Remember the good old days when games worked out of the box?
I don't, I grew up with the GameCube, and if Sonic got absorbed by a solid stone wall and fell into the void, that was YOUR problem. Hallelujah to the digital age!
A bit less than a week in, and already a ton more bugs have been found and patched (you don't want to read all of them... I don't want to admit all of them... ːsteamsadː ) but that's not all! Here're some neat little quality of life changes made at the behest of helpful players:
- All characters (except Drinn) now start with 1 extra heart of HP -
Because this game, and its bosses in particular, can be hard. Harder than I set out to make it, honestly. It's tough, balancing a game around the experience of yourself and a small group of dedicated testers. The game performed decently at previous SAGE outings, but indepth feedback was in fairly short supply.
...Drinn is already OP enough as is though, so no buffs for her.
- Camera has been significantly improved -
Now instead of constantly wheeling around to try and GUESS where you want to go and how fast you're trying to get there, the camera is just shifted more to the right of the screen. There're a few spots in the game where this could be slightly less convenient, but given all those bugs I don't want to admit I had to patch, I've decided to save theory crafting the most elegant possible solution for Feedback Patch 2.
You can also now hold the UP or DOWN key while standing still to take a quick peak up or down. I tried my best to eliminate spots where this would even be needed during the level design phase, but it was requested by a friend of a friend, and adding it didn't hurt.
- Subtle red screen flash on player hurt -
Just because a couple people mentioned not always noticing when they've taken damage.
- Hitting lava (and its counterparts) now cancels ground pounds and fast fall -
This is one I've been meaning to change for a while, but just never got around to. Previously, hazards like lava and acid that bounce you upwards on contact wouldn't reset your gravity, meaning it was possible to get caught in an inescapable damage loop when using certain abilities.
- Frebb's midair handling has been tamed -
Finally found the line in my spaghetti code that made the main character turn so fast midair! His weight now feels far more natural midair, and precision platforming should be much easier.
- F12 now takes screenshots -
Didn't even know I had to do this manually, and never thought to test it because I quite frankly forgot screenshotting with F12 in Steam games was a thing it's been so long since I used it.