Hey Survivors!
Over the past month, alongside gearing up for our upcoming playtests, our primary focus has been locked on two major pillars: multiplayer connectivity and board state clarity.
We want to make sure your co-op sessions are smooth, stress-free, and tactically transparent. Here is a look at what we’ve been building!
Multiplayer Connectivity: Smooth, Resilient Co-Op
Our goal for multiplayer is simple: playing with friends should feel as smooth and stable as playing solo. You shouldn't have to worry about a sudden network hiccup ruining a great run.
Graceful Disconnect Handling: A temporary connection drop shouldn't immediately lock your game or kick you to the main menu. If your connection stutters, the game alerts both you and the host immediately and works in the background to reconnect you as fast as possible.
Seamless Survivor Takeover: If a player does lose connection completely, the game won't grind to a halt. Control of their survivor temporarily transfers to the host so play can continue smoothly. Once the disconnected player jumps back in, the game quickly syncs their state and hands back control of their survivor seamlessly.
Disconnected mid-run? The game detects your active session and lets you rejoin your team immediately.
Seamless re-syncing! Players jump right back into control without locking up the game for others.
Work in Progress: We’re currently refining the logic for what happens if the host drops, alongside preemptively squashing other potential multiplayer edge cases. We want host transitions to be as painless as possible.
Board State Clarity: Strategy Over Confusion
During testing, we noticed it was sometimes tricky to keep track of actions, spawns, and tile changes happening during other players' turns. In Maximum Apocalypse, victory or defeat should hinge on your strategic choices, and not on missing vital information.
Clear Monster Spawns: When new monsters spawn via dice rolls, the game now dynamically pulls up and highlights exactly where they appear on the map. This info is broadcast to all players in the lobby so the whole team immediately knows which paths are becoming hazardous.
New monster spawns across the map are highlighted so the whole team knows where the danger is.
Dramatic Boss Announcements: Bosses are game-changing threats that require immediate team attention. When a boss arrives, it now interrupts all active player screens with a lobby-wide announcement. Everyone sees where the boss spawned, who it's targeting, and what unique traits or abilities it brings to the table. Don't worry about being interrupted mid-move! If a boss spawn breaks into your turn, the game remembers your exact state and drops you right back into your action as soon as the cinematic broadcast ends.
Global boss alert showing Daxton Jaeger's arrival effect, syncing all players before unpausing the action.
Playtesting Update
If you haven't applied for the focus group yet, don't worry! The sign-up form is still open! We’re kicking off our first wave of playtests this September, with priority going to our Kickstarter backers.
Invites go out on a rolling basis as forms come in, but if you don't make it into the initial group, hang tight! We'll be bringing more players in across multiple rounds right after. 😉
Fill out the Focus Group Application Form here: bit.ly/MAPlaytestingForm
Thank you all for your continued support and feedback as we keep pushing toward a polished, apocalyptic experience.
— The Mega Cat Studios Team 🐱🐈⬛