Monthly Update: December

Here are the updates from December that those of you not in the discord would have missed!

PLEASE NOTE: I will also include the updates from today. As I have updated the build a few minutes ago! So check those out at the very bottom!

🧪Potion Slot Changes: Out with the old "F" slot, in with the Acurine Ability slot!

❄️🔥⚡Acurine Abilities Unveiled: There are currently five different Acurine Abilities, four of which change depending on whether you are using melee or ranged. These Acurine Abilities only share cooldowns for the respective Acurine shard. Meaning, you can use the Ice ability and still use the Fire ability while the Ice is on cooldown.

💰 Currency Swap: Gold coins are out, added the new currency "Acurine Dust." More about this new currency and its uses will be revealed soon!

🎯🔄 Soft Targeting System Implementation: Introducing a new soft targeting system! Responding to feedback that some testers don't use the tab key for locking on, I've developed a soft targeting feature. Upon attacking, the immediate area around the player will be scanned for enemies in range, and the system will soft lock onto the closest target. This functionality applies to all attacks, including light, heavy, break block, jump, as well as parrying and blocking. You can also dodge with the space bar while the soft lock is engaging. Fear not, this soft targeting does not replace the tab targeting "Hard lock," so you can still tab target as usual if you prefer.

🎯 Soft Targeting Smoothed: Made a few adjustments to the soft targeting system, making it just a bit smoother!

🔄 Dodge/Rolling Dynamics Update! 🔄 With the advent of the new soft targeting system, players can now execute a roll by hitting the space bar while the soft target is engaged. This window lasts for approximately 1 second, providing strategic maneuverability during combat. 🔀 ALTERNATIVELY! Players have gained the ability to Dodge/Roll by double-tapping W,A,S,D For instance, swiftly tapping "D" twice consecutively allows the player to elegantly roll to the right! Master the art of evasion with these dynamic changes! 🌪️🏹

🏹 Ranged Challenges: I've been trying to come up with a way to combat the player being able to kite enemies given they have enough arrows. I did not want to make ranged attacks cost stamina, so I've changed the ranged crosshair to change dynamically if the player is moving, making it just a little bit harder to land headshots.

⚡ Enhanced Lighting Arrows with Braziers! ⚡ I've made significant adjustments to how lighting arrows with braziers operate. Previously, you would light an arrow, get a timer, and had to patiently wait for the timer to expire before relighting your arrow. Now, the process has been refined! You can re-light your arrow from the brazier at any time during the countdown timer. This means you have the flexibility to re-set the timer and relight your arrows whenever strategic necessity demands. Experience a more seamless and dynamic arrow-lighting mechanic! 🏹🔥

🤖 AI Improvements: Reworked some of the AI in my ongoing process to overhaul all of the combat! Enemies will now feel a lot smarter to fight against! Gone are the days of being able to just mindlessly spam the light attack button and defeat your foes! 😉

Enemies now receive an Anim notify when attacking, rotating them towards the player. Previously, you were able to easily get behind enemies since they would not rotate during the root motion of their attacks.

Enemies will now try to lunge attack when the player is out of range or after they roll to evade an attack, given they are a far enough distance to trigger it. Increased the percentage of the enemies' "Random Parry chance."

Enemies will now play more defensively after being blocked/parried and will also play more aggressively right after blocking/parrying.

Enemies now have a cooldown after finishing an attack combo, changing their behavior to play a little more defensively for a second. This helps with attack spam and also makes it feel a little better.

🏰 Arcane Spire Expansion: New floor in the Arcane Spire with an elite enemy, mini-boss tweaks, and extra challenges!

The room also offers four braziers to light your arrows with; previously, it was only one. 🔥

💊 Enemy Health Changes Removed the percentage values of enemy health. Now, only the health bar will show. This is mainly due to the combat overhaul I'm working on. Some enemies may have low health but hit like trucks, while others may have higher health but hit a little less heavily. So it just didn't look right to me showing the values.

🔧 Improved Inventory Interaction:🔧 Players can now swiftly close the inventory and pause menu by pressing the respective buttons twice or hitting "esc," streamlining the user experience during gameplay.

⚔️🔧Weapon Fixes and Enhancements:⚔️🔧 Addressed an issue where two-handed weapons prevented jumping even when sheathed. Now, proper functionality is restored, allowing seamless gameplay with two-handed weapons.

UPDATES TODAY: 1/6/2024

Quick fix on the main menu – no more button spam required when hitting "New Game"! It's smooth sailing now.

Now, for the fun stuff:

Blocking Update: Tired of feeling forced into dodging or chugging potions? Yeah, me too. Changed the blocking mechanism – Previously the chance for the players block to be broken was based off the players stamina vs the enemies stamina, resulting in parrying/blocking being pointless most of the time. I've reworked this and blocking/parrying is now a lot more impactful.

Enemies telegraph block break attacks with a red skull icon, giving you a chance to dodge.

Jump Attack: It feels a hundred times better! No more missing because the enemy moved an inch. Landing where you want to land – what a concept!

Atmosphere Tweaks: Cauna and the Arcane Spire got a makeover. Checkpoints got visual upgrades too. I made a lot of changes to the spire; this is largely due to the mini boss being a giant frost mage skeleton. I wanted a fitting Atmosphere ;)

New Enemies: Added some fresh faces to the Arcane Spire – spice things up a bit.

With the steam next fest approaching I'm trying to work as fast as possible, I've got a lot of stuff I would like to do before it gets here, so stay tuned for more updates!

Some of the things I'm planning on having in the next update Include:

🛠️ Next Layer of Polish: Gonna polish things up a bit. Because why not make it look even better?

🎮 Combat Tutorial Upgrade: The tutorial feels like staring at a screen of text – not my style. Planning to make it more interactive and engaging.

🗝️ Key Keeper Level Rework: This level needs more life! and as it's the last level of the demo I really want it to be awesome!

FRIENDLY REMINDER!: The kickstarter pre-launch page is live! So if you like the game and would like to support the development you should check it out and follow it HERE