Valley 2 Beta .901 "Now We Are Twelve" Released!

[x4000]

Original: http://arcengames.blogspot.com/2013/02/valley-2-beta-901-now-we-are-twelve.html

This one continues the final polish.  There's a bunch of updated art, more updated writing, and a variety of mostly-minor balance improvements.  Also a handful of bugfixes.

The biggest thing in this release is the three new playable characters: Hinge, Kyo, and Farel.  Farel is definitely one of my favorites now!  This brings us up to our full roster of 12 playable characters, with some color variations for several of them in addition to that.

Oh, and also, there's now a handy way to view your currently-equipped perks from the escape menu.  I can't believe we didn't think of this, and I'm not aware of anyone mentioning it to us before (or at least it didn't pass my desk).  But a member of the press mentioned that today, and it seemed like a boneheaded omission.

There was another thing like that in there, too: Cinth pointed out how we never labeled any of the spells as to which were primary, secondary, special, or ammo.  Yet perks reference those specific categories by name.  Facepalm.  Again that was not something I'd ever heard anyone say anything about until today, and it didn't occur to me, but actually two people (one again a member of the press) brought it up within 12 hours of each other today.  Go figure!

On the bright side, as frustrating as it is for me to have missed stuff that seems so basic as that, it really doesn't seem like there's a lot of that sort of thing.  My fingers are crossed that I haven't been blind to something else that's going to make me smack my head, though, heh.

Tomorrow the last of the monster sound effects are coming, as well as the last of the writing (including the end of the game scene).  And then the day after tomorrow is 1.0 release day!

More to come soon.  Enjoy!

This is a standard update that you can download through the  in-game updater itself, if you already have any version of the game.  If you have the beta on Steam, it will automatically update for you.  When you  launch the game, you'll see the notice of the update having been found  if you're connected to the Internet at the time.  If you don't have the standalone game, you can download that here.  If you already own the first game, just use your existing license key to unlock the sequel for free!

[Platypus]

I'm really liking a lot of the new Henchmen and Region dialogue in the game, gives a lot of background without being too dense.

Anyway, tiny thing but I think there's a typo in one of the dialogues when you are first leaving the Stronghold.

" But seeing you bring back that crystal to aid lead us... "

I don't know, but I think it was supposed to be
 " aid and lead us... "

[Oralordos]

Very nice. I think Farel will be my favourite as well now. Why does Farel have 2 portraits in the folder but only one in-game?

[Cinth]

Ok.  Gates aren't a virtual roadblock anymore  .

On to business (where is my can of Kiwi?)

  I floated through the tutorial again and didn't see mention of the concentration bonus system and how it works.  Also, the on and off again nature of the concentration bonus indicator is rather annoying.  Personally, I think it should be an always displayed element of the UI.
  An idea I had for the tutorial bit was an interjection like the one that explains calibers.  Except this one would pop up when you get the first concentration bonus level (turns on the UI element and has the explainy bits and the pointer to the help section).

  Rockets (only played with the Illum) seem rather lackluster with the new caliber rules.  Prior to the change, they were a risk/reward shot.  Risk being self damage and reward being a cheap blocker.  Now they feel like all risk and no reward.  Definitely not as fun to use. 

  The Elder's second defeat message might sound better as "I withdraw from the fray".

  I feel like there is a wealth of information that is missing, an encyclopedia of sorts.  Something populated with biomes (monster data), tile descriptions, mage classes, and other stuff of that sort.  Probably not something needed right away, but a welcome addition IMO.

  Something else that I thought might be cool was a timed release of monsters in the biomes themselves.  Most of the biomes I've been through have plenty of nasty monsters.  Maybe have the nastier denizens show up as the danger levels rise.

[x4000]

Thanks on the typos, will fix.

Re multiple portraits but only one in game, that's because we didn't do a color variant for the sprite in-game, so the portrait would not match.

Re concentration system, it is self explanatory once you find it. It's not mentioned or shown until then because it's a feature for advanced play only and not something we remotely expect new players to try to worry with. Not showing bulky items on the HUD except during contextual times is pretty common these days.

Rockets were super OP before, so I'm not surprised they are less fun now. They are a great way to hit many enemies without having to aim well now, but no cover at all as you noted. Before there was pretty little risk.

In terms of an encyclopedia, I've intentionally avoided that. I think there's a joy to discovery that gets lost if the game is telling you everything in that fashion.

In terms of a timed release of monsters, I agree that would be cool, but only in an expansion. We got seriously burned holding too much back from the start in he first game -- some reviewers concluded that the game literally had 5 monsters, etc. Sigh. I think the balance of how we did it here in this one is really solid. However, if we do expansions for the game, that is likely how we'd handle monsters in existing biomes so that we could be really nasty with the new ones.

[Cinth]

Fusillades work better for hitting multiple enemies without aiming.  I couldn't find a spot for rockets in my gameplay.

The encyclopedia thing, well, I keep having to go back to tiles to see what they do... among other things.  It's one of those things I like to look through when I don't want to play but I want to brush up on stuff.  Any encyclopedia I would want would only be accessible from the main menu anyway

The monsters idea I got when on one of my umpteenth runs I finally ran into a griffon.  Was one of those neat-o moments.

[x4000]

Yeah, there are some pretty rare monsters as it stands anyhow.

In terms of an encyclopedia, I'm hoping that an external wiki will be a project some folks pick up for this.

[Penumbra]

I have always loved the in-game "Monster Log" type thing. It tracks number of kills of each monster type. Would actually be even more interesting if it was "profile" based instead of for an individual game.

So no spoilers, but that always made me love to see all the blank pages between the monsters I had found.

[madcow]

I have always loved the in-game "Monster Log" type thing. It tracks number of kills of each monster type. Would actually be even more interesting if it was "profile" based instead of for an individual game.

So no spoilers, but that always made me love to see all the blank pages between the monsters I had found.

Post release. Definitely. A beastiary that fills out as you kill enemies. Perhaps just the image at first, and as you kill it more includes the attack animation, a description about it, etc. Fun metagame to find interesting and stimulating animals of another culture - and kill them.

[Panopticon]

I'd like to say that I'm having a blast with the game. Play sessions are fun and snag free and getting pretty long now too. I'm finding Valley 2 compulsively playable, and I'm thrilled by how all of this is coming together. It's surprisingly close to what I imagined back when you guys first began development on AVWW's Alpha, a deep turn based meta-strategy game with fast, nintendo-hard but fun action gameplay. You've taken two genres that would seem to be at complete odds and have made them not only work together, they complement each other.

Outside of the granular work of polish and balance I can't really think of anything that bothers me or needs fixing. Great work guys and this beta has been really gratifying to participate in, I've had a blast.

[x4000]

Thanks a ton for all the support, folks.

We're almost there now.  This is likely the last release prior to 1.0!  http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,12485.0.html