Aug 10, 2022

Bring in the Score of a Lifetime in Bounty Hunting!

Brawlhalla - whitesheepie

After a lifetime of thwarting evil, Ezio was surprised to discover that Valhalla was real. Ever one to trust his own judgment, he accepted the valkyrie's offer and is glad he did. Upon his arrival, Ezio was given a set of Asgardian robes and weapons to use when competing in the Grand Tournament. Ezio is the 56th Legend to join Brawlhalla, and the Asgardian Ezio Skin along with 2 other iconic Ezio Skins are available now in Mallhalla.

Chase your quarry across the nine realms and beyond in the new Brawl of the Week: Bounty Hunting! The new Bounty Game mode comes to the regular 1v1 Map Pool, with 200% Damage. KO the elusive Bounty to get double points, and score the most points in 3 minutes to win!

If you’ve ever wanted a chance to give feedback to BMG, now is your chance. We’re hosting a survey to get to know what your priorities and most wanted updates are when it comes to Brawlhalla. Head over to http://brawlhalla.com/survey and speak your mind!

To catch the latest Brawlhalla news and content, be sure to follow us on Twitter, Twitch, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Discord!

Ezio, the Master Assassin, is the newest Legend to enter the Grand Tournament! The reward for a life well lived is eternity in Valhalla. Wielding his Auditore Blade and the Apple of Eden, Ezio is ready to use his assassin’s skills on any rambunctious opponents that stand in his way.

New Legend - Ezio

Ezio - “The Master Assassin”
Weapons: Sword, Orb
Stats: 5 Strength, 7 Dexterity, 4 Defense, 6 Speed
“After a lifetime of thwarting evil, Ezio was quite surprised to discover that Valhalla was real. Ever one to trust his own judgment, he accepted the valkyrie's offer and is glad he did.”

Ezio enters with 3 new Skins:

Asgardian Ezio - "The reward for a life well lived."
Revelations Ezio - "I have seen enough for one life."
Armor of Brutus Ezio - "May you who finds my family's armor receive strength in battle."

The Wolf-Kissed warrior, Eivor, is a new Epic Crossover. Eivor features custom Signature effects & lock-in animations, dedicated Roster spot, and two new Weapon Skins: Gungnir & Varin’s Axe. Players can also choose which Eivor to represent them!

In Brawlhalla, Eivor mirrors the abilities of Brynn and will remain in Mallhalla after the event ends. Ezio is a brand new Legend with his own abilities and will also remain playable and purchasable after the event ends.

Featuring:

Eivor Epic Crossover

“My destiny is mine to weave.”
Players can choose which Eivor to represent them!
Animated Weapon Skin: Gungnir’s Spear!

KO Effect

Desynchronization

“Reload last save…?”

Emote

Leap of Faith

“Center your mind, steady your hand, and take the plunge.”

Avatars

Assassin Crest

“We work in the dark, to serve the light. We are Assassins.”
An animated Avatar!

Abstergo Industries

"We change the world. Every day, in a hundred different ways."
An animated Avatar!

River Raid

"Sharpen your blade, grab your axes, the raiding horn is sounding…”
An animated Avatar!

Freerunning

"Torno fra un attimo!"

Flying Machine

“Da Vinci’s finest invention.”

Sýnin

“Always good to have a second pair of eyes.”

This event also includes:

A brand new Game Mode: Bounty!
Four new Brawls of the Week that feature the Bounty game mode.
New splash art and UI theme, including original main menu, character select, and victory theme music.
Two new Maps, including a Free-for-All Map called Florence Terrace.
One more week to claim your daily login bonus of 250 Gold to celebrate this Epic Crossover event.

Track down the score of a lifetime in this timed, 200% FFA mode. The first person to get a KO becomes the Bounty and will take 2x Damage until they are KO-ed. Whoever KOs the Bounty scores more points and becomes the new Bounty. Score the most points in 3 minutes to win!

New Bounty Game mode
3-minutes, FFA
4 Players
200% Damage
KO first to become the Bounty.
The Bounty takes 2x damage.
KO-ing the Bounty scores more points and makes the player become the Bounty.
Score the most points to win!

Speak your mind and tell us about your player experience in Brawlhalla! Whether you’ve just started playing or you’ve been playing for 6000 hours, we want to hear from you. What do you like? What do you want? What do you dislike? Let us know by visiting http://brawlhalla.com/survey to participate in the Player Survey.

Lucien lurks in the shadows in the newest Prime Gaming Bundle! This limited-time pack includes:

Dark of Night Lucien
Lucien Legend
Mother of Pearl Blasters
Darkheart Shredders (Katars)
Golf Clap Emote

This promotion is available to all Amazon Prime members. Claim your loot at http://brawlhalla.com/prime.

The free-to-play Legend rotation for this week includes: Jhala, Kor, Val, Ulgrim, Munin, Mako, Wu Shang, Reno, & Gnash.

Jhala – Given the title “Exalted Lion” by Apollo himself, Jhala “The Unbroken” takes the glamor of Valhalla in stride while having fun slaying her foes with Axe and Sword.
Kor – Blackguard Keep’s left platform mover takes his place in the arena wielding both Gauntlets and Hammer.
Val – An android assassin with terrifying strength and quicker-than-light cognition, Val is a force to be reckoned with when utilizing her Sword and Gauntlets.
Ulgrim – Equipped with flawless Ivaldi creations, his Axe and Rocket Lance, the legendary blacksmith forges his way into battle!
Munin – Rocking out to the sweet sounds of her Scythe and Bow, she’s ready to brawl in the Grand Tournament and finish her next Ravenqueen concert!
Mako – The ultimate apex predator from The Sea, Mako, with her Greatsword and Katars, aims to make fish meat out of her opponents in the Grand Tournament.
Wu Shang – Using the way of peace, discipline and martial arts, he takes down his foes with Spear and Gauntlets!
Reno – Four arms, compound eyes, fearlessness, and an added dose of genius make this Chitnoid Gunslinger the greatest bounty hunter this side of the Pecosid asteroid belt. He’ll take on any job with his trusty Blasters, and loyal Orb companion.
Gnash – In the darkness, before the dawn of history, this Legend was raised by the harsh jungle itself. This Super Hunter uses his Hammer and Spear in battle.

Aug 10, 2022

Episode One Launch Day!

Pitch Black: A Dusklight Story - Episode One - Purple jam Audio

This is the first instalment of a six episode saga, featuring around one hour of gameplay with features for replay-ability.

Uncover

The world of Dusklight is bleak yet filled with character. The last remaining capital city of a post-apocalyptic wasteland remains in the grips of a deceitful church and tyrannical corporations. With the aid of a unique Auditory Zoom mechanic you will uncover the mysteries of Dusklight.

Choose

Choices matter, choose to listen and explore, choose to charge and fight, choose the dark or the light. Pitch Black subtly adapts to how you want to play it, and you'll experience different aspects of the narrative depending on how you play.

Fight

Fight your past, fight for your future, with the choices you make and if you choose to, with your bare hands. Using a unique audio combat mechanic unlike anything you've played before.

Don't want to fight? You always have a choice, you can sneak by, or run from enemies. Experience the stealth mechanic here.

The World

The Pitch Black universe goes beyond this series of games, delve deeper through our Tales of Dusklight binaural Audio book series:

Listen to some sound worlds from Dusklight with our interactive binaural ambience explorer.
https://www.purplejamaudio.com/soundsofdusklight

The Tech

Purple Jam uses Binaural Audio to construct AAA, highly polished environments, all of which are entirely navigable using only your ears. Binaural Audio implements HRTFs to accurately convey spatial audio information – positioning, distance, roll off, width, environmental reflections; the ways we as humans hear in real life have been captured, remapped and gamified.

Feature List

Dynamic Mechanics (Stealth, Combat, and more)
Diverse areas to explore and interact with
Personalised experience through choices and an alternative ending
Responsive and Reactive world and dialogue options
Original music and sound design for AAA finish.
Engrossing dialogue, fully voice acted.
Immersive environments through Binaural Audio (DearVR)
Player Quality of life Save and Load system
Immediate Arrow Key (PC) controls
Presence giving Terrain System
Player Progress Defined Menu Audio

Completely Blind and VI Accessible

This product has minimal visual implementation. Visual aids are non-existent, and so any visuals you do encounter give you no advantage whatsoever. This is a true Audio Game with professionally recorded dialogue, sound effects and audio-system implementation. Headphones/Earphones are highly recommended to make use of spatial navigation, unique immersion qualities and to make the game a more playable experience.

Aug 10, 2022

The Cycle: Frontier - Patch 1.4.0

The Cycle: Frontier - TC_Roderick

Hey hey Prospectors!

Do you have some time on your hands right now? ‘cause we have some new patch notes hot out of the oven ready to be perused! And because we didn’t have an update last week, these ones will be a bit lengthy, as we’re striving to strike out a good game balance and iron out all of our remaining issues.

As a quick heads-up, the maintenance for this update will be a bit longer than usual as well. Remember the infrastructure changes we mentioned in our last notes? We’re applying all those right now!

But before moving to the main course, let’s start this show with an, er, apologetic appetizer (alliterations are cool).

Server Issues & Compensation

If you’ve been playing The Cycle: Frontier lately, you may have noticed that we’ve been running into several server issues lately. While those will be put to rest with this update, we’re aware of how much trouble they may have caused you. That’s why we have decided to offer a small compensation to every player out there.

As such, every Prospector who have logged into the game since July 1st will receive the following for free after the update:

150.000 K-Marks
1 Scarab
1 Advocate
1 Malestrom
2 Shields
1 Helmet

We apologize once more for the inconvenience and thank you all for your patience and support.

With that out of the way, time to dive in the patch notes proper!

Changes

Improved general fluidity and responsiveness of the heavy melee strike, so delivering very hard head bonks should be a smoother experience.
Changed the text box on timer skips to make clear that you can use either K-Marks or Aurum, not both.
Tweaked the looting tables for the different creatures of Fortuna III.
Reworked the icons for some weapon attachments so they should be easier to differentiate from one another.
Various improvements to our general UI.

Balancing & Economy

Tweaked some crafting requirements:
- Orbital Cannon Beacon
  - Derelict Explosives needed reduced from 6 to 3.
  - Faction Scrips needed reduced from 200 to 80.
- Laser Drill Beacon
  - Faction Scrips needed reduced from 200 to 80.
- Oil Pump Beacon
  - Faction Scrips needed reduced from 200 to 80.
Increased the Faction XP & K-Mark rewards of hard jobs by 50%.
Reduced the repair costs of most gear:
- Repair costs of Uncommon items reduced by 10%.
- Repair costs of Rare items reduced by 20%.
- Repair costs of Epic items reduced by 60%.
- Repair costs of Exotic items reduced by 75%.
- Repair costs of Legendary items reduced by 85%.
- Reduced the overall “availability” of grenades.
Grenades have been removed from the shop and are now available in the Crafting Station for 300 K-Marks, 2 Copper Wires and 2 Hardened Metals each.
Grenade rarity level changed from Common to Uncommon.
Overall reduced the amount of Grenades found as loot on the surface.
Reduced the amount of Grenades received as mission rewards.

Bugfixes

Improved general performance, especially regarding foliage and rendering distance.
Fixed an issue where members of the same squad would drop on different server instances.
Similarly, fixed an issue where players with a very high matchmaking rank wouldn’t be able to drop as a trio. Guess sometimes you’re just that good.
You will now be able to claim your cosmetic items even when your stash is full. There’s always room for more swag after all.
Fixed an issue that prevented the Crusher Caverns from resetting properly.
Tweaked waterfalls a bit so they can be their actual planned pretty selves.
Research in your Private Quarters shouldn’t take one second longer than indicated anymore. Think of all you’ll be able to do with that whole second.
Fixed some issues that would prevent players from completing the tutorial.
Fixed a small graphical artifact when using 2x optics with a Basilisk.
Fixed several instances of rain pouring through ceilings, windows and otherwise seemingly solid objects. Sure, the weather sucks on Fortuna III, but come on.
Fixed a weird issue where weapon charms seemed to have a mind of their own on the preview screen.
Tweaked the maps a bit further: floating objects, misaligned buttons, inescapable pits, etc.
Corrected some pathfinding issues for the confused wildlife.
Fixed some containers being invisible until approach. No more stealth field generators for boxes!
Bullets will now pierce tarps from both sides.
Weapon attachments will now be fully visible from the Crafting Station.
Fixed an issue that prevented equipping a new spray.
The Comm Wheels will stop breaking if too many people try talking at the same time. To be fair, cutting off people is rude.
Equipped weapons won’t poke their head out when throwing grenades.
The Thrill Seeker is now fully usable and ready to scout the surface once more.
Foaming an enemy Prospector right as they foam you should now count as actual progression for related missions. Double KOs never get old!
Fixed some visual issues with the Crusher’s ranged attack.
Also, killing a Crusher with a heavy melee attack won’t send it into outer space anymore.
Fixed more issues with Marauders teleporting around, dealing damage to Prospectors way out of their reach or attacking opponents while turning their backs on them. Super Jeff has been nerfed.
Fixed a visual issue where accepting a new mission would seem to reset progress on existing ones.
Fixed an audio issue where the sound of crumbling mineral nodes would play over and over and over and over and over again.
Fixed more audio issues where natural traps like bird flocks would emit their sound at the wrong location.
You should know properly see the outlines of your squad mates while on the surface.
Fixed an issue that would trigger an infinite loading screen when purchasing items in a shop or claiming rewards from the generators.
Fixed an issue where the ramps of a Laser Drill would disappear when moving too far away.
Pressing the Esc button should now work in every menu. It seems there is in fact an escape.
Fixed an annoying issue where an Osiris campaign mission wouldn’t grant the Orbital Laser Beacon it’s supposed to, making the next mission a bit harder to complete.
Using the “Return to Station” option should now properly update mission progress when applicable.
Fixed a visual issue that would show the “Average Match Time” as 0 in the player stats. No, you’re not that fast.
Fixed an issue where backpacks couldn’t be moved to the stash despite the latter not being full.
Prospectors on the character selection screen after the tutorial shouldn’t appear as foamed anymore. This if not “Return of the Living Foamed” after all.
Fixed an issue where insured items wouldn’t appear properly in your Private Quarters after being foamed.
Fixed an issue that prevented players from interacting with Dead Drops.
Changed a couple of spawning points for drop pods. You shouldn’t start your exploration session right next to angry locals now.
Fixed an issue that would also apply a weapon coating when trying to equip a weapon charm.
That grid visible around the evac ship? It’s gone. You’ve seen nothing.
Various writing changes and localization fixes.

Misc

Starting the game in Admin mode will now create an error. Please make sure you’re not launching the game in Admin mode.
The Biker Queen is now called the Monarch. All hail the new paragon of badassery!

Make sure to join our Discord server (https://discord.com/invite/thecyclehttps://discord.com/invite/thecycle) and our subreddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/TheCycleFrontier/https://www.reddit.com/r/TheCycleFrontier/)

Do not forget – Fortuna favors the bold!

Aug 10, 2022

🛒 Super Mini Mart is getting ready for business!

Super Mini Mart - Reactive

Hi there!

We’re very excited to announce that our super mini business plan is right on track and that we’re hard at work crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s for our mini marts’ grand opening! Just take a look at our cozy little Reveal Trailer below:

As some of you may already know, Super Mini Mart isn’t your run-of-the-mill management game. Our approach is more wholesome than hectic, with plenty of tasks to fill your work day, but also enough downtime to smell the roses and get to know your charming clientele!

Here’s a short recap on some of our store’s most sought-after goodies:

A vibrant yet laid-back world, with lots of pleasant things to do and charming people to meet
A mini-universe densely populated with unique characters, each with their own quirks and shopping habits
A myriad of shop items with unique requirements and mechanics
Gameplay relying on natural interactions and intuitive controls, set in a highly interactive world
Charming 3D aesthetic with the option to turn pixel shading on or off for your shopping convenience

That’s about it for today’s announcement, but before we conclude, we’d like to remind you all to wishlist Super Mini Mart on Steam if you like how things are going - this is such a help for us indie devs!
And if you'd like to chat with us, you can join us on Discord and get to see what happens behind the scenes.

We’ll be back soon with more updates.

Thank you and have a great day!

Aug 10, 2022

August 2022 Update

Starstruck: Hands of Time - createdelic

Hello Stars Truckers! Recently, a few people have asked me about the status of the game. Then I realized... even though I write updates every few months on the game's newsletter, I haven't posted an update on Steam on a while! So here's today's newsletter update, re-posted here on Steam!

A preview of the exclusive 4-panel comic sent on the newsletter! If you missed it, you can still get it (and the three other comics) emailed to you instantly when you join the newsletter.

Development Status Update

In the last email, I mentioned that I had the game playable in a barebones way up until the ending. So four months later, how has development been going?

It's been going well! The game is now about 70% polished for everything up until the ending!

I keep saying I "polished" the game, but what does that mean? Here's one example: the buildings in town now look different after you destroy them as the Captain. It would be a shame if the final game didn't work like this, right? Along with stuff like this and improving/expanding many of the cutscenes, I've also been adding new content and a whole bunch of secrets where it felt right. A first draft of the main dialogue is now in the game, too.

Next development update should be an exciting one, since (hopefully) I'll be able to say things are polished to satisfaction and that I've started working on the ending.

Thanks for reading. See you in the next email update in a few months!

-Max

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1054950/Starstruck_Hands_of_Time/