The infamous and annoying "Attempting to Remove Null Entity" bug is hopefully fixed now. This has been one of the most inconsistent bugs to track down and replicate and also one of the most disruptive so I'm really hoping that this solves it. Let me know!

• Fixed one cause of the “Removing Null Entity” crash.

Greetings, esteemed collaborators!

Do you know what’s Next? Fest!

Yeap, we are using this announcement to tell you that we’re participating on this edition of Steam Next Fest, alongside our traditional development updates!

I know I know, we’ve already posted an update this month and we’re already posting again, don’t worry, we won’t spoil you like this ever again, that just proves how committed we are!

Let’s not waste any more time, we aren’t getting any younger, or older for that matter. So before we get into the bones of this matter, let’s talk about the Next Fest and why you should care.

This is it, the final countdown for Early Access is upon us. Will I tell you the date? No. But I’ll tell you we’re getting reaaaally close and there are certain things we have to do because of it. Yes, I said we, you’re in it now too! Steam Next Fest is an once-in-a-deathtime opportunity that up-and-coming games have where visibility is just like the majestic giraffe: really high. Many living souls will be able to get to know E-Lich for the first time, and more importantly: wishlist us! Yeah, you got that right, it is time for you to join us in shameless promotion of this experience, Undead Resources told us it is in our eternal contract, so you kinda have to do it.

But really: this is a crucial part of the road for any indie developer (whatever that means) to reach a good sizeable audience of living souls. So grab that fax machine (or pager) and share it away to all your family, friends, enemies, acquaintances, neighbors and even exes. Tell them that they’ll have so much fun playing it that they can go ahead and already wishlist it before even trying, just to save some time! And to help you convince them, I’ll share some extra changes we did, and also include the full changelog that covers those additions and the ones from our last post.

There ain’t no rest for the wicked, and that’s us! And since we are legally obligated to keep working, you can join our eternal toil! Don’t forget that we hold regular playtests, besides the ever-constant bragging competition in our Discord server. Your presence in it, just like in our completely fun happy hour gatherings, is mandatory!


And that’s it for this news-update. As always, we really appreciate your support! It’s almost as valuable as your souls.

E-Lich Corp - "We value your life. And death. Seriously."

As you may now have heard, Unity has been made aware of a security vulnerability that affects all games built with Unity Engine 2017 and newer, so it recommended that any games developed with affected Unity versions should upgrade to a patched engine version.

You can read more about it here:
https://unity.com/security/sept-2025-01

• New boons

• A new spell evolution

• New talents

• NEW HERO!

  • By that I mean a new boss.

• New Adventurers

• New regular enemies that no one really cares about other than their souls

• NEW WEATHER FEATURE!

  • We're introducing a game changing feature to your runs: Dynamic Weather!

  • Rain, Snow, Eclipse... you name it! Each weather has unique effects that impact gameplay, ranging from boon drop rate differences per weather, unique weather-related boons, unique enemy spawns, stat modifiers and more!

  • You can check the weather in each stage directly from the Stage Selection screen

  • Note this is a very early implementation, so expect more weathers and effects in the future!

• NEW BOUNTY & STAGE MODIFIER FEATURE!

  • You can now increase your Bounty in the Stage Select screen, making enemies tougher! And yes, management has confirmed bonus E-Scrips will be paid according to your bounty level!

  • You can now also enable Run Modifiers!

    • These are challenges for the toughest employees! They will eventually unlock new perks, achievements and more. But for now, they're there for those veteran players who want tougher challenges.

• Stage Select screen was revamped to accomodate the features above

  • The World Map was improved and is now animated!

• NEW LOBBY TELEPORT QUICK MENU FEATURE!

  • You can now teleport to key places in the lobby instead of walking to them

• New VFX Visibility setting!

  • You can now change the opacity/visibility of weapons and spells so you can finally understand what's going on behind the hundreds of simultaneous projectiles on your screen!

  • Loading Screen Tip of the day: "Lowering VFX visibility can have positive impacts on performance!"

• The Legendary Weapon Refactor is here!

  • If you've been around on our Discord server and/or over the dozens of in-skeleton events we've been to in the past couple of months, you have likely heard we were working on this for the past many mortal month-cycles

  • Melee weapons have been refactored!

    • The Sword can now do multiple slashes at once!

    • The Axe now does a spinning attack on its 3rd hit!

• The office is now more "alive"!

  • You can now see some coworkers going places and showing just how busy they actually are. Follow in their footsteps and get to work!

• The Village and Cave stages now have their own music!

• Added an Ambience volume slider to the settings menu

• Revamped several old talent icons to improved art

• Early enemies' experience has been lowered

• Rebalanced the Axe and Sword due to their new revamped behaviors

• Fixed the massive frame drops caused by mass collecting souls

• Fixed the game generating thousands of logs per minute, which impacted fps

• Fixed an issue that made all Adventurer enemies spawn from the same spawn point off-screen

• Somewhat fixed an issue where you no longer earned exp after defeating the first boss

  • This unfortunately can still occur (and we're still looking into it!), but it's much less frequent now

• Fixed a layer/passability issue near the eastern elevator

• Fixed several audio related issues, including mixer issues, SFX volume spikes, missing SFXs in some UIs and Spells, and much, much more

• Fixed an issue where you could get dash boons without having dash unlocked

• Fixed an issue where the Boss's HP Bar could appear in the death screen / animation

• Fixed localization errors

1. Fixed the issue with the honor display of world-ranked players.

2. Fixed the incorrect damage taken per death display in World Championship results.

3. Fixed the issue where players could still win the championship after being eliminated in the World Finals.

4. Fixed the issue where using \[Mischief Attack] by \[Tiger Cub] on \[Wukong] caused incorrect effects for \[Matata]'s \[Loud Roar].

5. Fixed an issue where some highlight moment points were incorrectly recorded.

6. Fixed an issue where Lan and Kid might continuously attack each other during laning.

7. Fixed the issue where Fernan could infinitely use \[Extract Memory] to copy Raven's \[Night Flight].

各位少侠们，

本次更新主要针对部分BUG及显示问题进行了修复与优化，部分系统与文本内容也进行了调整与完善。

感谢各位的耐心反馈与支持！

• 修复主角装备【破甲劲】后进入战斗时可能导致卡死的问题。

• 修复战斗胜利后出现概率性卡死的问题。

• 修复部分增益类技能图标无法正常显示的问题。

• 修复【蛇影同鸣】的实际效果与说明文本不一致的问题。

• 修复【九转还魂丹】效果未能正常触发的问题。

• 修复绝式槽显示的问题

• 修复在非 16:9 屏幕比例下分辨率被锁定、无法调整的问题。

• 修正若干文本描述错误及错别字。

• 修复购买部分消耗品后未能正确获得道具的问题。

• 调整了游戏初期的金钱获取量，以改善前期体验。

• 降低【月末考核之文】的数值要求

感谢大家一直以来的支持与建议！ 我们会持续关注玩家反馈，不断优化游戏体验。 祝各位少侠游戏愉快！

——九芽川工作室

BUG反馈群：730329538

如果游戏中遇到什么问题欢迎加入BUG反馈群跟我们及时联系！感谢您的配合。

☕ Cats & Cups — NextFest Demo Is Live!

Hey everyone!
We’re thrilled to announce that Cats & Cups is part of Steam NextFest with its brand-new free demo available now!

Run your very own cat café| brew drinks| serve your feline customers| and enjoy cozy chaos as you try to keep every cat happy (and every cup full).

🎮 What’s in the Demo

Here’s a sneak peek at what you can play during NextFest:

• Brew a variety of drinks for unique cat personalities
• Meet colorful customers like the Dog Thief and other familiar faces
• Customize your café with furniture and décor
• Manage time| orders| and cat moods as things get busier
• Unlock new recipes and story moments
• Enjoy cozy visuals| a relaxing soundtrack| and plenty of cat puns

This demo gives you a first look at the daily life behind the counter, and a taste of what’s to come in the full release.

🛠 What We Like from You

Your feedback during NextFest is super important! After playing the demo| let us know:

• Which moments made you smile
• Any tricky or confusing gameplay bits
• Favorite cats (and least favorite catstomers)
• Drink or décor ideas for future updates
• Any bugs| balance issues| or funny glitches you noticed

You can share feedback on our Steam discussion page or through our Discord (link in bio). We read every comment!

📅 What’s Next

• We’ll be improving and patching the demo during NextFest
• Expect new drinks| decorations| and cats in upcoming updates
• Full release is planned for Q4 2025 on Steam
• If you enjoyed your café time| don’t forget to wishlist Cats & Cups to get notified at launch!

Thank you for supporting Cats & Cups! We hope this demo gives you a warm (and slightly chaotic) taste of life as a cat barista.
See you in the café, and remember to call the cops on the Dog Thief! 🚨🐾

Rogue Duck Interactive

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3521410/Cats__Cups/




https://store.steampowered.com/app/3622640/Vending_Machine_Co/
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3962270/Perfume_Atelier/
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3771390/Carefully_Stamped/

Hey everyone! 👋

We’ve just released a major visual update for the demo — and it’s a cute one! 💫

🎨 New Hand-Drawn Card Designs

• All cards have been completely redesigned with brand-new, hand-drawn visuals.

• The new art brings a warmer and more charming feel to the game.

⚖️ Balance & Polish

• Several cards have been adjusted for better balance.

• General optimizations and UI/design improvements for a smoother experience.

It’s one of our favorite updates so far — we hope you’ll enjoy the new look and feel of the cards! 💖
Try it out and let us know what you think!

Watch our official Football Academy Manager broadcast for Steam Next Fest October 2025.

Discover how you can build your own football academy — scout young talents, develop their potential, and grow your reputation in the world of football management.

This continuous gameplay stream showcases the demo available during the festival. Play the demo now and begin building your own academy.

We've been working on tons of stuff, bug fixes and visual polish in the demo! Thank you so much for all your feedback!

• Stationary Turrets: Slightly reduced health for faster TTK.

• Phasebeam weapon:

  • Increased scorch scaling for higher precision damage.

  • Slightly increased toughness to improve overall TTK.

  • Easier to hit small enemies and overheat targets.

• Elite Destroyers: More HP but now drop upgrades sometimes

• Credit Drops: Removed per-sector cap

---

Added several new temperature-based stats:

• Frost Harvest: Chance for credits when frozen enemies are destroyed.

• Freezer Burn: Cold weapons apply Scorch, reducing enemy armor.

• Ice Lock: Higher crit chance for cold weapons.

• Permafrost: Extends cold zone duration.

• Frost Nova: Cold zones explode into ice shrapnel when destroyed.

• Heat Burst: Superheat zones detonate on deploy with heated shrapnel.

Upgrades shown in Portals can now have BONUS upgrades attached to them!

---

• Ship temperature gauge now dynamically updates with hot/cold upgrades which means...

• Superchill and Superheat thresholds shift based on equipped upgrades!

• Added tutorial steps for new Supertemp mechanics.

---

• Overhauled upgrade tooltip system for clarity and consistency.

• Added randomized perk borders, glow effects, and detailed tooltips on portal upgrades.

• Enhanced upgrade store tooltips to match portal upgrades.

• Active status changes now “bounce” visually so it's easier for the player to see they are changing during combat

• Added Skip Tutorial button and tutorial access from main menu.

• Added option to disable all tooltips in settings (thank you for your feedback on this!)

---

• Lighting improvements across all maps while messing around with what looks good and what doesn't.

• Updated Hivemind boss tileset so it looks better.

• Fixed multiple lighting issues (ice shrapnel, scorch rays, portals, lasers, debris, supertemp zones).

• Reduced light intensity in magnetic fields and supertemp zones so things don't wash out.

---

• Fixed controller aim assist not applying correctly in some cases.

---

• Can now SKIP the tutorial if desired (thanks for your feedback on this one!)

• Rebalanced early tutorial flow to better explain weapon systems and Supertemps.

• Fixed multiple tutorial-related bugs around sfx and progression

• Updated tutorial tips as the game has evolved.

---

• Fixed performance issue caused by tooltip garbage collection when hovering over portal stat upgrades

• Fixed various overlapping tween animations causing bounce effect issues when active status effects changed.

---

• Added and adjusted tilemap obstacles across multiple maps for extra variety:

  • Four of a Kind, Frozen Heals, Split Blackholes, Trinest, Mosquito Nesting, Triturret.

---

• Removed outdated crew log collectibles.

Cheers!

Hi! The build has been updated to the levels for the Winter domain. If you are going to play, don't forget to send any issues you find our way. You can help us the best way by recording your screen and voice and share that with us. Thanks again!

Hey everyone,

Already now, you can play the first Island Beekeeper demo during the Steam Next Fest. Start your cozy adventure on a floating island where life hums with the sound of bees. Gather rare resources, craft tools, and harvest magical honey that could save the dying world below. Your journey among the clouds begins here.

🐝 Harvest golden honey and care for your buzzing colonies

🐝 Learn to survive among the floating islands

🐝 Craft your first tools and gather resources

🐝 Fly on mechanical wings between sky biomes

🐝 Explore the Forest Island and meet the forest bees

This demo offers a sweet introduction to Island Beekeeper but the adventure is just buzzing to life! You'll find some features and items still on the horizon with building or cooperative mode actively in the works to let you team up with friends. Dive deeper into floating islands discover new bee species and expand your apiary in upcoming updates. Your feedback is gold - it helps us refine the game and craft an even more immersive world of Island Beekeeper!

Your feedback means the world to us! Dive into the demo experiment with bee-keeping mechanics like harvesting honey or crafting tools and share what buzzes you or what could use a tweak. Hop into our Discord community to chat with fellow island explorers - we can't wait to hear your thoughts and make Island Beekeeper even sweeter.