Sail Forth (Switch): all the updates (latest: Ver. 1.6 – Before the Wind)

On this page, you will find all there is to know about the various updates for Sail Forth on Nintendo Switch.

Click here for more Software updates!

Sail Forth – Ver. 1.6 (Before the Wind)

• Release date: November 6th/7th 2024
• Patch notes:

World Map

• The world map has been changed and improved significantly. The old Area Map and World Map items on the Radial Menu have been combined into a single Map which can be zoomed in and out of. You can fast travel when zoomed out in the map, and view nearby islands or points of interest when zoomed in. Map markers can now be viewed and placed regardless of the zoom level.
• The map now also displays a global wind field representing the wind direction at that location. I read feedback that some players experienced the wind suddenly changing directions unexpectedly as they traveled, which I discovered the source of and fixed. The wind is now a smooth field across the entire world map which shifts slowly over time and with weather conditions, and there should be no sharp changes in direction. This should make planning a sailing route to a destination a lot easier!
• With the new map features and further improvements to the open world which I’ll get into below, it also made sense to prevent fast travel to locations until they have been visited at least once. Locations that have not been explored yet are now labeled on the map, and the fog of war visuals have been improved to display exactly where you’ve explored anywhere in the Deepblue.

Spyglass

• The spyglass is a brand new key item which is given to the player during the opening tutorial. Saves that have already completed the opening will simply have the spyglass added to their inventory.
• It occupies a conveniently freed up spot on the Radial Menu and can be used to spot distant locations and ships. Spotted locations are marked on the map as an Unrevealed Location. This is a big new way to explore and find locations around you while sailing in the ocean.
• Spotting distant ships is a handy way to identify hostile ships before they engage you, so you can decide whether to try to avoid them or attack. Some ships now have special names, which will be displayed if they have one, which brings us to the next feature!

Persistent Entities

• All of the generated enemy and friendly ships are now persistent entities in the world which have their own agendas. Both enemy and friendly ships will sail between locations and can be encountered while out in the Deepblue. This should greatly increase the amount of stuff going on when sailing between locations, as previously these ships could only be encountered within a location.
• The old merchant fleets which sometimes spawned at Shipshape Shop locations have been updated with this system, and now travel between all the different shops. Following them is handy way to discover new areas!
• Friendly ships also now better track player reputation, which means that pirating merchant fleets should be a bit more of a dangerous career.
• There is also a new entity type, which is a Skull fleet. These are difficult enemies that should be avoided unless you are well armed.

New Ships

• I’ve also added two new ships to the game. The first is the Swift, a lighter Brigantine rig which is fast but still decently armed. It’s a great pick for exploring dangerous areas!
• The next is the Proa, a Polynesian-influenced outrigger which is quite nimble and also very lightly armed. Great for quick travel but skilled sailors can also completely out maneuver opponents.

Maelstrom

• Finally, the Maelstrom DLC has been massively expanded upon, increasing the size of its world map and added 4 new bosses to encounter within it.
• The world under the Maelstroms, the Underside, is now its own full map which connects to the above world at each of the Maelstrom locations. These can be sailed between just like in the above world.
• There are also 4 new bosses to defeat within the Underside, which are unlocked as the main story is progressed. These bosses drop new powerful upgrades for your fleet and can be fought multiple times.
• The Arcane Shop has two new weapons available, the Light Bringer and the Sun Lance. The Sun Lance is the first beam weapon that can be equipped to ships, and is a lot of fun to use.

Bug Fixes

• There are a bunch of bug fixes and smaller improvements as well, too many to enumerate. Some key things to mention though are a totally rewritten final boss based on player feedback, and some fixes to a few fish which were not spawning under the conditions they were intended to.

Sail Forth – Ver. 1.5.1

• Release date: January 16th 2024 (North America, Europe, Japan)
• Patch notes:

Cosmetic System

• Add cosmetic slots to all boats
• Boat helms are now cosmetic items
• Boat flags are now cosmetic items
• Add cosmetic items to Shipshape Shop and loot tables

World Map

• Improve the UX of the combined local and world map
• Can zoom into local map or out to world map
• Can pan freely in local map without restrictions
• Better rendering in local map of nearby locations
• Can fast travel back to the location you’re currently in

New Encounter

• Skull Clan Summoning Circle: For those seeking additional challenge. Look for a big skull atop a rock surrounded by torches!

New Items

• Add several new types of flags to equip in boat cosmetic slots
• Add several boat helms to equip in boat cosmetic slots
• Add many other cosmetic items such as lanterns and figureheads

New Timepiece Key Item

• Allows fast forwarding to sunset or sunrise and seeing the current time
• Talk to the Lightkeepers after doing some of their quests

Misc Features/Fixes

• Toot and Goose can now be retrieved in the end-game from their camping spot
• Perf improvements to inventory screen with many items
• Ship outfit screen has better camera movement for viewing current slot
• Fix boat repairs being getting stuck if fast travel is triggered mid repair
• Items acquired from Shell Shop show proper prices at other shops
• The Manage Docked Boats screen now shows stats of the selected boat
• Fix boats sometimes showing up in the wrong section of the sell boats screen
• Fix case where Marga might not spawn after getting the Harpoon until player fast traveled
• Fire arbalest variants are now linked to the correct visuals
• Fix a case where dialog would fail to progress when rescuing some Moontiders from the Tekk Clan
• Fix a case where capturing a Tekk Clan ship could result in some broken crew members on your ship which would then cause all sorts of other issues like getting stuck on the fishing screen
• Fix another case where an already sinking sailor could be picked up and then get into a broken state
• Increased hit box for Tekk Clan Tower panels
• Weather properly returns to normal after destroying Tekk Clan Towers
• Fix case where boats could get stuck repairing when fast traveling mid repair
• Fix case where boat physics could get broken if the oar shove off sequence was interrupted
• Fix potential soft lock in Lightkeeper Recruitment arc where players could end up unable to deliver the Spectral Oil to Bello
• Fix missing string when asking Lightkeepers for directions
• Fix missing strings for Tekk Speedboat name and description
• Fix a rare case where turning in an old photo to Snapps could result in a soft lock
• Fix some cases where teleporting the player boat to safety could mistakenly put the boat inside an island

Sail Forth – Ver. 1.4.4 (Open Seas Update)

• Release date: ???
• Patch notes:

Open World Exploration:

• Loading screens between areas are removed
• Can sail seamlessly between areas
• Added ‘Deepblue’ ocean biome between areas with its own soundtrack
• Island generation has been reworked a bit to give locations a bit more personality

World Map Rework:

• World Map generation has been redesigned with an open world in mind
• Can now freely explore the biomes in any order after Sandy Shores
• Difficulty is now scaled based on your overall progression in the game, rather than by which location you are in
• Depending on where you explore, you may still encounter some high-challenge enemies
• Player exact position is now saved instead of just current location

Content Updates:

• New boat: Kestrel, a mid sized schooner balancing armament and maneuverability
• Clams: New digging/surfacing behavior to make finding them more interesting
• Clams: New types of pearls are dropped by clams
• Clams: Moontide Shop uses Moon Pearls instead of normal pearls
• Ship Shape Shop: Shops now have intermittent sales depending on the calendar day, look for flashing lights!
• Ship Shape Shop: Can now sell boats that are stored in your dock without undocking them first

UI Updates:

• New combined Area Map + World Map with better visuals for nearby locations
• New design for wind indicator in the steering/compass display
• World Map shows real player position instead of anchoring to nearest location
• Label ‘key’ items in inventory

Misc:

• Crates and other small targets now always take 1 shot
• Perf improvements when many boats are visible
• Time passes during eclipse so you aren’t stuck on the same day forever
• Improved sinking physics for destroyed boats
• Improved sorting of crew inventory and cargo

Bug Fixes:

• Photo hunt encounter now properly progresses through the various ‘giant’ photo subjects, fixing cases where players were unable to complete their photo collection
• Boat AI now uses oars properly when necessary
• Fix case where player escorts might stop following player for no reason
• Fix cases where the wrong fleet boat could be selected after exiting the outfit or crew manage screen
• Fix many cases where NPCs could be covered by trees or rocks
• Adjust ice target course to be less insanely difficult
• Many fixes throughout the game to quest logic and cutscenes

Sail Forth – Ver. 1.3.0 (The Fleet Update)

• Release date: ???
• Patch notes:

Fleet Management – The Dock

The goal here is to enable more playstyles and allow you to accumulate new ships in a satisfying way. Don’t want to deal with a fleet? Store all extra boats in your dock and use them like extra lives. Got a neat boat for a specialized purpose? Bring it out of the dock when you want to use it.

• Boats can be stored at a dock, accessible from the fleet management menu whenever not in combat
• Unlimited boats can be stored at the dock along with their crew and loadout
• If your entire fleet sinks but you have docked boats, you can undock them to continue the fight
• Previously in places where you could acquire a boat (encounters, boarding), you might have had to scrap it due to no remaining room in the fleet, now it can be stored at the dock directly

Fleet Management – Orders and AI

Some of the most common feedback about the game so far has been that the fleet AI doesn’t do a great job of avoiding collisions. I spent a bunch of time overhauling the way the AI sees the world around it and expanding your ability to control them.

• Greatly improved navigation AI: Your fleet (and other AI boats) should be much more adept at avoiding collisions
• The ‘set order’ functionality of previous demos has been restored and updated
• Fleet boats can be told to Escort, Hold Position, or Hold Fire
• Can also issue one of these commands to the entire fleet at once
• Your fleet will attempt to escape combat and return to your flagship if you are not close by

Progression Balancing

Another common bit of feedback from the community was that the progression felt a bit strange. Having large ships available from the first shop you encounter meant that some players would grind it out immediately and not feel any need to upgrade for the rest of the game. With this in mind, the set of available ships has been modified to spread out the progression more sensibly throughout the game’s chapters. Special thanks to Neizod from the community for a great writeup on the Steam forum about this problem!

• Based on feedback many of the boats in the game have had their balance tweaked, in addition to a revised unlock progression
• Each new Shipshape Shop encountered will unlock a new boat of that chapter’s tier
• Larger ships are now unlocked later in the game and have had their prices updated to reflect this
• Removed boat selection from tutorial sequence to curate a more consistent intro experience

Content Updates

This is not a content-focused update but I did find some time to add a bit of stuff. The new Tekk Speedboat should make the Tekk Clan fleets a bit more interesting to fight, and the Croaker bounties have been overhauled to present a bigger challenge. Many people have asked for more ability to customize their crew-members, and this update brings a small first step towards this, giving you the ability to set their colors separately from the boat/sail colors.

• The way enemies are placed in the world has been overhauled, which will allow for new types of content in the future
• For now the main difference is that hostile locations such as forts have a chance to spawn new enemies each day
• Updated Croaker Bounty encounters which now scale in size and difficulty
• Introducing the Tekk Clan Speedboat: a fast and lightly armed engine-powered vessel
• Tekk Subs are now implemented as proper ‘boats’ in game terms, giving them better physics and AI
• Tekk Destroyer weapon slots increased to 4
• Updated visuals for Lightkeeper Flagship: Based on feedback the design of the ship has been revised with a more realistic and better looking sail rig
• Crew color customization: Your crew’s color scheme is now chosen separately from the sail colors

Other fixes and changes

• Updated tutorial system: The old tutorial system felt a bit heavy handed as it would frequently pause the game and force you to do something that you potentially already know how to do
• Tutorials now use a ‘checklist’ system that never pauses the game, and are much less intrusive
• New tutorial added for camera zoom controls
• ‘Feedback’ option now available from the pause menu to report bugs directly from the game
• Improved capsizing logic: If your boat capsizes, your crew is temporarily thrown in the water and must spend some crucial time flipping the boat right side up again, which can be devastating in a battle. Watch those sails!
• Many smaller bug fixes and tweaks, too many to enumerate here

• Additional notes: none.
• Source: Festive Vector (Steam)

How to download updates for Sail Forth for the Nintendo Switch?

To download the updates for Sail Forth, you have three options:

• let the console do its thing if you have automatic downloads activated, and didn’t completely turn it off

If not…

• try to launch the game from the Home Menu while being connected to the internet. You should get a prompt when doing so: simply follow the instructions on screen;

OR

• select the game > press either + or – to go to the Options page > select Software update > select Via the Internet.

To check that you have the latest version installed, simply select the game on the Home Menu, and press – or + to go to the Options: the version number is displayed just below the game title.