The multiplayer implementation of the Arcade Mode is almost complete, and we’ve had a long, sweaty testing session in the “office” today! We could’ve streamed it over at Fred’s Twitch channel, but we didn’t think of that until we were nearly finished. However, we’ll probably test it some more in the coming days and we’ll try to remember to stream it then so everyone can watch us fail miserably at our own game! :D
On the subject of streams, Fred has begun streaming on his previously mentioned channel again! Since he might be streaming pretty often, we won’t be posting the link on Facebook each time, so we recommend anyone interested in watching him do animation work to follow him on Twitch or us over on Twitter.
Anyway, back to Arcade Mode. As always, we’re making an effort to make multiplayer as interesting as the single player experience. The monster scaling carries over automatically from the Story Mode, but we’re also modifying encounters and room sizes to better accommodate the number of players in the game.
To avoid having players becoming more powerful as an effect of the increased enemy count, the drop rates are adjusted to make it comparable to how much money and loot a single player would’ve received. Speaking of loot, a huge difference in the Arcade Mode compared to the Story Mode is that clients receive their own loot, kind of like how it is in Diablo 3. This is to avoid having a single player accidentally (or intentionally) take all the good loot, and it also leads to a lot greater diversity in how players build!
The resurrection system is also altered, disabling in-combat resurrection completely. Instead, any players that die will automatically revive with 1 HP when a room is cleared! This might seem harsh, but since health is the most valuable resource in the Arcade Mode, having regular resurrection would be very powerful as it constitutes a form of healing.
To round things off, here’s an animation from an upcoming skill with the hugely creative work name “Berserker Mode“!
one question. you guys are giving anymore beta invites no more? just wanna know. btw,Keep up that AWESOME Work , can’t wait for it to come out to play !
Yeah, more beta invites will be nice <3
Yeah cant wait to play the game :D neeeeed beta !! ;D
The berserker animation looks so smooth!
Beta invites would be such a favor.
I cant tell you how much i would like to play this.
Is there a floor clear goodie at the end of each stage of the arcade mode? Would be nice if there were some kind of reward for trespassing a floor ( i mean not a single room but the entire level)
Love berserker mode :D Keep up the work
Wow that berserker animation looks so good :D I tried arcade mode alone. Its challenging, but also fun.
I’m glad to see the multiplayer for arcade mode getting worked on. I’m curious about why not have player-specific loot for story mode, too? It would help with the scenario of summoning that special rabbit boss and only one person being able to get its loot, at the very least.
Man, the devil of the berserker mode looks scary!
Gool update and balancing things. Different loot for different players is a good thing. I hate it when someone steals my stuff!
Does Fred have fixed stream times? I would love to watch the stream, but I don’t know when.
Modifying encounters based on group size sounds awesome! Have you considered allowing the player to also change these kinds of settings? For example, playing solo but having the game behave as if it is full? I’m not necessarily for the idea if it ruins balance but increased monster density just looks cool.
@ZombieTruckHead
Diablo 2 had such a command (for single player).
/players # (where # is 1-8)
It would set the difficulty to as if you were playing a multiplayer game with # people.
Theodore (administrator) wrote at 15/01/2014 14:27:@Dario: We might give out some more to test some of the bigger new features, but we’re not sure when. At some point, we’re going to leave the closed beta environment for a more inclusive solution, but as you know ETAs are not our thing so I can’t give one there either :P
@Ark626: Currently, you’ll find one health orb after each cleared floor, and you get one “normal” tier drop for defeating bosses on odd-numbered floors, and a “nice” tier drop on even-numbered floors.
@claudekennilol: It’s unlikely we’ll do local drops in multiplayer, since we’re planning to add trading eventually which will help with most problems that exist right now. Regarding the White Rabby’s carrot sword, I’m 99 % sure that everyone in the party gets it regardless of who picks it up? If not, then that’s a bug!
@Sogomn: He doesn’t have fixed stream times, but that’s an interesting idea!
@ZombieTruckHead: We’ve discussed adding such a feature, but we’re not sure yet. If we do, I’d rather give it an in-game implementation (i.e. you do something to trigger it) instead of making it a setting in options, since we already have a Hard mode!
Ah, the Rabby drop probably works as intended. I just read on the forums that only one drops and haven’t played with others to know whether or not that one drop yields a sword for everyone.
While MP is well and good, I remember with fondness the days when me and two friends beat the living snot out of Secret of Mana – one of the most fun I’ve had ever, and I’ve been longing for a similar experience for years.
I don’t suppose a MP on the same machine would be possible?
Wow, nice. I can’t wait for play this game ;-;