Beat Invaders 3.0 is here!

Hey everyone!

it has been quite a while – over two years already!
While Beat Invaders is a finished project for me, and I continue to work on my new game, Engraving, it is still a project that I love dearly.

There were a couple of bugs that bugged me (pun intended) and some things that just broke down with services that I used that were taken offline (Dailies/Weeklies).

Originally, I planned to fix those bugs and release a minor patch. But then I had way too much fun!
So, this month’s development time was poured completely into Beat Invaders.

If you find new bugs, I would love to hear about them via the in-game Feedback tool or on the Beat Invaders Discord server.

I really hope you will enjoy playing the new version of Beat Invaders as much as I did making it!

Beat Invaders 3.0 - Patch Notes

Highlights

• Season 3 started: Leaderboards are fresh and clean - I will post the top scores of the last season in the upcoming days.
• Hyper Lone Wolf game-mode was added: This was requested a couple of times by the community.
  
• Added slight Vertical Movement: General gameplay change - Delivery HQ installed the Convoy Control Protocol into every Ship. This will allow the Ship to gain a bit of vertical movement, which Convoy Freighters will react to. Talented pilots can use this to employ new defensive or offensive tactics.
  
• Route Effect System: Whenever you jump to a new System, you can alter your run by adding Route Effects. These stackable, optional effects will make the game a bit more challenging while offering bigger rewards!
  
• Steam Community Items: Trading Cards, Badges, Backgrounds, and more!
  
• German language: I finished my work on the translation integration and added German as a second language. If you want to play Beat Invaders in your language, reach out on the Discord and help me with the translation!
• Missions menu: In this new menu, you get an overview of your Achievements - and maybe a good idea of what to do on your next run!
• 7 new Achievements!
• Three new Meta Upgrades: You can now equip up to three Hacks, repair your Freighters, and store up to three Specials - very common community requests.
• 5 new in-game Ship Upgrades!

Improvements

• Improved appearance of Upgrade Icons. Added Rarity labels and made Rare upgrades easier to recognize.
• Damage Numbers: With more damage influence from different Route Effects, this helps to get more information about the damage you deal! You can enable it via the options.
• Added Attract mode: This starts the game automatically in demo mode after idling in the main menu; you can enable it via the options.
• Added a Shield display over the health UI when your ship is protected by the Shield provided by Defensive Refactoring.
• Added a template to the Feedback Reporting tool’s bug section.
• Added Option for low Screenshake; previously, you could only enable or disable it.
• Added Option to confine mouse to the game window.
• Improved Hack Selection screen: Selected Hacks are now easier to recognize, and the layout was rearranged for consistency between screens.
• Improved Options Menu: Restructured to make it easier to navigate and look less cluttered.
• Reworked Dash charge UI element to make it easier to read.
• Clicking/Selecting a profile in the profile selection screen now directly changes to this profile.
• Added Icons to profiles to make it easier to recognize which is active.

Balance

• Increased enemy life with increasing wave count.
• Boss: The Hammer now shoots additional projectiles.
• Meta Upgrade cost becomes more expensive with increasing levels of the upgrade.
• Increased the maximum amount of Dash charges that you can get via in-game Upgrades (3 > 4).
• Added level up options to Evasive Attack (launch 1 additional missile per level, up to 4 in total).
• Immensely buffed damage of Ultrashield shards (400% + bonus based on absorption + wave count bonus).

Bugfixes

• Fixed double inputs with external controller on Steam Deck.
• Fixed broken Daily and Weekly leaderboards, making the achievements available again!
• Fixed bug where additional Upgrade Levels were awarded after loading a game with the Cutting Edge upgrade equipped.
• Fixed typo in Repair Bot description.
• Fixed a bug where "Meta Upgrades" button glow did not update after changing profiles.
• Fixed a bug where "Meta Upgrades" were not sorted correctly.
• Fixed letters in the Upgrade screen appearing in incorrect colors.