Hello again, NIMRODS!
We've got something really exciting to show you guys today! We're going to talk about the new options we want to provide to all of the NIMRODS when we hit our Early Access release! That's right; today's post is going to be on our newest project: The Options Screen!
Work in Progress
Okay, okay, I kid. We know that the options screen isn't what you guys are looking for in a Devlog, and that's not the main subject of today's post. But it is something we've been working on.
And sometimes that's the way game development works. A lot of oft-requested features make their home in the options menu, such as keybindings, and they've got to be coded out, even if it's not glamorous. After all, a good options screen goes a long way towards making a game feel professional and polished. But it doesn’t make for the most exciting devlog.
So as we finish polishing up the options screen, let's talk about the actual subject of today's post: Augments!
Out of all the feedback we've gotten, the augment system is the thing we've gotten the most positive feedback on. Players love the way that augments can mix and match, and we feel like our gun building system is second to none. So, obviously we're going to lean into it!
For Early Access, we're not adding new lines of augments, but we are adding a fourth tier to every branch of every augment line. Those with calculators handy can derive that that means 58 new augments will be in the game, eight per slot! (Except the underbarrel slot gets 10... we could probably write an entire Devlog on how that came to be.)
We've done a lot of these augments earlier, some as early as last October, and we were just waiting for the right time to tease them. Given that we've been hard at work on an unglamorous options screen, this seems to be the time!
Bullet Hell Barrel
The first Tier 4 augment to show off is an upgrade to the Hellsplitter Barrel called the Bullet Hell Barrel.
Why bother aiming when you can just spray bullets indiscriminately everywhere instead?
Work in Progress
The bullets all do significantly less damage than they would before you took the Bullet Hell Barrel, but if all of them were to land, you'd end up dealing way more damage per second than any other barrel of this tier. This means for the Bullet Hell Barrel to make the most sense, you'd want to be surrounded by monsters as much as possible... or guarantee your hits by using some other augment...
Tech Module: Sightsword
Another augment we're excited about is the Tech Module: Sightsword.
This augment came about when Zerk was playing around with the Containment Field and asked the team "What if this were a rectangle instead of a circle, and the long end of the rectangle faced towards your cursor?"
I felt like there was still room for "aura" based builds where you were encased in a sphere of bullets, but the idea of directing your Containment Field with your vision was too cool to pass up. This made it feel natural for one branch of the Tech Module; you could either take a route that makes your Containment Field more defensively oriented, or a branch that makes it more aggressive.
But why have a boring rectangle when you could have a freakin' fifteen-foot long sword blade!
Work in Progress
Fire your gun a lot, fill your sword-shaped containment field up with bullets, then swing your cursor around to slam all your bullets into enemies. It's super fun! Just be careful not to swing your sightsword into a rock. You know how they love to eat bullets.
Neodymium Magnigrap
I mentioned on the forums that we were planning to "weaponize" XP. Here's how! Named after the real-life dangerously powerful rare earth magnets. The Neodymium Magnigrip causes any XP that you pick up to rip through enemies and damage them.
This is an interesting augment in my opinion because it converts Collection Range, a utility stat, into damage; the longer your collection range, the more likely there is to be one—or multiple!—Enemies between you and the XP you're picking up. It makes positioning more interesting and combos well with several other augments that give you increased pickup range when a certain trigger occurs.
Ring of Flames
I love the idea of orbital bullets. Right now, that mechanic is only included on the Orbital Dissuasion Barrel, which is only used in some niche high-armor builds because of how much power is dedicated to that barrel's triggered ability.
I was trying to figure out where else we could use that tech, and the Immolative Emitter seemed like a perfect fit; its purpose was to spray fire everywhere, right? Well what if you were in the center of a fire tornado?
Work in Progress
Explosive Shield Grip Barrel
We've got the shield grip in the game right now, and it occupies a nice role: A small pool of what basically amounts to extra HP, except that it's got its own unusually-fast regeneration mechanic.
The Tier 4 version adds a new interesting complication: When the shield breaks, it damages all enemies on the screen:
Work in Progress
This takes the shield's recharge mechanics a step further; instead of wanting to stay at your maximum shield as much as possible, this incentivizes you playing on the edge a little. It's obviously super useful on builds where you want to get hit, making the Shield Projector branch competitive with the Spiked Grip for the grip slot in those sorts of builds.
In conclusion, we think augments are great and are always looking to expand the builds players can make. Tier 4 is as high as our Augments will get in the forseeable future; once we finish up our EA release, our plans are to make a fifth Augment for each slot. Something to look forward to well down the road!
Does this give you any build ideas? Want to speculate on what the Tier 4 for your favorite upgrade might be?
Come hang out in our Discord!
Until next time, NIMROD!
~Talonos