This update finally adds an ending to campaign mode. I say "an" ending rather than "the" ending, because this is only the first and easiest ending to achieve. Simply playing until Loop 35 will bring you to your final confrontation with Reign, and while the fight does have a slight twist in that Reign shares some of her power with her partners (and you can choose whether you want those partners to be Mechanical or Elemental), I think that most players who make it this far won't find it to be too difficult. It might even be a bit of an anticlimax.
Nonetheless, it's still an ending, and that means that the development of Corrupted Saviors is moving to a new phase. From here on, I'll be less focused on rushing new content into the game, and more focused on making the existing content more pleasant to play. After looking through feedback over the past month, I think the biggest issues that need to be addressed are (1) game balance, (2) load times, and (3) the clarity of the mechanics as expressed to the player. I'm going to want to at least begin to address all of these before moving on to the Basis route and the Thousand Chosen Battle which will act as the foundation for the later routes.
After leaving a month to iron out any final issues with the game, I'll be designating the next release as Version 1.0. This will also give me time to polish up the ending a little more. There's a bit more unique flavor I'd like to add for players who continue on to endless mode. Reign also still doesn't have a proper Forsaken form, but this is because there are actually serious balance questions that need to be answered before that point - you'll be able to use the Forsaken Reign as a full-fledged member of your roster for the later routes, which means that I can't just give her a bunch of overpowered postgame-only abilities. At the same time, she needs to be able to compete with Mechanical Forsaken, and Elemental Forsaken are going to be getting some buffs as part of the coming balance rework. The later endings will basically ask the player to break the game's balance over their knee, but there needs to be some balance in the first place so that breaking it can feel properly satisfying.
The other immediate goal is a proper "multiplier summary" feature. Right now, it's very easy to get lost in the sea of additive and multiplicative bonuses the game throws at you by the time you reach the later loops. By next month, I want the game to be able to show the player a comprehensive list of everything that's happening underneath the hood. This should also help with the upcoming balance work, since seeing a breakdown of all the multipliers will make it much easier to figure out which ones are simply too weak to be worthwhile. Until then, I hope everyone enjoys the boss fight!
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- Content: Added the final boss fight to campaign mode's Loop 35.
- Other: Reign cannot become Forsaken before Loop 35. Save files where she had become Forsaken will retroactively return her to being one of the Chosen.
- Other: Added the Loop 28 warp route to campaign mode.
- Bugfix: Resolved some crashes that could occur when traveling between cities.
- Bugfix: It's no longer possible to enter a bugged warp route on Loop 31.
- Bugfix: Creating a new save file will no longer sometimes put the game into a bugged state.
(1) game balance, (2) load times, and (3) the clarity of the mechanics as expressed to the player.
ReplyDeleteAfter playing this game a lot, without understanding advanced math, Id say:
(1): dont balance it. Just make the game "Infinitely Escalable" With that I mean, every time you lose , you should be able to restart the game stronger, either by keeping forsaken, keeping items, or both
(2): the current way save files work, is better, but the reign fight goes back to slow for some reason...I have noticed 2 things, one is when you close the game, sometimes it corrupts the save file in a way that you cant click in some of the buttons, 2 if you win the loop very fast , your second in command is sometimes listed as 0 cost, and sometimes as X cost , from day to day
(3): the clarity: After all this time, I still dont know what is the base damage from your commander or a forsaken. Each loop gives you damage reduction and it should be shown how it affects your choices
Thanks for the feedback. Regarding point (1), my stance has always been that allowing players to grind for an infinite bonus is no more interesting than just giving them access to a cheat menu. Players who just want to be stronger can give themselves whatever resources they want, while players who want to face a challenge using limited resources should have a baseline balanced difficulty for that challenge.
DeleteRegarding (2), I think I know what's causing the game to run more slowly when Reign is around, so that'll be high on my list of things to optimize. If you encounter any other bugs, it'd be helpful for me to be able to look at a save where that bug is happening, since otherwise there's not enough information for me to know what could be causing the bug to happen for you and not for other players.
Regarding (3), I'll make sure to also include the base damage in the multiplier summary so that players will easily be able to check that the in-game damage matches what the summary tells them to expect.
Sure, I have been uploading save files to f95 , just commenting because it is relevant for what you were posting
DeleteHonestly congrats on making it this far, the vast majority of projects like this dies before theyre even properly playable.
ReplyDeleteThank you! I make a point of trying to work consistently, even if the progress sometimes isn't as fast as I'd like.
DeleteId like to add some insights, more like opinions for the balance/post game. The more micro/macro focused species is a genius idea, i think they could be expanded upon. Since T5 forsaken arrived i agree that its pretty imbalanced, and i guess later bosses would need serious thinking on how they would fit into the game. The Reign usage and that "Thousand chosen based loops" came as a surprise, it kinda feels like getting into hard mode in Terraria as like a 1 against the world scenario, id love to see something similar. I hope that Basis, Wisdom/Reason and so on will come after L35, it would be nice to get all bosses on the same save. Otherwise, the already existing systems fit into each other so well, i see so many possibilities for reworks. Id like to ask (if you have time/motivation) to rework the Despair distortion, given that its locked after loop 10-15 if not already developed, its unique in its way (Elementals are useful, but could be also expanded). Id be willing to update the Wiki as best i can after 1.0, but it wouldnt be very aesthetically pleasing im not good in that :D
ReplyDeleteThank you for the feedback! Presently, any bosses you haven't defeated before Loop 35 will still show up in Loop 40, 45, etc. in endless mode. In the future, different routes will have special boss fights featuring multiple bosses at once so that you'll be able to get them all in your Forsaken roster even before Loop 35.
DeleteI agree that it'd be interesting to introduce another "onramp" to Despair for players who didn't use it in earlier loops, but at the same time, players who focus on building up the achievement should still get a reward for it. I'm not sure how to handle that yet, but it'll be on my mind.
This is a huge milestone! Congratulations! I've followed this game for years, and I wholeheartedly support the relook at existing content, especially performance and UI.
ReplyDeleteThank you! The addition of new content is going to slow down somewhat as the focus moves toward improving what's already there, but I hope that the more polished experience makes up for it.
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