Greetings, Defenders! This weekend we'll be recapping all of our Hero Focus events! It's a mashup!

From Friday to Monday, all Hero Focus Weapons will have 3x the drop rate, and Legendaries will have their drop rates doubled. If you haven't tried any of the new Hero Focuses, now is the time! We want to see what you come up with!

This event will run from Friday 1 PM EDT to Monday 11 AM EDT. Hero Focus weapons will drop on all maps in Free Play and End Game modes.

Have fun this weekend, Defenders! May the RNG gods smile upon you!

Greetings, Defenders! This weekend we'll be recapping all of our Hero Focus events! It's a mashup!

From Friday to Monday, all Hero Focus Weapons will have 3x the drop rate, and Legendaries will have their drop rates doubled. If you haven't tried any of the new Hero Focuses, now is the time! We want to see what you come up with!

This event will run from Friday 1 PM EDT to Monday 11 AM EDT. Hero Focus weapons will drop on all maps in Free Play and End Game modes.

Have fun this weekend, Defenders! May the RNG gods smile upon you!

This week, Pmasher and Blacksmith reply to more of your Alpha & Beyond feedback, talk about upcoming changes to the Inventory and more! Plus, take this five-minute survey for your chance to win 1,000 gems!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usw-bXbSQIY

This week, Pmasher and Blacksmith reply to more of your Alpha & Beyond feedback, talk about upcoming changes to the Inventory and more! Plus, take this five-minute survey for your chance to win 1,000 gems!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usw-bXbSQIY

A word from Co-Creative Director Daniel Haddad:

"Greetings, Defenders!

In this post I’ll be addressing some of the more recent topics that have been on a lot of your minds. The goal of this post is to give you a sense of where we are going with these changes and gather some feedback from all of you as we continue to work on these updates. With that said, let’s dive into it!


The Temporary Item Box (TIB for short) was a fantastic system that served many purposes. Instead of micromanaging your loot in the middle of a match you could trust your TIB to collect it for you, so you could sort through it later keeping your inventory nice, clean, and organized… It even saved items that fell out of the world! However, the infinite free space this provided could be a serious problem when Dungeon Defenders II went free as inventory space is one of our two sources of monetization.

When we removed the TIB, we created the Scavenger to do one job. His goal was to collect items that you rightfully earned but could not collect. So the Scavenger is meant to do half the things the TIB used to do… but what about the other half?

The truth of the matter is, we really didn’t know how bad interacting with loot was because the TIB was functioning as a bandaid for everyone (us included). We decided to rip it off and see what happened, hoping that it would expose the exact inventory issues we have to fix. Now that we’ve gathered enough feedback we are working on all the things Scavenger does not do. While it is still heavily under development, I’m going to walk you through the vision of what we are trying to achieve hoping that it will help alleviate some of your concerns.


We would like to refine the way you are interacting with your inventory to make it more streamlined and less daunting. Additionally, we want everyone to be able to enjoy the game without purchasing inventory space. At the same time, we want inventory space to be something players value and enjoy purchasing. Here are the changes we are considering:

• Bags can hold a much larger amount of slots (think the size of 4+ bags)
  
  • individual bag purchases will likely cost more to match the amount of space you receive
• Players can open only one bag at a time (no need to worry about pesky scrolling issues)
  
• Players can customize bags with Sorting Options
  
  • The first Sorting Option will be the ability for you to flag a bag as “Auto Collect”
    
    • When a bag is flagged as Auto Collect it will automatically pick up items you did not collect when the game ends
      
    • There will be a LOT of visual feedback to let you know when your Auto Collect bags are almost full
  • In the future we’d like to add even MORE cool Sorting Options
    
    • Example:
      
      • Auto Collect Squire Only
        
      • Auto Collect Legendary Only
        
      • Auto Collect Weapons Only
    • Note: Don’t hold your breath, it might take a while
• We are also investigating auto collecting items sooner than the end of the game as well as the possibility of expanding the size of a bag. How important are these two features to you?

We think this effectively returns the rest of the functionality of the TIB, but with more control and no timers. Instead, your only limit is inventory space. What do you think?

Please keep in mind that this is the long term vision of the Inventory. We are currently working on allowing you to flag an existing bag as “Auto Collect” as well as the feedback you need to know how full those bags are getting. After that we will be taking a look at the bag size points I mentioned above and in the long term, more Sorting options.


When we released Loot & Survive, the majority of our focus was on getting the Campaign feeling right. We also wanted to make sure our new loot systems were functional and allowed interesting conversations to form in the community. Our long-term goal was to provide you all with cool tools under the new system to allow you to shape the meta as the game evolves! As a result, we made a quick pass on Nightmare and left it be.

With Alpha & Beyond we took our first stab at really balancing Nightmare to be difficult. This time around we opted to make Nightmare the ULTIMATE CHALLENGE! We wanted to pull the difficulty back instead of push it forward, because you guys are always better at the game than we (or you) think. And we DID IT! Yaaaay! Except it was a little TOO ultimate…

Why did this happen? Welp, the truth is because we were going fast. We wanted to get you Nightmare I-IV and 4 hero builds as quickly as possible to iterate on your feedback.We had a handful of hardened defenders play an early version of Nightmare and while their reaction was positive, it didn’t give us the quantity of feedback we needed to get the balance right. That requires all of you. And honestly, this is why we’re in Early Access. Over the weekend we gathered all your feedback and decided to make some more changes to N1, N2, and N3. Once we get a good gauge on if you N1, N2, and N3 feel satisfying, we will then transition to figuring out N4."

Click to read the rest! (Because Dan talks too much and the rest of it won't fit on Steam. Curses!)

A word from Co-Creative Director Daniel Haddad:

"Greetings, Defenders!

In this post I’ll be addressing some of the more recent topics that have been on a lot of your minds. The goal of this post is to give you a sense of where we are going with these changes and gather some feedback from all of you as we continue to work on these updates. With that said, let’s dive into it!


The Temporary Item Box (TIB for short) was a fantastic system that served many purposes. Instead of micromanaging your loot in the middle of a match you could trust your TIB to collect it for you, so you could sort through it later keeping your inventory nice, clean, and organized… It even saved items that fell out of the world! However, the infinite free space this provided could be a serious problem when Dungeon Defenders II went free as inventory space is one of our two sources of monetization.

When we removed the TIB, we created the Scavenger to do one job. His goal was to collect items that you rightfully earned but could not collect. So the Scavenger is meant to do half the things the TIB used to do… but what about the other half?

The truth of the matter is, we really didn’t know how bad interacting with loot was because the TIB was functioning as a bandaid for everyone (us included). We decided to rip it off and see what happened, hoping that it would expose the exact inventory issues we have to fix. Now that we’ve gathered enough feedback we are working on all the things Scavenger does not do. While it is still heavily under development, I’m going to walk you through the vision of what we are trying to achieve hoping that it will help alleviate some of your concerns.


We would like to refine the way you are interacting with your inventory to make it more streamlined and less daunting. Additionally, we want everyone to be able to enjoy the game without purchasing inventory space. At the same time, we want inventory space to be something players value and enjoy purchasing. Here are the changes we are considering:

• Bags can hold a much larger amount of slots (think the size of 4+ bags)
  
  • individual bag purchases will likely cost more to match the amount of space you receive
• Players can open only one bag at a time (no need to worry about pesky scrolling issues)
  
• Players can customize bags with Sorting Options
  
  • The first Sorting Option will be the ability for you to flag a bag as “Auto Collect”
    
    • When a bag is flagged as Auto Collect it will automatically pick up items you did not collect when the game ends
      
    • There will be a LOT of visual feedback to let you know when your Auto Collect bags are almost full
  • In the future we’d like to add even MORE cool Sorting Options
    
    • Example:
      
      • Auto Collect Squire Only
        
      • Auto Collect Legendary Only
        
      • Auto Collect Weapons Only
    • Note: Don’t hold your breath, it might take a while
• We are also investigating auto collecting items sooner than the end of the game as well as the possibility of expanding the size of a bag. How important are these two features to you?

We think this effectively returns the rest of the functionality of the TIB, but with more control and no timers. Instead, your only limit is inventory space. What do you think?

Please keep in mind that this is the long term vision of the Inventory. We are currently working on allowing you to flag an existing bag as “Auto Collect” as well as the feedback you need to know how full those bags are getting. After that we will be taking a look at the bag size points I mentioned above and in the long term, more Sorting options.


When we released Loot & Survive, the majority of our focus was on getting the Campaign feeling right. We also wanted to make sure our new loot systems were functional and allowed interesting conversations to form in the community. Our long-term goal was to provide you all with cool tools under the new system to allow you to shape the meta as the game evolves! As a result, we made a quick pass on Nightmare and left it be.

With Alpha & Beyond we took our first stab at really balancing Nightmare to be difficult. This time around we opted to make Nightmare the ULTIMATE CHALLENGE! We wanted to pull the difficulty back instead of push it forward, because you guys are always better at the game than we (or you) think. And we DID IT! Yaaaay! Except it was a little TOO ultimate…

Why did this happen? Welp, the truth is because we were going fast. We wanted to get you Nightmare I-IV and 4 hero builds as quickly as possible to iterate on your feedback.We had a handful of hardened defenders play an early version of Nightmare and while their reaction was positive, it didn’t give us the quantity of feedback we needed to get the balance right. That requires all of you. And honestly, this is why we’re in Early Access. Over the weekend we gathered all your feedback and decided to make some more changes to N1, N2, and N3. Once we get a good gauge on if you N1, N2, and N3 feel satisfying, we will then transition to figuring out N4."

Click to read the rest! (Because Dan talks too much and the rest of it won't fit on Steam. Curses!)

Balance

• Nightmare balance updates
  
  • Reduced Wave Count to 7 on all End Game difficulties to reduce the time of a Nightmare run
    
  • Reduced enemy levels across NM1 - NM3
    
  • Reduced Orcs and Drakins in all threats for Nightmare
    
  • Reduced number of groups coming out in early threats
    
  • Added breaks into the groups coming out to match other schedules’ functionality
    
  • Adjusted threats to be more solo friendly on EG Insane
    
  • Fixed Special Enemy and Ogre spawns on all End Game difficulties.
• iPwr range distribution chances in Nightmare were changed to have higher iPwr items appear more often.
  
• Victory Chests across the entire game (minus campaign) should now drop items within the upper half of the reward iPwr Range. This will hopefully make Victory Chests more rewarding.
  
• Victory Chests should now spawn with higher tiers more often.
  
• Victory Chests now drop items as follows:
  
  • Normal Chests: drop 5 items
    
  • Win of the Day Chests give 2 extra items
    
  • Super Win of the Day Chests give 4 extra items
• Pet consumable quantity from Victory Chests reduced by 1
  
• Chance to see items for other heroes increased. This was done to help players that use DPS heroes in Nightmare get gear for their builders.
  
• Adjusted the amount of loot that drops from Minibosses and Special Enemies slightly to compensate for the Victory Chest change. Players should get less loot from enemies and more from Victory Chests with better qualities.
  
• Adjusted the buildable area around spawn locations on some maps.

Features

• Added ability to resize launcher. If you were unable to see the Play button on the launcher, you should now be able to resize the launcher until you see it!
  
• In a private game, when the leader selects Replay or To Tavern on the Summary Screen, the game will now immediately transition to that option.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue where some players could not proceed past the Defend the Ramparts/Defend the Throne Room quests.
  
• Fixed an issue where Xpadder support wasn’t working properly. Please let us know if this is working properly for you now!
  
• Fixed an issue where Frostbite Towers built backwards near other tower clusters would grant a damage bonus to those towers without having to fire.
  
• Fixed an issue where dragging pets from the All My Pets inventory in the Stables to the equipped slot sends pets to the Scavenger.
  
• Fixed incorrect evolution recipes for gold versions of the gato (fledgling) and dragon (elder) stages.
  
• The Monk's Betsy Polearm weapon no longer drops with Hero Damage as both the primary and secondary stat or with Defense Speed as a secondary stat.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Elemental Chaos Trap’s placement footprint was not properly mirroring the same placement rules as the Proximity Mine.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Recruiter and Magical Interference 2 challenges were rewarding XP as challenges should only be rewarding gold.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Gran Master said she was rewarding the player with a Movement Speed IV Skill Sphere when she actually grants a Movement Speed V sphere.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Gran Master was not properly rewarding the correct Critical Damage spheres for the fourth quest.
  
• Fixed an issue where pet reroll numbers were sometimes off by 1 point.
  
• Fixed another issue where a rerolled pet’s stats were not as high as the reroll process said it would be.
  
• Fixed an issue where the "G up to continue" message slides off screen at the start of the end game countdown.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Power Pole and Spiral Energy passives were not working.
  
• Fixed an issue where the player is slowed if attacked by an enemy affected by a Serenity Aura with the Idle Flow passive activated.
  
• Fixed an issue where the doors near the southern spawns in Throne Room did not have collision.
  
• Fixed the spelling of “exterior” on a lane billboard.
  
• Fixed the billboards on each Special Enemy and Miniboss spawner to say “Incoming!”
  
• Fixed the ability to build inside a few spawners.
  
• Fixed each lane’s spawn zone to have better tower prevention radiuses.
  
• Added a potential fix for a Concussive Shots explosion decal issue.

Balance

• Nightmare balance updates
  
  • Reduced Wave Count to 7 on all End Game difficulties to reduce the time of a Nightmare run
    
  • Reduced enemy levels across NM1 - NM3
    
  • Reduced Orcs and Drakins in all threats for Nightmare
    
  • Reduced number of groups coming out in early threats
    
  • Added breaks into the groups coming out to match other schedules’ functionality
    
  • Adjusted threats to be more solo friendly on EG Insane
    
  • Fixed Special Enemy and Ogre spawns on all End Game difficulties.
• iPwr range distribution chances in Nightmare were changed to have higher iPwr items appear more often.
  
• Victory Chests across the entire game (minus campaign) should now drop items within the upper half of the reward iPwr Range. This will hopefully make Victory Chests more rewarding.
  
• Victory Chests should now spawn with higher tiers more often.
  
• Victory Chests now drop items as follows:
  
  • Normal Chests: drop 5 items
    
  • Win of the Day Chests give 2 extra items
    
  • Super Win of the Day Chests give 4 extra items
• Pet consumable quantity from Victory Chests reduced by 1
  
• Chance to see items for other heroes increased. This was done to help players that use DPS heroes in Nightmare get gear for their builders.
  
• Adjusted the amount of loot that drops from Minibosses and Special Enemies slightly to compensate for the Victory Chest change. Players should get less loot from enemies and more from Victory Chests with better qualities.
  
• Adjusted the buildable area around spawn locations on some maps.

Features

• Added ability to resize launcher. If you were unable to see the Play button on the launcher, you should now be able to resize the launcher until you see it!
  
• In a private game, when the leader selects Replay or To Tavern on the Summary Screen, the game will now immediately transition to that option.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue where some players could not proceed past the Defend the Ramparts/Defend the Throne Room quests.
  
• Fixed an issue where Xpadder support wasn’t working properly. Please let us know if this is working properly for you now!
  
• Fixed an issue where Frostbite Towers built backwards near other tower clusters would grant a damage bonus to those towers without having to fire.
  
• Fixed an issue where dragging pets from the All My Pets inventory in the Stables to the equipped slot sends pets to the Scavenger.
  
• Fixed incorrect evolution recipes for gold versions of the gato (fledgling) and dragon (elder) stages.
  
• The Monk's Betsy Polearm weapon no longer drops with Hero Damage as both the primary and secondary stat or with Defense Speed as a secondary stat.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Elemental Chaos Trap’s placement footprint was not properly mirroring the same placement rules as the Proximity Mine.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Recruiter and Magical Interference 2 challenges were rewarding XP as challenges should only be rewarding gold.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Gran Master said she was rewarding the player with a Movement Speed IV Skill Sphere when she actually grants a Movement Speed V sphere.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Gran Master was not properly rewarding the correct Critical Damage spheres for the fourth quest.
  
• Fixed an issue where pet reroll numbers were sometimes off by 1 point.
  
• Fixed another issue where a rerolled pet’s stats were not as high as the reroll process said it would be.
  
• Fixed an issue where the "G up to continue" message slides off screen at the start of the end game countdown.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Power Pole and Spiral Energy passives were not working.
  
• Fixed an issue where the player is slowed if attacked by an enemy affected by a Serenity Aura with the Idle Flow passive activated.
  
• Fixed an issue where the doors near the southern spawns in Throne Room did not have collision.
  
• Fixed the spelling of “exterior” on a lane billboard.
  
• Fixed the billboards on each Special Enemy and Miniboss spawner to say “Incoming!”
  
• Fixed the ability to build inside a few spawners.
  
• Fixed each lane’s spawn zone to have better tower prevention radiuses.
  
• Added a potential fix for a Concussive Shots explosion decal issue.

New enemy prototypes for Nightmare and beyond. New event proposals.

Working on some VERY EXCITING things that aren’t quite ready to come out into the light. Soon! Other than that, assisting our Nightmare balance changes.

Working on Nightmare balances. Reading threads and getting some solid notes on the next steps for End Game balance.

I left the office on Friday after three weeks of intense balls to the wall programming with very little sleep to fly back home to good ole San Diego. I’ve pretty much been sleeping ever since. Now it’s Wednesday and I’m starting to feel a little more human.

I’ve been reading forums, watching dev streams, and all that jazz. Got some ideas on some stuffs on how to get some action items. I’ve also got some bugs I’m trying to clean up in time for the next hotfix. #LifeOfAGameDev #WouldntTradeItForTheWorld

Catching up on what’s been going on after having been out of the office for the past week!

Continued work on the hotfixes, some PS4 work, and trying to squeeze in some DD1 update stuff.

Working on new pets, skins, and weapon variety system. Lots to implement and test with the animation team, and always fixing bugs as they come.



Going to begin shortly on weapon variety tasks! Are you ready for spreadshot staffs and bows? Are you ready for homing staffs? ARE YOU READY FOR DIFFERENT MELEE FIGHTING STANCES? I’m ready. I’m like Kyle Katarn in Jedi Outcast, I’m going to wreck your face with my awesome weapon variety lightsaber and stats and homing projectiles woo wooo and then I’m going to stop DRINKING COFFEE IN THE MORNING!

The views represented do not necessarily reflect the views of Trendy Entertainment. But seriously, this is shpretty shcool shtuff.

After a milestone stabilizing the game during which we encountered some very interesting stuff, we are slowly getting back into feature development and/or feature tweaking. The community can be very outspoken about stuff

One of the biggest challenges of game development is that, ”Nothing is set on stone.” Both our designs and systems need to be flexible enough to accommodate for changes.

We, as a team, need to keep our ears open as changes happening now can potentially break the things I’m working on right now.

In any case … back to development. This milestone will be about (optional) gamepad support; during the last milestone we realized some of you guys are using third party applications to simulate controller support; we will try not to conflict with those of you who are using those. This means we will have another pull from our PS4 branch which could lead into new bugs or conflicts. I can’t really say we accounted for platform specific features (like different key mappings per UI basis); part of this milestone will be laying out a framework or an open communication channel for this issues; aka: meetings.

We have new programmes on the floor! A data analyst and a new engine programmer. That means: welcoming them to the team, helping them get up to speed on our systems and processes and schedule and redistribute task accordingly. That last part has been getting more challenging as more and more users join the game; the pressure raises proportionally: stability, server performance and downtime reflect directly on our costs… should we add a “donate” button?

“Your friendly developer needs a hand, please donate =)”

Ok… thats enough. I have some code to write, or some meeting to be, or some info to gather.

Still working on the Social Hub level, polishing out-of-bounds areas. (Remember, it’s a work in progress, so there’s not a release date yet.)



Polishing the out-of-bounds areas of the Social Hub with new buildings and more stuff!.

Also, I would like to show you the new tavern in the social hub. (Remember, it’s a work in progress, so there’s not a release date yet).



Getting hands on with the latest hotfix, reviewing additional test cases for future testing, and considering expanding our RQA family in the direction of a regular community playtesting team.

Kyle Katarn is no longer Star Wars canon. =/

Before I begin, I’m so happy to see Kyle Katarn mentioned three times in this Dev Log. Dark Forces II is my favorite game ever. I spent so many hours as a kid dueling other people on Battle Ground Jedi and failing miserably to make my own levels.

That perspective is what makes this job so rewarding. It’s thinking of people, children and adults alike, spending their time playing the game you work on. Having fun. It’s important to keep sight of that and always head towards that goal. We make video games because we want to provide some creature comfort to escape from the troubles of the world -- or maybe just to escape to a place where having fun is the whole point of existing. That’s a beautiful world, and I’m happy to work on something that provides that.

I want to thank everyone in the community for your patience. I know sometimes it feels like we aren’t focusing on the things you want to see improved -- or maybe it’s making a change that feels like a step back -- but this is a process of iteration. Some things will be iterated on sooner. Improving the Fun Factor is priority number one. I know some people will read that and dismiss me. But it’s the truth. We make games to make fun. We need to feed our families, too, because the whole “starving artist” thing stops being cute when you hit your mid-20s and you have children to feed. But I see comments where people assume that a developer is focusing more on making money than making fun. People spend money on games they’re having fun with. People want to spend money as a thank you to the people who gave them joy that day, and that is the goalpost we’re working toward.

New enemy prototypes for Nightmare and beyond. New event proposals.

Working on some VERY EXCITING things that aren’t quite ready to come out into the light. Soon! Other than that, assisting our Nightmare balance changes.

Working on Nightmare balances. Reading threads and getting some solid notes on the next steps for End Game balance.

I left the office on Friday after three weeks of intense balls to the wall programming with very little sleep to fly back home to good ole San Diego. I’ve pretty much been sleeping ever since. Now it’s Wednesday and I’m starting to feel a little more human.

I’ve been reading forums, watching dev streams, and all that jazz. Got some ideas on some stuffs on how to get some action items. I’ve also got some bugs I’m trying to clean up in time for the next hotfix. #LifeOfAGameDev #WouldntTradeItForTheWorld

Catching up on what’s been going on after having been out of the office for the past week!

Continued work on the hotfixes, some PS4 work, and trying to squeeze in some DD1 update stuff.

Working on new pets, skins, and weapon variety system. Lots to implement and test with the animation team, and always fixing bugs as they come.



Going to begin shortly on weapon variety tasks! Are you ready for spreadshot staffs and bows? Are you ready for homing staffs? ARE YOU READY FOR DIFFERENT MELEE FIGHTING STANCES? I’m ready. I’m like Kyle Katarn in Jedi Outcast, I’m going to wreck your face with my awesome weapon variety lightsaber and stats and homing projectiles woo wooo and then I’m going to stop DRINKING COFFEE IN THE MORNING!

The views represented do not necessarily reflect the views of Trendy Entertainment. But seriously, this is shpretty shcool shtuff.

After a milestone stabilizing the game during which we encountered some very interesting stuff, we are slowly getting back into feature development and/or feature tweaking. The community can be very outspoken about stuff

One of the biggest challenges of game development is that, ”Nothing is set on stone.” Both our designs and systems need to be flexible enough to accommodate for changes.

We, as a team, need to keep our ears open as changes happening now can potentially break the things I’m working on right now.

In any case … back to development. This milestone will be about (optional) gamepad support; during the last milestone we realized some of you guys are using third party applications to simulate controller support; we will try not to conflict with those of you who are using those. This means we will have another pull from our PS4 branch which could lead into new bugs or conflicts. I can’t really say we accounted for platform specific features (like different key mappings per UI basis); part of this milestone will be laying out a framework or an open communication channel for this issues; aka: meetings.

We have new programmes on the floor! A data analyst and a new engine programmer. That means: welcoming them to the team, helping them get up to speed on our systems and processes and schedule and redistribute task accordingly. That last part has been getting more challenging as more and more users join the game; the pressure raises proportionally: stability, server performance and downtime reflect directly on our costs… should we add a “donate” button?

“Your friendly developer needs a hand, please donate =)”

Ok… thats enough. I have some code to write, or some meeting to be, or some info to gather.

Still working on the Social Hub level, polishing out-of-bounds areas. (Remember, it’s a work in progress, so there’s not a release date yet.)



Polishing the out-of-bounds areas of the Social Hub with new buildings and more stuff!.

Also, I would like to show you the new tavern in the social hub. (Remember, it’s a work in progress, so there’s not a release date yet).



Getting hands on with the latest hotfix, reviewing additional test cases for future testing, and considering expanding our RQA family in the direction of a regular community playtesting team.

Kyle Katarn is no longer Star Wars canon. =/

Before I begin, I’m so happy to see Kyle Katarn mentioned three times in this Dev Log. Dark Forces II is my favorite game ever. I spent so many hours as a kid dueling other people on Battle Ground Jedi and failing miserably to make my own levels.

That perspective is what makes this job so rewarding. It’s thinking of people, children and adults alike, spending their time playing the game you work on. Having fun. It’s important to keep sight of that and always head towards that goal. We make video games because we want to provide some creature comfort to escape from the troubles of the world -- or maybe just to escape to a place where having fun is the whole point of existing. That’s a beautiful world, and I’m happy to work on something that provides that.

I want to thank everyone in the community for your patience. I know sometimes it feels like we aren’t focusing on the things you want to see improved -- or maybe it’s making a change that feels like a step back -- but this is a process of iteration. Some things will be iterated on sooner. Improving the Fun Factor is priority number one. I know some people will read that and dismiss me. But it’s the truth. We make games to make fun. We need to feed our families, too, because the whole “starving artist” thing stops being cute when you hit your mid-20s and you have children to feed. But I see comments where people assume that a developer is focusing more on making money than making fun. People spend money on games they’re having fun with. People want to spend money as a thank you to the people who gave them joy that day, and that is the goalpost we’re working toward.