Howdy Guardians!
You’ve been asking about it and here it is: the Autumn update playtest is now open to the public! That means you can play the (slightly less stable) version of the Autumn update right now (on Steam only)!
To access it, head over to the beta tab of your Roboquest game properties, select the “playtest branch” and Steam will start downloading it.
Don’t worry about your progress, we keep separate save files for both the playtest and the live version of the game.
The playtest will run until the 4th of October and then the Autumn update will officially land on all platforms at once (slight delay on various platforms may happen). When that happens, we will shut down the playtest.
The update’s localization is being worked on right now and will be available at a later date (and at a different pace depending on the community translators availability). That means that the playtest is only available in English for now.
Please keep in mind that the playtest purpose is to detect and fix the potential gamebreaking bugs and other smaller issues so your experience will likely be less stable than the live version of the game.
If you want to help us track bugs and issues, a friendly reminder:
- If you crash and don’t know the reproduction steps, please just restart your game, we will receive the crash report automatically
- If you crash and know how to reproduce the issue, please send us a F10 report and describe the reproduction steps
- If you encounter an issue or a bug and have the presence of mind to, please send a F10 report right when you encounter it, this will make sure we receive the latest line of codes that caused the issue
- If you encountered a bug at some point, please send a F10 report when you remember it, describing the reproduction steps is awesome if you can
- If you happen to have a video of the issue, you may report it on Discord or on the Steam forums
- You may also report those issues on Discord and Steam if you prefer, though keep in mind that it’s less efficient for us
Like usual, we’ve opened new channels of discussion on both Steam and Discord in case you want to report stuff or simply give us your feedback there.
That’s pretty much it, you may find the major highlights of the patch as well as the complete list of changes below (no fancy visuals for now, we keep those for the official release!).
We hope you’ll enjoy the changes :)
Happy robot bashing guardians!
PATCH HIGHLIGHTS
Here are the highlights of the changes coming into the Autumn update.
New Boss
A brand new boss is coming into play.
Where will you face him, you may wonder…
Well, he’s been added to the random pool of Act 3 bosses. That means you can now encounter either ‘Beetle Royale’ or this new boss called ‘Uncle Jim’ when reaching the end of Act 3.
New Enemies
We’ve added a dozen new enemies, mostly new 3D models, animation sets and attack patterns but also a few texture swaps.
We knew enemy variety was one of the weaknesses of Roboquest for a long time now and we initially planned to add even more at this update. But we’re preparing the game for the arrival of a new system of ‘elemental variants’ for the enemies and we decided to wait for this system to be completed before adding even more enemies.
Among other effects, those new enemies are ready to confuse, flash and burn you.
Enemy Rosters
Following the addition of so many new enemies, we’ve been reworking the roster of enemies you encounter in each level (we call that the ‘bouquet of enemies’).
The current rosters you will encounter are not final and we will monitor our data and your feedback to fine tune it. But most level rosters have been changed and you will encounter a higher variety of enemies in general.
We will continue to modify the level rosters, especially when more enemies will be added and also for level rosters that haven’t changed that much in this update.
We’re just getting started!
Basecamp Interface
The basecamp is going under heavy changes and you’ll be able to experience the first of these changes in the Autumn update.
You no longer unlock the basecamp upgrades by interacting with several 3D objects, now the ‘Upgrade Basecamp’ console will bring up a 2D interface and all purchases will be done here. It should speed up the process and make it possible to actually have a glimpse of every upgrade you’ve already purchased and those you haven’t.
Later down the road, we will also overhaul the basecamp 3D visuals, but it’s not there yet.
Networking Performance
Technically speaking, we’ve updated how movement prediction works on the server-side. Now, the client is responsible for handling his own movements and the server no longer corrects it. In terms of gameplay it means that you should no longer experience any stutters or rollbacks when playing as the client with latency.
Of course, the discrepancies of movement between server and client still exist (even if you no longer experience them on the client side) and you will probably see your brobot stutter and rollback (and vice versa).
That doesn’t mean that multiplayer is ‘FIXED’, that means it should be much more enjoyable than before in general. But we’re still working on fixing the performance bottlenecks (in terms of bandwidth) and the other multiplayer quirks and bugs.
PATCH NOTES
Player
• Reduced player health gain per level from 40 to 30
• Increased base player speed by 5%
Developers' Note: We removed the ‘Weird Hat’ gadget from the game, it was picked way too often and we didn’t feel it was fun to have a mandatory gadget. We reallocated the bonus it was giving to this base value increase but also in a new basecamp upgrade. This should promote a higher gadget diversity while still giving players their sweet movement speed bonus.
• Considering the base movespeed of the player has been increased, all movement speed bonuses increase the speed by a higher value than before
• Added new statuses for the player:
• Burned - Slowly burns your scratch damage bar until there’s none, then stops burning
• Blinded - Covers a part of your screen and puts everything in black and white
• Confused - Reverses your movement keys
• Reduced player stun duration from 3s to 1.75s
Developers' Note: We always thought that people were going to spam the QTE much faster than some actually are. These people were stunned for 3 seconds which seems a bit… unfun. This shouldn’t change much for people already succeeding the QTE.
• Taking another stun while already being stunned no longer resets the stun QTE
Developers' Note: This actually wasn’t really intended, felt pretty bad and on top of it was pretty confusing if you were already focused on completing the previous QTE.
Pickups
• Powercell lifespan increased from 9s to 12s
• Updated powercell blink-warning time window to better indicate when they are about to disappear
• Healing cells lifespan increased from 6s to 7s
Rewards
• Cleaned up chests types and names:
• The ‘Starter Pack’ is the chest appearing at the very beginning of your run, at the start of the canyons, it contains specific rewards based on your basecamp upgrades
• ‘Max’s Chests’ are the chests containing weapons and other rewards in the safe areas
• ‘Corrupted Crates’ are the chests you can find at the end of challenge rooms
• These chests all have their own unique reward system
Developers' Note: Each chest will have their own unique visual later down the road.
• ‘Max’s Chests’ can now contain items
• Basecamp upgrades now clearly indicate what type of chest they are improving
Developers' Note: In this update, we’ve brushed off and improved the perk roster for both the Commando and the Engineer. We’re planning to do the same for the Recon and the Guardian in the future.
Commando
• Replaced some perks that were underpicked or didn’t seem interesting with new ones
• Re-balanced perks overall
• Maximum Fury increased from 10 to 12
Rocket
• Damage increased from 75.0 to 80.0
• Impact force increased from 95.0 to 100.0
Shorty
• Damage increased from 9.0 to 11.0
Engineer
• Replaced some perks that were underpicked or didn’t seem interesting with new ones
• Re-balanced perks overall
Summon-Buddies
• Cooldown increased from 14.0 to 16.0
• Drones dodge less often
• Drones draw less aggro
• Reduced drone health
• Increased damage of drone secondary attacks (from perks)
• Drones can be summoned for free in safe areas (summoning does not trigger the ability cooldown)
Scrap Blaster
• Damage decreased from 55.0 to 50.0
• Impact force increased from 50.0 to 60.0
• Now deals explosive damage
• Projectile speed increased from 7000 to 12000
• Cooldown decreased from 5.0 to 3.0
• No longer homes
• Reduced scrap generated by 1
Recon
Laser Dagger
• Damage increased from 40.0 to 50.0
• Now drops extra healing cell on takedowns (like other melee attacks)
• Added two new weapons:
• Bubble Splasher - A cooling weapon hurling waves of bouncing bubbles
• Missile-Gatling - A burst-fire weapon blasting volleys of homing rockets
• Reworked and improved the gunfeel (recoil patterns) of many weapons
• Sentries summoned by the ‘Assault Sentry’ now inherit the element of the weapon
• Added ammo and reload system to Assault Sentry, Throwing Knife, Elite Crossbow and Longbow
Developers' Note: While it may seem like a direct nerf to these weapons, it makes them viable in much more builds than before (noticeably those in relation with reload and ammo counters).
Affixes
• Added new white affixes for weapons:
• Havoc - Bonus melee damage and attack speed while in hand
• Restock - Chance to recover an alt-fire charge after using it
• Sidekick - Takedowns reload your other weapons
• Added new green affixes for weapons:
• Lag - The last shot deals more damage
• Top - The first shot is always critical
• Added new blue affixes for weapons:
• Breach - Bonus firerate for a short time after applying a critical hit
• Velocity - Bonus critical damage and projectile speed
• Bullseye - Bonus critical damage after applying a critical hit
Balance Changes
Dual Uzis
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Assault SMG
Primary Fire
• Impact force increased from 7.0 to 8.0
Tommy Gun
Primary Fire
• Damage increased from 8.0 to 9.0
Light Machine Gun
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Power Gloves
Primary Fire
• Damage increased from 35.0 to 38.0
• Impact force increased from 55.0 to 68.0
Torpedo Gun
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Mortar
Primary Fire
• Impact force increased from 50.0 to 80.0
Throwing Knife
• Ammo in clip increased from 1 to 8
Primary Fire
• Critical ratio increased from 3.25 to 3.5
Scout Sniper
• Ammo in clip decreased from 8 to 6
Longbow
• Ammo in clip increased from 1 to 6
Ice Cannon
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Cryo Launcher
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Fire Gun
Primary Fire
• Firerate increased from 4.0/s to 5.0/s
Shock Cannon
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Fire Launcher
Primary Fire
• Damage increased from 24.0 to 30.0
Blast Rifle
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Assault Rifle
• Ammo in clip decreased from 35 to 30
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
• Damage increased from 10.5 to 11.0
Minigun
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Blast Minigun
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Laser Saw
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
• Damage increased from 10.0 to 15.0
• Impact force increased from 8.0 to 16.0
Long Rifle
• Ammo in clip decreased from 15 to 12
Primary Fire
• Damage increased from 34.0 to 36.0
Blast Sniper
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
Elite Crossbow
• Ammo in clip increased from 1 to 8
Primary Fire
• Damage decreased from 58.0 to 52.0
• Firerate increased from 1.11/s to 2.0/s
• Critical ratio decreased from 1.75 to 1.5
Assault Sentry
• Ammo in clip increased from 22 to 25
Primary Fire
• Recoil pattern has been updated
• Damage decreased from 22.0 to 18.0
• Firerate increased from 3.33/s to 5.0/s
Cyclone
Alternative Fire
• Damage increased from 110.0 to 120.0
• Impact force increased from 60.0 to 90.0
• Radius increased from 0.9m to 1.0m
• Cooldown increased from 4.0 to 6.0
• Stack amount decreased from 2 to 1
• Updated game effects specifying ‘you no longer consume ammo or energy’: the system will now consider that you’re locked at the ammo value you were prior to activating the effect (for example, activating an unlimited ammo effect while at 95% of your magazine will activate the ‘Top Quality’ passive of the Guardian whereas the previous version of the system didn’t activate it)
• Balanced many Commando and Engineer perks
• Replaced several Commando and Engineer perks
Developers' Note: We’re sorry not to be able to provide an exhaustive list of these changes. We’re still thinking of a proper way to keep track of all those changes (which are both hard to track individually and hard to automatically generate). The stabler the game will be, the easier for us it will be to start detailing those changes.
• Added 23 new items:
Developers' Note: We won’t cover them here and will let you discover them directly in the game.
• Items are now sorted in 3 categories: Common, Uncommon and Fantastic
• Items of the same category now have the same price
• ‘Smithing Joe’ now provides weapons of any tier instead of the weapon tier of your current level
• Weapon rarities are now clearly indicated on their tooltip: Common (white), Uncommon (green), Superior (blue), Epic (purple) and Fantastic (orange)
• Reduced superior weapon cost from 6 to 5
• Reduced epic weapon cost from 9 to 8
• Reduced fantastic weapon cost from 16 to 12
• Basecamp upgrades are now displayed and unlocked in a 2D interface panel (still accessible through the ‘Upgrade Basecamp’ console in the basecamp)
• Removed all other elements related to upgrading the basecamp as a result
Developers' Note: We’re working on getting the basecamp into its final form. The 2D interface panel is the first step and should ensure a much better experience when improving your basecamp and keeping track of all the basecamp upgrades.
• Increased the amount of Wrenches granted by Data-Logs from 4 to 5
• Increased the amount of Wrenches granted by the challenge rooms in Act 1 from 1 to 2
• Added a basecamp upgrade increasing player’s speed by +2/4/6%
Developers' Note: This upgrade should make sure you can still reach the movement speed values you had while using the now-removed ‘Weird Hat’ gadget.
• Added a basecamp upgrade increasing the amount of health gained per level by +5/10
• Removed ‘Weird Hat’ from the Gadgets
Developers' Note: Like specified in other developer notes above, we reallocated the bonus movement speed from this gadget to other elements in the game.
• Added two new gadgets:
• Roller - While riding and for a short duration after, increases both your movement speed and firerate
• Swiss Army Knife - Restores health for each powercell you spend
• Certain enemies now have an elemental resistance (represented by an elemental shield nearby their health bar)
• Enemies resistant to a specific element take 70% reduced damage against that element
Developers' Note: We’re planning to make ‘elemental’ versions of most enemies (meaning enemies either resistant to an elemental or dealing damage of that element) in which case we will swap the texture of an enemy to properly indicate its elemental nature. These ‘elemental’ versions will mainly be used to diversify and increase the difficulty of the different Heroes+ (but not only).
• Added multiple new enemies: ‘Fire Fly, Ice Fly, Flash Fly, Hat Fly, Smoke Fly, Shield Pod, Fly Nest, Battle Pod, Shield Bot, Gatling Bot, Ball Pod, Ball Bot, Bull Fly’
Developers' Note: We won’t describe the new enemies here, we will let you discover them in the game.
• ‘Boom Nest’ texture updated (it is now red-ish to clearly indicate the fact that it’s spawning explosive enemies and to differentiate it from the newly added ‘Fly Nest’ which has the same model but spawns regular ‘Light Fly’)
• Updated the enemy roster of all levels
Developers' Note: We will continue to monitor and fine tune the enemy roster for each level.
• Reduced enemy damage overall
Developers' Note: With the addition of new enemy types and new attack patterns, a lot of levels became ‘harder’ in terms of ‘practical difficulty’ (difficulty based on mechanics) so we’re tuning down their ‘simulated difficulty’ (difficulty based on values and metrics) to compensate.
• In arenas, enemy respawns have a lower tendency to exactly replace the latest enemy you’ve destroyed and will more often spawn other eligible enemy types
Developers' Note: This prevents players from developing strategies where they destroy certain enemies first and wait for their respawn in order to get rid of this type of enemy for the remaining duration of the encounter. This also increases the likelihood of having several types of enemies at once at any given time of the encounter (which makes for more interesting fights).
• ‘Gunpawns’ now also throw grenades in addition to their regular blaster attack
• Enemy mines area of effect increased by 20% and model size reduced by 35%
• ‘Light Flies’ shoot from a closer distance
• Reduced the amount of healing cells dropped by ‘Goliaths’ from 18 to 10
Bosses
• Added a boss in the boss pool of Act 3: ‘Uncle Jim’
Developers' Note: That means you may encounter either ‘Beetle Royale’ or ‘Uncle Jim’ at the end of Act 3.
• Reduced Bosses’ ‘enrage’ speed bonus in higher difficulties
• Updated most bosses health to make their time-to-kill more homogeneous
Judgeball
• Removed the aerial rocket when going full artillery mode
Developers' Note: This change should reduce the amount of spots you have to pay attention to during this attack (by removing the aerial one).
• Reduced shockwave damage by 10%
• Replaced the bouncing balls by mines during the spin-to-win attack
Billy Boom
• ‘Billy Boom’ stun ball replaced by an explosive rocket and increased its frequency
Developers' Note: Billy Boom has a slightly too high winrate against you and conveniently enough we wanted to keep the possibility to transform Bosses’ patterns into elemental variations of them for the higher difficulty levels. Making this change gives us the possibility to bring back the ‘shock’ version of it later and should help reduce that winrate.
• All lava traps in the game now use the same visual: green acidic ooze, they all bump the players
Developers' Note: We felt like the red-ish lava was too bright for the eye and was too disturbing. We also felt like people had a hard time realizing when they were taking damage in lava-traps that weren’t bumping them. We got rid of these problems by simply and conveniently making all lava-trap look and behave the same way (green acidic ooze with bumping damage). Finally, we feel like lava-bump is pretty fun.
• Added explosive barrels to the Quarry level
• Smoothed ‘Sir Catercoaster’ lava rocket-jump
• Reworked Act 1 rock visuals
• Improved ‘Oasis’ visuals
• Improved ‘Canyon’ visuals
• Updated the 3D model of all the challenge room doors
• Updated the 3D model of the doors at the end of all levels of Act 2
• Updated the 3D model of the doors within all levels of Act 2
• Updated bosses’ explosion VFX
Developers' Note: When our VFX artist started working on that task, we were pretty scared that we’d lose that Sonic©-ish style. But we feel like he’s done a wonderful job at preserving that feel while still managing to align it with the visual style of other Roboquest’s VFXs. We hope you’ll think so too!
• Overhauled and updated all enemy death visual effects (depending on enemy size, damage type used to destroy it etc.)
• Updated VFX and decals for all enemy and player explosions
• Updated enemies’ mines VFX and decal
• Updated enemies’ shield VFX to clearly indicate the origin of the shield
• Updated enemy bouncing ball VFX
• Updated Bosses’ frozen status VFX
• Updated and improved performance of the Quarry’s smoked areas
Developers' Note: This still needs a lot of work to align it with the Roboquest style and reduce its performance cost. This is just a hotfix for now.
• Updated ‘Mark’ visuals and VFX
• Improved network performance
• Switched the authority handling movement, making the client player’s movements feel much smoother (should highly reduce rubberbanding issues)
Developers' Note: It should finally feel way better to play as the client player (when you were previously experiencing things such as rollbacks or stutters. This doesn’t mean that all multiplayer issues have been solved though.
• Improved elements related to enemy death performance
• Improved minimap and map display performance
• Improved general UI performance
• Improved enemy animation calculation performance
• Improved performances of all projectile and impact VFXs
• Fixed many bugs
Developers' Note: We actually fixed many of the crashes and bugs you’ve been reporting (thanks for your reports!). We didn’t track them all but we know you would be pleased to see the bugs you’ve been reporting listed here. We’ll try to do our homework better next time.
• Added many bugs
Developers' Note: The programmers told us to add that, so we did :D
That is the end of the changelist for the autumn update.
Have a great day everyone, and once again, happy robot smashing!