If it's Friday, it's time for a Dev Diary! I am going to share today quite a few things, many of them work-in-progress. As we get closer to having a Beta, we are integrating systems, and so we can begin showing how things will work.
First of all, here's a quick clip we've done of the new UI. If you watch carefully, you'll see the weapon shop, the gear shop, the twin weapon equip, the item shop, and even the contract tree. Some things are still being worked on, but it's a pretty interesting clip:
[previewyoutube="d5dTCk7jFcw;full"]
On the video above you'll see the items are currently placeholder. Here are some of them, in all their 3D glory. We expect to integrate them next week:
Of course, as now your weapons have elemental damage, we felt it would be a nice touch for contracts to show you their "typical" element, so you enter the contracts well prepared. So in these two shots you can see the damage of your currently equipped weapon (above) and the contract's recommended element (below)
And, of course, our art team is still working on Gears, our equipment. There's never too much of this in a game like Killsquad, here's today's batch!
On a non-visual update, here's two very important items:
1) We have shortened all contracts on Recruit, so they are around 15 minutes each. We feel less is more: shorter, more varied missions, with good replay value. Veteran will remain longer, of course.
2) You'll remember on our last Gathering we said our driving force was Progression, specifically, giving you guys more ways to customize your hero. We are already adding:
- Twin weapons - Six item slots - Weapon elemental damage - Our two gears, which now become visible
Okay, I am happy to announce we have decided to add 2 more slots, which we call "Permanents" for now. Permanents are our way to give you guys more control over passive skills. In the current system, most Passives emanate from the weapons & gears. So, when you changed your weapon, you lost the passive (say, a shield passive). This put players between a rock and a hard place: you wanted to keep the Passive skill, but at the same time you need to move on from that weapon as it's not strong enough.
Wouldn't it be amazing if you could somehow "lock" your favourite passives?
Enter Permanents! You can wear two of these, and think about them like "cursed amulets": Each Permanent generates one passive, say shield in the example above. The way it works is, when you get it (for example via the Colosseum of the Unseen) the Permanent is not charged. So it will have a negative effect on your passive. In this example, shield will be *lowered*. Still, by using the Permanent and beating contracts, the Permanent will be slowly charged, and its true passive will flourish. So for example a Permanent giving you 25% extra shield, may start taking 10% from your shield, so you need to work on it to unleash its power.
We are thinking Permanents will be tied to the Unseen, so expect them to drop on Colosseum Battles. But this is still being discussed.
We feel Permanents are a great way to further customize your hero, and at the same time enhance the game's progression. What do YOU think? Post your ideas on the forums, we are always there to read them!
So that is it for today! Lots of stuff, and more to come as we integrate all game systems. We expect to begin announcing our Beta date soon. Still lots of work ahead, but the game is coming together nicely.
See y'all in the Outer Reach!!!
Dev Diary Update
Hello all, another week, another dev diary! As you will see, we are making progress on all the items discussed in our last Gathering video. If you missed it, it's here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aB3GlYDpsyU
1) We are working full steam on the new enemies. You saw one last week, and we bring 4 more today. Here they come!
We begin with a ranged enemy, for Wasteland07
This is a ranged enemy, for Kemmekh
This is a ranged enemy, for Palace of Pain
And here is a melee enemy for the Palace of Pain.
Expect these to drop on our updates 2nd half of 2020, to breathe new variety into the game. We're still discussing their behaviours, names, backstories. So, if you want to get involved, go crazy! Remember these are basic enemics, not bosses, so you are going to encounter them in relatively large mobs.
2) We have been working on the new shop, which you can see here. Worth noting is: - The 2 weapon slots on the right hand side, with the elemental damage of each weapon. Remember you can now swap between your two weapons mid-combat - The 6 item slots at the bottom, in this case, unoccupied - On Troy's body, you can see his gears. We think they are a bit too small, what do you guys think?
3) More about the shop, here you can see the new Gear section, where you can check out all the features of each gear before buying it.
4) Talking about internals, we have completed our migration to Unreal 4.25. So expect images soon of beautiful sunsets, nights and more from the Killsquad universe.
5) And another internal item, the implementation of checkpoints is now complete across Recruit and Veteran, so gone is the frustration of being killed at the very last moment: you can now go back to the checkpoint, and take it from there.
We hope you like the progress of this week. We're deep into contract rework, balancing, and testing. If you want to know more, stay tuned next week!
Dev Diary Update
Hello all, here's what we have been working on this week. As you will see, we are making progress on all the items discussed in our last Gathering video. If you missed it, it's here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aB3GlYDpsyU
1) We have added weaknesses, strengths and attack types to all enemies. These can now be consulted on the Codex, and of course are applied in battle:
2) On a non-visible update, but crucially important, the team has completed work on Checkpoints for all Bosses/final battles on the Veteran section. So, when you die in a boss fight, you get a second chance without having to cross the whole level again. Next week we will carry that onto the Recruit section. With that, the full game will have the announced checkpoint system we described at the Gathering.
3) Work has begun on the new enemies, here is one of them in 3D, more coming soon, there's 6 of them in production as we speak:
4) The biggest change announced at the Gathering was the revamp of the levelling/contract/vector/enemy system. We are now implementing all of this. It's already working across Wasteland07 and Kemmekh, next week we will implement the new vectoring / enemy system on The Palace of Pain, our 3rd world, and begin balancing it.
5) The new shop is also making good progress. All inventories are loaded, weapons have their own elemental strengths. We are now working on effects & bits and bobs of the new shop. In this case, all the notifications for new products:
You can now preview skins on your heroes, with the new shop style:
6) Also as part of the new shop, we can now confirm all gears will be visible on your hero. So, as you equip a gear, that gear will be worn on the shoulderpads or your bounty hunter. As examples, here are two such gears, in 3D:
7) We are migrating to Unreal 4.25. Which brings lots of bug fixes, but also enables the amazing Atmosphere system. So you can expect day-night cycles, better nights, evenings, dawns and dusks, across the Killsquad universe. Nothing to show just yet, but check out this video, it's really cool:
[previewyoutube="SeNM9zBPLCA;full"]
So that is it for this first week of Dev Diaries. We will be back next week with more goodies. We hope to show you the whole progression UI (contracts, shop, inventory) plus much more enemy work! We still have one more week of pure dev work then the effort will shift to balancing, playtesting and debugging all the new systems.
Take care!
Roadmap update
In this video our game director explains all the features currently being developed, which will drop in the next few months. Enjoy, and let's discuss on the forums!
[previewyoutube="aB3GlYDpsyU;full"]
Killsquad: Crush the Plague is out!
A dark Plague is attacking the Killsquad universe. One by one, planets are falling, infected by an unknown force. Creatures are mutated into pulsating blobs of pure evil. And the Federation just can’t cope. Someone is going to have to step in before it’s too late. Welcome to a new episode of the Killsquad saga, Crush the Plague.
[previewyoutube="5V-M4oyeXpM;full"] Crush the Plague is the natural continuation of the Genesis update we released two months ago. On Genesis, you got the first Act of Killsquad, the 12 Recruit contracts. You got your first glimpse into the life of a band of space bounty hunters: chaos, destruction and money.
Crush the Plague delivers the next 8 contracts, designed for Veteran players. Expect longer, harder missions for you and your friends to embark on. You’re going to face the Federation Forces, the controllers of the galaxy. You’re going to embark on relatively mild zoological expeditions. But things are going to get messy with curses, minions of the Plague, new mission types and brand-new epic bosses for you to battle against.
Remember Killsquad is an Early Access game. Released in July 2019, we are updating it every 2 months as we continue development. So, if you are a Killsquad supporter, Crush the Plague is our way of saying thank you and giving you a reason to come back to the game. And, if you haven’t tried Killsquad before, now it’s a better moment than ever: a 20 contract storyline, dozens of enemies to crush, epic boss battles, on top of a classic 4 player coop class-based top-down bullet extravaganza.
And stay tuned. Our next update takes us to Space Station Skua, the battlestation of the Federation Forces: new environments, a whole new set of enemies, coming to your screen in the Early Summer. And we are working on the game’s progression system, to give you a deeper career path for each one of our heroes.
Crush the Plague is our way to send all of you, our fans, a message of unity and courage. The full update has been developed by the Novarama team working from home due to Covid19. While the “Plague” theme existed before the Covid19 outbreak, we thought a message of fighting disease, of heroes united, and of overcoming challenge, was what our fans needed.
So, in these dark times, we’re gonna tell you to team with your friends and go in a monster killing spree. Together. Because that’s what we heroes do.
We hope you enjoy Crush the Plague. See you in the Outer Reach!
We have just released the Beta version of our next major development update to Killsquad, aptly titled: Crush the Plague. As you know, our last update overhauled the whole recruit experience, the first act of the game. Crush the Plague upgrades the first section of the Veteran experience, providing 8 brand new action packed contracts. New quests. New bosses. You name it.
In Crush the Plague, an evil force is spreading throughout the Killsquad universe. It contaminates all life forms. It deforms creatures and turns them into monsters. And it’s getting worse every day. Someone must step in and sort out this mess. That’s us, the Killsquad. Sounds familiar? With this update, we want to remind all of you, our fans, that in troubled times, a party of heroes is all you need to fix things and stamp plagues out. The Killsquad will prevail, and so will we.
This full update has been developed by the Novarama team working hard from home due to Covid19. While the “Plague” theme existed before the Covid19 outbreak, we thought a message of fighting disease, of heroes united, and of overcoming challenge, was what our fans needed.
As with all Beta versions, there may be bugs. So, please play only if you wish to participate in our Beta program. To join, please send us an e-mail here at killsquad@novarama.com, with the subject line "Killsquad Beta Program participation". After a couple of hours, you will receive instructions on how to join.
We are hoping to release Crush the Plague as a stable public build in 1-2 weeks. We really hope you’re all doing great, and, if our game can make your days of confinement a bit, our goal as a company has been fulfilled. So now, enjoy Crush the Plague!
And the good news don't stop here. In the next few weeks we will be revealing what comes next: new adventures as the Killsquad assaults Space Station Skua, the Federation mothership. And our all new progression system, which we have been designing for some time now. All of this is coming to the game in the next few months.
Remember Killsquad is an Early Access game. As such, it is not a finished product: we are developing the game as we speak. And we share it with the community so we fund it, gather feedback and make the game better by talking to you guys.
So please DO get in touch in our Forums, on Twitter (@killsquadgame) or via Email (killsquad@novarama.com). We love to hear what you have to say. But always keep in mind the game isn't finished, so please try to keep comments constructive!
Stay safe guys!
Novarama
Development Diary: Veteran 1
Hello Bounty Hunters! Dani here, Game Director at Novarama.
After a few rough days due to the coronavirus outbreak, I’m here to tell you everything we’re working on for our next major Killsquad update. A ton of cool stuff ahead, we hope you enjoy this post.
Last time we spoke, we explained how we are fixing variety in Killsquad first, to then move into progression. Variety has to do with giving you guys rich missions, adventures and enemies. And progression, which will come right afterwards, is all about giving you heroes that grow and evolve and loot.
We already updated Recruit on the Genesis update. Our next 2 updates (coming in April and June) deal with Veteran. The first update will come second half of April, and it’s full of cool stuff. Here’s all I can share as of today:
First, you will be embarking on a long quest versus the Plague, a hidden infection that is spreading throughout the galaxy. Plague is an unknown force. First, it appears as mysterious seeds that arrive from space, and slowly begin infecting a planet. Here are the seeds of the Plague, from which Plague emanates:
Plague affects all lifeforms, infects everything you see. Soon, planets become blobs full of pulsating danger:
[previewyoutube="Lruk_QIoSnI;full"]
As Plague advances, it brings its own set of deformed monsters. You have met the Nightbringers before. That’s the first stage of the infection. But expect things to get way worse this time around, with new Plague-themed boss battles, including or most epic boss yet:
[previewyoutube="JR7zwrhqY60;full"]
Speaking of bosses, with Helldörren, Abomination and Moggoth now gone, we can now infiltrate their territory to reap the benefits of their disappearance. To name one, hatching eggs of a Queen Moggoth in a military facility has become a serious research project. So, our friends at Biosystems Labs will send you in a zoological quest to find these eggs, and ship them back in an escape pod for further research. As usual, things won’t quite go as planned!
[previewyoutube="RU-sVRfaaZg;full"]
You will also expore new areas of our game world, such as the breeding grounds of the mighty Vasperiath. To summarize, in a month from now we are going to be giving you 9 new contracts, full of content for you guys to enjoy.
And of course work never stops. We’re already coding our next update, Veteran 2. This is centered around the Federation, and their brand new battle station planet, Skua. You’ll be of course meeting the Federation in our first update. But Skua is where things will get serious, and you’ll encounter the Armed Forces of the Federation. Here’s a sneak peek of one of their units just for you guys:
[previewyoutube="hFvRxnVDKPs;full"]
As you can see, the horizon looks great, with one update weeks away and another one right afterwards. With these two, we feel our work to make the Killsquad world rich and varied will be mostly done, and we will move on to progression.
So, before departing for today, let me take a couple lines to tell you we at Novarama are all safe and working from home, and we wish you all safe times during these next few weeks. As you know we’re based in Spain, which has been hit quite hard by coronavirus. Our region wasn’t the worst luckily (Barcelona), and we were careful enough to move all teams to remote work before the infection began.
As the virus spreads around the world, stay safe guys. Social distancing is the name of the game here. And we are doing our best to give you a fantastic game to spend these weeks at home. Let’s focus on killing monsters on a game screen. In the real world, we need to work together to break the infection chain.
Dani out!
Development Diary Update
[NOTE: all the screenshots on this post are content coming on our next update]
Hello all! Dani here, Game Director at Killsquad bringing your development update. It’s been 2 weeks since we released Genesis, our last update. I wanted to tell you how it went, and what comes next. Lots of goodies, so stay tuned!
As we announced, our focus for 2020 is two game areas: VARIETY and PROGRESSION. Variety as in “more stuff to do and discover”, progression as in “and my hero grows and evolves”. As we announced, we are tackling variety first (so you get a richer game ASAP) and progression will come afterwards. Here is our roadmap:
Feb: Genesis (reforms all of recruit, already out)
April: Vet 1 (reforms 8 contracts of Veteran, those taking place in our existing planets)
June: Vet 2 (reforms 4 more contracts of Veteran, all taking place in a new planet, Skua)
June will complete the variety updates. Then, all the second half of 2020 is Progression updates, more on this in a bit.
in the lair of the Vasperiaths
Of course when we released Genesis we got some negative reviews from the players who would have wanted us to tackle progression first. Still, as new players began discovering Killsquad and entering, they began saying nice things about the update. Our recent reviews are actually really good (vast majority of the last 10 days of reviews are positive, thank you so much guys!), and the traffic we had for the Genesis release was as high as the Christmas Break one, so that’s great as well. It seems we're making real progress in delivering a cool game world full of places to visit and stuff to do.
So, now that Recruit is working much better, let’s move to Veteran, where we are going to double down on the content. You guys are gonna love the stuff we’re working on.
Veteran is going to consist of 12 contracts, 8 of them happening in our 3 initial planets, and 4 more happening in a brand-new world, Skua, which is the home of the Federation Army. As Veteran is a big section of the game, we’re splitting it in two updates.
the plague extends
On Veteran1, expect to visit new areas of our world, such as the Vasperiath nests, go on weird new quests such as one about collecting Queen Moggoth larvae, and many more. If you’re a classic Killsquad player, here you will meet the Nightbringers (which are gone from Recruit, if you noticed it), the Feds (same story), and the Omens of the Plague. So Veteran is gonna feel super distinct and unique.
So again expect more quests, more unique locations, more Momma (she’s a blast, isn’t she?). And of course being Veteran, this is all going to come in a more challenging form factor, so get your gear ready: crossing one of these contracts is not gonna be a walk in the park. Oh, I am happy to announce that following many requests from the community, we’re also working on an all-new boss, the biggest one we’ve done yet. She’s related to the Plague, so expect an epic boss battle. I don’t want to show anything yet, I want to save the surprise for you guys. But expect a very challenging boss with some really cool mechanics that feel fresh and old-school at the same time.
more plague mayhem
We expect Vet 1 (which is still missing a commercial name) to drop second half of April, and of course about one week sooner for Beta members, so make sure you sign up. Giving you a sneak peek of what comes afterwards, you're gonna fly into Skua, our 4th planet. Turns out, you’ve only met the light infantry of the Federation Forces. Skua is their battlestation, full of heavily armored robot soldiers. This is going to bring more content into Veteran, and a high-challenge zone.
So as you can see we’re gonna make sure each and every contract feels special and unique. We want players to get a rock-solid game world full of hidden corners to explore. Progression will come post-June. I don’t want to get into too much detail as it’s still under discussion, but suffice to say we’re listening to you guys. We feel our current approach has some pros, but also lots of cons: you get the feeling heroes don’t grow, no sense of true progression. And we want to give you guys the solid hero journey you desire and love. A journey where your hero becomes stronger, gains new skills, and finds loot along his quests. We will move into this area once we can guarantee your hours of gameplay are filled with content and variety, so expect a more “classic RPG” system that keeps you coming back to earn new loot and skills.
a mechanized bridge crosses Kemmekh
So as you can see we DO have a plan. It seems, based on reviews, that the plan is making an impact on your perception of the game, so we’re confident we’re on track. All we need from you is three very basic things:
First, be patient. We all want games here and now, but this is a live development, and we can only progress so fast.
Second, support us. We love to read stuff on forums. We love positive reviews. We love Twitter followers. Being indie is tough. But you guys make it all worth it.
Third, tell your friends about us. We feel we’re beginning to turn the tide, Killsquad is growing day by day. And we need you guys over there pushing us and motivating us.
That’s it for now! Gotta go back to the trenches. See you in the Outer Reach guys, Dani out!
[previewyoutube="RU-sVRfaaZg;full"]
Genesis Update is Out Now!
[previewyoutube="sKIgEhprYaA;full"]
Genesis replaces the whole first act of Killsquad. It affects all the Recruit contracts. It's our biggest update so far, so I wanted to take a moment to explain the vision behind it, and what comes next. You know we've been very open about our development process before, and this time it's not going to be any different.
2019 brought the release of Killsquad, a good amount of sales, and a game we could iterate from. Killsquad was a lot of fun to play, but it was a small game.
2020 for us is all about VARIETY and PROGRESSION. By variety, we mean we want you to visit more places, meet more enemies, enjoy more game experiences, all of this providing a sense of journey & adventure through the Killsquad world. By progression, we mean we want you to slowly build up your hero, see him/her get stronger, learn new skills & get new gear. And, all of this, keeping the core action & online loop intact.
So, let's start with variety. With Genesis, you're going to feel a very different game experience from 2 months ago. Here's the highlights you can go play TODAY:
Quest system, where you receive and fulfill specific missions to progress through the recruit act. Gone is the time when you didn't know what to do next.
Less contracts, but each more carefully crafted, so each mission does feel unique and special. There's no 2 contracts where you're doing the same stuff.
New enemies & enemy progression. Each mission brings new foes for you to encounter, including 2 brand new semi-bosses.
New locations for you to visit, we'll let you discover those.
New gameplay mechanics so you get more of the stuff you already loved
Voice acting & storyline
As a systems upgrade, we also added an in-lobby chat, so finding partners is now easier than ever. Or you can just hang out there and make new friends.
With all this, the game should now feel very different. We can't wait to get your feedback, please do so in the forums. Because, guess what? we have 2 more variety-oriented updates lined up, let's call them Veteran Part 1 and Veteran Part 2.
Veteran 1 comes April and upgrades the first half of our veteran contracts. Visit the Vasperiath Nest. Meet Helldörren in his throne room. Watch as the Plague infects a planet. Meet the Federation in their crusade to control the galaxy.
Veteran 2 comes June and is the second part of our veteran experience. As announced, this takes place in an all-new planet, Skua, the military base of the Federation. So it's a brand new world, 100% new enemies, etc.
In parallel to this, we're working on a big Progression re-imagining. We're hard at work designing the new progression system. Our goal is to implement that sense of growth and power you guys desire, so expect deep changes to be announced soon here as well.
For those of you who are veterans, don't worry, your progress isn't wiped: your weapons, your vector and your progress are stored. As the Quest system is brand new, you'll still face the first quest, as if you were a rookie. So I recommend equipping just basic gear, and jumping in on the new Quests with the new guys to have fun together. We hope you have a blast. And don't worry, we're preparing stuff for you guys as well. Watch this space for news regarding depth and progression sooner than you think.
That's it for today, have fun, and expect a roadmap update with details about Vet1 and Vet2 soon.
If you want our classic patch notes with all the nitty-gritty, they are here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/910490/discussions/0/1742268065070110507/
Dani out!
Roadmap update
Hello again, bounty hunters, welcome to 2020!
Sorry we have been silent for some time: we have been really busy. After the New Year break, we took 2 weeks to discuss internally the future of Killsquad, so we could present it to our community. I am happy to say we're ready to share it today. But before we begin, a bit of context:
Killsquad is a self-funded game: there’s no publisher or secret corporation behind us: it’s just us, Novarama, a bunch of game veterans, doing what we feel is right to build a great game. We are lucky to be able to fund it via sales, so every euro or dollar we make goes back into improving the game. We're in Early Access, so the game is still growing. We don’t intend to get rich with this game: Killsquad was born and still is a passion project & a tool to learn about Steam & Unreal for us. As such, our design process is very reactive: instead of thinking "we are always right and we know it all", we read each and every negative review, and use those comments to drive our design process forward.
First, you guys complained about bugs. So we focused on fixing stability. Then, about not finding people to play. That's why we dropped 2 updates in a row to fix that. If you look at our negative reviews today, a lot of them admit the game is fun to play, but complain it feels repetitive and lacks progression. Which does make sense: as an Early Access game, we focused on the experience first, to then extend the size of the game. So, that's going to be our driving force for the first half of 2020: give you more variety, a richer game world and a deeper lore.
How are we gonna do this? As it’s a huge undertaking, we’ll split the process in 2 big updates: the first one will come during February, and it will revamp the Recruit experience. The second one will come around April, focusing on Veteran.
So, today, I’d like to show you all that’s coming to Recruit next month.
First of all, we are reducing the number of contracts, so we can devote more time to make each one unique. So, we will offer 12 (down from 20) contracts on Recruit. By having less contracts, we can have more carefully designed ones and a better overall experience.
Contracts on Recruit will be unlocked progressively, so you’re not overwhelmed by the whole game. To do so, we will use our Quest System, which you saw a glimpse of in our Christmas Event. Quests will give you goals to fulfill, and a way to slowly unfold the world of Killsquad. These quests will also serve as a tutorial of sorts, making sure game systems are presented properly.
[previewyoutube="VwpERsoCoiA;full"]
Then, contracts will be story driven, have voice acting, and will deliver a unique experience. So, whether you play solo, or with a squad, expect a more polished “campaign”.
Of course, to fill these contracts we will need more baddies, so there’s more stuff to discover. You’ve seen some of them already on Twitter. We’re bringing two new semibosses to the game. The first one is Rex Guerrilla, a servant of Helldörren:
[previewyoutube="OjcsJT6qFSg;full"]
The second one is a fugitive from Biosystems Labs that you may encounter in your adventures on Wasteland7:
[previewyoutube="k6W9wLWyU7E;full"]
Needless to say, we’ll need artwork to make those contracts feel different. We’re working on a big number of set pieces, so our universe feels richer. No big reveal today, you’ll have to wait til the update to check it all out, but expect new locations, NPCs, and so on. Here's a glimpse of things to come:
Of course expect new gameplay constructs so there’s more stuff going on and more ways to have fun. Here’s some insider clips of random stuff we’re working on, from exploding barrels, to switches, to killing blades, shield areas, and many more.
By the way, all this work won’t prevent us from working on other game areas that also need some loving and care. So, on this same update in February, you guys are getting a lobby chat, to make the social aspect better and make finding team mates even simpler.
[previewyoutube="zMVQdCLjIc4;full"]
We’re now working to have all of this ready for the update. We hope we will continue to get your invaluable support. We’ll reveal the new Veteran section soon, which will bring a whole new planet & faction among a lot of other cool things. But we’ll talk about that when the time comes.
For now, all we can ask for is your patience and support. Great stuff is coming. Novarama
