In the last FFF-386 we covered the natural landscape of Vulcanus which mostly showed the visuals, but as you are probably aware we always put gameplay first. Now it's time to find out what kind of greater good you can do to the planet...
We were really pleased with this horseshoe design - did you know that whether a horseshoe is considered lucky displayed 'up' or 'down' varies in different cultures? We thought we would do both, and hope that it brings our story's secret lovers some extra luck…
Most of all, we are checking for FUN so that every level has that ‘I’ll play just one more hand…’ feeling.
Regency Solitaire II is coming to Steam early next year – we would love you to wishlist it and help us make it a success:
The Avalon Battle Pass is now available to preorder in-game! Take on Seasonal Challenges to collect Glory and unlock Premium rewards throughout the new Season, and grab goodies from the Free Pass.
Cosmetics inspired by Arthurian legend are yours to unlock via the Avalon Battle Pass. Fight with honour to draw Blades and exchange them in the Seasonal Store for special items from previous Seasons.
PREORDER BONUSES
Players who preorder the Avalon Battle Pass in-game before December 14 will begin their quest with special bonuses:
Victory Pass: Complete this exclusive Premium Pass to claim Treatises, Bronze, Scrolls of Mastery, and Silver. You can also unlock the Caradoc's Cavalry, a new 3-Star Cavalry Unit!
1x Treatise
2x Greater Scrolls of Glory
10x Unit Medals
50,000 Bronze Coins
FREE AND PREMIUM TRACKS
You can earn rewards fit for a knight of the Round Table with the Free Pass, or obtain even more gallant gifts by unlocking the Premium Track with the Avalon Battle Pass.
Here are a few of the highlights waiting to be unlocked in Avalon:
Siege Perilous Hero Attire (Instant Premium Unlock): Adorn your Hero with the finest regalia in the kingdom.
Knights of the Stone Unit Attire: Armour fit for only the realm’s most gallant soldiers.
Steed of Avalon Mount Set: Gallop into battle atop a mighty steed.
Knight of Avalon Hero Attire (Tier 100): The ultimate armour for a Knight of the Round Table.
SEASONAL STORE
Unlock Blades from the Battle Pass to exchange in the Seasonal Store for special cosmetic items, including Antique variants of Battle Pass Attire from Seasons of yore!
Preorder the Avalon Battle Pass now in-game and prepare to fight like a knight on December 14!
Those without faith in the Emperor are but an empty vessel, a pointless husk; only through His will can your pitiful existence have meaning.
A lot has happened since the last Dev Diary in March this year. Battlesector was displayed at Warhammer Fest in Manchester, featured in the Warhammer Skulls Festival to highlight the release of the Orks faction pack, and the Chaos Daemons of Khorne were released as a playable faction in late August. Despite that, our duty to the Emperor isn’t complete, so we are here to share some news about a massive upcoming feature that will be available for free to all Battlesector players.
A feature that has been requested frequently, and one that we’ve always wanted to add was support for user-generated content (UGC). Recently, we’ve been working on a new Map Builder, that will allow any player to create and share their own custom maps.
Using an easy-to-use in-game tool, you’ll be able to arrange terrain pieces to construct maps to your own design. You’ll start by configuring the maps’ size and ground type. You’ll also be able to control the map lighting settings, so whether you want to create a fog-shrouded manufactorum or a blazing desert on Baal Secundus, the choice is yours. You’ll also be able to configure which objective types are supported.
Once you’ve made a map, you can share it with the world, via an in-game cross-platform upload system.
Player-created maps - whether it’s one you create yourself or one you download - will be available for use in skirmish mode, multiplayer (Live and Asynchronous), or can be added to the pool of maps used when a new Planetary Supremacy campaign is generated.
Finally, we plan to add the ability to join multiple maps together to create your own campaigns.
There is still some way to go before this feature is ready, so look for an update early next year. We can’t wait to see what creations you come up with.
Welcome to another edition of the Hostile Mars dev log! Going forward, you can anticipate a monthly dev log update, scheduled for the first of each month.
DEVELOPMENT
We've been hard at work experimenting with a wide range of enemies, turrets, traps, and weaponry, and this phase of development has been an absolute blast. Our primary goal is to elicit that "Wow, that's incredible!" reaction from our players, inspiring them to explore and utilize game mechanics in innovative ways while contending with hordes of robotic adversaries.
Magnet Gun
One exciting addition to our arsenal is the Magnet Gun, a versatile tool that generates a magnetic field along its aiming axis. This magnetic force can be employed in numerous strategic ways, such as pulling groups of enemies together, launching them into deadly traps, or simply slamming them into the Martian surface for maximum impact. The possibilities are only limited by your imagination.
Magnet Trap
We've also integrated this magnetic mechanic into one of our traps, allowing players to efficiently group large numbers of adversaries, setting the stage for epic battles and creative strategies.
Boss Design
We're also diligently exploring ways to make boss wave encounters a truly unique and captivating experience, steering clear of the typical "bullet sponge" enemy archetype. Given our focus on the "massive amounts of enemies" pillar, you can expect the boss battle to integrate this element in an intriguing and innovative way. Stay tuned for some thrilling surprises!
Obstacle Course Testing
The previous bots would override their velocity and thus could ignore bumps or be completely stopped in awkward positions, but it resulted in unnatural movement and would occasionally cause them to go through walls.
Now that they are properly using physics though, it’s possible for them to get stuck against steps. So, we’ve been observing and testing solutions to help them be more dangerous >:) It turns out that having them perform a small jump when they detect being stuck is really effective. As a bonus it gives them some funny personality, don't you think?
Status Effects
Leveraging the modularity of the new system, we’re extending the base behavior of the bots with status effects. Starting with a slowed and stunned effect which is already being used by traps. Additionally, we made a couple to disable the physics and entire behavior to manipulate the enemies with weapons and traps. More will be made as we work on the traps.
By the way, the Orb bot has been updated to the new system as well.
Breakout Mode
We’ve also brought back the behavior of attacking structures when the enemies can’t path to the core, they’ll still try to come as close as they can, but if they come across walls, traps, or any other building they’ll angrily lash out on it.
Build Mode Improvements
Players now have the ability to go into an inspect mode while in the build mode which allows them to drag over an area to select placed items. The UI changes to now show a list of all selected item types and the amount selected. From this mode, the player can choose to remove all selected items or only remove items of a specific type. We have more plans for how the player can interact with the world in this mode in the future but that will be covered at a later time.
Featured in Unity Unite Keynote
Hostile Mars received an exciting spotlight at Unity's annual Unite conference, and it's truly thrilling to witness our game take center stage and generate buzz among gaming enthusiasts!
ART
During November the art team has continued working on new enemy designs and assets that will populate the world.
Check out these enemy concept art pieces:
And some early testing of the combining bot enemy type. This enemy will be able to combine, forming a bigger and more powerful adversary.
That's it for this dev log. Remember, moving forward you can expect a new one on the first of each month!
'twas the month before the new year, when all through the Dorf Not a Creature was stirring, not even a --- HEY, stop asking for 357 additional trees in your forest, Batholomew Bear!
Yup, that's right! For the month of December, our Monthly Mode is all about quests. How many can YOU complete with no more than 50 Tiles?! And don't worry, no trains will trash your lofty Highscore-Throne amibtions. 😉
Want to talk strategies, brag about your #1 Highscore, or just hang out with fellow Highscore Hunters? Join us on Discord!
Most are tasty amuses-bouches. Some are pretty major reveals. A few real world treats will only last for 24hrs, but you'll never miss anything in-game. Playing BOOK OF HOURS any time in December will give you everything the calendar's revealed to date whenever in-game winter rolls around. So there's no stress if you're 'out' having 'fun' with 'friends'. Except, you know. Have a think about your life choices there.
To start with today's door as an example, it reveals:
Door 1: Seasonal art in BOOK OF HOURS
The next time you're playing BOOK OF HOURS and winter comes around, you'll notice some festive cheer sprinkled throughout Brancrug Village and Hush House. For anyone who wants to be left alone like the Weary Detective and his Illustrated London News, there's an option to turn off seasonal art in the Settings menu. For everyone else, take careful note of Reverend Timothy's Christmas tree next to the Rectory...
More like this every day from now until Christmas Day. Check the advent megablog if you're not sure what today's gift is - we'll announce them every day at noon.
That's it! Warmth, good cheer and a glass of Chateau Raveline to you and yours. Merry Christmas, friend.
