Afterthought Games has outlined the next wave of work for The Isle in its latest DevBlog #72 Steam announcement. Oviraptor, the Migration changes, and Entombed Saves are moving through final QA before their first release to the hordetesting branch, while Baryonyx, the Hatchery, and several core systems continue to develop.
Migration and Entombed Saves enter QA
Lead Programmer Filipe said the new Migration and Entomb save systems have been finished and merged into the master branch. They are now being tested by QA, with the team checking for problems before the systems reach players. The work follows earlier Migration plans shared in the previous development update.
QA Lead hypno confirmed that testing is also nearing its final stage for Oviraptor, Entombed Saves, and the Migration changes. No release date was announced for the hordetesting build. The QA application form remains open, with the team still seeking testers in the EU and AU timezones through the QA application form.
Oviraptor grows feathers while Baryonyx learns to swim
Oviraptor’s growth stages are being built around feathers that appear as it reaches adulthood, giving the dinosaur a changing look as it matures. The animation team has been working through those stages and is preparing the creature for hordetesting.
Baryonyx is receiving a different kind of gameplay work. Its underwater movement follows the ground in a way that resembles Beipiaosaurus’s water latch, but the animal sinks passively and attaches to the bottom automatically. The movement should feel close to running on land, although Baryonyx can swim normally after jumping. It will not sink automatically when it is already sitting on the water’s surface.
The creature also requires new swim and attack animations, along with a large amount of mechanical testing. Its systems could affect how Spinosaurus and Suchomimus play, so the team is spending more time tuning Baryonyx than it has with some other animals.
The Hatchery gets its full complex
Environmental work has reached the latest completed version of the Hatchery, a large facility with a basement and several routes through the building. It is prepared for the next HordeTest and will connect to a medical facility for animals on the island.
Work is continuing on the exterior and interior gates, satellite structures, and staging areas around the Dome. Once finished, these additions should give players access to one of the largest structures on the island.
Footsteps, wildlife, and replay tools get more control
The audio and programming teams are replacing the old rigid footstep setup with a unified system that scales visual and sound effects by species and size. A weight-driven system now helps footsteps transition between growth stages, while movement speed and weight affect sound falloff and filtering. Keeping the footsteps in a single asset should also make global audio changes easier to apply.
Foliage interaction audio is being adjusted to address inconsistencies, and work has started on Spinosaurus call concepts before the audio team turns its full attention to Avaceratops. Adult sounds are being produced alongside juvenile calls.
Programming work covered server performance, development tools, and world systems. The landscape grass painter now works across static meshes, walls, roofs, and landscape surfaces with clearer previews. Landscape streaming and tree-destruction performance also received more work.
Players will be able to cycle through nearby interactions with R, while controller users can use the D-pad to select an interaction. Ambient spawning has also expanded to include rats, grasshoppers, dragonflies, giant enemy crabs, snails, and lizards. AI nesting and ambient-spawn filtering remain in development.
The advanced gore and runtime dismemberment prototypes are progressing across dinosaur assets, with ragdoll behavior and the way bodies settle after knockdowns or deaths receiving attention. The team also worked through replay menu problems, proxy pawns falling through meshes after rerendering, SQLCipher linking issues, shutdown crashes, SQL and I/O problems, and telemetry race conditions.
Replay tools are gaining time-of-day controls, aperture and focal length settings, manual focus, weather presets, and extra effects. An initial arcade cabinet framework is also in place, along with its first prototype game, Goat Run.
Animation work reaches Parasaurolophus and the ceratopsians
Parasaurolophus is being animated for both bipedal and quadrupedal movement, which nearly doubles the work compared with an animal built around one stance. The team said that project is about halfway finished while animation revisions continue for other creatures.
New vocal animations are being added for Baryonyx and Camarasaurus. Baryonyx’s movements focus on its deep calls, with body vibrations and tail slaps that fit its life around water. Camarasaurus keeps its sing-song vocal style but is being presented with more force when an adult animal becomes aggressive. Avaceratops has new vocals as well, though some of those animations still need to be completed.
Diabloceratops and Triceratops are also receiving faster attack animations and shorter recovery periods. Those changes are being applied to the ceratopsians first, while the broader recovery work is intended to reach more of the roster over time. The animation team is also reviewing Quetzalcoatlus, Avaceratops, and Camarasaurus in the game, with Austroraptor’s ability to jump from the water serving as one example of a mechanic that grew naturally from the creature’s behavior.
The Isle’s next HordeTest has several systems and creatures waiting for their first public testing pass. Tell us what you think in the comments, and follow us on X, Bluesky, YouTube, Instagram, Steam, and Telegram.
The Isle
Developed by Afterthought Games
