Version 0.780b

Teddy

Developer
Staff member
Summary: Arrrrrcaaaade mode!

Recommended level: N/A

Update Description

Note: This is one of those real Frontline updates, where sounds are missing, some graphics are placeholder etc! The gameplay should hold up well, though!

Why update Arcade Mode?! It took forever!

Yes, well, when we began this effort we naively thought it wouldn't take very long to fix Arcade Mode up, but, uh... onto the "why"!

Until now only a small percentage of players got much enjoyment out of Arcade Mode. The mode was a cold, hard place with little of Story Mode's charm, but with all of the combat's brutality. Basically, we didn't feel like the game mode felt much like Grindea, and we wanted to change that, while also giving players who previously loved the mode more varied and interesting stuff to sink their teeth into.

We did several things to improve the general Arcade Mode experience, but the biggest by far is the complete revamp of the hub town, Arcadia. Before, your total score made some minor changes to the town and added a few NPCs with quests. Now, you earn gold by doing runs, which you can then spend on different buildings that all provide some useful or not-so-useful feature! Among the useful features, you'll now be able to practice against bosses you're having trouble with, make the mode easier (or harder) with treats and curses, train perfect guarding in the dojo, and getting potions to help you out.

Aside for that we've made some pretty big changes inside the runs as well, like new Event Rooms that buff you or give you special treasure, and new NPCs that help you out in different ways.

Four new floors have also been added, ending the mode on floor 16 instead of floor 12 (featuring Mt Bloom and Tai Ming).

...but most importantly, you're now accompanied by your new best bud Trunk!

Regardless if you enjoyed the mode before or didn't care for it much, please do try the revamped version out! We hope with these changes we can capture the hearts of more players now than before!

What's left before Arcadia 2.0 comes to Stable?

We want to add a few more quests related to some buildings, and also add achievements for the higher floors... and of course fix all the bottles of bugs you guys are probably going to hand us!

Ok, ok, I get it, but... what about the desert?

Arcade Mode has mostly been super intensive on the code side, with all the new features and floors that have been added. This means that while I've been stuck on this update during all this time, Fred and Vilya have made good progress on the art for the story! In fact, most of the areas and NPCs we need for the desert have already been made, which hopefully means that when Arcade Mode is ready for Stable, I can start implementing the desert storyline right away.

Basically, if it weren't for Arcade Mode I would've been in a severe graphics bottleneck for a long time!

Next Up: We'll fix any issues that come up on Frontline and tweak stuff according to feedback, we'll add achievements and their rewards, and we'll add a few quests. When that is done, and we've gotten all the new sounds from our sound dude, the whole shebang will go off to Stable!

PATCH NOTES

Hotfix Patch 0.780c

  • Hotchange: The Shadier Merchant price for HP Pots now scales with more sanity
  • Hotfix: The game no longer crashes when perfect guarding red projectiles in a challenge room
  • Hotfix: Clients can now open and receive the reward of the Grindea Chest event rooms
  • Hotfix: Finishing Chix chicken quest in Mt Bloom no longer crashes the game
  • Hotfix: The store discount treat no longer work while in the Arcadia town
  • Hotfix: The Arcade Mode Queen Bee fight no longer spawns adds that give exp
  • Hotfix: Buying stuff so that your Essence reach 0 no longer locks you out of managing perks
  • Hotfix: You can no longer press Escape to get out of the taming item selection and lose your invested gold
  • Hotfix: Fixed a number of bugs related to pets in Arcade Mode multiplayer
  • Hotfix: Using a Time Crystal should now work in multiplayer as well
  • Hotfix: Connecting to someone in Arcadia now sets the score multiplier correctly
  • Hotfix: Game should no longer crash randomly when arriving at floor 17
  • Hotfix: Time Crystals no longer reset used pet items
  • Hotfix: Watching replays and fighting in the arena no longer creates taming items
  • Hotfix: The score multiplier is now set correctly in replays

Additions
  • Arcade Mode: It's a bit of a bunch of a lot of new stuff
  • Translations: Challenge descriptions (like 'Herd The Chickens') can now be translated
  • Translations: Grade type names (Clear Time, Damage Taken, etc) can now be translated
Changes
  • Balance: Shielding Rabbys now creates a small delay between their attacks
  • Balance: Frosty Friend can now only aggro multiple enemies at once when in Gold Charge
  • Balance: Elite Boars have been tuned down slightly. Just slightly.
  • Balance: Boss multiplayer scaling in Arcade Mode is a bit less brutal
  • Gameplay: The bow can now be cancelled into from attacks
  • Arcade Mode: The game will now remember what name you chose last time you played
  • Arcade Mode: Enemies spawning as elites now increase the time limit for S rank more than before
Bug Fixes
  • Multiplayer: Clients should no longer be able to be left behind when fighting the Mimic
  • Crash: Fixed a bug where Marino could sometimes get damaged by the player during the chase scene, crashing the game
  • Oops: Freeze duration reductions between elites and bosses were flipped! Now bosses are more resistant than elites
  • Multiplayer: Halloweeds won't use their root spell anymore if there's only one player alive
  • QOL: Reflected Wisp projectiles should now hit their previous owners (or some other enemy) more reliably
  • Oops: Fixed a bug where sometimes you turned into a static phase shift ball when battling GUN-D4M
 
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TsReaper

Boar
Very nice update! From my perspective, Arcade Mode is quite fine-tuned after this update. The monsters and bosses are more forgiving yet still challenging. The brand new Arcadia indeed stimulates my will to play Arcade Mode over and over again!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Possible bugs discovered till now are listed below.

1. The edges of one of the challenge rooms in Mt. Bloom floors appear to be strange.
sog.mtbloom.challenge.png

2. If you build the bank with a Lood Egg in your inventory, talking to Richie will immediately trigger the dialog "My, my! Is that not a Lood Egg...", without first telling the player he wants a Lood Egg.

3. I bought some perks from the Bishop and close the menu. When I talked to Bishop again, the menu entries (Manage Perks, Nightmares, etc.) didn't appear, and only the dialog "Grindea is the arch goddess of collecting and adventure. Her presence..." popped out. The bug remains the same even after I restart the game. Now I can't manage or buy perks!
(After some trying, it seems that this bug is triggered when I have no essence.)
 

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TsReaper

Boar
Bug list cont.

4. One cannot go back to the other rooms on the same floor after the boss battle against the black ferrets in Mt. Bloom. The edges of the water in the room seem strange too.
index.php


5. In the "kill in order" challenge room in Mt. Bloom, some enemies are spawned outside the room.
index.php


6. The "double healing" treat doesn't seem to affect the health orb given in the Grindea treasure chest room (not the starting room).

7. The recording system in the Arcade Mode seems to be really buggy. In my own recording, the HP drops down to 0. And after watching another player's recording (TKLD178's, to be precise), I gain control of the character in the recording! When I select "end run" from the menu, the game over screen pops out, and I can even upload the score to the server, even though it's technically not my score!
sog.record.png
After watching the replay, the taming item in my inventory also changes from the flower to the candy out of some mysterious reason.
 
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subaru313

Rabby
Hi guys, thank you so much for the update!
Arcadia feels a lot more satisfying now and I can't wait to unlock all the new stuff.
Trunk is a really cute opposite of Bag, good job there too. I especially like how he reminds me of the healing orb I left in the first room :D

As for bugs, I once entered a room with a question mark on the first floor that was completely empty.
Immediately after entering the room the window 'room cleared with grade C' popped up but when I finished the floor the C-grade wasn't shown.
Another thing was an elite bee that circled around me without attacking for a looong time before my pet cloud buzzed it from the sky (but I guess that hasn't got anything to do with the new patch).

I played long enough to unlock Remedi and I feel a little ambiguous about how the potions work in Arcadia right now.
If I am not mistaken, one has to walk back to Remidi's shop every time upon dying to choose the potion in the flask again. Otherwise the flask will remain empty during the run.
On the one hand, I think it's nice to visit the potion seller often so you get motivated to try new potions out.
On the other hand, I feel that it is very annoying to (remember to) walk back to Remedi every time you died even though you are dead set on that one potion and don't want to change it.
(That last point probably belongs in the suggestion section but I'd love to hear your thoughts on it.)

Thanks for your hard work!
 

The G-Meister

Giga Slime
I played long enough to unlock Remedi and I feel a little ambiguous about how the potions work in Arcadia right now.
It's the exact same system that's in story. Once you set the flask at Remedi's stand, that flask always has that potion set. Upon using the potion, it gives you the buff and goes into a cooldown while it fills up again, and it fills up faster if you're attacking enemies. Once it has filled up again, you can use it again.
 

TsReaper

Boar
Watching the replay seems to remove all my Lood Eggs and my dragon egg from my inventory. It will also change the type of the taming item in my inventory. I should definitely demolish the cinema!
 

Teddy

Developer
Staff member
Watching the replay seems to remove all my Lood Eggs and my dragon egg from my inventory. It will also change the type of the taming item in my inventory. I should definitely demolish the cinema!

It seems to be run by thieves!! :mad:

Maybe you should seriously demolish it by restoring a save file backup made before you built it and got robbed! The bug should be fixed in the latest patch at least
 

res7less

Jumpkin
Randomizing a hero no longer suggests a new name every time, is that a bug or has that been changed to keep the recently used name?

Edit: Also, I just got into an empty room marked as "?" on the map, which got immediately cleared after entering, receiving a C grade :D

Edit2: I was able to buy 2 items from the Shadier Merchant despite not having enough HP to pay him.

Edit3: It goes on. I was able to build a Cinema, but kept the money.
 
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Own

Moderator
The progression system with quests in New Arcadia feels extremely underwhelming where some quests are concerned.

- Katarina, who you get by spending at least 100,000 gold unlocking things... wants you to defeat Vilya on floor 1? This hasn't transitioned well from old Arcadia. If anything you should be having to defeat Vilya in Mt. Bloom, or a stronger version of her in Evergrind Forest. Or defeat Vilya 3 times in a single run, in all her appearances to get the hammer back. This quest is like getting asked to kill some rats in a basement when you're level 50, it may as well not be there.

- Likewise, the quest to recruit Tannie... kill a few extremely basic elites? That's less a challenge and more busywork. I'd feel more satisfied if you had to defeat an Echo of Madness while on Evergrind Fields to free her, and would be fitting storywise, having that specific enemy capture her. An ordinary Echo of Madness on Floor 3-4 is difficult but not impossible if you play it safe, the same way that Halloweeds are a typical enemy on F5-6 but a single one is dangerous enough as a boss on F1-2.

It seems like most quests have been designed under the assumption that no one will ever get past floor 5, nothing past that floor has been part of any quest as far as I remember.

Should I be posting all the graphical bugs, co-op bugs, script errors and minor bugs I've been putting in chat here? Or are those all being recorded?

Actually... to spare people posting duplicate ones, copypaste time:

1

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/433628979799523338/434864804956733441/unknown.png

Torches don't shine at night like they do at the festival.

2

All my free furniture is gone. As is my gigaslime beanbag chair, my keg and every other arcade furniture unlockable beyond my red gigaslime beanbag.
I assume this is caused by joining someone who didn't have those quests completed, or... something.
Joining into other players worlds really screws your save up something fierce.

3

The Receptionist doesn't pop up with a 'joined the town' when you build the arena. She's a people too!

4

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/433628979799523338/434856546837463060/unknown.png

To the left and right of me are invisible little bumps of barriers I got stuck on trying to walk

5

You still can't see blizzards in challenge rooms in Seasonne as P2-4.

6

You still can't see fists move on their first swing vs Gundam in arcade as P2-4.

7

Hydras have no roar coming up from the water.

8

Goddess statue can give you a healing orb even if you're at full HP.

9

A streamer was experiencing a bug where his potions would reset to empty after every run.

10

Story fountain vs Arcade fountain.

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/433628979799523338/434252730706558977/unknown.png https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/433628979799523338/434252887397236740/unknown.png

Story has water flowing out of it, Arcade doesn't. Arcades back texture for the fountain also appears unfinished compared to Story Mode?

11

Not sure if it's fixed or not since I reported it, but if you join the lobby of a brand new player going into arcade and they load up the game, you're given the option on what to reset and keep the same as they are.

12

Using the flower as P2-4 kicks P1 out of their menu and tells you that you must clear the room of all other enemies first. Even if a bee is the last enemy. And it makes you appear as a glitchy flower moving mess to P1.
 
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Teddy

Developer
Staff member
It seems like most quests have been designed under the assumption that no one will ever get past floor 5, nothing past that floor has been part of any quest as far as I remember.

The plan is that eventually, every quest line (aka building) begins like that but has quests that eventually reach the higher floors! The second half of the quests will be obtained by upgrading the building (another floor on the tavern, a fancier park, blooming fae tree, etc).

These things won't necessarily make it into the game even for Stable, though! It might be stuff we add a piece at a time when I catch up with Vilya & Fred in story mode again.

Should I be posting all the graphical bugs, co-op bugs, script errors and minor bugs I've been putting in chat here? Or are those all being recorded?

One of these I hadn't written down so this was good :D (most are being written down though)

All my free furniture is gone. As is my gigaslime beanbag chair, my keg and every other arcade furniture unlockable beyond my red gigaslime beanbag.
I assume this is caused by joining someone who didn't have those quests completed, or... something.
Joining into other players worlds really screws your save up something fierce.

I actually think that was the arena and cinema before the latest patch. I'll try to think up of a way to restore those things for the undoubtably many people who it has happened to (without them realizing I imagine)!

Is there something else that gets screwed up by joining other players' worlds? The bug where you get the transfer GUI again after joining a fresh save is fixed, at least!
 

res7less

Jumpkin
- The buttons are switched when playing a replay in the cinema. (playing with gamepad). LB says "Slow Down", but it speeds up and vice versa.

- When purchasing something for Essence (perks for example), the inventory Essences don't diminish immediately. The bottom indicator shows it correctly, but in the inventory Essences are only reduced the next time you die.

- GUN-D4M fights in replays lead to major desync and ultimately to replay aborts due to teleport plates not being used properly.

- Are Chickens supposed to also drop hazards when herded into a coop during a challenge while playing with Booby Trap curse?

- Is the required next score supposed to be that high?
somuch.PNG

- Game Crash (reproducible): Receive first Golden Lood Egg, speak to Oak, select "Manage" (Golden Lood shows as 0 of 1 in the menu, even though the Egg isn't hatched yet), exit "Manage", access egg beds. Probably possible with other eggs. Confirmed: Works with any egg, no matter if first or not. Going to "manage", then accessing egg beds with eggs in inventory crashes the game.
 
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Lamphobic

Green Slime
<3 new nightmare modes. I always wanted the option to replay them after finishing the quest and my favorite by far is elites with leveling.
 
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Teddy

Developer
Staff member
@res7less and @TsReaper

I thought I should tag you to mention that one of the dialogue lines have been altered in the latest frontline patch! It's the removal of the line where Trunk calls Arcade Mode the "trail of the Goddess", which was intentionally similar to Trial of the Goddess, but creates wrong impressions of the lore relation between Arcadia and Story Mode.

We're usually fine with the lore being open ended and vague in places, but
in this case there's a strong allusion that Faita went and beat Arcade Mode, which is not what she did, and making the player believe she did has no interesting purpose.
The intended effect of Trunk's line will be moved to some other event instead!
 

Kailyou

Green Slime
I wonder if there will be any future updates which improve arcade mode?

I do not like story modes in general and I always prefer such modes like the arcade.

The mode does not feel grinding at all because there are just a very few updates.

Are there any plans for the future in increasing the grind fact in arcade mode to open an endless game experience?
 
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