Valley 2 Beta .900 "Tell Me A Story" Released!

[x4000]

Original: http://arcengames.blogspot.com/2013/02/valley-2-beta-900-tell-me-story-released.html

This one is the second release today.  As indicated by the increment in release number to 0.900, we're now very near to final 1.0 on the game.

This release has a lot of relatively minor fixes and changes, which is pretty much what to expect from here until 1.0.  That, plus the remaining sound effects, the last of the art, and the last of the writing.  There's a good chunk of writing and art in this one, and the entire tone of the boss fights in particular is completely different now; you get more of a sense of the backstory of the individual characters you're facing.

We had a lot of cool backstory for this game, but it wasn't really utilized until lately.  We've been working on the region interjections when you go into a new region, too.

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!

[Winge]

I think it takes me more time to read the patch notes than it takes for you to patch the game, lol.  Punch spells were definitely borderline OP.  Be interesting to see how good/bad they are now.

BTW, I think you have a typo in the section .808 patch notes.  It reads:
Monster Spells:
    Except where noted, all monster spells are Normal caliber.
    Except where noted, all monster spells are High caliber.
    Except where noted, all overlord spells are Ultimate caliber.

I'm guessing the second "monster" was supposed to be "henchmen"?

[madcow]

New story dialogue, reworked caliber system. I'm being sorely tempted to install on my work laptop

[Aklyon]

Fixed up the resistance burrows so that they are now fully functional.

    The NPCs no longer blindly run against the wall in these.
    Also, the NPCs will properly talk to you.

Yay! Finally.

All of the henchman dialogue has been redone from scratched, except for their death soliloquies (which are coming). A lot more of the backstory of each of them is now revealed as part of that.

    You may also have noticed a lot of changes to the region entry text lately, too. More's coming there, too.

More yay!

[Misery]

Ok, let's see, a few things to go over here....


First of all, the research areas, they're no longer impossible on Hero.... but they now might be too easy.   More specifically, they became quite short, which is the main reason for it.   They were definitely too long before, but this seems a very drastic cut to the size of the things.  The one I just did was actually easier than all of the surface areas I've done so far in this session.

Secondly, this isnt directly related to this patch, but I wanted to mention it:   Deep Gates are still WAY too strong.   Like, "I dont know how in the hell I'm ever supposed to close one" strong.  The RNG can EAT your guys here.   The maximum health of any one survivor is 9, and that means the soldier guys.   But the gate is capable of doing that much damage IN A SINGLE GO.  No matter what you do, when you move onto the tile, there *will* be a monster there.  No exceptions, because it's making a monster every turn.  And then it might spawn MORE of them around the tile.    There's very little strategy in dealing with these;  the only conceivable way to do this that might work is to put a huge heap of survivors on and around it, and then just HOPE that it doesnt murder the guy sitting on top of it.  Way, way too random.    And this isnt that far into the game.... turn 30, I think.   WITH an Ivory Tower active.  I cant even imagine trying to close one of these horrors in the later parts of the game.    And you definitely cannot just leave one of these things running;  you have to stop them immediately, or the monsters are going to wander around and wreck your buildings, growing in numbers with each passing turn.


Next, bombs:   Mostly useless now.   I experimented with them for awhile, and then just completely dropped them.  The delay on them actually was the main reason they had good use;  because you didn't have to get super close to use them on most enemies.   They were good for popping things that other spells couldnt hit, or that were just very risky (or both, usually).   For example, a Fire Walker.   I encountered a situation with these guys that involved a short-ish horizontal tunnel, and some generally dangerous terrain, and my other spells werent going to kill it without major risk of damage due to the terrain and how everything was laid out.   Previously, I'd have used the bombs here, dropping them on the edge of the thing's movement range, so that it walks into them and gets exploded, while I can move far enough away to be out of the range of the swirling flames (before they fly off randomly).   Cant do that anymore.... the bombs dont stay there long enough.  In order to hit the thing with those bombs now, I have to get to such a range where it pretty much *will* hit me with the swirling fireballs that follow it.  This idea continues with.... well, basically everything that I would normally use the bombs on.  I simply have to get too close to use them, and it's not worth the risk.  Not as terrible as rocket spells, but pretty close.


The caliber changes, I have no thoughts on.   Have not noticed any differences.


The balance of other spells has been pretty good recently though.   The knockback ones arent completely awful, now that it's restricted to certain types.


Uhhhhh..... there was more to say, but heck if I can remember what it was.



EDIT:   A small suggestion occurs to me, which is to make the warp tiles a bit more obvious;  it's very easy to not quite notice these when they show up and are not purified, which is dangerous as Demonaica can use them to his advantage regardless.  Pointing these out to the player early on (possibly when he finally emerges from his castle) and telling them to watch out for those would also be good.   At least, I dont remember seeing that in any of the tutorial stuffs.

[Pepisolo]

Nice to see the story getting a overhaul. I've only read bits of it so far, but it seems much improved.

As for mines, I'm kinda ambivalent at the moment. The old mines were a lot more tactically interesting, but the new ones are easier to use. I wouldn't really mind them going back to 3 seconds or staying as they are -- completely unhelpful, but that's just my current opinion.

[Cinth]

First, just want to say the game looks great.

Can't say that I've run across anything game breaking so I'll throw some little things at the wall (and see what sticks  ).

The fencing on the title screen seems to flicker as it scrolls across the screen. It's just in the vertical bars part and it could just be me or my monitor.

We have perks that boost primary, secondary, special and ammo spells but the only spell that actually has that descriptor are the ammo spells (guilt by association there).
I had the idea that the [ESC] menu mage class spells box (bottom right hand corner) could house that info very easily. I would just stick it with the key the spell would be assigned too. So you would have the Spell icon, Spell name and under the name would be (A) (Primary).

And last I would have that same info box contents for the [Change Your Mage Class] area. I don't think there would be reason for these two areas of information to be different.

[keith.lamothe]

Secondly, this isnt directly related to this patch, but I wanted to mention it:   Deep Gates are still WAY too strong.   Like, "I dont know how in the hell I'm ever supposed to close one" strong.  The RNG can EAT your guys here.   The maximum health of any one survivor is 9, and that means the soldier guys.   But the gate is capable of doing that much damage IN A SINGLE GO.

That is an excellent point, thank you.  In for next version:

* Now when world-map-monsters are summoned (either pre-overlord lair spawns, post-overlord-emergence lair spawns, normal overlord summons, or deep gate spawns) they never get summoned directly to a tile with a resistance member and thus can never get into combat immediately after being summoned (the check for monster movement has already happened at that point).

This way you'll still have to deal with that turn's worth of deep-gate-spawned monsters, but they can't actually stop the closure of the gate.

[Teal_Blue]

Just a quick post on a really hard area to get around, not quite sure how to do it normal with like no double jump yet. Maybe i should get that and come back, but if the top part of this was just a little tiny bit shorter than the middle level, then i could jump it fine. As it is, being the same distance out, when i go to jump up, i fall off the ledge.    Its funny, except when i'm trying get up the ledge.     Well, maybe its still funny then too, its just i'm not as appreciative then, haha. Anyway, Help!

-Teal

[x4000]

Regarding bombs:

* The bombs and mines for players only now take 2.5 seconds to blow up instead of 1.5.  This is slightly less slow than the original 3 seconds, but still more useful for striking from cover than the 1.5 seconds.
** The enemy bombs remain at 1.5 seconds before blowing, and the player "Energy Bomb Burst" spell remains at 1.5 seconds as well.

[Winge]

Finally (successfully) finished a game!  Pretty good overall, although I did find a few bugs and have a few suggestions:

1.  Typo on destroyed towers (Junkyard Robotic or Thawing):  “The rubble here is plentiful enough to allow for soe construction.”  I'm guessing that "soe" should be "some".

2.  Swamp Castles state that they allow survivors to move farther on the world map, but don't.  My guess is that the description just needs to be updated (these provide cover now, right?).

3.  On the map, it is possible to move diagonally through impasse tiles.  For example, if the player is on tile #1 (see below), and there are Impasse objects on #2 and #3, the player can still move to #4 (assuming it can be occupied normally, of course).  I'm not sure if that is intentional or not; it just seems really strange, considering survivors cannot move diagonally.
     1
2        3
     4

4.  The Mesalord's Summon Molten Mesa does almost no damage (10's of damage when 500 is not uncommon) despite being a Lvl 5 Mage class ammo spell.  Or is this spell meant to be a defensive spell (Ultimate Caliber)?

5.  Crawlers whose paths cross destroyable boxes will crawl on boxes that have been destroyed.  I think that this only works if they started to crawl on a set of boxes, and one or more boxes along the path were destroyed.  For example, if crawler enemy C was on box #1 (see below) and the player destroys #2, the crawler will still continue to crawl up to #3, as if box #2 was still present.
     [3]
     [2]
  C [1]
[Ground]

6.  As mentioned by someone else on these forums, the Robotic Research Facilities feel a little bit too quick.  I am also not sure what purpose the 'ducts' serve that can take you quickly from the entrance to the mainframe (they always seem to be jammed).  So, here is my suggestion:

A.  The distance to the mainframe remains the same as current.
B.  Once hacked, the mainframe blocks the entrance, leaving the duct as the only exit from the room.
C.  The player must use the duct to pass through a different, longer corridor to get out.
D.  The new corridor joins the old corridor at the duct at the entrance.

I feel that this would provide the player with more of a feeling of hectic escape, having the original path blocked off and fighting through previously unknown territory to get out.  I don't know how feasible it is, and I certainly don't see it being complete for the first few patches.  I am 'testing the waters' at this point to see what other players think.

Overall, very well done so far.  I hope that the release goes very well for you; you've all put in a ton of work for this

[Aklyon]

The ducts are there incase you die. You can just sneak back into the mainframe room immediately.

[x4000]

More notes coming, but thanks very much for the feedback.

Re: The diagonal passage through tiles, we know about that one and it's basically unsolvable without a complete rewrite of the physics for the world map.  Given the isometric nature of it, it's a tricky thing to contemplate.  We've decided that's just basically going to be the way it is instead; it makes sense to be able to slip through those cracks to some extent anyhow; hence people trying it!

* Fixed a typo on the description of the impasse tiles.

* Fixed a bug where the Swamp Castles were not actually letting NPCs move any farther on the world map!
** Now it lets scouts move an extra 4 tiles per held castle, skirmishers an extra 3, and soldiers an extra 2.

* Fixed a bug with crawlers where they would still see destroyed crates as being there for 30 seconds after the crate was destroyed.

[x4000]

Robotic hacking changes:

* A couple of players felt like we were being too nice with our recent changes to the robotic hacking escapes, so we've upped the meanness again:
** The big room in the middle is now twice as long (still way shorter than it used to be with 5 rooms, but should be a good size now).
** There are now more vertical segments in these rooms, there are now segments with traps, and there is now a single segment with some dangerous water.
** Large swimming monsters now spawn like normal during the hacking escapes.
** The budget for monsters pre-existing in these chunks is now 50% higher during your escape.

[x4000]

Just a quick post on a really hard area to get around, not quite sure how to do it normal with like no double jump yet. Maybe i should get that and come back, but if the top part of this was just a little tiny bit shorter than the middle level, then i could jump it fine. As it is, being the same distance out, when i go to jump up, i fall off the ledge.    Its funny, except when i'm trying get up the ledge.     Well, maybe its still funny then too, its just i'm not as appreciative then, haha. Anyway, Help!

-Teal

Hey Teal, I just want to make sure I'm looking at the right thing -- I've posted a screenshot attached.  Are you referring to getting up to the ledge right above her?

If so, you're right that jumping from the ledge to the right over to the ledge above her head doesn't work because you bounce off the ceiling.  However, to get around this segment you need to just run to the edge of the ledge I have her standing on, jump out a little, and move back to the side.  She makes it up to the ledge each time with ease for me; but I'm an old hand at specifically this type of game, and am used to doing this from advanced Mario levels and I believe a bit of Metroid too.

Let me know how you fare with that, or if I'm missing a different problem!