Greatly simplified Blockly snippets. It used to be that Blockly snippets contained 3 blocks in general: an if statement, a condition for the if, and a terminator to run inside the body of the if. Those snippets still exist in the "Advanced" menu, but the primary way of interacting with the game will be with the new, one-line snippets that simply say something like "try to fire lasers". These new snippets act almost exactly like how the old ones did, but they're much clearer to use and customize. The tutorial and campaign missions now solely use simplified snippets. As a result, a couple of the missions are significantly easier than they used to be.
The Battle Log page has been completely revamped! All major features in Bot Land now have their own distinct buttons. This should make everything easier to find and should also cut down on the number of clicks it takes to navigate.
Added warning symbols to Blockly blocks that correspond to hardware that you don't have equipped. For example, if you put a "fire lasers" block into a script and your bot doesn't have Lasers, then you'll see the warning. This warning does not stop you from saving the script.
Consolidated the tutorial experience from three distinct parts down to just two. The tutorial now opens immediately with scripts and how to edit them.
Minor changes
The in-game documentation now rememebers your search query so that you can bounce quickly between code and the documentation for the function that you're trying to use.
On desktop, if you click the hardware slots at the bottom of the blueprint editor, it will now take you directly to your hardware slots and inventory, even if you're in the script editor.
On mobile, if you quick-edit a script from the Arena, then you can save the script directly from the editor rather than having to go back to the blueprint page first.
Lowered the default sound levels for the game. The idea is that it's better if players have to go to the Settings menu to raise the volume than to lower it.
On desktop, the mouse cursor is set to a pointer on cosmetic items in your inventory and the "grab" cursor on hardware items. This should make it clearer how to interact with them.
The end-of-campaign dialog now has confetti! Hurray! 🎉
Fixed a bug where the match-results screen would play a fanfare every time you unminimized it.
Stopped showing toast notifications when you beat a campaign mission since the mission-victory screen already includes reward information.
Removed Melee from The Floor is Lava inventory since it served no purpose.
Removed some unnecessary blocks from Blockly snippets around willRepair given that it already performs a check on the target's life.
Slowed down the darkening of the background during a tutorial to give the player more time to read before potentially distracting them.
Reworded Rooted Melee to make it clearer that killing a target is not what causes the user to be immobilized.
Bot Land version 1.4.4
Major changes
Improve tutorial and campaign
Trimmed some extra words here and there.
Removed the script from your bots in the third tutorial.
Increased the size of the very first Arena so that there's some breathing room.
If you come back to Bot Land without having done the introductory tutorials, you'll now be given the choice to restart them rather than just resuming them.
The fanfare now plays when you beat a tutorial mission.
Fixed a major bug preventing you from completing the fourth mission.
Clarified what "minimum range" means in the 4th mission (in the mission tips).
Cut out "Premade scripts" and "Advanced" categories from the Blockly toolboxes of the 4th and 5th missions.
Clarified some hardware descriptions that show in tooltips (Artillery, Inferno Lasers, Stunning Lasers, Vampiric Lasers, and EMP).
Changed title text in the blueprint selector to include the word "blueprints" at all times and no longer be in all caps.
Bot Land version 1.4.3
Major changes
Improved the campaign
Simplified I Need a Doctor
Cut number of tiles down from 24 → 18.
When you lose, the "Retry" button is now "Edit script" instead.
Originally, you had two bots that could shield and only one that could attack, which meant that it could be confusing which bot was doing the shielding and which one was being shielded. Now, there's only one bot that can shield.
Simplified A Bag of Chips
You don't have to pick a weapon any longer; you're given Missiles lv. 3 by default and you can't edit your blueprint.
When you lose the mission, the "Retry" button is now "Edit script".
Changed the wording a bit on the mission (e.g. remove a reference to "Blockly", which players may not be familiar with).
Simplified In the Shadows
Got rid of Zapper since you have Inferno Zapper anyway
Made enemies taunt when they take damage
Repositioned enemies so that the visit-every-tile strategy is viable
We now prompt when you leave a mission with unsaved changes after losing that mission. Also, when you try leaving without losing, it'll prompt you only when you actually have unsaved changes.
Fixed a bug where Adam's stream wasn't showing in the "Streams" tab in Bot Land when he was developing the game.
Added a loader to the campaign-victory screen that will show while we're figuring out how much Botcoin to dole out.
Bot Land version 1.4.2
Major changes
Improved bot and chip relocation. Previously, you had to long-press a bot or chip in order to enter relocation mode, but the length of this long-press was much longer than most people would try. Now, any drag action starting at a bot/chip that you own will enter relocation mode. Panning the Arena is also done by dragging, but you have to start from a blank space.
Fixed a bug in Campaign Mode where winning gets you stuck in a loop.
Replaced the tutorial GIF by mp4 videos. These are also much higher resolution.
Bot Land version 1.4.1
Major changes
The new victory effects (the fanfare and confetti) now show when winning in any mode, not just Campaign Mode.
Fixed a bug where the campaign-victory screen would show when it wasn't supposed to.
Changed confetti cannons out for a new one. 🎉 The new one should be slightly more performant.
Bot Land version 1.4.0
Major changes
Added a proper victory screen to Campaign Mode. There's confetti! 🎉
Fix critical bug where you couldn't continue while on a guest account due to a hidden EULA checkbox being unchecked.
Simplify A Bag of Chips
Arena size in tiles: 63 → 6
Max turns: 700 → 60
Enemy bots: 7 → 1
We also place your single bot for you now.
Simplify Out of Order
We now place the bots for you since there was already no choice in positioning.
When you retry, we put you back in the script editor.
The quick-edit-blueprint button is now disabled since you can't edit your hardware anyway.
Bot Land version 1.3.9
Major changes
Repackaged the guest experience slightly. Making a guest account is now the default experience so that players don't have to provide a username or email address.
Simplify tutorial and campaign
Second tutorial - added a GIF demonstrating how to drag Blockly blocks into the canvas.
The Floor is Lava
Shrank the Arena from 98 tiles → 33 tiles.
You no longer have to destroy the CPU, just the enemy bots. This allowed for many other nice changes:
Deleted a bunch of boilerplate Blockly, so the script only has to contain a single comment now rather than a function, a bunch of comments, and code that you weren't supposed to touch.
Got rid of Melee on your bots.
Disabled the quick-edit-blueprint button since you only need to modify your script.
Changed the "move" part of the script to be a single block rather than a snippet.
Stopped highlighting the mission tips since no one really clicked them anyway even after learning about them.
Ending the battle without having edited your script will now present a more contextual dialog whose main button will bring you diredctly to the script editor.
The picture that we show at the end of the script that you're supposed to make is now the EXACT script that you're supposed to make instead of an approximation.
Out of Order - shrank Arena from 35 tiles → 25 tiles. This should make bots wander less.
Magnetic Shutdown
Shrank the Arena from 98 tiles → 30 tiles.
Cut down on the number of enemy bots 13 bots → 6 bots.
Reduced range of enemy Missiles bots from 4 tiles → 2 tiles.
Prevented the player from making/editing blueprints since it isn't necessary.
I Need a Doctor
Cut down on the number of comment blocks from 5 → 2.
The correct bots are now placed in the correct spots for you.
Shrank the Arena from 40 tiles → 24 tiles and removed two enemy bots in the process.
Bot Land version 1.3.8
Major changes
Improved the tutorial/campaign.
Increased the size of the very first battle to give new players an idea of how Bot Land can look outside of the tutorial!
Cut down on text in many places.
Disabled the quick-edit buttons in the first tutorial.
Simplified the second tutorial so that players only have to add a single snippet for reflecting.
Fixed a critical bug in the tutorials/campaign where exiting wasn't possible.
Retrying the second tutorial puts you directly into the scripting view since that's the only place where the user can make a mistake.
After 6 seconds of having a tutorial dialog on the screen, the background will become darker so that your attention is drawn to the dialog rather than the rest of the screen.
Fixed a Blockly bug where dropdowns would sometimes automatically make a selection as soon as they were opened, which essentially made the campaign unbeatable from mobile devices.
Minor changes
Guests can now explicitly delete their accounts through the settings menu.
Clarified parts of the in-game documentation.
Bot Land version 1.3.7
Major changes
Overhaul tutorial and campaign experience.
Overall, scripting is now covered much earlier.
The non-scripting missions were revamped.
Many frustrations have been addressed, e.g. large Arenas were made smaller, instructions should be clearer, and there should be better help when you fail.
In general, the tutorial should be much faster now.
When you try to leave a campaign mission by clicking the ✖ button at the bottom, you'll now see a prompt asking if you're sure you want to leave. Many users lost progress because they had accidentally clicked that button.
Adam, the creator of Bot Land (and person writing these messages to you!), will now show up in the Streams tab for his development streams of Bot Land. You can watch him there on most weekdays! 😄
Minor changes
The Steam version on Mac should no longer warn you about incompatibility on launch.
Prevented pressing the browser's back button while in the tutorial or campaign.
When in Blueprint Management Mode (via the pencil icon in the blueprint selector), pressing escape or deleting your blueprints will now take you out of that mode.
If you play Bot Land from a mobile device, the "reset replay speed" setting will be checked by default.
Colored account-deletion buttons red to make them more obviously destructive.
Shield now shows its range in the tooltip.
Fixed a bug in Campaign Mode where bots sometimes wouldn't be placed where they were originally after retrying. This was caused by having new blueprints.
Bot Land version 1.3.5
Major changes
Allowed starting Test Mode with fewer than the maximum number of bots. This should make it easier to run quick tests.
Tutorial and campaign improvements
Shrunk the width of the Arena in A Bag of Chips by 5 tiles.
Adjusted flavor text of some missions.
Decreased the maximum number of turns from 4000 to 700 for A Bag of Chips so that battles don't take forever to simulate.
Added a warning in A Bag of Chips for when you lose due to not having any weapons equipped.
Changed wording in Blockly script of The Floor is Lava to make it clearer that you have to attach blocks to the comments, not just place them anywhere.
Minor changes
Artillery now lists its minimum range (5) in its tooltip.
Made the Landmines bots in Challenge Mode actually use their Artillery. This should make Challenge Mode ever so slightly harder.
Stopped asking for guest feedback during tutorial or campaign. This caused way too many bugs. Guests will now be asked for feedback if they've been logged in for at least 8 minutes and go to the battle-log page.
Expanded hardware details height on desktop from 250px to 300px as long as the window is at least 800px tall.
Fixed a bug in the second tutorial on mobile where an element was being highlighted that was off-screen.
