Once again thank you for the terrific reception of Jupiter Hell full release! It's time for the new beginning, kicking off post-release updates with Jupiter Hell 1.1 Exordium! The update release is accompanied by a week-long promo, so if you were holding off to see how the game is going to fare after the release, you can grab it now, 20% off. This is a variety update, including UI/UX improvements, new early game enemy and weapons, and a huge improvement in character build variety! Many of which features will be continued in 1.2 - we decided to bring you the first set of them early, and you can read all about them below! Both 1.1 and 1.2 (which will hopefully land this year), are targeted at improving three main areas of the game - UI/UX and gameplay information, trait changes and build variety and early game improvements. We decided to split the update information (and changelog!) into these three sections. Wanna know all the details? Grab something to drink, this will take a while.

== UI/UX and gameplay information ==

Multiple save slots

A highly requested QOL feature has been added - you can now have multiple saved games running in parallel (no longer will that Endless run lock you out of enjoying the rest of the game :P). Moreover, the game will detect if you have saves from a previous version, and mark and store them for you - if you accidentally update and have an old save game lying around - no worries! You can switch to "previous" branch with the previous version, finish your run, and update back to mainline from Steam beta branch functionality :).

Character and enemy information

The character screen ("c" or navigating left/right from inventory/equipment), has received an overhaul - you have descriptions of what the current status effects mean, information on your current speed, detailed resistances information and more. Arguably more important, you have a similar screen for enemies (press h when targeting an enemy, or Right Trigger + Left Stick on the pad) - including precise health, description of all its status effects, detailed armor and weapon stats.

Other UI/UX improvements

There's a new Settings option for remembering your last entered name, even between sessions. You can pair it up with disabling name entry after a run to permanently set the name of the character. There's a new Setting for enabling constant outlines for enemies and the players for better visibility. Target reticule color is based on hit chance. When aiming manually, the squares are colored according to range (red is beyond max, green is within optimal, yellow is either below minimum or above optimal). Key repeat works in UI menus, there's no VO quip when topping off ammo with full inventory, and there's an alert on armor/headgear destruction. More status effects have their time left to end displayed in the status bar. Bottom right corner has a mini-display of how long your last action took in in-game seconds. Related Changelog entries NEW #0694 - support for multiple save slots! NEW #1545 - constant outline option in Settings/Display NEW #1595 - new character information screen! (c) NEW #1593 - new enemy information screen! (h when targeting) NEW #1547 - "Remember last name" option in Settings CHANGE #1543 - key repeat works for UI menus CHANGE #1595 - last action time displayed on UI CHANGE #1585 - you can only target in vision range CHANGE #1408 - incompatible saves will no longer be removed CHANGE #1558 - target reticule color based on hit chance CHANGE #1558 - manual targeting highlight by range CHANGE #1577 - no voice when topping off ammo CHANGE #1573 - alert messages on armor/headgear destruction CHANGE #1343 - resistances are percentage based CHANGE #1595 - removed "enemies left" information (metagaming) CHANGE #1568 - stimmed, juiced, adrenaline have turns left in UI

Further work

The character/enemy information is step 1 on the path to a full Hellpedia - expect it soon, along with enemy flavor descriptions and such! Also in progress is full mouse support that should make it into 1.2 also. We're also considering a detail screen for items too.

== Trait changes and build variety ==

The 1.0 traits, apart from a few exceptions, railroaded the player build into specific weapon groups. Sometimes the choice for a weapon group for the run had to be made very early, making finding nice exotics or uniques feel quite painful if they didn't fit your build. As part of improving early game, we decided to lift many restrictions to traits to allow broader build variety and broader weapon usability withing a given build.

Basic traits

Sustained fire and Son of a Gun have been reworked - and they now work with all ranged weapons.

Masters

Masters are now available earlier (L6), further levels available every 4 levels, and have less prerequisites in general. This should provide for more build variety and more options within a given build. Bulletstorm now works with auto's - granting them additionally +1 shot at L2. Sharpshooter works with auto's and semis, while Sniper works with ALL ranged weapons.

Balance

As Son of a Gun lost its range benefits, Gunslinger opt-range penalty has been reduced, and Headshot has received a massive accuracy bonus. Entrenchment was a bit too dangerous to use, so now it grants resistances when used. Vampyre needed a bit of love, heals 5/7.5/10 of both armor and health depending on target. Survivor was the only Master we deemed in need of a nerf - the damage bonus only is applied when below the regeneration gate, but is much stronger to further flesh out its risky playstyle. The increased usage possibility of auto weapons meant they needed a slight range nerf not to overshadow dedicated long and short range weapons for their respective traits. Related Changelog entries CHANGE #1571 - Master traits require level 6, less prereqs CHANGE #1569 - Vampyre buff - 5/7.5/10 for both armor and health CHANGE #1569 - Entrenchment additionally grants all resistances CHANGE #1569 - Bulletstorm works with auto's - +1 shot at L2 CHANGE #1569 - Sniper works with all ranged weapons CHANGE #1569 - Sharpshooter works with auto's and semi's CHANGE #1586 - Sustained fire is weapon agnostic CHANGE #1586 - Son of a Gun is weapon agnostic, no range bonuses CHANGE #1586 - Gunslinger opt-range penalty reduced by 1 CHANGE #1586 - Headshot grants accuracy bonus CHANGE #1569 - Survivor crit bonus counted from below 25% CHANGE #1569 - Survivor crit bonus increases with level CHANGE #1589 - nerf - auto range 2/3/8->7, assault 2/4->3/8

Further work

Apart from balance changes (more below), some traits still are too restricted and should open up for more weapons. While there are a few Masters that are "signature" (Gun Kata with pistols/SMGs, Blademaster with blades, etc) we generally want to have Masters and traits that still leave some choice in the weapon department.

== Early game improvements ==

Grenadiers and grenade launchers

Starting out we have a new enemy, the grenadier, which is designed to break the movement and engagement patterns in the early game. He also brings the new grenade launcher (with dedicated 40mm grenade ammo) which is a great early game swap weapon for crowd control. Grenade launchers also have their ADV variants added, and there's a new exotic grenade launcher to be found.

Level generation

We also started a long term revamp of level generation and improvements. Some early changes should already be noticable in the early Callisto level generators. We also are improving the lighting situation - Callisto was way too dark!

Early game gameplay

Melee fans will enjoy the fact that knives know come with intristic Resilient perk. Early game ADV rolls (9mm pistol, auto, SMG and shotgun) can now roll with higher perk values. Related Changelog entries NEW #1597 - new early game weapon type - grenade launchers! NEW #1598 - new humanoid enemy - grenadiers! CHANGE #1569 - knives have intristic resilent perk CHANGE #1597 - ADV grenade and rocket added to manuf. stations CHANGE #1572 - improved lighting on several Callisto levels CHANGE #1572 - improves some visuals and levgen on Callisto CHANGE #1589 - early game weapons can have better AV values

Further work

This is just the beginning of several early game improvements we have planned. We are aware that early game is currently the weakest and most repetetive part of the experience. Along with trait changes providing more options in the early game, we plan to add more early game enemies, more encounters, more level variety and level features. We're also considering some changes to character creation too - stay tuned!

== The rest ==

New stuff

3 new unique weapons have been added (1 auto, 2 rotary), so there's now 3 of each - auto and rotary weapons, one early, one mid and one late game. New windchill event is added to Europa levels. Enviropacks and large and small combat packs have been added to the consumable department. The former provide a huge and fairly long resistance boost to allow exploring status heavy areas even for players without the proper resists (or survive tough fights), while the latter are a regeneration alternative to medkits - possible to pop BEFORE a hard engagement.

Balance

Event XP has been halved as it was often a make or break thing for early game - the general amount of XP available on every level has been increased to compensate. CalSec and Valhalla shutdown XP is unchanged. Plasma weapons have been buffed to be a more viable switch possibility even if you have good early game gear. Nightmare respawn has been modified. We intended to have the respawn be a clock that keeps the player on the move. Instead Nightmare and above became a gate that allows only gib-heavy builds. Hence, gibbing no longer prevents respawn, only makes it take longer, to open up more build variety. We also didn't want fighting respawns to be the meat of the N!+ experience, so the respawn timers have been increased. Oh, and Molten wont appear on AV weapons anymore, no reason to burn yourself :P

Bugfixes

The regular supply of bugfixes also got in. Several enemies got missing resistances, exalted kerberi will properly appear in mortem files, Radeon users will see the low health screen effect and micro launchers will now appear as often as they were meant to. Related Changelog entries NEW #1583 - 3 new unique weapons (1 auto, 2 rotary)! NEW #1568 - added enviropack, combat pack (large and small) NEW #1576 - new windchill level event CHANGE #1567 - negative healing mods affect large med/stimpacks CHANGE #1581 - halved XP gained from events CHANGE #1581 - increased per-level XP spawn size to compensate CHANGE #1589 - buff - plasma rifle damage 12->15 CHANGE #1589 - buff - plasma pistol damage 22->25 CHANGE #1589 - buff - plasma shotgun damage 50->60 CHANGE #1610 - N+ - gib doubles respawn time instead of prevent CHANGE #1610 - N+ - respawn timers made longer CHANGE #1589 - Molten will no longer appear on AV melee weapons FIX #1597 - fixed micro launcher exotic generation chance FIX #1557 - low health overlay works on Radeon cards now FIX #1343 - toxiberi are immune to poison FIX #1343 - cryoberi and cryoreavers are immune to cold FIX #1609 - exalted kerberi appear in kill counts properly

== Full Changelog ==

.../breaths in... Release 1.1 - Exordium - October 11th, 2021 NEW #0694 - support for multiple save slots! NEW #1597 - new early game weapon type - grenade launchers! NEW #1598 - new humanoid enemy - grenadiers! NEW #1583 - 3 new unique weapons (1 auto, 2 rotary)! NEW #1545 - constant outline option in Settings/Display NEW #1568 - added enviropack, combat pack (large and small) NEW #1576 - new windchill level event NEW #1595 - new character information screen! (c) NEW #1593 - new enemy information screen! (h when targeting) NEW #1547 - "Remember last name" option in Settings CHANGE #1543 - key repeat works for UI menus CHANGE #1595 - last action time displayed on UI CHANGE #1585 - you can only target in vision range CHANGE #1408 - incompatible saves will no longer be removed CHANGE #1558 - target reticule color based on hit chance CHANGE #1558 - manual targeting highlight by range CHANGE #1577 - no voice when topping off ammo CHANGE #1573 - alert messages on armor/headhear destruction CHANGE #1597 - ADV grenade and rocket added to manuf. stations CHANGE #1572 - improved lighting on several Callisto levels CHANGE #1572 - improves some visuals and levgen on Callisto CHANGE #1571 - Master traits require level 6, less prereqs CHANGE #1569 - Survivor crit bonus counted from below 25% CHANGE #1569 - Survivor crit bonus increases with level CHANGE #1569 - Vampyre buff - 5/7.5/10 for both armor and health CHANGE #1569 - Entrenchment additionally grants all resistances CHANGE #1569 - Bulletstorm works with auto's - +1 shot at L2 CHANGE #1569 - Sniper works with all ranged weapons CHANGE #1569 - Sharpshooter works with auto's and semi's CHANGE #1586 - Sustained fire is weapon agnostic CHANGE #1586 - Son of a Gun is weapon agnostic, no range bonuses CHANGE #1586 - Gunslinger opt-range penalty reduced by 1 CHANGE #1586 - Headshot grants accuracy bonus CHANGE #1569 - knives have intristic resilent perk CHANGE #1567 - negative healing mods affect large med/stimpacks CHANGE #1568 - stimmed, juiced, adrenaline have turns left in UI CHANGE #1343 - resistances are percentage based CHANGE #1581 - halved XP gained from events CHANGE #1581 - increased per-level XP spawn size to compensate CHANGE #1595 - removed "enemies left" information (metagaming) CHANGE #1589 - early game weapons can have better AV values CHANGE #1589 - buff - plasma rifle damage 12->15 CHANGE #1589 - buff - plasma pistol damage 22->25 CHANGE #1589 - buff - plasma shotgun damage 50->60 CHANGE #1589 - nerf - auto range 2/3/8->7, assault 2/4->3/8 CHANGE #1610 - N+ - gib doubles respawn time instead of prevent CHANGE #1610 - N+ - respawn timers made longer CHANGE #1589 - Molten will no longer appear on AV melee weapons FIX #1597 - fixed micro launcher exotic generation chance FIX #1557 - low health overlay works on Radeon cards now FIX #1343 - toxiberi are immune to poison FIX #1343 - cryoberi and cryoreavers are immune to cold FIX #1609 - exalted kerberi appear in kill counts properly

== What's Next ==

There are several features we planned for 1.1 but decided not to keep it in development for too long - these will land in 1.2! This includes full mouse support, German, Russian, and Polish text localisation, browsable Hellpedia and Help improvement, and more revamps of the early game (including two more early game enemies) and more changes to the trait system to make it more flexible. We hope to ship 1.2 before the year ends, so stay tuned! Yours,

[ 2021-10-11 17:06:06 CET ] [ Original post ]