Hello Hunters,
The second build lands July 31, and the map is the big change. The run now crosses more than one part of Brazil.
Up to now you were in the Norte. That is where the Capelobo lives, in the tellings and in our game. The new region is the Sudeste, and it sits on the other end of the country and does not share the same fears.
That distinction matters more than it sounds. Brazil is not one folklore, it is many, and they do not agree with each other. A creature that everyone in one state grew up hearing about is unheard of six states away. Putting real distance in the run is how that stops being a line in a design doc and starts being something you feel while playing.
Two new fights come with it, and both are against the spirits of hunters who came before you. They tried to finish the same ritual you are trying to finish. They did not make it. Three new cards come out of what they left behind.
There is a new place on the map where you build amulets. Figa, Patuá, Sal Grosso.
An amulet is not a button you press in a fight. You choose it in the moment before the first turn, it fires on its own, and then you live with it. Every one of them gives you something up front and takes something back. Draw an extra card at the start of combat, and at the start of your next turn the most expensive card in your hand goes back into the deck. That is the shape of all of them.
You start with one slot. The second one is bought on the map. Upgrading an amulet costs cards off your deck, which means the amulet system runs on the same currency as everything else here, which is sacrifice. Charges reset when a new run begins.
You told us the first turns were dead. You dumped your hand on turn one, then drew one card and waited.
You now start with more cards. And every fight in the game has been rebalanced, plus the new spirit fights on top. Honest version: the second build is harder than the first. That was on purpose. The first build played too easy for most of you right up until the Wolf, so we pushed the whole floor up instead of only sharpening the spike.
The Rusted Knife went from 3 attack to 2. Several of you said it was winning fights on its own. It was.
The Capelobo softlock. Roughly a third of runs got stuck on the enemy attack phase with nothing to do but quit the game. The cause was the tutorial never closing itself out. It closes now.
The ghost card bug. All your cards attacking at random, and the effect carrying over into the next fight. It was leaking between combats in code. Sealed.
The card hover flicker. Hovering a card with another underneath made both animations fight each other. That was a timing problem on the hover animation and it is fixed.
The map going too dark when you press ESC. We have not touched it yet.
The stutter when the board fills up. We could not reproduce it. If it happens to you again, tell us what was on the board and how many cards were in play.
Brightness in fights is a setting, not a bug. Pause menu, settings, brightness. Turn it up if the enemy is hiding in the dark.
We are being straight about this so nobody downloads Friday expecting it. The audio pass is not in. The UI and card icon revamp is not in. Both start next month and both are already scheduled. Enemies that talk during fights, which a lot of you asked for, are not happening for now. We do not have the budget for that many lines.
What we did do instead is work on the narrative system. And the one who brought you back has a name now.
We used to call him o Mandatário. He is o Patrono now, and that word is not coming back. Mandatário is the one who gives the order. Patrono is the one who takes you in and expects to be paid for it. The second one is closer to what he actually is to you, and it is what he sounds like across the whole first run, because he speaks a lot more now.
Signups for a key are open right now, and keys go out in waves starting Friday:
https://obscurium.firstlook.gg/signup/playtest-2
One run is about 30 minutes. That is all we need from you. Tell us where you got bored, which fight felt unfair, and whether the harder floor is now too hard.
We hang out in Discord and the keys and the news land there first:
See you in the dark,
The Wild Pepper Games team