• Fixed an issue where the Agent bot could get stuck on the Workshop map.
  
• Fixed a bug causing certain projectiles to pass through walls on the Fifth Floor map.
  
• Improved performance and optimization on the Workshop map.

Game Update 2.0.0.25.10.25EA

• Added new fishing rods, reels, and lines to the fishing shop
  
  
• Increased the realism of fish bites – fish reactions are now more natural and depend on the species and type of bait used
  
  
• Increased the maximum weights of certain fish species in the Masurian District to better reflect their realistic sizes
  
  
• Added new reel sounds (for all models except the basic one) and improved the sound quality and synchronization during reeling
  
  
• Improved the reel drag system for rods placed on stands — removed the previous restriction that prevented fish from pulling the line
  
  
• Updated and redesigned rod icons for a clearer and more consistent appearance

Hello chaos makers!

Optimization. Such a big issue with so many modern games.🙄 Unfortunately, we aren't an exception with Chaos on Wheels. That's why in v.1.1. update we have worked hard on optimizing Chaos on Wheels to run better, more efficiently, and to run stable.

❗ This is the first update of many in the series of optimizations and quality-of-life updates. ❗

We improved global lightning performance (it might cost some quality, but one issue at a time 😏), changed bullet projectiles, and focused on two particular maps; Valley and Desert. We feel those maps are the most popular, and we decided to start with them. In the next updates, we'll make sure to cover all other maps as well.

Before, we had every and each bullet being a projectile with its own velocity, gravity, speed, ... All that computing with so many bullets in the scene wasn't optimized, so we reworked it to be linetraced like it's in most shooter games. It's much more performant and, honestly, I'd dare to say it even looks better. We'd love to hear your thoughts, do bullets now look better, worse, or is it the same for you? 🤔

Some of the other recent findings that we find extraordinarily interesting is the issue with the audio lag on the gun firing... Turns out it's a bug within the Unreal Engine. Since the audio asset is short (<0.2s), the engine has an issue with it, hence the lag. Now that we know the issue, we will fix it by redesigning the logic behind it. You can expect it to be included in the next update. 🔉🐛

Here are also some updates on Chaos on Wheels 2. The next playtest is scheduled for the beginning of December. For those who missed the last playtest, Chaos on Wheels 2 is an online multiplayer car combat game where players fight in an arena and manage their own garage.

Sign up via Google form 👉 Google Form or find out more on the website https://chaosonwheels.com/

We're looking for talented 3D artists who are creative and would like to create an inspiring, combat-ready car designs. Join our Discord and talk to us there.

After a bit of a delay, Thrive 0.9.0 is nearing a state it can be released in. Usually we put out a Release Candidate build, however this time the build is being just called a beta, because it is in much rougher shape than usual, but we are putting it out anyway as we don’t want to delay 0.9.0 further. The most major omission in the build you are likely to notice is that it is not possible to save the game while in the editor. Saving has been only reimplemented for the swimming around portion of the game. Besides the background work the most major visible new feature is the microbe terrain system that adds bit of inert terrain in many patches and the tweaked current particles and some other visuals. There are also major balance changes and new features added to auto-evo.

This build had to be delayed a few weeks due to the saving reimplementation, which took much more time than expected, but hopefully it will be worth it in the long run as it will act as a base as we move development to further stages. And cutting down saving time to just a lag spike should make saving feel at least a bit better.

To access the beta build, you need to select the "beta" version in the Steam client for Thrive. Right click Thrive in your Steam library and then in the properties select "beta" as the version.

Please provide any feedback you have on this test build. We are especially interested in hearing about the new game balance and how auto-evo feels. If you can manage to break saving in the microbe stage, we are very interested to hear how you did that, and if possible the save file you have if the problem occurs during loading, so that we can have saving fully working for the 0.9.0 release.

You can leave feedback below in the comments, or on our forums in this thread: https://community.revolutionarygamesstudio.com/t/0-9-0-beta-testing/8710

It hasn't even been a month since QUADRICEPS, but there's another massive update coming soon, RETINA! More features will be coming, mostly in the form of tweaks, another set of reworks to Bow and Arrow, and new Gameplay Modes.

TO ACCESS THE TESTING BRANCH:

1. Right Click "Death Road to Canada" in your Steam Library

2. Go to Properties

3. Click on the Betas tab on the left of the Properties window

4. Click on the dropdown in the top right, and change the Beta Participation branch from "None" to "beta - TESTBRANCH"

The console is also turned on for this testing period. Use the ` key to open the console, and then read below for a list of some commands to try out.

• Added Isabelle, the Paladin. Smite away!

• Ending Dialogue added for Isabelle

• Added Time Stop character, work in progress, it will get new art and a retheme

• Added Defective, an eldritch horror multi-splitting character

• Added Bank, Marshland, Viaduct locations

• Added Siege version of Viaduct location

• You can type the following commands into the console to check out the different locations:

  • [c]to_the_marshes[/c]

  • [c]to_the_viaduct[/c]

  • [c]to_the_treasury[/c]

  • [c]road{ siege2-viaduct }[/c]

• Added 3 new whips, in a new weapon category based on the Ringmaster's unique weapon

• Added pike

• Added kukri

• Added buff banner support weapon

• Added Barret 50 cal (named "M.O.A.R")

• Made new weapons sellable

• Made new weapons findable

• Fencer perk added

• Big Shot perk added

• Car Boat with turret added as a reward to the Marshland location

• Improved the DNK16 "burst" feeling and very marginally buffed it

• Hektatrius event updated for one of the new characters

• Adjusted Anime Girl store timer setting

• Made it easier for AI to get into the car during floods, in Severe Weather Mode

• Gourmand now provides morale to the team at meals

• Kensai Perk reworked according to community discussion

• Phoenix now gets a bottle of hot sauce on start

• Hero Type now has an aura of protection

• Reworked the regular, dog, and ice cream vans. They all do something special now, to help justify the increased gas costs.

• Regular Van: Spawns furniture

• Dog Van: Spawns a friendly dog

• Ice Cream Van: Spawns delicious flavors

• Fixed bug for gun racks sometimes losing rifles

• Bugfix for lightning bolts being pushed inward from map edge

• Fixed a bug where bow&arrow arrows were invincible

• Fixed a bug where not enough zombies spawned in the warehouse location

• Fixed a bug where too much loot spawned in the warehouse loc

• Fixed a weapon seller list bug

• Fixed some bugs in events pertaining to Friend of Dog

• More fixes I'm forgetting about

• Fix for realignment having blank division names
  
• Fix for draft page team being null
  
• Updated article to inculde player picture for holdout messages
  
• Updated logic for holdout settings
  
• Fix for playoff show scores issue
  
• Fixes for coach talks and coach talk displays
  
• Updates to draft screen UI
  
• Updates to impact players
  
• Updates to FA Bidding logic
  
• Added position summary to FA screens
  
• Updated OT logic, Fix for OT ending incorrectly
  
• Updated coaches to remove 0 year contracts
  
• Updated installer to include font files
  
• Updated coach watch list

Preparing for Closed Beta

Closed beta release is planned for November which will feature voice acting and an original soundtrack.

Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 Release

The first two chapters of the game will be released between December 2025 and the Spring of 2026, so please wishlist the game to get the release announcements.

Showcasing at TORG Gaming Expo in Nov 2026!

If you stop by our booth you'll have access to game swag and you can meet the entire team in person.

• Updated messaging for personality/playing time
  
• Reset Jersey function in team configuration
  
• Updates to certainty display
  
• Added Fullscreen/F11 functionality
  
• Fix for duplicate recruting emails
  
• Adjusted leaving early logic
  
• Hide Streak if hide scores enabled
  
• Updated Compare Player views
  
• Update clock display for spiked ball play
  
• Updated clock adjustment for spike plays
  
• Added icons for transfer player
  
• Updated recruiting screen to reduce flicker
  
• Update coach import/export to add more properties
  
• Added morale boost for captain selections
  
• Updated point calculation for Coach Talks
  
• Updated coach talks not displaying correctly
  
• Adjusted coach hiring logic to incorporate off/def preferences
  
• Fix crash in player dialog if player removed from universe
  
• Fix CPU coach hiring to allow unemployed coaches instead of generating new
  
• Fix for crash if not enough players to perform coach talks
  
• Ported Play Game and Watch Game "follow ball" functionality
  
• Updated installer to install correct font files

New position for male-female, male-shemale, female-shemale and shemale-shemale couples

Quick Dev Update

Yesterday I got a world spell casting and a resource “source” location of a Rose Bush to appear on the map and save and load. These are the fundamentals necessary to fix the resources feature of Hex Events.

But while we wait for that, let’s continue with the second part of the Core Loop refinement

What is Archmage Rises? Managing the three spheres of life: Self, Magecraft, and Realm.
You could think of it as Self, Work, and Society.

The Art. The Craft. The Power. What is it really like to be a mage in a medieval fantasy world? That’s what this game is about and what differentiates it from other games like Dwarf Fortress, Rim World, Guild 2.

I’ve thought for a long time about this and I’ve boiled down the ‘mage fantasy’ to these three areas to manage: Experience, Spells, and Tower

This represents the biggest departure from how the game plays now because there will be a new Spell Progression system.

Theory and Practice. These two principles are in tension. I have struggled for years, but I think I found a solution on how to implement:

1.      You get better at magical knowledge by researching it.

2.      You get better at spells by using it.

Two analogies to help describe what I’m aiming for.

I’ve been programming most of my life. The way I have really grown, to actually BE a better programmer, to reach new levels of understanding and approach to what I program is by reading theory based programming books, like Design Patterns, Game Design Patterns, Refactoring, or Debugging Applications (I doubt anyone has read this last one, it taught me how to program defensively and avoid bugs in the first place).

But just reading the book doesn’t achieve anything. Some neat ideas, but theory without practice quickly fades and the lessons are lost.

I’ve been trying to learn the piano. No amount of watching youtube videos of people playing, or reading music theory, will improve my piano playing. Yes, being able to read the notes is important (I want to play classical not just chords), but practicing the songs is the only way to learn and master it.

So theory helps: but is useless without practice. Yet, I’ve met programmers who have been programming for 5 years and never ‘leveled up’. Meaning, they have 1 year of experience 5x, instead of 5 years of growth. Seeing each problem not as unique and you are the first person to ever encounter it, but as a version of just a few core problems, radically improves your ability to solve it well. For instance, in game AI many problems can be solved with a version of Dijkstra (or A* which is just Dijkstra with a heuristic). I’m not talking about pathfinding – where they excel at, I’m talking about goal setting, future planning, resource management, and long term strategy of the AI.

If one didn’t know the Dijkstra or A* algorithms, they’d think “unit purchasing” was a unique problem that required a unique solution.

The image in my head of a wizard studying in a fully stocked library with tomes piled around: I want that core to the game.

But getting out there and practicing the spells, I want that core to the game as well.

• Adventuring is an ideal way to build up your School XP

 

XP is earned in Spell Schools Arcane, Fire, Ice, Storm, Earth. Think of it like science beakers in Civ, but across 5 vectors. You manage your growth in each through Adventure, Study, and Experiments to make Discoveries.

• Casting a spell earns you experience in that School – Adventuring, Events, Traps, etc.

• School XP is spent on a spell school Research Tree.

• Experiments

Predictable progression across plays.

• Almost all spells and some spell upgrades are visible on the tree. This creates predictable unlocks across plays, just like the skill trees or tech trees we see in the games we love

• Spell Knowledge is grouped into Tiers. I’ve tried, and failed, for years to figure out how to make “all spells equal”. I just can’t get a single damage fire spell like Fire Bolt to be equally awesome as Fireball which does AOE and leaves residual burn. I’ve given up on making all spells equal, they will be tiered with the best ones earned at the top of the chart.

• The XP cost of a spell or spell upgrade in a Tier increases as you buy them, so each choice in Tier 2 may be 1,000xp, but once you make it, the other Tier 2 choices are 1,500xp.

• Spending XP on Spell Knowledge earns you the ‘design’ of the spell, you have the general idea of it, but you don’t actually know how to cast it until you Discover it in an Experiment.

Turn theory into useful outcomes like Spell Upgrades. Provides variability across plays, push your luck mechanic, allows specialization per play. Experiments cost you, but they always result in something good.

Here is an example chart I made of possible Fireball Upgrades. You will see they have rarity:

 

• Experiments lead to discoveries – of Spells and spell Upgrades

• Experiments require: Reagents, some xp, and a Blast Chamber (Conclave or Tower)

• XP cost is modified by the magical affinity of the region you are doing it in

• If you have unlocked a spell design, your next experiment in that school learns the spell with one upgrade making the base version different in every play.

• You choose the scale of Experiment to perform which affects the rarity (result table) of the result. Solo (standard), Collaborative - requires 1 friend, Grand - 3+ and large room size

• Relationship with collaborators

• Experiments always succeed – failure is only introduced by bad relationship, low wellbeing, and high fatigue

• A discovery pop up shows 2-3 Refinement options; player picks one. Sometimes a common option has a bonus Mastery point on it. Mastery points reduce the cost of unlocks in Study

• This system allows you to go deep on a few spells with lots of upgrades, or know lots of spells with just a few upgrades

• It also gets pretty close to the feel of custom spells without all the trouble of custom spells

 

The physical manifestation of your awesomeness. And totally 100% not phallic!

I’m keeping the general UI of what we have, but I think what we have right now of just gold is too simplistic. I’m changing the design to something I like more.

• Rooms of your tower provide gameplay features. You need somewhere to take the Sleep action, and the quality of your Sleep results will be affected by the room. Want a hireling? Build them a bedroom. Want to do an experiment? Built a Blast Chamber.

• Rooms are built with base resources (wood, stone, gold) and special resources (glass, gems, etc). I think this will make people happy.

• Because of regional elemental affinity, it is worthwhile to be picky where you build your first tower, and eventually you will want one in 5 different regions for your Experiments

• Gold--, Resources—

• Output: New Room

• Gold--, Possession—

• Output: Better room stats

 

There is obviously more that can be said, but I think this is a good summary of where I’m headed. Next time I’ll conclude with design thinking in Realm in part III!