The Steam playtest has started! If you signed up for access (either at SEGE or via my website) you should have received an email containing your key. If not, reach out to me and I’ll get you squared away. Over the next several days, we’ll be working to set up the Discord sever to dispense Steam keys as well.

There have been significant changes since the web demo. The upgrade system has been completely redesigned and re-balanced, to provide a more dynamic and varied experience. The movement system has also seen some improvements, to provide better mobility and a more interesting upgrade path.

Although new enemy types will be coming soon, the existing saucers have also been reworked to be more aggressive and threatening. Careful attention has been paid to the difficulty slider, and it now provides a much wider spectrum of intensity.

One of the biggest changes this week was the removal of the shield. This change, which was initially an experiment, ended up making the game much more interesting and strategic. The blue bar on the left side now functions as a more conventional stamina bar.

There have been many smaller changes as well, such as subtle refinements to the physics interactions of your projectiles. If you have tutorial messages turned on, you’ll see that these now fade away instead of being instantly replaced with the next ones.

Finally, this morning I finished adding musical sounds to the GUI interactions. This has been on my agenda for a long time, and it was deeply satisfying to add this extra layer of polish before launching the playtest.

Thanks for reading! Cheers!