Welcome back and Happy New Year!

This is going to be a BIG year for Hopoo Games and I cannot wait to tell you more about what we have in store for you in the future - for today we’ll start with meeting a new friend!

Don’t forget the Dev Thoughts also comes in a super-sweet video format! I’ve done something slightly different this month - let me know what you think in the comments!



Before we meet our new friend… Some big announcements are in order!

The Risk of Rain 2 Expansion - Survivors of the Void - will launch on Steam on March 1st 2022

The SRP of the Expansion will be $15 - but for a short period at launch this will be discounted down to just $9.75!!

Aaaaaand finally before we get into the rest of the Dev Thoughts - check out the Steam Page which has been freshly updated!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1607890/Survivors_of_the_Void

Now its time to meet the first of two new playable characters in Survivors of the Void.






Railgunner is a specialist at long range single-target massive damage. She has a number of unique tools and mechanics that make her the queen of making anything in her sights turn into a red mist.


Or into pink blobs of beetle brains

This month’s Dev Thoughts is devoted to showcasing the Railgunner’s abilities - first up is her iconic M99 Sniper mode (Oops.. I said the S word already.)





Activate your long-range scope, highlighting Weak Points and transforming your weapon into a piercing 1000% damage railgun.





Unlike other survivors, the Railgunner’s attacks cannot randomly crit - when you hit one of the highlighted Weak Points through her scope you are guaranteed a Critical Strike - All Critical Strike Chance gained through items and equipment is converted into Critical Strike Damage.

After firing a shot the Railgunner’s M99 Sniper mode starts an Active Reload bar - a perfect reload lets you fire your next shot sooner and also makes that shot deal an additional +500% base damage.





Next up is Railgunner’s non-scoped attack




In a perfect world the Railgunner wouldn’t have to use the XQR Smart Round System - but as we’re all painfully aware Petrichor V is not a perfect world…

When you’re not using the scope the railgun fires rapid fire smart rounds that home in on enemies for 100% damage.

While it doesn't have the stopping power of the M99 Sniper - it certainly has its uses. It can help attack close range enemies that are swarming you





it can also quickly finish off those enemies that, selfishly, haven't quite died to a single railgun shot.





Next up we have an ability that actually makes the Railgunner rival Loader in maneuverability…




Railgunner utilises very versatile Concussion Devices that have two primary uses.

Firstly with a well timed jump it can be used to propel yourself to high or distant places to escape danger or get a better vantage point





(or both)

And it can also be used to knock back smaller enemies, breaking up dangerous packs making them easier to pick off one by one.

Its third secret use is that it makes damn cool trickshot-gifs for development blogs.





And finally the pièce de résistance in Railgunner’s arsenal..




Railgunner’s special ability is the Supercharge. Briefly overloading her railgun turns it into a boss one-shotting beast - firing a huge piercing round for 4000% damage and 150% Weak Point damage.





With this great power comes a big drawback, once used ALL your railgun weapons are disabled for 5 seconds leaving you with just your Concussion Device for defence - you had better make that shot count!

The Overcharge is also much wider than a usual shot - making it very useful for taking out large conga-lines of enemies.





It’s also very useful for killing that Solus Control Unit that always seems to spawn at the start of Sky Meadows from across the stage.







And that concludes our deeper dive into Railgunner’s abilities! She does of course have alternate abilities to unlock and an alternate skin for beating the game on monsoon much like the other survivors - but i’ll leave those up to you to discover for yourselves!


Let the speculation commence!

Don’t forget to check out the video Dev Thoughts above for some extended play footage of Railgunner & See you again soon when we will be very close to the release of Risk of Rain 2: Survivors of the Void.






Adios!

Jonathan @ Hopoo Games

Regular readers will have probably noticed that I mention testers a lot in these emails. It makes sense though, it's honestly thanks to them that the game is shaping up to be what it is. Testing a game in progress is not always fun; the game is incomplete, buggy and hard to understand. Tester tears are constantly shed. Usually, little by little though, it gets better. But this time is a bit different. I've been tackling one of the main tester complaints, and this time we're aiming for a big jump in quality 💪

I'm talking of course about the tutorial.

This is an image of just a fraction of the tutorial improvements I've been asked for:



And slowly, but surely, I've been tackling them. So far:

• I've created a new tutorial level that focuses more on connections
  
• streamlined the objectives so they are more visible
  
• simplified language
  
• will change the last level to focus more on turns and abilities.

The tutorial is a bit longer, but information should flow better 😀



There's still work to do, but it's really shaping up. I hope to have it ready by next week. For all you co-conspirators that haven't played the game yet; when you do, pour one out for the testers who suffered to give you a better experience.

Happy conspiring!
Rafa

Today I would like to share the progress of work on the updated build mode. There will be 3 types of placeable objects in the game: floor (beds, tables, chairs, etc.), wall-mounted (shelves, paintings, etc.) and decor, which can be placed both on the floor and on other objects, according to type of tables and shelves.

Check this out:



More cool development news coming soon! Good luck to all!
In the meantime, you can add the game to your wishlist or follow the development on my Twitter.

Hi everyone!

Today, we have some exciting news to share with everyone - Shadow Warrior 3 is launching on March 1st! In case you prefer to consume your news in a more visual form, have a look at this chunky pre-rendered trailer



In addition to announcing the release date, we have opened pre-orders which come with a nice bonus in the shape of Koromodako Katana, a weapon so great we gave it eight legs. Check a look.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1036890/Shadow_Warrior_3

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2716030614

A yellow episode of petronille_marie's series of coloured levels-terraforming, fields on naturally occurring wild yellow biplanes and watching your engines delivering components to the yellow potion Lab through yellow flowers populated hills. DNRT.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2717128899
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2720380669

Familiar layout yet different gameplay? @petronille_marie delivers-two different DNSAT levels with same lay of the land: attractive lake setting with islands rising from below the lake and revealing additional production buildings to connect to your supply chain.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2721437868

A terraforming puzzle spiced up with DNSAT, Lost Mines has multi-level terrain that turns every delivery into a separate journey of planning railway network extensions with extra care. With demolition team unavailable and 14 minutes on the 5-star timer, this valley is a formidable challenge.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2715965783

Indeed, we have just 60 seconds on the timer, but combined with Earn 28 000 TV2$ and Blow Up 1 Train objectives Very Short presents a puzzle with curiously higher replayability potential :) Dubbed "evil" by the Workshop commenters, this submission is a different experience.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2720425883

Potion-making, Customs stations, complex railway junctions, unexpected shortcuts, autofactories and unconfirmed reports of some LPT-tier tricks involved. A fine recipe that gives a taste of true train puzzle challenge and strength to enhance on it with your own Editor creations :)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2720368222

A multi network level with quite some multitasking and almost no changing zoom level and moving your camera around. Compact design that houses two separate supply chains is to be united into one with a trivial 350 000 TV2$ construction project. 40 minutes on the clock and at least 200 track tiles to build.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2717265752

We are breaking into a snowman bank/stronghold. We are to rescue snowman crews from under the water, but the Earn At Least 2 700 000 TV2$ objective and seven separate entry points we can blow up to gain access to the shiny treasure indicate we can...pursue additional venues while we are at it :) We have highly trained spiders, dynamite factory ready to go, no idea where the next terrafoming event will take place and 20 minutes on the timer. Enjoy your ride!

Congratulations on your well-deserved award @LittleBear! A €10 Steam gift card will be delivered by our contact ASAP.

Tell us about your TV2 workshop adventures and visit our Discord server for an upcoming LPT challenge. Until next week!

----

*Do No Stop Any Trains
*Do Not Destroy Any Track Tiles
*Do Not Reverse Trains
*Do Not Use Pause

----

:tvhook: Train Valley 2 Discord Server.

:tv2computer: Our Twitter.

When Animation Studio Manager first entered Early Access a few months ago, I got lots of feedback from streamers and players. They liked the potential of the game, but it was rough. Over the last several months, I've been working hard to add tutorials, rebalancing and add lots of depth to the first 8 levels.

Additionally, level 9's initial rollout has begun! There are a couple level 9 features that aren't finished yet and will be included in another update coming in a few weeks - in fact, I'll be releasing a "Road Map to Completion" next week!

But for now, let's dive into the full list of updates:

• Now when you finish level 8 and click on the To-Do list, it continues on to level 9!
  
• Mom pops up to note that you two are now rivals and enemies.
  
• Instead of choosing a normal Corruption Perk, you are given a final Perk based on your current
  
• The Publicist now has access to his Level 9 Booster
  
• Production Employees now have their level 9 Awards Upgrades
  
• The final Media type is unlocked: 'Awards Bait Film'.

• As Mom notes during the Level 9 sequence, you are now competing against Mom!
  
• The Awards go like normal, except you have more Coins for Pontification and must answer a few more questions for the Paparazzi.
  
• There will be an additional minigame in the next update as well.
  
• Mom texts you to briefly taunt each time she wins an Award
  
• Mom will always win the Best Picture Award while you're in Level 9, and she should win at least one of the sub-category Awards as well.

As a full-blown Studio, you have a lot of moving pieces and sometimes things go wrong. That's what these Disasters are all about.
An issue will arise involving a piece of Inventory (Dialog, Storyboards, Scenes, or Designs) and you have three choices to deal with it:

1. Ignore it and Sacrifice some Employees. Depending on your XP Loyalty, you could lose nearly half of your Employees in each Department.
   
2. Ignore it and Sacrifice your Fan Rating. Depending on your Minimum Fan Rating Soul Perk level, you could lose up to 50% Fan Rating.
   
3. Fix the issue. If you started Level 9 with the Pure Perk, you'll need 100 of the problematic Inventory and 250 Positive PR. If you got the Corrupt Perk, you'll need 500 of the Inventory, 500 PR, $1,000,000 and 4 Soul Portions.

• Inventory Market Buy/Sell complete rebalance
  
• Several Apps got a Help Button that explains the App a bit.
  
• New App - Plant the Seeds of Pontification
  
  • At level 8, you get an App that allows you to "mention" a Genre each week to start the judges thinking about that Genre.
    
  • You can do this once each week between Awards Ceremonies (6 weeks). If you pick the same Genre each week and then submit an Awards Film with that Genre, they judges have a much greater chance of picking that Genre as their favorite, giving you bonus Award Points. (combine this with the Writer's levels 7 & 9 upgrades to guarantee they will love your work!)
    
  • Your mentions reset each Award Show, though, so you must come back each week.
  
  
• New App - Finding Balance
  
  • At level 8, you get an App that allows you to trade Rotted Potato Score for Finding Balance minigame points.
    
  • In the minigame, you are trying to reach 100 Points in each bucket. For every 10% Rotted Potato Score you trade in, you start with 5 points in both buckets.
    
  • You can trade 10% each week between Awards Ceremonies (6 weeks), but the starting score resets each Award Show, so spend your Potatoes wisely and come back each week to keep boosting your score!
  

• Overall
  
  • Happen more frequently now, based on your game mode (Easy, Medium, Hard)
    
  • I.T. and Security Toggles have also been increased to match these more frequent attacks. .
    
  • The more corrupt you are, the more likely you are to get Hackers/Viruses. Especially in Medium and Hard modes, corruption can even allow Hackers/Viruses overwhelm the Toggles
    
  • Added a variable to ensure a week between hackers/viruses
• Hackers
  
  • Added a down arrow for Hackers, so you can drop the number down, without having to go around the dial
    
  • Since the code is non-repeating, it now prevents you from selecting a number that has already been confirmed to be part of the code
  
  
• Virus
  
  • Now flashes the word "GO!" at the beginning of the game to ensure players know to begin.
    
  • Better instructions for clarity, including some pictures for reference

• Hot Seat Minigame
  
  • A lot more Hot Seat questions.
    
  • The answers that used to give 0 points now give 5 Points.
• Finding Balance:
  
  
  • Clarified instructions
    
  • Added a 3 second count-in before the game starts
    
  • Added sound effects for winning or losing.
    
  • Made Easy Mode a little easier by removing the "15" point options that fall.
    
  • Added a little more time to the ending results because they were too fast to read.
    
  • Side bars GLOW when you catch their basket.

• Corruption/Soul Restoration:
  
  • Hiring Fees. Doubled the impact that Corruption has on Hiring Fees
    
  • Corruption Perk: XP. Dropped XP amount to 25XP for Slightly Corrupt and 100XP for Corrupt
    
  • Slightly lowered the Cash payout for the levels 7 & 8 Pure Level Perks
    
  • Due to Inventory Market rebalancing, Soul Restoration using Themes has been reduced back to its previous cost of 250 Themes
• Employee Bays
  
  • Quality Control's Bay size has been reduced to match the Artist and Composer, as that is closer to the actual ratio needed.
    **Due to this change, if you load a saved game, you will only have the Quality Control Department head, but none of your Employees.**
    
  • Editor & Sound Design Bay prices have gone up slightly, but Quality Control's Bay price went down
• Media/Film Inventory Requirements
  
  • Slightly balanced Ads/Deals & Publicity for Films
    
  • Lowered Animation Requirements overall
    
  • Increased Story Requirements to more closely match Animation throughout
    
  • To make Approvals/Quality Control less confusing, the number of Approvals is now more closely aligned with the other materials instead of being 4X higher. However, to compensate, that means Q.C. now works 4X slower. So basically, this doesn't change the economy at all, it just makes things less confusing.
• Extra Credit
  
  • Balanced Media Requirements to match new 'Make Media' ratios
    
  • Increased XP output in level 2 to 25XP.
• Full TV Seasons
  
  • Increased amount of XP earn from Full Seasons to 50 / 100 / 250 / 500
    
  • At level 4, only the 11-minute TV Season unlocks to help focus the player on completing one season.
    
  • After creating the first Season, the Executive pops back up to explain that you can build your next season, but can't release another 11-minute until the previous one is canceled or renewed.
    
  • The 22-minute TV Seasons unlocks at level 5 and is now part of the To-Do list
    
  • The other two TV Seasons unlock at level 6, and the Streaming series is part of the To-Do list as well.
• Swag Bag
  
  • Lowered costs of starting high tier from 250 Inventory to 100.
    
  • Now Inventory requirements increase by 15 every time you use it.
    
  • Perk values reduced from 5%/10% to 2%/5%
• To-Do List
  
  • Level 3 now requires 4 more Writers instead of 2.
    
  • Level 5 now requires you make another Season of TV.
• Achievements
  
  • Genre Achievements have all been reduced to 10
    
  • Total Media Achievements have been reduced to 500 / 2500
    
  • Total Awards Achievements have been reduced to 10 / 25 / 50
    
  • "Cream of the Crop" now requires a Rank 5 employee in all Corporate Departments as well as
    Production Departments
    
  • 17 new Achievements, mostly related to newer features.
• Fans
  
  • Fan Demands happen slightly less frequently when your corruption is low, and more frequently as it gets higher.
    
  • Ignoring the Fan Matching Game after level 6 now results in a loss of Fan Rating as well.
• Increase Production Upgrade: Corporate Training from 10XP to 25 XP
  
• If you go Bankrupt, you lose all Employees EXCEPT Department Heads. Previously, you lost all Department heads except the Producer.

• Hover over the "Risky Business" or "Catch a Break" navigation tabs, and a Popup appears showing you any active Perks, plus how long they will still be active.
  
• Added a fourth page to the Employee Clipboard for the Awards. Awards were previously stuffed at the bottom of the Media page, but it was way too crowded
  
• Level Up Article
  
  • Has been clarified to be written by the Paparazzi News, which ties into the Paparazzi questioning you in the Awards Show.
    
  • The 3 news links on the right side of the Article now show tips when you hover over them.
• Added a little movement to the tutorial characters so they're not just staring at your blankly!
  
• Added P.R. Disasters to the Help App
  
• The Media Tablet no longer has the "Film" button until you hit level 5 since you can't make them until then.
  
• Level 5 Tutorial - If you are playing with the tutorial on, after the Producer shows you the first two Corporate hires, the Executive takes over to show you where Corporate Training is, and shows you how to access Films on the Media Tablet.
  
• Level 7 Tutorial - The Executive explains a few things about winning awards. If you lose the awards show, the producer has a meeting right away (instead of waiting for the second failure)

Since things are really close to wrapping up with this update and the next - I will be cleaning up some code including some variables to allow old version save files to still work. As long as you load/save your files before the next update, you'll be fine. If you don't load those old games, then they will be deleted.

Lots of bug fixes, some QoL additions. A lot of these issues have been around unsolved for too long and they are being fixed as part of a pass to solve long outstanding issues affecting the game.

• Customization variant picker: Similar items in the customization menu are now grouped together in the list. Clicking an item shows all the variants of that type, like different colors.
  
• Added brace sensitivity slider. If you already have hip sensitivity set in your config, and don’t have brace sensitivity set, it will automatically graft hip sensitivity to brace sensitivity.
  
• Adds "Disable Sprint Toggling Brace" option in controls, off by default, saves in DPIO. Does not affect Single Button Aim Brace. Makes sprint always have priority when holding sprint + aim or sprint and brace.
  
• Added simple HUD scaling: Doesn't really do much on 16:9. Mostly affects resolutions approaching square or ultrawidescreen. The slider is kind of obtuse, but 1.0 will make the hud small in ultrawidescreen; 0.0 will make the hud small in square modes. 0.5 is the old default. Recommend 0.9 for 21:9 and 0.1 for 4:3. Some more work is planned in the future for scaling of various UI elements and a better slider.

• Added logic so that if you use toggle crouch and press use sprint+aim to brace, you won't errantly stand up when not moving
  
• Unblocked opening doors while holding a charge. You can now open doors while holding charges in your hands (door and wall)
  
• Inverse toggle aim for SBAB now disables itself if SBAB is turned off to show you that it’s a child option of SBAB.
  
• Reordered SBAB option to be above the inverse SBAB since that makes more sense to the user so you can understand that it's a child option
  
• Disabled doors occasionally killing players who were not standing near the door. The underlying issue was also found and resolved, so that it can eventually be re-enabled without bugs.
  
• Fixed issue where players who have toggled on ADS, Brace or Crouch have it errantly toggled at the start of the next round, and causes new players to not be able to pick guns up.
  
• Fixed bug where the UI during bomb explosion screen overlaps and covers the killfeed.
  
• Fixed bug where the UI during bomb explosion screen can have an incorrect duplicate.
  
• Fix bug where the UI toggle that lets you hide the password text in the matchmaking password field did not turn off when the password filter was completely disabled
  
• Fix players making footsteps when not moving due to being disconnected or loading the level
  
• Optimization regarding acknowledging events
  
• Make config write in a human readable form so it's easier to manually edit.
  
• Updated EAC violation UI so the checkbox actually does something when you click it
  
• Updated EAC violation UI so it will eventually automatically close the game if you don’t take any action (missing check box problem)
  
• Widened level numbers on XP climb so they don’t stretch out onto new lines on wide numbers
  
• Fixed the <B> bomb indicator rendering on the bomb explosion view screen when it shouldn’t

Hello Sailors,

Today we have a quick update addressing various improvements and bug fixes.

• Improvements to online multiplayer and specifically those with slow a connection
  
• Synchronization fixes: flying players, missing treasures and obstacles, bugged animations should now appear
  
• Fixed a major bug with the tutorial on 2nd level
  
• Update to various controls issues (Keyboard and Controller)
  
• Steam Remote Play is now working correctly
  
• Update to audio including quiet and missing sounds.
  
• Mary's attacks have been made much easier to use
  
• Lobby canceling issues now fixed.

Thank you all for your patience, please feel free to share your thoughts in our social channels.

• Discord
  
• Facebook
  
• Twitter
  
• Instagram
  
• Official Website

We are very grateful for the downloads. We are very proud of it.
We are working on a new compilation that will be different from the current one, soon you will see a new teaser of it.
You are invited to acquire the Soundtrack that helps us to improve the project.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/1483070/Dome_Discover_Soundtrack/

- Added new environment - Lunar New Year
- Patched environments that were shorter than the duration of the song
- Community Maps Update - Now all community maps are correctly displayed
- SteamVR Update - The game will now pause when the SteamVR dashboard is open
Lobby changes:
- Drum Room has been replaced by Tournament Room (feature is coming soon)
- Twitch Chat Update: Added support for 7TV emotes, 7TV fancy painted names, Twitch GIF emotes, fixed Chat disconnection issue