Oct 31, 2022

The Events at Unity Farm Playtest - Evelyn_Titan1Studios

Happy Halloween Beta Testers!

We're still working on some of those bugs you guys have reported over the weekend and we thank you all for the feedback! If you haven't already we'd also ask that you complete our Closed Beta Survey.

Updates/Fixes:

Adjusted overall colours in the Tutorial and main Farm hub.
Fixed a seam in the skybox of the Tutorial
Fixed rock martials that were causing some glitches in lighting
Updated the lighting in the main Farm hub
Fixed bug where the remainder of The Book quest would be skipped if the player selected Liv's Notes bookmark multiple times, resulting in a hard lock of the game.
Updated sounds of crystals encountered during the tutorial
Fixed visual glitches in some VFX that caused them to only render in one eye
Tweaked blending in some of Alliss' animations
Fixed bug preventing the set height button from working in the pause menu
Fixed homing functionality of the Electricity spell to behave correctly with Large Electro-Mech Spiders
Fixed bug that was causing enemies to be invulnerable when their health reached 0
Fixed a bug that caused the book to be too far away to be used if the player died
- Note: This still remains a problem if the player dies while holding the book

Thank you all for your participation!

Don't Forget To:

Oct 31, 2022

It's time to boogie in your own spooky rooms!

Escape Simulator - Nicky

Another update? 😱

That's right! Today we're rolling out another update for Escape Simulator with some additional features! This update includes new options for both room builders and puzzle solvers, so there's a little something for everyone. But before we get into the ✨new stuff✨, we would like to remind you that both Escape Simulator and the Steampunk DLC are currently on sale! This sale lasts until November 1st, so be sure you don't miss out on any sweet deals. More info can be found on our store page right here!

Build your own spooky room! 👻

Always wanted to build your own Halloween room? Well, now you can! The Halloween props that were used in our brand-new Graveyard room are now available to use in the room editor! That means you are now free to use our tombstones, carved pumpkins and spooky fences. We can't wait to see all of your creations!

A groovy new outfit! 🕺

We're going back to the 70's again! In case you missed it, we recently released an additional free room that is entirely centered around the grooviest decade of them all. However, to truly dive back into the 70's, you'll need an appropriate outfit as well. Well, we've got you covered! We're adding a new customization option that will really take you back in time!

Even more coming up! 🤠

Of course we still have a whole bunch of awesome stuff planned for the game! First and foremost, we have a new Wild West DLC coming up, which is set to release in December. If you haven't already, make sure to wishlist here! Additionally, we still have more free rooms coming up as well, so be sure to keep an eye out on our channels for more updates and announcements. Finally, if you would like to meet and talk to other players and room builders, feel free to join us over on Discord or Reddit. In the meantime, thanks again for all of your continued support!

♥ Pine team

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2175260/Escape_Simulator_Wild_West_DLC/

Oct 31, 2022

Marvel's Midnight Suns Strategic Combat Live Stream

Marvel's Midnight Suns - crystal.2K

Recently, during the second in a series of live streams planned for the run up to Marvel's Midnight Suns' December 2 launch, members of the Firaxis development team revealed the four Marvel heroes that will be joining the game as Season Pass DLC next year. Creative Director Jake Solomon, Lead Designer Joe Weinhoffer, and Senior Producer Rachel Sima also played through two Tactical Missions while offering insights into the game's turn-based card combat. You can watch an archive of the entire live stream below. Note that some characters and skins featured require unlocking via gameplay.

The stream afforded us an action-packed look at how some of the Midnight Suns heroes fight alongside each other, as well as at how you can improve and modify their abilities as you progress through the main story. For the first mission, damage-dealers Ghost Rider and Spider-Man teamed up with Nico Minoru, who can heal her allies while generating a lot of Heroism.

In case you're unfamiliar with Marvel's Midnight Suns' Heroism system, here's a quick explanation courtesy of Senior Franchise Producer Garth De Angelis:

"Heroism is the resource that your heroes use to unleash their signature and most powerful moves. You earn Heroism by playing less powerful abilities, thus building the capital to unload a pivotal, turn-the-tide onslaught. The best heroes know how to manipulate the battlefield to their advantage, so in addition to using Heroic abilities, you can use Heroism to perform bonus Environmental Attacks that don't spend any of your remaining Card Plays. Your heroes can vault off giant boulders to pound Hydra Mystics into the ground, kick dumpsters at Shadowhounds to send them flying, pull streetlamps down on top of Hydra Commandos - the battlefield is your playground!"

Knowing how and when to use Heroism is key, and is just one of the decisions you'll need to make each turn along with which ability cards to play and whether to reposition any of your heroes. That's after you've decided which heroes to bring into your next Tactical Mission, of course. Which Midnight Suns members' abilities are best-suited to the mission objective? Do any of your heroes' skill sets synergize particularly well? Should you play with favorites you've already leveled up or invest in different heroes who could prove useful in later missions?

The team selected for the second on-stream mission again included Ghost Rider, who this time fought alongside Blade, who employs Bleeding and Lifesteal status effects to deal additional damage and self-heal; and Captain America, who protects allies by taunting enemies into attacking him instead.

The heroes were leveled up before attempting this challenging mission, so not only were their Health and Offense stats higher, but they also had access to upgraded ability cards. Heroes can be upgraded by playing through the campaign. Here's Lead Designer Joe Weinhoffer to share more info on hero progression and ability upgrades:

"Every hero has multiple ways they can progress and improve their abilities over the course of the campaign. First, every hero has a character level that determines their Health and Offense in combat. Playing ability cards in combat for a hero will grant them XP, and eventually they will level up and improve their stats. The Offense stat affects the damage dealt by all of that hero’s ability cards, so more Offense is always better for more damage!

"The next step is to Upgrade an ability, which gives it a pre-determined boost in power. Every hero ability has an Upgrade, with bonuses including increased damage, reduced Heroism cost, additional status effects, bonus resource generation, and more. The Upgrades have all been designed to complement the hero’s overall ability kit and primary gameplay role. For example, Blade inherently applies a lot of Bleeding to enemies, so some of his Upgrades grant additional bonuses when targeting Bleeding enemies. It’s always a good idea to Upgrade hero ability cards to reach their full potential.

"Finally, once an ability has been upgraded, it can then gain a Mod as a final boost. Mods are similar gameplay bonuses to Upgrades, but aren’t specific to a given ability or hero – the Mod which appears on a given card is random. You may find a card with a minor Mod to give a slight damage boost or an incredibly powerful one which adds Knockback or makes a card Free!

"Mods provide that extra edge in combat, and since they are random, there is a ton of flexibility on how your version of Blade may differ from another player’s. Modded cards start appearing in Gamma Coils later in the game, or Mods can be directly added and rerolled in the Yard once the Crucible upgrade is constructed. You can reroll the Mods on each of a hero’s abilities until you have the perfect synergistic build."

In addition to answering questions from the community, the Firaxis trio confirmed that the four heroes joining the Midnight Suns roster in Season Pass DLC next year are Deadpool, Venom, Morbius, and Storm. The Season Pass is available as part of the Legendary Edition and is also available for individual purchase. We'll have more information to share on their respective in-game abilities next year. In the meantime, look out for the next Marvel's Midnight Suns Live Stream with Firaxis where members of the development team will be diving into a bunch of the fun things you'll be doing with your team of heroes when you're not in combat.

Oct 31, 2022

DEV VLOG 3.0 : Crash Test Dummies

CRASH EFFECTS Inc. - CodeStormStudios

Happy Halloween Crash Test Engineers! Crash Test Jake back with another installment of the Crash Effects Inc. Development Vlog. Today we're going to talk about the high tech Crash Test Dummies you will get to use in game. These sophisticated pieces of equipment are at your disposal to test and evaluate the impacts of crashes on the human body. The dummies are lined with all sorts of sensors that measure various metrics in order to capture the extent of damage during an impact. They are very sensitive so keep that in mind when placing these things as they capture even the slightest changes in velocity.

You can place these dummies in the seats of your vehicle prior to executing a crash in the Vehicle Bay. When setting up your dummies for evaluation you can give them names, weights, height profiles, whether they were buckled up during impact, occupations, relationship status...

Ok so maybe not the last two but we are working on that tech to make them more personable.
There are various configurations of dummies that can be seated including:

Male Crash Test Dummy
Female Crash Test Dummy
Seated Child Crash Test Dummy
Baby in a Car Seat Crash Test Dummy (Included in future release stay tuned)

Data Collection

Enough of the chit chat, let's show how we use them. In the gif below I just picked up and threw Crash Test Steve here onto that Electric Forest Runner's windshield we showed off at Next Fest 22' to create some data. Thank you for the applause I've been working out with the Hulk lately!

All we need to do now is walk up to him after a crash test and extract the data to our work tablet by pressing the Interact button to dump the data collected.

Dummy Evaluation

Now, once we have collected the data from him we just need to open our work tablet up and select the Data Evaluation Tab to see the data collected from all of our dummies.

We can click around on the various body parts of the dummy to see the data recorded during the crash test by the dummies sensors. The severity of damage to each extremity is recorded as: None, Minor, Severe and Critical. These extent of the injury is also color coordinated to how severe the injury was with the colors mapping to injury classification as follows:

Green - None
Yellow - Minor (think scrapes and bruises)
Red - Severe (Think Fractures and broken bones)
Pink - Critical (I leave this one to the imagination)

As we can see, Crash Test Steve took a pretty hard hit on the right side of his body when we threw him up onto the Electric Forest Runner in this example. He may have suffered extensive damage to his pelvis and right foot from the looks of it. We also can see metrics such as the peak G Force applied to the extremity, peak impulse measured and even peak velocity. I will let you do your homework on those terms if you don’t already know what they are.

In the future, a readout of the types of injuries captured by the dummy will be recorded in the far left column of the data collection view. Injuries such as a broken foot or fractured ribs to name a few. We are still working on fine tuning the bugs with this super cool feature so stay tuned!

Welp, that’s all I have for today folks. Let us know if there is something you want to see these high tech dummies do or any other feedback you want to share! Feel free to post on this blog post or in the steam forums.

Crash Test Jake Out!

Oct 31, 2022

October Monthly Dev Diary

College Craze - imprettyink

Back with October’s issue of Monthly Dev Diaries where you can read short, monthly updates on College Craze’s progress!

If you can’t wait to play the latest version, want sneak peeks, tons of bonus content, and special-edition merch, consider becoming a Patron.

It’s been a productive month, editing, posing, and polishing v5! In typical Pretty Ink fashion, I added a few more lines and interactions after editing, pushing the word count to ~118K. Testing has also gone smoothly. The first wave brought on a hefty number of bugs, but they were all very simple to squash, so I’m confident the build will be good and ready by the release dates!

Patrons at the Alumni & Dropout tiers will get access on Nov 1st, Seniors & Juniors on Nov 8th, and Sophomores on Nov 15th. As I mentioned last month, there won’t be any more free/public updates, so if you can’t wait, consider supporting in November. Otherwise, the game’s full release is slated for Summer 2023.

In other news, the Fall Fanworks Fest on Discord has been a roaring success! Congrats to the winners, and thank you to all of those who have participated! I’ll be back to posting bonus content for Patrons in November, so look forward to Gabe’s postcard and Inkspot Interview as well as other Lore Posts.

That’s all for now. See you next month!

xoxo,
PrettyInk