Small update here:

• Optimized buildings generation in episode 2 to reduce stutter and generation times
• Restored lost building details in episode 2 Arcade and Custom modes

[ 2023-11-05 16:38:09 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello, patrons

Some changes have been happening around the castle!

Added Difficulty Options

From now on, visitors can choose what kind of experience they want to have on site. This update includes five difficulty options for the main campaigns:

• Easy: for non-gaming folk
• Medium: for casual playthrough
• Hard: for the actual challenge
• Hard O.H.K.O. ("One-Hit Knock-Out"): for the best of the best (or masochists)
• Custom: for when none of the above fits your needs

Additionally, added handy descriptions for above in-game.

Custom Difficulty

It is now possible to additionally customize difficulty settings campaign-wide. These settings are saved to a file, so you can come back to your favorites the next day. Note for speedrunners: the "Custom Campaign Seed" option has been moved here.

Achievements finally arrived

Some extra challenges and memes are hidden there

Other changes

• Ramped up difficulty curve in Arcade mode
• Optimized generation a bit for Arcade and Custom modes
• Fixed side path's length generation
• Ensured that the ammunition is spawned first, when generating rooms
• Accuracy stats now take crossbow bolts into account
• Reworded some hints on the Hint Board
• Increased number of enemies processed per frame
• Fixed a crash when de-spawning a powerup when it's animation still plays

See you in the castle!

[ 2023-09-03 14:21:09 CET ] [ Original post ]

Fixed mouse sensitivity and fov resetting to startup values after zooming / unzooming with the revolver

[ 2023-06-06 21:09:09 CET ] [ Original post ]

Beloved guests

Much has changed since last time I reached out to you. Most importantly - another person has joined the development: Filip Pichalski. Over the year we were working together to make sure your visits are as much exciting as possible, and today, we're pleased to announce the following changes:

Second area - Castle Town - is now open to the public!

Explore procedurally generated town, populated with procedural buildings and streets. Battle in largest areas yet and use various objects to your strategical advantage. Be sure to climb to observation decks for the best view of the castle and surrounding XVI century town! Available in all modes - campaign, arcade and custom (Access does not require beating Episode 1)

New Enemies:

Sniper skelly

Has a rifle and coolest hat ever. Unfortunately for him, his laser sight gives him away.

Kraken

Aka a terror from deep (aka "I've seen enough internet to know where this is going")

New boss - Batrick

It is customary that every gothic setting has at least one bat boy. You'll meet him at end of episode 2 and he will really test your spacial awareness (aka "how annoying it would be for snipers to always have a good angle on you?").

New weapon - Crossbow

Launch explosive bolts that "stick" to enemies. Then enjoy the fireworks upon pressing 'alt fire' button or letting the fuse burn out.

New ability - Kick

Allows you to launch barrels into enemies and enemies away from you (with minor emotional damage). You're also encouraged to open treasure chest with it, because it looks cool. Can be performed with 'quick melee' button.

New Minimap system:

Shows room relations, unexplored areas and key items you might've missed. And that's about it. Sorry, the castle grounds just can't be translated to Cartesian coordinates (and besides it would take the fun out of "where the f*ck do I go next" part)).

New Hint Boards system:

On almost every level, an info board will spawn, each having different gameplay tip. Additionally, on arcade level #1, it will explain arcade mode rules. Because nobody reads the manuals anymore...

Health system changes:

• Added "i-frames" after being hit by melee attack
• Low armor no longer "deletes" damage it cannot take
• Tweaked starting / max health and armor
• Tweaked damage taken from enemies

New option: custom campaign seed

You can now input custom, campaign-wide seed. This replaces "do not randomize campaign" option - sorry (not sorry) speedrunners

Stylistic overhaul:

• New HUD style
• New pickup styles and effects to improve visibility
• Background in Main Menu

Various bug fixes and tweaks:

• Generate "starting" doors on beginning of each level, to allow players to mentally prepare
• Enemy projectiles no longer disappear when de-loading their room
• Aiming with the revolver zooms in view
• Fixed enemy animations when player breaks their line-of-sight
• Rooms can have two sub-paths
• Reworked Big B.'s stage generation
• Treasure chests can be opened by explosions
• And a Mysterious game mechanic I won't spoil

[previewyoutube=3xPjpCFXb6w;full] [/previewyoutube]

See you in the Castle!

P.S. For all you speedrunner folk, the previous version can be accessed by switching to branch "legacy_1".

[ 2023-06-04 17:35:24 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi I'm still alive and working on ep2! In the meantime I've squashed few bugs and decided to not hold back these fixes until next part. So, without further ado this is what changed:

• Enemy AI - less cheesing:
  • throw boomerang lower if player is crouching,
  • fix line-of-sight checking when player is crouching
• Framerate handling:
  • fix too slow / too fast crouching on low / high framerate
  • fix jittery movement on high framerate
  • fix floaty movement on low framerate
  • fix shotgun not firing on high framerate
  • fix aiming toggle not working on high framerate
  • fix reloading not working on high framerate
  • fix muzzle flash not showing on low / high framerate
• Minor tweaks:
  • after dying, players restart level with full health, also fix "hurt" effect staying after selecting restart
  • un-tick "invert running" by default for new players (your existing settings should not change)
  • waiting for game over screen is now skipped only by jump key to avoid triggering accidentally
  • split first level into "warmup" and "real" levels
  • give player the shotgun directly on level 4 in campaign, to avoid ammo spawning problem for now

Hope you're having a great day and see you around the castle!

[ 2022-07-10 19:45:47 CET ] [ Original post ]

Big update to look and feel of entire episode 1! Campaign mode: tweak pacing and level design, shotgun may now be obtained on level 3 Arcade mode: shotgun may now be given by rng god earlier than level 4 Special Rooms

• Special Room's voxel map may now spawn rotated making level more random
• Add new special rooms
• Remaster old rooms

Remaster room links:

• Room links / connections / doorways (however you want to call it) now have procedural size and offset, making levels more WIDE
• Links in outdoor maps now don't have silly link ceiling
• Add more variations of locked doors (size)

Outdoor map rooms now have correct wall size in relation to neighbors Add procedural 'doors' to doorways to hide ugly room loading (and somehow help indicate maze direction?) Tweak AI processing Difficulty tweaks:

• "Arena" rooms have 1.5x base difficulty because they're more open by nature
• Enemy projectiles have more lifetime before de-spawning
• "Chaser" moves a little faster
• "Big B." will not attempt to shoot hurting and spawner projectile at same time (so less friendly fire)

Minor bugfixes / tweaks

• Fix dialog to pickup powerup not appearing when player opens treasure chest by hand
• Enemies spawned dynamically (during boss) autonomically free their slots, allowing boss to spawn more enemies again
• Enemies: fix walking animation not triggering when loosing line-of-sight to player
• Rename option "Legacy Campaign Generation" -> "Do not randomize campaign seed" to avoid confusion
• Update some wording in manual

[ 2022-04-10 14:45:22 CET ] [ Original post ]

Controls fix:

• fix bug with weapon swapping on Windows

Performance improvements:

• fix shader cache for some objects

[ 2022-03-25 13:38:36 CET ] [ Original post ]

Input Options improvements:

• Add "Toggle Run" option
• Add "Invert Mouse Y" option (thanks @vodkins)
• Rename "Invert Running" to "Swap Run / Walk"
• Implement binding mouse wheel to actions
• Allow rebinding "Select Next Gun" and "Select Prev. Gun" actions

Other changes:

• lower default master volume to not blast people's ears off after options menu updates (will reset to 0.4)

[ 2022-03-19 13:45:49 CET ] [ Original post ]