Spin Rhythm XD News

Hi there,

What a crazy week it's been! Welcome to all our new Spinners. We are blown away by everyone's response to the launch.

We've got a small patch we're pushing out before we take a bit of a break (we're all heading interstate for a wedding then taking a couple of weeks off).





[h2]FEATURES[/h2]

• Added No-fail mode in accessibility options!
  - Want to slam through a track that is too difficult for you? This mode allows you to play with full visual effects (rather than the muted practice mode background), and your leaderboard score will be locked to the score you achieved at the point of failure.
  
• Added gamepad control styles!
  - Default - A balanced, more instantaneous response
  - Legacy - Pre-1.0 feeling with some wheel inertia
  - Rotate Stick - The wheel is controlled by rotating the analogue stick - it’s back!
• Removed Burst Compilation
  - This might have far ramifications (it’s supposed to make code execute more smoothly) - but it seems to have reduced stuttering and crashing issues for many people. Let us know if you feel any difference
  
• Locked tracks now require a button press (instead of an automatic animation) - this is also skippable
  
• Added Whirlpool RemiXD level by Programmatic. Play this chart by completing the XD difficulty for Whirlpool
  
• Added tooltips! Hover over certain options to reveal explanatory text - more of these coming soon
  

[h2]POLISH[/h2]

• Some XD difficulties have been adjusted to better reflect their challenge level
  - Lovesick is now 26
  - Beyond The Heart is now 24
  - Ghost Ship is now 23
  - Time is now 22
  
• Adjusted SRTB artist links (in hamburger menu) to only recognise Songwhip URLs (we don’t want to be responsible for people embedding dodgy links)
  
• You can now speed up all menu animations properly when using gamepads
  
• Background music will now be lowered when calibrating
  

[h2]BUGS[/h2]

• Not a fix, but we noticed a bug with track speed override where it wouldn’t properly enable unless you swapped to and from another track. We couldn’t reliably reproduce this, so if you find a way to please let us know.
  
• Fixed a bug where filtering by difficulty range could still put you into difficulties that should have been filtered out.
  

See you next patch!

Join us on Discord!

Hi Spinners, thanks for your support and patience on the road to 1.0. Extra thanks to all our Discord members who helped with beta testing this release, translations, and the love and memes that keep us going.

Check out our official trailer, and please retweet our launch tweet if you can! If you haven't left a Steam review yet for SRXD, we would greatly appreciate it.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]



We're finally here! Let's go through all the new features.



[h3]FEATURES[/h3]

• New tracks! We added 4 new tracks to reach 60 tracks (if you count the tutorial!) - we had another full track planned (Second Wind by L'indecis), it's licensed and the levels are made, but we wanted to save it as a free track update for the release of the Chillhop DLC so players could get a taste of that style of music.
  
• New UI - it's shinier, more user-friendly (works on all inputs properly!) and has a ton of cool skins for you to unlock and equip.
  
• Improved gamepad controls! Wheel speed increases per-difficulty with improved note tracking.
  
• New handy track list side panel which can be enabled or disabled, and can display your performance progress, leaderboards, unlocks or whichever info you prefer.
  
• New mascots! Meet Jim Rhythm and LadyJ, interdimensional... DJs? Subspace MCs? Who knows, they just up the vibe and groove to whatever track you have selected.
  
• Level up system - play levels and beat your high scores to gain XP, level up and unlock new songs, new wheel skins, UI skins and more. Currently it takes around 15 XD difficulty levels to unlock all the songs, or completion of all of the Normal difficulty levels (and a couple of Hards).
  
• Up Next system on the results screen (replaces random track selection). Keep your flow as SRXD suggests the next track to play around your current difficulty range, no more need to quit out and pick a track to play.
  
• RemiXD levels! We've been running RemiXD competition for a while now. Discord members create and vote for tough as nails versions of official tracks. These unlock when you beat the XD level, and have been added to the game as the ultimate challenge.
  
• Better practice mode! Click and drag to loop multiple sections, have greater control over playback speed and more.
  
• More options, better options! You can now change accessibility features, wheel skins and more while you play or practice, no more need to quit out to main menu.
  
• Better search and filter! Scroll to the top of the list to reveal the search bar (or use the CTRL + F shortcut - or whatever shortcut you want to bind). The filter button appears while searching, and has more and better filter options including custom difficulty ranges.
  
• Integrated customs! No more separate track list and separate edit mode overlay (access edit mode via the hamburger menu on the top right hand side of a selected track).
  
• Artist links per-track! We used Songwhip (an awesome free service) to create artists links to each track, making their music easier to find on your favourite platform. Access via the hamburger menu on a selected track.
  
• A new tutorial system! Learn how to play in real time, no more stuffy unplayable slideshow presentations. Also enjoy fun challenges at the end of each tutorial like the old days - don't worry, you can't fail these.
  
• Lifetime stat tracking! Lots of useless and trivial info such as total notes of each type, total time playing, total points etc.
  
• A couple of new achievements! And removed some old ones (like the ones that required random song selection.
  

[h3]REMOVED FEATURES[/h3]

• SpinFM - we removed this since it was a bit of a dead feature.
  
• Daily challenge - other than achievement hunting, no one was really using this so we piffed it.
  
• Random track select - this has been replaced with the Up Next feature.
  

[h3]Wow! So many cool new features, what else do you plan to do?[/h3]

We have a few things we would still like to improve or implement at some point.

• Endless mode - play a mashup of short sections of every track as the difficulty and speed slowly increase. The tech is there and working, it just needs to be implemented properly. We think this would make a really fun mode for both beginners and hardcore players.
  
• Better editor - we want to include mouse controls and cutting levels for Easy / Normal, as well as some other quality of life fixes (like swing tempo support, proper triplet charting without fiddly time signature stuff and so on).
  
• VR - sure why not? Maybe with console release.
  
• A whole lot of menu SFX we didn't implement in time.
  

[h3]What about other platforms? Where's the Switch version?[/h3]

We only have a single programmer, so all our focus was on making SRXD 1.0 on Steam as good as possible. We were still putting new features in up to a few days before launch, and other platforms are much more strict with certification, meaning we couldn't release these simultaneously. With such a small team, we figure it's better to have a complete product and then focus on porting one platform at a time.

We might focus on Switch next, we might focus on PS4/5 and possibly VR. Stay tuned.


[h3]Where's the DLC?[/h3]

We planned to launch 1.0 with Monstercat DLC. All the levels and backgrounds are made, but they wanted more time to work on marketing, so we will be launching it sometime in the future (possible alongside our first console launch).

If you have any issues or feedback or just want to spread the love, join us on Discord and let us know.



Thank you for your support and happy spinning.

Hi Spinners, this is a small update before Christmas just to give you a few new tracks and show you what we've been working on to prepare for 1.0.





While we work on our final features for 1.0 (level up system, unlockables, proper gamepad and console-friendly UI), we have kept up licensing tracks from around the place. We were going to release them all in one bunch at 1.0, but we decided to release some early as a Christmas present.

We're pleased to be able to add the awesome Au5 to our roster with Voidwalkers (co-written with Chime), along with Aussie funk pop band Supathick and their extremely catchy tune "Time". Oh and we slipped in the title track from Teminite's Raise The Black Flag album. Send them to the depths!




We have changed our UI many times since we launched. Initially we wanted something cool and dope, which evolved to cool and dope but slightly functional and finally to cool, dope but a bit all over the place. Turns out if you slowly add features to a UI that wasn't designed for them, things can quickly get complicated.




Our main goal with the UI update was to make it more controller friendly. We want to achieve this by making sure every menu has a simple flow of left to right, with options going up and down only along the selected axis.

In our current UI, it is unclear what is currently highlighted and what is selected (active). We have written some nice clean shaders to highlight both the current selected object, and the selected UI section.





We have created a new UI colouring system which lets us build unique colour palettes (one of our unlockable level up rewards). Check them out below.





The design of the track select menu now contains two distinct panels. The left-most panel can be swapped out for level up / unlock info, leaderboards, or player stats (including the selected level's run history). This should cater to more types of players whether you're chasing medals (clearing all tracks), grinding one chart until you're the best, digging into stats, or looking to unlock everything.

Difficulty is now more clear, and the flow of the menu no longer asks players to choose difficulty every time they play a level (which ends up feeling redundant). The difficulty ring now loops up to level 100!

There are "playlist" icons on the right which let players flip between base game charts, DLCs and customs without leaving and returning to the menu.

The actual level playing state has been refactored so that all options including calibration, accessibility and such are available while playing a level (accessible via pause menu). This means you will now be able to swap settings, track and wheel skins on the fly without having to quit back to menu. Neat!

Keep in mind that there's still a lot of work to be done on this new UI. Icons are missing or placeholder, polish will still be done etc.





One final thing, we are going to be shutting down SpinFM and replacing it with a proper multiplayer system some time in the future, so we will no longer be adding new tracks to the service.

See you next update.

Hi everyone

We've been busy working on our Switch port and final updates before 1.0. We were recently asked to join the Melbourne International Games Week Steam sale, so we decided to release two new tracks and some minor bug fixing for the occasion!

Go and check out a bunch of other games that are proudly made in Melbourne, Australia!

Details below.



[h3]FEATURES[/h3]

2 new tracks from the artist Sharks who is signed with Disciple!

• Whirlpool and Water Elemental will take you on an intense journey through an underwater soundscape. Their detailed sound design and intricate rhythm lend themselves perfectly to Spin Rhythm XD’s mechanics.
  

Sharks is in our Discord so send them some love if you like the tracks.

[h3]POLISH[/h3]

• Fixed a number of track twist issues at track speed 40
  
• Taps now check the wheel position on the current frame and the previous frame (to improve accuracy in certain situations)
  

[h3]BUGS[/h3]

• Fixed a bug where the game could crash due to certain backgrounds loading incorrectly
  

See you next patch.

Hi everyone

With the new scoring system having been in the wild for a month now, we've made a few small changes to clean it up and make it less punishing or discouraging for new players, without the need for any kind of leaderboard resets.

Details below.


[h3]FEATURES[/h3]
The main feature of this patch is the refining of our recently updated scoring system. Having a score reduce from PFC > SFC > FC ended up feeling like multiple layers of punishment for not being perfect, so we have simplified the whole system.

• Updated scoring timing windows
  - Good - 79ms
  - Great - 59ms
  - Perfect - 38ms
  - Perfect+ - 16ms
  - Release timing remains slightly more lenient than the above values
  
• Removed Superb Full Combo (SFC)
  
• Combined Superb and Great into one bracket
  
• Anything below Great is now Early / Late
  
• New Perfect+ display options (customise menu)
  - Choose between Rainbow, Bright and None Set this in the “customise” menu to make Perfect+ stand out more or less to your liking
  - “None” will remove the + and only show “Perfect” (when either Perfect or Perfect+ are hit)
  

[h3]POLISH[/h3]

• Updated calibration wording to be a little clearer in its instruction
  
• Note / beat stack dithering effect now supports two notes instead of one
  
• Fixed dithering issue with “Your Pain” background elements
  
• Using custom backgrounds will no longer affect the practice background
  
• Removed some annoying features when placing notes in custom editing
  - Match note stacks no longer appear when placing two match notes on the same tick
  - Placing a spinner on a spinner will no longer jump to the next note tail
  - Placing a scratch on a scratch will no longer jump to the next note tail
  

[h3]BUGS[/h3]

• Fixed the broken recently wiped leaderboards including
  - Inject XD
  - Beyond The Heart XD
  - I See Lite XD
  - Robo Trio XD
  - Reach You XD
  - Twist Sound XD
  - VOLT XD
  - Believe XD
  - BUBBLES XD
  
• Fixed a backspin in The Magician Expert
  
• Fixed a backspin in Mimic Expert
  
• Fixed a backspin in Colorblind Easy
  
• Fixed a bug where the custom menu UI could become transparent
  
• Fixed a bug in custom editing with the D function where selection could malfunction after using playback with notes selected
  
• Fixed a bug in custom editing where selecting would take multiple attempts to be successful
  
• Fixed a bug where using a combination of Prism Bucket and 2 Minutes backgrounds could soft lock a chart permanently
  
• Fixed a bug where combined beat / match stacks did not take wheel position into account
  
• Fixed an issue with No Limits background
  
• Fixed Daily Leaderboard
  
• Removed our beloved Steve from the top of multiple leaderboards
  

Our last planned big update before 1.0 (unless we get sidetracked) is redoing our menus to be more controller friendly, as well as including a basic level up / unlock / cosmetic system.



See you next patch.