Threat System Overhaul & UI Refinements – Patch 0.11.2

Thanks again to everyone playing the demo and sharing feedback, it’s been incredibly helpful in shaping both the direction and feel of the game!

This week’s update focuses on a major overhaul of the Threat system, alongside UI refinements, new gameplay interactions, and general polish.

A lot of this work lays the foundation for future content, with Threat now becoming a much more central and reactive system.

Threat System Overhaul

Threat has been significantly expanded and is now integrated across enemies, rewards, and encounters.

• Threat is now colour-based, tracked via a dedicated system

• Refactored into a new ThreatManager global for better scalability

• Added functions for adding, removing, and querying Threat cleanly

• UI now pulses and updates dynamically to draw attention to changes

• Added VFX to Threat icons and skull thresholds

Gameplay Integration

• All Forest enemies and the Black deck now interact with Threat

• Enemies gain additional effects at specific thresholds (e.g. 10+ Threat)

• Added new threshold-based rewards:

  • Increased gold at higher Threat

  • Improved rarity of battle card rewards

Boss & Run Impact

• Boss reveal now factors in Threat colour, i.e black boss more likely to appear with higher black threat. (This will only matter in full version of Hunter's Hand)

• Each boss is tied to a colour, with white Threat split evenly

• Ties are resolved randomly for more varied outcomes

• Ancient reveal now causes a significant increase in Threat

Feedback & Debugging

• Added debug display for:

  • Current Threat

  • Ancient reveal chance

  • Per-colour probabilities

• Added debug buttons for testing (energy gain, boss rolls)

• New popup system triggers when reaching Threat thresholds

Changes & Improvements

UI & Presentation

• Updated main theme with new palette:

  • Charcoal, off-white, pastel orange (primary), vivid orchid (secondary)

• Reduced top bar size (~64px) and font sizes (18px) for a cleaner layout (needs readability testing)

• Added reusable player portrait component

• Enemy portraits now use card art crops instead of sprites

Scenes & Layout

• Character select screen updated:

  • Animated shader background (more performant)

  • Smaller, repositioned UI elements

  • Added back button to main menu

  • Added player starting HP to info panel

Battle & Visual Feedback

• Added VFX when Threat thresholds increase or decrease

• Status UI now scales in/out on activation in addition to flashing

• Added shadows beneath characters for better grounding

Systems & Content

• Added reusable popup scene (used for Threat notifications)

• Warding Circle updated with options to:

  • Remove Threat

  • Convert Threat (with varying costs) (Placeholder Background animation)

• Added Exhaustion curse card (1-cost, Tenuous)

• Map updates:

  • Warding Circle will appear after first treasure and ~5% of nodes

  • Added icon + legend entry

  • Improved map generation code readability

Events & Environments

• Event locations updated with improved positioning and VFX

• Battle and event visuals continue to be refined

Bug Fixes

• Fixed enemy played card portraits shifting position

• Fixed title card visual issue

• Fixed relics failing to deactivate due to freed UI references (now using cached nodes)

• Various UI alignment and visual inconsistencies resolved

Balancing

• Threat gain significantly increased on Ancient reveal

Ongoing Work

This update marks a big step toward making Threat a core part of the game’s identity.

Next steps will focus on:

• Expanding Threat interactions further across systems

• Continued UI/UX refinement (especially readability)

• Building on this foundation with new content and encounters - including the new desert biome...

As always, feedback is hugely appreciated! It directly influences how these systems evolve.

See you soon, Dan