It's even made by the developers themselves. (Art by "Carles and Jan")

I don't know why or how it happened, and it never happened again - but that day, the game wouldn't let me select the next stage and "forced" me to skip it, which is something you're normally not allowed or able to do.

Did this happen to anyone else?

PS: if the animation doesn't load, try to open the gif in a separate window / tab: https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/19ab72f9-8805-4b2c-ada3-07e104900f83.gif

No idea how or why this happened, but it wasn't the first time. I'm on the most recent update, no mods or other programs installed that could mess with the software.

At least it is an easy fix, but still slightly annoying.

In case the gif doesn't play automatically: https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/f98173ee-afd0-46fd-89c5-2338b993cd6b.gif

Original Source: https://www.newgrounds.com/art/view/limehazard/i-sacrificed-for-less

Original article: https://steamcommunity.com/games/1313140/announcements/detail/4030227267358129030?snr=2___

The actual "event" that unlocked these decorations has already passed, but if you set the console's internal clock to any day between the 3rd and 17th of February 2024 and boot up your game, you will still find the chest next to your totem. You do not need to separately download anything if you're on the latest patch, and everything is free of charge ;)

Direct Link: https://bleedingcool.com/games/party-animals-announces-cult-of-the-lamb-crossover/

Marketed as a "crossover" but it really is just a reskin that you can purchase with in-game currency - no special requirements, but also no extra gameplay content or other gimmicks.

Still a neat little extra for fans of the franchise.

... but apparently the Switch can't handle more than 46. After the 47th joined, the game broke - the gif isn't lagging, this is what the screen itself looked like, weird rumble and all. The lamb was stuck cleaning up the same pile of barf for the rest of the night, and reloading didn't fix the lag so I wasn't able to cull the flock either.

RIP current playthrough.

...on the plus side, the other 2 playthroughs still work just fine, and it was my own fault for breaking the game anyway so I'm not too mad about it.

Direct Link: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1313140/view/6915906760353923311

Patch Notes 1.3.0 - Sins of the Flesh

New Features

• Added a new weapon - the Blunderbuss! Lamb goes pew pew.
• Added 6 new Achievements.
• Eggs - Followers can be hatched from eggs! Golden eggs will grant special skins.
• New Resources have been added. These include Grapes, Hops, Cotton, Silk Thread, and Yolk.
• Extra Resource rooms
• New Follower skins - Lemur, Caterpillar, Seal, Snake, Worm.
• Extension of the Sozo questline
• Sin Doctrine category (4 new choices, 8 new Doctrines)
• Auto levelling up followers after sermons and rituals.
• Rebuilding structures mini game.
• Shop room inside the dungeon with an NPC (Berith) that sells unique clothing.
• Re-indoctrination option on the indoctrination podium.
• Outfit and necklace assigning option on the indoctrination screen.
• Disciple ritual that turns level 10 followers into Disciples.
• Followers will now fight with one another, causing injuries and sometimes death.

The Sin System

• Followers generate sin which can be used as a new currency! Sin can be generated from specific Sin rituals and buildings. Spend it on upgrading the Temple, removing the cooldown on purgatory, re-indoctrinating followers and building structures.

New Rituals

• Rite of Lust - Followers will dance in their birthday suits around the shrine. Choose your favorite Follower to become the Mayflower Leader for half a day! This Follower will generate Sin. Followers will not work for half a day, instead they will prance around naked.
• Rite of Wrath - Followers will cause havoc on the base! Choose a follower to become the Wrath Leader. This follower will generate Sin. Gluttony of Cannibals - Choose a follower to be consumed by others. This will generate Sin.
• Sinner’s Pride - Choose a follower to absorb the Sin of all followers.
• Discipleship - Choose a level 10 follower to become a Disciple, in your inner circle of true believers.

Buildings

• Drinkhouse - Craft drinks at the drinkhouse for your followers. Once a follower consumes their delicious little treat beverage, they will generate Sin. There is also chance to become Befuddled. They may need a little tactical spew to keep the festivities going.
• Drinkhouse Level 2 - Queue more drinks.
• Mating Tent - You asked for it! When two Followers love each other very much, they may enter the tent, and find an egg afterwards...
• Hatchery - Place eggs in the Hatchery to make them hatch. What will come out?
• Drum Circle - Play a drum circle mini game for a chosen follower to generate Sin.
• Tailor building to craft and assign clothing to followers.
• Bigger silo storage buildings for fertilizer and seeds.
• Janitor station 2 building.
• Seed Storage - Followers will collect seeds from this building and deposit them into Seed Silo’s.
• Fertilizer Storage - Followers will collect fertilizer from this building and deposit them into Fertilizer Silo’s.
• Disciple Collection Shrine - Allows Disciples to deposit devotion from other buildings into a central building.
• Disciple Boost Shrine - Allows Disciples to pray that eventually fills up a shrine to give the Lamb a boost for the next crusade.

Follower States

• Befuddled - Followers will stumble around, vomit, fight, chat, laugh, sing, and generally have a merry old time until they are no longer befuddled.
• Injured - Followers will limp around feeling sorry for themselves until they are no longer injured.

Chore Levelling Up

• When cleaning a poop/vomit/burnt or cleaning out an outhouse, XP will be generated.
• Once the chore XP bar reaches full, the Lamb will unlock a new mop. There are as many as 10 (!!!) mops to unlock.
• The higher the mop, the faster the Lamb can clean.

Poop variations

• Golden Poop - Drops gold when cleaned. Drops gold/gold bars when harvesting a crop fertilized with golden poop.
• Glow Poop - Attracts fireflies.
• Devotion Poop - Generates devotion when cleaned. Crop fertilized with devotion poop will generate devotion over time.
• Massive Poop - Drops multiple poops when cleaned. Followers can get stuck in the massive poop :(
• Poop pet - Drops a poop pet when harvested, only when the poop is from a follower with the poop skin.
• Rainbow poop - Gives 5 times the chore XP when harvested. Instantly grows a crop when fertilized with rainbow poop.

Lore Tablets

• 15 Lore Tablets to collect across the game!

Traits

• Disciple Trait - Can re-educate Dissenters and use special Shrines.
• Jerk Trait - Jeers at the lamb. Chance to steal Lamb’s gold. Will tell the Lamb they suck after a failed crusade.
• Hot Tempered Trait - May start a fight with other followers.
• Royal Pooper Trait - Only poops golden poops. Say that 5 times fast.
• Scared Trait - Runs away from the player. Can be bullied/reassured.
• Terrified Trait - Sits in the corner of base and cries. :(
• Lustful Trait - Increases odds of mating in the mating tent.
• Celibate Trait - Decreases odds of mating in the mating tent.
• Fashionable Trait - Generates Devotion 20% faster when wearing a unique outfit.
• Hedonist Trait - Decreases productivity by 10% but increases Sin generation by 15%.
• Ascetic Trait - Decreases Sin generation by 10% but increases productivity by 15%.
• Virtuous Trait - Produces Sin 20% slower.
• Unrepentant - Produces Sin 15% faster.
• Doctrinal Extremist Cult Trait - Choose to generate Sin from the Confession Booth instead of Loyalty.
• Violent Extremist Cult Trait - Chance of Sin appearing as a reward from mini-bosses.
• Fertility Cult Trait - Followers hatched in the Cult will be born with some Sin
• Allegiance Cult Trait - Followers hatched in the Cult will be born with a high Loyalty level.
• Dissented Followers have a chance to show up inside the dungeon and fight the player.

Twitch Integration Update

• Added outfits for viewer followers! Viewers can now select a snazzy outfit in the follower builder after they win a follower raffle.
• Added mobile support. You can now use all of the integration’s features on your mobile devices as well!
• Added additional Help/Hinder outcomes

Changes

• Follower level is now capped at 10 - Followers at max level can can still participate in any interactions or Cult events that would normally increase their loyalty, but their loyalty bar will not appear anymore.
• Balanced the Enrichment Ritual.
• Added prompt to signify that sacrificing followers in certain locations are permanent .
• Laplace Dice is now a single use relic.
• Paean demon will no longer give hearts whilst wearing the Berseker or Fragile Fortitude Fleeces.
• Rebalancing commandment stones from levelling of Followers.
• Remove necklace option.
• Hide/Show necklace option.
• Skip sermons.
• Followers level capped at level 10.
• Dissenters who have left the cult have a chance to show up in the dungeon and fight the Lamb.
• Achievements menu that displays unlocked achievements.
• Fixed confusion with end of level bonus items

Bug Fixes

• Fixed demons not joining in the final fight.
• Fixed certain follower questlines
• Fixed lighting issues with blood moon ritual
• Fixed Morgue and Crypt issues
• Fixed birds displaying above the base in photo mode
• Fixed certain weapons not showing on crusades

Sinful DLC Pack

• 6 tailor unlocked outfits
• 6 new decorations
• 5 new Follower skins: Tiger, Llama, Hammerhead, Ladybug, Sphynx
• 1 player fleece
• As an addition : 2 tailor outfits for Heretic pack, and 2 tailor outfits for Cultist pack.

Direct Link in case the first one doesn't work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugEna7qwxZY

(sound warning)

In less than a week, the free(!) update will be live.

Sozo and his mushrooms - you can't separate those two. But what looks like merely an addiction at first glance, is way, way worse if you know what's really going on here ...

The thing on his head is not a funny red hat - it IS a mushroom. One that is growing directly out of Sozo's brain, mind-controlling him and basically eating him alive from the inside.

Sounds freaky and made-up, right....?

Except there is such a fungus in real life. It is called Ophiocordyceps unilateralis or "Zombie-Ant Fungus" and it takes control of infected ants, forcing them to abandon their colony and seek out a place that's beneficial for the fungus. Once the ant reaches the spot that the fungus finds comfy enough to bloom, the ant bites down into whatever it is standing on to hook itself in place. The fungus then spreads, kills the ant, and releases its spores.

Remember what happens if you finish Sozo's quests...? Once you leave and return, he will be dead, lying on the ground with X-ed out eyes, and the mushroom on his head is split open and surrounded by a lot of smaller mushrooms growing out of his body and backpack ...

It's not exactly a mystery what happened here.

Kudos to the CotL team for researching this stuff and adding it to the game. ;)

Source:

• Original Source of the artwork: https://chibysoly.tumblr.com/post/696038782367072256/didnt-like-the-result-but-i-do-love-sozo-this

• Original Artist: https://chibysoly.tumblr.com/

Original Source: https://www.pcgamer.com/now-that-the-sex-update-is-real-cult-of-the-lamb-turns-to-pokemon-and-the-sims-for-inspiration/

In what is either a very blatant marketing strategy or a case of Icarus soaring too close to the sun, the Cult of the Lamb developers at Massive Monster put out a tweet earlier this week saying "we will add sex to the game if we hit 300k followers by the end of the year."

As you can tell, it took less than a week to make the sex update a reality. At the time of writing, the Cult of the Lamb Twitter account has 455,000 followers. Sex quite literally sells. While Massive Monster is already on record as saying that the age rating wouldn't change in a Steam thread, the atmosphere's still about as feral as you'd expect. Here's an excerpt. It's going very well.

(Image credit: Steam Forums)

In a recent interview with Polygon, Massive Monster have clarified as to what games they're looked to to help them bring sex to the cute cult simulator: "We used games like Pokemon and The Sims when it comes to references, but put our own cult-ish spin on things. The age rating will not change."

One would assume this means that any cultish copulation would happen off-screen. Pokemon breeding is a thing, but you typically do it at a distance via menu. Meanwhile the Sims is famous for the very enthusiastic noises its people make while bumping uglies, such as "woohoo" and "plarkam". While some fans might be disappointed by this turn of events, I'm about to be a real party pooper. It's only for a paragraph, I swear.

I'm usually all for a bit of smut, but this is for the best even if it is the expected outcome. Cult of the Lamb is a game about starting and growing a cult, and while the game mostly dances around said subject matter with its cute art style, I should point out that cults do happen in real life and they're horrific. Adding sex to a game where you run one requires a Sims-level disconnect to avoid becoming an absolute nightmare. Alright, now that I've killed the vibe, let's go back to talking about the funny sex update.

One revelation from the interview is that the tweet may not have had much to do with the sex update itself: "We have been working on Sins of the Flesh since we finished the last update earlier this year," gasp. In fairness it's not as if Sins of the Flesh will just be adding sex—it'll be adding new features, stories, and gameplay stuff. It's entirely possible that the "follower fornication" as the team politely puts it is a new addition to the pipeline.

"It was something we workshopped a long time ago and didn’t go with, but now our programmers are working on the update as we speak. Our team is very talented and we have no doubt that it will be ready for release. We always finish on time." There it is: Cult of the Lamb sex real. You'll be able to play the update "very early next year (like, very early!)" according to the team's news update.

Original source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2848267947

I have no idea how they managed to do that. but at least the "clean up" option is still availiable....

Honestly, I thought the guns and nudist update were a joke at first until the creator confirmed that those things will indeed be in the game, but now there will apparently also be .... rainbow poop.

It's even on the official wiki already: https://cult-of-the-lamb.fandom.com/wiki/Sins_of_the_flesh

Source: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1313140/view/3871470142929174563

The new weapon type is planned to be included in the Sins of the Flesh free update set to launch early next year.

The name "Knucklebones" is quite literal - because the dice used in this game were originally made from animal bones - more precisely, the "knuckle"bones of a sheep's hind legs which makes it a little more macabre that the main protagonist of the game is a lamb.

Unlike the in-game version however, the IRL variants of the game are usually more focused on dexterity and speed rather than strategy - like tossing and catching the bones in a specific way, for example with the back of the hand. They may even have been used as utensils for divination, tho there are no known clear "rules" for interpreting a throw.

...and yes, "variants" is plural here, because the game seems to have been invented independendly in various places world wide, over the course of thousands of years.

In 2022 for example, archeologists unearthed over 500 individual knucklebones in an excavation of the ancient city of Maresha (Israel), many of which were carefully modified, like "[...] shaved down, polished, perforated, or filled with lead – in order to improve the roll of the dice."^1 Some were also engraved with the names of greek deities, numerals, or other symbols, presumably to be used in some form of divination - or gambling.

And these are far from the oldest ones. The earliest "game set" of knucklebones ever discovered dates back to around 5,000 BCE, with depictions of the game itself being present in various mediums of art across the centuries, like for example in paintings and pottery.

Unlike the "traditional" knucklebones, the modern variants are often made from plastic or metal, with some sets also containing an additional rubber ball. Sometimes the "bones" are tossed, other rulesets require the ball to be bounced and the player picks up bones while the ball is still in the air, then catches the ball again.

The rules of the in-game Knucklebones however were invented by the creator of Cult of the Lamb. While IRL knucklebones have indeed been used for gambling, and some have been engraved with numbers, none of the "ancient" gameplay rules are 1:1 identical to the videogame variant.

You may have come across articles like this (gamerant) or this (IGN) or this (pcgamesn) already, plus a ton of tweets and similar posts on social media, all desperately urging players to buy the game NOW because it will dispappear forever at the start of the next year. Sadly all of these articles are pretty high up in the search results if you use your favorite internet search engine to look for more information.

This however is not accurate, and the creators of the game have been battling this misinformation left and right.

Don’t worry, Cult of the Lamb isn’t getting deleted. Massive Monster, which developed the game, jokingly posted to X last week that it’s taking the game offline on Jan. 1, when Unity’s new, wildly unpopular install-based fees are set to launch. Even Unity itself was seemingly concerned: It replied on X that it was “working to clarify specifics.”

Soon after, Massive Monster reassured Cult of the Lamb fans that the post was a joke — Cult of the Lamb is safe. “It was a joke on Twitter — I mean X — that the media sensationalized, like a lot,” the developer said. “I read in one article that we’d already deleted the game, which is news to me.”

Source polygon who seems to be the only "popular" gaming tips website that bothered to look for accurate information first.

Long story short, you don't have to worry about this game disappearing for good, whether on Jan 1st or any other time.

Original Source: https://imgur.com/t/cult_of_the_lamb/oXOVkrV (animated)

Made with polymer clay

During the Halloween season, there was a special event called the Blood Moon Festival offering new follower forms, a new ritual and deco items for free. Technically this event is over and "unobtaineable" until next October, when Devolver Digital might repeat it.

However, you can also just go to your Switch settings and temporarily set the console date to a day between 24th Oct to 10th Nov 2022 which will make the event availiable, provided you're on the most recent update. The same tactic might work on other consoles and on PC, but personally I have only tested the Switch version so I only know that this one is accurate.

Don't forget to change the internal clock back to the original date and time after activating the event, otherwise it might affect other games on the console (like making Resetti yell at you in Animal Crossing for tampering with the clock, or removing otherwise availiable Pokémon in the Wild Area in Pokémon Sword/Shield). Going back to the normal time and date will not delete the follower forms and items you have obtained "during the event" so you won't lose anything ;)