Today, Hungarian localization has been added to the game, thanks to DDarkness. As always, some of UI and localization system bugs were fixed on the way. I have also updated the game to the latest LTS Unity version, which will improve stability and perfomance on some configurations. If you are interested in translating the game into your language, please welcome to our forum. Other than that I have prepared set of images for new Steam library, which will be available in beta on September 17. If you own and have ever played the game, please consider to leave a review: only 1 review needed to get the Steam raiting. It will help me a lot! Don't forget to join our Discord channel and leave your feedback there.

[ 2019-09-14 14:28:43 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hello, everyone! Today I released the last update in this year. Two new locales (Belarusian and Ukrainian) have been added to the game with the help of Aliaksandr Haradzetski and Skovoroda l10n. Many thanks to them. Other than that the hint system was reworked for the first four levels. In addition to that more contrast color is now used for the captured by player nodes. It will be much easier to learn base mechanics of Spreadstorm and progress beyond level 005.00. And last but not least, if you like (or for some reason don't like) the game, please consider to leave a review. It will help me to make the game much better and reach a new audience, which will also leave feedback, and so on, until the game will be perfect. Also you can join our Discord channel and leave your feedback there. Thank you very much and Happy Holidays!

[ 2018-12-30 20:43:29 CET ] [ Original post ]

After three broken keyboards, twenty cups of coffee and almost a million died nerve cells I managed to add 4k and any aspect ratio support to Spreadstorm. I had to completely rework UI scaling, positioning and some assets, but it was totally worth it. Dozens of bugs was fixed on the way and now you can not only play on any monitor, but the game is also performing stable 60 fps all the time! Also, Czech localization has been added to the game, thanks to @siSINka_CZ. We are always happy to add a new language to the game with your help. if you are interested in translating the game into your language, please welcome to our forum..

[ 2018-11-17 17:27:49 CET ] [ Original post ]

Today, Korean localization has been added to the game, thanks to AlexDraconian. It was great challenge from the technical side, but after ten cups of coffee I was able to deal with it. Also a lot of UI and localezation system bugs were fixed on the way. Now almost any language can be added to Spreadstorm. So, if you are interested in translating the game into your language, please welcome to our forum.

[ 2018-09-24 19:15:09 CET ] [ Original post ]

We have recently added three new localizations to the game: german, french and spanish, If you will find any issues or mistakes in them, please let us know on the community forum or by email to iamarugin(at)gmail.com To celebrate this we are starting weekly deal today: save 25% on Spreadstorm!* Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or subscribe to publisher page on Steam for instant notifications wherever you are! *Offer ends 10 September at 10AM Pacific Time

[ 2018-09-03 18:29:34 CET ] [ Original post ]

Yet another update has arrived. It will greatly improve game quality and stability.

Features:

• Added Continue button to main menu when game is loaded.
• [Keyboard] Arrow keys and Enter work to navigate the UI in addition to WASD and Space. (Required reset controls to default).
• Localized controls window.

Changes:

• Improved patrol behaviour so it is more predictable now.
• Decreased required energy for nuke action by 15%.
• Increased starting maximum energy from 150 to 175 (will work only on new save).
• Save stats now reset on starting new game+ so you can continue to get achievements with stronger signal.

Fixes:

• Fixed a bug, when the game suddenly stuck on late levels.
• Optimized memory consumption on long sessions.
• Removed unsued key bindings from controls.
• Fixed different UI bugs in controls window.
• Fixed a bug when patrol just disappered after loading game.
• Fixed an issue when controls window not opened when level was loaded.

Enjoy!

[ 2018-07-12 20:20:56 CET ] [ Original post ]

Some critical issues was addressed in this update. Also several levels was rebalanced to improve overall difficulty curve.

Changes:

• Base speed of Inverter signal decreased from 36 to 32. Level 016.00 and other similar will be much easier now.
• Increased amount of energy received on levels 024.04, 024.05, 024.08 and 048.00 to support more different strategies.
• Levels 024.27 and 024.29 was adjusted to deny "cheat" strategies in them.
• Improved layout of level 048.00. It became more forgivable to mistakes.

Fixes:

• Fixed an issue, when timer node continue to work after you have lost.
• "Depth of Field" effect returned to world camera.
• Fixed missing tooltip on nuke upgrade.
• Fixed wrong button tooltip on "Capture" action.
• Fixed an issue when part of 013.00 level was not loaded.
• Fixed some issues in the final sequence.

[ 2018-07-10 17:08:36 CET ] [ Original post ]

This update addresses several core, performance and visual issues.

Changes:

• Button "Reset" in main menu renamed to "Reset Level".

Fixes:

• Fixed an issue when level reset sometimes stuck.
• Some late levels performance optimizations.
• Fixed an issue when some patrol levels completely broke if you stood there long enough.
• Fixed an issue when transfer led to nowhere from first I/O port in level 024.09.
• Fixed some visual bugs in 024.0x levels.

[ 2018-07-03 12:51:40 CET ] [ Original post ]

Today we released Spreadstorm v1.1.0 with the ingame achievements and also Steam support. It will provide extra dimensionality to the game objectives and adds more ways to playthrough it.
Also we fixed some minor bugs and improved game stability. Now it's time to rest a bit in anticipation of your feedback and think about ways of further game development. Enjoy!

[ 2018-06-20 20:40:01 CET ] [ Original post ]

Features:

• Added Screen Mode selector instead of nonfunctional fullscreen toggle in Video Settings.
• Added hints to Hacking Panel, Modules window and additional hint near the Inverter on level 004.00.
• Modules window now displays "Current energy" and "Maximum energy" stats.
• Added "gamepad recommended" label in main menu.
• Shorter date format for game saves and custom levels.

Changes:

• We changed internal format of playtime in save files (due to preparation to adding achievements into game). Unfortunately it will be reset to 00:00 in all save files.

Fixes:

• Fixed wrong resizing of UI elements, when changing screen resolution.
• Fixed text in dropdowns being unreadable on higher resolutions.
• Fixed scroll sensitivity in dropdowns.
• [Gamepad] Fixed highlighting of UI elements when settings window first opened.

If you have any issues or questions please leave them here or send it via email. We realy want to make a great game and this will greatly helps us.

[ 2018-06-18 14:21:58 CET ] [ Original post ]

Six months have passed since our first release in Early Access. A lot of things have changed since that day. We totaly reworked game visuals, environment, some mechanics, improved stability, added level editor and doubled the amount of levels. Even with all this in mind, it seems to me that there is still much that can be done. But today I can say with confidence, that this game now worth your time and ready for launch. Thanks to all of you for your support and feedback during the Early Access. As always, we will keep updating the game with bugfixes and small new features (like achievements that will be in the next update). Thank you, unbeGames team

[ 2018-06-13 20:14:09 CET ] [ Original post ]

We proud to announce, that the next piece of the puzzle came to its place and Spreadstorm moved to the next stage of evolution. Since day one we've wanted to create not just a simple puzzle, but bring Spreadstorm into the world interesting enough to explore. We had an idea, what this world would to be and every single level was crafted with this idea in mind. So, we made three-dimensional map of this place and before creating the next new level, we carefully thought out its location, direction and size on this map. The result looked like this:
This was good foundation and helped a lot when the time has come to start building the environment. And guess what? The whole last month we spent working on this, but it definitely was worth it (although there is still much work to be done on game world).
Besides environment, we added yet another six new levels and heavely reworked the area of timers. And of course, made some minor fixes and improvements. This was last Early Access update, and, if everything will go according to plan, Spreadstorm will be fully released soon. Thank you for your attention and see you in the next update.

[ 2018-06-08 20:10:05 CET ] [ Original post ]

Three months of hard work have passed and now we can share the results with you. This update includes a lot of exciting changes: first version of level editor, total rework of Tracer and Patrol mechanics and levels, based on them, AI improvements, hacking mini-game extension and 9 new levels! With this update we, in fact, reached our two main Early Access goals: creating level editor and doubling the amount of levels. But we are still far from completion. Whereas in this update we concentrated on reworking of existing game mechanics and levels, it's time to implement and playtest a lot of ideas we have and start moving towards the 1.0 version. So we are planning to release the last Early Access update in May with bugfixing and several levels for timer mechanics and then the full game release with all new stuff. We feel that now is a good time to adjust the price of the game. It will be increased by 30% in the beginning of May. This will be the final price update, unless something unforeseen happens, so it will also be the price for 1.0 release. If you want to purchase Spreadstorm at Early Access price — now is the right time. Now let's talk about the update.

Level editor

Easily create new levels and playtest them. You can also share them with friends (manually for now). Main menu -> Extra -> Level Editor. Create your own experience.

Tracer and Patrol mechanics rework

Previous implementation gave no room for mistake. For example, if you triggered the Patrol you almost instantly lost. Now you can learn the enemy's behavior and completely avoid it even if you made a mistake.

Two new node types

Try to guess what it can be.

More hacking mini-game variations

It is way more exciting to hack now.

9 new levels

Everyone likes new levels.

And much more

You can find full release notes in the game under the Updates section. Best regards and see you soon, unbeGames team.

[ 2018-04-17 18:35:15 CET ] [ Original post ]

It's been awhile since our last update, but weve been busy figuring out how to build convenient and simple level editor for our game. It was in our plans at the beggining of the development, but we underestimated the upcoming challenges a bit. So, the first question is why do we need this? Why we can't just make the game? The answer would be "Because of game nature". Every level consist of the small elements which we called "nodes". Players can move through them and interact with the large one. The smallest level in the game (which is the first one) consist from 22 nodes. And it would be ridiculous to manually place every single node and establish every connection between them.
Level in the game engine So, at the start of the project we invented our own text format, that described our level, each node, their connections and possible interactions that player can have. When the game starts it grabs the file with the description of level and just generate it. It was a kind of win, because it worked great, but for example the file with the first level consisted of 112 lines of text! It was faster to create levels using text, because you can copy and paste the same lines and quickly adjust them, but another problem arises: the errors. Every time you change something there could potentially be an error. You forget to change parameter, or copy-pasted redundant one and level generates incorrectly or game doesn't start. It takes enormous amount of time to figure out where the error are. Plus than the levels become larger than 50 nodes copy-pasting becomes very slow and unconvenient.
JSON description of first level We created five levels using this approach and decided to move towards the simplest version of ingame level editor. It looked like this:
Here you can place nodes, connect and move them, select their type and level editor generates text file, which than used by game to generate level itself... Nonetheless there were tons of problems with this first version of level editor. It could only generate the level structure, but other things like interactions, enemies, node modules had to be manually added to text file (hello, errors!). After the file was finished we had to import it into the game engine, generate level, place the lighting, decorations, bake it, test it and iterate all over again. Despite this we created another 25 levels using this "piece of tool". So, the game has successfully released to Early Access, feedback was collected and major bugs and problems was solved. So it's time to take a break and focus our attention on our main tool - the level editor. It's time to rewrite it from scratch with the resolutions of all described problems, improved workflow and future public release to our users in mind. It should be convenient, intuitive and useful. And after month of thinking and experimentation we finally found the way to do this. Stay with us and see you in the next update.

[ 2018-02-15 19:41:00 CET ] [ Original post ]

It's been awhile since our last update, but we’ve been busy figuring out how to build convenient and simple level editor for our game. It was in our plans at the beggining of the development, but we underestimated the upcoming challenges a bit. So, the first question is why do we need this? Why we can't just make the game? The answer would be "Because of game nature". Every level consist of the small elements which we called "nodes". Players can move through them and interact with the large one. The smallest level in the game (which is the first one) consist from 22 nodes. And it would be ridiculous to manually place every single node and establish every connection between them.
Level in the game engine So, at the start of the project we invented our own text format, that described our level, each node, their connections and possible interactions that player can have. When the game starts it grabs the file with the description of level and just generate it. It was a kind of win, because it worked great, but for example the file with the first level consisted of 112 lines of text! It was faster to create levels using text, because you can copy and paste the same lines and quickly adjust them, but another problem arises: the errors. Every time you change something there could potentially be an error. You forget to change parameter, or copy-pasted redundant one and level generates incorrectly or game doesn't start. It takes enormous amount of time to figure out where the error are. Plus than the levels become larger than 50 nodes copy-pasting becomes very slow and unconvenient.
JSON description of first level We created five levels using this approach and decided to move towards the simplest version of ingame level editor. It looked like this:
Here you can place nodes, connect and move them, select their type and level editor generates text file, which than used by game to generate level itself... Nonetheless there were tons of problems with this first version of level editor. It could only generate the level structure, but other things like interactions, enemies, node modules had to be manually added to text file (hello, errors!). After the file was finished we had to import it into the game engine, generate level, place the lighting, decorations, bake it, test it and iterate all over again. Despite this we created another 25 levels using this "piece of tool". So, the game has successfully released to Early Access, feedback was collected and major bugs and problems was solved. So it's time to take a break and focus our attention on our main tool - the level editor. It's time to rewrite it from scratch with the resolutions of all described problems, improved workflow and future public release to our users in mind. It should be convenient, intuitive and useful. And after month of thinking and experimentation we finally found the way to do this. Stay with us and see you in the next update.

[ 2018-02-15 19:41:00 CET ] [ Original post ]

This update brings you some bug fixes and game improvements as well as several new levels in the tutorial section of the game.

Savegame compatibility

This new version is not compatible with old savegames. However, if would like to continue your old savegames, we have made the old build available on different Steam branch named v0.56 To switch to a previous build, follow these simple steps: In your Steam library, right click the game Spreadstorm and select Properties. In the Properties screen, click on the tab BETAS. In BETAS, click the arrow to open the dropdown. From the dropdown, select an old "v0.56" branch and then click Close.

So what are the key features?

• Reset and save system overhaul: it is harder to break the game with it now.
• 6 new levels extending tutorial section of the game.
• Timer signal behavior totally rewrited, so it is more consistent and less annoying.
• Visual appearance of common and uncapturable nodes improved.
• A lot of bug fixes, small levels changes and performance improvement

Full release notes:

Features:

• Incremental save game system implemented: it will be much easer to migrate the savegames in the future releases.
• Savegames format changed from text to binary: x2.5 faster load and save process.
• New reset system based on checkpoints: every level is resetable now.
• Timer signal behavior changed so it is more consistent and less annoying.
• 6 new levels extending tutorial section of the game.
• Rotating items above the upgrade node added: it is harder to miss them.

Changes:

• Common node model changed to show it connections.
• Uncapturable nodes now more noticeable than earlier.
• Invert signal is more noticeable when turning on/off nodes.
• Only inverter and redirector nodes can be fortified now.
• Reset hint was moved to the second level, new hints at the start of the game added.
• Redirector node can not be turned in the same direction as it has already turned.
• If redirector has no available directions to turn to, it will not show Redirect action.
• Double redirector node has only one "Turn" action now.
• Fortify and Autohack actions consumes energy after operation completion.
• Added a little delay when moving through nodes with actions. Stopping on them will be easer now.
• Node actions opens with a delay - no more flickering when moving through nodes.
• Module acquisition action is called "Acquire" now instead of "Activate".
• Camera angle and height tweaked to get more satisfying results.
• Arrow now highlighted when signals moves through node groups, attached to them.

Fixes:

• Base speed is correctly calculated when the game starts.
• Camera a bit smoother now.
• Performance improvement and less memory consumption on large scenes and on save/load game.
• Due to access issues to Documents folder on some computers, saves and setting was moved to the AppData folder.
• Multiple clicks on game save or continue button will not load multiple instances of world anymore.
• Modules button does not appear on first levels after exiting and reentering the game.
• Options now work not only in the main menu.
• Fixed issue where game stuck on loading save with the finished game.
• Fixed move sounds.
• Fixed some UI bugs in 1280x720 resolution.

[Game Update] v0.67.4 - 24.01.2018

Fixes:

• Fixed scroll in updates window.
• Main Menu closes immideatly after selecting save slot.
• Alive enemies resumes movement after loading level.
• All interactive UI closes on character lost.
• Fortitfication now works properly.
• Fixed different bugs with Protection Panel.

[ 2018-01-15 18:39:08 CET ] [ Original post ]

This update brings you some bug fixes and game improvements as well as several new levels in the tutorial section of the game.

Savegame compatibility

This new version is not compatible with old savegames. However, if would like to continue your old savegames, we have made the old build available on different Steam branch named v0.56 To switch to a previous build, follow these simple steps: In your Steam library, right click the game Spreadstorm and select Properties. In the Properties screen, click on the tab BETAS. In BETAS, click the arrow to open the dropdown. From the dropdown, select an old "v0.56" branch and then click Close.

So what are the key features?

• Reset and save system overhaul: it is harder to break the game with it now.
• 6 new levels extending tutorial section of the game.
• Timer signal behavior totally rewrited, so it is more consistent and less annoying.
• Visual appearance of common and uncapturable nodes improved.
• A lot of bug fixes, small levels changes and performance improvement

Full release notes:

Features:

• Incremental save game system implemented: it will be much easer to migrate the savegames in the future releases.
• Savegames format changed from text to binary: x2.5 faster load and save process.
• New reset system based on checkpoints: every level is resetable now.
• Timer signal behavior changed so it is more consistent and less annoying.
• 6 new levels extending tutorial section of the game.
• Rotating items above the upgrade node added: it is harder to miss them.

Changes:

• Common node model changed to show it connections.
• Uncapturable nodes now more noticeable than earlier.
• Invert signal is more noticeable when turning on/off nodes.
• Only inverter and redirector nodes can be fortified now.
• Reset hint was moved to the second level, new hints at the start of the game added.
• Redirector node can not be turned in the same direction as it has already turned.
• If redirector has no available directions to turn to, it will not show Redirect action.
• Double redirector node has only one "Turn" action now.
• Fortify and Autohack actions consumes energy after operation completion.
• Added a little delay when moving through nodes with actions. Stopping on them will be easer now.
• Node actions opens with a delay - no more flickering when moving through nodes.
• Module acquisition action is called "Acquire" now instead of "Activate".
• Camera angle and height tweaked to get more satisfying results.
• Arrow now highlighted when signals moves through node groups, attached to them.

Fixes:

• Base speed is correctly calculated when the game starts.
• Camera a bit smoother now.
• Performance improvement and less memory consumption on large scenes and on save/load game.
• Due to access issues to Documents folder on some computers, saves and setting was moved to the AppData folder.
• Multiple clicks on game save or continue button will not load multiple instances of world anymore.
• Modules button does not appear on first levels after exiting and reentering the game.
• Options now work not only in the main menu.
• Fixed issue where game stuck on loading save with the finished game.
• Fixed move sounds.
• Fixed some UI bugs in 1280x720 resolution.

[ 2018-01-15 18:39:08 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hey everyone! We’ve been hard at work on Spreadstorm since the Early Access release in December. A small intro of some of the things we’ve been working on are:

• Game core rewriting. Overlooking how the different game systems works and applying necessary changes to it.
• Bugfixing. Our small community have reported dozens of bugs and we are investigating them.
• Level changes. Looking at how players walk through the game, we found some issues in level design, and we think about how they can be fixed.

Before closing this update up we want to talk about core rewrite a bit more. So, one of the important systems in Spreadstorm is the Reset system. In its current implementation it resets state of the unfinished level thereby helping players to get out of progress blocking situations, such as running out of power or locks in different parts of level. But finished levels is not resetable. It produces many issues and some of them are:

• You could reset 24th level halfway through and will be forced to spend a lot of time restoring lost progress, not to mention the potential bugs this action will bring.
• You could finish one level, go to another and recharge there, return back and spend all your power and you will not be able to return it back, because finished levels are not resettable.
• After you lost all power in non resettable level, you can return back to the unfinished level, reset it and get the negative power. gg.

After figuring it out a while we found the solution: all levels are resettable all the time, but we will have a checkpoint system. So if you finished the level, made some bad stuff in it and after reset - it would revert level state to the last checkpoint (level finishing). So the 24th level would have 4 checkpoints and all problems will gone. Another change which helps to avoid the last issue is if you leave unfinished level it will autoreset, so you can not spend the power of this level somewhere else. Furthermore the changes in reset system shows us, that our current save system, where we save where we save the whole level, will not work with checkpoint system. So we will have to convert our save system to the incremental saves and this leads too... That's all for now, I hope you enjoy this quick inside look on our development process and you have the idea what's going on. See you in the next update.

[ 2018-01-04 13:27:12 CET ] [ Original post ]

Hey everyone! We’ve been hard at work on Spreadstorm since the Early Access release in December. A small intro of some of the things we’ve been working on are:

• Game core rewriting. Overlooking how the different game systems works and applying necessary changes to it.
• Bugfixing. Our small community have reported dozens of bugs and we are investigating them.
• Level changes. Looking at how players walk through the game, we found some issues in level design, and we think about how they can be fixed.

Before closing this update up we want to talk about core rewrite a bit more. So, one of the important systems in Spreadstorm is the Reset system. In its current implementation it resets state of the unfinished level thereby helping players to get out of progress blocking situations, such as running out of power or locks in different parts of level. But finished levels is not resetable. It produces many issues and some of them are:

• You could reset 24th level halfway through and will be forced to spend a lot of time restoring lost progress, not to mention the potential bugs this action will bring.
• You could finish one level, go to another and recharge there, return back and spend all your power and you will not be able to return it back, because finished levels are not resettable.
• After you lost all power in non resettable level, you can return back to the unfinished level, reset it and get the negative power. gg.

After figuring it out a while we found the solution: all levels are resettable all the time, but we will have a checkpoint system. So if you finished the level, made some bad stuff in it and after reset - it would revert level state to the last checkpoint (level finishing). So the 24th level would have 4 checkpoints and all problems will gone. Another change which helps to avoid the last issue is if you leave unfinished level it will autoreset, so you can not spend the power of this level somewhere else. Furthermore the changes in reset system shows us, that our current save system, where we save where we save the whole level, will not work with checkpoint system. So we will have to convert our save system to the incremental saves and this leads too... That's all for now, I hope you enjoy this quick inside look on our development process and you have the idea what's going on. See you in the next update.

[ 2018-01-04 13:27:12 CET ] [ Original post ]

Dear Players, Today is a very special day for us! For the last three months, ever since we started this project, we have worked hard to try deliver an unusual, dynamic and fun experience. And now we are super excited to share our work with you. It is only the starting point and we have a lot of things to do: implementing new mechanics, fixing bugs, optimising the game and adding more and more content. But at this point we think, that our game have something to show and it is fun to play already. Now I want to talk about our roadmap a bit. After the Christmas holidays we will be focused on refactoring and optimising the game core, which allows to decrease the number of bugs and glitches and we will be able to experiment with new ideas more rapidly. The next step will be improving the internal level editor. It takes more than a day to create a new level from scratch for now, and with the improved level editor we hope to cut this time by a half. After that we can focus on adding content and polishing the game, and this the point, where the path to full release will begin. Finally, when the game will be ready and probably after full release we will review and recreate our internal level editor, so that it can be ready for use by the community. That's all for now, thank you for your attension, have fun and see you in the next update.

[ 2017-12-21 15:15:11 CET ] [ Original post ]

Dear Players, Today is a very special day for us! For the last three months, ever since we started this project, we have worked hard to try deliver an unusual, dynamic and fun experience. And now we are super excited to share our work with you. It is only the starting point and we have a lot of things to do: implementing new mechanics, fixing bugs, optimising the game and adding more and more content. But at this point we think, that our game have something to show and it is fun to play already. Now I want to talk about our roadmap a bit. After the Christmas holidays we will be focused on refactoring and optimising the game core, which allows to decrease the number of bugs and glitches and we will be able to experiment with new ideas more rapidly. The next step will be improving the internal level editor. It takes more than a day to create a new level from scratch for now, and with the improved level editor we hope to cut this time by a half. After that we can focus on adding content and polishing the game, and this the point, where the path to full release will begin. Finally, when the game will be ready and probably after full release we will review and recreate our internal level editor, so that it can be ready for use by the community. That's all for now, thank you for your attension, have fun and see you in the next update.

[ 2017-12-21 15:15:11 CET ] [ Original post ]