Stage 3 is here! Internally, it’s our favorite yet, and we hope everyone enjoys it as much as we do! While we’re still very interested in feedback, we feel that Stage 3 is in a pretty good place and is ready for public consumption. This patch also contains a lot of balance and gameplay tweaks, check out the notes below for more details!
- Stage 3: Scorpion Land! Explore mysterious and ancient robotic temples in this desert land, and collect the secret blueprints needed for your final mission! Features over 22 unique new enemies with unique abilities, new mechanics, and a [redacted] to [redacted], culminating in a battle on an [redacted]. –Dev Note: Scorpion Land! is available to anyone who has completed the Crystal Caverns. It is intended to be the most challenging stage yet, and we playtested internally with between 5000-7000 salvage of upgrades to find a balance we felt good about. Feedback is greatly appreciated, and we anticipate making lots of adjustments once we start getting some responses.
- Shotgun changed again! Knockback increased 33% from 3 → 4. Shotgun base damage reduced 50%. At ⅓ max range or less, shotgun pellets now pierce enemies and continue onward. –Dev Note: We’re still trying to nail down the shotgun. We reduced its base damage as it was too strong against big enemies like bosses, but we gave it a piercing ability and increased its knockback so that it would remain very strong at close range against regular enemies. It remains a strong damage and path clearing weapon, and is still a strong choice against large enemies and bosses.
- Reduced auto-shotgun ultimate volleys per shot from 4 → 3. Reduced damage 40%. Eliminated piercing. –Dev Note: Our ultimate weapons are probably the most in need of balance generally, and the auto-shotgun was overpowered to a ridiculous degree, especially with recent shotgun changes. It still might be completely overpowered after these nerfs, but we took it down quite a bit this patch and will reassess in the future.
- Energy Burst given an additional count of piercing at level 6. –Dev Note: Energy burst gets a little love. It’s our vanilla and simplest “new player” starting weapon, and we want it to remain a viable choice as players progress in the game. Its high damage coupled with its knockback and the added piercing should make it much better at punching through swarms of enemies later in a run.
- Cyber Pulse Ult: Shocking Pulse changed due to bug fix. It will now stun enemies longer for each enemy it passes through, as originally intended. –Dev Note: Not much to say other than we fixed a bug, so it should be more effective at crowd control now.
- Hypercharged Tesla Coils: Damage penalty for the ult reduced from 60% → 30% –Dev Note: The damage penalty when taking this ult was too steep and punishing, this buff will hopefully make it feel more rewarding and worthwhile as an ultimate option.
- Drilling Burst: Now does 25% less damage. –Dev Note: Drilling Burst was slightly overpowered, and with this change it will hopefully be brought more into line with other ultimates.
- Heavy Metal ability reworked: Now heals for all the damage done to you by the ability over the next 30s (no longer based on the number of kills). –Dev Note: Heavy Metal’s ability was a little too hard to use before, and this change makes it more reliable and consistent.
- Malware’s Virus effect now benefits from +damage upgrades and passives. –Dev Note: This change will buff Malware’s ability proportionally if damage upgrades are taken, and will let him scale and still be a viable pick in later stages.
- Lucky 1101’s Reroll ability given a 20 second cooldown. –Dev Note: Reroll was very very strong, allowing a reroll of every single level-up. This slight nerf will affect the early game (when level-ups come fast and furious) more than the late game, but will still leave Reroll as a very strong ability. It will hopefully make the choice of when to use Reroll more interesting as well.
- Increased the Health and Regeneration upgrade from 35 → 40 health per level purchased. Health and Regeneration passive ability during runs increased from 35 (common) → 40 (common) per level, and adjusted the higher rarities upward as well. –Dev Note: We felt that both of these were a little stingy for the cost, so we increased them.
- Increased the Max Shield upgrade per level from 15 → 40. Increased the Max Shield passive ability from 20 (common) → 40 (common) and adjusted the higher rarities upward as well. –Dev Note: This is a fairly large buff, but we want to try it out and give players more options, and this helps the shield upgrade compete against HP and Regen. Since shields regenerate automatically after not taking damage for a few seconds, buffing these choices makes them a much more attractive option for players looking to periodically “take a hit” and grab xp orbs. Additionally, being able to increase shields to a greater degree makes certain character abilities and builds more attractive and possible.
- Advanced Weaponry upgrade base cost reduced from 2000 → 1500 salvage. –Dev Note: This upgrade is great, but too expensive. We’ve reduced the cost, and any salvage put toward advanced weaponry before patching should be refunded to players upon loading their game.
- Reduced the hit points of the crystal caverns bosses by 1/6th. Reduced the max speed and damage of the green boss’s projectile slightly. –Dev Note: The crystal bosses were slightly too hard to kill for the average player with a typical amount of upgrades, even a player having a really good run. These changes will make the bosses more reasonable to take down. Additionally, the green boss in particular was overpowered compared to the others when tackled last or second-to-last, and these changes will hopefully bring its difficulty more in line with the others.
- Added two new enemies to the crystal caverns. –Dev Note: We had some enemy ideas that never made it into the crystal caverns as intended, so we finally added them. Enemy waves have been slightly adjusted to welcome them to their new underground home.
- Buffed giant tunnel worms in crystal caverns. –Dev Note: Giant tunnel worms are a weird (and fun!) hybrid of enemy and terrain hazard. Wth the increased piercing and AoE capability of weapons and ultimates, they were starting to become slightly too easy for players to destroy. They remain very killable after this patch, but will require players to be a little more determined and deliberate to take them out.
- Added a visual status bar display above the experience bar that shows temporary player statuses and cooldowns, whether from beneficial item pickups or harmful enemy abilities. –Dev Note: We’ve wanted a visual indicator for status effects for awhile, this is the first step in that direction. We have additional functionality planned for the future, but feedback on the current iteration is always appreciated.
- The upgrade menu now shows both the current value of purchased upgrades and the value the next level will give.
- Added a new Steam achievement for beating stage 3.
- Added a new hidden Steam achievement.
- Adjusted/replaced some art
- Updated some menu layouts to be more consistent
- Various tiny bug fixes and improvements
We hope that you, our players, enjoy the new stage and all the changes in this patch. As we continue working on Robot Resistors, we plan to refine Stage 3 and other aspects of the game based on player feedback, so we really want to know what you think! Please reach out on our Discord or on the Steam Forums, we’d love to hear from you. Expect the next couple patches to appear fairly soon, with new characters and weapons as well as some potential QoL improvements we’ve been mulling for awhile. Thanks again for playing!
–The Crablacksmith Team (James, Frank, Luke, and Adrian)