My drifters, it has been a long while! Too long. But I am happy to say that the radio silence has been for no other reason than that we have been working very hard. On fun things! So, without further ado, I'm excited to share with you what we've been creating for the next big update, which will enter beta testing as soon as possible.




Draft Mode is a new Challenge Mode that can be unlocked at Rank 50. Enabling it allows you to jump right into wave 120 with 30 upgrade points to spend. This is a great way to test build concepts before committing time to them, or for veterans to simply skip to the fast-paced, blood-pumping late game.



This update introduces alternate bosses. Three of the five that will be added are in this update, potentially encountered at waves 20, 80, and 100. Alternate bosses are more difficult (but also more rewarding), so you will only encouter them if you've enabled Challenge Mode: NEMESIS.



The Ceratotitan is a melee attacker, encountered at wave 20, that can move surprisingly fast given its size. Its pincer attack deals a lot of damage and will test your mobility and positioning. Additionally, it can spawn and attract swarms of offspring to assail you or charge up a radial projectile attack.

As for the other two alternate bosses coming up, I won't spoil them just yet. And two more will appear in the update following this one. Additionally, all new bosses have their own original sound tracks.




Ultra-Rare Wild Mod: Ricochet

• When your weapon projectile would be destroyed, it instead rebounds an additional time toward a nearby target
  
• -15% projectiles
  
• Recursive: This mod may be taken multiple times

Supermod: Charged Shields (Requires: Charged Shot + Focused Shields)

• While charging your weapon, 25% of your charge value applies to your shield effect radius and shield effect power, up to a maximum of +100%

Ultra-Rare Wild Mod: Challenger

• Summons a challenger, a champion or boss enemy bearing increased power and orb drops
  
• Each subsequent challenger is stronger and grants more orbs than the last
  
• If the challenger is destroyed, it will drop a random power-up
  
• If the challenger is destroyed, you will gain +1 level
  
• Recursive: This mod may be taken multiple times

Supermod: Infuse (Requires: Discharge + Magnitude)

• Discharge now deals 15% of your current shields self-damage to you
  
• When you fire your weapon its base damage is increased by the amount of self-damage dealt by Discharge divided between projectiles fired
  
• Discharge's bolts of energy originate from your weapon projectiles instead of you, when they are destroyed on impact

Drones were feeling dated, and so we have given the trees a major overhaul, allowing them to better compete with the perils of Enemies 2.0. Additionally, many underperforming mods have been folded into existing mods. For instance, you don't have to purchase Formation: Pursuit or Formation: Rampart anymore. They just come with the Assault Drones and Defense Drones mods, respectively.









We've also made many QoL changes to constructs. For instance, for specialized Drone and Ally types, you no longer have to make it to the bottom of the tree. You can get Assault Drones, Defense Drones, Interceptors, or Allies right after buying the root mod.

• Mines have been reworked to provide a low-investment, alternate option to Loaded Mines. Mines (without Loaded Mines) now spawn 6-9 bomblet explosions moments after detonation. Each bomblet deals a portion of the mine base damage. Additionally, Minefield and Retribution have received large buffs.
  
• Turrets have been given much better scaling from mods and improved missile damage and base hull.
  
• Other construct support mods, like Self-Destruction and Burnout Reactors have also been made stronger.
  
• Construct AI is being looked at, especially in regards to their behavior in the presense of a Bulwark. They will soon regard the business-end of a Bulwark as a bad target, and a bad place to hang out.
  
• Formation: Battalion and Formation: Rampart track more firmly with the player, like the default formation does.
  
• Carrier has been given a pass as well, and we'll be watching during beta to make sure its performing up to par. Carrier has lost its malus to rate of fire and gained a shield durability buff. Additionally, it's got some newly refurbished mods to play with...

As with all of our updates, we'll continue improving the quality of the game. Here are some of the other buffs and features you can look forward to:

• Ataraxia has been reworked, providing bonus powers for threhholds of stored upgrades.
  
• We've continued to address complaints of spikey difficulty, especially for new players. Particularly unfair waves and enemies are being iterated on.
  
• Many dozens of player buffs have been included, especially for underperforming Supermods, shields, weapons, and bodies.
  
• Cargo Train boxes now drop four different types of power-ups.
  
• Power-ups and experience orbs are now highly resistent to the pull of singularities. Rejoice!
  
• Raycasting has been implemented for Railgun, allowing you to strike enemy weak points with precision.
  
• A visible list of banished mods can now be seen on the upgrade menu.
  
• We've made dozens of bug fixes and optimizations.
  
• Spanish localization has been added.

Enemies 2.0, part 3, follows this upcoming update. That will add the last of the 2 alternate bosses, as well as Challenge Mode: Boss Rush, where you will face all 10 bosses, one after another, and earn large upgrades inbetween. As usual, other features and reworks will also arrive, such as new weapon gear and a glow-up for the Ally trees.

We've got quite an active discord with a very chill and inclusive community. The dev team is also pretty active there. We recently opened up some new channels like #weekly-discussion, #ask-the-devs, and #feedback. The latter allows you to submit feedback to a bot that lets players upvote or downvote the suggestion. I'm also quite proud of the #game-dev-help channel, which is a space for current and aspiring developers to learn and collaborate. So... come chat with us!

Steam Reviews really help! As a tiny operation, Nova Drift relies on its quality and reputation to sell, and reviews also encourage the Steam algorithms to show the game to more people. Please do take a moment to fill out a short review, even if it's only a few words. It just might make a big difference.

Thanks for reading. Best wishes,

Chimeric / Jeffrey Nielson

This week we gathered feedback from players regarding the increased difficulty of the game, especially for newer players, since the Enemies 2.0 update. We agreed there was quite a bit we could do to alleviate the steepness of the learning curve and have made some changes in today's patch. Enemies 2.0 introduced dynamic waves, which, like any procedurally generated system, is famously difficult to tune. I'm sure it will take some time to get it just right, but I'm confident that today's changes are a step in the right direction.

* We tuned the exp curve to be slightly more like to the old one, which means a few more level ups during early game. I believe this small change makes quite a big difference to the new-player experience, which can be a bit exp starved due to the relatively low enemy quantity.

* Many of the more dangerous things that dynamic waves does are now gated behind the Challenge Mode: Elite Enemy, instead of being in the "core" experience.

* The new enemies introduced in Enemies 2.0, which tend to be tougher and more dangerous, are also introduced later if the Elite Enemy Challenge Mode is not turned on.

* Several of the more dangerous enemies introduced in the previous update have had their difficulty tuned in such a way that allows slower and less "glass-cannon" builds to deal with them.

* Many other small changes have been made to enemies that tend to be dangerous to new players, for instance, enemies that attack using beam weapons are now easier to escape.

Thanks for your patience as we continue to refine the game and approach release. We'll keep working to ensure that Nova Drift has something for everybody!

This is Nova Drift's largest ever update, incorporating a vast rewrite of its underlying systems. This update is the first of three parts, focusing on enemies and encounters. We're very proud to finally share it with you! Here's what's new:

• Dynamic Waves: Wildly variant procedurally generated enemy encounters. We've ripped out all of the preset enemy waves you're used to and replaced them with a system that generates them!
  
• Curated Waves: New unique, hand-crafted encounters
  
• 6 New Enemies: You will now face the Bulwark, Hammerhead, Myrmidon, Cherub, Tracer, and Swarmling
  
• Enemy Formations: Foes may now appear in formation with each other: Rank and File, Orbit, Flank, V, Trail, Fractal, and Support Formations
  
• Battlefield Zoom: Expanded views allow more room to maneuver as action ramps up
  
• Reworked Station Omega: We've raised the bar on the wave 40 boss encounter
  
• A New Challenge Mode: Annihilation: A blisteringly difficult arcade experience, designed for veterans and masochists
  
• New Wild and Super Mods: Deflagration, Explosive Growth, and Far Sight
  
• New Sound Effects and Music
  
• Much More: Lots of balance fine-tuning, quality-of-life features, borderless fullscreen mode, background parallax, new performance settings, major optimizations, a progression overhaul, legacy build support, and Korean localization

https://steamcommunity.com/app/858210/discussions/0/3658515990056189069/

https://steamcommunity.com/games/858210/announcements/detail/5812453185837511418

https://steamcommunity.com/games/858210/announcements/detail/2968418692466778160

• The unlock progression has been reworked. Please check your Unlocks menu, and be warned: You may have lost or gained access to upgrades and features, depending on your Account Rank. You may also see the new unlock order here: https://trello.com/b/4NhLxMb9/unlocks
  
• Its a brand-new universe, please reset your expectations! The new enemies and formations are tough and will require strategy and adaptation. Major changes have been made to the exp curve, enemy stats, run progression, and meta progression. Some beta players expressed frustration that they weren't able to reach previous goalposts of wave number or scores. I'd like to remind players that, since the game is endless, these comparisons are relative. Allow yourself a metaphorically clean slate or a literally clean leaderboard. Later, once the campaign is in, we'll have more tangible goal-posts.
  
• Please keep in mind, even though Nova Drift has been receiving updates for years, it is still an early access game. Major sweeping changes to enemies and waves will naturally and substantially disrupt player balance. Before full release, its important for developers to be bold with adjustments and there are often unforeseen consequences. And that's okay-- its good for the longterm health of the game-- know that I will continue to assess and adjust the game's balance as we receive more data from players. All that said, many adjustments have already been made to the player abilities that appeared to suffer the most from the new encounters.
  
• This is just the beginning. What part 1 of Enemies 2.0 accomplishes, more than anything else, is laying the foundation for future content, making that content safer and easier to add from a development perspective. The roadmap to full release is posted on Steam and Discord.
  
• We now support legacy builds! Starting with the Syzygy update (on the branch legacy_syzygy), old versions of Nova Drift will be accessible on Steam branches. Legacy builds use their own global leaderboards.

Super Mod: Deflagration, Wild Mod: Explosive Growth, & Wild Mod: Far Sight


The next two major updates will build upon the new enemy architecture, adding new bosses and more alternate ways to play Nova Drift. As many players have requested, alternate boss encounters will go a long way to ensuring that every run feels unique and different than the last. That's the first task: Create an alternate boss for all currently existing boss encounters. At waves 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100, you will encounter one of two possible bosses.

With new bosses in place, we'll be free to create two new game modes: Draft and Boss Rush, each with their own global leaderboards. Draft mode allows you to start with a complete build and jump into late waves, while Boss Rush puts you up against all bosses in a row, as you grow in power between each one.

We will also continue to raise the bar on existing bosses as well as add new enemies and encounters. Finally, we've got some crazy concepts for new Gear and Super Mods that we're experimenting with, including a few melee weapons! We'll preview them as we make progress.



I realize it had been a long time between patches, so I'd like to thank you all for waiting. While this update required us to completely rewrite several of the most core architectures of the game (work we began even before the Syzygy update!) I think it was well worth it. It is now fast and easy to create new Nova Drift content, and I am very relieved the hardest part of development is over. I'm excited to get back into the creative space that inspired the project in the first place.

We've got quite an active discord with a very chill and inclusive community. The devs are also pretty active there. We recently opened some new channels like #ask-the-devs, #weekly-discussion, #frequently-asked-questions, and #feedback. The latter allows you to submit feedback to a bot that lets players upvote or downvote the suggestion. I'm also quite proud of the #game-dev-help channel, which is a space for current and aspiring developers to learn and collaborate. So... come chat with us!

Steam Reviews really help! As a tiny operation, Nova Drift relies on its quality and reputation to sell, and reviews also encourage the Steam algorithms to show the game to more people. Please do take a moment to fill out a short review, even if it's only a few words. It just might make a big difference.

Thanks for reading. Best wishes,

Chimeric / Jeffrey Nielson

Our next major update, releasing on January 18th, represents the first part of "Enemies 2.0", Nova Drift's largest ever overhaul. Enemies 2.0 will be rolled out in several parts, the first of which focuses on enemy encounters. The update is currently being tested on the Beta Branch, if you'd like to give it a try. We've created special channels on the Discord server for you to discuss the changes and submit feedback. Please keep in mind that the update is not finished and we've still got a lot of work to do, especially on difficulty tuning!

To access the BETA branch on Steam: Right click the game in your Library and go to PROPERTIES, switch to the BETAS tab, and choose the "beta" branch. You might also have to exit Steam and restart it to force the update.

Nothing is set in stone for these updates, but things may go a bit like this:

(Launching Jan 18th)

• Dynamic waves overhaul
  
• Enemy formations
  
• 6 new enemies & boss overhaul (Station Omega)
  
• Battlefield zoom

• 5 alternate bosses
  
• Boss Rush challenge mode
  
• Draft challenge mode

• More new enemies
  
• More classic boss overhauls
  
• Further refinements to dynamic waves

And as usual, these updates will also contain a whole lot of new stuff to play with, balance changes, quality of life changes, localizations, and other surprises.

Long story short, we've ripped out all of the enemy waves you're used to and replaced them with a system that procedurally generates them. Some people have expressed interest in exactly how they work, so let's break it down!

The first thing the script does is decide which enemy to spawn by picking from a weighted list. Some enemies are a lot more common than others. Some enemies don't have a weight until you've reached a high enough wave to encounter them.



Note that "waveInfo" is outputting exactly what the spawner is doing to both the debug console and the in-game wave log, which is accessible with cheats. This will really help us balance these huge changes during the beta.

It's getting all of this spawn data from a different script where many parameters are defined for the enemies, enemy spawn types, enemy entrances, and enemy formations.



Each enemy has a defined set of ways it can spawn, enemies it prefers to be paired with, and followers it's capable of supporting in formations.

Next, the spawner must look up the different types of spawns that are valid for the selected enemy types and, again, choose one by weight (some spawns are more common than others). Spawn types determine the position and order enemies spawn in, whether they have followers, and if they do, how the followers behave.



Spawn types include: standard, arc, centered, fleet, pincer, v formation, v formation pincer, spiral, spiral double, spiral triple, box, cascading pincer, cascading pincer opposing, cascading fleet, cascading adjacent, cascading edges, formation: orbit, formation: flank, formation: rank and file, formation: trail, formation: protect, formation: support

Some enemies can enter the battlefield via a portal or by emerging from the background. This time the entrance is selected randomly from the choices.



A lot of factors determine how many enemies should be spawned. First, the script uses triangular distribution to get a base value from a low, mean, and high value derived from the spawn info. Then, it adds some random factor and scales it based on how far the player has progressed. Next it determines if this is going to be a paired wave. Paired waves mean that two dynamic spawns are happening at once, each with reduced enemy quantity.



Paired waves are usually inherently more difficult, so the two waves add up to 85% of the original quantity. (52.5% quantity for the first wave and 32.5% quantity for the paired wave).

Later, in step 6, it'll multiply quantity yet again based on which spawn type is being used.



Spawn types with a high quantity multiplier tend to be easier, distributed gradually, or more infrequent.

Certain enemy types either always repeat (like Saucers) or sometimes repeat (such as Interceptors or Shredder Mines). As the players reach higher waves, these waves are able to repeat more times. There is also a function here that determines how long the delay should be between a repeating wave. This is useful in some spawn types, too, like the spiral spawn.



One of the most exciting features of Enemies 2.0 are enemy formations.



There's more: Protect (stay between the player and the leader) and Support (cower behind the leader).

To make a formation, enemy follower quantity is first determined using the same method as the leader quantities. Followers may also have the ability to cascade their actions. For instance, if a formation spawns with a leader orbited by 8 Wardens, they might fire one at a time, slightly offset, instead of firing all at once. This makes things a bit more interesting. Also, followers might decide to break off from their leader, one at a time. The values that drive those behaviors are defined here, too.



Formation break off is especially interesting with the new kamikaze unit, the Hammerhead!

First, some default values are defined for the enemy spawner to use, many of which are overwritten by the unique needs of each spawn type. Now the script has generated all the variables it needs to tell the spawnEnemies() script what to do! A switch statement contains the spawn conditions for every spawn type that may have previously been selected.



This is code for 3 of the 22 different spawn types.

The enemy spawner objects are responsible for a lot, too, but covering how those work could be a whole separate blog post. In short, they do the following:

• Determine, based on what was spawned and how many things were spawned, how much time should be added to the clock before the next wave automatically advances
  
• Stores an array of all enemies to spawn, coordinates where they should spawn, and determines their rarity (meaning the enemy could upgrade to elite or champion)
  
• Handles creating portals, warnings, etc
  
• Sets timers to create the enemy objects at the correct time and place
  
• Creates and arranges the enemy's followers, if any
  
• Repeat for incremental or repeating spawns, as needed
  
• And, finally, silently self destructs and experiences unending peace in the great beyond

But the Dynamic Waves script isn't finished yet...

Almost done. Now, the script sees if a Cherub (a new support enemy) wave is paired with the wave (at no extra charge!). This is something that happens very rarely. Next, paired spawns are handled. If it was determined earlier that the wave would be a paired one, it runs the dynamicWaves script again, this time with instructions to create that specific enemy wave with reduced quantity (and with formations excluded).



While procedurally generated waves do add massive variety to Nova Drift, I ultimately decided that I did not want to have every possible wave (except bosses) be this unpredictable. There are some particularly mean or wacky things (like the above example) that are much better handled as "mostly curated" waves. I'd like to create a system that takes an array of such handcrafted waves and scales them based on a few simple variables like wave progression. The player would encounter these waves at wave multiples of 5 or 10, instead of Dynamic Waves, when the player is not facing bosses.

Also a bunch of other new stuff is coming that needs wrapping up...







It's been very interesting and extremely challenging crafting this system with the enormous help of our resident "Code Elf", Ultraken. It pulled me wayyy out of my comfort zone, it took half a year to create all the related assets, and I learned an almost overwhelming amount. When I started Nova Drift 7 years ago I was coming from an art background and was barely able to code, relying mostly on Game Maker's "drag 'n drop" functions and forum-copy-pasta. I feel like I've come a long way, this may be the first time I wasn't entirely embarrassed to show the "guts" of our game. Thanks for reading the blog and being a part of that journey with me. I'd also like to thank the other coders on our Discord that were able to provide feedback and guidance.

Steam reviews really help! As a tiny operation, Nova Drift relies on its quality and reputation to sell, and reviews also encourage the Steam algorithms to show the game to more people. Please do take a moment to fill out a short review, even if it's only a few words. It just might make a big difference.

Best wishes,

Chimeric

Hello players new and old,

It's time to give some brand new peeks at what's coming up for Nova Drift in 2021. The full details on everything can be found at Chimeric's Blog, but here's a pretty comprehensive review in case you want to keep your experience fully in-Steam...

Quick note - the Nova Drift OST is currently 55% off for the next week!



One of the more common complaints about Nova Drift is dying to late-game confusion. Player feedback indicated that things were feeling cramped as waves get into the several hundreds the screen begins to fill and with bullets and explosions. Also, the more tactical enemy formations that we wanted to create required more room to work correctly. We needed a way to control the battlefield size. To mitigate these concerns we added camera zoom functionality allowing us to pan out and view a larger battlefield. In future versions, the game will gradually zoom out as waves advance, or zoom way out for certain big encounters. We also added shiny new parallaxing starfields.




In order to make the zoom changes super-noticeable we revamped Station Omega. It was made 70% larger, much bulkier, and more visually interesting. We also gave all of its visual effects a once-over and added some new ones. It's more or less the same fight, but now it is easier to access its vulnerable nodes. Most bosses will similarly receive a revision before we're done and a few will receive drastic overhauls.




Most bosses and many enemies will be overhauled over the course of the Enemies 2.0 updates. Additionally, many brand new enemies and alternate boss encounters will be introduced. Here's a preview of some of them:








The backbone of enemies 2.0, enemy formations allow us to assign enemies certain behaviors while their leader exists. Currently there are 6 formations:

• Trail - Enemies follow their leader in a line
  
• Orbit - Enemies orbit their leaders in an ellipse
  
• Flank - Enemies flank their leaders at a certain angle
  
• Rank and File - Enemies line up rank and file behind their leader
  
• Support - Enemies focus on healing and supporting their leader instead of nearby allies
  
• Protect - Enemies will place themselves between you and their leader

We've got quite an active discord with a very chill and inclusive community. The dev team is also pretty active there. We recently upgraded the server to level 2 and opened some new channels like #ask-the-devs and #feedback. The latter allows you to submit feedback to a bot that lets players upvote or downvote the suggestion. I'm also quite proud of the #game-dev-help channel, which is a space for current and aspiring developers to learn and collaborate. So... come chat with us!

Finally, please consider leaving a review if you haven't yet - it always helps the game reach new players, which is nice!

Thanks for reading,

- MIles @ Pixeljam / Jeffrey @ Chimeric

Thanks to everyone for their entries! Here are the official winners... please note that a single person can't win in multiple categories:

WILD META FIRST PLACE: FlashBPanther - 7.46.28 - https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1013064284
NORMAL MODE FIRST PLACE: ngi_ery - 7.35.24 - https://youtu.be/RLCcTWqS7IY

SECOND PLACE (Wild meta): Batotsu El del Mostacho - 8.16.02 - https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1009362772
THIRD PLACE (Wild meta): Idiotica - 9.21.22 - https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1004714155

SECOND PLACE (Normal mode): Ge - 8.03.27 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSfnB7rq60Q&t=3s
THIRD PLACE (Normal mode): Shadow Sovereign - 8.15.04 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdMU-bncF8k&ab_channel=BrandonBurnett

Special Mentions:

Massive Damage Award - Idiotica - https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1004714155
iPhone 15 Award (aka tallest screen) - UDTakeover - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Vle1ru431G0OOxRWkJEfxahOwWVrCZwI/view?usp=sharing
Pacficist Award - Epileptix - https://youtu.be/pWk6bQcimXs

I'll DM everyone with their prizes. Ping me if you don't get yours...

Hello everyone! While Jeffrey (Chimeric) decompresses from the incredible task of moving his entire life and family halfway across the planet, I will be helming the next major event, which will be described right after a brief message that Nova Drift is currently 40% off for the next 13 days, and the soundtrack is 50% off as well. This is a great time to get both things as a bundle for that buddy that enjoys both novas and drifting: https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/12177/Nova_Drift_Game__Soundtrack/

Now onto the main event:


Duration:
Submissions will be accepted between now and May 11th, 2021, 12:00 PM EST.

Submission Rules:
- Time must taken using the built-in Speedrun Mode timer.
- Submissions must be accompanied by video, with your time visible.
- Videos must contain the loadout screen, the full gameplay, and the end game screen. High resolution is preferred, but not required. Feel free to compress the video in order to make upload and download speeds more reasonable.
- Recording must have game sound and no substantial area of the screen blocked.
- Time starts on the first frame the player is visible and stops when the wave 100 Seraph is destroyed. Your time selecting upgrades also counts!
- No mods or game altering software may be used.
- Links to your video may posted in the #contests-submissions channel on Discord (https://discord.gg/Zp2MkPJ) or in the newly created Contest Submission Steam discussion: <https://steamcommunity.com/app/858210/discussions/0/3130541756136966467/>. You can chat about the contest in #contests-chat on Discord.

Game Rules:
-The wave 100 Seraph must be destroyed.
-In the rare instance that the Seraph is damaged by a singularity or comet, the run will be considered invalid.
-All Challenge Modes must be unlocked and turned on. Practice Game Mode must be disabled.
-If you enable Wild Metamorphosis, your submission will be entered into the WILD META contest, else you will be entered into the NORMAL contest.

Prizes (for both contests):
5 Nova Drift and Nova Drift OST keys to give to your buddies, plus public recognition!
And if you want it: The Pixeljam Complete game bundle (Itch.io key)

Other prizes will be given to second and third place, plus perhaps bonuses for extra creative speedrunning solutions :)

FAQ:
Q) Loadout screen?
A) The game over screen that shows all the mods that created your build.

Q) How to turn on the timer?
A) In the game settings screen

Q) After I beat Seraph should I just kill my player?
A) Probably, unless you want the video to be way longer :slight_smile:

Q) Can I upload the video to youtube or other similar platform?
A) Sure, just send us the link to the youtube video. However you want to host and share the video with us is fine.

Q) Can I submit multiple videos as I do better and better?
A) Yes!

Q) Will the timer keep going after I beat Seraph?
A) Yes, but the sub-timers will show the final time to beat Seraph, and that's the time we'll use.

Good luck! Now get runnin'...

Hello all,

We're excited to finally launch the latest major update to Nova Drift, titled SYZYGY, which we assure you is a real word.



View the PATCH NOTES for the full details of the new features and changes, but here are the highlights:

• Speedrun Mode has been added to the Settings menu. While this is toggled, you'll always see your game time and wave. Additionally, the game will display your splits for each boss you defeat and submit to the new leaderboard once Seraph is defeated (wave 100).
  
• 2 new music tracks have been added: Parallelism (in normal mode) and its remix Parallelism (Freed) (in Wild Meta mode)
  
• Added a unique animation and sound effect for player death that scales in intensity as your level (for that run) increases. This is powered the shiny brand new Visual FX Engine that will be used in other parts of the game in future updates.
  
• Major reworks for Singular Strike, Warp Shield, Salvo & Vortex.
  
• Over 100 balance adjustments and bug fixes!

April 13 UPDATE: Hotfix V. 0.31.20 is now live, fixing several construct-related crashes.

This is also an update to keep you busy while you wait for the first round of enemy improvements and additions. With this update, we have switched to the new enemy "engine" in preparation for those changes, so there may be some growing pains to iron out. Let us know if anything is amiss in the bugs discussion or on Discord.

As usual, please leave a review for the game if you have not yet: https://store.steampowered.com/recommended/recommendgame/858210/ - this helps a lot with getting the game in front of new players.

With this update complete, we are now prepared to focus fully on the Enemies 2.0 updates we discussed in previous posts. To be released over many small incremental updates, Enemies 2.0 will bring new enemies, fresh enemy behaviors and formations, enemy support roles, alternate bosses, new power ups, secrets, and reworks to existing enemy content, both mechanical and visual. Beyond raising the bar on enemies, the overhaul aims to improve Nova Drift's variety, scaling, and fairness, while emphasizing tactical gameplay, improving build versatility, and reducing general chaos and confusion. It's a Nova Drift renaissance!

Enjoy the update, and take care :)

-Miles @ Pixeljam

A balance update in the BETA branch to keep you busy while you wait for the first round of enemy improvements and additions. With this update, we have switched to the new enemy "engine", so there may be some growing pains to iron out.

Don't worry! We've already made huge progress toward the enemy updates you've been waiting for.

Minor Features and Improvements

• Speedrun Mode has been added to the Settings menu! While this is toggled, you'll always see your game time and wave. Additionally, the game will display your splits for each boss you defeat
  
• Since we're supporting speedrunning, the game now uses "real time" instead of game time. As a result, your time at game end is accurate regardless of your hardware
  
• Comets now shatter on enemies they can't one shot, creating a spray of rock and ice. This helps make comets less swingy on boss fights and more interesting during encounters
  
• Added a unique FX and SFX for the player death! The higher your level when you die, the more spectacular it is (up to level 50). The SFX you hear will be a little different, each time, too
  
• Added a new setting: Auto deploy Turrets
  
• Added a new setting: Auto deploy Mines
  
• Added a new BGM Track: "Parallelism"
  
• Added a new BGM Track: "Parallelism Freed", the remix to Parallellism, that plays in Wild Metamorphosis
  
• BGM Tracks: Zeroed, Recursor, and NoGrav now play in both Wild Metamorphosis and standard as they have no remix
  
• Auto deploy will no longer behave differently for Architect. If you do not want architect to auto deploy, you can leave these settings off
  
• Constructs will now attempt to avoid impending blasts, such as Celestial bombs
  
• "Centering" enemies on screen now works better with various monitor aspect ratios
  
• Grenades, Grenade submunitions, and Salvo missiles are no longer removed from the game if you level up while they are present
  
• The player won't take damage from enemies or celestial hazards while touching a singularity until 3 seconds after they come out
  
• Reroll drops in the Wild Metamorphosis challenge mode are consistent with the reroll penalty at game start, which is 50% fewer rerolls. Previously this rate was reduced, but not consistently
  
• Improved the accuracy of measuring various shield radii

Balance and Mechanical Changes

• Super Mod: Singular Strike has been reworked. New rules: Your weapon behaves as though your projectile count is 1. Your projectile count beyond 1 is fused into your single projectile, strengthening it. Up to 25 projectiles can be fused. +15% damage, size, and blast radius. Each projectile fused adds an additional 50% of its damage to your projectile. Each projectile fused further increases the size and blast radius of your projectile, with diminishing returns. +.1-second rate of fire delay
  
• Warp Shield has been reworked, and given updated visuals. The warp destination no longer automatically rotates around you, and is instead forward facing. It has gained a new power: If your shield protects you when it breaks, you will be intangible for .75s while teleporting. In this state, you may steer the position of the destination point around your shield radius
  
• Salvo has been reworked. Salvo now stockpiles 4 missiles per .5 second interval. Modifiers to projectile count affect the number of missiles stockpiled per interval while modifiers to rate of fire affect the interval duration. It still has diminishing returns as the stockpile becomes larger. Salvo is considered a 4-base-projectile weapon
  
• As a result of the above changes, Salvo begins weaker, but scales much more powerfully from many weapon mods. Also, Salvo always fires 1 missile and ignores burst fire. However, for the purposes of barrage, it still behaves as it previously did
  
• Salvo seeking begins to decay after being in existence for too long (this is only noticeable with really, really slow projectiles)
  
• Salvo-Loaded Mines now calculate their projectile count based on a stockpile of one second
  
• Vortex has been reworked, with the goal of making it easier to use at low levels, and less out of control when pushed to the maximum. Vortex charges faster at small sizes, and has a lower base cost of self-damage. However, to compensate, the self-damage costs scale more exponentially with the size of the vortex. You may need to release your Vortex sooner at very high sizes!
  
• Vortex scaling has been made generally more sensible and consistent under the hood. Singular Strike now applies its size bonus during the charge rather than on release
  
• Vortex has been given new visuals that are less blinding and occlusive. Also, the Vortex is held slightly farther away from the player so you are less likely to collide with your target
  
• 18 -> 12 base projectile count for Flak. Flak has gained a new power: Doubles added projectiles gained from upgrades. Slightly reduced Flak spread and projectile size
  
• Made Grenade's cluster count less prolific at high size modifiers. Shouldn't affect much at low values
  
• Blade used to deal "area" damage if it was in contact with a target. Blade now does this all the time, making it more reliable and generally more destructive, especially at larger sizes. Its area hitbox has been made more accurate
  
• Blades have a new hidden ability: They now take -50% less total damage from all sources (except self-damage)
  
• 1.75s -> 1.5s Blade assembly time
  
• Blades no longer trigger so much player self-damage from mods that scale with your rate of fire
  
• Overseer will now only add additional blades from base construct count and added constructs, not from projectile mods
  
• 180 -> 220 base damage for Pulse
  
• Pulse projectiles now work with all projectile mods!
  
• 50% -> 35% Pulse base damage for Pulse shards
  
• Thermal Lance base beam damage has been increased by 15%
  
• Cloak rate for Spectre is now 1% faster per your level
  
• +200% -> +250% cloak max stealth bonus
  
• Shockwave shield small pulses have a 22% longer delay between pulses. Shockwave shield now only releases its large shockwave on shield reset if the shield has broken
  Orbital Shield now gains less magnitude based on how much magnitude it already has, resulting in a soft cap on size and damage. To compensate, the base magnitude gain from damage has been increased ~21%. (Orbital was reaching potentially screen-sized sizes, shutting down enemies completely)
  
• Firefly thruster size now also scales with sources of "total" thrust, such as Amp and Ataraxia
  
• 25% -> 15% Firefly self-damage resistance
  
• 25% -> 15% Firefly crash damage resistance (Firefly was already the whole package with no drawbacks on top of being capable of massive area burn damage)
  
• Body power multipliers now affect Battery projectile size modifier
  
• 600% -> 400% for Leviathan max crash damage bonus
  
• Banishing any Wild Mod using the Research body gear now costs 2 rerolls, however Research now gains its defensive buff for spending rerolls by banishing, not for the amount of mods banished. (Research has become a staple of truly busted Wild Metamorphosis builds to the point of becoming practically mandatory in the highest scoring builds. Something had to be done)
  
• Overseer has been reworked. It now provides +1 to advanced constructs instead of doubling them. It still doubles basic and standard construct assembly limits. Overseer's assembly speed buff has been increased 1% to 2% to match its thrust malus. (Overseer's explosive power when combined with Engineer was negatively impacting game balance. Without making this change, advanced constructs would need to be made weaker, which negatively impacts all other ship bodies). As a result of this change, some constructs have been adjusted to help compensate for the loss of power to Engineer via Overseer:
  
  
• 30 -> 25 second assembly time for Allies
  
• 35 -> 30 second assembly time for Turrets
  
• 125 -> 150 hull for Turrets
  
• 25 -> 30 damage for Drones
  
• .04% -> .05% assembly speed per your level for Elegant Construction
  
• -30% -> -40% drone rate of fire for Rocket Drones
  
• +25% -> +60% damage for Rocket Drones
  
• +30% -> +40% drone hull for Reinforced Drones
  
  
• Weapon movement and turn rate modifiers now apply to Interceptor Ally
  
• Interceptor Allies will not fire a number of Blade Drones exceeding your Blade assembly limit
  
• Barrage will now only scale additional projectiles for Blades from projectile modifiers, not construct assembly limit modifiers
  
• Splinter Shot projectile count has been made less prolific at very high size values
  
• Super Mod: Tempest Break now requires Deadly Wake and Flash Shielding instead of Streamline and Flash Shielding. (Shieldbreaker builds couldn't afford to be this fragile)
  
• +8 -> +10 base damage for Super Mod: Barrage, which now grants base damage instead of flat damage
  
• 25% -> 30% maximum hull or shields converted for Conversion
  
• Siege Weaponry now works with Charged Shot, Thermal Lance, and Vortex. This applies self-damage continuously while charging, and the rate of fire multiplier from Siege-Weaponry applies to the charge rate
  
• Siege Weaponry + Charged Shot now boosts Salvo stockpile rate while charging
  
• Siege Weaponry + Interceptor Ally now applies construct fire rate multiplier
  
• Weapon total thrust while firing malus are now multiplicative with each other. Base maluses of this type have been adjusted: Thermal Lance, Torrent, and Vortex -35% -> -30%
  
• -90% -> -80% total thrust while firing for Siege Weaponry. Siege Weaponry's ramping self damage has been made less severe
  
• Charged Shot minimum bonus value is now +0%, instead of +15%
  
• -80% -> -90% for Calibrate max spread reduction
  
• Splinter shot velocity now has a floor. This helps things like Blade bursts stay relevant when the projectile is at the apex of boomeranging
  
• Rare Wild Mod: Twin Strike spread reduction is now a "total" modifier to your spread
  
• -15% -> -10% for rare Wild Mod: Twin Strike total spread modifier
  
• -5% -> -7% for rare Wild Mod: Twin Strike cooldown and recovery
  
• +10% -> +7% weapon damage and projectile size for Heavy Caliber
  
• -10% -> -7% weapon velocity for Heavy Caliber
  
• Wild Mod: Maelstrom scaling has been adjusted similarly to how Orbital Shield was
  
• Wild Mod: Scorching Wake fireballs now offset more the more you have, causing them to be less clumped-up
  
• Wild Mod: Solar Heart has been made more impactful. It's bonuses have been doubled and it's malus has been more than doubled
  
• +50% -> +40% global damage for Hidden Power (This massive bonus was from an older time, where there were fewer ways to deal "secondary damage")
  
• Firing Array has been reworked. New Rules: +15% total projectile damage and blast radius for your central projectile. Other projectiles also receive adjustments to projectile damage and blast radius, incrementally decreasing to 0% for your outermost projectiles. +30% total projectile size for your central projectile. Your other projectiles also receive adjustments to projectile size, incrementally decreasing to -30% for your outermost projectiles
  
• Gemini Protocol now works for shielded constructs
  
• Rare Wild Mod: Obsession has been reworked. It now only applies the malus for recursive mods added by Obsession, not for your total Wild Mods owned. As a result, the malus has been increased from 1 % to 3% of your total hull and shields
  
• Wild Mod: Spontaneous Generation no longer self-destructs Architect's constructs.
  
• +3% -> +2% maximum hull and shields for Wild Mod: Rampage
  
• Hull threshold triggers have been reworked. This affects Retribution and Outrage Module. They now trigger based on the original damage dealt, and not the damage taken. Since this is more damage, the trigger threshold has been increased from 10% to 15% of your maximum hull (This change was primarily made so that "Minebreaker" builds could work again, now that Retribution has limitations)
  
• Armor stack quantity gained by taking damage has been reduced by 37.5%. To compensate, Rebuke damage has been increased 60%. (Adaptive Armor was insane value for one point, and pretty much a mandate for any very high scoring build. It still provides a lot of defense when needed, but it's now more in line with other defensive mods)
  
• Self damage "hits" no longer always give at least one armor stack, but Self-damage now generates armor stacks at a more favorable rate. 50% -> 75% efficiency
  
• 35 -> 40 base hull from Rapid Reconstruction
  
• +80% -> +100% regeneration from Rapid Reconstruction
  
• 25 -> 100 damage for Blink (This change was primarily made so that the Super Mod: Displacement deals more relevant damage
  
• Super Mod: Burnout Reactors + Gemini Protocol now behaves as you'd expect
  
• Each type of damage resistance is now additive with other sources of the same type instead of either additive or multiplicative. Fixed several inconsistencies with how damage resistance is calculated
  
• Stacking burn damage from enemy orbs, especially from Seraph, takes longer to ramp up to its full damage, starting from 0. This effect has been applied to enemy deadly wakes, as well. My hope is that these are less of a hard counter to Leviathan as a result, as well as making Seraph and Spitfire less of an "insta-kill" at very high waves
  
• Regeneration and shield cooldown no longer occurs if the player is invulnerable (except during Emergency Systems)
  
• Made knockback from the player less extreme at high values

Localization Changes

• For strings that were changed this update, and new strings moving forward, tool-tip numbers now reflect in-game variables. This means that changes which only affect numbers will not require re-translation
  
• Improved dozens of upgrade descriptions

Fixes and Under The Hood

• Removed the requirement that you first orb come from an enemy if you're skipping waves using the Danger Zone challenge mod
  
• Previously, "flat" damage and "base" damage behaved inconsistently, scaling from some things they should not, in order of operations different than what you'd expect. This has been corrected. All instances of flat damage are now base damage, and base damage is simply added to the weapon base damage before modifiers. This affects: Wild Mod: Solar Heart, Super Mod: Antimatter Rounds, and Super Mod: Barrage
  
• Fixed some hitboxes that were slowly and invisibly rotating, causing some unintended behavior
  
• Fixed Corrosion's wildly inaccurate tool tip damage
  
• Rewrote Bastion code to try to be less of an error-prone special snowflake
  
• Windowed Mode: For window sizes that fit vertically but not horizontally, we now clamp the width to the maximum and allow it to be used
  
• Leviathan tries harder to keep its segments together
  
• Leviathan, at extreme sizes, now doesn't show its seams while wrapping
  
• Crates outside the edge of the screen are allowed to generate loot normally when destroyed
  
• Charged Mines now correctly reduces your mine assembly limit, as it claims it does
  
• Fixed Constructs using Siege Weaponry automatically having Saturation Fire
  
• Fixed reflected projectiles not getting handled properly in a few places
  
• Fixed recoil resistance not affecting player recoil from Heavy Caliber
  
• Fixed Calibrate applying in a few cases it shouldn't have
  
• Fixed some inconsistencies with Blade assembly limit being misreported
  
• Fixed Turret Specialist not reducing Turret self-damage
  
• Fixed the Construct Swarm rate of fire boost only applying to a single advanced Swarm Construct
  
• Fixed Venom Strike not scaling with body power multipliers
  
• Warp Strike now wraps wider, allowing the weapon to hit off-screen enemies more reliably
  
• Railgun and crash damage now can't reach quite such extreme values of screen shake and has a cap
  
• Fixed a silly bug where one half of Eclipse chassis had their rarity bonuses applied twice, and the other had none
  
• Fixed the possibility of Retribution occurring if you can't assemble and deploy constructs
  
• Fixed some strange scaling with some blast radii
  
• Fixed several cases where weird things could apply Essense Sap
  
• Fixed Hives being trapped off-screen
  
• Dart projectiles now disable wrapping and destroy-outside behavior while lodged in something
  
• Made the knockback modifier from Polar Inversion work on a case by case basis so things like enemy recoil and comets aren't affected
  
• Things that worked in a circular range have been made more accurate, using real pixel values
  
• Included some missing Simplified Chinese characters
  
• Wild Mod: Winnow can no longer banish THE VOID and does not grant rerolls or size reduction for them

See the build history at: https://blog.novadrift.io/patch-notes/

Hello all!

We're doing a developer stream TONIGHT, Wednesday, 9:30 PM EST at https://www.twitch.tv/pixeljamgames.

Come hang out with me (Miles), who is not the lead dev by any means, who will be video hosting Jeffrey, who by all means IS the lead dev.

Miles will be fiddling with the new Visual FX Generator, working with Jeffrey to find interesting and beautiful presets to plug into the game. Jeffrey will be answering all your questions, provided they are about the game and not random life advice, which Miles will answer because he has more bandwidth for that type of thing.



See you then?

-Miles @ Pixeljam