Launch day is coming soon (January 28th) and this update is intended to get some last minute testing on the near-final game code. I hope everyone is looking forward to the full release as much as I am!
The biggest new demo features are the additional options (including playing the full song) on rematches, the improved destructibles and crowds, new dance animations, and a new song, No Time by Nurnberg Productions.
Patch Notes
These notes only cover changes to features that affect the demo. Lots more features and improvements are coming exclusively to the full game!
Let me know if you run into any issues on the new version. And if something you were hoping for isn't here, don't worry; there will be more updates coming after launch. Either way, I'd love to hear your feedback, which you can leave via the in-game form, the Steam forums, or just as a comment on this post.
UI
Added additional options when rematching pilots to allow controlling the battle length and to set the win condition to End of Music, allowing you to play the whole song, similar to what's available in Freeplay mode.
The pop up at the end of the demo now contains the game's release date: January 28th 2026!
Updated dialogue UI animation to be a little more 3D.
Added replica Tenzerks to the in-battle menu so you can see their mods/level/moves during a battle.
The music selection screen is now sorted by artist name.
Added an option for changing difficulty in the options menu when you have a save file loaded. Previously this was only available in the character customization menu.
Added new pronoun options for She/They and He/They. This one goes out to all the haters! Keep it up and you never know what pronouns I might add next.
Added an on-screen warning UI when you do not have all available mods equipped for your current lead/replica Tenzerks.
Increased the size of Acclaim/Damage numbers slightly.
Adjusted lead Tenzerk portrait positioning to fit better on the UI where there are many different Tenzerks unlocked.
Navigation tweaks for the Tenzerk menu.
Added a confirmation to the Return to Main Menu and Fast Travel to Town options.
Added extra text that clarifies when music vocals are muted in Streamer Mode.
Added a setting to adjust the intensity of screen shake in battle
Music
Added a new song for the Bon Donatello boss fight, No Time by Nurnberg Productions.
Removed the double time sections from Woven in Dusk and added it as regular non-boss song.
Added new vocals for the songs Temptation and Woven in Dusk, now featuring Logan Justine and Jamie Wiltshire respectively. When hiring musicians directly I always include a no-AI clause, and when purchasing the rights to pre-created tracks, I only acquire tracks that are labeled as not having used AI music or vocals. However, I saw some player concern about the vocals on Woven in Dusk and started to have my own concerns about Temptation, so to be absolutely sure, I went ahead and had new vocals recorded for these songs.
Added a new victory jingle and sound effect
Added new music for the BATTLE TOUR intro
Improvements to beat and sustain placements on some songs.
Removed the song Eye by Philip Rice. This was taken out as part of adding more original/exclusive songs in the full game and rebalancing the ratio of original/exclusive to Creative Commons songs on the soundtrack. But if you liked this one, it's available here.
Improvements to custom music where too many sustains and too many short stems would be generated.
Reduced the volume of song previews on the music selection screen.
Gameplay
Increased the length of battles across the game, especially in the early-game.
Tuning to the XP gain rates of each Tenzerk.
Tuning to Acclaim gain and other move numbers across all Tenzerks.
In Endless Mode, at high challenge levels, opponent's cooldowns are increased.
Fixed an issue where damage would crit at a fixed 5%/50% crit rate/crit bonus. Damage now crits using half of your Tenzerk's crit rate/bonus.
Adjusted the number of fans and likes gained at each Pilot Level.
Added a floating text warning when you trigger a cooldown while affected by the Empix's Long Cooldowns debuff.
Adjusted how the Sabotage stat works so that extremely high values will not have as severe an effect or potentially cause opponents to damage themselves.
Added an extra room in the Nor Sentryville Museum.
Art/Visuals
Improvements to choreography during gameplay sections, allowing for more natural moves while still keeping as much connection as possible between the placement of the notes and the animations chosen.
Tenzerk footsteps now leave cracks and jagged rocks on the ground.
Added additional foot animations and dance moves.
Improvements to visual clarity of Rhymery post photos.
Updated lighting of nighttime battles.
Reduced the number of trails from the Aedonix's Flourish move to improve visual clarity and performance.
Improved/changed some Tenzerk paint sets.
Updated museum battle arena fog and lighting.
Reduced the dark intensity of the Aedonix's solo effect.
Added new VFX for some opponent moves.
Added additional destructibles to all battle arenas, particularly new tall destructibles that can be destroyed by arm motions.
Powerful Tenzerk moves now create shockwaves that can destroy destructible objects.
Improved crowd NPCs so that they can now spawn more consistently and run away during battles.
Lighting adjustments across the game.
Added an additional eye customization option.
Audio
Added additional audio of opponent moves.
Fixed missing/incorrect navigation sounds on the Tenzerk menu.
Bug Fixes
CPU and GPU performance improvements, especially in heavy battle scenarios.
Fixed an issue where non-english characters would appear incorrectly when scrolled off screen on the music selection or custom music UI.
Fixed an issue where the game would not save immediately when confirming a save after manually loading an older save file and then saving.
Fixed an issue where the mouse cursor could get stuck on screen after playing a battle in Freeplay mode.
Fixed an issue where the UI cutout effect around the battle cursor could be sized inconsistently.
Fixed an issue where the Aedonix's grace notes could sometimes appear inconsistently.
Fixed a spot where the player could get stuck by the kitchen table in their home.
Fixed issues where non-continuous stems could occasionally be generated in battle.
Fixed an issue where the player response dialogue UI would allow making a choice too early with the gamepad.
Fixed issues with opponent pilots who would be framed incorrectly by the black bars when approaching them.
Smoothed out the audio when looping a song, and fixed issues where an excessive amount of time with no gameplay could occur after a loop.
Factory Worker Sanya now has a proper Rhymery username.
Fixed an issue where the Empix's chain VFX could disappear when changing battle arenas or disconnect when playing at low framerates.
Fixed an issue where the Interact UI prompt could get stuck on screen occasionally.
Fixed overly bright water in the forest battle arena level at night.
Fixe an issue where the transition VFX on a music loop would only play halfway.
Fixed an issue where the player's Tenzerk could T-pose if affected by a boss Malfunction at the time that the music loops.
Fixed an issue where the last saved time wouldn't update after a manual save.
Fixed clipping issues with the dark background of some popup windows.
Fixed issues where the camera could be too slow to catch up to the player while sprinting up stairs.
Fixed an issue where the arena transition effect could get temporarily stuck on screen if you won or lost a battle while it was active.
Fixed an issue where certain NPCs, like the player's mom, could appear with different face customizations in different scenes.
Fixed an issue where the Sentilon's drones did not respect the paints applied to the Sentilon itself.
Fixed incorrect UI/VFX animations when switching rapidly between menus.
Fixed issues with click sounds that would play excessively.