Hello everyone! Another update with small changes that should make the game more engaging for both VR and PC players
I'm pretty happy with the state of Mandrillian's upgrades, but there was a pretty obvious outlier. The Scanner was pretty much useless and overshadowed by upgrades both cheaper and more expensive (even if it did look pretty cool).
Until now, the Scanner did a... well, scan of the area. If the lasers touched a Robot, it would get a marker showcasing its position for a while. It also replaced the scent tracking, making it the only upgrade that wasn't a Berserk replacement. It wasn't precisely an amazing upgrade, especially at its price point.
Enter the Jammer.
This rework of the Scanner still has the cool looking laser swipe effect, but for just 1 second. If there are jam-able stuff in the laser's range (around 5 meters on a ~200º radius in front of the Mandrillian), it will let out a disruption pulse.
These are the things that are affected by the pulse:
- Multitool force-uncloaks and gets prevented from cloaking again for 5 seconds
- Sentry Turret gets jammed for 10 seconds
- Gate Consoles freeze up for 10 seconds (loading screen freezes, button inputs don't register)
- Closed gates (keycard operated) are forced open
- Armed mines and C4 charges get disarmed
This makes the Jammer a pretty good deal for 400 points. In fact, it was such a good deal that the Healer is now also 400 points instead of 500, and the Fire Bomb is now 200 instead of 250. There's still probably some more adjusting to do so all upgrades are equally attractive, but I think it's starting to balance out pretty nicely. Cheaper upgrades can be good for annoying the Robot early-game, forcing it to waste resources but preventing the Mandrillians from saving up enough points for beefier upgrades. Mid-tier upgrades are good disruptors and can counter some of the Robot's common strats (with the Plasma Turret being able to blow up barrels, the Jammer disabling explosives and traps and the Healer negating poison smoke). And top-tier upgrades (the Self-Destruct and the Armor) are high-risk, high-reward "finishers" that can win a match while still being countered by a smart Robot.
With this out of the way, it's time for me to start working on the Main Menu scene and removing all the remaining placeholders. Stay tuned!
CHANGELOG
- Scanner upgrade rework: now called the Jammer
- Decreased Fire Bomb price from 250 to 200 points
- Decreased Healer price from 500 to 400 points, making it the same as the Jammer
- Fixed some clipping geometry on the map
- Mutitool now counts as "cloaked" for an extra second after decloaking (the time it takes for the cloak FX transition to fully finish). This means you can no longer quickly tap decloak, fire/use the shocker the very next frame then re-cloak again without getting the battery drain/heat buildup penalty
- Multitool's shock now more effective against multiple insectoids surrounding you
- Small noises (sprinting footsteps, automatic doors) minimap notification radius reduced from 15 to 14 meters
- Keycard Gate noise minimap notification radius reduced from 60 to 45 meters
- Slightly increased average duration of the elevator's loading screens
- More code optimization