Hi Stuffies... We're back! Did you miss us?
You've probably noticed a lack of Recapped posts in the last few months. This is because we've been super busy wrapping up the Wardrobe and hosting a private playtest for it!
The good news is that we achieved our goal, and the Wardrobe is now functionally complete and mostly polished. We've even managed to squeeze in loads of extra features, assets, and polishing over our 3 months of testing!
While we still want to revisit the Wardrobe later to add a couple more ideas, we've decided to lock it down and move back to the rest of the game's development. Starting in January, we moved all coders back to development on level editing, gameplay, and the main menu!
In the past month alone, we've managed some exciting progress on new/resumed tasks, and we're seeing the full structure of the game shape up!
What exactly have we been up to over the past month or so? ...Let's get into it!
Restitched: Level Editor Gameplay (video)
We've released a time-lapse video of basic level creation in Restitched. This video is several minutes long and packed with many features shown in action!
Check it out to see how the level editor can be used to quickly assemble scenes and gameplay!
Trixel+ Anniversary 2025
In October, we celebrated another year of trixel+ as a Patreon service. Why celebrate? Well, it's very important to us! Without the generous support from this platform, we wouldn't be able to make Restitched and afford its necessary development costs.
As a way of giving extra thanks, we host a month-long anniversary celebration each year featuring new announcements, goodies, and extra content.
Check out the full post to see what it was all about!
Restitched: Asset Previews (#23-26)
Check out these new glimpses into Restitched's asset library! Check out the full collection of these posts here.
Restitched: Limited Edition Stuffy Plush
At long last, Stuffy is now a real-life plushie! We've commissioned a batch of ~100 limited edition plushes. These are currently only for our dev team, but we plan to offer them to the community in the future!
Restitched: Wardrobe Test
From October to December 2025, we hosted our first community playtest focused on the Restitched Wardrobe. This proved to be very productive! We spent the final months of the year fully focused on this area of the game, making around 400 changes, fixes, and additions.
We put the customization tools directly in the community's hands to see what they think. We received a lot of positive feedback and helpful suggestions. Seeing how players interact with the game motivated us to improve the experience based on their direct input!
We prioritized feature ideas and turned them into reality, fixed countless bugs, and made much-needed Quality of Life adjustments.
Wardrobe Test - Community Creations Spotlight
The Wardrobe Test resulted in some absolutely banger community outfits! We saw loads of popular character recreations, but also some unique characters and styles as well.
We spotlighted some of those early creations in a full blog post, but there have been sooo many more since! Join our Discord server and check out the #wardrobe channel to see even more of the playtesters' lovely outfits!
Wardrobe Testing Feedback
To our surprise, players found the Wardrobe to be much richer and more in-depth than they expected. This was amazing to hear, as we've been working very hard on it! In a feedback survey, most playtesters ranked it as being just as powerful or more powerful than other similar titles with character customization.
Additionally, playtesters rated the art style, sound, assets, and more with very positive scores! The survey found that players enjoyed the Wardrobe, had fun, and would recommend it. Some players had even put in a whopping 70+ hours over the first couple of weeks!
Wardrobe Livestream
During the late Wardrobe Test phases, we had one of our developers (Luke, 3D Animator) host a gameplay livestream with our Discord community. This was a blast, and we had a lot of funny moments and memes created.
You can check out the archived stream video here.
Clamp's Workshop x Restitched - Art Contest
As a way to bridge creative communities with similar interests, we teamed up with the Clamp's Workshop community to host a new Restitched art contest!
The prize? 10 winners received an invite to the Wardrobe Test, a special role, and one month of free access to our Patreon.
Check out all the entries submitted, including the winning artwork, here!
Steam Store Page Update
We've updated our Steam Store page with a better description, along with a couple of new screenshots from the more complete Wardrobe mode.
Join Stuffy on a charming platforming adventure as they "restitch" unraveled communities. Unleash your creativity with a robust 2.5D level editor, play dress up with a powerful mix-and-match Wardrobe, and share your creations via Steam Workshop!
Development Tools
Every development team needs its own tools. We're no different! In Unity, we use a range of custom tool windows, quick actions, and features to get things done and save time while doing it. Below are some changes we've been making to improve them...
Bulk Edit Actions
We've added a mass-edit option for datasets. This allows us to set certain fields on every single asset without needing to manually edit them. For example, we can select the "Household" props category folder, open the tool, and set a new author text. The engine will update the Author field for every item in that selection.
This is useful for setting the "Trixel Creative" name on all the assets made before we added the author field. We can also use it to recalculate Props' colliders and auto-fit the mesh into layers without needing to open the Prop Editor tool for each one.
These types of 'bulk edit' options are very handy for saving time, and we'll likely keep adding to them so we can mass edit more fields and datasets.
Prop Import Tools
Another huge change we've made this month is to the Prop Import Tools. Every spawnable item type in the game uses its own dataset, and those contain 'asset' files that hold the info/data. For example, an "Apple" data object contains the name, ID, author, description, physics presets, collider data, default color, and more.
One issue we've faced is how absolutely horrible the Prop import process was. In fact, it's why we avoid importing new Props as much as we used to: it requires an immense amount of time and effort.
Originally, we had arbitrary layer limits that were more visual than practical. To solve this, we needed to add clearer layer data to the game, so that Unity knows 1 layer equals x Unity units in world space. Currently, one thick layer is equal to 1.5 units (we've just changed this from 1 to 1.5, which you'll read about later in this post).
With the layer limits now defined in the engine, we can reference them in other scripts. This meant we could finally revisit the Prop import tools and make them work more reliably and quickly.
Instead of artists needing to set a model's origin point in Blender, rotate it to a strange direction that the prop system expected, and offset it to visually fit into what we defined as a 'layer'... We can now automate most of the process.
In the new version of the tools, the game will auto-fit a Prop mesh into the layer range we've set it to, just by resizing the root asset until the depth of a single game layer is filled. It then takes a cross-section of the mesh to ensure it's sitting inside a layer (this avoid empty props from being spawned).
Because we have to manually draw collision in a special tool window, we've also made it so that the collision gets resized with the Prop when we run the new 'auto-fit' feature. Previously, we'd have to delete the collision data and redo it by hand if a prop changed size.
Another result of these improvements is that we now support thin-layered Props! They behave basically the same as thin-layered Building Materials...
Stamp Editor Tool
Because we have nearly 1,000 Stamps and it's always growing, we use a custom in-engine window to display Stamps and easily edit their data. Until now, the tool was rather simple and didn't let you multi-select Stamp listings. That's a big deal when you need to import and edit lots of them at once!
We've now added multi-select support, along with other minor improvements. It's even easier and faster for us to import and update our Stamps!
Connectors and Joints
This month, Linus resumed development on Connectors and Joints! These are the physics-driven attachment features for all level objects. For example, connecting a joint and making it spin, or attaching a piston between two objects.
Working against Unity limitations and prior game design structures means this feature is a big one to develop. It relies on so many interconnected pieces of the game, and some of them haven't been touched for a long time.
Linus has laid the groundwork for what's to come, and we can't wait to see where it goes soon! We're first focused on getting joints set up, which you can see a prototype of in these videos.
You can also set the Joint type, as it's all contained in a single "Joint" object. Changing the type will also change the settings visible to you. This makes it easier to configure any placed Joint without needing to delete and replace it!
This is proving really handy in testing our new player movement changes and the default physics settings for objects.
Logic System
Raphael and Gabe are both now working on logic's resumed development. This is a tall order for us, but very important and central to the gameplay and level editing experience.
The back-end structure of logic is still being set up, and part of that involves a refactoring of our main cursor code to support logic components while staying multiplayer-friendly and future-proofed. It'll be a little while until we can show you the logic being placed in a level, connected together, have its settings changed, and seeing it affect objects. But once a solid framework is built, it'll be even easier and faster to get all that working.
"Main Cursor" Refactor (levelobjects and logic selection)
As mentioned earlier, the main cursor code is undergoing some renovation to support logic and become a bit tidier and more robust. Raphael, our Lead Coder, has taken on the challenge with a list of notes, concerns, suggestions, and team discussions:
Stamps Sort Order
Because Stamps work uniquely compared to other datasets, the Stamps weren't sorted in the menu by their alphabetical titles. This is because the game sorts items by their file name or dataset import number, and not the actual asset name we give them.
We've now fixed this! Stamps will show up in alphabetical order in the Craftbook.
When we first looked into this issue, we thought the fix would be much harder. We even started working to mass-change all Stamps' file names to match the asset name instead of their ID number. In the end, we found out we could make the Craftbook code dig for the asset name and use it as a custom sort order.
Game Settings
The game settings have been updated to support more options, including our ability to hide certain scene assets when you're on a lower graphics preset.
For those running the game on the lowest graphics mode, certain particles and background objects will be hidden to save performance.
Steam Rich Presence
We've added rich presence support to Steam! This means your online activity status will show what you're doing in-game.
Currently, we support the following states:
In-game (generic/unknown)
Loading... (loading screen)
Styling a Stuffy (wardrobe)
Building a Level (level editor)
Playing a Level
Exploring Story Map
In Main Menu
Proper Game Pausing
Believe it or not, we've not had proper game pausing until now. We have been able to pause physics objects in the level, but not fully freeze Stuffy or other gameplay effects. This is because there are way too many variables to consider, and manually coding pause support for each one could be a huge time cost and a disaster!
So, we've taken a different approach. When the game is paused, we still freeze physics via the '.isPaused' tag in the 'worldmanager' system, but we also change Unity's timescale to 0. When unpaused, it restores to a timescale of 1.0.
If the game detects you're playing online with others (support not yet fully added), it'll refuse to pause the world or timescale. This is because pausing in online gameplay would freeze the level for other players.
A downside to this was that we've coded and animated various UI elements to work based on timescale. We had to go through the code, changing some structure, and set the UI animator components to 'unscaled time'... which now allows them to show up even when the game is paused!
Doing it this way is ultimately better because you get a nice frozen level that includes everything from shaders to physics, and even particles!
New Light Settings
We've added settings and improvements for placeable light objects:
Light Cookies (shadow effects)
You can now cycle through different shadow effects on lights. For example, maybe you want it to look grungy and dirty, like a flashlight ring, a disco ball pattern, blinds, or even water caustics!
These settings are useful for adding a bit of detail to lights in your level. After all, lighting is one of the most important visual things in any good scene! In some cases, you could maybe disable real shadows and use a shadow effect instead. This would save a good chunk of performance, because shadows are very expensive to render in games.
As a nice side effect, we discovered that adding a shadow style and turning up fog will produce light rays through the shadow pattern. So cool!
Shadows Toggle
As mentioned above, you can now toggle shadows per light! This could help you save lots on performance in your level, especially if you use some lights more as decorative/rim lighting, or background effects.
As level creators get familiar with the game and tools, we expect it'll become common practice to set up lights and their settings in clever ways to save extra performance.
Shadow Intensity Slider
When shadows are active (by default they are), you will now see a slider to change the shadow intensity. Full strength is the usual value, but if you prefer subtler shadows, you can always lower it!
To save performance by default, we only use 'hard shadows' mode on all placeable light objects. The difference between soft and hard shadows in Unity can add up to hurt performance, but the difference in visuals is negligible for normal level usage.
Disable volumetric fog script when at 0%
We discovered that the game continues to render a light's volumetric fog effects even if you set the 'Fogginess' slider to 0%. Volumetric fog can be a very expensive calculation, and, although very pretty, it certainly should not really be used by every light if you have many!
By keeping the script active even at zeroed-out values, the game was still calculating rays of light and multiplying them by other expensive operations in the code and shaders. Now, when you set fogginess to zero, the game will completely disable the script on that light and save performance.
Eyedropper Spawning Improvement
The Eyedropper Tool is so, so, so very handy! But what isn't handy is trying to eyedrop something in a back layer and having it spawn a copy in the first layer...
That's a thing of the past! When you eyedrop anything in the level, the temporary placement brush mode will now keep it exactly in the layer you eyedropped it from. Additionally, it'll even remember how many layers a Building Material filled and carry that over to the new placement copy.
In this way, it's a bit similar to cloning, except it's only putting a clean copy of the source asset on your cursor, ready for placement. The same as if you'd selected in the Craftbook, except now with the carried-over layer position and depth. This makes it quick and easy to reach in and reuse assets already in the level. Much better than scrolling to find that Building Material, or having to search for it!
New and Fixed Cosmetics
Our 3D Artists have been combing through the Wardrobe feedback and asset library in an effort to polish, optimize, fix, and increase feature compatibility. For example, some of our older assets were made before we had secondary recoloring support, or they incorrectly use sub-meshes (which our Stamping system doesn't support).
Rather than spending months trying to brute force a fix to the Stamping tech, we've decided it's best to update the assets themselves. In some cases, the artist decides it's better or easier to remake or retexture the original asset!
This one isn't a change, but we thought many of you would appreciate knowing we've added a Pilot/Aviator Cap!
New Shaders
To support secondary recoloring on Cosmetics, we use a custom shader that takes a black/white mask texture. This tells the shader how to separate the texture between the first and second recolor slots.
It multiplies a player-chosen color in that region by the underlying base texture. For accurate recoloring, we need to make every base (albedo) texture grayscale. We can then set the default colors these slots use when the item is first equipped. The player can then always change it to what they like.
To expand this shader even more, we also added emission (glow) properties, like pulsating and strength. This lets our artists author unique glowing cosmetics like a pulsating t-shirt or smartphone screen!
To create our tutorial popups' scrolling stripes effect, we also made a generic UI shader to pan the UV of a texture. This gives us looping, tiling, animated stripes that are used as the border of tutorial popup menus and a screen pause effect in the level editor. This replaced an older Unity-animated effect (and is now better for performance!)
Main Menu Clouds
We had an artist take the clouds from our key art file and clean them up to be game-optimized. Now we're using them in our main menu scene! This may or may not stick around, as we haven't given the main menu a proper art pass yet.
New Props
While many of us have been working on the Wardrobe, we've also had an artist chipping away at more Props for the level editor. We'll show those when they're imported (using the new and improved import tools)!
Default Background Update
We've extended the default level background to support our updated layer thickness and amount. A couple of other backgrounds are still in need of this adjustment.
This was done by extruding the whole mesh on the Z axis from 1.0 to 1.9. As a result, the tarps are more wrinkled and thicker. Although it's serviceable and looks fine, a proper 'adjustment' may come later.
Wardrobe Scene Polishing
We've given the Wardrobe a proper art pass! The scene now has all of its final props, effects, and lighting. We've also added a ceiling and filled in some gaps off-camera. This is because we've added a feature to zoom, pan, and tilt the camera.
Story Map Concept
We want the Adventure to feel like a focal point of the game, and to stand apart from other game modes with its own immersive menu that builds off existing systems. We already support 3D movement and optional abilities, so what stops us from putting Stuffy into an open, explorable world that makes the story feel more connected and real?
Before we prototyped the idea (more on that later in the post), we asked concept artist Ari to sketch up some quick ideas of how this might look and work:
Connectors UX Mockup
Halston quickly threw together a mockup of how a connector might be represented when hovered and moved via nodes.
This came after some quick discussion and concern on how we'll implement the connectors with the main cursor feature. We want to be unique and innovate where possible, but sometimes there's only one good way to do something!
Main Menu
The Main Menu is the heart of the game, as it bridges your experience together like a hub destination. It's been a challenge for us to dedicate time to it, since the rest of the game is infinitely more important to nail down first. However, this year, we've gotten back to it for the first time in a long while!
We're basing it on earlier concepts, while also still trying to explore new ways to keep it dynamic and interesting.
The first stages of this task involved Jake and Halston working to set up a framework of the menu. Until now, we used a placeholder prefab that held all the menus inside it. It wasn't very optimized, nor easy to work with... So, we've been busy gutting that version and splitting each menu into its own prefab.
We've also set up the main menu as its own scene with a spawnable Stuffy, camera, and background. This has transitioned it from a 2D texture-based menu into a physical one.
We've been working on some early art passing to make it more presentable, and we're liking where it's headed!...
We're interested in moving the camera around depending on which menu you're in. This would be a cool way to keep things dynamic and reduce background clutter when certain UI is shown. For example, loading the "Level Editor" list would pan the camera up into the clouds or to a different area of the background.
We have a lot of polishing ideas for this scene, like changing the background color depending on player color, animating Stuffy, adding effects, etc... While promising, it still needs a bit of work to behave as we intend. Then we can start making it prettier to look at!
Animated Buttons
We've updated the default menu buttons to have a rolled paper corner when highlighted. This bit of polish adds to the overall vibe, but also makes it even clearer which selection is active.
Control Prompts
We've added more control prompts and updated their icons with Kenney's Input Prompts asset! These popup instructions help guide you when certain things are highlighted or when some tools and cursor modes are active.
Item Info Popups
We've added window popups when viewing more info for a Craftbook item. This lets you read its description or see any options it might offer. We've used this as a fun opportunity to add some silly lore and jokes to many items. :)
Improved Search
The search chapter of the Craftbook now prompts you when no search is active, and we've even updated the algorithm to include smart-matching (eg, typing "Red" will no longer show things like "Tattered Cloth", yet "pop" would show lollipop items).
Improved Workshop Menu Browsing
We've visually improved the in-game Steam Workshop menu for browsing outfits. We've also improved the search algorithm there, too. Lots of optimizations were added to ensure outfits load quickly and in paged segments.
We've also unlocked a feature that lets Workshop content show up as "Featured" by our team, and they even come with a special icon and in their own 'Featured' category! You'll also notice that favorited items show up with their own icon, too.
Filter Menu in Workshop
We've now restored an old work-in-progress filters menu when browsing Workshop content. Originally, this was prototyped before we even had a unified pop-up 'window system'. We've gutted and replaced the old code and assets with a new, cleaner window that piggybacks off existing game elements like toggle and roller widgets.
This lets players further refine a search from the in-game Workshop browser, like by changing the sort order or filtering by tags.
Tutorial Popups
Based on playtesting, we found that some players don't instantly know what the game offers or how certain tools work. For example, the Design Tool is a major feature of the Wardrobe, but it's tucked away in the Toolbar among other, less-major features.
Our solution to this was implementing our planned tutorials system, but as popup windows. This allows us to call upon a tutorial from almost anywhere in the game and from any action the player can make. Clicking certain options or entering certain scenes can now show a tutorial window.
These tutorials work as either one-off popups, or in instructed steps. Each one has its own thumbnail image. You must go through all steps to close the popup, but once you've seen it, the game will never open it again, as we store a 'seen' flag in your saved data.
You can, however, disable tutorial popups altogether from the Game Settings menu.
Have you seen a tutorial but want to revisit it? We plan to add a tutorials menu list that lets you revisit any seen tutorial. Certain Craftbook items may also have a tutorial option in their item info menu in the future.
Window Title = Object Name
When you select an object and open its settings panel, the window title will now show the name of the object it belongs to! If you are editing a group of objects, the name will simply be "Grouped Selection". As a failsafe, the window title will fall back to "Settings" if the name can't be fetched for some reason.
Save Prompts in Mode Switch
When you switch the game mode from the pause menu, it'll now prompt you to save your level or discard changes before going to play mode. Previously, it would auto-save your changes. This wasn't ideal, because maybe you've entered a level, moved something, then wanted to play the version from before you moved it.
Max Limit Popups
In the Wardrobe, we display a popup message when the maximum number of Stamps has been placed on a Cosmetic. This lets the player know they can't place more and how many can be placed. We've now extended this into the level editor, so you'll see the same message when placing Stamps on objects!
The limit for placing Stamps on level objects is much lower than for Cosmetics. This is because only 4 Stuffies would ever be in a scene, but potentially hundreds of Stamps objects can be in levels and at very large sizes. This increases texture memory too much, and so we've had to make the Stamp limit more conservative to avoid performance issues.
There are potential performance solution to this, like by dynamically sizing the quality of Stamps based on the object size it's placed on... or, adding some sort of texture atlas system for memory management. Some basic plumbing code for that latter idea has already been added, but it's not yet working because it falls out of scope and would mean refactoring important parts of the game.
Multi-Select Marquee Box
When clicking and dragging the select cursor in a level, you activate a multi-selection mode This lets you drag a box around objects to select multiple at once. Until now, the functionality was there, but with no visual to show this happening!
For now, we've added a 'line renderer' system to create a box around the select zone. This will match your chosen player color and highlight any objects in its range. There are still issues with this approach, like how the box clips through the floor and other objects because it doesn't render above everything in the scene.
Pause Menu Changes Between Game States
The pause menu has a list of options, such as replay level, exit, resume, switch game mode, respawn, and more. Now, we've added a way for the game mode to change which options are shown.
If you're in the story map, you'll only see a few basic options. If you're in the level editor, you'll see things like "switch game mode", but not "replay level" (this is unnecessary since you're building a level, not playing it!)
If you're in gameplay, you'll see yet another set of buttons, but based on whether or not you own the level that's being played. Do you own the level and have edit permission? Then we show the "switch game mode" button.
Expandable Craftbook
We've finished adding an option to expand the Craftbook view in both the level editor and Wardrobe. This is handy for players who want to see and browse more content at once!
Cutscene(s) Prepwork
We've mentioned it before, but the cutscene snippets you saw in the Official Trailer were designed to be from the opening act of the game's planned story. Our 2 animator, Luke and Brennan, are now working to shift these animation files into Unity for an in-engine recreation of that cinematic.
Originally, we thought it was fine to simply animate in Blender, export the video, and play it in the game as needed. We now realize we'd be better off making cutscenes in Unity directly.
There are a few pros to animating in Unity:
player outfits can be shown on Stuffy
any dev can easily edit the scene without being an animator or using other software
if a segment lacks animation, we can put existing clips on a timeline or 'play' stuffy directly while recording their actions
we can automate sound effects like footsteps and overlay other sounds easier
it will fit to the player's screen size and graphics quality
any changes to art assets or Stuffy will automatically change in the cutscene due to shared assets
While it is definitely a big step to get it all up and running, and learning a new workflow, it will ultimately be easier for us overall and make cutscene work faster. We could even have animators focus on blockouts and framing, while an artist can also work in the scene to do an art and lighting pass.
We're still figuring it out, running tests, and getting the animators setup with git and Unity for the first time! Our tests have shown promising results, though!
Better Pause Menu Animation
The pause menu animation has been fixed and adjusted, so it now plays nice and smooth! For a long time, this was broken due to a wrong Unity Animator setup and some wonky code.
Loading Screen Animation
Instead of having the loading screen simply appear and disappear, we wanted to add an effect that makes it feel more natural. We spent several hours prototyping a rolling paper effect, but weren't able to get it right yet. So, we've added a simpler squash and stretch effect when the loading screen appears.
We think this is better than nothing... but still hope to get that rolling paper effect working at some point!
Story Overworld Map
Stuffy's Adventure is meant to be the core part of the game. It'll hopefully serve as a decent example of what the game offers overall, with examples of our assets, gameplay, and proof of what the level editor can be used for.
Because most players are, well, players... we want to make this area of the game feel big and important. To do that, we've decided it's best to immerse the player right in the story world instead of slapping the levels into a simple menu.
We're in the early stages of prototyping a story map that's been planned for at least over a year now. We've started our work by making sure you can load into this new game map from the main menu and ensuring the game recognizes it as its own new game state.
Stuffy is already somewhat functional on the story map, allowing them to run around in 3D and interact with things, as they do in levels. This is possible because Stuffy is designed and coded as a 3D character, but we've locked them into a layered space due to the game's 2.5D layered-level design.
We have loads of ideas for how the story map could look and what's possible in it, but we'll save that for later when more progress is made!
Story Planning and Revisions
Carter, our primary writer for the Restitched story (taking the helm after our former writer, Billy), has been busy revising the story document that we've had planned for years! We really enjoy the story that's been laid out, and we can't wait to see how it might translate into actual gameplay.
Telling full stories is tricky in games like ours. Everything must be built with the level editor's offerings, but that's only possible when it's mostly final and stable! It's also tricky to make characters and worlds in our limited format. We'll likely rely on environment/level design, possible engine-side cutscenes, and speech boxes to guide the player through it.
In any case, the story is always being revised and polished before we actually get around to making the levels! Our latest round of changes has shown a lot of promise by answering some lingering questions and concerns we've had.
We're basically ready to begin building the first 3 story worlds' levels just as soon as the level editor is ready with all its base features. These areas of the story are the most finalized ones, and have a good chunk of their in-game assets ready for use.
Tilt/Zoom/Pan Camera
In the later stages of the Wardrobe Test, we added the ability to zoom, tilt, and pan the camera around Stuffy based on the playtesters' suggestions. This helps you place Stamps more accurately and to get a closer look at the items you're editing.
Secondary Recoloring
Another huge request from playtesters was to get extra recoloring options for some Cosmetics. More control equals more creativity! Now, we've made custom shaders and coded extra menu items to let you set a secondary color on some items via the Design Tool.
Wash Tool
Placed too many Stamps? No problem! Use the Wash Tool to select any Cosmetic and scrub it clean. Would you rather wipe all Stamps everywhere on Stuffy? We've also added an option for that, which can be done by holding a certain key and clicking anywhere on your player.
New Categories and Layout
We've reorganized some Cosmetic categories and split them up into more chapters in the Craftbook menu. This was a change based on playtester feedback, as some people felt it was overwhelming to have too many categories and items shown on a single page.
Now, Cosmetics are split across several 'chapters' (or pages), including Skin, Head, Face, Upper Body, and Lower Body. Within those chapters are categories, like Ears, Horns, Noses, Eyes, etc...
"Hand Prop" Pose Override
When Stuffy holds a Prop in their free hand (left side), it would usually show up as a bunch of awkward clipping. This was because they played the usual idle animation, which was made assuming there'd be nothing in the hand.
To fix this, DeRose added a special override to the arm when a prop Cosmetic is held. Now, Stuffy will hold items away from their body and at a new angle. Because of this change, we've had to manually resize and realign several hand items! ...much better now, right?
(WIP) Hat+Hair Deformation
This prototyped feature was introduced at the end of the Wardrobe Test and adds the option to wear certain hair and head items together. We've added shapekeys to some hairstyle meshes, then we flag each eligible hat type with its own shape number. When worn together, the hair will try to deform to match the shape of the hat you have on.
In some cases, deforming the hair isn't enough. So, we either scale or adjust the head item to fit better. For example, the Miner Helmet sits very low. When wearing it with hairstyles, it'll move upward, letting the hair be visible.
This is a prototyped feature because it takes incredible amounts of manual work to support it, and needs to consider several dozen combinations. Likely, this will not become the 'golden standard' for the game, and players will need to decide for themselves if it works well enough to wear certain hat+hairstyles together.
We'll do our best to improve this when and where possible, but do expect lots of minor issues with clipping, as not every head item is shaped the same!
Stamp Hover Effect
Just like in the level editor, the Stamp selection hover effect is now working in the Wardrobe, thanks to our coder Linus! This came with lots of challenges and unknowns (we're not shader experts), but we were able to add it and have it match the player's UI color too.
This makes highlighting Stamps so much easier! Now you'll always know which one you're about to pick up.
Emotes Chapter + Previews
We've added an Emotes dataset! This is a collection of assets that associate animations with their own title, description, author, special settings, etc...
This makes it possible to preview emote animations from the Wardrobe, and later we plan to add support for setting emotes in preset slots for use in gameplay. For instance, maybe you want to set 'flexing' as a readily-available emote. You'd do so in the Wardrobe menu, then press whatever input it was mapped to when you're back in a level.
This feature will mainly be for use in multiplayer, so we're not actively pursuing its development past this until more multiplayer progress is made later.
New Music Tracks
Our resident music man, Thomas, has composed new music for the game. This includes both level music and Wardrobe music!
Sound Support in Wardrobe Animations
Gabe has coded support for subtle sound effects to play when Stuffy is doing certain animations. For now, we've added this to the torso unequip, "wash tool scrub", and nose pat animations. When Stuffy wipes their chest or pats their face, you'll hear subtle sounds to make it feel a bit more realistic!
Hotkey Action Sounds
When you press one of the action hotkeys, a special sound can now play for some. This includes actions like cloning, flipping, ungrouping, and so forth...
Sound File Loudness Normalization
We've updated a couple of sound effects to normalize loud peaks in the audio. This was done for the generic select sound, for instance. We felt it was a bit too loud at its peak, so we dampened it slightly for easier listening.
We've also trimmed some empty space from certain sound effects files. This makes them play and/or end quicker, feeling more responsive.
Character Movement Rework
DeRose has jumped right back into gameplay work and has been busy resuming progress on Stuffy's refactored movement code. The 'playercontroller' script is responsible for almost everything the player does, including how they move and feel.
Because gameplay is the reason to play a game, we must balance it until it feels right. Instead of working off an ancient, messy player script, we've decided to make a new script that carries over and improves the same features.
DeRose is currently focused on improving Stuffy's movement to use real 3D code, rather than splitting movement style between left/right and in/out (layers). This makes them feel more predictable to control and take full advantage of 3D space.
Additionally, we're working on improvements to slope behavior and mid-air steering. We want Stuffy to feel quick and responsive, but also reactive to the environment. They'll flail when they fall, stumble when they slip, and brace when they land. However, tuning it with the actual movement will improve the way it feels to play. We hope to find a balance between being responsive, but still look weighted and grounded in the scene.
Mid-air steering after a jump can work in many different ways, and we're still trying to find what's right for the game. Do we let running jumps have a greater distance? Do we let you tightly steer in the air, or do we base it on momentum from your run prior? Do we cancel air momentum when you try to change direction, or do we just make its force act against the existing velocity from the running-jump?
Thicker Layers
We've made a significant change to the game this month. Layers are now thicker and account for 1.5 units of space instead of the previous 1.0 units.
We've made this change because we felt a single layer was far too thin to land depth-based jumps on, causing frustration and not being very fun. The higher a player's margin of error is, the more enjoyable simple platforming can feel.
The thinner layers of the past didn't really support important objects like trampolines, blink bubbles, etc. They were so thin in depth that we had to flatten the models just to make them fit inside. This might have looked 'okay' from the normal gameplay view, but turning the camera to the side revealed just how tight and restrictive they really were.
This helps solve a longtime major burden and concern of ours!
Increased Layer Count
Not only did we thicken layers a bit, but we've also increased the max number of layers you can use. Previously, the limit was 15 thick layers. We've bumped this up slightly to 20.
This was a decision we made via team voting and personal experiences in the game. We feel that Stuffy's 3D movement style thrives with more space, and there's no real reason we couldn't increase this arbitrary limit to allow for deeper level styles. It also makes camera controls like top-down views more useful.
More layers (and thicker ones) improve the game feel for Stuffy, allow more room to create, and are still always completely optional. You can still use however many you want!
Pushing In/Out Experiments
A game design flaw we've been feeling more lately is the way we unite 3D movement in a 2.5D layered world. Creatures like Stuffy can move freely, but certain actions are locked to an axis/layer. Why can you push things left and right, but not in and out? Players might expect this to be possible, since we're teaching them that Stuffy moves freely. Why not the objects they push too?
We quickly 'hacked' in a prototype to push objects through layers, and not only left and right. So far, it feels good and looks right. We think this might be a missing piece of the puzzle to help expand level design into bigger, interactive areas.
You might remember our chessboard scene from the Official Trailer. What if you could push the blocks around on the chessboard using both left/right and in/out movement?
However, one issue here is that layers exist for a reason, and we can't simply allow physics objects to sit between two of them. To fix it, we're thinking of changing pushing through layers into a 'shove' movement, so Stuffy would apply a burst of force to nudge the object back or forward one layer at a time. We know this can work, because classic grid-based 3D games like Tomb Raider (PS1-era) did the same!
We'd need to interpolate or ramp the movement between layers to avoid it looking too linear and rigid. We'd aim to sell the effect that you're genuinely, smoothly shoving it around and not just snapping it back a layer.
Prefab-Based Slopes + More?
During discussions about the game design concern mentioned above, our lead coder, Raphael, also suggested adding prefab-based objects to further unite layers and 3D movement. One of these ideas included a slope, which Stuffy could fully interact with by walking up and down it, or sliding if it's too steep.
Our current concerns are how to implement this within the system we've already created for layer-based objects. If it can be a building material, it'd have to be a special type. If so, can it be vertex edited (likely not)? How do layer-based objects interact with it if they can't rotate forward?
Stuffy, as a 3D-coded character, already supports moving around on slopes regardless of their orientation, so we have no concerns from the player side of things.
Broken Stuffy Placement
We've fixed a long-broken feature this month. Last year, we changed the way Stuffy moves around in physics settings. We now use interpolation to smooth the movement. As a result, the placement of Stuffy in the level editor would not change layers, because movement was fighting the code for cursor position.
Now this has been fixed, and even improved a bit! There's a new smoothing effect when Stuffy scrolls between layers, so the effect looks less jarring than the original snapping.
Build Shadows Bug
For whatever reason, the game has different lighting in builds than it does in the Unity editor. This was a big issue we spent weeks debugging when it first happened after our trailer build from December 2024. We weren't able to nail down the exact reason, so we updated Unity to no avail. Then, we deleted baked lighting data and hardcoded our own ambient light source in. This seemed to mostly fix it.
A similar (or perhaps the same?) issue is back, and this time showing up in the main menu. We haven't figured it out yet, but we'll be looking into this once the main menu is more complete... in case it resolves itself along the way.
Prop -> Material Cutouts
When you place a Prop inside of a Building Material, it's supposed to cut out the material in the shape of the Prop's colliders. This feature was added years ago at the start of development, back when we used 2D physics and 2D colliders.
Over the years, the game has changed significantly. This feature has fallen far behind, as it's not often used during development and was easily missed.
Now this is broken more, as it only cuts out materials in the first game layer and is very tiny. We've spent hours trying to debug this, but none of our fixes or ideas worked.
As of now, this is still broken until we can revisit it or have new ideas on how to convert 3D prop colliders back to 2D and get it to register with the material cutting system.
Broken Sky in Builds
Strangely, exiting the Wardrobe and returning to the level editor in a build will break the sky and lighting. We aren't sure why this happens yet, as the issue doesn't exist in Unity.
Missing Mannequin Preview in Builds
Another build issue is the pause menu preview of your Stuffy doesn't show any cosmetics! There's likely some editor-only code somewhere that prevents this, but it's strange that it only happens here and not in other areas of the game. Maybe it's even related to the broken sky mentioned above?
Craftbook in Wrong Places
Sometimes when you switch the game state, the Craftbook wouldn't be told to teardown, change, or hide. For example, going to the wardrobe and exiting back to the main menu would make the Craftbook stay, even in an area where it shouldn't exist. This would happen when switching between play and edit mode sometimes, too.
We've improved the code and tied it to the game states better, so now the game will recognize if the Craftbook is showing up in an unsupported game mode and hide it.
Chapter Ribbons Stuck/Duplicated
For most of development, the Craftbook's chapter "ribbon" effect would sometimes get confused and duplicate itself based on the last chapter you viewed in a different game mode. We also had an issue where loading in the Wardrobe for the first time would highlight a chapter icon, but not show the ribbon.
This was partly related to the way we handle the UI's chapter ribbon animation, but also some code that didn't refresh or clean up the UI when game modes change. This is now fixed, and the ribbon will only have one copy active and only for actively-selected pages.
Chapter Count Mismatch Bug
When we change between the wardrobe and level editor, each game mode has its own Craftbook Chapters List asset, which holds all of the pages the menu is supposed to have for that game state. When the amount of chapters were different from each other, the Craftbook would try to create new chapters to fill the missing amount. This resulted in duplicate chapters, like 2 search pages.
We've fixed this, so now the game stores and refreshes the right array between game mode changes.
Horns Not Stampable
Near the end of Wardrobe Testing, we created a whole new Cosmetic category for the first time in a long time. This category was for Horns (rather than scattering them across the head and ears categories). However, we missed a step when setting this up, so Stamps couldn't be picked up from the horns they were placed on.
This has been fixed, and now everything works as expected! Who doesn't love a simple fix?
Stuffy Joins Fraymakers! (Community Mod)
In an impressive community mod, Whimz has brought Stuffy to the Fraymakers fighting game! Stuffy is considered an "Assist", and can use their trusty Needle 'n Thread mechanic to help you take down an opponent!
“Stuffy swings their Needle & Thread forward to pull in foes for a quick bear hug, doing low damage but putting them in a position for strong follow ups. If you’re a bit more strategic, you can utilize them for forcing opponents to go airborne or for catching foes on the way down.”
Check out the trailer here, and find more links in the video description!
Wardrobe Test Creations
Our playtesters have made some mind-blowing custom Stuffies during the playtest! Check out some of our recent favorite outfits:
YouTube Videos
Some of our community members have posted some informative or gameplay videos about Restitched! Check out some of them below!
Mario Outfit Timelapse - by Whimz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8nZh7TwvWM
"The wardrobe test is INSANE" - by Marneyy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZeunUPrrmo
"Restitched Wardrobe Test - outfit time-lapse" - by Marneyy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5DEBNSXE64
"I played Restitched - let me tell you EVERYTHING" - PlushPiney
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Fj-NwDgSdk
"What is planned for Restitched in 2026" - by PlushPiney
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnB_D2_hjYw&pp=2AYK0gcJCZEKAYcqIYzv
Discord Fan Art
The fan art channel on our Discord server has some super neat things, like full recreations of the Stuffy model, outfit concepts, reaction memes, and more. Check out a few of them here!
...and that'll do it for January! We hope you've enjoyed seeing our progress from the month, and we can't wait to make and share even more. ❤️
2026 is already off to a strong start! At this rate, we're stoked to see everything finally come together! Restitched is a big and ambitious game. It's also our first, and as hobbyists no less.
We appreciate all your support, patience, encouragement, and shared excitement! Several years ago, we started this project as just an idea... but through passionate work, we've learned so much, and it's shaping up to be more than we imagined!
We hope our open communication on Discord, along with these Recapped! posts (and other Patreon content), show that we care and want you along for the journey.
Your feedback shapes our development, and we enjoy feeling like we're making the game with you, not just for you. <3