When I started this project last year I figured a lot of this would be stats and menu driven, with a relatively simple visual representation, but I'm enjoying seeing how much it seems like it's going to be possible to pull off with more typical gameplay.

Oh, and I do intend building styles and types to adapt to the environment, I've tried it out and it works well but not all the mechanics are in place yet, but the intent is fully that buildings should reflect the terrain, especially housing.

I'm generally very happy about how this direction is going and it's much easier to see how some specifics of how this might be surfaced in gameplay.

For example, players being challenged to create or maintain a certain about of terrain of a particular type to unlock certain bonuses, but working within a system that is flexible and allows for creative problem solving with no single right answer.

This adds to the existing mechanics for grassy parkland of more larger grasses in boggy areas, around sea level, and mountain flowers at higher elevations.

* Flora viability on sandy terrain is now dependent on proximity to water.

This is very basic with quite a steep fall off and is something I expect need to tune.

Additional variations in terms of plants supported (e.g. reeds, tall grasses) seems like an obvious direction.

These were actually very simple changes to implement, I hadn't been in the headspace to think about them yet.

* When generating terrain, rivers and lakes are more likely to have more tree coverage at their shores.

* There is a 'timberline', a height at which tree coverage starts to thin out, and also a 'treeline', a height at which trees are no longer viable.

They are used to determine the ecotone and help make the terrain a bit more readable without having to use the grid or wireframe view.