Nivalis Better Time

Better Time gives you more time to explore Nivalis and run your businesses. Choose how quickly the day passes, or select an exact wait while the city continues its routines.

Version 2.2.3 — official Update #4, Steam build 25828494.

Install LUZ Civic Terminal (recommended). It can download and install the recommended BepInEx build, import mod ZIPs, manage profiles, check declared dependencies and apply your selected mods. Manual installation remains available.

Features

• Clock speed from 0.0 to 2.0 in steps of 0.1. The default is 0.3; 1.0 is normal speed, 0.5 is half speed, and 0.0 freezes the natural clock.
• A compact native Wait menu with exact hours/minutes/seconds, synchronized arrival previews, a duration slider, presets, and a central dual-time clock.
• Menu-only A/D, Space and Q shortcuts, with saved recall of the last chosen duration.
• Keyboard and controller shortcuts with separate saved bindings in the game's Controls menu.
• Business activity during waits, including customers, ingredient use, completed visits and hourly staff wages.
• A result showing actual time advanced and arrival, meals, visits, cash in, cash out and net cash change. Choose Return to game or Wait again.
• Cancellation that keeps elapsed time and completed purchases or payments.
• Waiting stops at the 02:00 curfew. Use a bed to sleep through 02:00 to 08:00.
• NPC seating, tasks, carried props and placement are refreshed when you return from a wait.
• Metro arrival estimates follow your chosen clock speed. The shared phone-call cooldown no longer stretches with a slower clock.
• Repairs five NPC animations that stopped during sustained eating, kitchen work, dancing, hangover idle and cold-weather stair descent.

Clock settings

Change the speed while playing through Settings > Mods > Better Time when Unofficial Patch is installed, or Settings > Gameplay > Clock Speed when using Better Time on its own. The slider and typed values use one decimal place. Your selection is saved.

The setting changes the natural clock. Sleep keeps its usual destination. Walking, service actions and animations retain their normal pace. At 0.0, natural time freezes; an explicit wait still works.

Using Wait

Press T or LT/L2 during normal gameplay. Finish conversations and put down carried objects first. Drag the slider, type whole hours/minutes/seconds, or choose 15 minutes, 1 hour or Until curfew. Presets only select a duration. Review the arrival day/time, then choose Start waiting. The selection is limited to the next 02:00 curfew.

The slider moves in one-minute steps and includes the exact curfew endpoint. When less than a minute remains, it moves in one-second steps. Exact fields allow second precision throughout. Empty or invalid fields prevent starting.

On a controller, select the slider and use left/right to adjust it. Use up/down and left/right to navigate the other controls. A/Cross on an hours/minutes/seconds box enters adjustment; use the D-pad/stick to change it and B/Circle to finish editing. Keyboard users can use Tab to reach controls and arrow keys to adjust the slider.

Choose Stop waiting, or press Escape, B/Circle or your Wait shortcut. Any active business update finishes before arrival restoration. Elapsed time and committed purchases/payments are retained. The result keeps the actual arrival; Wait again returns to selection without starting automatically.

Waiting at a frozen clock uses normal-speed simulation. Very slow positive clock settings can take longer to process the same wait.

The central analog clock shows current time in amber and arrival in blue. The curved arrow follows the hour hands clockwise; waits longer than twelve hours use an additional rim track. Digital readouts retain exact minutes and seconds.

Businesses and the wait summary

Customers, schedules, ingredient consumption and hourly staff pay continue during a wait. The customer-arrival setting prevents new restaurant visits while the natural clock is frozen, except during an explicit wait. At other speeds, the game's hunger and visit timing follow game time.

The result shows meals, completed visits, cash in, cash out and net cash change. Net cash is not profit: ingredients consumed from existing stock were paid for earlier, and other transactions can affect your balance. Sales still depend on your menu, prices, stock, service and customers.

Metro, phone calls and NPCs

Metro arrival displays account for your clock speed. The shared delay between phone calls no longer grows with a slower day; individual scripted quest delays keep their usual rules.

After waiting, Better Time updates NPC tasks, seating and held objects to match their current activity. It also repairs five sustained NPC animations that would otherwise stop after playing once.

Controls and compatibility

Rebind WAIT in Settings > Controls with the keyboard or controller you want to change. The two choices are saved separately. The menu updates its button hints when you switch devices.

Better Time works independently, and Unofficial Patch adds its settings to the shared Mods tab. City Life can account for needs during waiting and sleep. Other mods that replace the clock or business simulation may conflict.

The optional Nivalis Greenhouse integration targets the inspected 1.0.11 binary. Its workers keep their own presentation and timing rules. Accelerated Wait does not promise normal-play greenhouse production throughput. Native gameplay acceptance is pending.

Nivalis Greenhouse 1.0.12 has since been published but has not been verified with this integration. Better Time refuses accelerated Wait with an unsupported provider before changing its clock or input state.

Known limitations

A crowded or obstructed location can leave an NPC without a verified clear position after waiting. Better Time keeps that NPC's position and logs a warning. Waiting does not fix every seating or navigation problem. If a wait stops with an error, keep the log for a bug report.

Physical input testing has not covered every keyboard layout or custom controller. Report the device and binding if WAIT does not respond.

Version 2.2.3 remains a candidate. Both waits in the latest 2.2.2 Windows playthrough completed without reported presentation-handoff failures. The new activation guards and the latest candidate still require their own gameplay acceptance.

Updating

Keep NivalisSlowDays.dll and your existing hvizeu.nivalis.slowdays.cfg. Remove the deprecated standalone Half, Quarter and Eighth Speed variants; Better Time itself remains supported.

Installation

Requires Windows x64 and BepInEx 6 IL2CPP.

With LUZ: close the game, select your profile and use Maintenance > Install recommended BepInEx if needed. After first-time loader setup, start the game yourself once, let it initialize, then close it. Use Registry > Import ZIP / DLL to import this mod, then Apply profile. If you already have mods in the game, use Maintenance > Import existing installation before your first Apply. Keep the full plugin folder, including manifest.json and icon.png.

Installing through a Thunderstore-compatible mod manager also installs the declared dependency, BepInEx-BepInExPack_IL2CPP-6.0.755. Launch through that manager when using its profile.

The tested loader is build 788. Compatibility with the dependency's build 755 has not been verified in-game.

For manual installation, install the loader separately and follow these steps:

1. Save and close the game. Back up your saves in %USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\Ion Lands\Nivalis Nights.
2. In Steam, select Manage > Browse local files.
3. If BepInEx is not installed, extract the loader beside Nivalis Nights.exe. Start the game once to initialize it, then close it.
4. Extract this mod's ZIP into the game folder, merging the BepInEx folders.
5. Keep one copy of NivalisSlowDays.dll under BepInEx/plugins/NivalisSlowDays/. Replace the old DLL when updating and keep your configuration.

Press T or LT/L2 to open Wait. Change WAIT in Settings > Controls. With Unofficial Patch installed, clock settings are under Settings > Mods > Better Time. Otherwise use Settings > Gameplay > Clock Speed. Inside Wait: A/D change duration by thirty minutes, Space starts, and Q toggles saved duration/zero. Shortcuts pause during numeric editing.

To uninstall, close the game and remove this mod's DLL. Keep BepInEx if your other mods need it. Removing a mod does not undo saved progress.

Feedback and support

If this helps your playthrough, an endorsement or rating is appreciated. For bug reports, include the mod version, game version, other mods, steps to reproduce, and BepInEx/LogOutput.log. For performance reports, include hardware, graphics settings and a comparison on the same save.

Support my work on Ko-fi. Made by Hvizeu. Uses BepInEx, HarmonyX and Il2CppInterop, supplied separately with the loader. This is an independent, unofficial mod.