Hello Willowguards!
It's been a little second, but we've kept busy in our burrows. First things first - version 1.7! It's not quite the content update we would've wanted, but there was so much bug-fixing and balancing work being done under the hood, that we thought it best to give y'all access to this version already! Also as an excuse to make this post. Without further ado:
Version 1.7 - the Rebalance Update
Subtle rebalancing that touches on every part of the game (both original and Frostreign), specifically around the number of monsters spawned at once. There are now some limits to how many nasties will surround you at once (although if you run around blindly and attract every monster in Woikos, you will still be overwhelmed) - no changes have been made to the NUMBER of monsters spawned, just their cadence. Hopefully, this will lead to some encounters being a little better balanced. It's still the same game, just perhaps a little less 'bullet hell'-like. Let us know how it feels!
Changes to how Action Surges work: all action surges (even the empty one, before you unlock the inclination ones) now RETURN ONE CARD TO YOUR DRAW DECK. Tenacity, as before, still returns more, but also recharges any cards you currently have in your slots (identical to the Reagent Satchel cards - except you never run out of Tenacity!). This will hopefully encourage players to more freely use the cards they have, as no matter what Action Surge you are equipped with, you will always have access to your discarded cards again (eventually).
Since this change makes the Obelisks a little less useful, they have been given an additional use. Aside from shuffling your entire discard deck back into your hand, Obelisks now also grant a single use of the Second Chance ability. The Second Chance ability works like it does in many games - when reduced to 0 hit points, instead of dying, you will recover your health and armor after a few seconds, and get back in the fight. Of course, if you died knee-deep in monsters, you'll still be knee-deep in monsters...but it's a shot!
In addition to this, there is some new content:
For Frostreign Owners: Two new monsters have descended from Alteros to make your day worse. The Batfang is a horrific flying bat-like creature that bites and fires magical grenades at you. Keep moving, or die. The Vermin Matriarch is perhaps the final form of the line of Vermin - she moves effortlessly through the ground, and spawns her own special children for you to deal with. Make sure to bring a Rune of Health!
Your companion now has three ability slots + two slots for 'default' abilities. This is to encourage pre-planning, and also to avoid situations where the player has to flip through 5+ abilities to get to the desired one.
There is now a new heavily randomised room for the Willowwaters Hunt location, for added variety.
And finally, sundry bug fixes:
Fixed projectiles passing through walls if the enemy is too close to the wall when firing.
Fixed a Frostreign bug where monsters could pick up Nexus Currency, making levels requiring it impassable.
Fixed an incident of friendly fire during the Woikos siege (also rebalanced the encounter a bit)
Increased the fade-in time of backgrounds to hide the day/night/evening transitions.
Fixed the player death counter not updating deaths properly.
Frostreign: Fixes to the first Shimmervale dungeon's optional objective.
Frostreign: New companion abilities are added directly to their slots.
Various small UX/UI and animation bugs fixed here and there + some typos corrected.
Enjoy!
To celebrate the new release, we're going on sale (-50% across everything!)! We are already on sale as part of the wonderful Anthro Festival 2026, but this sale is going to continue until the end of the month, coinciding with our presence at GamesCom 2026 in Cologne, Germany (26-30 August 2026)!
If you happen to be around, feel free to stop by our booth and test out our exclusive Frostreign demo, or come take a look at the in-development version of the Hollowroot board game! Or come check out what else MiTale has been working on, aside from Willow Guard.
NB: We're also launching translations of the Willow Guard pages in Spanish, Portuguese, German and French. This does not however mean the actual game text is translated - only the page itself.
NB2: The demo will continue to be available until the end of Gamescom, and has also been updated to 1.7.1.1!
NB3: Want to check out our booth and see what the mood is like at Gamescom without being there? We're going to LIVE STREAM from Gamescom on Wednesday 26.8 from 5 PM CET! Tune in through our Discord server (links on the page)!
Thank you for now, and good luck in Tersa, Willowguards!