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Art Contest Results & Steam Leaderboards for Speedrun Mode

Buckle up, Turbo - This is a pretty big round of updates, with lots of new things to play around with, and even Steam Leaderboards to compete in!

If you encounter any bugs while playing, please report them to me on Discord!

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Art Contest Results - Heal Snail Upgrades

Many moons ago, the Discord server began a lengthy discussion about possible ideas for Heal Snail's elixir forms.
This is why an Art Contest happened, so that Frosty & Hollow snails are fully designed by the community!

(Next thing you know, Imma get pressured into making Hollow Mussel smh)

🔮 Hollow Snail

When a nearby turret dies, spawn explosive mines on all surrounding tiles that drain enemy health upon explosion

Art Contest winning entries:

🧊 Frosty Snail

Converts all connecting mucus tiles into Ice Mucus

Ice Mucus "over-heals" turrets by granting them an ice shield

Art Contest winning entries:

btw: Frosty Snail had a very fiery birth. A fire truck paid my place a visit on the day I made Frosty Snail. No kidding. Oh my word. I wish you could smell the house right now as I'm typing this.

🎖️ Honorable Mentions

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Speedrun Mode!

Speedrun Mode is a new "challenge option" that gives you ways to speed up enemy spawns and get through levels super fast.
(Enabling Speedrun Mode also makes the game harder, for this reason.)

Each level comes with its own Steam Leaderboard for completion times! You can now compete with other players for the most efficient way of beating each level!

Operation Octo is normally not speedrunnable, due to the enemy waves spawning on set timers. However, in Speedrun Mode, enemy spawns follow “The 50% Rule”:

  • When 50% of the current wave enemies’ HP has been taken, the next wave spawns immediately.

  • (This feature was suggested by TylazerMK, who speedruns PvZ)

To enable Speedrun Mode, go to the new “Gameplay” section of your settings, and scroll down:

(Note: In order to submit your scores, you must be playing on Steam, and have active internet connection!)

Here is a guide on the intricacies of speedrunning OO.

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Gameplay Settings

The settings menu has just gotten a new "Gameplay" category:

General

Minimalist UI

  • Switches to a smaller version of the in-game UI that does not block your view

  • Only recommended for experienced players - You'd have to use hotkeys to place turrets

Mouse Click to Move

  • Move Odin around by Right-Clicking on tiles

Highlight Placeable Tiles

  • Shows noticeable borders around all tiles you can drop turrets onto

Display Stats in Manual

  • Voyager Manual shows you actual stat numbers

Accessibility

Disable Clam Damage Share

  • You no longer receive damage when Clams are getting hit

Infinite Enemy Spawn Delays

  • When you’re not doing well, further skeleton spawns are prevented indefinitely

  • You can still produce Pearls while enemy spawn is paused

Pause Game when Placing Turret

  • Stops time so you can ponder about where that turret goes for as long as you want

Infinite Placement Range

  • Lets you drop turrets anywhere on the map, not just around Odin

Disable Auto Camera Zoom

  • Prevents the camera from zooming in/out on its own (when placing turrets / taking damage)

Allow Hammering Anything

  • Lets you place Hammer Shark onto any turret

Challenge

Deck Randomization Button

  • Adds a button that lets you select random turrets to fill up your deck

Turn off Odin Regen

  • Odin no longer automatically heals up after 5 seconds of not taking damage

Prevent Healing Odin

  • You cannot recover Odin’s hp via external means such as Heal Snail

Lethal Clam Laser

  • Allow Clam’s damage share to kill Odin

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Level Reworks

  • In Level 3-5 "Graveyard Shift", spawns now gradually speed up if you have not been hit / stunned during the current & previous waves, to that point that multiple blue jellies could spawn in each row

  • Fossil spawns also speed up depending on how many non-fossil items you have picked up recently

  • If you collect the initial introduction fossils fast enough, fossils will spawn faster during the first wave of jellies

  • In Level 3-5 "Graveyard Shift", Jellyfish carrying fossils are now beaconed when inside illumination

  • When a fossil-carrying Jellyfish is about to exit the map, it now flashes red and illuminates itself

  • If you missed a fossil-carrying Jellyfish, the next fossil spawn will be sped up

  • Jellyfish now spawn a distance away from the map borders, and would not immediately disappear upon exiting the map borders

  • Starting Elixirs are no longer allowed inside 3-5

  • Fixed a glitch where the reward chest does not spawn at the large skull in 3-5

  • Most players hate the Archeologist achievement. It has been suggested that if each run of the level was shorter, the achievement that requires a perfect playthrough of the level would feel much less tiresome to get. (Just to be clear, Tylazer beat the achievement in one hour before. Archeologist wasn't toooo bad if you're good ;) )

  • To address the player frustrations, and make the level speedrunnable, I've done a lot of reworks inspired by Creeps' original suggestion that the level should speed up if you're doing hitless. A speedrunner could finish the level in half the amount of time now.

  • This round of changes will also help casual players who have trouble finding fossils (which would cause the level to drag on for too long).

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Russian Localization

Thank you to TheStimerGames for translating Operation Octo into Russian!

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Balance Changes

  • Red Herring's charm effect now takes priority over that of Siren & Pearl Tree

  • As a gadget, Herring should take drastic effect when placed down, and manage to save endangered turrets regardless of whether the player is using other charmers.

  • Hollow Everywhere Eel upgrade cost increased from 30 to 40 pearls

  • If you have lots of Hollow Eve Eels all over the map, you can easily get huge values out of their life drains. This cost increase will hopefully make it less of a no-brainer to dump all your Hollow Elixirs onto nothing but Eve Eels.

  • Frogfish gadget reload time decreased from 20s to 19s

  • This is to account for the time it takes you to click on & drop Frogfish, so that Frogfish's reload does not gradually go out of sync with the Clam production cycle, which takes exactly 20 seconds.

  • Mutant Shooting Star upgrade cost increased from 15 to 20

  • Yep, 15 cost for the very significant coverage boost is too much.

  • Hollow Bumperfish now glows in the dark

  • Serious Hollow Bumper reworks incoming, but for now, I'lm letting it glow 'cause it's a literal disco ball.

  • When a Potion Factory deploys, it now passes its status conditions onto its deployed form

  • When a Potion Factory deploys, it now slides to the tile it is deployed onto, rather than snapping directly to it

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Misc Changes

  • Levels now display a level overview (including enemy types in this level) when hovered over

  • I really put this off for years.

  • Starting Elixirs are now limited to one per level, to be selected before the level starts

  • Added the option to play without a starting Elixir, after you've bought one

  • Suggested by LameGamerTime

  • This change has been planned since before the game's release, but I never got around to making it during the pre-release crunch :( Being able to start a level with 3 Elixirs is way too OP, and completely destroys the early game balance; Besides, selecting only one of the elixirs solves the problem of how the eventual 4th starting Elixir would be added ;) Now that Speedrun Leaderboards are going up, I finally made this happen.

  • (Challenge players have wanted the ability to play without starting Elixirs for a long time now. That also got taken care of by the Elixir Selection panel.)

  • If you still want to play with multiple starting Elixirs, use the "/GiveElixir 2" dev console command! (Change the number for which Elixir you want granted)

  • Added the ability to remove gadgets from your selection before a level starts

  • If you want to play without gadgets, there is now a way to remove the constant urge to click on gadget buttons.

  • Gadgets now have a unique death sound different from that of conventional turrets

  • There are now unique off-screen beacons for gadget knock-out & turret perma-kill

  • Suggested by Rain

  • Spiky Urchin's manual entry now displays "Speed" as a stat

  • Watchdog's manual entry now allows switching to its mobile form

  • Adjusted Spiky Urchin's manual entry so that Timmy was placed "in" the toilet, not just "on" the toilet

  • It makes more sense for Timmy to have been in the toilet bowl - As Alejandro said: "A ball cant crawl out if its stuck in a hole". This lore change will better clarify the cause of Little Timmy's death.

  • Added a /SelectPreviousDeck dev console command

  • This command tries to select the last deck you used, instead of the latest deck you won a level with. This is mainly to help challenge players who need to restart a level over and over. If you haven't started a level since launching the current game session, the command does nothing.

  • Using this command alone would not disqualify your speedrun score.

  • No, I will never add a button that does this. PvZ2 devs might have eventually relented, but I shall not 🗿

  • Added 7 new achievements (related Everywhere Eel, new Snail upgrades, etc.)

  • Gamepad placement cursor can now be moved all the way to the edges of the screen while the camera is zoomed out (instead of always being confined within a rhombus shape at the screen center)

  • Steam Deck now gets enlarged info panel & pause menu UI

  • When the Steam Overlay is enabled during a level, the game now properly auto-pauses

  • Turret Clams now function properly inside Graveyards

  • Added bubble VFX for Argonaut, Frogfish, and Everywhere Eel

  • An ejected Leviathan battery no longer displays full-bars unless it is completely fully charged

  • Enemy spawns will no longer be delayed if Odin is dying / too many Clams have died, but there are no skeletons on the field except Reapers

  • Adjusted range displays for Hermit, Urchin, Mutant Shooting Star

  • "Healing soul" trails now vary in size depending on the heal amount delivered to their targets

  • After finishing a level, if you have no new levels unlocked, the camera would now go to the latest level you just played, instead of the last level of the biome

  • Scroll bar UI no longer blocks attempts to scroll a page via mouse scroll

  • Some performance optimizations for VRAM

  • Serious performance optimizations for when you're attempting to place turrets

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Bug Fixes

  • Fixed a glitch where you can place Hammer Shark on top of another Hammer Shark inside Graveyards

  • Reported by AnthoneyRose

  • Fixed a glitch where upgraded Death Ray forms sold for lower prices inside Graveyards

  • Reported by Nimsi

  • Fixed a glitch where a duplicated Everywhere Eel created after a level's completion can still be scared

  • Reported by IdiotWithATophat

  • Fixed a glitch where Turret Clams cheated into regular levels fail to spawn the last turret in your deck

  • Reported by Virty Laughs

  • (fixed against his will)

  • Fixed a glitch where environmental decoration light beams are not always positioned near the top of your screen

  • Fixed a glitch where Disorientation Star VFX's violent shaking (when disorientation is about to wear off) can appear barely noticeable depending on the screen resolution

  • Scene transition fades no longer get paused by (and remain on top of) the pause menu

  • Fixed UI issues when creating a new profile via the profile window using gamepad

  • Fixed a glitch where boss characters appear instantly, without fading in

  • Fixed a glitch where the player could zoom out & place turrets before a boss level officially starts

  • Spiky Urchin, Diver Skeleton, and Smoke Sprayer now stop their attacks after you've failed a level

  • Fixed a glitch where while placing Imitation Crab, the imitated turret's radius line does not display

  • Fixed a glitch where Mutant Pleco could heal Odin from an infinite distance away

  • Attempted fix for a glitch where Leviathan could fail to glitch out

  • Fixed a glitch where the "Quick Reflex or Dumb Luck" achievement could be unlocked by Crab Trap instead of Zappy Jelly

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Tutorial Changes

  • The "Pistol Shrimp in your starting hand" warning message no longer shows if you have other high-DPS turrets in your starting hand, such as Argonaut (which didn't exist in the past)

  • Rephrased the aforementioned warning message so that it's more likely to be interpreted as a suggestion

  • The aforementioned warning message no longer shows on Level 2-11

  • This warning message (meant to help beginners during early game) is outdated. It originated from a time before Gadgets & gemium turrets existed. The criteria for triggering the warning can be loosened a lot now.

  • Arrows now point at the Gadget swap buttons if you have a new gadget, but have never performed a gadget swap

  • Gadget buttons now flash red for new players if an unaddressed skeleton is attacking a clam while no combat turret can be afforded

  • Level 1-3 now reminds the player to place down Urchins via an arrow

  • Blobby vs. Mortar tutorials no longer pop up if you killed 3 or more skeletons using the Blobfish