It's update time! We've overhauled the way teams/sponsorships worked, added a daily challenge mode, daily quests, and more! The road to sponsorship and the way you progress once sponsored has been changed. Therefore we've reset everyone's team. Your unlocks and Rep will not be taken away. It's a big one so let's get right into the changes.
Changes:
Teams rework: - Obtaining a team no longer happens when reaching 1000 rep. Instead you'll have to complete 3 sponsor nodes on the world map instead before you get an offer. - Sponsor nodes now give you a choice; you'll be able to start up an Arboreal, Enemy, or Kinetic track, regardless of which team you're in. - Once sponsored you'll be able to complete daily sponsor tasks. These are refilled back up to 3 once per 24 hours. Completing sponsor tasks progresses you in your team, unlocking sponsor gear along the way. - We've added the much requested option to leave your team! When leaving your team your sponsor progress will be reset to zero. Your Rep will not be reset, and your unlocks will not be taken away, but if you obtain a Kinetic sponsorship you won't be able to wear your Enemy gear, until you switch back to Enemy.
Daily Challenge: - In the Ride menu, you'll now find the Daily Challenge option. This starts up a regular session, except that you only get one chance per day. - The seed for this session is the same for all players and changes every day. - Scores for the Daily Challenge are stored on a separate leaderboard and are viewable in the Standings menu.
Bonus objectives rework: - A common complaint was that bonus objectives often weren't doable on your current track. Our intention was that players could choose their next track based on the bonus objective they were given. In practice this didn't work very well so we shuffled some things around. The bonus objective will now be generated during track generation, it will randomly pick an objective from a pool of objectives that you're certainly able to complete on the current track.
New bonus level. By now you've probably found the construction site in Highlands, can you find the new one as well? This one features a new type of objective as well.
Session markers in freeride mode. Pressing 'T' or 'LeftStick' will plop down a marker in freeride levels, you can then respawn from there whenever you like.
Mixer plugin updates. Should fix performance problems.
Level generation build crew (all the yellow ones) are now included in level seeds. The old seeds will still work.
Switched a few keybindings around on controller. Check the keybindings menu for new bindings for: toggle UI, skip song, and reset camera angle.
Diminishing returns applied to stunts. Doing the same thing over and over will now award less Rep.
Initial game loading sequence sped up.
New team items added (by completing sponsor cards once sponsored).
New generic unlocks added to the random item pool.
Speedrun timer now in milliseconds.
Stoppie nerfed, Fakie buffed, Stoppies & Wheelies now have diminishing returns applied.
Construction site now has a separate finish line, so you are not forced to complete the objective.
Update platforms: The update has been pushed live on Windows and Mac. Linux will be pushed live later today, or tomorrow at the latest. Xbox players will receive this update, combined with the next update, next month. This is due to the complicated and time costly nature of porting and updating on console.
Community: If you want to keep up to date with the known issues and our current plans, join our Discord, or have a look at the Roadmap! As always, we'd love to hear your thoughts!
The next Descenders is coming to Steam in less than 2 weeks (note that the next Xbox update will be next month, and encompass two PC updates in one). Here are some of the features you can expect:
Teams Rework
Up to now, the team you pick doesn't make a great deal of difference to how you play the game. With the next update, there will be daily objectives to complete that will be team-specific, and will earn you additional Rep and special team gear.
New Secret Level
By now you've probably found the Construction Yard in Highlands. With the next update, there will also be a brand new, secret level to find hidden somewhere else. What will it be? Where will it be? You'll have to wait for the update to find out, but all we'll say for now is -- it's quite different to anything you've played in Descenders before...
Daily Challenge
The next update will finally introduce the Daily Challenge to Descenders. Every day, every player will be given the same set of levels, and you'll have just one run to get the biggest Session Rep score that you can. There will be daily leaderboards for every Daily Challenge, so you can track how well you're doing each day compared to everyone else.
Session Markers in Freeride Mode
You asked for Session Markers in Freeride Mode, so here they come. You'll be able to plop down a marker on a level, and then restart from that position whenever you like.
Bonus Objectives Rework
Right now, you are told your Bonus Objective on the world map, and have to pick a level that matches what you are required to do. However, we've found this sytem is a little confusing, especially for new players. With the new update, the Bonus Objective will be automatically generated based on the level you pick, and will always be completable.
This update is coming in the next couple of weeks -- we'll let you know when!
The Rogue-Bike update is here! We've revamped most of the existing systems (rep system, world map) and we're introducing a big new feature: the build crew. Let's dive into the changes right away:
Changes:
World Map overhaul: - Randomized start/finish line and level placement. - Added more special nodes to the map. (Medic, First person, Danger zone, and more??) - Day/night cycle. A new environment starts in the morning and playing a level advances the day. Reach the end of the world map before you run out of daylight.
Rep system overhaul: - Rep can no longer be lost. The risk of losing reputation made end-game players play very safe, this wasn't very fun to watch. In order to see more sick tricks we're introducing: - Flow (rep per minute). Flow is the reputation one earns per minute, making sure that the players who are on top of the flow leaderboards are actually the most entertaining to watch as they constantly have to do the sickest stunts. - New sessions start at 0 rep, the goal is to reach the end of the last environment with as much rep as possible. Session rep is added to your account rep after each session. Leaderboards will track 'best session rep', 'flow' (only on successfully completed runs), and 'overall account rep'. - Diminishing returns. Doing the same trick over and over will reward fewer rep each time.
Build crew: - Build crew is a way to customize and tweak a session to the players liking. - At certain rep milestones during a session new crew members will be unlocked. The player will have to choose one out of four randomly generated crew members (modifiers). Crew members last until the end of a session and a fresh session starts with 0 crew members. - Crew members can be: wider paths when generating levels, higher bunny hops, decrease in off-road friction, generate fewer obstacles, always show the compass, and many others. Right now we've implemented 22 different build crew members and there are more to come! If you have ideas for other crew members, let us know!
Removed the 'Practice' option when starting a new session. Practice session was a way to ride without consequences but after removing reputation losses this no longer feels needed.
Removed dawn and night random visual modifiers. Storm can still randomly occur. Dusk now appears after having played 7 levels in the same environment. Night appears 2 levels after dusk. Completing a boss jump and entering a new environment resets the day timer.
Mixer integration. Allows for interaction between viewers and streamers on the Mixer streaming platform.
Speedrun timer. Enable in the gameplay settings to show a speedrun timer during your sessions. This timer ONLY pauses during loading screens.
Added and tweaked a bunch of sound effects.
Added a few new outfits, bikes, and accessories.
Updated to a newer version of the Unity engine. This should improve the experience on lower end computers and macs.
Performance upgrades across the board. We had to do a ton of performance upgrades when working on the Xbox version of Descenders. We took the ones that were applicable to PC/Mac/Linux and carried those over to the Steam version of Descenders.
Updated the Steam plugin. This fixes the bug where some players have no leaderboards.
Bugfix: pressing 'equip now' in the game over screen now actually equips the newly unlocked items.
Reputation reset With the new rep system and the new leaderboards we're resetting everyone's reputation. Based on your current rep we've handed out a few legacy items. Everyone who scored at least 1 reputation has received an accessory item. If you obtained 50.000 rep you've received another legacy item. And if you managed to obtain an impressive 250.000 rep you've gotten a third item on top of that.
Community If you want to keep up to date with the known issues and our current plans, join our Discord, or have a look at the Roadmap! As always, we'd love to hear your thoughts!
We're here today to give you some pretty exciting news.
A couple of months ago, the RageSquid team came up with a massive idea for Descenders that would make the game even more exciting and fulfilling, while fixing some of the issues people were having with the roguelike elements and the Rep system.
And now we're finally ready to unveil what we're calling The Rogue-Bike Update -- and it's coming on May 15th.
Here's what you can expect:
The New World Map
Currently, you play through the Career Mode world by world, and move from left to right on the world map. Other than picking what the new level will roughly contain in terms of steepness, stunts and curves, there isn't much to it. Until now.
With the Rogue-Bike Update, you'll now be tasked with exploring a randomized world map, filled with special nodes to discover. Your goal is still to reach the boss jump and clear it to move on to the next world, but you might want to ride around a little first and see what the world has to offer...
But don't ride around for *too* long. If you spend too much time exploring, the sun will begin to set, and you'll be plunged into darkness, making completing the boss jump a whole lot trickier.
The New Rep System
The current Rep system is fine, but we've found that it stops the best players from wanting to take risks. All this will change with the Rogue-Bike Update.
From May 15th, each new run that you do will set your Session Rep back to zero, and you'll only earn Rep, rather than losing it. You'll also now be judged based on your Flow -- that is, your Rep per minute.
In other words, the better you ride and the more tricks you do, the better your Flow. And when you finish a Session, your Session Rep will be added to your Total Rep. Easy!
Crew Members
Right now, once you've unlocked Canyon or Peaks, you might as well keep restarting from those worlds to reach the final boss. With the Rogue-Bike Update, we introduce Crew Members, who give you a reason to start from Highlands each time.
Every time you earn a certain amount of Rep on a run, you'll unlock a new Crew Member. These Crew Members will give you special mutators, such as softening all your landing impacts, or adding extra steepness or stunts to every level.
These mutators allow you to play the game your own way, and pick the abilities that matter to you. You can, of course, still start runs from later worlds, but you won't earn as many mutators that way.
But what about my current Rep?
On May 15th, we will reset all Rep scores. However, we will be giving special items to each and every Descenders player based on how much Rep they've earned before then:
If you've bought and played the game before May 15th, you'll earn a legacy item to show that you played before the Rogue-Bike Update
If you've earned more than 50,000 Rep by May 15th, you'll also earn an extra special legacy item
If you've earned more than 250,000 Rep by May 15th, you'll earn both of these items, and an extra, extra special legacy item
When can I see the update in action?
We'll be showing off the Rogue-Bike Update for the first time live on http://mixer.com/nomorerobots next Tuesday, May 8th, at 8am PT / 5pm CEST.
We know you've been enjoying Descenders, but we also know you've been wishing for something a little more... uphill. We've been experimenting with new ways to play Descenders, and we've come up with something we're sure is a great way to reach new heights!
We hope you like our new game, Ascenders!
You can play for free right now! To play you'll need to be on Windows, go to Descenders properties in your Steam library, go to the BETAS tab, enter "AscendersTheGame" as the password, and click CHECK CODE. You can now select Ascenders in the dropdown menu.
Be careful whlie you're enjoying this new game, because Rep is carried over to your regular Descenders progress. But so are any unlocks you may get ;)
We know you've been enjoying Descenders, but we also know you've been wishing for something a little more... uphill. We've been experimenting with new ways to play Descenders, and we've come up with something we're sure is a great way to reach new heights!
We hope you like our new game, Ascenders!
You can play for free right now! To play you'll need to be on Windows, go to Descenders properties in your Steam library, go to the BETAS tab, enter "AscendersTheGame" as the password, and click CHECK CODE. You can now select Ascenders in the dropdown menu.
Be careful whlie you're enjoying this new game, because Rep is carried over to your regular Descenders progress. But so are any unlocks you may get ;)
(Windows only at the moment. Mac&Linux coming soon!)
Hey all!
Last week's update gave the game a few new sound effects. Unfortunately some of these effects weren't properly categorized so the volume sliders had no effect on them. Because this is quite intrusive we wanted to get this hotfixed instead of waiting for a next bigger update, so here we are! In addition to the sfx fixes we are happy to announce that we've partnered up with German mountain biker and youtuber Fabio Schäfer. His brand of gear, #SCRAPE, is now unlockable! #SCRAPE gear is the first brand we're collaborating with this is something we want to do more often, so tell your favourite youtuber/biker to get in touch with us and we'll try to work something out to get their brand in the game!
#SCRAPE items include 3 new goggles, 2 long sleeve jerseys, 1 short sleeve jersey. The items are of uncommon, rare, and extraordinary rarities.
Bugfix: categorized sound effects so that volume sliders affect them.
Minor CPU performance improvement.
Mixer integration The idea was to enable Mixer integration in this hotfix but after we publicly tested it in yesterday's stream we decided that it's too easy to abuse it in its current state. We'd like some more time to tweak it to make sure that it's solid. We'll release this when we get back from event season that's starting next week (PAX/EGX Rezzed).
Community If you want to keep up to date with the known issues and our current plans, join our Discord, or have a look at the Roadmap! As always, we'd love to hear your thoughts!
(Windows only at the moment. Mac&Linux coming soon!)
Hey all!
Last week's update gave the game a few new sound effects. Unfortunately some of these effects weren't properly categorized so the volume sliders had no effect on them. Because this is quite intrusive we wanted to get this hotfixed instead of waiting for a next bigger update, so here we are! In addition to the sfx fixes we are happy to announce that we've partnered up with German mountain biker and youtuber Fabio Schäfer. His brand of gear, #SCRAPE, is now unlockable! #SCRAPE gear is the first brand we're collaborating with this is something we want to do more often, so tell your favourite youtuber/biker to get in touch with us and we'll try to work something out to get their brand in the game!
#SCRAPE items include 3 new goggles, 2 long sleeve jerseys, 1 short sleeve jersey. The items are of uncommon, rare, and extraordinary rarities.
Bugfix: categorized sound effects so that volume sliders affect them.
Minor CPU performance improvement.
Mixer integration The idea was to enable Mixer integration in this hotfix but after we publicly tested it in yesterday's stream we decided that it's too easy to abuse it in its current state. We'd like some more time to tweak it to make sure that it's solid. We'll release this when we get back from event season that's starting next week (PAX/EGX Rezzed).
Community If you want to keep up to date with the known issues and our current plans, join our Discord, or have a look at the Roadmap! As always, we'd love to hear your thoughts!
