Hello everyone!

A quick news bite to let you know that the Mac and Linux versions of Dead Cells are available in the beta branch. So if you have a friend who hasn’t been able to play yet because they prefer the penguin or the apple to the window, tell them to hop in and report any bugs to us!

HERE'S HOW YOU ACCESS THE BETA for those who haven't had to before.

Next news, we're bringing back the original pixel art font. You can activate it in the settings!







Finally, we're also working on something which has been in our minds for a long time... Something that’s been quite difficult to pull off due to the way we built the game since the beginning: allowing the community to mod Dead Cells.

Internally we have a limited, basic mod support working. However, currently even very minor updates break compatibility instantly, which is kind of a deal breaker. Once we've fixed that, we will release the tools into the wild along with some basic documentation. Hopefully, as early as this month. So, if you're interested in modding Dead Cells, please stick around, we will need your feedback to get this right!


Take care,
The MT team

Community Highlights:

@koiyokidd was nice enough to include the Beheaded among his favorite indiegame characters!



Quick fan art, by @_wildarrow_

Behold the magnificent update art by our very own dev Matt!

Hey there everyone,

The Babel update which you can check out over here, is live for everyone!

The only info we left out of our last update was that we've included a little Discord integration for y'all to play with. It's nothing fancy, it just shows how long you've been playing and which level you're in.



Of course this wouldn't be news if there wasn't some shameless self promotion... So chek out us on sale in this here bundle.





Captain Caine put together this wonderful little Firewatch inspired piece.


The prolific Elkopolo is at it again with a bad ass Inquisitor!

The MT team.

Hello everyone,

We hope that you're enjoying the latest additions to the game! After the Baguette update, named after the myth that we pushed a patch without having the translations ready, we're keeping the theme of language-based title with the Babel update.

As previously announced in the roadmap, this is the first of the two updates not focused around in-game content but rather on making Dead Cells accessible to more people.

The most important feature of the patch is the addition of new languages officially supported:

• Deutsch
  
• Español
  
• Italiano
  
• Русский
  
• Português
  
• Türkçe
  
• 한국어
  
• 繁體中文

Moreover, all bows and crossbows received some (cosmetic) love!



We were also thinking that the character wasn't looking nostalgic enough when staring into space. Now it's better!



Last quality of life improvement, the new version of the ceiling turret (known as the Barnacle) is now usable without a roof thanks to the latest technology designed by our finest engineers.



Nothing can stop the progress of science.

Oh, and you thought you could escape GDPR here? Slight change on our side, we're still tracking errors and crashes, but now we've anonymised the process.

Take care,
The MT team

Community highlights:

Guest Star, by @Elkopolo. And yes, yes half of the office is playing it while the other half is threatening to kill the next person who say "boi" with a spoon. A very, very, little spoon.



Request sketches, by @TotesNotAl

Heya friends and foes,

Hope you're doing fine, enjoying spring and having half your body explode with allergic reactions! On our side, we’ve just released the latest update for everyone on the main branch. Speaking of which...

The Seventh Update is finally live! Initially we had some issues on the localization side, hence the "Baguette update" as half the game was still in french, but it's all good now. Well, apart of the usual batch of typos, for which we're sorry in advance.

As usual the full patch notes can be found here, but here’s a fairly decent summary of the main features.

• Back to the roots: The Forge has been reworked. Again. Turns out, the previous system of weapon upgrades was really kinda locking people into only one build and a few weapons… Since the variety and fun of the gameplay are mostly down to playing with different weapons, it made the runs feel a little too repetitive.
  
  So we decided to re-introduce more randomness to the formula. Instead of allowing you to upgrade specific weapons, now the cells you invest at the forge will go towards unlocking a guaranteed percentage of weapons dropping at higher quality levels. So for example; it might be that 10% of all weapons with drop with + quality, meaning you should eventually see ALL weapons drop with + quality… I’m gonna come back and have another crack at this paragraph once you all tear it to shreds...
  
  For players having already invested in the Forge, some of your progress has been imported to the new system. It’s not a 1:1 match, but you shouldn’t have lost too much of your progress.

• Legendary Items!: Okay, calm down, I know it sounds clickbaity but give me at least five seconds to explain myself before hanging me to the nearest tree! In the same vein as the Forge rework, we have introduce legendary weapons. These weapons are different from the "S" quality (the highest available through the Forge). Like colorless items, these items scale with your higher stat, but without the +20% damage taken. They are very powerful items with a lot of affixes, some of it exclusive to Legendary items.
  
  You have a guaranteed legendary drop each time you defeat a boss (apart from the last one, we're not quite horrible enough trolls to give you the best weapon ever and then NOT let you test it... Or are we? (No, no we're not, promise). There is also a slight chance to loot one from regular or elite enemies.
  
  These legendary drops are chosen from among the entire (almost) pool of existing items in the game, even if you haven't found the blueprint or unlocked the weapon yet. Again, the idea is to make some items you would have never used viable… and if you get the legendary version of your favorite weapon, you can bring the champaign!

• Affix reroll and sharpening: Guillain brought a friend and pulled some strings to get him an internship under the Blacksmith's supervision. Anyway, this new guy is now able to reroll the affixes of your weapon… for a small tribute of gold. He can also sharpen your weapons, upgrading the quality of your items by one degree (from + to ++ or from ++ to S). This should compensate a bit if you have been unlucky and didn't find anything worth taking or buying while exploring.

• Challenge room rework!: We did it! After 10 months having this delayed again and again for higher priority features, we've finally found the time to rework the challenge/ portal rooms. You get the chest when you enter, and the portal closes behind you if you decide to open it. Now the challenge is in finding them, not in perfecting them. No more monsters, just our nastiest trap rooms yet...

• New UI: Putting in an HD font and a modern UI instead of the old-school one we had before was a hotly contested decision in the office. Was that incoherent with the pixel art aesthetic or, to the contrary, perfectly fits the mix between modern and retro games that is Dead cells? Words we will regret for eternity have been pronounced. Friendship has been broken. Jaws, too. But in the end, the majority (among the members still standing and able to speak) were in favour of the new UI. ¡Viva la revolucion!

• Heaps of balancing: The usual batch of bug fixing, level design tweaks and balance changes. Most notably, the nerf of the cooldown reduction mutation make it less a no brainer, the Nightmare difficulty has become nightmarish-er, and the gold economy has been tweaked.

We hope you will like the changes! In any case, please give us your feedback in the comments.


After (almost) one year in Early Access, we seem to finally be heading toward a proper release. We've run the numbers several times and apparently we should be out by August* (unless the office burns down, half the team falls sick with ebola or zombies happen (in which case you might find us running with the zombie crowd looking for a tasty tartare of brain).

This Seventh Update is the first of a few smaller updates before the lore arrives at launch and we are hard at work on the Mac and Linux versions! Don't forget we’ll be pushing a big juicy FREE DLC post release…

*Date non contractual: Acts of god, unexpected lottery wins and irresponsible drinking habits may delay launch of game at any time.


http://Discord.gg/deadcells The largest community run Discord server has been verified - it's now the "official" discord server of Dead Cells. There are heaps of nice people there who can help you with the game and who are more than ready to discuss ideas and critiques about Dead Cells with you.

While we’re celebrating the Discord, here’s a little of the community's handiwork!


"drew something that represents my hurtful moment. what's yours?" by @Elkopolo




"TF2 and Dead Cells crossover" by @Elkopolo



Hand of the King, by @Genericghoul1



Cute Dead Cells fan-art by Aude-javel


Take care everyone,
The MT team.

Hey there,

Hope everything is going your way! On our side, the next update is coming along nicely. Well, actually, for the braves out there, it's already available on the Alpha branch, ready to be playtested and broken down by the finest analysts of our community. Exceeeeeeept that 30% of all the texts are still in French (that will change before beta normally).

A note on the French: basically we’re still in the US after the GDC and haven’t had time to get the translations done in house (Steve you lazy bastard!), however the pros will be sending through a first draft during the week if all goes according to plan… In the meantime… Omelette du fromage.

By the way, if you're looking to talk about Dead Cells with other players, there are a couple of places where you can do so outside of the Steam forums:

• Reddit
  
  
• Discord: One of the most active Discord (but there are a few others out there).
  
  
• DocFirebird's YouTube channel is also a great place if you're looking for an in-depth analysis of the meta and a look to the general usefulness of every weapons.

Current additions to the game are listed there if you want the complete list. There is a bunch of quality-of-life improvements as well as a complete rework of the Forge and weapon upgrade system. And also new challenge levels! We will go into more details when the update will be ready for the Beta branch.

As a final note, we just left the GDC which was an amazing time to meet many other indie devs out there! Thanks again to the Indie Megabooth for featuring Dead Cells in their line-up. We're now heading to Pax East in Boston, where we hope to meet as many of you as we can!

Take care,
The MT team

Community highlights of the day:

Unrealistic fanart, by fromdreams:



Dead Cells’ quick sketch, by HAX:

Hey there,

Hope everything is going your way! On our side, the next update is coming along nicely. Well, actually, for the braves out there, it's already available on the Alpha branch, ready to be playtested and broken down by the finest analysts of our community. Exceeeeeeept that 30% of all the texts are still in French (that will change before beta normally).

A note on the French: basically we’re still in the US after the GDC and haven’t had time to get the translations done in house (Steve you lazy bastard!), however the pros will be sending through a first draft during the week if all goes according to plan… In the meantime… Omelette du fromage.

By the way, if you're looking to talk about Dead Cells with other players, there are a couple of places where you can do so outside of the Steam forums:

• Reddit
  
  
• Discord: One of the most active Discord (but there are a few others out there).
  
  
• DocFirebird's YouTube channel is also a great place if you're looking for an in-depth analysis of the meta and a look to the general usefulness of every weapons.

Current additions to the game are listed there if you want the complete list. There is a bunch of quality-of-life improvements as well as a complete rework of the Forge and weapon upgrade system. And also new challenge levels! We will go into more details when the update will be ready for the Beta branch.

As a final note, we just left the GDC which was an amazing time to meet many other indie devs out there! Thanks again to the Indie Megabooth for featuring Dead Cells in their line-up. We're now heading to Pax East in Boston, where we hope to meet as many of you as we can!

Take care,
The MT team

Community highlights of the day:

Unrealistic fanart, by fromdreams:



Dead Cells’ quick sketch, by HAX:

Hey all,

Man what a day! We’ve been hard at work getting everything ready to launch the Hand of the King update onto the main branch, thus exposing all the rest of you poor souls to the final major content update before we leave Early Access!

If, like some in Northern England you’ve been buried under 20 foot of snow, your internet down, living by candlelight wondering what’s been happening in the outside world and you missed our last update on what’s new… Then here’s a brief recap:

• New boss! - He’s a real stinker, very little room to maneuver around him, rapid attack patterns and of course stacks of damage.
  
• New level: Originally named “The Castle” it’s all shiny and fit for the habitation of some royal highness. We’ve made up for the bogus name by including some familiar, but interesting enemies.
  
• Nightmare Difficulty: Mouhahaha (Dr Evil style laugh). Ok really it’s a fourth difficulty level designed to induce controller smashing rage in the truly masochistic. You asked, we delivered... Just bear that in mind when you’re holding the smashed remains of your controller in your hands.
  
• Loads more stuff: We’ve updated the roll, shortened a bunch of levels, added more weapons and of course done a bunch of balancing.
  
• Check out the patchnotes here and the previous more detailed beta post here.

For those of you who can’t be bothered reading fiddly patch notes, check out our latest vlog entry! It sums up everything we’ve done for this update and a little of what we’re planning for the next few months (spoiler: polishing, lots of polishing).

https://youtu.be/D7EXiu-jFNs

For anyone who doesn’t like to suffer alone, those who like to share and the real sadists out there… The game is on sale! Tell a friend, lure them in with “oh man the controls are so nice…” then make some popcorn and settle in.

It’ll be 33% off most of this week so get it while it’s hot!


The intrepid DocFirebird has put together a little video for people getting started in the game, or those who might be wanting to start pushing further into the game. Check it out here:

https://youtu.be/RFCN0hGxo8s

Hey all,

Man what a day! We’ve been hard at work getting everything ready to launch the Hand of the King update onto the main branch, thus exposing all the rest of you poor souls to the final major content update before we leave Early Access!

If, like some in Northern England you’ve been buried under 20 foot of snow, your internet down, living by candlelight wondering what’s been happening in the outside world and you missed our last update on what’s new… Then here’s a brief recap:

• New boss! - He’s a real stinker, very little room to maneuver around him, rapid attack patterns and of course stacks of damage.
  
• New level: Originally named “The Castle” it’s all shiny and fit for the habitation of some royal highness. We’ve made up for the bogus name by including some familiar, but interesting enemies.
  
• Nightmare Difficulty: Mouhahaha (Dr Evil style laugh). Ok really it’s a fourth difficulty level designed to induce controller smashing rage in the truly masochistic. You asked, we delivered... Just bear that in mind when you’re holding the smashed remains of your controller in your hands.
  
• Loads more stuff: We’ve updated the roll, shortened a bunch of levels, added more weapons and of course done a bunch of balancing.
  
• Check out the patchnotes here and the previous more detailed beta post here.

For those of you who can’t be bothered reading fiddly patch notes, check out our latest vlog entry! It sums up everything we’ve done for this update and a little of what we’re planning for the next few months (spoiler: polishing, lots of polishing).

https://youtu.be/D7EXiu-jFNs

For anyone who doesn’t like to suffer alone, those who like to share and the real sadists out there… The game is on sale! Tell a friend, lure them in with “oh man the controls are so nice…” then make some popcorn and settle in.

It’ll be 33% off most of this week so get it while it’s hot!


The intrepid DocFirebird has put together a little video for people getting started in the game, or those who might be wanting to start pushing further into the game. Check it out here:

https://youtu.be/RFCN0hGxo8s

Concept by Thomas. 1920 x 1080 version available here

Hey friends,

A little post to let you know that the Alpha bug hunting phase is pretty much over so now is time for the beta balancing phase.

The sixth update, code-name: A four-star Castle according to TripAdvisor, is bringing in a big new chunk of content:

• A whole new level, called the Castle, which is, as the sharpest among you may have guessed from its name, a castle. We know, it’s a very risky choice for an action-platformer, but what can we say? We're all about innovation around here.

Concept by Gwen


Ingame render

• Two new enemies: will provide a suitable distraction while you’re strolling around in the castle, admiring its breathtaking portraits and daring architecture.

Let it gooooooo


We're not safe anywhere these days...

• The HotK (yes, that’s what the cool kids are calling the Hand of the King these days), is the final boss of the game. I won’t lie, he doesn’t go down easily. Try to remember that WE are the culprits before throwing your innocent controller at the wall. Also try to bear in mind that we do love you, in spite of what that boss might lead you to believe.
  
  
• Of course, if the boss isn’t hard enough for you, you will now be able to access the 4-cell “nightmare” difficulty. If you do decide to play on 4 cells, maybe book an appointment with the nearest doctor, because something is definitely not right with you.

• Colour balancing: the HP you get when collecting a scroll depends on the colour; Survival will get you more HP than Brutality, which will give you less HP than Tactics. Also, the grenades are now Brutality items by default, with some being dual-coloured (Tactics or Survival). All in all, Tactics has been slightly nerfed.

• The dodge mechanic has been tweaked to let you roll in the middle of a series of strikes without rebooting the attack pattern of your weapon, which can be especially useful for weapons with a long windup followed by quick or stronger strikes.

• Fog Fjord/Graveyard/Sepulchre/Ossuary‘s level design have been reviewed. The reduced length of these levels is the most notable difference.

• New weapons and skills: you can now punch your enemies to death, if it’s your thing. It might even help you manage your stress levels when playing on nightmare difficulty...

That pretty much covers it all, however you can find a detailed list of changes by clicking here. We’re planning to stay in beta for approximately a week, which should be enough time to get your feedback and do a bit of a balance pass. Please note the emphasis put on the conditional in the previous sentence. The implicit, subtle, carefully hidden, message here being that it could be shorter (lol, as if) or longer.

Time for the ever incredible highlights from the most excellent community:

The prisoner, as seen by @EyedSiU and some black and white goodness, by The Dumbs Khaotix




An original take on the electric whip by Davi Sa




Thank you for reading, and more generally speaking, for bearing with us this long!

Best,
The MT team.

Concept by Thomas. 1920 x 1080 version available here

Hey friends,

A little post to let you know that the Alpha bug hunting phase is pretty much over so now is time for the beta balancing phase.

The sixth update, code-name: A four-star Castle according to TripAdvisor, is bringing in a big new chunk of content:

• A whole new level, called the Castle, which is, as the sharpest among you may have guessed from its name, a castle. We know, it’s a very risky choice for an action-platformer, but what can we say? We're all about innovation around here.

Concept by Gwen


Ingame render

• Two new enemies: will provide a suitable distraction while you’re strolling around in the castle, admiring its breathtaking portraits and daring architecture.

Let it gooooooo


We're not safe anywhere these days...

• The HotK (yes, that’s what the cool kids are calling the Hand of the King these days), is the final boss of the game. I won’t lie, he doesn’t go down easily. Try to remember that WE are the culprits before throwing your innocent controller at the wall. Also try to bear in mind that we do love you, in spite of what that boss might lead you to believe.
  
  
• Of course, if the boss isn’t hard enough for you, you will now be able to access the 4-cell “nightmare” difficulty. If you do decide to play on 4 cells, maybe book an appointment with the nearest doctor, because something is definitely not right with you.

• Colour balancing: the HP you get when collecting a scroll depends on the colour; Survival will get you more HP than Brutality, which will give you less HP than Tactics. Also, the grenades are now Brutality items by default, with some being dual-coloured (Tactics or Survival). All in all, Tactics has been slightly nerfed.

• The dodge mechanic has been tweaked to let you roll in the middle of a series of strikes without rebooting the attack pattern of your weapon, which can be especially useful for weapons with a long windup followed by quick or stronger strikes.

• Fog Fjord/Graveyard/Sepulchre/Ossuary‘s level design have been reviewed. The reduced length of these levels is the most notable difference.

• New weapons and skills: you can now punch your enemies to death, if it’s your thing. It might even help you manage your stress levels when playing on nightmare difficulty...

That pretty much covers it all, however you can find a detailed list of changes by clicking here. We’re planning to stay in beta for approximately a week, which should be enough time to get your feedback and do a bit of a balance pass. Please note the emphasis put on the conditional in the previous sentence. The implicit, subtle, carefully hidden, message here being that it could be shorter (lol, as if) or longer.

Time for the ever incredible highlights from the most excellent community:

The prisoner, as seen by @EyedSiU and some black and white goodness, by The Dumbs Khaotix




An original take on the electric whip by Davi Sa




Thank you for reading, and more generally speaking, for bearing with us this long!

Best,
The MT team.