The Beast Update - Patch Notes · Legend Bowl update for 25 March 2021

About the Update

Legend Bowl becomes a bigger, more varied experience than ever with new content across the board!

The Beast patch is here, and we are so excited to finally bring this to our players! The game has been upgraded across the board with the goal of improving stability, play ability, and overall quality of the game. We have overhauled several aspects of the game and as subtle as some of these may seem on the surface, rest assure so much has been added to the game under the hood. We've tried to note every piece that has changed since the last patch, but we're sure we've missed some due to the size of this update.

Let's go over some of the main highlights before we dive into the patch notes

The most noticeable change is to the teams and boy are we excited about this one! All 32 teams have been fully upgraded with new logo art, end zone art, and team names. We felt like the old logos weren't doing enough to showcase our game and wanted the teams to be better illustrated across the game. In addition, the stadiums and fields have been upgraded to show new shadows and field texture. The field doesn't look so plain and flat anymore with these new changes. We also added new field art, most notably when playing in the post season. You'll see East and West logos along with playoff themed art on the field now.

The majority of the work in this patch has gone into improving the gameplay. We've spent hundreds of hours cleaning up the on-field gameplay, and we feel the game is just getting better and better each day we play it. To highlight some of the new stuff, we've added injuries to the game. So now players can get injured on the field and lose stamina while playing injured which makes them slower and less effective during the game. Their skill and fatigue will be negatively affected while playing injured, but they can still play. The CPU will auto substitute injured players when available players are on the bench, but you will have to manage your roster manually when players get injured, so watch out for this one.

Auto substitutions are now a thing! This is huge because bench players matter now and players will sub in and out based on percentages settings. You can tune them however you like, but players will now come in and out based on stamina levels and this brings so much more depth into the game. Bench players now get playing time like in real life and statistics don't just go to the starters. We're super excited about this feature and hope you like it as well.

We spent a significant amount of time improving the running to be more successful as we felt it was under powered. So blockers now block more intelligently and make holes for rushers to push through. Rushers also find those holes and follow blockers more effectively now. Down field blocking was upgraded so blockers can better protect ball carriers when running in the open field. So rushing overall has been improved, and we're liking the changes so far.

Lastly, we felt settings needed some love in the game. We have a section below outlining each one, but the community wanted more, so we delivered in a big way. You can finally change settings during a game, which we know doesn't sound like much, but it's super useful to not have to quit a game in order to change a setting. We won't say anymore here as you can read the notes below to get all the details on these new settings.

How to Get it

The Beast Update is a free, automatic download as part of the Early Access development of Legend Bowl. If you've come directly to this post, check out the game here:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1106340/Legend_Bowl/

Once you've downloaded the update, you may need to restart your Steam client. In the off chance the game isn't working properly for you after the update, please try verifying the game files:

Right-click on Legend Bowl in your Steam Library
Select 'Properties...', then select the 'Local Files' tab
Select 'Verify Integrity of Game Files...'

Note: This update will clear out any existing custom rosters or saved data you may have added to the game. We apologize for this inconvenience, but it's Early Access and these core changes to the game are to be expected so hang in there for us!

This may alleviate any issues. If you run into any technical issues, please check our Technical Support FAQ for solutions.

Patch Notes

Gameplay Fixes & Improvements

NEW All 32 teams have been polished and upgraded with new logos and names. We are super pumped about this item and hope you love these as much as we do!
Performance has been greatly improved in this patch. The game had several memory leaks that would cause slow downs across the game. This was a huge undertaking and should vastly improve the stability.
NEW "Auto Subs" setting controls when players sub in and out based on stamina level percentages.
Tuned kicking for less out of bounds kickoffs and more realistic field goals.
Fixed issue where player skill ratings would be shown in decimals due to difficulty settings.
Bumped up fumble percentage when quarterbacks are tackled.
CPU AI has been given tuning to increase the amount of shorter yardage plays and avoid the high frequency of big plays.
Run blocking improved to open holes for the running back based on chosen play.
Teams now have base 3-4 or 4-3 defensive formations so depending on what team you play against the CPU will choose these base formations during play calls.
Blocking up field has been upgraded to give more protection when running the ball.
Rushing AI path finding improved to follow blockers and avoid tacklers.
Quarterback sacks have been tuned as QB's would either throw the ball away or run 100% of the time and avoid sacks.
Fixed several bugs where wrong team gets ball or line of scrimmage incorrect during fumbles that go out of bounds.
Fixed issue where receivers would stop running after a catch and wait until user interacted. Receivers now move with ai logic until gamepad is pressed.
Ball carrier hurdles only work when tackler is diving close to ground now.
Fixed numerous issues where players would move to incorrect spots on field because of bug in movement ai code.
Throwing lofted passes are no longer penalized unless blue meter is less than 1%. It used to be 10% or less got heavily penalized. This means you can now throw more accurate soft touches passes and lead receivers without being penalized.
Passing when meter is red received an increase in accuracy penalty.
Fixed issue where WR, TE, HB, or FB that were blocking would be included in receiver progression list and showed receiver icon when they were blocking only.
Fixed player sprite issue where quarterback would have ball after dropping it when out of bounds at the end of play.
Fixed issue when playing training camp offense only mode and other team's players showing on field.
Tuned stamina to work nicely alongside new auto substitution feature.
Fixed ball carrier running west sprite because ball was off centered from arm.
Fixed issue where ball carrier AI was incorrectly moving towards the closest defender instead of away from them.
NEW Referees now fall when colliding with players.
NEW Fall animations have been added when players get blocked and tackled.
Team timeouts now replenish when overtime starts.
Timeouts can now be called during extra point and 2 point conversion plays.
Fixed issue where defenders wouldn't tackle ball carrier when in tackle range.
Fixed issue where sacks were being counted even though QB crossed line of scrimmage.
Roster files updated so player stamina rating now becomes max fatigue level when match starts minus any injury discounts of course.
NEW Play art now displays as players move to line of scrimmage instead of having to wait until players finish lining up.
NEW Defensive players can be cycled by holding down B button and using D-PAD or Left Stick during pre-play to more easily select players.
Fixed issue where defensive players would get stuck in strafe mode instead of run mode.
Team rosters have been updated to store team specific settings for each stadium.
NEW injuries have been added to the game for all game modes. In order to ensure you have enough players for each depth and not cap injuries to only available player spots, we're allowing injured players to still play in games. Their skill and fatigue will be negatively affected while playing injured, but they can still play.
NEW injury animations have been added to the game showing players grabbing leg and moaning.
Players turn with rotation now based on agility rating vs flipping instantly when you move up/down or left/right.
Decreased lineman speed by 20 points globally across roster.
Fixed issue where defender would play conservatively on ball when near the opponent's end zone, thus giving receiver an open catch for a TD.
Fixed issue where plays were being counted twice in team stats.
Fixed ball carrier stiff arm working in opposite direction of closes defender.
Bench players now face different directions and have helmets on or off randomly to look more authentic.
Miscellaneous bugs and fixes.

Art & Visual FX

NEW Steam achievements have been added to the game to give you achievements to unlock!
NEW screenshots can now be taken when pressing the key "C" any time while playing the game so you can show off the game to your friends online. Saves to your "C:\Users\YOUR NAME HERE\AppData\Local\legend_bowl" directory.
New splash screen has been added to give that wow factor... probably not! :)
Patch notes now on main menu that links you to the latest patch notes.
Player card UI can now be toggled on/off during replays.
Added more fans to the stadium.
Fixed camera shake issue when playing replays and camera rattles around when selected player bumps into other players.

Settings

NEW settings for field color, field type, dome, rain %, snow %, baseball field settings tied to team.
Quarter minutes have been widened to now allow setting quarter length between 1 and 15 minutes.
NEW setting to toggle camera shake on/off.
NEW play clock acceleration setting runs down play clock after choosing play to better simulate realistic quarter lengths.
NEW sounds added to game for a more realistic on-field experience.
NEW stadium setting allows user to select 1 of 6 stadiums or set them to be team specific. There are 3 new DOME stadiums and all stadiums have names now.
NEW injury setting to turn injuries on or off.
NEW footsteps sound setting to turn on/off all those taps running across the field.
NEW field color setting allows user to control which field color is shown during a game or you can set them to be team specific.
NEW field turf setting allows user to pick grass or turf field surfaces or you can set them to be team specific.
NEW baseball setting allows user to toggle baseball art on field or you can set them to be team specific.
NEW sim quarter length setting so allow user to control how many minutes simulated games should utilize for simulated season games.
Weather can now be set to TEAM and change depending on the home team's location.

Season & Tournament Modes

Fixed issues with season mode coach not drawing correctly when flipping back and forth through menus
Weekly newspaper no longer changes text and images every time you look at it during the season.
New facility built notification popups when facility is finished being built.
Facilities now build after each week is completed.
Career mode is now called Season mode.
Sim engine improved to allow for more substitutions during simulated games which gives more realistic stats across team depth chart.
Fixed issue where last games of the week were not building weekly wrap-up news when you played or simmed them alone.
Facility team boosts have been added to simmed games.
Season schedules now select from 4 random schedule versions to provide more variety when playing multiple seasons.
Added sim game option to tournament user games.
Tournament team select now shows team rankings.

Crash Fixes

Fixed crash when in season mode and you quit a game before finishing.
Fixed crash when playing as the same teams and checking the depth chart in game.

If you experience any bugs or issues please report them here or more preferably in our Discord where you can chat with the community, report bugs, or give feedback on the game.

As always, if you've enjoyed the game so far and like what you're seeing out of the game it would be great if you can leave a review on Steam!

Twitter
Discord
YouTube

Legend Bowl update for 25 March 2021