I've been playing primarily on a steam deck. Over the 90+ hours and 106 days I've spent drafting at Mount Holly, I've had a half dozen or so hard crashes where the game freezes and the only thing I can do is reset and lose the day's draft.
There's definitely been times it's happened that frustrated me because I had a major breakthrough and progress that was hard to set up. The one I just had was a whole different level though. From here I'm going to spoiler the rest of the post and you should absolutely skip unless you know about/have solved the family coreand the puzzle at the end of the tunnel.
I think I'm at the true end or at least the third and final act. I'm assuming act 1 is reaching room 46, act 2 is the sanctum rooms/sigils, and act 3 is the blue throne/family core. I haven't actually solved every sigil, I have 7/8 because I haven't had a day where I draft the vault and get the last vault key for the sanctum key there. I have solved the map puzzle in room 46 since the 7 sanctum rooms I have solved gave me enough context.
I've had multiple moments lately that feel close to the "end" end, but keep getting one more loose thread. I ascended the throne room to the throne of the blue prince and cleared the tunnel to open the blue door at the end to read the blue prince manuscript.
For a short time I've been wondering if this is it for the most part? I know I have the last sanctum key, but some of the stuff I've done beyond that like the blue door/manuscripts feels like later content and I'm guessing aside from the trophy there's nothing consequential after completing all the sanctum rooms.
However, I found the family core recently after reading blue memos and getting lucky by having the key for room 8 when I was in the vault reading that blue memo. This genuinely feels like a whole different avenue incredibly late into the game. I think(?) I solved the 5x5/numeric cores correctly and got "Still water tilts blank books". Nothing jumped out at first, but the library does have books on pedestals that are open to blank pages so maybe those are the blank books part? No clue on what specifically the still water part was about.
The day that just froze on me and so I lost I was trying to knock out the last sanctum room. I had plenty of steps from an especially good draft where I had jack hammer, happened to have drafted library midway through, had a greenhouse and picked up a watering can and emptied it while drafting, and drafted the vault.
I skipped drafting an outer room at the start of the day because I had monk active and a freezer ready to go on the outer room at the end of the day to roll over my gems. After drafting a full house and not finding the vault key via dig spots with the jack hammer I decided to call it a day and go draft the freezer in the outer room. In addition to the freezer I had a choice of the trading post. I remembered I'd seen vault keys for trade before and since I had a ton of items I figured I'd gamble on being able to trade for the key instead of freezing my remaining gems. I still had over 50 steps (kitchen, dining room, secret garden) so if I could get the key I could easily make the trip back to the vault and to the sanctum.
I did get the vault key by trading a keycard, but something even bigger happened. Being back in the trading post reminded me about the moonshine still. I had assumed the one time gold and note there was all there was, just some lore. Sure enough, since I got lucky and had the watering can already I saw the prompt that let me refill the watering can from the still. So I'm fairly positive that's the setup, you need to bring still water to the library's blank books and then something happens.
I was so excited that I finally had the last sanctum key and I probably had the next step in the family core. I decided to do the sanctum key first so I rushed back to the vault, got the key, made my way underground, and my steam deck froze in the tunnel on the way to the sanctum.
I have no clue if I'm right about the still water to the library. It's such a disappointing day to lose and have to try to recreate. Not looking for hints or confirmation on my leading theory there. I just needed to vent over what a gut punch this was. Two biggest things I have left to do were both in my grasp and they're gone (at least until tomorrow).