We're happy to announce that the first update for Rogue Cell, version 1.1, has been released! We tried hard to get this one out while the game is still on sale. This update includes New Game+, quality of life improvements, and some bug fixes, outlined below.

New Game+

Spoilers ahead for those who want to experience it for themselves!

NG+ is a mode that will unlock once you have completed the main game. For those who have already beaten the boss, this mode should automatically unlock. You can access this mode from the main menu by selecting New Game+.

As hinted at in the above notification, NG+ will throw hazards at you right from the start, including prey cells, predator cells, viruses, and a couple new variants:

• Fast Prey: these speedy cells are similar to regular prey cells, except they will zip by at greater speeds and won't deviate to grab mass.

• Tiny Viruses: these smaller viruses will drift through the environment and act as an early-game hazard that players can avoid or take advantage of.

• Worker-Spawning Predators: these super predators act like other super predators, except they've learned the mystical art of creating worker cells to collect mass. Keep an eye out for these early-game giants.

Prices in the upgrade tree have also been increased by 50% for this mode, and if that's not enough, a respawn cost will take 25% of your DNA, so be sure to spend it while you have it, and plan ahead before hoarding points.

This mode also features times to beat in a post-game, local leaderboard, as well as a timer to keep track of how fast you're progressing. We've already seen a pretty incredible completion time in the beta:

Quality of Life

On the QoL side, three big changes have been made.

• An indicator has been added to the upgrade panel, to indicate that there are upgrades available down below the bottom of the screen, for those upgrades you might have missed while scrolling up.

• Some players were confused by Immune System and Beneficial Virus. Immune System gives you a 50% chance to survive a virus, rewarding you with nothing if your survive absorbing a virus, while Beneficial Virus would add DNA to that survival. Some players missed the connection, so to simplify it, we've moved Beneficial Virus to be a requirement for Immune System II, and to come after Immune System. Immune System will now give a small amount of DNA on survival, with Beneficial Virus boosting the amount, as it felt very underwhelming to get nothing for surviving.

• Some players reported some very bad luck with rolling that 50/50 chance with Immune System. While mathematically possible to get 40+ deaths in a row, it's not exactly fun. So to remedy this, we've updated the coin flip to be more "smooth". You should expect far fewer deaths in a row. And, to encourage players to give it a try (and to not discourage it right after unlocking), the first virus after unlocking the upgrade will always be a successful roll.

Bugs

Suspiciously few bugs... If you've spotted any, please let us know in the Discussions section of the Community Hub, or by contacting us directly at contact@maplelike.com

• Fixed an issue with the boss' damage roar using the wrong roar clip and being too quiet to even notice.

• Fixed confirmation popup not always auto-center-aligning text when displaying 1-2 lines.

• Fixed keyboard/joystick navigation of the options menu, where options would not auto-scroll fully into view on all resolutions.

There are two issues we still have on the list that are being looked at:

• We have had a few reports of achievements not always popping while in-game, and while they do appear after closing the game, this is a big feel-bad moment. While we don't have the solution yet, this is something we're looking into, to determine if it's on the project side, the Steam SDK side, or on Steam's end.

• D-Pad for some controllers still do not work when navigating menus. This is on our list, and we're attempting to source controllers to reproduce this in order to find a fix. We apologize for the inconvenience!

Future Plans

Speaking personally now, Rogue Cell 1.0 was the full game that I set out to make. Version 1.1 builds on that with some quality of life improvements and a New Game+ mode, all inspired by feedback from you. At this point, I consider the game feature-complete. I don’t currently have plans for future content, but I’m always open to ideas and will still work on patches to fix any bugs that crop up. If there's something you'd love to see though, please feel free to share, as I'm not closing the door on future content. But for now, I'll be setting my sights on future projects.

This has been a personal project from the start, with help from friends, as a way to both challenge myself and showcase what I can build independently, and so I'm thrilled to see such a positive response to something I've made and put out there. I appreciate all of your support.

Thanks for playing.