Mowing fifty lawns is a lot of grass. So after the big level overhaul from the latest playtest, we spent some time on the things that make you stop and look while you mow. Here are a few favourites.
Planes have right of way
The Airport Grounds description always said it: Mow between the runways. Planes have right of way. Now they really do. Every minute or two, when a runway is on your screen, an airliner comes in to land on it. You first see its shadow sliding over the grass, then the plane itself, a little bigger while it is still high. It touches down right next to you, rolls a few hundred metres, then opens up its engines again and climbs away off the far end: a touch-and-go, with the roar to match.
Your robots know the rules too: they cross the taxiways, but they never drive onto a runway. And if you mow near the terminal, a marshaller in a hi-vis vest may run out to wave you in with his orange batons. "This way! This way!" Park at the gate and he crosses them: "Perfect!"
Racing Circuit: helmets recommended
The Formula cars now lap the circuit on the racing line all the time, call at their pit boxes now and then, and keep to the track. Now and then one of them overshoots a bend, spins into the gravel or onto your lawn with a squeal of tyres, leaves dark skid marks behind and waits sheepishly for a gap before it rejoins the race.
Lifts that move, a skier without snow
The Summer Ski Resort has chairlifts and a gondola, and the seats now actually travel up and down the lift lines. Down on the green pistes you may meet a skier in full gear who is trying very hard to ski down the grass. He pushes off with his poles, gets nowhere ("Where's the snow?!") and eventually stomps off.
Somebody has been mowing here at night
Crop Circle Valley finally explains itself. Now and then a flying saucer swoops in over your mower with an eerie hum and a green beam, slides over to a nearby patch and beams a fresh crop circle into the grass. Its little green pilot climbs out, waves at you and hurries back in. The circle fades after about a minute, so you never know whether you really saw it.
Festival Grounds: three stages, one mower
The festival now has real stages with light shows and a crowd in front of them. Somewhere in that crowd is a festival-goer in a unicorn onesie who loves your mower. He runs up and dances along behind you for a while, and when you stand still he switches to the robot dance.
Animals get out of the way
Animals and people no longer stand still when a mower comes at them. Cows, goats, horses, kids and cricketers move aside, and herds graze and flee while staying inside their own fences. The Safari Park now has real animals: hippos in the waterhole, elephants on its shore, giraffes, zebras, wildebeest, rhinos and ostriches. And keep an eye on your mower there: a monkey likes to hop on for a ride and run off with something shiny.
All of this is in the playtest build now.