NEW MAIN MENU & SAVES
- Reworked the Main Menu with proper UI buttons, hover effects, click sounds, and menu music.
- Added a Continue button that remembers your latest safe checkpoint.
- Continue now displays the saved level plus the date and time it was last played.
- Endless Mode is disabled until it actually exists.
- Credits is disabled until it actually exists.
- Added separate Settings and Accessibility menu support.
PAUSE & ACCESSIBILITY
- Improved the pause menu flow with Resume, Restart, Main Menu, and settings-panel support.
- Pause-menu audio can now play while the rest of the game audio is paused.
- Added an optional SPIKE STAGE meter.
- The meter is enabled through Main Menu → Accessibility and stays enabled across all levels.
INTERMISSION & PROGRESSION
- Improved checkpoint logic for Levels 2 and 3.
- Dying on later levels returns you to the correct intermission checkpoint.
- Fixed the Escape phone call incorrectly skipping after entering the scene directly.
- Phone calls now only skip when returning through Continue after a previously resolved checkpoint.
BALANCING & ECONOMY
- Continued tuning case rewards, skull penalties, refresh costs, spike tax, loans, drinks, GPUs, and Level 2/3 progression.
- Reduced skull / negative-reward weight to make harsh losses less constant.
- Increased general case profitability so runs have more room for recovery and strategy.
- Improved Level 3 GPU value so more mining hardware remains worth investing in.