Death Road to Canada STOMACH Update

This update again adds tons of content, of all types. There's new locations including 2 new starter locations, 5 rare characters, weapons, gameplay modes, text events, 4 new vehicles with special properties. There are also major reworks to some old content, along with the usual bugfixes. There's so much that it's hard to focus on one thing, but I would like to point out that there's some new changes to City locations! Now you can find interesting setpieces in the cities, to vary those locations a bit.

Read more for a full list of changes for this update and quick news on on my next game, Space Dingus! All the way at the bottom of this post, there will also be a mysterious preview for the next update, TRACHEA. EDIT: Hotfix changes below, as we add them.

Here is a message from the update developer, Professor Sycamore:

[c]Hello my beloved community! I hope you're all doing well. I've been hard at work on this update, and the next update - TRACHEA - is already in development. [/c]

[c]The improvements this update are quite visible - you will almost definitely notice new things if you start a run.[/c]

[c]I hope you enjoy this mountain of content! This is our largest update yet. I'm going to sleep for a good 200 years now. [/c]

[c]Lots of love Sycamore![/c] [c] [/c]

As always, let us know what you think about this update! Either on this steam page, or the Official Rocketcat Discord.

Space Dingus News

Monthly developer logs about our progress continue. We started limited playtesting awhile back, but haven't opened up wider Discord/Steam playtesting yet. We figured that we got this far, so instead of doing a tiny "does this run?" kind of playtest, we may as well get the entire gameplay loop running.

Here is a link to our last developer log, so you can see what experimental stuff we've been working on while we work towards the Big Playtest: View on Steam

As always, please Wishlist the game and sign up for the upcoming Steam Playtest:

Space Dingus HOTFIX #1 Changes (4/4 9:03 AM PDT)

• Fixed issue where car could sometimes collide with road signs in freak accident

• THE HORRORS zombie spawns no longer continue to occur after end state is reached at Canada border

Full List of Changes for STOMACH Update

Rare characters

• Admiral : prevents bandits and car breakdowns! Loves water!

• Zeus : SMITE ME OH MIGHTY SMITER

• B*yonetta : Combo madness!

• Magus

• Pewter

New Weapons

• Dolt ACP, fires twice as slow, always pierces two targets

• Target rifle, 1-3 penetration range

• Battle rifle, faster than hunting rifle but much lower pen

• New Police Station loot:

  • Added Machinepistol, an interim between uzi and pistol

  • Added SWAT shotgun, an interim between the shotgun and top tier shottys

New Locations and Adjustments

• Train Ride! Hop aboard an automatic train. The first of "Holdout" type missions!

• Antiquated Citadel! Defend until the gate can open. Lots and lots of ammo!

• 2 New Starting Locations

  

  • Railyard: Pry open containers w/ a crowbar.

  • AddedParking lotA wide variety of cars are available, including the new vehicles!

• Adjustment to City generation, including new setpieces!

  

• Integrated reworked cities into the pool of available layouts. There are now 36 cities in total, up from 18. Easy cities also have rework equivalents

  • Reworked cities have all sorts of new decorations

Gameplay Modes

• Mutation Mode EX! More zombies, and the zombies now also gain much more HP over time!

• THE HORRORS MODE. Zombies always know where you are, and spawn from the ground even in missions!

• RPG mode has been reworked! Many of the classes have received balance changes or been

  redesigned outright. Furthermore, your starting perks, traits and stats matter much more now!

Weapon Reworks and Adjustments

• GUN ANIMATIONS FOR MOST MAJOR FIREARMS! Weapons affected:

  • Pistol, silenced pistol, shotgun, slug shotgun, hunting rifle, minigun, uzi, ak47, dolt, snubnose, flechette shotgun

  

• Axe Rework!

  • Axes now all hit one singular target, but create an AoE effect around the target!

  • In many cases, this allows them to cleave more than before!

• Many axes have also had their cooldowns reduced!

• WHIP NERFS

  • Leather whip power -> 0.2

  • Gave leather whips a 0.5% break chance

  • Infernal whip multihit -> 3

  • All CDs increased by ~10%

Trait Reworks and Adjustments

• Resilient type rework; now provides 1 damage reduction from events

  • Removed +1 HP for resilient type

• Hidden potential rework; check in game for details, now provides max bonus to stats when training

• The Big Shot reworks; now is much more consistent and applies to shotguns, also has different colour bullets

• Trademark Weapon rework: the following traits now have a weapon...

  [c]--------------------------------[/c]

  [c]Bandit || Switchblade[/c]

  [c]Warrior || Steel Pike [/c]

  [c]BERSERK || Skullcutter[/c]

  [c]BTTW || Switchblade[/c]

  [c]Hero Type || Silver Longsword[/c]

  [c]Oblivious || Frozen Ham [/c]

  [c]Resilient || Mailbox [/c]

  [c]Fierce Temper || Sledgehammer[/c]

  [c]Hyperfixated || Phaseblade [/c]

  [c]Craftsman || Stillson Wrench [/c]

  [c]TBD || Megaphone [/c]

  [c]---------------------------------[/c]

Location Adjustments

• Added alternative prison layout

• Mysterious factory has received improvements to it's loot table. No more umbrellas!

• Removed buoys from beach after consistency complaints

• Added pool noodles to the beach

• Nerfed prison loot slightly

• Exchanged some old trees for better looking ones; relevant to beach, bus depot

• Added 4 new vehicles to mechanical rare trader camp

Text Events

• BISON CROSSING

• CULTIST BANDITS

  

• DARK CARNIVAL

• SKELETON CAPTAIN

• Added calmshot interaction to merciless bandits

• Ringmaster can now command his spider to eat other spiders in events

QOL Improvements

• Expanded list of tips and tricks at game start screen - now 100!

• Fixed many temporary chars being able to steal your loot!

• INFOMATIC LIBRARY added to Zombotown/Unlocks Zone, a place where you can read about extended info about game mechanics!

Other New Content

• Reworked Nimbus

  • Nimbus can now sometimes pick a stat-up when a mission ends, representing his RPG level grinding

• Added new vehicles, exclusive to harbour and parking lot...

  • Ambulance. Fast but fragile, 13 MPG. Characters operate at one medical skill higher than normal when healing

  • Taxi. Average speed. 12 MPG. Choose one more location for city shop looting events

  • 18-wheeler. Hard to repair but chonky

  • Camper Van. Slow, extremely easy to repair, eats gas. Provides chance to dodge TIRED effect

• Changed Van Smelt scaling to make it more effective, especially past 30 headshots

• Road dialogue for all chars from QUADRICEPS, RETINA and STOMACH

• Added VISUAL ONLY military zombies to military depot and citadel

• More ending conversations for all modes! Quick Death also has an expanded conversation tree as a reward for beating it!

• Flavor text for when TIRED is successfully avoided

Tweaks and Bugfixes

• Pet shop dogs no longer pick up items until recruited

• Added flavour text for when a stat is maxed out but tries to increase

• Fixed "brandish guns" option showing when you don't have any guns

• Fixed "JUMP IT MAN" outcomes not dealing car damage

• Fixed various bugs and text issues in other events

• Improved wording of the tutorial and throwing objects guide

• Reduced prices of gimmick trader items

• Improved compatibility between Back To The Wall and other perks

• Chickens should now properly not pickup loot

• Fixed bug where cities would not always generate their selected store

• Improved visibility of keys and safe combos in edge scenarios

• Fixed several events not accounting for gourmands, pets or tiny eaters

• Fixed ancient bug pertaining to healing events

• Fixed campfires in trader camps not using the right food amount when resting

• Adjusted distant thunderstorm FX frequency in weather mode (applies to non-thunder weather)

• Fixed Lynn Thompson grammar error

• Fixed G*rf text event bug

• Major WIP feature for modders: Prefab Builder. Visit events/stomach/parking_lot_test for a more complete overview & notes. This is useful since nearly all base game buildings are controlled by hardcoded words

• Fixed zombie sprite bug

• Fixed weapon lists bug

• Fixed various other bugs

• Fixed Phoenix bottle bug

• Fixed ancient bug that made keys not spawn in houses

• Fixed bug with Quiet Hotel and similar locations

• Fixed Isabelle smite applying to incorrect weapon types

• Adjusted Isabelle smite sfx for less audio fatigue

• Fixed car key spawning bug in specific area

• Fixed bug where post mission screen wouldn't show in some locations

• Fixed bug where keys could spawn twice

• Fixed bug where Mecha Mountie could kill people still

• Fixed bug where halberd was inadvertently affected by axe rework

• Fixed typo in hints

• Museum treasure spawning reliability improved

• Improved consistency in Mansion loot spawning, both rare and uncommon

• Improved consistency in for rare Altar location

• AdjustedMODDERSDrastically improved the Prefab Generator tool. Check parking_lot_example for details

• MODDERS: rifles now preserve more values when penetrating, such as shooterid or anim.substate

TRACHEA Update Preview

Steam post imageWorking on a new Prefab Builder for easier creation of buildings. Also shown, a couple of new Rare Characters! Steam post image

New Location WIP, the Harbor.