Hi everyone! Launch day for our Monsters & Monocles horde survival spin-off game is here! Monsters 'til Midnight is now available to buy! It's $4.99 |4,99 |4.29 with a 20% discount Running for the launch week! [previewyoutube=mQgapeW_Z6Q;full][/previewyoutube] We're really proud of the game we made, and getting something smaller in scope over the finish line is exactly what we both needed to move forward. A sincere thank you to everyone for your continual patience and support. It means a lot to us.
We really hope you enjoy the game! The Retro Dreamer team

[ 2023-05-31 18:35:34 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, Its been a while since the last update, so lets jump right in.

Taking a Break and Quick Prototypes

During the summer, it became increasingly clear that we were both feeling pretty burned out creatively from working on the game full time for around 8 years now. We kept pushing on with it the best we could, but soon realized that we needed to step away for a little while to recharge. Around this time, a few developer friends suggested that the outlandish world of Monsters & Monocles would be a perfect fit for a timed horde survival game. We really liked the idea, and decided to spend a couple of weeks making a quick prototype using many of the same assets. Pretty early on we could see that it had promise, so we decided to spend a little more time during the summer expanding the concept to see if we could turn it into an actual game.

Monsters til Midnight

By the end of summer, the game had really started to come together, and also began to take on an identity of its own as a legitimate Monsters & Monocles spinoff. Since it shares so much of its DNA, but with its own thematic twist of trying to survive against the march of time itself as the clock strikes midnight, (literal indestructible marching clocks of death in this case), Monsters til Midnight felt like a perfect fit.
The Monsters 'til Midnight coming soon page can be found here.

Where does Monsters & Monocles Fit Into This?

Although the coming soon page for Monsters til Midnight is now live on Steam, we still have some work left to do in order to wrap it up, so we have a Q1 2023 release date penciled in. We still have every intention to return to Monsters & Monocles, and were hoping that some time away will help offer fresh perspective and a sense of renewed energy needed to get it across the finish line. As always, I truly appreciate all of the kind words of encouragement, and the many large buckets of ongoing patience that you've all given us. Thank you for reading, and please stay safe and take care. Craig

[ 2022-11-17 04:47:06 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, Although the first quarter of each new year always feels like a blur of both personal and business tax return preparation work, weve still managed to push on and complete another major pillar of the game-NPCs!
A host of colorful characters waiting for you to lend an ear Although there've been a few of them in the game in some capacity for quite some time, they were never really presented properly or polished up to an appropriate standard.
Professor Crowley busy deciphering ancient manuscripts in his study With this in mind, weve spent the past couple of months working on adding animations, creating and implementing a proper dialogue/conversation system, fleshing out and improving character dialog, fixing and improving interaction mechanics, and generally just trying to make them feel more like theyre part of the game and its world.
James Gearsford hard at work maintaining the mighty airship HUB Trying to also figure out a dialogue system that also works well in local MP was quite a challenge, but overall were really happy with how everything turned out. We feel like they add a nice layer of texture to the game that really helps to capture its inherent silliness, while also fleshing out the games underlying story and narrative a little more.
The new NPC dialog system in action With the NPCS finished, the next major pillar weve started working on are the remaining boss fights. Ill have more on this in future updates. Thank you all for reading, please stay safe and take care. Craig

[ 2022-05-09 21:46:29 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, Its been quite a while since the last update as both of us try to navigate the challenges that come with having young kids currently learning from home via independent study, but things are still ticking along with good progress being made across various parts of the game.

Dropping Off and Picking Up

We spent some time fleshing out the full sequence from finishing a zone > returning to the airship > unlocking one of the five zone fragments > choosing the next zone. All of these sequences have a lot of moving parts to manage and took some time to get to a point where we were happy with them, but we think they really help tie things together from a game-flow perspective, and add a bit of character also.
Alongside all of the above, I finally started work on dun, dun duuun the final boss and the final zone that contains its hideous form. I dont want to spill too many beans on that front right now, so more on that in the future ;P Finally tying all of the various game sequencing together and starting work on the final zone has felt like a big milestone for us. We still have a lot of hard work ahead of us, but the final outline has really started to take shape, and thats such a powerful motivator to keep us pushing towards the finish line. As always, I truly appreciate all of the kind words of support and encouragement that you all provide. Thank you for reading, stay safe and take care. Craig

[ 2022-02-05 03:01:52 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, Since the last update, weve been focused on finishing up all of those new items, relics, and weapons that were previously shown. Since quite a few of them use brand-new mechanics and systems that didnt exist in the game, it was quite a task working through everything. Were now getting very close to drawing a line through the loot aspect of the game, which feels like a great milestone to reach :) Heres a sneak peak at some of the new content weve been working on. Certain things still need final art, VFX, and general tuning in some cases, but its still nice to have even more permanent abilities and upgrades to work with as you find a play-style that best suits you.

Weapons

Hunter's Dream
The Hunters Dream is a new holy-class weapon that fires a barrage of deadly stakes. It's fairly slow fire rate and large spread make it tough to use at range, but it can be especially devastating when combined with the Dragons Breath relic that adds a burning status effect. Diamond Cutter
The Diamond Cutter is a rapid-firing beam-class weapon that fires richotteing shards of superheated crystal. Its not particularly accurate, and overheats quickly, but is great in tight spaces.

Items/Relics

Enchanted Candelabra Item
The Enchanted Candelabra item grants the player a flaming trail of fire whenever they dash. Its very useful for boxing in weaker enemies to finish them off, and can also be used defensively to create breathing room if your weapons need time to cooldown. Meteorite Fragment Relic
This mysterious, extraterrestrial relic offers players the ability to drop a row of exploding space rocks upon dashing. Its very handy for wearing down tougher enemies even as you seek to find a better position. Alongside the new content, I also managed to completely finish the airship HUB area outside of some minor polish and its supporting NPCs that still need to be finalized. Along with everything shown here, the game is also progressing well in various other ways, both large and small. As always, we really do appreciate all of your continued support and patience throughout the games development. Thank you for reading, and please stay safe and take care. Craig

[ 2021-11-02 22:23:19 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone! As I discussed in the previous update, the massive, and much needed UI/UX overhaul we've been working on is just about wrapped up outside of the odd bit of final polish. This puts us in a really nice position to start adding more of the really fun stuff like new weapons, items, and relics! I don't want to give away too many specifics right now, but here's a quick look at some of the new loot I've been working on:

Items

I tried to have fun with the Victorian theme and time-period for these. The "Dubious Handkerchief" and "Shrapnel-filled Corset" are two of my favs :P

Weapons

My main goal with the new weapons was to pad out some of the underserved classes such as beam and fire. My personal fav goes to "The Fragpipes", which is the most shrill-sounding homing missile launcher ever devised!

Relics

For the new relics, I continued to lean into the same mythological themes and figures as the existing relics.
We still need to get all of the new additions integrated and working as intended, but we're so happy to finally flesh this stuff out a bit, and provide a wider range of fun toys to play with :D Thank you for reading, and please stay safe and take care of yourselves. Craig

[ 2021-09-15 00:31:05 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, As mentioned in the previous couple of updates, these past few months have been all about working through and finishing every aspect of the game's UI. We're happy to report that we managed to hit our goal this past month, and have now started working on wrapping up all of the game's supporting UX work and general connective tissue. This should really help round out the overall game-flow and make the game feel like a more complete experience. Here's a rundown of some of the new UI work:

Game Title Screen

It being the first screen a player sees, I wanted to add a bit more detail and general polish to the game's title, as well as adding a few subtle animations to breath a bit of life into it.

Codex Screen

Since the airship's codex computer is so detached from the rest of the game UI, I wanted to try something more unique and thematic, so I decided to make it a more detailed representation of the actual in-game console sprite.

Relic Screens

Trying to come up with a clear and easy to use screen for equipping/upgrading relics, that also works in single player, local MP, and online MP has always been a bit challenging. After testing a few ideas and different approaches, we decided it would be best to split equipping and upgrading into two distinct screens
The equip relics console is all about selecting the relics you want from the ones available, with the new central grid view showing you which relics still need to be discovered
Having relic upgrades be a unique screen helps remove some of the UI complexity and visual clutter, and makes it a distinct action.

Game Over Screens

For the game over screen, it became clear that the key information a player would want after a solo run, would be fairly different from that of a MP group. With that in mind, we decided to take a unique approach for each.
In single player, all items, relics, and weapons collected on that run are now tracked and shown.
In multiplayer, a crown is awarded to the each player for least deaths, most kills, and most gold collected. (It looks like our heroes have seen better days T_T) Although it's been quite the task working through an entire game's worth of UI, we're really happy with how everything is coming together, and are in a good place to finish up all of the remaining UX work needed to bring us closer to having a fully fleshed out game. Once that core foundation is done, we'll then be able to push ahead with the remaining content, and all of the fun stuff that entails :) Thank you for reading, and please stay safe and take care of yourselves. Craig

[ 2021-07-05 23:10:13 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, As mentioned in the previous update, weve been working on improving and finishing all aspects of the games UI and UX.

Player HUD

Working at a higher resolution for all of the games UI elements allows us to strike a much better balance between readability and aesthetics, and creates a much better separation between game elements, and UI elements.
Weve also added much needed visual indicators to the HUD such as HUD frame shake and flash overlay when taking damage, damage value preview indicators to the HP bar, and a weapon overheat animation. The new "Deceased" reaper overlay also adds a not so subtle (and pretty metal ) indicator to teammates who have died. Equipped weapons also now have an icon to show their class.

Core game UI

For the games core UI, weve gone with a fairly clean, simple approach that still incorporates aspects of the games Victorian theme.
WIP settings screen
A pack(pride?) of Ruperts illustrating the new color selection feature
New default, win, and defeated character portraits We still have plenty to do on the UI front, but once its wrapped up, well be in a much better position to start adding more new content and really start pushing towards finishing the game. Thank you for reading, and please stay safe and take care of yourselves. Craig

[ 2021-04-13 01:11:01 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, I realize that we've been quiet on here for the past few months, so I wanted to take some time to let you all know what's been going on. Towards the end of last year (and beginning of this year), we were faced with some deeply personal challenges and family tragedy. Without going into specific details, the past few months have been incredible difficult for us on all fronts. We thank you all again for your patience and understanding as we do our very best to move forward, we really do appreciate it. In terms of Monsters & Monocles, this past month we started working on a complete overhaul of the game's UI and supporting UX. This will help the game feel much further along (and more polished), while also allowing us to better add new content. We'll have further updates on this front as me make progress and have more to share. Thank you all for your continual patience with us and with the game. We're doing our best everyday to move the game further along towards being finished to the level of quality we strive for, and that you all deserve. Please take care and stay safe everyone. Craig

[ 2021-03-01 23:18:42 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone. With the kids starting full distance learning over the summer, this past couple of months have been quite challenging (and a bit of a blur to be honest!) but were trying our best to make progress as we settle into a new routine. Here's a rundown of what weve been working on:

The Airship

Since the airship HUB is essentially the core connective tissue of the entire game, its something Ive been wanting to improve and finish for a LONG time. My main goals over the past month or so have been to nail down exactly what it needs to contain in terms of game functionality, and also to flesh out how each room will look and feel. Im still in the process of cleaning up and implementing the new rooms, but so far we have:

The control/zone select map room

Mostly polish, and a proper representation of the central eye platform that will eventually unlock the final boss level once you complete all of the corresponding zones.

Central Lobby/Start Room

Since this room acts as the spawn point at the start of each session and upon returning to the airship, I wanted to make it a bit more interesting and unique visually. I've also seen a few requests to have the option for different starting weapons in the forum, and I agree that it's a good idea, so the weapon platforms are the first step towards factoring them into the airship layout/design.

The Engine Room

I dont want to say too much about what I have in mind for this intriguing little room right now, but it will have a couple of uses down the line. Stay tuned for more info... <_<

The Relic Room

For the relic room, I wanted to lean more into the idea that the games relics are powerful artifacts that have largely been lost to the sands of time before being rediscovered by our heroes. Still a couple of rooms left to do, and bits of clean-up, but Im happy with how the airship is progressing.

Greater Zone Room Variety

Alongside working on the airship, Ive also been fleshing out the room variety for each of the main zones, utilizing the various new traps and elements I now have to play with. Not really a lot to show right now, but it feels good to finally start growing the room count to keep each run feeling more varied and fresh. Thats everything from the past couple of months. Definitely a challenge as I mentioned, but things are moving along. Take care, be safe, and we'll see you next time :) Craig

[ 2020-10-06 00:25:29 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone. For the past few weeks Ive been chipping away at quite a few different elements across the entire game. Here's a rundown of what I've been working on: Progress on complete UI Overhaul
One of the largest improvements that were working on, is a complete overhaul of the UI and UX across the entire game. Our main goal is to make everything look better aesthetically, to be more functional and generally just more cohesive and polished overall. Were also trying to inject some of the games charm and character wherever possible. I started reworking and improving the existing character select portraits, and Im also working on win/loss variations to REALLY let you know how your run went :P (Very rough WIP art shown below)
Lots of other UI improvements are more behind-the-scenes type changes right now, but Ill be sharing more progress in the coming weeks. Here Comes a New Challenger! Ive always wanted to develop a more varied and fleshed out roster of playable characters, and this month I was finally able to make a start on the first new addition to the gang!

Meet Larcen Gable, an infamous cat burglar with a hefty price on his head, hoping to make amends by fighting off the hordes of evil. Hes one of many new characters that Ill be bringing to life for the finished game. Traps, Traps, and More Traps!
This month, weve also been systematically working our way through each of the zones, designing and integrating new traps to make each one feel a bit more interesting and distinct than they are right now (Im looking at you spike traps <_<). This will also give me a lot more to work with when I start fleshing out the room variety for each of the zones.
Thats everything from the past few weeks. Thank you for reading, and well See you all next time! :D Craig

[ 2020-08-03 22:18:54 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone. Apologies for falling behind a bit with these updates the past few months, but rest-assured that I've still been making progress on the various elements of the factory zone during that time. Here's what I've been working on: Factory Boss - Initial Ideas and Sprite Design I spent some time brainstorming ideas for a fun and interesting boss to round out the factory zone. I settled on the Scrap Golem, a decommissioned mining bot that finds itself cobbled back together and reanimated by a mischievous gremlin pilot.
It has a nasty retractable chain-claw and a scorching flamethrower up it's sleeve...literally!! Im looking forward to fleshing out potential attacks and behaviors as it comes to life. Factory Zone - Final Touches and Animated Tiles As the factory started coming together, I felt fairly happy with the core tileset, but felt that it was just all a bit too static given the fact its supposed to be built around the idea of this free-flowing molten metal-filled victorian factory. With that in mind, I began experimenting with adding a lot more animated tile variants to help bring it all to life a little more
I still need to clean things up a bit, and also work on the wall tiles, but pretty happy with how its progressing, and its definitely something Id like to incorporate into the other existing zones at some point down the line.
Alongside the things above, I've also been working on the various props and enemies that round out a complete zone. Thats everything for now. Thank you for reading, stay safe, and well See you all next time! :) Craig

[ 2020-06-04 22:20:10 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone! After weeks of hard work, we're finally getting close to wrapping up the Mansion's Lord Skullington boss! We're super happy with how it's all shaping up, so I wanted to share a quick sneak peek at some WIP gameplay: [previewyoutube=22uH7ZWvyEg;full][/previewyoutube] *Capturing in-editor video on my Mac isn't as great as I would like, but rest assured that it all runs at the usual buttery smooth 60fps We still need to polish up a few things and keep tuning the different attacks and phases, but it feels great to finally inject him with some of the extra character and personality that's been floating around in my head for so long :) Aside from the mansion boss, I've also been chipping away at reworking the airship HUB. My main goal right now is to get a feel for it's layout, size, and range of NPCS we need to really flesh it out and best serve the game structure-wise. We don't have anything too interesting to share just yet, but stay tuned for more updates in the future. Thats everything for this month. Thank you for reading, and well See you all next time! :D Craig

[ 2020-02-28 23:13:34 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone! As we all kick-off a brand new year, its time for our very first progress update of 2020. Lets jump right in! The lions share of our time this past month has been spent further developing the mansions boss. The main elements were working on are new art/animations to better illustrate his various attack tells and wind-ups. Experimenting with and Implementing the actual attacks themselves, and also exploring ways to better utilize the arena in interesting ways.
The above example shows the newly added hat toot animation for when the boss fires off a volley of seeker orbs to chase the player. Since the bosses are the largest sprites in the game by far, theyre quite time consuming and challenging to work on, but Ive been making good progress towards my goal of a complete art pass. Weve also been working on the addition of fun and unique little intro scenes for each boss battle. These quick little animations really help add a lot of charm and personality to each encounter as you prepare to take them on. Heres a quick peek at Lord Skullingtons intro - Not all door knockers should be knocked o.O
Once all of the art and various attack behaviors are in place, the next step is a full tuning pass across all of the phases, with lots and lots of playtesting across both single player and MP modes. Thats everything for this month. Thank you for reading, and well See you all next time! :D Craig

[ 2020-01-21 21:58:37 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone! As the year draws to a close, heres a rundown of what weve been up to this past month. Factory Zone Enemies To complement the industrial nature of the factory itself, I wanted to really lean into the steampunk element of the game. Furnace Face (far-right) is a heavy hitter with potential for nasty fire-based attacks. The Gear heads (center) could be a fast moving, projectile spraying spinning top of death. Lastly, the Gremlin (far left) are literal gremlins in the machine that may throw the odd spanner in the works...or at unsuspecting players :P
We still have a ton of zone work left to do before we implement this gallery of rogues, but I look forward to seeing each of them offer new challenges in the factory zone. Zone Traps The games existing traps are an aspect of the game that weve been wanting to improve and flesh out for a long time. The spike traps in particular are too frequent, and not readable enough during more intense moments. Along with improvements to the spike traps, we also started developing a few zone-specific traps to help offer greater variety and challenge. The flame vent trap below is one example, but weve also been developing a more variants for the other zones to help them feel more distinct.

Traps are very challenging to implement due to how much potential network latency/syncing factors into their timings for online multiplayer, so we still have plenty to work on before we're ready to push them live. Mansion Boss/General Boss Foundation Work We recently started taking a proper look at how we would like the game's bosses to be implemented. This encompasses everything from generating their floors as lockable arenas, playing boss-specific intro animations, and also how and where loot is generated. With all this in mind, we decided to use Lord Skullington's battle as a test bed, which can then be applied to the game's other bosses.
Gavin has been making some great process on this front, while I've been roughing out and developing his attack animations and supporting art. Here's a VERY rough WIP of his full beam spin attack. That's everything for this month. We hope you have a great holidays, and we'll see you all in 2020! Craig & Gavin

[ 2019-12-20 20:56:58 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone. In an effort to keep you all up to speed with what were currently working on, Im aiming to put together an update post each month. Lets jump right in! Combat Arenas We felt that the transition into/out of the locked combat rooms was one of the weakest interactions in the game. Snapping players into rooms was jarring, lacked any kind of clear transition, and was something we wanted to address. The first step was to add animations to the barriers themselves as they appear/disappear.
With the games local and online multiplayer modes allowing players to split up and potentially be in different rooms when an arena is triggered, the barrier teleportation pads allow other players to join the battle when ready (or not if you have those type of friends :P). The game currently lacks a visual representation of this, so we integrated a player turns into floating ectoplasm teleport animation, along with a small period of invincibility as they enter the arena.
As with any major changes or additions that touch single player, local multiplayer, and online multiplayer, there are a ton of potential issues and edge-cases to test and fix. The online mode is especially challenging as various player state and position changes are involved, so were still a little way off pushing these changes live as we continue to tweak and play test. New Factory Zone As Gavin works on integrating the arena assets, Ive also been fleshing out the fifth and final main zone, the abandoned Victorian steelworks. Its an industrial-type area featuring molten lava pits and heavy machinery, topped with a layer of steampunkiness.
The above screengrab is a current WIP as I continue to refine and polish up certain aspects. Once the tiles for both floors are nailed down, I need to work on props (large and small), and also some enemies unique, zone-specific enemies to bring it all together. Thats about everything for this month. See you next time, and thank you for reading! Craig

[ 2019-11-19 21:28:00 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone, It's been a while since our last update, so I wanted to offer a quick rundown of what we've been up to since then. We're still in the process of working through a pretty massive team member transition, as Gavin, the game's new programmer gets up to speed with 5+ years worth of someone else's codebase. With this in mind, we felt that it was wise to initially focus on a broad range of general QOL improvements, polish and fixes across the entire game as he finds his feet, rather than dive into more complex aspects right off the bat. Rest assured that we're actively working towards another fully-fledged update, which will be set live as soon as it's ready. We thank you once again for all of your continual patience, it really means a lot :) Craig

[ 2019-10-16 21:54:41 CET ] [ Original post ]

Firstly, I wanted to offer a massive thank you to everyone for your continued patience and understanding over the past few months. We didnt intend to have such an extended period of radio silence, but rest assured that the game is still very much in development, and will only leave early access once we feel like its a game that youre happy with, and that were proud of. Towards the end of last year, we had to part ways with Ryan, the games programmer to date. This role will be passed on to Gavin, my business partner, and Retro Dreamer co-founder. There will obviously be a period of adjustment, but Ryan will still be on hand when needed to help ease the transition. We will be sure to keep you all up-to-date when we have things mapped out in more detail going forward. Thanks again, The Monsters & Monocles Team

[ 2019-04-12 19:16:08 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone! Lots of cool new stuff this update, so let’s dive right in!
This update is all about moving forward with our goal of adapting all of the existing zones to use the new room-based generation system. It’s taken a lot of work to get there, but we’re super happy to finally have both the city and forest zones be a step closer to where we want them to be. The forest zone still maintains its more organic shape and scattered tree cover, and be on the lookout for hidden pathways and shortcuts that cut through the treeline. For the city zone, we’ve built upon its mix of narrow side streets, branching paths, and open town squares. When things get dicey, look out for the various alleyways that can provide a quick escape route when you’re in a pickle!
As with the tomb rework from the last update, the current state of these zones is very much an initial rough pass. Our priority was to get them up and running and playable with the new system, and to give them a much needed visual overhaul. We’ll be working on adding more room variety, enemy behaviors/types, and overall polish in future updates. Alongside the city and forest zone reworks, we also added a range of new chest/treasure room variants. There are now three separate weapon chests, with each corresponding to their appropriate level of weapon rarity. The skull-adorned monster caches are fairly rare, and offer two guaranteed weapon drops. These are great for when you want to overhaul your loadout. The ornate relic chests are very rare, and offer either a relic, or a single soul gem (the persistent currency used to purchase and upgrade relics). The final treasure room variant is a large decorative teapot, that spawns a host of tea/health pickups when opened. In terms of actual room types, you may also come across a few new variants as you explore each zone. Portal rooms are currently a very rough pass towards reintegrating them back into the game. Things like positioning, terms of when/where they spawn, art/polish, and enemy types spawned are all things that will be tuned and developed as we go. The mansion now has a dedicated exit room that leads to the zone boss. This idea will eventually be incorporated into all of the other zones. Although not currently functional just yet, we also added support for dedicated miniboss rooms. These will be explored further in a future update. Finally, the mysterious, glowing statue rooms are an exciting first step towards developing stronger narrative threads and context that will run through all of the zones. That’s all I want to say about those for now...I’ve already said too much! <_<’ >_> Thank you for reading, and for the continued support and encouragement. Please leave any feedback or suggestions you may have in the forums :) Cheers, Craig & Ryan

[ 2018-08-09 21:44:06 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hi everyone! This update ended up being one of our largest to date, as we added new things, polished some old things, and generally made some big core changes.
The primary focus on this update was to improve all of the elements relating to items & relics, as well as finally adding active items! Players now have a single active item slot that can be triggered during key moments using ‘F’ on the keyboard, or the ‘X’ button on XBox controllers. We felt that providing players with powerful one-off, or limited use abilities was a good way to compliment their weapon and passive item selections. Right now, there currently 2 active items for testing - The holy hand grenade (applies set damage to all enemies on screen with 3 minute cooldown), and the coolant flush (resets cooldown on carried weapons with 3 uses). As this is just the initial pass, they both lack clear HUD indicators, final effects, and general balancing, but those are all things we’ll be addressing in future updates as we roll more active items into the mix. The holy hand grenade does have a red overlay as it recharges, to at least show when it’s usable/unusable in the short term. Alongside the active items, we also added animations, and general visual polish to all of the existing items, relics, and treasure chests. Our goal was to make collectible items both more satisfying to collect, and to improve their readability during gameplay. The last big addition on this front, are the new soul gems, which act as second, relic-specific currency. These gems are used to purchase and upgrade relics, and are persistent across runs, meaning that you can gradually work towards upgrading specific relics, without the fear of losing a large amount of regular coins upon death before reaching the airship. Right now they’re only a guaranteed drop from bosses, and upgrade amounts aren’t tuned, but we’ll be working into things in subsequent updates.
Aside from items, we also felt like it was a good time to make a couple of more fundamental changes to the core gameplay. The two largest being the removal of both lives and objectives. As we tuned enemy behaviors, damage, and overall challenge, we began to feel like the concept of lives was diminishing the sense of tension/reward, as all lives prior to the final one felt somewhat inconsequential. Having just one life in single player now means that health is much more precious and rewarding when found, and items like the ankh (which offers a single-use revive upon death), and relics relating to HP feel much more important. We also carried this concept over to multiplayer, with players able to revive one another indefinitely, as long as at least one player is alive. Although the shared pool of lives was interesting, we felt it was much too unforgiving at times, as it often forced players to sit-out and be unable to play for long stretches. As this is such a large change, we would love to hear your feedback on this front across both single player and multiplayer. The tuning and balancing of health drops etc is still ongoing, and your input on this front would be a massive help :) Similarly to lives, we also took a good look at the current objective system, and asked ourselves whether or not they truly benefited the core gameplay. Although we’re happy with the fundamental ideas behind some of the objectives, we felt like having them be a mandatory requirement to complete the floor, often meant backtracking, and aimless searching for specific things that didn’t add to the core gameplay in a meaningful way. With that said, we hope to experiment with reincorporating certain aspects like the key gun and minibosses back into the new map generation system as optional elements in future updates. The final major addition for this update, is the inclusion of the new room-based tomb zone! Although it’s a very rough pass as we still develop room shapes, enemy art/behaviors, and overall variety, it represents a nice step towards expanding out and applying all of the work we’ve done in the mansion, to the remaining zones. The ‘new’ tomb should start to take shape and begin moving closer to completion in future updates as we work towards bringing all of the existing zones up to the same level of polish as the mansion. Thank you for reading, and as always, please leave any feedback you may have in the forums :) Cheers, Craig & Ryan 2018/05/10 - 1.14.6704 (Content Update 12) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * The digsite has been reworked with the lessons learned from the mansion changes over the past several updates. * Added an initial set of 10 digsite room configurations (6 combat, 3 trap, 1 treasure) * Added initial digsite enemy waves and challenge waves * Reworked digsite props to have rounded corner colliders for better pathing around them * Fully reworked tile art for digsite levels * Lives have been removed as a resource. In single player you now have a single life. In multiplayer revives are now free and the game ends when no one is left to revive downed players. * Added 'active' items - they are items that you trigger with a button press and either have limited uses or a cooldown. * Active item: holy hand grenade (explosion damage to all enemies in room, 3min cooldown) * Active item: coolant (instantly resets gun heat state, 3 charges before item is consumed) * Small red treasure chests now only contain coins and health * Added 'soul gems' a currency for relic purchases and upgrades * All bosses now drop a soul gem on death * All items and relic art was reworked and given idle animations * Coin sprites and animations have been reworked * Reworked selection of 'special' rooms to be per-zone instead of per floor, increases variance between runs * Damage flash has been switched from red to white to improve overall visibility/readability * Active items can now be rewards from a challenge room * Active items can now be a rare drop from item chests * Added ability to require certain rooms to appear on a floor in the map generator. Each floor in mansion and digsite will always have at least one treasure room * Updated to Unity 2017.4.2f2LTS * Removed per-floor objectives from game, investigating reworking some of the elements for optional/secondary zone content * Fixed several map generator bugs that could cause hangs on loading * Fixed several map generator bugs that could cause invalid rooms to be selected for combat arenas * Reworked all of the pickup/collection effects for items * Added upgrade code to input bindings to auto-assign new functionality (e.g. active items) to default keybindings * Reworked fragments and soul gems so a single pickup will add to all players in a network game (instead of only the player who picks it up) * Reduced room count of mansion levels to improve overall flow * Reworked plaement phase of 'special' rooms to try and improve chances of them being scattered throughout the map more * Items that can be picked up now have a bounce tween to help with visiblity on busy maps * Updated art and animations for all treasure chests * Treasure chests now leave a debris remain after opening * Fixed issue with colliders in challenge rooms where sometimes you could not pick up the item from one side of the podium

[ 2018-05-11 00:30:01 CET ] [ Original post ]

This update tackles one of the oldest tasks we've had on the todo list: an in-game map! There's a persistent minimap in the HUD, and you can display the full map by going to the pause menu. Rooms will appear on the map as you enter them, and special rooms will be marked with an icon. Currently we mark entrances, exits, shops, npcs, treasure rooms, and challenge rooms. Currently we do not have the ability to mark individual objective items on the map, although we hope to add that in the future.
We've also added challenge rooms! These are rooms where the combat difficulty will be higher, but there will be a reward for anyone willing to take on its challenge. To start with, each floor in the mansion has a challenge room containing a map of the floor, in the future we will add additional high level powerups as well.
We've also added several NPC's to the mansion, currently with 1 appearing per floor, each offering different benefits. Talk to them and see what they can do for you! (And beware the Widow, her blessings are not always a boon). The NPC's are currently static with a simplistic chat system, but we'll be changing that down the line.
There are also several changes to game balance around player health, enemy spawn counts, and adjusting spawn counts per each additional player in multiplayer games. Tread carefully! Smaller additions to this update include new combat and treasure rooms, double difficulty arenas, nine different widow potions, and changes to the map generation to prevent rare degenerate cases (e.g. - entrance spawns on spikes, objective collectables spawn inside an indestructable prop). We also fixed several small networking bugs and exceptions that were causing gameplay issues. At this point the last 3 or 4 updates have changed the gameplay considerably in our zone of focus (the mansion), so if you have feedback about how the mansion is playing we'd love to hear it! We're approaching the point where we're going to take the lessons learned from the mansion and start applying it to the other zones to get them up to speed, so if there are things you particulary like or don't like please let us know so we can consider them. If you've been playing in local or network multiplayer we'd especially be interested to hear how the latest balance changes are working for you! Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2018/02/21 - 1.13.6627 (Content Update 11) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * We finally have a map! Added an on-screen minimap as well as a full map in the pause menu * Added minimap room markers (currently for npcs, challenge rooms, treasure rooms, entrances, and exits) * Added a map item that gives you the full map for the current floor * Added 3 challenge rooms with more difficult spawn wave patterns * Added 5 new combat rooms * Added 2 new treasure rooms * Added rare 'double difficulty' arenas * Added NPCs: Widow, Klunk, Garrison, and Meredith * Widow: Offers 3 random potions, may be helpful or may be harmful there's only one way to find out * Klunk: Trade in 2 guns for one random one * Meredith: sells relics at a significantly reduced rate * Garrison: Sells weapons at a significantly reduced rate * Added 9 widow potion items What's Changed: * Made adjustments to all possible arena waves * Tweaked enemy generation to be slightly friendlier for single player, but added additional enemy spawns per additional player in MP. * Adjusted enemy costs during generation * Reduced player health, but increased invincibility time after taking damage * Changed mansion rooms so the entrance or exit will no longer appear on spikes Misc: * Fixed several small networking bugs * Fixed occasional bug where 2 maps would be generated on a single floor

[ 2018-02-22 20:50:16 CET ] [ Original post ]

This update tackles one of the oldest tasks we've had on the todo list: an in-game map! There's a persistent minimap in the HUD, and you can display the full map by going to the pause menu. Rooms will appear on the map as you enter them, and special rooms will be marked with an icon. Currently we mark entrances, exits, shops, npcs, treasure rooms, and challenge rooms. Currently we do not have the ability to mark individual objective items on the map, although we hope to add that in the future.
We've also added challenge rooms! These are rooms where the combat difficulty will be higher, but there will be a reward for anyone willing to take on its challenge. To start with, each floor in the mansion has a challenge room containing a map of the floor, in the future we will add additional high level powerups as well.
We've also added several NPC's to the mansion, currently with 1 appearing per floor, each offering different benefits. Talk to them and see what they can do for you! (And beware the Widow, her blessings are not always a boon). The NPC's are currently static with a simplistic chat system, but we'll be changing that down the line.
There are also several changes to game balance around player health, enemy spawn counts, and adjusting spawn counts per each additional player in multiplayer games. Tread carefully! Smaller additions to this update include new combat and treasure rooms, double difficulty arenas, nine different widow potions, and changes to the map generation to prevent rare degenerate cases (e.g. - entrance spawns on spikes, objective collectables spawn inside an indestructable prop). We also fixed several small networking bugs and exceptions that were causing gameplay issues. At this point the last 3 or 4 updates have changed the gameplay considerably in our zone of focus (the mansion), so if you have feedback about how the mansion is playing we'd love to hear it! We're approaching the point where we're going to take the lessons learned from the mansion and start applying it to the other zones to get them up to speed, so if there are things you particulary like or don't like please let us know so we can consider them. If you've been playing in local or network multiplayer we'd especially be interested to hear how the latest balance changes are working for you! Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2018/02/21 - 1.13.6627 (Content Update 11) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * We finally have a map! Added an on-screen minimap as well as a full map in the pause menu * Added minimap room markers (currently for npcs, challenge rooms, treasure rooms, entrances, and exits) * Added a map item that gives you the full map for the current floor * Added 3 challenge rooms with more difficult spawn wave patterns * Added 5 new combat rooms * Added 2 new treasure rooms * Added rare 'double difficulty' arenas * Added NPCs: Widow, Klunk, Garrison, and Meredith * Widow: Offers 3 random potions, may be helpful or may be harmful there's only one way to find out * Klunk: Trade in 2 guns for one random one * Meredith: sells relics at a significantly reduced rate * Garrison: Sells weapons at a significantly reduced rate * Added 9 widow potion items What's Changed: * Made adjustments to all possible arena waves * Tweaked enemy generation to be slightly friendlier for single player, but added additional enemy spawns per additional player in MP. * Adjusted enemy costs during generation * Reduced player health, but increased invincibility time after taking damage * Changed mansion rooms so the entrance or exit will no longer appear on spikes Misc: * Fixed several small networking bugs * Fixed occasional bug where 2 maps would be generated on a single floor

[ 2018-02-22 20:50:16 CET ] [ Original post ]

Happy New Year!
This update is a bit smaller than usual with the break for holidays, but Craig and I are back hard at work after a few days off. We hope you all had a happy holidays! The content in the update breaks into two major sections - player/enemy movement & prop/decoraton. For movement we stated by taking the updated movement code from the previous update and applying it to all enemies as well. We had initially been hesitant to do this because it's a more cpu intensive system, but it results in much smoother movement around walls and props. If you notice performance issues with this build, please let me know. In addition to changing the collision system we also updated all the props in the mansion to have rounded corners. This should reduce any sticking points on props. Eventually we need to apply this to wall corners, but this is a bit trickers since that is a custom generated collision mesh. Finally we updated all the player characters to have a new dodge animation instead of the old blue dash. We lowered the speed at which you sady significantly, but increased the time you dash by quite a bit. This will give you a larger window of invincibility while you dash, but you should still cover a similar distance as before. In particular this should make it easier to correctly time a dodge through large laser beams (skullington fight) and large spike sets. Also, it just looks cooler. For prop and visual work we did a full pass on all the static props in the mansion, removed several, and added several new ones for variety. We also re-added all of the large scale props like dining room tables to the rooms. They provide additional cover from enemies, but has a limited life. All props also have a permanent debris on destruction, a new explosion effect, and new debris particles. All candles/torches in the mansion should now work as a functional point light to make the whole scene a bit brighter. And we also added a mask in all the empty space on a level to reduce the likelyhood of seeing any random sprites poking through the sides. All in all, hopefully all this work makes the mansion feel more varied and interesting. Thanks for reading, and we hope you have fun! We're looking forward to all of the new stuff we'll be adding in 2018. :) Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2018/01/02 - 1.12.6576 (Content Update 10) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Happy New Years! What's New: * Enemies now use the same movement code as players, providing improved movement around props and wall edges * Decreased player dodge speed from 32 to 12, but increased dodge/incincibility time from 0.15 to 0.41 seconds * Added a dodge animation for all player characters * Added a dust trail to players while running * Added first pass of a full map "ceiling" mesh to reduce sprites poking out into empty space * Added functional point lights to mansion walls that have a candle or torch * Added prop remains/splats for persistance after destruction * Reworked all prop colliders/hit areas to be more accurate and smooth pathing out for players and enemies * Updated to Unity 2017.2.1f1 * New Prop: Knight's armor * New Prop: Grandfather clock * New Prop: Large Dining Table (Round) * New Prop: Large Dining Table (Horizontal & Vertical) * New Prop: Sofa * New Prop: Dining Chair (Red & Blue, front & side variants) * New Prop: Potted plant * New Prop: Fireplace * New Prop: Book Stacks * New Prop explosions and debris effects What's Changed: * Fixed several map generation bugs that were causing excess mesh generation and performance issues * Fixed prop bug that would spawn multiple explosions and debris effects on death * Reworked all mansion rooms to contain a valid start/exit location * Reworked prop and enemy debris sorting to ensure prop debris always shows on top * Fixed netcode bug where incorrectly configured props can cause an error on level initialization

[ 2018-01-02 22:23:42 CET ] [ Original post ]

Happy New Year!
This update is a bit smaller than usual with the break for holidays, but Craig and I are back hard at work after a few days off. We hope you all had a happy holidays! The content in the update breaks into two major sections - player/enemy movement & prop/decoraton. For movement we stated by taking the updated movement code from the previous update and applying it to all enemies as well. We had initially been hesitant to do this because it's a more cpu intensive system, but it results in much smoother movement around walls and props. If you notice performance issues with this build, please let me know. In addition to changing the collision system we also updated all the props in the mansion to have rounded corners. This should reduce any sticking points on props. Eventually we need to apply this to wall corners, but this is a bit trickers since that is a custom generated collision mesh. Finally we updated all the player characters to have a new dodge animation instead of the old blue dash. We lowered the speed at which you sady significantly, but increased the time you dash by quite a bit. This will give you a larger window of invincibility while you dash, but you should still cover a similar distance as before. In particular this should make it easier to correctly time a dodge through large laser beams (skullington fight) and large spike sets. Also, it just looks cooler. For prop and visual work we did a full pass on all the static props in the mansion, removed several, and added several new ones for variety. We also re-added all of the large scale props like dining room tables to the rooms. They provide additional cover from enemies, but has a limited life. All props also have a permanent debris on destruction, a new explosion effect, and new debris particles. All candles/torches in the mansion should now work as a functional point light to make the whole scene a bit brighter. And we also added a mask in all the empty space on a level to reduce the likelyhood of seeing any random sprites poking through the sides. All in all, hopefully all this work makes the mansion feel more varied and interesting. Thanks for reading, and we hope you have fun! We're looking forward to all of the new stuff we'll be adding in 2018. :) Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2018/01/02 - 1.12.6576 (Content Update 10) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Happy New Years! What's New: * Enemies now use the same movement code as players, providing improved movement around props and wall edges * Decreased player dodge speed from 32 to 12, but increased dodge/incincibility time from 0.15 to 0.41 seconds * Added a dodge animation for all player characters * Added a dust trail to players while running * Added first pass of a full map "ceiling" mesh to reduce sprites poking out into empty space * Added functional point lights to mansion walls that have a candle or torch * Added prop remains/splats for persistance after destruction * Reworked all prop colliders/hit areas to be more accurate and smooth pathing out for players and enemies * Updated to Unity 2017.2.1f1 * New Prop: Knight's armor * New Prop: Grandfather clock * New Prop: Large Dining Table (Round) * New Prop: Large Dining Table (Horizontal & Vertical) * New Prop: Sofa * New Prop: Dining Chair (Red & Blue, front & side variants) * New Prop: Potted plant * New Prop: Fireplace * New Prop: Book Stacks * New Prop explosions and debris effects What's Changed: * Fixed several map generation bugs that were causing excess mesh generation and performance issues * Fixed prop bug that would spawn multiple explosions and debris effects on death * Reworked all mansion rooms to contain a valid start/exit location * Reworked prop and enemy debris sorting to ensure prop debris always shows on top * Fixed netcode bug where incorrectly configured props can cause an error on level initialization

[ 2018-01-02 22:23:42 CET ] [ Original post ]

For the last several weeks we've been working hard on the content and balance of the Mansion - with a goal of getting it to 1.0 quality so we can use it as a template for the remaining zones in the game. To that end, we added several new enemy variants (Pinkeye Earl, Speyeball Earl, Pinkeye Jr). We also completely revamped the enemy selection/spawning system for both normal enemies and arena challenge rooms. All of the mansion enemies have been moved to the behavior tree AI system and there have been many changes to their behaviors. Several bullet animations have been replaced as we try to work on a style that makes them more visible and give them a consistent feel across the range of enemies. Several enemies got a new coat of paint to bring their looks up to par:

We have also started tweaking player movement/mobility, most of the work in this update went towards giving player smoother movement around props and walls, reducing many cases where you might "stick." Please let us know how this feels to you, we will continue to tweak it going forward! Besides all that we added several small quality of life things - for instance in arena challenges all enemies now have a spawn warning animation so you are more likely to not have an enemy spawn on top of you. We've hopefully fixed the remaining issues with arenas not correctly opening, thanks to everyone who submitted information that helped us track that down! Have fun with the update, and always we'd love to hear what you think! Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2017/11/16 - 1.11.6529 (Content Update 9) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * Added shoppe to airship * Added Speyeball Earl * Added Pinkeye Earl * Added Pinkeye Earl Jr * Props no longer drop health or items, only a (very low) chance of coins * Arenas now have a spawn warning to indicate that a new enemy is appearing instead of spawning it instantly * Overhauled enemy generation code to use a new method instead of the old percentage of area calculation method * Overhauled arena enemy generation to work alongside the new systems * Added new arena rooms that use the new enemy types * Modified player movement to work a bit more smoothly around walls, props, and enemies * Added a 'scatter' behavior and applied it on all rats for more erratic behavior * Updated to Unity 2017.2.0f3 What's Changed: * Fixed multiplayer bug where arenas would not finish/resolve correctly * Converted Speyeball Jr to behavior tree system * Moved speyeball and pinkeye to behavior tree system * Tweaked speyeball and pinkeye behavior * Removed slowing effect from ghost, moved ghost to behavior tree system * Increased beam range and sweep of tesla sphere * Converted Skullclops to behavior tree system * Significantly increased skullclops dash length * Updated enemy data tooling to account for new enemies * Removed gungir from relic list until we can add it back in with corrections * Added logic to behavior tree system to allow enemies to respond to wall collisions * Added teleport to scatter ghost * Replaced art for several bullets * Updated web art and gave it an animated fade out * Replaced art for ghost and scatter ghost * Replaced art for bombdemons * Updated art for rats * Fixed seed info not appearing correctly in network MP games * Fixed spawn position of spike traps * Adjusted collision on spike traps to be a bit more forgiving around edges * Adjusted player collision slightly * Replaced skullclops art * Changed all weapon sound effects to use random selection instead of round robin * Replaced art for slime jr * Replaced art for super slime jr

[ 2017-11-17 01:58:19 CET ] [ Original post ]

For the last several weeks we've been working hard on the content and balance of the Mansion - with a goal of getting it to 1.0 quality so we can use it as a template for the remaining zones in the game. To that end, we added several new enemy variants (Pinkeye Earl, Speyeball Earl, Pinkeye Jr). We also completely revamped the enemy selection/spawning system for both normal enemies and arena challenge rooms. All of the mansion enemies have been moved to the behavior tree AI system and there have been many changes to their behaviors. Several bullet animations have been replaced as we try to work on a style that makes them more visible and give them a consistent feel across the range of enemies. Several enemies got a new coat of paint to bring their looks up to par:

We have also started tweaking player movement/mobility, most of the work in this update went towards giving player smoother movement around props and walls, reducing many cases where you might "stick." Please let us know how this feels to you, we will continue to tweak it going forward! Besides all that we added several small quality of life things - for instance in arena challenges all enemies now have a spawn warning animation so you are more likely to not have an enemy spawn on top of you. We've hopefully fixed the remaining issues with arenas not correctly opening, thanks to everyone who submitted information that helped us track that down! Have fun with the update, and always we'd love to hear what you think! Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2017/11/16 - 1.11.6529 (Content Update 9) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * Added shoppe to airship * Added Speyeball Earl * Added Pinkeye Earl * Added Pinkeye Earl Jr * Props no longer drop health or items, only a (very low) chance of coins * Arenas now have a spawn warning to indicate that a new enemy is appearing instead of spawning it instantly * Overhauled enemy generation code to use a new method instead of the old percentage of area calculation method * Overhauled arena enemy generation to work alongside the new systems * Added new arena rooms that use the new enemy types * Modified player movement to work a bit more smoothly around walls, props, and enemies * Added a 'scatter' behavior and applied it on all rats for more erratic behavior * Updated to Unity 2017.2.0f3 What's Changed: * Fixed multiplayer bug where arenas would not finish/resolve correctly * Converted Speyeball Jr to behavior tree system * Moved speyeball and pinkeye to behavior tree system * Tweaked speyeball and pinkeye behavior * Removed slowing effect from ghost, moved ghost to behavior tree system * Increased beam range and sweep of tesla sphere * Converted Skullclops to behavior tree system * Significantly increased skullclops dash length * Updated enemy data tooling to account for new enemies * Removed gungir from relic list until we can add it back in with corrections * Added logic to behavior tree system to allow enemies to respond to wall collisions * Added teleport to scatter ghost * Replaced art for several bullets * Updated web art and gave it an animated fade out * Replaced art for ghost and scatter ghost * Replaced art for bombdemons * Updated art for rats * Fixed seed info not appearing correctly in network MP games * Fixed spawn position of spike traps * Adjusted collision on spike traps to be a bit more forgiving around edges * Adjusted player collision slightly * Replaced skullclops art * Changed all weapon sound effects to use random selection instead of round robin * Replaced art for slime jr * Replaced art for super slime jr

[ 2017-11-17 01:58:19 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello! First of all, thanks to everyone who's reported their experiences with the new map generator and arena challenges so far - the feedback has been incredibly helpful and because of it we've been able to track down issues that otherwise would have been a nightmare to find.
But on to the update! The biggest change in the mansion generator is the inclusion of shops in the main zones, instead of as an interstitial level. It's the first "special" room type that we've managed to include, towards our longer term goal of increasing moment to moment diversity on a level. Along with the shop we've also added the first two in-level NPCs, Monsieur LeClawe and his cat. Their conversations are temporary until we do the full conversation mechanics/UI, but it's fun to see them in the world after all this time. Now that shops are integrated into the levels we will need to revisit the loot tables and costs. It is on the todo list, but will be part of a larger revamp as we look at what items are worth having in shops, what their rarity should be, and what the costs should be to scale with the value and player progress. It's a balancing act that relies on a lot of other game systems and mechanics, so we appreciate your patience for it. In addition to the shops there are a bunch of smaller but visible updates - notably a secondary tileset for the mansion, several new arena challenges, and bug fixes that were preventing some players from progressing in the last version. You can see the full changelog below. We hope you enjoy this update, and we hope to be back soon with the next one! Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2017/10/03 - 1.10.6485 (Content Update 8) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * The new generation system (e.g. the mansion) now integrates a shop into each floor rather than having a single interstitial shop between the two main floors of a zone. * Added the first two shop types (normal and black market) to the mansion generator. * Added a new tileset on the first floor of the mansion * Added two shop NPC's (LeClawe and his cat) * During play the level seed is now displayed on screen * Shops now change the music based on whether or not a local player is in the shop * Shops can now pull from different loot tables, letting different shops pull from different item sets * Added several new arena challenges * Updated to Unity 2017.1.1f1 What's Changed: * Tweaked difficulty of some arena challenges * Fixed floor names created by new generation system * Fixed bug where zone transitions were sometimes incorrectly generated on the mansion * Added a data validator to ensure that bad data can't make a challenge arena bug out * Added additional validity checks to challenge arenas to make sure they open as expected * Added a periodic check to see if someone has been caught in an arena barrier - and if so teleport them to a safe location * Fixed error with barrier & key objective where it could prevent some level rooms from being correctly processed * Arenas now have a per-wave timeout of 120 seconds. After that it should immediately move on to the next wave or open the doors if the last wave has already been processed. * Fixed an errant ceiling tile on the treasure room map Misc: * Added ability to weight rooms with odds, currently only used in shop selection * Replaced shop table art Known Issues: * We've had periodic reports of challenge arenas not opening. We've tried to bulletproof the code as best we can, but if you see a specific case of this please note the level seed in the bottom right corner of the screen and let us know! We are still actively looking for a repeatable test case to reproduce the issue.

[ 2017-10-03 23:41:22 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello! First of all, thanks to everyone who's reported their experiences with the new map generator and arena challenges so far - the feedback has been incredibly helpful and because of it we've been able to track down issues that otherwise would have been a nightmare to find.
But on to the update! The biggest change in the mansion generator is the inclusion of shops in the main zones, instead of as an interstitial level. It's the first "special" room type that we've managed to include, towards our longer term goal of increasing moment to moment diversity on a level. Along with the shop we've also added the first two in-level NPCs, Monsieur LeClawe and his cat. Their conversations are temporary until we do the full conversation mechanics/UI, but it's fun to see them in the world after all this time. Now that shops are integrated into the levels we will need to revisit the loot tables and costs. It is on the todo list, but will be part of a larger revamp as we look at what items are worth having in shops, what their rarity should be, and what the costs should be to scale with the value and player progress. It's a balancing act that relies on a lot of other game systems and mechanics, so we appreciate your patience for it. In addition to the shops there are a bunch of smaller but visible updates - notably a secondary tileset for the mansion, several new arena challenges, and bug fixes that were preventing some players from progressing in the last version. You can see the full changelog below. We hope you enjoy this update, and we hope to be back soon with the next one! Cheers, Ryan & Craig 2017/10/03 - 1.10.6485 (Content Update 8) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * The new generation system (e.g. the mansion) now integrates a shop into each floor rather than having a single interstitial shop between the two main floors of a zone. * Added the first two shop types (normal and black market) to the mansion generator. * Added a new tileset on the first floor of the mansion * Added two shop NPC's (LeClawe and his cat) * During play the level seed is now displayed on screen * Shops now change the music based on whether or not a local player is in the shop * Shops can now pull from different loot tables, letting different shops pull from different item sets * Added several new arena challenges * Updated to Unity 2017.1.1f1 What's Changed: * Tweaked difficulty of some arena challenges * Fixed floor names created by new generation system * Fixed bug where zone transitions were sometimes incorrectly generated on the mansion * Added a data validator to ensure that bad data can't make a challenge arena bug out * Added additional validity checks to challenge arenas to make sure they open as expected * Added a periodic check to see if someone has been caught in an arena barrier - and if so teleport them to a safe location * Fixed error with barrier & key objective where it could prevent some level rooms from being correctly processed * Arenas now have a per-wave timeout of 120 seconds. After that it should immediately move on to the next wave or open the doors if the last wave has already been processed. * Fixed an errant ceiling tile on the treasure room map Misc: * Added ability to weight rooms with odds, currently only used in shop selection * Replaced shop table art Known Issues: * We've had periodic reports of challenge arenas not opening. We've tried to bulletproof the code as best we can, but if you see a specific case of this please note the level seed in the bottom right corner of the screen and let us know! We are still actively looking for a repeatable test case to reproduce the issue.

[ 2017-10-03 23:00:44 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello players! We've just pushed the latest update to both the testing and default branches, so you should see it regardless of what branch you are playing on. The most visible change will be the addition of combat arenas - rooms in the mansion that offer a series of enemy waves you need to defeat to progress. The wave/locked room structure will require you to change tactics and provide a nice pacing change as you work your way through a level. It's a major structural change though, so we'd love your feedback on them. We will continue to tweak wave counts, enemy counts, arena count and distribution, and more as we continue to work on the game. It's worth noting that we already realize that the arenas need some additional user experience stuff like warning indicators for incoming spawns, blocking exterior enemies from shooting through, etc. But we felt like it was in a good enough spot to start getting feedback from players. A more behind the scenes change is we've taken some time to build out additional tooling to modify monster generation throughout a level - it's really nice to be able to iterate on all of the data more quickly, and as we start to fine tune the encounters it will allow us to work on them much faster. (For folks who are on windows you can find the first of the tools in the Mods/tools folder - although be warned that if you change data it can break the game/online play for you!) There are also some minor changes to netcode, including the start of an overhaul of how trap timings are propagated. It's not where we want it to be yet, but timings should appear more accurate for people playing in our recommended ping range time of 0-120ms. Thanks, as always, for playing and we'll be back soon with the next update! Ryan & Craig 2017/08/31 - 1.9.6452 (Content Update 7) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * Challenge Arenas! A certain number of rooms on each floor will now require fighting multiple waves of enemies. * Changed the netcode for trap timings in an online game. Movement may be a little less smooth but trap placement and timing should now seem more consistent on client machines. (NB: this will degrade with high/inconsistent ping times, we currently suggest playing with a ping of under 100ms to your game host) * Added the 6 initial challenge arena configurations * Added the first version of the enemy configuration tool. This is mostly for internal use right now but will also be used eventually for anyone making mods. Use of the tool is *not supported* but for curious folks you can find it in the Mods directory. * Added animated tile support so we can start adding more life to the game maps * Updated to Unity 2017.1p4 * Updated controller library to newest version, adds several new controller types to use * Fixed bugs where enemy spawning was checking the map for valid locations incorrectly, you should no longer get enemy spawns near your starting area.

[ 2017-09-01 01:23:54 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello players! We've just pushed the latest update to both the testing and default branches, so you should see it regardless of what branch you are playing on. The most visible change will be the addition of combat arenas - rooms in the mansion that offer a series of enemy waves you need to defeat to progress. The wave/locked room structure will require you to change tactics and provide a nice pacing change as you work your way through a level. It's a major structural change though, so we'd love your feedback on them. We will continue to tweak wave counts, enemy counts, arena count and distribution, and more as we continue to work on the game. It's worth noting that we already realize that the arenas need some additional user experience stuff like warning indicators for incoming spawns, blocking exterior enemies from shooting through, etc. But we felt like it was in a good enough spot to start getting feedback from players. A more behind the scenes change is we've taken some time to build out additional tooling to modify monster generation throughout a level - it's really nice to be able to iterate on all of the data more quickly, and as we start to fine tune the encounters it will allow us to work on them much faster. (For folks who are on windows you can find the first of the tools in the Mods/tools folder - although be warned that if you change data it can break the game/online play for you!) There are also some minor changes to netcode, including the start of an overhaul of how trap timings are propagated. It's not where we want it to be yet, but timings should appear more accurate for people playing in our recommended ping range time of 0-120ms. Thanks, as always, for playing and we'll be back soon with the next update! Ryan & Craig 2017/08/31 - 1.9.6452 (Content Update 7) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- What's New: * Challenge Arenas! A certain number of rooms on each floor will now require fighting multiple waves of enemies. * Changed the netcode for trap timings in an online game. Movement may be a little less smooth but trap placement and timing should now seem more consistent on client machines. (NB: this will degrade with high/inconsistent ping times, we currently suggest playing with a ping of under 100ms to your game host) * Added the 6 initial challenge arena configurations * Added the first version of the enemy configuration tool. This is mostly for internal use right now but will also be used eventually for anyone making mods. Use of the tool is *not supported* but for curious folks you can find it in the Mods directory. * Added animated tile support so we can start adding more life to the game maps * Updated to Unity 2017.1p4 * Updated controller library to newest version, adds several new controller types to use * Fixed bugs where enemy spawning was checking the map for valid locations incorrectly, you should no longer get enemy spawns near your starting area.

[ 2017-09-01 01:23:54 CET ] [ Original post ]

Short Version:

We’ve started an initiative to rework all the map generation in the game, and the mansion is the first zone to get changes. There is a new branch called “testing” that you can download now that contains the work to date. Our next update will focus on adding even more content to the mansion.

Long Version:

For a long time now Craig and I have felt like the map generation isn’t quite where we want it to be. We have a list of features that we’d *like* to see in the maps - unique/rare one-off rooms, NPC places, trap rooms with more design than “randomly placed spikes,” rooms with unique visuals, and more. We’ve made several efforts to prototype these features in the existing map structures, but were never really happy with the results, and the effort to author a single space of the type was so great that we would likely fall well short of the variety that we want to see. As a second but equally important issue, we’ve been frustrated with the game pacing on the existing map structures. We feel like the moment to moment combat is fun but over the course of a zone the pacing is basically a constant level of challenge. Ideally it would vary more, with peaks where the combat is more intense, and valleys where players get a bit of downtime to recover and explore. So with those issues in mind, we decided we needed to redesign the map generation system to better fit the needs of Monsters and Monocles. Our multi-step plan to validate a new design was:

• Create a small tool to allow for testing and modification of the basic generation algorithm
• Port the new generation code to the Monsters and Monocles codebase
• Create a tool for defining the map segments with all the required metadata
• Rework map rendering system to handle new segmented map generation with varying tilemaps per segment
• Create several new rooms/segments for the map generator to use (empty rooms, combat rooms, trap rooms, treasure rooms, etc)
• Replace the main combat floors of the mansion with the new map system
• Test and ship

The initial tool for testing out the new designs wasn’t much to look at, but it allowed for very quick iteration on both the generation algorithm and different room shapes for testing. The tool itself was working after a couple days, and then I spent the next three weeks working on the algorithm, tweaking potential room shapes and sizes, generating large batches of maps for design discussions with Craig, and then finalizing details like calculating a critical path, adding looping paths, etc. We spent a lot of time at this stage because it is far and away the easiest stage to fix problems, and the more we got correct at this stage the easier the rest of the stages would be.
(Screenshot of the test tool we used to create the new generation system) Once we were done with the prototype tool phase, I quickly brought the core algorithm code into the main game codebase and reworked it to start generating the necessary data structures required for play. I also developed a file structure in the Tiled map editor to start drawing out map segments and define all the necessary metadata. At this stage the goal was to be able to add all the data we need but also do it as simply as possible, since added complexity will increase the time to create variants, and eventually reduce the overall number of variants we can create. During this phase we reduced the segment creation process from around 2 hours per segment to approx 25 minutes (with a bit more time required for trap rooms with complex layouts). We feel pretty good about these times, but we plan on tweaking the Tiled map editor a bit to meet our needs even more. Now we had map data being generated, and all of the data structures were valid, but we couldn’t see the maps! I needed to rewrite the map renderer to change from a monolithic map to creating and rendering several small segments. Fortunately I was able to reuse a lot of the existing renderer infrastructure, and just went through a refactoring process to increase the flexibility. At this point we could see the the new maps and actually start to play! Well, we could run around the maps anyways. Once we hit that step I had to slowly start adding back in all of the remaining features that make a map playable - enemies, props, objectives, hidden entrances, exit points, etc. While I worked on that we also created more map segments and added a new trap type - a spinning blade of death. And while I was working on all of this stuff, Craig had been reimagining the visuals for the mansion and using our new tooling to overhaul all of the tiles and details. It’s a huge step forward for the game visually and it’s not even using all of the new options at his disposal yet! I can’t wait to see how it looks when he’s done. He also plans to revisit the props and other objects to bring them to a consistent level.
(Mansion tiles: before)
(Mansion tiles: after!) So, that’s a rough outline of the work for this update, and we’re launching it all today in a new branch called “testing.” If you’re interested in checking it out you can do so by following these instructions:

• Right click on Monsters & Monocles in your library
• Select “Properties” in the popup menu
• Go to the “BETAS” tab in the dialog that appears
• Select the “testing” branch
• Close the dialog. At this point steam should automatically queue the patch download for you. If it doesn’t quit and restart the steam client. You’ll know when it’s worked because you’ll see [testing] next to the game name in your library

We hope you enjoy the new map system and see the same potential in it that we do - we’ll continue to push more changes and content into it as part of the testing branch, and once batches of work have stabilized we’ll push it from testing to the main game branch as well. Thanks as always for your patience, and have fun! -Ryan & Craig 2017/07/26 - 1.8.6386 (Content Update 6) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note: This build is currently on the TESTING branch because it is not guaranteed to be stable and we will update it as needed. Changes will be pushed to the main branch as appropriate. What's New: * Removed original mansion map generator * Added new map generation system based on room variants * Added 10 combat room variants * Added 5 trap room variants * Added 1 treasure room variant * Added a boss room for skullington fight (and slightly reduced overall space for fight) * Removed original mansion tilesets * Added all new gothic stone tileset * Updated map renderer to support multiple tilesets within a single floor * Added a new spinning blade trap type Known Issues: * Spinning traps can desync in online MP on clients

[ 2017-06-26 22:59:36 CET ] [ Original post ]

From: Overlord To: Minions Minions, I have two major items to touch upon in this memo. First, our Research Division has announced that a new monster type named the “Papergeist” has escaped the experiment labs and flown to the zones of engagement. It is a ghost with an endless search for knowledge and will devour any books and papers it comes across. Give it space and do not let it consume any of our internal memos! It’s already eaten a collection of my early journals from my early days as an analyst in Central Services, and I don’t know what it will do with the information. If you find a Papergeist and manage to recover any portions of my journal, please return them to immediately. And don’t read them. You must promise not to read them. Second, our Spymaster has informed me that the heroes have recently received upgrades to their airship. The new device is called Turing’s Enigmatic Analyzer, or T.E.A., and will begin to track a wide variety of tactical information for them. They have also added a fragment analyzer that can take partial pieces of pages and attempt to reconstruct them into a readable whole. To help process all this information they have also added a B0T-13R model robot to keep things running smoothly. Please, minions, redouble your efforts and show the heroes that any attempt at improvement is a futile effort. Yours, Overlord of the Secret Criminal Organization of Nasty Evildoers Att. Intel Report 1.7.6331 INTELLIGENCE REPORT #: 1.7.6331 TOPIC: RELEVANT CHANGES IN ZONES OF ENGAGEMENT What's New: * Turing's Enigmatic Analyzer has been added to the airship * Fragment Converter Device has been added to the airship * Your trusty butler, B0t-13r has been added to the airship * The first book of journal pages has been added to the game * Papergeists have been added to the game * Added codex entries for weapons, items, and relics Changes: * Reworked entire seeding system so each game starts with a single distinct 'parent' seed, that all other seeds and generators are built from. This improves our ability to replicate levels more consistently and also moves us a step closer from being able to share seeds for fixed runs/challenges Fixes: * Dynamic lighting had broken with unity 5.6, now fixed * Several shader objects had broken with unity 5.6, now fixed * Debris particles should now appear as expected * Fixed bundle name on mac to fix issue where game wouldn't load

[ 2017-05-02 20:57:03 CET ] [ Original post ]

S.C.O.N.E. INTERNAL MEMO # 10004

From: Overlord To: Minions Minions, I apologize, but I must dispense with the customary pleasantries to offer up a warning: BEWARE. Unbeknownst to us, the heroes have received a supply drop of several new weapons and items. This arsenal has drastically improved their firepower and tactical options. Until Central Services can fully evaluate these new offensive capabilities, I urge you to take care and engage the enemy in groups of sufficient number. An initial intelligence report has been attached to this memorandum, and I have included a brief clip of some of the new weapons we’ve seen the heroes using. I'm still not sure how they managed to weaponize a cucumber sandwich...
With that unpleasant news out of the way, the remaining news is relatively minor but still worth mentioning: The zones of engagement have been slightly modified to bring the size of the zones within standard operating regulations. This should allow you to more efficiently funnel the enemy into advantageous encounters. Our devious traps to cause “crashes” or “infinite loops” when a hero tried to enter zones have been found and removed. Likewise, we will no longer be able to create a mansion zone that blocks the players from the exit. This is unfortunate, as it means heroes will be able to progress at will. As always, we will persevere. For the remaining changes please review the attached intelligence report. As always, thank you for your efforts and please contact Central Services with any questions. Yours, Overlord of the Secret Criminal Organization of Nasty Evildoers Att. Intel Report 1.6.6297 INTELLIGENCE REPORT #: 1.6.6297 TOPIC: RELEVANT CHANGES IN ZONES OF ENGAGEMENT What's New: * New guns and items to play with! * New gun: Antique Pistol (Bullet class, Rare) * New gun: Auto Cross Launcher (Holy class, Uncommon) * New gun: Cricket Bat (Explosive class, Uncommon) * New gun: Cucumber Sandwich (Spread class, Rare) * New gun: Double Shot (Bullet class, Rare) * New gun: Flame Belcher (Fire class, Common) * New gun: Hole Puncher (Spread class, Common) * New gun: Plasma Rifle (Beam class, Uncommon) * New gun: Wave Beam (Beam class, Common) * New item tier: Uncommon (previously all were common) * New item: Brandy Snifter (Common) * New item: Fancy Slippers (Uncommon) * New item: Slippery Moustache Wax (Uncommon) * New Item: Iceberg Fragment (Uncommon) * New Item: Steam Powered Fan (Uncommon) * New Item: Demonic Bullets (Uncommon) What's Changed: * All zones have had a pass over map size to try to make them more roughly in-line with our long term plans * Guns can now have multiple valid exit points/angles for bullets * Added "contact" damage type for all melee damage * Added ability for items to modify damage taken per damage type Fixes: * Fixed a rare but major issue with mansion generation that could cause an impossible level to be generated * Fixed an issue where mansion generation could infinitely loop trying to place doors * Fixed bug with item cloning not correctly tracking gun modification fields * Fixed bug with item sprites not being located correctly on screen (they were center pivot when they should be bottom pivot) * Several miscellaneous bug fixes across all level generators that would cause unnecessary stalls or loops * Added caching of map segments for town generation improving overall generation time * Fixed bug where HUD texture atlas could become corrupted

[ 2017-03-30 20:11:21 CET ] [ Original post ]

S.C.O.N.E. INTERNAL MEMO # 10003 From: Overlord To: Minions

Dearest Minions,

It is my pleasure to announce that after several months of preparation, the zone of engagement in the Ancient Forest is now fully operational. I would like to thank all of you for your patience while the work was being completed, and hope this new zone provides much needed assistance in your fight against the heroes. I noted that several of you were unable to attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony this morning - please file your absence forms immediately or be subject to disciplinary action. I would also like to welcome the new monsters working with us in the Forest. Welcome to the team all Doomshrooms, Flamedeers, and Grave Hermits. We expect great things from you, and look forward to seeing you in action. For all of you deployed in the forest zone, a word of warning: avoid the deepest floor at *all* costs. Although we have successfully corrupted the Old Man of the Forest to our cause that is no guarantee that you are safe in his presence. Tread carefully. As always, I have attached the latest intelligence report for your edification. Please read it at your earliest opportunity. Yours, Overlord of the Secret Criminal Organization of Nasty Evildoers Att. Intel Report 1.5.6420 --------------------------------------------------------------------- INTELLIGENCE REPORT #: 1.5.6420 TOPIC: RELEVANT CHANGES IN ZONES OF ENGAGEMENT What's New: * The forest zone is now live! It is not complete, but should be fully playable. * The Old Man of the Forest now sees over the forest exit * Doomshroom, Flamedeer, and Grave Hermits are all now live in the forest * Reworked forest art * Reworked enemy groupings on forest * Added new props to forest and updated all debris particle effects * Added new title music * New custom map built for the Old Man of the Forest fight Changes: * Updated to Unity 5.5.1 - this might small like a sound thing but required several major changes to lighting, input, and physics. Please keep an eye out for bugs! * Fixed several behavior tree nodes for enemies so they will face the correct way while moving * Players can now be affected by damage causing status effects (e.g. burning) * Sound effect player now culls sound cues based on distance from the main audio listener * Bullets no longer count a target as 'hit' if passing through while invincible * Started support for pluralization of text values for objective text * Added ability for traps to hold their damaging state for a given duration instead of a single frame check * Added ability for traps to be fired by controlling AI enemies * Reworked entrance/exit selection for cellular automata maps to better enforce a minimum distance Fixes: * Fixed multiple generation bugs that could cause a crash when teleporting in to a new zone * Bullets fired now despawn on level change to prevent them from persisting into the new level * Reworked shader for particle debris so it can properly alpha fade based on supplied color gradient

[ 2017-02-01 04:12:17 CET ] [ Original post ]

S.C.O.N.E. INTERNAL MEMO # 10002 From: Overlord To: Minions

Dearest Minions,

I felt it appropriate to issue a short missive to make you all aware of some changes that you will undoubtedly notice over the coming days, before returning to my work establishing our stronghold in The Forest. Please familiarize yourself with these changes immediately and incorporate the information into your daily work against the nefarious heroes. First: We have retained the services of a professional Relic Hunter to assist in identification of the items we find in the zones of engagement. They are working around the clock to identify and name all relics found and submitted to Central Services. Please send all new relics to Central immediately via the nearest available pneumatic tube. Second: Central has identified and weaponized four new relics for immediate use, please see the attached Intelligence Report for more details. Third: Central has also … lost four relics. Those responsible have been sacked. Central Services Executives send their deepest regrets to anyone using the crumpet cannon, gatling gun, hand cannon, or firebuss relics. Hopefully new relics will be found over time that make up for the loss. Fourth: I have authorized the use of several experimental rare minions across the current zones of engagement. Please be aware if you see a Tesla Turret, Dark Scorpion, Scatter Ghost, or Pink Eye that they are in our employ, and give them any assistance needed. Thank you, as always, for your tireless service. I know you may be feeling beleaguered, but look forward to the new year as we attack our foe across new zones of engagement. Yours, Overlord of the Secret Criminal Organization of Nasty Evildoers Att. Intel Report 1.4.6199 --------------------------------------------------------------------- INTELLIGENCE REPORT #: 1.4.6199 TOPIC: RELEVANT CHANGES IN ZONES OF ENGAGEMENT What's New: * Relic Rework - All relics given new art, new names, and new functionality. Four relics replaced with new ones. Details in a section below. * Rare Enemies - Pink Eye, Dark Scorpion, Scatter Ghost, and Tesla Turret have joined the enemy forces * Initial work on contextual button icons. Controller players should now see xbox or ps4 controllers based on their controller type. (Keyboard support still in progress) * Gun pickup UI now shows what class a weapon belongs to before pickup * Relic/Item pickup UI now shows what type of item it is before pickup * Relics now tell you their effect on pickup * Added the concept of damage types so the system can respond to them differently. Initial type is Explosion, will add new types like Burn etc as needed. Relic Details: * Midas Crown (prev. coins+) - new art/name * Bandit's Glove (prev. coin range+) - new art/name * Flask of Endurance (prev. dash recharge) - new art/name * Puma Mask (prev. dash speed+) - new art/name * Flask of Vigor (prev. health+) - new art/name * Wings of Icarus (prev. speed+) - new art/name * Holy Chalice (prev. health regen) - new art/name * Templar Shield (prev. knockback-) - new art/name * Enchanted Teacup (prev. health item+) - new art/name * Janus' Hourglass (prev. combo cooldown+) - new art/name * Loki's Mask (prev. combo kills-) - new art/name * Jaws of the Last Wight (prev. revolver dmg+) - now affects Bullet class weapons, new art/name * Hand of the Last Wight (prev. revolver fire rate+) - now affects Bullet clas weapons, new art/name * Flames of Ra (prev. flamethrower burn+) - now affects all Fire class weapons, new art/name * Totem of the Wind Giant (prev. machine gun range) - now affects all Bullet class weapons, new art/name * Dragon Breath (prev. stake launcher burn) - now adds burn to all Holy class weapons, new art/name * Ares' Wrath (prev. grenade launcher explosion radius+) - now increases radius on all Explosive class weapons, new art/name * Khione's Ice Crown (prev. blunderbuss slow) - now adds slow effect to all Spread class weapons, new art/name * Gungir (prev. revolver max hits+) - now adds additional hits to all Bullet class weapons, new art/name * Cloak of Houdini (new!) - Reduces movement penalties from slowing effects * Skadi's Tear (new!) - Slows the rate at which weapons overheat on all weapon classes * Stone Golem's Heart (new!) - Reduces damage taken from explosive blasts * Fist of the Titans (new!) - Increases knockback on Spread class weapons Changes/Fixes: * Portal modified to not allow for knockback, which previously prevented its firing sequence to occur * Adjusted enemy generation on town * Fixed bug where barrier/key objective could be defeated by dashing through the barrier * Fixed bug where last alive player could drop out from menus * Removed two beams in the airship where players could get stuck * Fixed bug where tutenkraben's health bar wasn't appearing if he was shot before initial state change. * Fixed bug where vase hermits weren't properly responding to player proximity * Fixed bug where in an online game after a loop levels weren't always correctly cleared out for the next loop.

[ 2016-12-21 21:58:12 CET ] [ Original post ]

Like all our technical updates, this update is a mix of features, fixes, and other work needed to prepare for upcoming content updates. The biggest internal change is that the entirety of the input handling system has been rewritten and all of our input libraries have been updated to their latest versions. This was a necessary step towards supporting in-game rebinding for both controllers and keyboard/mouse. It's also given us much of the infrastructure we need to eventually show context sensitive button prompts. If you notice any changes in behavior regarding input/controls please let us know in the bug report forums! (And if you've already been customizing your keyboard controls please note the file has changed, you now need to be editing keyboard_controls.xml in your save data folder.) Another change that won't be visible but I'm excited about is that all weapons now belong to one of six classes - going forward we'll be using those classes for different types of buffs/penalties so they can refer to an entire group of weapons instead of just an individual weapons. It sounds like a small change but it opens up what we can do with relics and items quite a bit! Weapon classes will be made visible in the upcoming content update. With this update finished I'll be moving on to full time work on Content Update 2 (Craig has already been working on the art for it). We'll be posting more news about that as it gets closer to completion. Finally - Sony has graciously invited us to demo at Playstation Experience in Anaheim! If you're going to be there, please find us and say hello. Cheers, Ryan

What's New:

• Active items are now visible in player hud
• Transitioning between floors now requires an explicit button press
• Game should now remember last selected relic set from a single player game for subsequent games
• Added the ability in local multiplayer for a player to drop out of the game from the pause menu
• Added Shoppe music
• Added custom weapon sfx for several weapons, and several reworked sfx

Fixes:

• Game should no longer crash if paused for an extended period of time
• Reworked zombeast attack sequence to ensure full damage from attacks go through
• Reworked zombeast to be immune to knockback

Misc Tech Stuff:

• Input Libraries updated to latest version
• Completely reworked input handling and input binding serialization
• Weapons have been grouped into classes in preparation for upcoming content changes
• Reworked relic internals to share an implementation with the item system
• Added additional local stat tracking to know when players have seen a given gun/item/relic, and how many times they have picked it up during play. Data will be used in a future content update

[ 2016-11-18 02:41:57 CET ] [ Original post ]

From: Overlord To: Minions My Dear Minions, I would like to commend you on your efforts in stopping the heroes as they traverse our encampments and attempt to interrupt our grand schemes. You have worked admirably as a team and I know that you truly are trying your best. However it has come to my attention that heroes are frequently and repeatedly defeating us across all our current zones of engagement and this simply will not suffice. As such I am ordering several changes, to be implemented immediately: First: New objectives and events have been deployed across all zones. You, my minions, should not need to do anything for these to take effect but they should add a new set of challenges for the heroes to overcome. I do recommend that you avoid gazing into the magic portals, lest it mistake you for an enemy. Second: We’ve received reports that the heroes have gained an ability called a ‘damage state.’ Intelligence believes that this makes it more clear for them to recognize when they are injured. Along with this change they have learned a new technique that allows them to keep firing while being knocked back. Going forward please be aware of this new threat to you. Third: Several of you will be sent to combat training. All Spider Thieves will receive more training in knife throwing, and Chimney Bats will spend time practicing with Mummybats. After training please deploy back to your original zones. Fourth: We have started deployment into a new zone, which we are currently calling The Forest. Minions from the town are currently holding the encampment until the new recruits can be summoned. The heroes should not be able to find this zone yet, which will give us time to prepare our forces there. Finally: There are rumors of secret entrances that ███████████████████REDACTED███████████████████. Please do not call attention to these entrances as we do not wish for the heroes to find them. Again, thank you for all your efforts so far! I, and everyone else at headquarters, appreciates your effort and resolve. Please continue to push and in no time I’m sure we’ll have the world domination that we so desire. Respectfully Yours, Overlord of the Secret Criminal Organization of Nasty Evildoers PS - For more specific information, please see the included intelligence report. INTELLIGENCE REPORT #: 1.2.6144 TOPIC: RELEVANT CHANGES IN ZONES OF ENGAGEMENT CLASSIFICATION: TOP SECRET New Features: * Secret Room Generation: Initial pass of secret rooms you can find. Still very early! Please report a bug if any of the entrance spawns cause an issue * Added unique chests for secret rooms with varying drop rates * Random Events System: 10% chance of an event triggering on a level * 4 Enemy Events: When event type is triggered, enemy types on floor change * Door & Key objective replaced with Barrier & Key objective * Barrier & Key objective added to all zones * 2 all new objective types * Characters now have a damage state and show it when hit along with sfx * Shooting and dashing no longer prevented during knockback states Changed Features: * Bosses now have a guaranteed relic drop * Made changes to relic drop rates across the board * Mansion doorways now have variable width * Chimneybats no longer have a dash attack * Mummybats have moved into the town * Chimneybats and Spider Thieves both have much longer range on projectiles * Chimneybat projectiles have been slowed * Spider Thieves have had their projectile count increased * Spider Thief projectile now can hit up to four objects before expiring * Updated tilesets on dig site In Progress (Features are in the shipped build but disabled by default): * Forest Map zone generator * Forest Props: rocks, graves, standing lamps, tree stumps * If you wish to preview the forest map, you can add "forest" to Modsasezonesavailable_zones.json. We do *not* suggest playing it online at this point in time Fixes: * Fixed some sound effects that weren't pooling so stacking doesn't cause them to blow out * Spider thief projectiles now do damage as expected

[ 2016-10-27 20:39:00 CET ] [ Original post ]

As you read this, tech update 1 (version 1.1.6110) should be rolling out, the changelist can be found below. As mentioned previously the focus for this update was primarily on balance and quality of life issues, along with tech that we need for upcoming content updates. Please let us know in the forums if you run into any issues! We will push a hotfix if any big issues appear. Otherwise I'll be transitioning to work on the next update which is a content update. Have a great weekend! -Ryan

Weapons

• Several balance changes to weapons. Notably auto stake launcher, stake launcher, tea gun, shotgun, cluster bombs, scone mines. Balance is an ongoing exercise and we will continue to make changes as needed.
• Fixed bug with calculating target passthrough for a projectile
• Added screenshake/vibraton back to power weapons, they felt a bit flat without it.
• Teagun no longer fires through walls
• Added a feature where controller will rumble as guns are close to overheating. Makes it easier for controller based players to know when to swap weapons. We're still evaluating changes to make this easier for keyboard/mouse players.

Relics/Items

• The relic interface now tells you how many you've found out of the total set.
• Fixed bug with passthrough calculation when modified by relics
• If you already have an item or weapon of a given type, you are now prevented from consuming another by picking it up.
• Slight increase to relic drop rates. Rare relics should now be found more often. Will continue to monitor this and continue to adjust as necessary.

User Interface

• Started process of localizing game. In this update I added support for pulling strings from a localization spreadsheet, updated the font used, and switched the bulk of the menus/UI to use localized strings. For players interested in helping with localization I will be posting notes on how to help soon. The new font should have the needed characters for significantly more languages.
• Pressing cancel button (circle or b on controller, esc on keyboard) will now unselect character in character select, allowing you to choose a new one
• Pressing cancel button in character select with no controllers activated will return you to main menu (local game only).

Tech

• Enemy generation and loot table systems have been reworked so we can introduce shifting values based on loop count. This will allow us to increase the variance between loops and provide a sufficient reward for those challenges.
• Added support for using static maps in levels. Right now the airship is still the only static map, but this tech will be used in future updates for better store and boss level layouts.

Misc

• Updated mansion tilesets - basic cleanup and a color change on one of the rugs
• Updated boss health bar with new art
• Skullington's laser hitbox has updated to be more consistent with the graphical representation
• Skullington's attack patterns have been updated to increase variance

[ 2016-09-23 21:11:15 CET ] [ Original post ]

First off an apology for being pretty quiet in the forums and news lately - Craig and I both got sick demoing at PAX and have just been trying to get healthy.

PAX West

That said we had an amazing time demoing at PAX. We had a full 10 foot by 10 foot booth in the Indie MEGABOOTH and we were crowded for four days straight. It's a lot of work to run a show but we had a great time showing the game to new players, and even got to do some co-op runs with folks who already owned the game. If you came out to say hello, thanks! It was incredibly rewarding to meet people who have bought and are enjoying the game.

Game Updates

We're actively working on two different updates to get out the door as soon as possible. As always if you're curious you can see detailed status on our trello board, but I'll talk briefly about what to expect here:

Technical Update 1

The first update you'll get is a 'technical update' - this is focused on adding any new tech needed for future content, as well as rebalancing existing content and fixing bugs. Right now this update has about 25 changes in the changelog, and I'm hoping to get a few more in before we ship it to you. Technical Update 1 should go live sometime next week. Some highlights of this update are a first pass at rebalancing guns that are clearly problematic (tea gun, auto stake launcher, more) and adding some tech that we should be able to use in content updates to make game loops more interesting (modifying enemy generation systems based on loop count, improving loot quality based on loop count). This update will also be the start of enabling localization in the game, so we can start to add languages other than English.

Content Update 1

After the technical update ships we'll be focusing on getting the first content update out the door. Craig is creating all of the necessary art right now while I wrap the technical update, and then we'll both work on getting the content update finished. We don't yet have a date for releasing the content update but we're hoping it will be two to three weeks after the tech update ships. If there are any major bugs/issues in the tech update that may delay things. The focus of this content update will be adding new elements that will make the existing zones more entertaining and varied to play - new objectives, an event system that can change enemy generation for a given floor, and some new enemies. Also the very start of secrets, but I can't tell you about that because they're secret. We're also working on the first new zone but it will not be ready in content update 1. Zones are a massive undertaking that consist of level generation, new enemies, new boss, props, etc. If you dig around in the mod files you'll likely be able to get a sneak preview of it - but it'll be a couple more updates before it's in the main game proper. I think that's everything for now - back to work on this technical update for me. Have a great weekend!

[ 2016-09-16 23:33:53 CET ] [ Original post ]

Changelog

• Added the ability to dash through props
• Disable online mode if steam initialization fails
• Updated aim system to reduce cases where gun and player sprites can flicker
• Changing new mouse and keyboard camera to be enabled by default
• Fixed bug where new mouse & keyboard camera would not follow live player on death
• Fixed bug where a player has > 4 devices in local multiplayer
• BUG: Removed ability to select broken config options with launcher
• Changed default cursor size to 25%

Notes

Aiming is still not perfect with mouse and keyboard, especially when the cursor is right above/below the player. I'll keep working on it.

What's Next?

This will probably be the last hotfix for a while - I'm going to roll the next batch of changes into Technical Update 1. This will also give me some flexibility to make some much needed changes (like balance changes to weapons and items) in addition to more bugfixes. If you've still got a bug affecting you it has *not* been dropped - I will keep looking at them and fixing them. Also I'm aiming for a relatively short timeline for Tech Update 1 so you hopefully won't be waiting long. After Tech Update 1 we'll be working on and delivering Content Update 1. This will contain the first batch of new content for the game since launch. How much content we manage to fit in will partially depend on the bug load. More info on this as it gets closer to release.

PAX West

Finally - we'll be at PAX West in the Indie MEGABOOTH! If you're going to be there please come visit - we'll have pins and art cards to give away, and we'll be happy to chat about what's coming up in the next updates. For folks who can't make it - I apologize in advance for not being able to spend so much time on the forums or for a lack of updates over that period of time. Running a show is very time consuming, but I'll do my best to keep an eye things while I'm gone.

[ 2016-08-25 03:28:36 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hotfix 2 has now been pushed to the default branch, it contains the following changes:

• Experimental camera rework for keyboard and mouse players
• Basic error checking around steamworks initialization

New Camera

To enable this new camera, please enable the experimental setting in the settings menu, under the controls tab. This new camera system should feel much snappier and responsive for keyboard and mouse players. PLEASE give feedback on this new camera system. We'd like to make it the default at some point for keyboard and mouse players if the majority of people find it to be an improvement.

Error Checking

It appears that a non-trivial number of bug reports have been due to the game not fully initializing due to steam/steamworks not being available when the game launches. I am working on more robust fixes around this but in the meantime I have added a basic check on the title screen to ensure that initialization has occurred. If you see a red error message please try restarting the steam/the game to see if it fixes your issue.

Up Next

Based on issues reported it looks like there will be at least one, but more likely two hotfixes left before we settle into our normal update cycle. I'll post more information as we get those hotfixes out and settle into our normal cycle. Cheers, Ryan

[ 2016-08-19 22:04:44 CET ] [ Original post ]

I'm getting ready to push the first hotfix. The hotfix contains several small requests, and a good bit of work was taking a first pass at rebuilding the settings screen. The settings screen (and the settings dialog in game) now is separated into four sections. This will give us a lot more space for options going forward. There will be at least one more hotfix after this one to deal with additional launch issues/suggestions, so please don't worry if your issues aren't addressed in this one. Cheers, Ryan

Changes

• Reworked settings screen to be separated into 4 sections to accomodate increasing option count
• Added music track to title screen and menus
• Audio settings now have separate music and sfx sliders in addition to the master volume slider
• Added sound effect on player join in online lobby
• Added vsync option in video settings
• Improved cursor visibility code in online and local multiplayer
• Added option to constrain mouse to window
• Fixed a typo in the game over dialog

Notes

There are a set of bugs with constraining the cursor to the window when the game is in windowed mode. This does not affect play during full screen use. Notably the issues are:

• Windows: cursor can still exit into title bar area
• Windows: when changing window resolution, cursor constraints do not update correctly. This fixes itself on switching to a new menu/screen.
• OSX: Cursor does not properly restrain to window when constrain cursor is selected.

I've filed bugs with unity about all of these and I'll be working with them for a resolution. For now I just wanted you to be aware of the limitations and as they improve stuff in the base engine we'll roll those changes into the game.

[ 2016-08-18 22:09:32 CET ] [ Original post ]

First and foremost: A HUGE thank you to everyone who’s picked up the game so far. The first day has been a smashing success and we couldn’t be happier with the reception we’ve gotten. After 2.5 years of hard work it is exciting and encouraging to see everyone playing and enjoying the game. Unsurprisingly, there are bugs and good feature suggestions popping up. We’ll do our best to address as many of them as we can in short order, but we appreciate your patience as a small two man team making this game. Going over the issues, we’ve identified a handful of things we want to try and improve as soon as possible. They are:

• Bug: occasional crash/black screen for some players
• Camera improvements needed for keyboard/mouse players
• Players need damage state animations/better notification of damage taken
• Movement around props and walls can be frustrating
• Missing vsync option
• Option to lock mouse to window
• Separate audio volume sliders
• Bug: flickering mouse reticle
• Improve reticle size
• Other one off bugs reported (sync issue, one player with framerate issue, etc)

Once we get into a rhythm of regular updates, fixes would normally just get rolled into one of the two week updates. Given that we’ve just launched we’re going to be applying hotfixes as soon as we’ve had a chance to test them locally. If your bug or suggestion isn’t on that list, it hasn’t been forgotten! We’re tracking everything and we will continue to roll out fixes after this initial batch. Have additional feedback? please head to the forums and post it there! As I start coding these fixes I won’t be in there 24/7, but I will be monitoring it for feedback and posting as I go. As a final note - I’m happy to announce that we’ll be in the Indie MEGABOOTH at PAX West next month! If you’re there please stop by to say hello. :) -Ryan

[ 2016-08-17 19:47:12 CET ] [ Original post ]

With release now less than 24 hours away, I wanted to sit down and write up a “state of the game” post so players know exactly what to expect from the build tomorrow. We feel that transparency with players, especially during early access, to be a paramount factor in our success. Hopefully the only surprises you have will be pleasant ones. :) If this post doesn’t answer any of your questions - please feel free to hop over to the forums and ask! I’ll be monitoring the forums and will do my best to answer whatever questions come up. If you’d like to skip the text and just see some previews/streams of the game in action, I’ve included several links at the bottom of this post. Go check them out!

Networking

• Networking is in and functional. We currently suggest a ping of 120ms or less between players in a game. Given the frantic speed and nature of the game, and the volume of active players and enemies We are optimizing for those ping times. This unfortunately means that games that go across the ocean will generally have a degraded/poor experience. There’s only so much we can do to fix this, but we will continue to make improvements where we can.
• Networking currently uses a standard matchmaking/lobby system where you create a party pre-game and play from there. We currently do not support hot joining games in progress, although we would like to get that in at some point in the future.
• Voice chat is currently not supported, a task for investigating initial support is tagged for the first release.

Gameplay

• Basic gameplay, both single and multiplayer have been in for a while now and we’re pretty happy with the core. We will continue to tweak things where we think it’s necessary but what you get in the initial build is solid. (e.g. - we’re looking at is adding a damage state animation to make player damage more evident, and reworking how gun overheat is signaled to try and make approaching the limits more clear.) How this evolves over time will also partially depend on your feedback!
• “Looping” is still in its initial form. If you successfully loop now the levels stay the same but the enemies increase in difficulty and drop increased rewards. Over time we want to improve this by changing enemy compositions and adding additional challenges/objectives.
• Levels have a fairly small number of objectives right now - we’re working on adding more variety in the first update.

Content

• Full Zones: 3 - These zones are complete in the sense that the level generation, enemy sets, and bosses are complete. There will be additional things still added to these levels over time was we incorporate new mechanics (e.g. secrets, revisions to enemy behaviors, new enemies/objectives), but they are fully playable in their current state. It’s worth noting that all of the current bosses will definitely evolve over time - we have plans for additional attack states and mechanics to make them feel more dynamic.
• Guns: 21 - These run the gamut from the starting revolver to big guns like the firebuss to sillier guns like the tea gun. This is by no means the final set of weapons, we plan to add more over time.
• Items: 9 - The 9 items currently in the game were a first test to see if non-persistent items made sense as a mechanic at all. We like how they change the game and our testers have as well, so they are now an official mechanic in the game. We’ll be adding more of these going forward, as well as the concept of an “active item” that you press a button to trigger.
• Relics: 23 - The relic system will likely have an overhaul before too long to make relics more interesting as an element of metagame progression, but the existing relics are still perfectly usable.
• Secrets: 0 - Why am I listing this? Two reasons: 1. I want you to know that currently there are no secrets in the game. 2. I want you to know that there *will* be secrets in the game, but we won’t necessarily talk about them in update previews/release notes. They wouldn’t be very secret if we did. Keep an eye out.

Mods

• We’re still working on user mod support, we do *not* consider the game user moddable in this first early access build. We’re working internally to pull more and more data out of the unity/game engine side and into the mods folder, and also doing work on making tools to build mod data more easily. Going forward we will likely start enabling mods in a piecemeal fashion (e.g. character mods, gun/bullet mods, loot mods, all coming online at different times). We don’t currently have an ETA for this - it will partially depend on the demand relative to all the other features that people want in the game and the load of bugs that we get post-launch. But work will continue on it no matter what internally since we are starting to use it for content development.

  Gameplay Videos

  
  
  • Stumpt: Monsters & Monocles #1 (4 local co-op) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuJL-L_qu04
  • Sleepcycles: Monsters & Monocles Playlist (single player) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gueic4T478g&list=PLZk-lEc-XW-IYIzujBfFsgTgnitd046vj&index=1
  • Wanderbots: Let’s Play Monsters & Monocles (3 player online co-op) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N8s8H7iWqY

  Previews/Reviews

  
  
  • Hey Poor Player: http://www.heypoorplayer.com/2016/08/12/monsters-and-monocles-preview/
  • Big Boss Battle: http://www.bigbossbattle.com/preview-monsters-monocles/
  • The Insatiable Gamer: http://theinsatiablegamer.com/monsters-monocles-early-access-review/
  • Brutal Gamer: http://brutalgamer.com/2016/08/12/monsters-and-monocles-preview/
  Thanks for reading, and enjoy the game tomorrow! - Ryan
  
  [ 2016-08-15 19:17:27 CET ] [ Original post ]