixes

• You can now hide individual cosmetic items like clothing or gear, giving more freedom to define your character’s look.
• You can now bind a key to instantly hop on or off the nearest deployable vehicle.
• Context menus have been refined and reordered to be more intuitive for all major entity types.
• More control over performance with new toggles for entity rendering and terrain distance.
• Terraforming & Paving now give Construction XP.
• Mounting, crafting, and banking animations have all been updated for better sync and flow.
• Fixed UI elements appearing in the wrong place.
• Fixed items from item lists not stacking correctly in your inventory.
• Fixed left-click not transferring items into the town bank (only worked with drag).
• Fixed jittery player movement when rapidly clicking on buildings.
• Fixed the chat UI animating too slowly.
• Fixed issues with gathering while mounted in a cart.
• Fixed a crash that could occur when establishing a house.
• Fixed missing cargo slots in vehicles.
• Fixed flickering movement when sailing.
• Fixed deployable blueprints being offset when placed in water.
• Fixed leather crafting animation not stopping after crafting ended.
• Fixed teleport VFX not disappearing correctly.
• Fixed inconsistent behavior when collecting coins from loot chests.
• Fixed tools not appearing in hand when starting crafting.
• Fixed deer mounts not animating the player properly.
• Fixed damage text not showing when gathering or crafting.
• Fixed XP notifications replaying after opening and closing the map.
• Fixed visual bug when relogging in a vehicle.
• Fixed skiff controls causing errors when exiting or re-entering.
• Fixed rubberbanding when interacting with a building while pulling a cart.
• Fixed fast travel stutters and errors under certain conditions.
• Fixed tutorial map icon not appearing when referenced in text.
• Fixed bug causing tools to disappear when clicking a resource while gathering.
• Fixed vault and inventory UIs not opening properly after logging in.
• Fixed crafting project slots not updating correctly when resumed.
• Fixed claim borders not updating when placing new claim tiles.
• Fixed skiff animation error causing the player to go invisible.
• Fixed character orientation not resetting properly after dismounting.
• Fixed login screen showing internal error messages.
• Fixed player walking animation playing after dismounting while sprinting.
• Fixed move and interact controls not working in some situations.
• Fixed animation sync issues between player and mount.
• Fixed bug where items dropped from crafting were instantly collectible by others.
• Fixed some buttons in the UI not displaying their text correctly.
• Fixed context menu options appearing in the wrong order.
• Fixed empire page displaying incorrect counts for territory and settlements.
• Fixed bug with placing cargo piles on the wrong tile.
• Fixed blue visual artifact when placing lights at night.
• Fixed traveler interactions missing 'Talk' option unless you were standing nearby.
• Fixed building cargo actions showing incorrect prompts.
• Fixed bank storage UI not showing the 'Store All' button for some items.
• Fixed knowledge scrolls not auto-collecting when crafting relevant items.
• Fixed out-of-stamina error message triggering incorrectly while sprinting.
• Fixed item conversion sliders being limited to one stack.
• Fixed errors related to traveler head tracking.
• Fixed delay when interacting with bank and storage buildings.
• Fixed dropped items from deployables showing empty piles.
• Fixed some empires not being able to display their flags correctly.
• Fixed error caused by holding shift when interacting with terrain.
• Fixed gathering sound effects looping endlessly during tutorial.
• Fixed inconsistencies in coin extraction messages during gathering.
• Fixed "Add All to Project Site" not pulling coins from your wallet correctly.
• Fixed empire watchtower deconstruction sometimes not clearing territory correctly.
• Fixed housing placement occasionally causing a crash.
• Fixed "too far" errors when trying to re-enter skiffs.
• Fixed crafting recipe progression getting stuck at 2 out of total.
• Fixed player nameplate flickering when taking damage on the map.
• Fixed error when using teleport ability under certain conditions.
• Fixed a bug with shift+click ignoring terrain collision.
• Fixed tutorial "No" button showing without text in some cases.
• Fixed camera rotation keybinds not working correctly.
• Fixed "Escape" key canceling movement unintentionally.
• Fixed multiple UI elements layering over the XP tracker.
• Fixed broken movement logic when trying to drive carts with the mouse held down.
• Fixed placeholder text showing on some trader UI fields.
• Fixed invalid item generation from empty deployables.
• Fixed move targeting getting blocked by specific terrain configurations.
• Fixed deployable movement issues for observing players.
• Fixed bank deposit not working in certain storage buildings.
• Fixed some empire-related input fields resetting when typed into.
• Fixed XP tracker displaying in front of other UI elements.
• Fixed error when opening the trade finder under specific conditions.
• Fixed certain deployable visuals not aligning with terrain properly.
• Fixed loading screen not appearing correctly after death.
• Fixed bug preventing item collection from deployables when inventory was full.
• Fixed crafting projects not moving into inactive slots properly.
• Fixed resuming crafting sometimes duplicating project listings.
• Fixed trade context options displaying incorrectly for traveler offers.
• Fixed render distance changes not applying until pressing Confirm.
• Fixed occasional issues with the empire flag editor not saving properly.
• Fixed cargo expansion slots not appearing in some situations.
• Fixed marketplace and inventory UIs not opening correctly on first login.
• Fixed shift key bypassing resource colliders when moving.
• Fixed empire-related UI fields reverting changes after input.