Another step forward. (v1.32 patch notes)

Xross Dreams, v1.32 Patch Notes:

• As Hive, Shells and Shell Towers properly carry chain values when opening. You can properly "garbage chain" just like in the inspiring games.

• Hive no longer gets posthumous bonus points for Escalating, causing a slight desync online.

• Hive's Hold Timer no longer depletes when Hive is in the rear position. This is a bugfix, but I imagine this affects some strategies.

• Thinker's The Power now properly ignites in more situations. I went back to the arcade machine for the inspiring game and did a bunch of homework. You can now clear The Power if sandwiched between 2 fruit, if 2 of The Power are in a stack and drop onto a fruit/have a fruit dropped onto them, and/or if The Power is adjacent to a group of exploding fruit.

• As Thinker, Hard Fruit properly softens mid-ignition. This is a doozy of a bugfix. I will apply this change to all other Dreamers in the next patch, but since it's such a huge engine change I want to dedicate more time to testing it and making sure nothing breaks. As per the inspiring game, Hard Fruit that softens will explode if touching a group of currently exploding fruit, which happens at least once every time. This is kind of a big deal. Anyway, this sometimes leaves a hard gap that goes away in a second. I'll see if I can't take care of that with the rest in the next patch.

• Pause is no longer considered held if the round ends. No more frozen, floating thinking emoji.

• ALL TURN-BASED DREAMERS NOW CHECK FOR DOWN BEFORE RECEIVING ATTACKS. This is a necessary engine change that absolutely results in fewer desyncs Online. If you Down ("top out") with incoming damage it will guaranteed hit the next incoming Dreamer. No more arguments between machines about whether or not you got KOed. This affects strategy somewhat, I'm aware, as now there is a clear divide between Down and KO when it comes to managing incoming attacks.

It looks like the future things I need to do to make the game work better online will also significantly affect the game offline. This wasn't the plan, but I will do what is necessary to improve the experience. Thank you for your patience.