0.7.6e has been pushed to the new beta branch!
This includes a ton of new balancing changes, aesthetic changes, and more. I'm pushing this to a new branch because I'm still testing the difficulty and balance with some of these new changes, and it'll take a ton of testing to make sure this is what's right for the game overall.
The majority of these changes are to suit the vibe closer to the vision I have for the game, as well as to insist on a more mature and restrained tension.
Below is the changelog of changes that I can remember making in this version:
- New NPC Conversation UI System. Click on NPCs to talk to them. It will either be a questgiver, or an NPC which opens a conversation window, where you can converse with and respond to NPCs. They will give positive and negative dialog, and you can respond with positive/negative/goodbye responses. The NPCs can give rewards, alert the player of stashes of items nearby, or alert the player of nearby spirits.
- New "haunting level" system and difficulty rebalancing. Invisible haunting meter rises as the player explores, which is then the origin of most spirit and enemy spawns the higher it rises. Beating levels (-33%), collecting keys, and hanging out in blessed rooms are a few ways to lower the haunting level.
- Subtle new effects on many talismans. New particle effects, and brief physics pulse (pushes phys objects) from used talismans. Warp talismans tosses objects around within the path of the warp.
- Overhaul on many SFX. New ambient sounds added (creaks etc). Many of the old more aggressive ambient sounds have been made much more rare, making for a quiet experience when hauntings are not occurring. Ambient sounds on outdoor floors completely overhauled. New SFX upon beating a floor with a key. New SFX upon beating a floor with an elevator. Footstep SFX softened slightly. Some SFX reduced in volume.
- Many new songs added to OST. Some songs removed.
- New spirit behaviors and types. "Standing" ghosts which are little to no harm to the player (I think). "The haunting" which is an invisible intangible entity that moves around the level, makes sounds, imitates player footsteps, and interacts with objects like doors.
- New TV animations. 16 new TV animations which can play on TVs. TVs will now attract spirits to it every 15-45 seconds that they are making sound, which can cause problems for the player, or can be used by the player to concentrate spirits in one spot (like a less effective Beacon Talisman). TVs can also now be smashed by throwing a physics object at it, which will stop its sound and stop it from attracting spirits.
- "A door has opened somewhere on the floor" text removed, from floors without an end door / key. The door will now silently unlock with no text shown.
- New room "Room5a" added to Japanese Mansion floortype. More rooms soon to be added.
- Swinging wooden doors added to many rooms and floortypes. New sounds added to those doors.
- New hanging decor added to many halls and rooms. New SFX when running through these objects.
- Bugs fixed associated with particle lag, flashlight, etc.
- Various changes to RNG and probability.
- Other stuff I can't remember.
Known bugs:
- Sometimes flashlight needs to be toggled twice to turn on after opening map.
- Sometimes after entering an NPC conversation, dialog options cannot be clicked, softlocking the game.
- Sometimes questgivers reward the player with notes, which have been removed from the game, so they drop nothing and say "here's a note".
- Weird rubberbanding issue after beating some floors which softlocks the game. Very rare. Still trying to figure out what causes this.
To switch to the beta branch, right click on the game in your Steam library and click "properties". Go to the "betas" tab, and switch to the "beta" branch, as shown here:
Enjoy and let me know what you think! Feel free to start a discussion on Steam, join our discord, or reach out on twitter if you have any suggestions.