First off: Really glad to see 𝔂'𝓪𝓵𝓵 liked THE JESTER UPDATE, and I can't thank you enough for all the reviews you guys left because of it 💖 (if you still haven't left one, now's the time boi)
...but it's about time we got some new Modes, ain't it? One is like a massively-improved GG1 "CLASSIC", and the other is entirely new since it revolves around Deposits.
Of course, no major update is complete without new mechanics, Guardians, Parts & Mods!
Everything below has unlock conditions listed in-game in the CHECKLIST but if you already meet their requirements, you'll instantly unlock them upon opening the game!
DRAFT MODE 🃏
Genes have a chance to be RARE, EPIC or LEGENDARY (boosting stats or removing downsides).
there's no heal button, bleaching, banishing, locking, storage, recycling, or moving anything around once picked! Everything's a permanent commitment.
defense/survival-oriented builds are great in this Mode since you don't necessarily need to eliminate Microbes (since they don't drop Biomass).
A new resource, "Skips", will let you skip shops if you don't like anything on offer - Studies and Deposits can drop Skips!
MINER MODE ⛏
your entire economy is based on what you can mine from deposits.
there's a variety of brand new deposit types exclusive to this Mode (most will help, but some will hurt).
there's also a chance for absolutely giant mega deposits 👀
ZONES
A surprise new feature: Every few waves, a "zone" will spawn that grants buffs while you're in it!
Some sit in place (but are smaller), while others spin around the area or bounce off the walls.
Just a fun little extra mechanic to spice things up.
NEW GUARDIAN: REDACTED 💗
REDACTED
NEW PLATFORM: LANDER 🌕
drag & drop Nanobot to reposition (can't shoot while dragging)
Speed 200
Health Max +50%
Inspired by a game from a friend of mine, Primordio. Surprisingly intuitive to use, and while it is moving, it's super fast. You just can't reposition and shoot microbes at the same time is all. This was originally going to be "Booster", but the entire functionality of that idea ended up becoming the "Jets" Mod.
NEW BRACKET: DISC 💿
flying disc flying pattern
Damage +100%
Firerate -50%
It's nothing like the "Orbit" Bracket. It makes every weapon fire 8 projectiles in a ring that flies forward. The size of that ring is based on Accuracy. This will make even a weapon like GGGG "Wavequake" fire forward.
NEW MOD: MAGNET 🧲
Knockback pulls Microbes towards the target Microbe instead
No, it's not GG1 Magnet. Hitting a microbe with a high-Knockback shot will make all other microbes near that one get pulled towards it. With enough Knockback & Firerate, you can turn microbes into mini black holes to easily group enemies together and move them away from you.
NEW MOD: EGG 🥚
egg
AND OTHER NEW PARTS?
Remember those part unlocks you got from achieving victory in the first 3 Modes at DEPTH 1/3/5? Yeah, that applies to "DRAFT" & "MINER" too.
Assuming you haven't used Enzymes to unlock them early in the CHECKLIST, progressing through the DEPTHs of the 2 new Modes will unlock these (some were released this update, while others were technically released but otherwise unobtainable without Enzymes):
DRAFT DEPTH 1: "Plane" Platform
DRAFT DEPTH 3: "Pneumatic" Core
DRAFT DEPTH 5: "Helix" Bracket
MINER DEPTH 1: 🆕 "Lander" Platform
MINER DEPTH 3: 🆕 "Disc" Bracket
MINER DEPTH 5: "Xenon" Core
🥔 "POTATO MODE" SETTING
In SETTINGS → DISPLAY you'll see a new toggle for "Potato Mode" - should help players on laptops with iGPUs that can barely reach 60 FPS significantly.
stay tuned for 0.9.0: THE DAILY DIVE UPDATE
new-and-improved Daily Dive
"U" 👀
new Guardians
new Motherboards
new Mods
⚖ BALANCE
"Crossbow" Hull: Armour Max 5 → 4.
"Clover" Mod: now also requires that Armour be 2 or less.
Evasion from Chips (ex. "Evasion +25%" Chip) now capped to 50% instead of 75% (I figured this was better than nerfing the Chip to be "Evasion +20%").
🔃 CHANGES
"Tempest" Guardian: unlock condition now requires applying a total of 300000 → 1000000 Knockback to Microbes.
🔨 FIXES
Parts:
"Jester" Guardian: fixed a couple things with this that I won't reveal but were genuine bugs.
"Sanguine" Guardian: the "Crit Damage +100%" chip would falsely state that it has "NO EFFECT" when using this Guardian.
"Biofuel" / "Fusion" / "Quantum" Core: when hovering to see Nanobot stats mid-run, the Core Buildup stat icon will now be faded out since it's not relevant to these Cores.
"Periscope" Mod: Crit projectiles would appear at full opacity for their entire lifespan sometimes.
"Scissors" Mod: no more weirdness when combined with Hitscan + Flak.
"Wings" Mod: the unlock condition would be finnicky sometimes.
"Compensator" Mod: would sometimes guarantee Crits at times when it shouldn't.
"Dispatch" Gadget: now increases Damage on Explosive weapons as expected (and also now plays nice with the "Jammer" Mod.
"Cloak" Gadget: achieving victory while cloaked wouldn't reset the visual effects for next wave.
Endless Mutations:
"take Damage 2/s while at 0% Heat": now actually does that.
"take Damage 2/s while above 50% Heat": now actually does that.
"giant bubbles" Anomaly: now removes all current Shield & Shield Max when the left choice is selected (which is what it said it did).
some SETUP button warnings showed the wrong text (ex. "Nexus" Guardian + "Minelayer" Barrel).
losing Health Max wouldn't actually reduce Health, it just looked that way in the UI - this could lead to cases where your Health bar dissappears but you don't self destruct.
pausing & re-entering an Endless dive no longer removes the grey colourization of the background.
various fixes for oddities that would occur upon resetting a highly-complete save (via SETTINGS).
the "UNUSED" header colour would sometimes be white instead of tinted by your paint colour.
some typos.
some text was missing for non-English languages.
Gamepad / Steam Deck Stuff: (been putting these off way too long)
PAUSE Menu: "SKIP SHOP" & "AUTO HEAL" can now be navigated to.
RESEARCH Menu: trying to research something while an unlock popup is shown will research the thing instead of move selection or dismiss the unlock popup.
SHOP Menu:
activating the Banish button with the cursor will now still let you navigate left and right through shop items.
when Bleaching, moving the cursor now won't prevent navigating to shop items.
can perform actions while a discovery popup is shown.
sometimes, certain slots would be impossible to navigate to.
a handful of other "feel" improvements (so that navigation moves to where you expect).
Don't be alarmed if the cadence of minor updates slows down. The next 2 major updates will still be roughly 44 days apart. Just reaching the point where there's not much left to balance/fix! All that remains is content additions now.
💖 Please add a review! They directly support GG2 / development 💖
You know those sites like Patreon or that Buy Me A Coffee one? That's what reviews are to a game.
Whether it's 30 paragraphs or 1 letter, they all directly influence Genome Guardian 2's success & exposure.