Thank you
Over a thousand of you downloaded the demo in its first week. I'm one guy building this thing, so watching that number climb has been pretty surreal. Lots and lots of work still to be done but...
Thank you, genuinely. Extra thanks to everyone who left feedback in-game, in the Discord, or left anonymous play data on. I can't watch anybody play, so the only way I find out something's broken is when you tell me or the numbers do. Both did, a lot, and demo-1.1.0 is most of what came out of it.
Week one, by the numbers
A few things from those who shared data that made me laugh:
You scored 153 goals and rang the iron 130 times. 85 crossbars, 45 posts. That's nearly as many pings as goals. Ya'll can't buy a goal sometimes eh?
Hardest shot on record: 108 mph. Longest goal: 88 feet.
426 hits thrown, 47 of which ended with somebody breaking the glass.
49 goals went top shelf, and 25 came after a deke that left a jockstrap hanging from the rafters.
There were 23 own goals. 18 of those were scored by an actual human. Woof.
15 fights, and collectively you served about 47 minutes in the box.
Week 1 Demo Polish Pass! - The whole cast got redone
Crazy what time not trying to put together a demo and make sure it work allows for. There have been a few tuning passes that have gone out. Skaters, goalies, the ref, the coach, the crowd, even the zamboni. all got a polish pass in between watching the metrics. Jersey stripes are real textures now instead of projections, the goalies got proper pads and masks with actual designs, and both sticks were built from scratch instead of placeholder assets I'd been living with. It's closer to the look I've been chasing since the start. It's not finished, not by a long shot, but the models are simpler than they were, so lower end machines should pick up some performance too. Let me know what you think! Or if you hate it, tell me that.
What week one turned up
Some of you were getting multi-second freezes, usually right at a faceoff. I could see it happening in the data but not why, so this latest build adds instrumentation to catch it properly. If that's been you: it was real, it wasn't your machine, and I'm on it.
TRAINING CAMP wasn't good enough, and almost nobody was finding it anyway. It's rebuilt. There's a PREGAME PRACTICE offer on the first boot card now, and the drills stop rushing you so you can just mess about with passing and shooting. One of them was teaching the opposite of what the game actually does, which was a fun thing to discover.
3-ON-3 ARCADE was two menus deep. It's on the main menu now. Try it, it's fast and stupid in the best way.
Goal GIF capture was costing more than it was earning, so it's off by default. Still there in Settings if you want it.
Online isn't good enough yet. Most connection attempts are failing before they ever
reach a game. I know exactly how bad that is now, which I didn't a week ago. It's next.
Also in there: the ref drops the puck on the dot, VSync defaults off now (it was doing strange things to performance on my own machine), and the GAME SPEED slider goes slower than it used to.
Quick note on data
Anonymous play data is on by default from the latest build, with a notice on first boot and one press to refuse. No name, no Steam account, nothing that points at you. Change it any time in SETTINGS. I'd rather say that plainly than have you find it later.
What's next
Online, and making hits feel like they actually connect. I'd rather make this good than make it bigger. The in-game feedback button goes to exactly one person and it's me. Keep it coming. Hopefully see ya on the ice
- Kyle