Nothing At Stake · published
Coinciding with October Next Fest, we decided to fully relaunch the demo, focusing on delivering a much more refined experience which reflects our intent for the full game.
To do this we again looked carefully at the tutorial and the first 20 minutes of gameplay afterwards and sanded off points of friction, making things like lantern acquisition easier on first and subsequent playthroughs. We also improved guidance in this process, the goal being for nobody to walk away without a strong idea of the macro objectives, even if they drop out early.
The secondary major objective was to fill out all of the available map possible, with the goal that no one enters a building without feeling they were rewarded.
DESIGN
MAJOR TUTORIAL IMPROVEMENTS to reduce early deaths and much more reliably teach item use
Lantern is now granted by the mayor, or can alternatively be acquired dialogue-free in a very accessible place in Crossroads
The initial key received the above treatment as well, with the mayor instead directing you to its location
Unarmed attack becomes claw slash, with a much more generous arc
Unarmed attack, item use, and pickup use now uniformly allowed on wall, in air, and in slide
Bottle hold/press split removed for simplicity, where instead some liquids simply are drinkable on press, and everything else gets dumped
Gamepad controls reworked again, as there was too much weight put on the ability to move while inventory-ing and move while throwing or aiming, and not enough ease of sprinting and sliding and attacking during these
ACCELERATION system- parkour actions make you faster
A new member of Crossroads! A fellow explorer, they can be encountered out in the world for perspective and advice.
Another new member of Crossroads! They don't stay very long...
A mysterious creature hidden somewhere can bring your currency through timelines...
Fairies!
Automatic, non-fairy resurrection added under a specific circumstance
Campfires can be activated by fairies as a "warp-back" point on resurrection
Added a couple spoken Zale reactions to help players understand commonly used level elements
Ignited pickups on the ground no longer ignite characters on contact
Interacting with major meteors and meteor-based bosses offers a new reward
All pickups have some kind of throw hitbox now, instead of only some
More pickups are allowed to roll (including bomb)
Ladder slide for fast downage
You can fall a bit higher without taking fall damage
Carried pickups have collision now
CLOCKS!
CANNONS!
LEVELS
Lake basin makeover
Filled many straggler buildings in field and lake
Sewer vastly improved
Underground expanded
Many more heart pieces in the world
North end of field fleshed out
Meteor zones in lake & field with unique aesthetic flair
GROTTOS
FIXES
Issues involving pushing crates over lips should be greatly reduced
Fixed many pathfinding issues
Fixed many ladder issues
Fixed inconsistencies with cobwebs
Fixed bombs and molotovs exploding in hand
Fixed inconsistency with rolling out of fall damage
First person looks is less jittery
Better swim handling for mobs
Improvements with camera keeping out of walls
Various crash fixes
LOOK & FEEL
Multiple characters look fancier
Proportion/height difference between various humanoid species exaggerated
Dialogue cam reworked for nicer-looking angles that show character faces better
Characters flap their jaws during dialogue
Characters look towards Zale on proximity
Zale looks towards other characters on proximity
Fancy new animation for chests with major items
Meteors mess with the screen even more
Musical stingers for item use and death!
Camera pitches up or down in tandem with ladder climbing
Camera pitches down while Zale faces a ledge and the camera is behind him
Wind effects for many, many props
MANY MANY NEW SOUNDS FOR MOBS
OPTIONS & PAUSE MENU
FPS slider
VSync toggle
Pixelate toggle