So, remember when we said this update was supposed to be out in July?
...Yeah, it's been a hot minute since we last posted anything, but we aren't dead!
What's Going On?!
For starters, this update grew way out of scope; What started as a couple features meant to cap off a large update became a massive update in it of itself while still encompassing all of the planned changes, as well as the promises made last community update. There were a lot of ideas had during the development of this update, as well as some changes to production behind the scenes which led to this update taking much longer than it reasonably should have.
So, in order to cover as much ground as possible, we will be going through each change, one by one.
Fast Forwarding (Floor Warping)
The main feature that this update was meant to bring, you can now travel to any floor from the Hub, assuming you beat the boss of that floor before, all for a nominal fee. The cost of each floor is listed below:
Hotels = 50
Deep Storage = 100
VIP Suites = 200
The means to travel to different floors can be accessed by talking to a new NPC in the Hub; the Casino Concierge! A mysterious figure employed by Moneybags who only communicates through a bright red telephone. Their phone can be found at the desk next to the main door and tutorial door in the Hub.
This feature is unavailable until you have killed at least one boss.
New Items
This update brings with it four (Technically five, but we'll get to it later) new items! Bringing the total item count up to 25.
Music Changes
Three new combat tracks have been added for each floor, giving each floor a truly unique feel and breaking up the monotony of listening to the same track on repeat when in combat. There are also two more new tracks, one of these tracks replacing the Hotel Calm Music due to copyright concerns, the other track plays in the shop. Overall, the new music should help in giving each unique area it's own feel while also providing a refresh to the game's soundtrack.
All of the new tracks were sourced from Kevin Macleod at incompetech.com, a detailed track list/attribution is viewable in the game's credits
Steam Achievements
One of the other large features in the update; Steam API support and Steam Achievements. There are now 42 Achievements that can be earned through playing the game and challenging yourself, such as playing with an item in a specific way, or completing the game without items, there are a slew of new challenges for you to take on with these new achievements.
Some of you may have already seen the achievements appear quietly on the game's library page, and this was due to our internal testing. With this update, every achievement should be achievable.
For those truly daring, unlocking every achievement will reward you with a unique crown to adorn Jimmy's head in-game, showing off your overarching achievement, and allowing you to flex your skill!
In the future, we may use Steam's statistic tracking to store specific stats (Enemies killed, etc.) to allow players to compare and contrast their stats globally, but for now, we have achievements, so get hunting!
Boss Fight Changes
(Or rather, tweaks)
Unfortunately, we weren't able to make any significant changes to boss AI or behaviour, but we were able to spice up the UI bosses use, ontop of adding some extra sequencing and rewards for defeating bosses.
Bosses will now have a large health bar on the bottom of the screen, displaying their HP, attack telegraph, charge timer, and their name.
Defeating a boss and exiting the room will give the player a large chip reward, as well as a brief screen congratulating you for defeating the boss. The chip reward scales based on what floor you're on.
This is designed to refresh the appearance of bosses, as well as allowing for better clarity on health and when the boss is about to attack, especially when offscreen.
New Rooms
There are four new rooms added in this update, 1 for the Hotels and Deep Storage, and 2 for the VIP Suites, rounding out the totals to four rooms per floor, not counting the shop or boss arenas. These new rooms are designed to showcase some of the new traps, while also providing some unique arenas to fight in.
Resonant Safes
Upon clearing the first room of any floor, an item called a Resonant Key will spawn,
This item takes up an item slot, and is the fifth item listed earlier. This item cripples you by limiting you to two items, should you choose to take it.
If the Resonant Key is brought to a shop, it can be used to unlock a massive safe containing large amounts of cash and chips, the reward scaling based on what floor this is done on.
Resonant safes are designed to be simple risk/reward features for giving large amounts of currency and to make the grind for chips easier.
Flawless
If you complete a room without getting hit, you will receive a bunch of cash and chips at the end of a room. This allows you to get a simple reward for playing well, the reward scaling based on what floor you're on. The reward will also scale further based on how many times you've gone flawless in a row.
Telegraphing Changes
Telegraph exclamation marks are now split into two versions
If an enemy has a red exclamation mark and is attacked, their attack is interrupted, preventing them from attacking
If an exclamation mark is yellow, then the enemy's attack cannot be interrupted.
Red exclamation marks are reserved for all normal enemies except for the green soldier types, while yellows are used for all elites and bosses.
In Hard Mode, all enemies except bosses can be interrupted, regardless of exclamation type.
Traps
Two new traps have been added to various rooms. All of these traps have been added into the new rooms and retroactively into the old rooms.
Gas Pipe
A pipe that spews out a cloud of toxic gas on an interval that inflicts poison, has a large, circular area of effect. Starts appearing in Deep Storage.
Flaming Pipe
A pipe that occasionally spews out fire that ignites anything in it's way, has a narrow area of effect. Starts appearing in Deep Storage.
New Enemy Types
Two enemies have been added in this update, both are variations on the ranged goon:
Toxicologist
Donning a surgical mask and teal garbs, this revolver toting fiend fires poisonous bullets as well as being immune to poison and traps. This enemy appears rarely in the Hotels onward, and commonly on Hard Mode.
Hot Shot
Wearing gaudy clothes like their rapid firing cousins, the Hot Shot fires flaming bullets that set both you and props on fire, while also being immune to fire themselves. This enemy also appears rarely in the Hotels onward, and commonly on Hard Mode.
And here's a few more Patches and Changes that don't quite fit anywhere else in the article!
- Loading Screen Layout Changes
- New Contextual Loading Icons
- Various Sequences can now be skipped by clicking the screen (Loading Screen, Floor Warp Countdown)
- Particle Effects for whenever cash or chips are collected, the amount of particles changes based on how valuable the pickup was
- Flash effect whenever health is collected
- Spawn Effects have a bright red light, making them easier to see
- Reload UI Speed is no longer tied to FPS
- Safety Mask now has a visual for when it's equipped
- Safety Mask now protects from Poison damage, similar to the Asbestos Suit
- Buffed the strength of Blue Gloves' luck effect
- The player can no longer glitch their elevation, which led to invulnerability and soft-locking the game
- Adjusted the attack speeds of the Aggressor and Gunslinger
- An overall price increase to the game
Here's a list of what will be coming with the Controller Update
We promise it will not take as long to make the next update!
- Full Gamepad Support
- Statistic Tracking; Track past runs, with the most recent run being viewable in-game
- A grave system, allowing you to reclaim a portion of your cash when you die in a run
- Random Elements that can spawn objects in rooms that either assist you or grant you a new objective you can optionally complete
- Fully redone map screen
- Hard Mode Rebalances
- A new, Unique, Enemy type
- An Alternate Ending to the game
- New Items
- Possibly a Codec System for lore dumping and to finally give the enemies official names/details in game (No promises on this one)
- Updated Steam Page Assets
After this update, we plan to release from early access, marking the game as feature complete. This does not mark the end of development, however, we have plans to make smaller updates and changes after the game's full release!
And with that, we have reached the end of the list of changes!
Or at least, the most major changes + the ones that we could remember, there's probably a large number of tiny changes that went undocumented/we couldn't remember. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
With warm regards from Null Exception Studios, we really hope you all enjoy the update, and have as much fun playing it as we did developing and testing it!
- Ethan
Changed files in this update