I have decided to change the core gameplay mechanic of receiving upgrades from the trick score to only get XP from the gems that killed enemies drop. Even though I felt like this was a cool mechanic and brought something new to the Vampire Survivors genre, I feel like simplifying the core gameplay loop is for the better. It was a nightmare to balance. Inexperienced players that weren't able to do big combos yet would be punished by getting less upgrades, making the game even harder, which resulting in even less upgrades. On the other hand being good at doing tricks and combos gave you a lot of upgrades, resulting in the game becoming too easy. To still give a meaning to doing tricks I'm working on a "Overdrive" system which is similar to the "Special" bar in Tony Hawks Pro Skater. Doing tricks and combos will fill up a meter. Once full it will give you some advantage in form of passive or maybe active abilities. (This is not decided yet). Also I plan on adding global leaderboards. To be on top of the list you'll need to have the highest score. I hope these changes will make it easier for players to get in to the game and enjoy the frantic chaos of killing loads of demons while pulling of sick tricks and combos. Here are the changes I made:

• XP gems are now the only source of XP (you won't receive XP from tricks anymore)
• Changed the bike physics a bit. Now it's a bit faster and you jump higher off of quaterramps
• Overdrive Mode. Doing tricks fills up the overdrive bar next to your healthbar, once full you enter overdrive (which currently gives you more attack speed)