Yes hello,
Remember last year when I said that the game will release in August? Well, I didn't specify which August, did I? So don't accuse me of lying now, because the game will release on the 28th of August. 2026! Accuse me of lying only if I fail to release it on that date. I know, short notice. Sorry if you have to cancel your holiday plans for this
One thing worth mentioning is that the game will have Early Access status on Steam. Don't take this as a "This isn't finished" label, take it as a "There will be more" label.
The price will be $4.99 or whatever the equivalent is in your Krones or Pesos or Rupees or shiny pebbles, with a 25% discount for a week right off the bat!
Now the more fun stuff, a list of big changes since the last update in April:
New Alpha area type! These are very infrequent and feature a special glowing Automon that has a different ability than it normally would. There are 10 possible Alpha species, one for each type. They have custom teams designed to make their abilities absolute hell to beat
Event system has been expanded with new events, there's now a total of 8! That isn't that many so I'm not sure if the exclamation mark was justified, but any new feature added to the game is an opportunity to come up with more
Instead of every NPC just being that darn bastard Barry Jitters, they are now random people with specific themed teams and some really stupid dialogue. Oh also, NPCs no longer hang around once defeated, they will just leave the area empty.
(If you are playing the tutorial, it will still be just Barry)
There are some RADICAL personal stats in the main menu. You can prove your loyalty to Tongo with stats now
Other things that are cool enough to mention, but not cool enough to screenshot:
Steel bonus reworked into debuff reduction, few Steel types reworked too
Area removal isn't instant anymore, you get a 3-turn warning and gyms get a grace period before they can start getting removed
In PvP or NPC encounters, you can now preview how many of each type the opponent has
You can emote at your opponent in PvP matches
Bot intelligence improvements
Player lives reduced from 8 to 6
Exp gain is slightly affected by level difference, lower level Automons will catch up marginally faster
I will be making another announcement on release day, and that will include a list of things I plan to add further down the line. Until then, you'll just have to keep reading this post over and over to get your Automon Arena kick