# Apple Man Sam - Alpha 3.2.0 Patch Notes

## Performance

This update is a major performance overhaul. Enemy rendering, combat processing, and VFX systems have been rebuilt from the ground up to handle peak combat with 600+ enemies on screen.

- **MultiMesh enemy rendering:** All horde enemies are now rendered via batched MultiMesh instances. 750 enemies now cost ~13 draw calls instead of 750+. Death effects, explosion particles, and shadows are all batched through the same system.
- **Vulkan Forward+ renderer:** Switched from Compatibility to Vulkan for automatic draw batching and better GPU utilization.
- **Combat cascade throttling:** Damage events, chain lightning triggers, and AoE explosions are now budgeted per physics frame. During intense combat, excess work is spread across frames instead of spiking in a single tick. You still kill everything just as fast — the visual feedback is just paced more smoothly.
- **Centralised enemy ticking:** Enemy melee, movement, and separation systems now run through centralised managers instead of individual per-enemy scripts. This eliminates hundreds of redundant function calls per frame.
- **Smarter VFX shedding:** Draw call pressure is now detected earlier and VFX quality degrades more aggressively under load. Death effects, chain lightning bolts, popup numbers, and explosion particles all scale down before you notice any frame drops.
- **Piercing projectile fix:** Piercing weapons (shuriken, etc.) entering a dense mob no longer process 20+ hits in a single frame. Hits are spread across physics ticks for smooth frame pacing.

**Result:** 200 enemies with full combat runs at ~270 FPS. 600 enemies at ~130 FPS. Previous builds would drop below 20 FPS in equivalent scenarios.

## Combat & Weapons

- Shuriken upgrades enhanced with near-range damage rampup — shurikens deal more damage at close range, rewarding aggressive play.
- Boss pool prewarming for Cole the Corn and Billy the Chilly — no more frame drops when bosses first use their attacks.
- Enemy melee attack range has been corrected. Some enemies were hitting from slightly further away than intended.
- Explosive Shell splash no longer double-dips on crit multipliers.

## Shop

- Gun Store redesigned with a new two-pane layout. Weapon list on the left, details and upgrades on the right. Cleaner, easier to navigate.

## Balance

- Enemies walking through decorative buildings now slow down and become semi-transparent instead of phasing through at full speed.
- Stage 2 enemy HP retuned for a smoother difficulty curve.
- Overtime enemy scaling adjustments for better late-game pacing.
- Damage popup numbers reduced during intense combat (player damage popups are always shown).

## Quests

Full quest rebalancing pass across all 445 quests for demo readiness.

- **Score quests rescaled** across the board to match the current scoring ceiling. Cumulative targets now range from 50K to 10M, single-run targets from 150K to 10M.
- **Kill quests increased** — core, loadout, and map-specific kill requirements tripled to reflect current enemy density and kill rates.
- **Weapon mastery quests replaced** — the old "beat the boss with X fully upgraded" quests have been replaced with varied single-run challenges (elite hunting, no-damage waves, briefcase runs, breakable destruction) and long-term progression goals (damage dealt, stages completed, gold spent, prisoners freed).
- **Vending machine quests updated** to match the new item-purchase system. Quests now track purchases by rarity tier (common, rare, epic, legendary).
- **Endless mode quests reworked** for Rising Tide compatibility — stage-based objectives replaced with time-survived and score-based goals.
- **Side objective quests** reworked for ATMs in The City.
- **Map score quests tripled** for Kingdom, Dusty Town, and Space Station.
- **Duplicate quest IDs fixed** and stale data cleaned up.

## UI

- Paid briefcases now show a large gold cost indicator above them when you're nearby, with a smaller "Press E" hint below.
- Level-up reroll hint is now larger, gold-colored, and properly visible above the weapon hotbar instead of being clipped.
- Added Exclusive Fullscreen display mode that prevents accidentally clicking off to other windows. This is now the default.
- Fullscreen now correctly targets the primary monitor instead of defaulting to screen 0.

## Bug Fixes

- Fixed invisible elite enemies that could appear after certain pool recycling sequences.
- Fixed golden weapon shader not applying to Katana and Nunchucks after purchase.
- Fixed Rising Tide boss challenge spawns not triggering correctly.
- Fixed camera binding issues during stage transitions and boss intros.
- Removed duplicate "STAGE COMPLETED" text that was overlapping the animated announcement.

## Known Issues

- At 750 concurrent enemies with full combat, FPS can still drop below 60. This is a density-driven cliff being addressed in a future update. Normal gameplay peaks around 600 enemies where performance is solid.