Originally posted by Mark on the official forums:

We are opening the Public Test Branch up with the new Wholesale world in it. This is not the final version of the world, so expect to get caught up on weird collision, lost looking for an illusive check point or unlockable, and all sorts of other unpleasantness.

Unlockables earned in the Public Test Branch do not carry over to the main game. Currency earned in this mode cannot be used to unlock containers. You will be able to earn all these unlockables again once the level is promoted to the main branch- and unlock all their rewards.

To switch to the Public Testing Branch, right click on Hot Lava in steam and click Properties.


Select the BETAS tab, enter the beta access code "participationaward" and click CHECK CODE. After this the drop down above will let you select the Public Test Branch. After switching, Hot Lava will need to download the new content.

Hey everybody.

There has been some confusion regarding "Open Beta". So I thought I would take a moment to clarify.

In the open beta announcement we said:

We're not quite ready for the massive rush of early-access yet. When a game goes into early-access it becomes part of the entire Steam ecosystem with curators, reviews, banner rotations and top sellers lists. So we're keeping a low profile for now until we believe we are ready for early-access. "

When a game goes into early access, it is then part of steam. So it will suggest the game to people who like that sort of game or games your friends are playing. It appears in top sellers lists, it's open for reviews, Steam recommends it to your friends and basically the game is given a soft marketing push by Steam. We don't want this right now. However, we have a lot of people who want to play the game. So. We're doing an open beta.

Basically, we want to sell the game through steam to people who know about it, but we don't want steam to help people find it.

This is the same thing we have done for Don't Starve, Don't Starve Together, Invisible Inc and most recently Oxygen Not Included. However, previously we sold keys to be redeemed in Steam through our website- beginning with Oxygen Not Included we can sell directly through Steam Thanks to Valve.

We put a banner up on the store page so it was super clear that the game is in Open Beta - hopefully Steam will have better messaging for this in the future like they do for Early-Access.

We realize this was confusing, and we appologize. Last time we did this for Oxygen Not Included you couldn't even search for the game on steam and you could only get it through a special link... THAT was confusing.

Sorry for the mix up. We'll see what we can do to clarify that directly on the store page.

Thanks everybody.

EDIT: (Thanks for the questions)

Closed Beta - Invite only. If you didn't sign up in time, you couldn't play.
Open Beta - Anybody can purchase the game and play.

I understand that some games use a free open beta to stress test their servers before they launch, and I apologize that I did not realize there would be confusion there.

Additionally, if you played during closed beta, we let players keep the game, for free. No need to pay for the game again. Ever.

Anybody who buys the game now or in the future keeps the game including people who were given the game for free or were gifted by friends.

Hopefully that clears it all up. Once again, thanks for the feedback and support.

Hey Everybody. 

Just wanted to make a quick note that open beta has begun for Hot Lava and explain a little about what that means, and where we are going to go from here. 

As of yesterday we gave out the game to over 12k people who signed up for the closed beta for Hot Lava. We're extremely thankful to everybody for their interest, thanks for all your helpful feedback and bug reports. 

As of today all new players can purchase the game from Steam. We have the price of the game set for 12.99. However, we are pricing the game at a discount to for people who purchase before launch at $9.99 for 2 copies of the game.

We're not quite ready for the massive rush of early-access yet. When a game goes into early-access it becomes part of the entire Steam ecosystem with curators, reviews, banner rotations and top sellers lists. So we're keeping a low profile for now until we believe we are ready for early-access. 

So, TL;DR

Buy it now for $9.99 - 2-for-1  - See you at School!

Send us bug reports here: https://forums.kleientertainment.com/forum/178-hot-lava-beta-bug-tracker/

Send us feedback here: https://forums.kleientertainment.com/forum/177-hot-lava-beta-suggestions-and-feedback/

HOTFIX - - 273105

• Fixed issue with groups where joining didn’t appear to do anything
  
• Fixed issue with groups where joining left the game without a playable character
  
• Fix third person causing replays to rewind. Replay’s position bar can be interacted with mouse, keyboard, and gamepad
  
• Fixed several instances of “player stuck at 0,0,0”
  
• Fixed issue with intro music
  
• Fix for players not appearing when they should
  
• Optimized player collider
  
• Fixed several lobster traps and spawn point issues in school and tutorial
  
• Clear navigation target when switching game modes
  
• Gamepad support for gift box selection
  
• Fix for leaderboard replays starting when the player exits the menu before the replay downloads

Hotfix - 273368

• Fixed issue preventing groups from forming in full levels
  
• You can now join a group from out of game, Hot Lava will launch directly into the groups game
  
• Fixed various bugs in group join

Phase 3 is here, and we've got a bunch of cool stuff for you all!

We have a whole new type of game mode to play, cool new collectible cards, a bunch of new cosmetic items and of course a ton of balance changes, bug fixes and quality of life improvements. Also, coming soon, the Wholesale map will be available on a new public test branch!

As always, check back here on the forums and let us know what you think. If you find any bugs or issues report those bugs through the in-game menu or through the bug report tool here: https://forums.kleientertainment.com/forum/178-hot-lava-beta-bug-tracker/

We will continue to add new players through now until the end of Phase 3 on June 12. All eligible beta applicants will be given access on a first-come first-served basis up until closed beta ends. Most new players will be added between June 11th and June 12th.

Yeah. We told you that you couldn't keep it, but we lied. Well technically we didn't lie, we just weren't totally sure we were going to give it to everybody... but we're sure now, thanks for your support!

Not closed beta, not early access, what is it? Anybody interested in checking out Hot Lava but missed closed beta can purchase the game and get in on the action.

The testing branch will be available on 6/12. We want players to focus on the normal game first, so we will be opening the Public Test Branch a bit later so we can have things nice and ready for Open beta on the 12th. We may have some of you come check it out early but it should be ready for everybody on the 12th.

We're not done yet, keep up the good work and send us your feedback and bug reports!

• Added three Pogo Stick trials to School
  
• Added new “Card” inventory slot
  
• Added a “Go Offline” button to allow players to force offline mode
  
• Added collision indicator overlay to the HUD, showing the direction of each player mid-air collision
  
• Added collectable cards to the School lava world
  
• Climbing grabs re-worked to reduce the feeling of unfair misses
  
• Vertical swings like ropes can now be used in any direction
  
• Repeated deaths to the same cause in a short period of time now instantly respawn you
  
• Reworked rarity and released new items
  
• Added description text to courses
  
• Added fallback support to remove trippy pink walls on low end hardware
  
• Various character and world performance improvements
  
• Various UI tweaks and improvements across all screens
  
• Improved portal model
  
• Added equip button to the playset screen to instantly equip a new item
  
• Added additional audio volume sliders for different sound types
  
• Revived scroll jump support under gameplay options
  
• Gamepad can now navigate the course list
  
• Clamp bad FOV settings to prevent weird tunnel vision bug
  
• Reduced audio playback lag
  
• Revised character models
  
• Prevent third person camera while moving
  
• Reduced the frequency of calls to Steam leaderboards
  
• Added path to disable data collection including link to privacy policy (https://klei.com/privacy-policy) for GDPR compliance. https://www.eugdpr.org/
  
• Too many bug fixes to list (Thanks for all the bug reports everybody!)
  
  Hotfix - 272214
  
  • Implemented new pogo tuning so that the player bounces higher
    
  • Pogo now maintains some vertical velocity when jumping from high places
    
  • Fixed tab menu intractability issues
    
  • Fixed aliasing issues on certain UI elements
    
  • Fixed issue with leaderboard entries not allowing you to play replays
    
  • Fixed issue where watching replays would pull the player into that course
    
  • Fixed double jump issue with pogo sticks
    
  • Fixed missing pogo stick issue
    
  • Fixed issue where pogo would not play the intro animation
    
  • Switched the online world for pogo trial 3 to be in the lava world
    
  • Adjusted pogo checkpoint collision so they can’t be reached from below as easily
    
  • Sync intro animations online

Hey Everybody,

The Second phase of Hot Lava closed beta is now closed.

Thanks again to everybody who participated. We got a lot of great gameplay feedback and information that is going to help us going forward.

So now we get ready for phase 3!

Tuesday June 5th will begin Phase 3 of closed beta. All previous participants will once again be granted access to the game and we will add an additional 2k participants and we will continue to add more player until the conclusion of closed beta. We expect Phase 3 to be the last closed beta phase.

We have decided to continue the closed beta registration until 5/22 - so if you haven't signed up, now is the time to do so.

Please note that this schedule is subject to change and we will make announcement as we get closer to confirm the time and date of phase 3 launch.

We'll have more details about phase 3 and the conclusion of closed beta shortly before phase 3 begins.

Thanks to everybody for all your support and encouragement, it really means a lot to us. See you on June 5th!

Hey Everybody

We are sending the next 3000 invites out. Those selected will now find Hot Lava in their steam Inventory. The test will run from today until next Tuesday on May 15th at which time the game will no longer be available to play until the next test period.

Since the last testing period, the team has been hard at work on making adjustments to the game in response to the feedback we received. The main concern we wanted to address based on tester feedback was that we wanted to give players a chance to rest a bit between levels while giving players better tools to socialize or practice routes and strategies in a more relaxed environment.

Of course, we also added a bunch of quality of life improvements and bug fixes as well. A lot of them. Those patch notes will come tomorrow. Once again, a special thanks to everybody who submitted bug reports and feedback in the last phase.

Don't worry. More levels are coming, but right now our focus was to improve upon the experience, rather than adding additional content. We've been hard at work on upcoming levels - so we have that to look forward to after Phase 2.

Tuesday May 8th will begin Phase 2 of closed beta. All previous participants will once again be granted access to the game and we will add an additional 3k participants. This phase will close on May 15th.

- At that time no further registrations will be accepted. We intend to let in all players before we reach early-access so don't miss your chance! If you have friends or are part of a community that would be interested, now is the time to let them know about Hot Lava.

If you did not confirm your registration for Hot Lava Beta, please visit https://beta.playhotlava.com before May 11th.

If you are not selected for this phase during Phase 2, don't worry. There will be more to come.

We will release more information about plans for future tests after phase 2.

For those of you who have not been invited yet, hang in there you will get your turn as well.

• Added “lava free” overworld - the floor is NOT lava
  XRAY effect on checkpoints
  
• Progress bar added to UI
  
• made the wall jumps look better
  
• Fixes to toxic area gameplay and lighting
  
• Improved controller support (Prevent conflicts with mouse, Configurable gamepad deadzone, Better gamepad support in menus)
  
• Bug fixes and polish to most existing courses in school and tutorial
  
• Added new surf course to Mastery Gym (surf name may change)

• Lava free overworld added
  
• XRAY shader added to checkpoints to better guide the player
  
• Progress bar added to UI
  
• Wall jumps converted to use deferred decal system
  
• Improved controller support. Prevent conflicts with mouse, Configurable gamepad deadzone, Better gamepad support in menus.
  
• Tweaked award pin and comic placement based on feedback
  
• Additional death announcement types added. Heat/Fan/Crusher.
  
• Increased the impact of objects and bobbles on the lava sim
  
• Overworld collectable challenge added
  
• Fixed Steam authentication
  
• Add option to disable gamepad (fix “mouse look constantly moving upwards” bug)
  
• Made things, like, easily 25% shinier
  
• Player pooling optimization to reduce hiccups while playing
  
• Tutorial content brought into line with level gameplay
  
• Various tweaks and fixes in school based on phase 1 feedback and reports
  
• Surf Mastery added to Mastery Gym
  
• Decals are now oriented to the normal of the surface they are applied to
  
• New level select UI
  
• Improved performance on lower quality settings
  
• Added level portals to the overworld
  
• Added progress gates to the overworld
  
• Wall Jumps now prevents rotation of characters momentum during the ride allowing you to look away from the portal and aim your next jump
  
• Report Bug now embeds an image
  
• Added a small 0.2s delay on accepting player input when the screen is fading from black
  
• Fixed a number of areas where players could get stuck
  
• Fixed bad collision in wind tunnels causing players to incorrectly die when rubbing against the wall
  
• Reset leaderboard results

• Missing key light in tutorial fixed
  
• Fixed visibility and sync issues with replays
  
• Enable timers in non-lava portions of the mastery courses
  
• Fixed challenge text being cropped out in advanced mastery course
  
• Fixed "player left" crash
  
• Mastery Gym player visibility fix
  
• Fixed occlusion issue in school
  
• Fixed invisible grab in school atrium (reported by Judgy)

• Fix issue where the timer would start counting before the player moved
  
• Fixed bad collision in early tunnel sections
  
• Removed invalid tooltip in pause screen
  
• Fixed issue causing the player to teleport to weird location on spawn
  
• Fixed viewmodel hiding not working consistently
  
• Fixed "bad rotation vector" error
  
• Simplification of wind tunnel section
  
• If you die holding jump, don't automatically jump on respawn

• Fixed 3rd person glitch
  
• More school collision fixes
  
• Fixed leaderboard crash

• Rework raycast for climbers to make it more accurate. This is the first of several climbing/swinging improvements we will be pushing
  
• Fixed issue with disconnection scenarios causing people to hang around
  
• Prevent lag spikes when bad data is received from other players
  
• Optimization: Reduced the number of pooled player instances per user
  
• Optimization: Deactivate wind and crusher areas when not near them
  
• Optimization: Only redraw portions of UI that have been dirtied
  
• Optimization: Don't request leaderboard results on every restart

Phase 2 is almost upon us!

Since the last testing period, the team has been hard at work on making adjustments to the game in response to the feedback we received. The main concern we wanted to address based on tester feedback was that we wanted to give players a chance to rest a bit between levels while giving players better tools to socialize or practice routes and strategies in a more relaxed environment.

Of course, we also added a bunch of quality of life improvements and bug fixes as well. A lot of them. Those patch notes will come tomorrow. Once again, a special thanks to everybody who submitted bug reports and feedback in the last phase.

Don't worry. More levels are coming, but right now our focus was to improve upon the experience, rather than adding additional content. We've been hard at work on upcoming levels - so we have that to look forward to after Phase 2.

Tuesday May 8th will begin Phase 2 of closed beta. All previous participants will once again be granted access to the game and we will add an additional 3k participants. This phase will close on May 15th.

Beta registration will close on May 11th - At that time no further registrations will be accepted. We intend to let in all players before we reach early-access so don't miss your chance! If you have friends or are part of a community that would be interested, now is the time to let them know about Hot Lava.

If you did not confirm your registration for Hot Lava Beta, please visit https://beta.playhotlava.com before May 11th.

If you are not selected for this phase during Phase 2, don't worry. There will be more to come.

Hey Everybody,

The first phase of Hot Lava closed beta is now closed.

Thank you to everybody who participated and sent us feedback and bug reports. We got a lot of valuable feedback and information that has really helped us know where we need to be going forward. For the most part, we didn't have any major unforseen issues and the feedback was right on track with what we were expecting to see.

This means we're now getting ready for phase 2!

Tuesday May 8th will begin Phase 2 of closed beta. All previous participants will once again be granted access to the game and we will add and additional 3k participants.

Beta registration will close on May 11th - At that time no further registrations will be accepted.

Please note that this schedule is subject to change and we will make announcement as we get closer to confirm the time and date of phase 2 launch.

Thanks to everybody for all your support and encouragement, it really means a lot to us. See you on May 8th!

Hey Everybody, 

A member of the Hot Lava team has an unexpected family emergency. We are going to delay the Hot Lava beta by a week so that they can be with their family.

The new date for the Hot Lava beta will be Tuesday April 10th. Selected participants will be notified by email if they are selected at that time.

We know you're all very excited and we apologize for the delay. We appreciate your patience and understanding. Thank you.