Your runs just got a plan.
Two of Starfend's core systems grew up this update. Stones now have somewhere to go — ten rarity ranks, from humble Stardust all the way to Cosmic — and skills stopped being a lucky drop and became something you draft, run after run.
💎 Stones: rank up & fuse
- 10 stone ranks — every stone now rolls a rank, from Stardust (grey) to Cosmic (cyan). Higher rank, stronger buff, prettier frame.
- Stone fusion — fuse 5 stones of the same rank into 1 stone of the next rank, right from the preparation screen. Those piles of early stones finally have a purpose.
- Deeper runs, rarer stones — the further you push, the better the drops. Sell prices scale with rank too.
- New in-game stone art across the board.
⚡ Skills: draft your build
- You start every run with a skill — the one matching your drone body's color. From wave 1, you have a button to press.
- Pick a new skill every 5 waves — after the wave buff on waves 5, 10, 15… you choose a skill drawn from the colors of the meteors you're actually fighting.
- Skills fuse — pick the right colors and they combine into stronger tiers, with a proper little cinematic: charge-up, clash, shockwave. It's very satisfying.
- Giant meteors now drop stones instead of skills — kill them for loot, draft your skills on schedule.
🎮 Controller & fixes
- Non-Steam controllers now match the Steam layout: X/□ calls the next wave, L3/R3 zoom, B/○ levels up the drone you're flying.
- Navigating the drone buttons with a controller now tints the placement effect with each drone's color, same as mouse hover.
- Fixed bugs when starting a second run in the same session, a survival timer that kept counting on the reward screen, and a keyboard-only tip showing up on controller.
- Defeat is quicker and more dramatic — a short slow-mo beat instead of a long crawl.
New here? There's a free demo — play a full run, no strings attached.
As always, this came partly from your reports — keep them coming in the Hub. — Solo dev behind Starfend