Today I'm posting a small status update to share some of the stuff I expect to make its way into version 0.6!
Since releasing version 0.5, most of my time has been spent working on one really big change/new feature instead of several smaller new features. Because of this I may have to delay the update a week or two just to make sure I get it wrapped up and ready to ship first (I normally aim for the first Monday of every other month for major update releases). Normally I wouldn't delay an update like this under my new release schedule, and would just release it with whatever is ready, however if I do that for 0.6 before finishing this stuff, it will be a pretty small update.
So what is the big change I've been working on? The (tentatively named) Pit Stop!
Now, between levels/attempts, you can visit The Pit Stop to shop, go on field trips when they are available and manage items with the new storage locker (More on that below). I have future plans for another big, brand new feature here as well, but until I've tested it and determined that it's actually a good idea it will remain top secret!
Johnny's store is now a room that maintains the style and functionality of the shop you're familiar with. Since it's an actual room now, it will also be able to appear in levels! I mainly intend to spawn it in endless mode so that you'll have somewhere to spend YTPs, however I'm also going to experiment with having the store appear in Hide & Seek levels.
Field trips will take place here now as well! After considering the changes I already had planned for field trips alongside feedback regarding how they currently work, I came to the conclusion that they would work better in The Pit Stop than in the middle of levels, since they break the pacing of Hide & Seek too much.
Unfortunately I don't think the new field trips will be ready in time for 0.6, so it will not have any. I removed the current camping minigame to clear the way for the new field trip system, so if you want to keep a version of the game that has that minigame now's the time to make a backup copy of the current version! My plan is to have field trips return in 0.7. Here's a teaser for that!
Then there's the storage locker! This big green locker appears in The Pit Stop and is also guaranteed to appear somewhere in every level. You can place items inside to store them for later, and the contents will carry over from level to level so you can stow away the best items for when you need them most. As with your inventory, the contents of the locker are saved every time you start a level, and will revert to the saved state whenever a life is lost.
Lastly, there's an exit which you can use to save and quit, replacing the save and quit button in the elevator.
Aside from the pit stop and related changes, I've worked on a handful of smaller things, like some improvements to the HUD and optimizations to the lighting system which will finally allow lighting to respond to changes in the level layout (Meaning light will now pass through portal posters for example). There's also a new structure I'd like to work on soon! If I have time I'll try squeezing it in, but it's one of those things that could take a few hours to several days to finish.
I think that's all I want to share right now! I'll let you all know when I've pinned down a solid release date for 0.6 and its pre-release. Until then I'll be busy getting this update ready to go!
Version 0.5.2 is available now with a hotfix for captions!
Hey everyone! With the last update, a new bug crept in that caused some captions to freeze in place in certain scenarios. That seemed like it would be a pretty annoying issue, so instead of saving the fix for another big patch in a few weeks, I decided to just release a small hotfix to take care of the issue now.
In other news, Baldi's Basics Plus is currently 30% off as part of Steam's Endless Replayability Fest! Now's a great time to grab the game if you haven't yet!
Here's the full (albeit tiny) changelog for version 0.5.2:
Bug Fixes
Fixed some captions permanently freezing in place and never disappearing in some scenarios.
Fixed propagated audio managers playing audio from an incorrect position on the first frame they are loaded. This issue also affected captions and so captions appearing in the incorrect position on the first frame they appear should also be fixed.
Version 0.5.1 is available now!
Hey everyone! Thanks for all the bug reports. I've spent most of my development time this past week fixing bugs, and version 0.5.1 brings all these fixes to you! Here's the full changelog:
Changes
Dr. Reflex now opens locked standard doors when he passes through them, just like other school faculty characters do.
Adjusted the balance of rare items.
It's a Bully now only pushes the player and NPCs. Other entities now pass through him.
Chalkles now forces all doors in the room shut when he activates.
Mystery rooms no longer appear on the map, even if the map is purchased from Johnny.
Bug Fixes
Fixed 'Nana Peels being lost from the inventory when saving and continuing a game.
Fixed stamina not dropping when running against an opposing force such that the player's overall velocity is less than their walking speed.
Fixed issues with how angles were calculated for sprites with multiple viewing angles.
Fixed an issue that caused an empty caption to appear during the flood event.
Fixed a confusing issue with power tubes. When the elevator screen is loaded, it will show how many tubes the player has at the moment, but now the tubes will also be updated when a new level is loaded and power tubes are restored to 3.
Fixed the elevator for endless mode showing 2 power tubes instead of 1.
Fixed a bug that caused some items with time limits, such as the name tag and boots, to continue using up time during field trips, wasting them.
Fixed portal posters never spawning in levels.
Fixed the principal whistle never appearing in Johnny's Store.
Fixed a bug where an entity sliding on a banana peel into the bully would result in it getting stuck bouncing off of the bully until he left (And sometimes making a horrible noise as well).
Fixed a bug where getting sucked into a whirlpool while holding a math machine balloon would result in it getting lowered.
Fixed inaccessible cells being visible on the map as part of some of the new cafeterias and libraries when purchasing the map from Johnny.
Fixed a bug that allowed lockers to generate into other rooms through doors or other openings.
Fixed Dr. Reflex not always facing an entity as he squishes it.
Partially fixed a bug that allowed swinging doors to generate on top of one-way doors and possibly other types. This may still happen occasionally but I have fixed one of the ways this could happen.
Fixed a bug that occasionally resulted in some items in levels not being dependent on the seed.
Fixed captions continuing to render for game objects that have been disabled (In particular, Arts & Crafters' caption remaining visible even after disappearing).
Fixed a bug that allowed the player to click on a Math Machine after their held balloon has popped and still be able to submit the last held number as an answer.
Potential Bug Fixes
These are bugs that I was not able to reproduce myself, but that I still attempted to fix by reviewing code and cleaning out potential flaws. Since I have not been able to test these bugs myself, I cannot verify they have been fixed. If anyone still experiences any of the below bugs, please let me know and try to provide as many details as possible to help me figure out how to reproduce the bug.
Hopefully fixed a bug that would cause Dr. Reflex to tilt the player camera up or down when turning the player to face him.
Hopefully fixed a bug that would rarely cause Baldi to stop counting down at the beginning of the level and never beginning the game, allowing players to get through the level without any characters spawning or events starting. This fix was attempted by adding a failsafe to the AudioManager sound queueing system.
Technical
The players height can no longer be changed by walking into a sloped collider or by any other means. This is a failsafe as sloped colliders should not be in the game but may occasionally slip in (As happened in version 0.4).
Some cells in levels can now be marked as secret and won't appear on the map, even if purchased from Johnny.
Known Issues
Note that many of the issues listed here have been reported by players, but I have yet to reproduce them myself, so the accuracy of them might vary.
Balloons occasionally clip into objects.
NPCs will often not try to flip themselves when they are oriented opposite the player during Gravity Chaos. This can lead to strange NPC behavior.
NPCs will occasionally appear to turn-around when entering open areas where a hallway bridges between two different parts of that open area.
Lockdown doors near spawn can be seen snapping into the open position at game start.
Dr. Reflex can squish NPCs even when they do not match his orientation during Gravity Chaos.
Captions are more likely to stack on top of each other and become hard to read due to the new sound propagation system. I plan on finding a way to prevent captions from rendering on top of each other.
There is no indication for when entities are about to become unsquished.
It is possible to see out of bounds while being rotated by a gravity flipper while squished.
On some screen resolutions, it is possible to see a gap through some elements on the elevator screen.
Some NPCs are very annoying when they are squished.
Wind and conveyor belt audio is not propagated.
NPCs will occasionally end up wandering into an area they should be fleeing from.
Dr. Reflex can sometimes get his hammer early while being pushed around by outside forces.
NPCs will occasionally get stuck on the merry-go-round.
NPCs can collide with other entities through walls, triggering their effects.
Math Machine balloons can rarely get stuck behind the diagonal math machine.
Principal, under some circumstances, can maintain his fast speed after using the principal whistle.
Whirlpools that spawn behind a closed elevator gate still pull on the player, and this can cause the player to get stuck if there are multiple whirlpools.
Dr. Reflex's sprite rarely getting tilted when pushed by multiple outside forces at once.
Holding the quick map open while opening the advanced map causes a small visual issue.
Arts and Crafters' echoes while attacking don't always match his orientation during the gravity event.
When spawning in a level, the inventory says "Nothing" even if an item is highlighted.
Chalkles' voice sometimes cuts out while laughing due to the audio being propagated and entering another room/going out of bounds.
Going on a field trip while the "all notebooks" notification sound is playing will cause it to play a second time after returning from the field trip.
A seed is displayed when playing pre-made maps.
Held sprite objects, such as the math machine balloons, can be held into other areas such that their lighting noticeably changes.
Mrs. Pomp doesn't wander around class rooms in pre-made maps. She just stands in a corner.
Certain sound effects are delayed while the environment is frozen (Such as when Mrs. Pomp is asking the player to come to her class).
Maps from saved games of Hide & Seek from older versions of the game will fill out the areas found from the previous play session, even if it doesn't match new level generation.
Principal doesn't open office doors during detention while fleeing from a tape.
Beans' gum will float if the surface it hit is moved away.
During the flood, hall swinging doors do not open, while swinging doors that lead into rooms do open.
The map in Johnny's store doesn't remain sold out after buying it when replaying the same level.
NPCs can rarely end up stuck in the ground after the flood event (If anyone can figure out how to reproduce this please let me know because I cannot).
Version 0.5 is now available! Featuring a new item, the 'Nana Peel!
Baldi's Basics Plus version 0.5 is now available!
This update features a brand new item, the 'Nana Peel! Toss it on the ground and anyone that steps on it will slip and slide and bounce around until they hit an obstacle dead-on. This includes you! You can use it in a variety of situations to maneuver around characters, trap them, send them away or to give yourself a small speed boost.
This update also adds You Thought Point pickups. These plus icons appear as items, but instead of going to your inventory, they add YTPs instantly! The more you explore, the more you'll be rewarded!
Speaking of YTPs, this update also includes the new Power Bonus! This multiplies the YTPs earned in a level (Excluding from field trips) by the number of lives you have when you finish. This not only rewards better play, but it fixes a design issue where dying and replaying levels three times each allowed players to grind YTPs, making it the optimal way to play despite being super grindy.
Alongside those big new features, this update also brings new room variants, posters and other small tweaks. The full changelog can be viewed below.
Additions
New item, the "'Nana Peel"
Dropped 'nana peels can spawn in cafeterias.
Banana Trees can rarely spawn in playgrounds. These are surrounded by dropped 'nana peels.
You Thought Point Pickups.
Several new posters were added.
A new type of poster, bulletin boards, was added. These only appear in faculty only rooms.
Added a few different variants for the cafeteria, playground and library.
Changes
Reworked the way items are distributed into levels by creating a loot table system.
Now, each level generates a list of items that should be found in it based on a set of parameters. These items are then placed throughout the level such that more valuable items favor harder to reach areas. Previously, items were generated by rooms individually, which meant it was almost impossible to control item balance per-level without changing the number of rooms that generated in a level.
Reworked the elevator results screen to show the power bonus and other values in a more sensical order.
The "Total YTPs" value on the screen now shows the YTPs earned in that level times the Power Bonus instead of the total YTPs the player has at the moment.
Many balance changes regarding items found in levels and YTP item prices in Johnny's Store.
Slightly reduced the volume of Beans' voicelines.
Big rooms in level 3 no longer have to be at the edge of the level.
Dr. Reflex is no longer guaranteed to appear in a run.
When telling a player to come to her class, Mrs. Pomp now favors class rooms that are farther away when choosing a room.
Getting sent to detention or teleported by Arts and Crafters now resets Baldi's sound queue. He will now always head directly to the alerted position unless distracted by another source after the player is teleported.
Bug Fixes
Fixed a bug that could cause some audio clips to be ignored when pausing/unpausing the game (E.g. pausing while Dr. Reflex was saying "try again!" would sometimes result in him ending the line early and starting another test).
Fixed a bug that allowed posters to generate behind the water fountain in the cafeteria.
Fixed some Beans' audio clips that were miscategorized and didn't properly reflect audio settings.
Fixed various unintentional typos.
Fixed the Math Machine rewarding double the intended amount of YTPs when correctly solving it.
Fixed the portal poster being usable on one-way walls and not doing anything.
Fixed a bug that would cause some positional audio captions to appear as non-positional captions (E.g. the conveyor belt caption in the endless medium map).
Fixed an oversight where Principal of the Thing would shut and lock all doors when entering/leaving detention. Now, all doors will be shut/locked only when first teleporting into detention. When Principal enters/leaves through a door, only that door will be affected.
Fixed an oversight that allowed Mrs. Pomp to have her class in a room she or the player is already in when first talking to the player.
Fixed the flood water object not being big enough to entirely cover large levels.
Fixed bus rendering issues.
Fixed being able to look backwards while in a locker.
Fixed doors staying open indefinitely when being forced shut during a flood.
Fixed a bug that caused some entity/NPC movement to be somewhat inconsistent with other game elements when pausing/unpausing. This allowed for exploits in certain situations, such as being able to pause the game while being pushed by First Prize to escape being pushed.
Fixed stamina dropping when run is held but the player is moving slower than their walking speed.
Pre-release Changelog
Fixed a level generator crash that would occur when there were not enough item spawn points in a level to place all the items in the loot table.
Fixed the endless random map always crashing.
Added 'Nana Peel to Johnny's store.
Known Issues
Note that many of the issues listed here have been reported by players, but I have yet to reproduce them myself, so the accuracy of them might vary.
Balloons occasionally clip into objects.
NPCs will often not try to flip themselves when they are oriented opposite the player during Gravity Chaos. This can lead to strange NPC behavior.
NPCs will occasionally appear to turn-around when entering open areas where a hallway bridges between two different parts of that open area.
Lockdown doors near spawn can be seen snapping into the open position at game start.
Dr. Reflex will not always be facing the entity he is hitting with his hammer.
Dr. Reflex can squish NPCs even when they do not match his orientation during Gravity Chaos.
Captions are more likely to stack on top of each other and become hard to read due to the new sound propagation system. I plan on finding a way to prevent captions from rendering on top of each other.
There is no indication for when entities are about to become unsquished.
It is possible to see out of bounds while being rotated by a gravity flipper while squished.
On some screen resolutions, it is possible to see a gap through some elements on the elevator screen.
Some NPCs are very annoying when they are squished.
Wind and conveyor belt audio is not propagated.
NPCs will occasionally end up wandering into an area they should be fleeing from.
Dr. Reflex can sometimes get his hammer early while being pushed around by outside forces.
NPCs will occasionally get stuck on the merry-go-round.
NPCs can collide with other entities through walls, triggering their effects.
Math Machine balloons can rarely get stuck behind the diagonal math machine.
One-way doors can generate directly next to lockdown doors.
One-way doors can generate on top of regular swinging doors.
Principal, under some circumstances, can maintain his fast speed after using the principal whistle.
Whirlpools that spawn behind a closed elevator gate still pull on the player, and this can cause the player to get stuck if there are multiple whirlpools.
The camera can rarely be rotated up/down when getting turned around by Dr. Reflex.
Dr. Reflex's sprite rarely getting tilted when pushed by multiple outside forces at once.
Holding the quick map open while opening the advanced map causes a small visual issue.
Arts and Crafters' echoes while attacking don't always match his orientation during the gravity event.
When spawning in a level, the inventory says "Nothing" even if an item is highlighted.
The wrong amount of power tubes is displayed when playing certain modes.
Mrs. Pomp's map icon is awkwardly placed in some rooms.
Chalkles' voice sometimes cuts out while laughing due to the audio being propagated and entering another room/going out of bounds.
Going on a field trip while the "all notebooks" notification sound is playing will cause it to play a second time after returning from the field trip.
A seed is displayed when playing pre-made maps.
Held sprite objects, such as the math machine balloons, can be held into other areas such that their lighting noticeably changes.
Mrs. Pomp doesn't wander around class rooms in pre-made maps. She just stands in a corner.
Certain sound effects are delayed while the environment is frozen (Such as when Mrs. Pomp is asking the player to come to her class).
Maps from saved games of Hide & Seek from older versions of the game will fill out the areas found from the previous play session, even if it doesn't match new level generation.
Principal doesn't open office doors during detention while fleeing from a tape.
Beans' gum will float if the surface it hit is moved away.
During the flood, hall swinging doors do not open, while swinging doors that lead into rooms do open.
The map in Johnny's store doesn't remain sold out after buying it when replaying the same level.
That's all for this update. This next week I'll be almost exclusively focused on fixing bugs for version 0.5.1! Of course, please be sure to report any bugs you find in this update that are not already listed as a known issue. Thanks, and enjoy the update!
Baldi's Basics Plus version 0.5 is on its way! + New ANGRY Baldi Plushie!
Hey everyone! I'm posting a quick status update to let you all know what's up with version 0.5 of Baldi's Basics Plus! First though, I'd like to say thanks to all the support and feedback I've gotten since the release of version 0.4. I'm so glad so many people are enjoying the new update and loving the new character, Dr. Reflex!
Now regarding 0.5, I want to keep expectations in check so I'll say now that this update will be on the smaller side. With how long and how intensely I was working on 0.4, I was putting off a bit of personal business for a while that all added up over time. So, since releasing 0.4 and a few patches, I've taken off more time than usual to take care of things. Taxes, property maintenance, Basically Games business/legal stuff, etc. Add to that a few days of time off to spend with friends and family and I haven't gotten as much Baldi's Basics dev work done as I normally would, but don't worry! My work life imbalance will correct itself with all this stuff done and future updates should be a little bit more substantial in terms of content.
0.5 Info
There are two main things you can expect in 0.5: A new item and big changes to item and You Thought Points balance.
New item
I'm not going to reveal what the new item is just yet, but as I mentioned on my Twitter a few weeks ago, I think it will be the most versatile item to be added to the game so far! It has one simple mechanic, but can be used to great effect in a variety of different situations. It's also pretty funny! I'm looking forward to seeing how you all slip it into your strategies once 0.5 releases!
Item balance
The other big new change is to item and You Thought Point distribution and balance. First, the way items are placed into randomly generated levels is getting overhauled. Currently, each room has items spawned inside separately from other rooms. This makes it very hard to control item balance as more rooms always means more items. In 0.5, each level will instead generate its own loot table, a selection of items that are then to be distributed into the level. This means I can more easily control how many items and what kinds of items will be found in a level, regardless of the level's size. Expect the game to get a little harder in 0.5 as I reduce the number of items in each level a bit. Hopefully this will make the game a bit more interesting to play as really powerful items won't be quite as prevalent, meaning you'll have to get more creative with other items! Of course, I'll be monitoring player feedback to continue tweaking the game balance.
New way to collect You Thought Points
You Thought Points are also getting some big balance changes. First off, YTPs will be able to be earned by collecting plus icons!
These plus icons are unique items that immediately reward you some YTPs instead of going into your inventory. They can be found in green, silver, and gold variants that add 25, 50 and 100 YTPs respectively. If you want to get as many YTPs as possible, you'll want to make sure you fully explore each level to find as many of these as you can!
Power Bonus
There's one more big change coming to the YTP system though, and that's the Power Bonus! Now when you finish a level, all the YTPs you earned in that level will be multiplied by the number of power tubes you have. So 3X if you beat the level on the first try and 2X if you finish on the second. If it takes you three tries, you get no bonus. I added this multiplier to tackle a game design issue where it was technically advantageous to intentionally lose and replay levels after nearly finishing them to grind YTPs. This isn't something I've noticed players doing, but I still want to make sure the optimal way to play is fun! The Power Bonus eliminates this issue entirely and rewards better play.
With this change comes increased prices in Johnny's store of course, as the average number of YTPs earned per-level is much higher now. My goal will be to balance prices in the shop so that it's a bit harder than it currently is to afford items, which will make it more important for players to try and get as many YTPs as possible. Again though, I will be monitoring feedback and adjusting accordingly!
In the future, there will be more things to spend YTPs on, but I'm not ready to talk about any of that yet. Stay tuned!
And a little more!
So far, those are the two most notable things I'm certain will be coming in version 0.5, but I'm still working on the update! There will be other small changes and additions as well. I've been thinking about adding more posters lately, and I will probably throw a few new room variants into the update as well. I'll have all the final details when 0.5 releases! When does 0.5 release, you ask?
Release date
I plan on releasing the 0.5 Pre-release to Kickstarter Demo backers on April 29, followed by the public release on May 6. Mark your calendars!
New ANGRY Baldi Plushie!
Last year I teamed up with Makeship to release a Happy Baldi plushie. This year, we've created an ANGRY Baldi plushie with a detachable ruler!
The campaign is almost over. It ends this weekend! So don't wait too long if you'd like to grab one. There's no guarantee that this plushie will ever be made again after this!
Each purchase will also include a Steam code for Baldi's Basics Plus. I'm sure many of you already have the game, so you can share the code with a friend! The codes will all be sent out some time after the campaign is finished.
That's it!
That's all I've got to share right now. Thank you all for the support and see you when 0.5 is ready to release!
New ANGRY Baldi plushie campaign from Makeship is live now!
The new ANGRY Baldi plushie campaign from Makeship is LIVE NOW! It will only be available to purchase until April 12, so don't wait too long! Every purchase will also include a Steam code for Baldi's Basics Plus! This is a great way to get the game if you haven't yet. If you do already have the game, you can share the code with a friend!
I'm super happy with how this new plushie turned out. It even includes a detachable ruler accessory Baldi can hold!
If at least 200 units are sold, the campaign will be successful and the plushie will be produced shortly after! If not, all orders will be refunded, so there's no risk in placing an order early. Steam codes will be sent out once the campaign ends.
Version 0.4.2 is available now!
Version 0.4.2 is now available! This update may be small, but that's because I've begun working on new stuff! In fact, I've already finished a new item that will be added in version 0.5!
As I continue working on new stuff, expect fewer bug fixes than in the 0.4.1 update. I'll try to get around to fixing all the current known issues eventually!
Changes
Big Ol' Boots now last 60 seconds.
Outside force modifiers (Such as wind or BSODA) now use a priority system that will cause lower priority modifiers to be ignored.
Bug Fixes
Fixed a bug that would cause NPCs to navigate through walls when targeting, wandering, and then targeting again in quick succession, such that the start cell and target cell never changed with each calculation.
Heavily reworked balloons to fix several issues they've had since the 0.4 update. They now pop when taken outside of a class room before respawning. When swapping a held balloon, the held balloon now takes the selected balloon's position. Balloons now have better movement.
Fixed some issues relating to changing the height of a non-grounded entity.
Fixed BSODA passing through entities when they are being pushed by multiple outside forces at the same time.
Fixed BSODA and other non-grounded entities being affected by forces that should only affect grounded entities (Like the conveyor belt and merry-go-round).
Fixed a bug where, if an entity was destroyed while on a merry-go-round (Such as an alarm clock despawning) it would cause the merry-go-round to stop affecting other entities.
Fixed a bug that caused non-player entities being pushed by outside forces to move slightly faster than they should.
Minor misc. fixes to the endless medium premade map.
Known Issues
Note that many of the issues listed here have been reported by players, but I have yet to reproduce them myself, so the accuracy of them might vary.
Balloons occasionally clip into objects.
NPCs will often not try to flip themselves when they are oriented opposite the player during Gravity Chaos. This can lead to strange NPC behavior.
NPCs will occasionally appear to turn-around when entering open areas where a hallway bridges between two different parts of that open area.
Lockdown doors near spawn can be seen snapping into the open position at game start.
Principal Office door can get stuck open indefinitely if sent to detention during a flood.
Dr. Reflex will not always be facing the entity he is hitting with his hammer.
Dr. Reflex can squish NPCs even when they do not match his orientation during Gravity Chaos.
Captions are more likely to stack on top of each other and become hard to read due to the new sound propagation system. I plan on finding a way to prevent captions from rendering on top of each other.
There is no indication for when entities are about to become unsquished (Not a bug, just an issue I intend to address soon).
It is possible to see out of bounds while being rotated by a gravity flipper while squished.
On some screen resolutions, it is possible to see a gap through some elements on the elevator screen.
Some NPCs are very annoying when they are squished.
Wind and conveyor belt audio is not propagated.
NPCs will occasionally end up wandering into an area they should be fleeing from.
Dr. Reflex can sometimes get his hammer early while being pushed around by outside forces.
NPCs will occasionally get stuck on the merry-go-round.
NPCs can collide with other entities through walls, triggering their effects.
Math Machine balloons can rarely get stuck behind the diagonal math machine.
It is possible to escape being pushed by First Prize by pausing/unpausing the game rapidly.
Principal locks all office doors when leaving his office during detention, even ones he is not leaving through, which can cause a door unlocked with keys to unexpectedly be locked again.
Mrs. Pomp can ask you to come to a class room that the player is already in.
One-way doors can generate directly next to lockdown doors.
One-way doors can generate on top of regular swinging doors.
Principal, under some circumstances, can maintain his fast speed after using the principal whistle.
Stamina drops when trying to move even if the player cannot move.
Whirlpools that spawn behind a closed elevator gate still pull on the player, and this can cause the player to get stuck if there are multiple whirlpools.
The camera can rarely be rotated up/down when getting turned around by Dr. Reflex.
Sometimes the edge of the flood water object can be seen.
Dr. Reflex's sprite rarely getting tilted when pushed by multiple outside forces at once.
Holding the quick map open while opening the advanced map causes a small visual issue.
Arts and Crafters' echoes while attacking don't always match his orientation during the gravity event.
When spawning in a level, the inventory says "Nothing" even if an item is highlighted.
The wrong amount of power tubes is displayed when playing certain modes.
Mrs. Pomp's map icon is awkwardly placed in some rooms.
Chalkles' voice sometimes cuts out while laughing due to the audio being propagated and entering another room/going out of bounds.
Going on a field trip while the "all notebooks" notification sound is playing will cause it to play a second time after returning from the field trip.
A seed is displayed when playing pre-made maps.
Held sprite objects, such as the math machine balloons, can be held into other areas such that their lighting noticeably changes.
Mrs. Pomp doesn't wander around class rooms in pre-made maps. She just stands in a corner.
Certain sound effects are delayed while the environment is frozen (Such as when Mrs. Pomp is asking the player to come to her class).
Maps from saved games of Hide & Seek from older versions of the game will fill out the areas found from the previous play session, even if it doesn't match new level generation.
Principal doesn't open office doors during detention while fleeing from a tape.
Beans' gum will float if the surface it hit is moved away.
You can look back while inside a locker.
During the flood, hall swinging doors do not open, while swinging doors that lead into rooms do open.
The map in Johnny's store doesn't remain sold out after buying it when replaying the same level.
Version 0.4.1 is available now!
Hello Baldi's Basics Plus players!
First off I want to say a big THANK YOU for all the great feedback I've received regarding the 0.4 update! I'm so glad that so many of you are loving the update, and I will be taking the more constructive feedback and using it to improve the game where possible.
Of course I also want to say thank you for all the bug reports that have been sent in! I would not have been able to fix so many bugs without them.
Lastly, I want to note that old mods MUST be uninstalled before you can play the new updates! Several people have reported severe issues with the new update, primarily being unable to move when starting a game, and the cause has consistently been old mods conflicting with the new version of the game. If you have mods installed and are unsure how to properly uninstall them, the easiest way is to delete the entire Baldi's Basics Plus folder installed by Steam and re-install it. It is not always enough to just re-install it or check file integrity via Steam. If you are experiencing a game breaking issue, please make sure you don't have any old mods installed.
With all that, here's the changelog for version 0.4.1, available now!
Changes/Additions
Added an error screen to the elevator for when the level generator crashes. This screen will inform players that a crash occurred and give them instructions on how to submit a proper bug report.
Mrs. Pomp no longer freezes the player in place when she first starts screaming at them.
The party event now has NPCs wander around the Principal's office, rather than just stand in place.
Math Machine balloons no longer have captions when they pop.
Updated descriptions for explorer mode and challenges for clarity.
Added a failsafe to the occlusion culling system which prevents it from crashing if an opening to an out of bounds area generates in a level.
Made Kickstarter backer posters much rarer, and limited them to appear in level 1 only.
Misc. code cleanup.
Bug Fixes
Fixed some furniture with rotation that was misaligned around the Y-axis, allowing the player to change their height and fly over/under the level by walking into it.
Fixed Mrs. Pomp being able to attack the player in rooms she cannot enter.
Fixed Mrs. Pomp sometimes targeting a door that doesn't lead to a hallway.
Fixed a bug that caused the player to be unable to move after using a teleporter while in a locker.
Fixed the floodwaters being audible at full volume for a frame when the event starts.
Fixed a bug that caused entities to get stuck in the ground when getting sucked into a whirlpool at the same time a field trip is played.
Fixed an oversight that allowed players to use items during field trip minigames.
Fixed Arts and Crafters attack sound being louder than intended and not respecting the sound effects volume setting.
Fixed propagated audio being audible at the wrong volume level for a single frame when a level finished loading.
Fixed several NullReferenceException errors that would occur when quitting to the main menu (These errors had no noticeable effect on gameplay).
Fixed Dr. Reflex always knowing the player's location the same frame he gets angry, even if they were out of his line of sight.
Fixed Baldi's "thanks for playing!" voiceline when quitting the game not respecting the voice volume setting. If the voice volume is zero, there will be no delay when quitting.
Fixed The Test being able to move while not observed when its navigation was overridden by external events, such as the party event or playing the tape/phone.
Fixed a bug that allowed hall lockers to be built into rooms.
Fixed the elevator and elevator gate audio sources not being propagated.
Fixed the order of challenge maps on the challenges menu to properly reflect the numerical order as displayed in the elevator.
Fixed Baldi's "smarter than me!" caption not being green in some contexts.
Further restricted the spawn positions of whirlpools to prevent players potentially getting stuck when the event ends while they are getting pulled down into a whirlpool.
Fixed several issues with pre-made maps
Fixed notebooks icons being misplaced.
Fixed the playground in the grapple challenge not having the playground room function assigned.
Added EntitySafeSpawn points to all Principal's offices in premade maps. These points are used by some game events, and without them strange behavior would occur.
Fixed a bug that could cause openings to an out of bounds area to form in special rooms (Like the playground or library).
Fixed an object that was not being occluded properly.
Fixed posters getting placed on the fence in outdoors areas.
Fixed the library being the only special room to generate in level 3. Now the cafeteria can also generate in level 3.
Known Issues
Note that many of the issues listed here have been reported by players, but I have yet to reproduce them myself, so the accuracy of them might vary.
NPCs are able to navigate through walls in rare cases. I'm not entirely sure under what conditions this is possible, but I've seen it happen a few times now.
Balloons occasionally clip outside of rooms or into objects.
NPCs will often not try to flip themselves when they are oriented opposite the player during Gravity Chaos. This can lead to strange NPC behavior.
NPCs will occasionally appear to turn-around when entering open areas where a hallway bridges between two different parts of that open area.
Lockdown doors near spawn can be seen snapping into the open position at game start.
Principal Office door can get stuck open indefinitely if sent to detention during a flood.
Dr. Reflex will not always be facing the entity he is hitting with his hammer.
Dr. Reflex can squish NPCs even when they do not match his orientation during Gravity Chaos.
Captions are more likely to stack on top of each other and become hard to read due to the new sound propagation system. I plan on finding a way to prevent captions from rendering on top of each other.
There is no indication for when entities are about to become unsquished (Not a bug, just an issue I intend to address soon).
It is possible to see out of bounds while being rotated by a gravity flipper while squished.
On some screen resolutions, it is possible to see a gap through some elements on the elevator screen.
Some NPCs are very annoying when they are squished.
Wind and conveyor belt audio is not propagated.
NPCs will occasionally end up wandering into an area they should be fleeing from.
Dr. Reflex can sometimes get his hammer early while being pushed around by outside forces.
NPCs will occasionally get stuck on the merry-go-round.
NPCs can collide with other entities through walls, triggering their effects.
Math Machine balloons can rarely get stuck behind the diagonal math machine.
It is possible to escape being pushed by First Prize by pausing/unpausing the game rapidly.
Using a BSODA to push an entity that is being pushed by a conveyor belt/wind in the direction the belt/wind is moving will cause it to pass through the entity.
Math Machine balloons can end up outside of their correct room sometimes.
Principal locks all office doors when leaving his office during detention, even ones he is not leaving through, which can cause a door unlocked with keys to unexpectedly be locked again.
Mrs. Pomp can ask you to come to a class room that the player is already in.
One-way doors can generate directly next to lockdown doors.
One-way doors can generate on top of regular swinging doors.
Principal, under some circumstances, can maintain his fast speed after using the principal whistle.
Stamina drops when trying to move even if the player cannot move.
Whirlpools that spawn behind a closed elevator gate still pull on the player, and this can cause the player to get stuck if there are multiple whirlpools.
The camera can rarely be rotated up/down when getting turned around by Dr. Reflex.
Sometimes the edge of the flood water object can be seen.
Dr. Reflex's sprite rarely getting tilted when pushed by multiple outside forces at once.
Holding the quick map open while opening the advanced map causes a small visual issue.
Arts and Crafters' echoes while attacking don't always match his orientation during the gravity event.
When spawning in a level, the inventory says "Nothing" even if an item is highlighted.
The wrong amount of power tubes is displayed when playing certain modes.
Mrs. Pomp's map icon is awkwardly placed in some rooms.
Chalkles' voice sometimes cuts out while laughing due to the audio being propagated and entering another room/going out of bounds.
Going on a field trip while the "all notebooks" notification sound is playing will cause it to play a second time after returning from the field trip.
A seed is displayed when playing pre-made maps.
Held sprites objects, such as the math machine balloons, can be held into other areas such that their lighting noticeably changes.
Mrs. Pomp doesn't wander around class rooms in pre-made maps. She just stands in a corner.
Certain sound effects are delayed while the environment is frozen (Such as when Mrs. Pomp is asking the player to come to her class).
Maps from saved games of Hide & Seek from older versions of the game will fill out the areas found from the previous play session, even if it doesn't match new level generation.
Principal doesn't open office doors during detention while fleeing from a tape.
Beans' gum will float if the surface it hit is moved away.
You can look back while inside a locker.
Dr. Reflex is moved slightly faster by wind/conveyor belts than he should.
During the flood, hall swinging doors do not open, while swinging doors that lead into rooms do open.
The map in Johnny's store doesn't remain sold out after buying it when replaying the same level.
Version 0.4 releases late February!
Hello everyone!
This is going to be a small status update, but I just wanted to let you all know that I'm ready to announce that Baldi's Basics Plus version 0.4 will finally release on February 26... At the latest!
The update is nearly ready to go. The one thing that's holding it back is Dr. Reflex's animation work, which is taking longer than anticipated. I was hoping to be finished taking photos by now, but I ended up having to redo a couple of animations so I'm not quite there yet. I think I'll be able to finish this week though! After that I'll have to edit every single photo, which will involve removing the greenscreen, manually editing out any other artifacts, making sure everything is lined up properly, making everything low res and dithered, etc. There are a few hundred frames of animation to go through, so I'm not quite sure how long that step will take me. I hope you all end up liking the final result because this is the most effort I've ever put into a character's visuals!
So that's why I'm saying February 26 at the latest. With that date I'll have plenty of time to ensure everything is ready to go, but there's a chance that, if things go really well over the next couple of weeks, I may be able to release it a bit earlier!
Of course, once this update releases that will mark the beginning of the new update schedule of a major update every two months, so you can expect version 0.5 to release around the end of April/beginning of May. I myself am not sure what will be in these future updates, I'm just going to be working on developing the new content I have planned and I'll ship whatever is ready in each major update. This means that they will vary in size, but they will always contain something new to discover. There will also be no more delays since I won't be holding updates back to finish certain features! If something isn't ready yet, it will just be saved for the next major update.
That's it for this small status update about a BIG game update! Thanks again for all the support!
Version 0.4 is releasing soon, and a new character has been revealed!
Hello Baldi's Basics Plus players!
First off I'd like to apologize for the lack of updates here on Steam. I have been posting status updates to the game's Kickstarter every two months for over a year now, but it didn't occur to me until recently that I should be sharing that news with everyone here as well!
If you'd like to see what you've missed, all previous status updates can be viewed on the Kickstarter's updates page.
I will be posting the latest update right here though! In it I discuss a big new feature coming to the game and the next character to be added, who will make their debut in version 0.4! When is 0.4 releasing you ask? Soon! February 2024 at the latest, but possibly sooner. Keep reading for more details!
Sound Propagation
Something I've never been super happy about with Baldi's Basics is the way sound works. Unity's built-in audio system is very basic and so it can't do much beyond very simple attenuation and panning based on a sound's location relative to the camera. This means that sounds have always ignored the level layout and passed right through walls. I'm sure many of you have noticed that in the game you can hear anything that's nearby even if there are several walls between you and the source of the sound that should affect it. What I've always wanted to do was have sounds wrap around the walls so that players hear where they are coming from, not where they are. For a stealth game, this sort of sound propagation is a big deal.
For example, if you're in a room with a single door, all sounds from outside should be heard coming from the doorway. Even if the source of that sound is closer to the wall opposite the door, the sound should only be able to pass through an opening, not a wall. There are plugins available that try to solve this problem, but many of them either don't work with procedurally generated scenes or utilize expensive (On the CPU, not expensive monetarily) raycasting techniques to achieve a more realistic sound, which would be overkill for Baldi's Basics. I have for a long time felt that, due to the simple grid-based nature of Baldi's Basics levels, there had to be a good way to achieve what I wanted, and while I had several ideas on how to tackle the problem myself they were either too complex to tackle any time soon or would put too much work on the CPU and hurt performance.
That is until I stumbled upon a sort of algorithm/technique sometimes referred to as Dijkstra maps! Without getting too technical, this technique involves creating a sort of map that points to the shortest path to the player's location from any other location in the level. You only have to generate this map once whenever the the player moves or whenever the level layout changes, and then it can be used by as many things that need it as often as they need it. This means that the game can calculate what route a sound needs to take to reach the player very quickly, much more quickly than other pathfinding algorithms, which means lots of sounds can be processed at once without impacting performance!
In this screenshot, you can see this system in action! The lines from Baldi are an approximation of the shortest path from him to the player (Who is at the red X). The audio source gets placed at the end of the cyan line so that the sound can be heard coming from the door, even though Baldi is technically in the opposite direction.
I was able to develop, polish, and debug this system in just over a week. Performance testing shows it runs just as well as I was hoping. I was not expecting to get this done so early, but now it's likely it will be yet another big improvement to the game that will ship with Baldi's Basics Plus version 0.4!
You might be wondering, besides the fact that it's really cool, what is the point of this? Well there are several reasons why I believe this is a big improvement over the way audio used to be:
Sounds you hear are now more relevant - Just because you hear Baldi on the other side of a wall doesn't necessarily mean he's close to you. There might be a long winding path between you and him. With this system, you will now only hear sounds from things that are truly close to you!
You can now hear where sounds are coming from - With the old system, you can roughly tell where a sound is, but not necessarily which direction it's coming from. With sound propagation, you can better tell which way to go to get closer to, or run away from, a sound.
It makes captions less overpowered - Many people have noted that captions are a bit overpowered in their current form since they not only point to where a sound is at, but easily visualize how it's moving as well. Captions have been updated to reflect the new sound propagation system so now they don't provide as big of an unintended advantage while still providing useful info for those who need them to play the game properly.
It improves the game's atmosphere - The game is now a bit more quiet overall which, combined with other factors, raises tensions a bit more.
Sound design is one of my biggest passions in game dev so I could keep going on about how excited I am about this feature, but I'll go ahead and move onto revealing the next character!
Spoiler Warning!
If you're trying to avoid seeing the new character before 0.4 comes out, turn back now! If not, scroll down!
Oh, and please be mindful when discussing the new character online by posting spoiler warnings as well so that people who don't want spoilers can more easily avoid them!
Presenting the next Baldi's Basics character...
Dr. Reflex!
As many of you guessed, the next character will be Dr. Reflex, who I first talked about way back in a Kickstarter update I posted just a week after launching this campaign! I mentioned that the name was "definitely pending" but I ultimately just decided to leave it as-is haha.
What I didn't leave as-is are his game mechanics! The character works very differently than what I initially described in that previous post, as the idea evolved a lot since then. Dr. Reflex wanders around the school just like any other character, and when he sees you he'll rush over and, if he catches you, force you to take a reflex test in the form of a timing minigame. After a few moments he'll open up both of his hands and you'll need to quickly click on the correct one (Obviously there will be an indicator showing which hand is correct, but I haven't settled on what that will look like quite yet). If you click the wrong one or take too long to react the minigame will reset, and it will continue until you win, which will earn you some YTPs!
You might be thinking that that sounds a lot like Playtime, but Dr. Reflex has a big difference that sets him apart. Unlike with Playtime, you aren't held in place and can just walk away whenever you want. Baldi getting too close to wait for the test to begin? Just walk away! What negative consequence could you possibly face for leaving before completing the test?
Well that's when Dr. Reflex gets really interesting! If you leave before completing the test, Dr. Reflex will get angry and head back to his clinic (A special room that will generate in levels he is in) and grab a giant percussion hammer (You know, one of those weird reflex test hammers doctors hit your knee with). With this in hand, he will begin hunting you down, and if he catches you he will hit you with it several times and squish you!
When you're squished, your character will be half their regular height, and the things you'll be able to interact with will become limited. You'll still be able to open doors and solve math machines, but you won't be able to hit buttons, pick up items and notebooks or enter lockers among other things. This effect will wear off after some time, so you'll have to be extra careful until you regain your normal height.
You're not the only one who can get squished though! In his fury, Dr. Reflex will squish any character he comes across, including Baldi himself! When a character is squished, their interaction with you will be limited. So, for example, Baldi won't be able to end the game, Principal of the Thing won't be able to send you to detention, etc. If other characters get squished, make sure you take advantage of the situation!
Once Dr. Reflex squishes the player, he will return to normal and, after a cooldown, the cycle will repeat.
Dr. Reflex's programming is already pretty much complete. From what playtesting I've done, he can create some really funny - and terrifying - scenarios, so I can't wait for when you all will be able to meet him in-game!
What's not complete is the artwork and sounds. Similar to First Prize, Dr. Reflex will have a sprite that rotates based on what angle you are seeing him from. This is not only cool looking, but it's also important for gameplay as, unlike other Baldi's Basics characters, he can only see you if you are in front of him or in his periphery.
The difference though is that his sprites will be animated! I explained some of this in an earlier update, but the plan is to use stop motion to animate him from eight different angles, which is looking to be a lot of work, but I think it will be worth the effort! I haven't done any animation yet, so for now I just have these static placeholder sprites to show off.
I also have yet to do voicework. I haven't settled on how I want him to sound yet, all I know is that his catchphrase will be "Thiiiiiiink... Fast!" which he'll yell as he first chases you down and starts his minigame.
I think that's about everything there is to know about Dr. Reflex at the moment. So, I'll wrap this status update up!
Wrapping up
Recently I said that a January release for Baldi's Basics version 0.4 was a pretty safe bet, and I'd say that's still likely! However I have yet to sit down and make a bunch of rooms for the new level generator (Largely due to sound propagation stealing my attention for a bit!), so between still needing to do that and Dr. Reflex's animation work, things may take a tiny bit longer. 0.4 will come out in February at the latest, but January is still a real possibility. I will keep everyone updated as we get closer to those dates.
Aside from all that, I've also been doing the usual bug fixing and polishing as needed. The changelog for 0.4 is going to be massive haha.
