New Campaign Mode Mission: The Train!
This is easily the most exciting part of the update, right?
A whole new mission between levels 5 and 6 (now 7!) that has the Commando on a moving train rushing through a canyon in the island. It's actiony, a run-and-gun refresher between the maze-like dungeon of The Lab and the really-maze-like dungeon of The Volcano.
You'll see a lot of familiar face but a couple of new enemy types as well. If the whole thing feels a little Contra at parts, then yeah, mission accomplished.
There's also a new(?) boss! With new music!
Cinematics Abound
The game's bosses have updated introductions, and there's a fancy new boss meter for them too.
The first and last boss of the game have some modified storytelling -- the end of the game is much more cliffhangery! But that's the magic of Early Access.
There's at least one (1) new in-level cinematic in Mission 2 (Night Raid), mostly to make sure the system works, but also to make it very clear that the boss door is open.
A whole bunch of tech went into the bones of moving cameras, cinematic this and that, enemies scripting along paths, etc. You'll be seeing more of this down the road.
Improved Final Battle
The last boss is a bit less of a punching bag. He moves and acts with some more smarts, can take more hits, and also has done a great job upgrading the ol' Invincible Particle Shield.
Raid Mode?
NGL, I didn't make a lot of changes to Raid Mode here. I fixed some bugs for sure, but this last build was about Campaign Mode. Don't worry! Raid Mode is clearly far from done, and I'll be tearing into it with the next major update.
Bug Fixes / QoL
I really didn't do a great job of recording each and every bug fix, but:
The few of you who came by the Discord, thank you, your fixes went in. Specifically the weirdness around controller and KB input with some raid mode menus.
The Combinator should be better than ever with regards to eating your items and giving you nothing in return.
Enemies have shadows now. What do you think?
The first level has a slightly more emphatic introduction to subweapons, and a great opportunity to use the Flamethrower.
Raid mode should not fail with a jungleless barren hell.
Raid mode shops actually charge medals now whoops.
New Logo!
Yeah? What do you think? Solid work from Andriy Lukin as well as the Eye of the Commando art team. https://andriylukin.com/
I made this pixel version :3 which was like 5% of the work of making the actual logo but still. Many thanks to the Strim Team for moral support while I try to learn how pixels work. 