The game has been patched to add a new maze, new upgrades, upgrade balancing, community items, and more!
News
Hey everyone! As previously announced, this is the penultimate content patch for Maze Mice. The next content patch will coincide with the game exiting Early Access. You can read more about that here if you missed it:
New Content
Added another unlockable maze
Added 3 more unlockable upgrades
Added a music track for the boss fight
Added a longest game stat
Added an auto-pick button (it appears when the upgrade pool is limited to 2 or less upgrades)
Added Steam trading cards and community items
Game Balance
Boomerang's base damage is now 500 (instead of 400)
Boomerang's damage increment is now 250 (instead of 200)
Boomerang's XP gain is now 2.5% (instead of 5%)
Fleas' base damage is now 3 (instead of 4)
Marbles' cooldown is now 9 seconds (instead of 10 seconds)
Recycling's cooldown is now 25 seconds (instead of 30 seconds)
Recycling's cooldown decrement is now 2.5 seconds (instead of 3 seconds)
Rubber Band's damage increment is now 125 (instead of 100)
Snowball's base damage increase is now 0.2% (instead of 0.1%)
Sunflower Seeds' cooldown is now 40 seconds (instead of 30 seconds)
Sunflower Seeds' cooldown decrement is now 4 seconds (instead of 3 seconds)
Thumbtacks' ammo increment is now 20 (instead of 15)
Toothpicks' base damage is now 5 (instead of 8)
Toothpicks' damage increment is now 5 (instead of 8)
Toothpicks' cooldown is now 12 seconds (instead of 10 seconds)
Zen now only appears if 5 or more upgrade slots are filled
Balance Reasoning
Boomerang made gaining multiple levels more trivial than I would like. Reducing the XP gain while increasing the damage will make the upgrade a bit more risky to take at early levels, while still being strong at later levels.
Fleas were able to deal a large amount of damage to the boss very quickly if obtained early in a run. Reducing the upgrade's base damage by even a single point will help bring it in line due to its exponential nature.
Marbles and Recycling were less powerful than I'd like them to be, but not by a large amount. Slightly reducing their cooldowns will make them more viable. The same goes for the damage increases for Rubber Band and Snowball, as well as the ammo upgrade for Thumbtacks.
Sunflower Seeds made it too easy to effectively stockpile HP above the player's maximum HP. While this strategy is still something I'd like to allow, increasing the cooldown of the upgrade will prevent it from being too powerful.
Toothpicks could easily make the boss fight trivial, while still frequently one-shotting enemies at early levels. It's for this reason that they've received the most drastic nerf among all the upgrades changed.
Zen was frustrating to see when the player had only a few upgrade slots filled. I suspect making Zen only appear with 6 or 7 upgrade slots filled would be too powerful, so this is a good middle ground.
Please let me know your thoughts either in the comments or in the official discord!
-Dan