Cassette Beasts News

“I don’t know how best to break the news. You’re stuck here. We all are.”
Bytten Studio & Raw Fury are back with our Cassette Beasts demo for you to play!

Washing up on the beach of New Wirral you meet Kayleigh who rescues you from a monster attack and becomes your guide in this new world. From there you may explore Harbourtown and its surroundings. Fight, record & level up as you and Kayleigh explore some strange events surrounding the town.

Want to know more about the monsters that you'll face, or just want to browse who you can meet in the demo? Check out our Cassette Beasts Official Wiki!

The demo also features local Co-op. First, complete the initial tutorial of monster transformation and unlock your partner:


Then simply connect two controllers and hit RB+LB or START to assign players:


[h3]Changelog[/h3]
If you played our demo last time in Steam Next Fest last year, here's some tweaks and changes made since then:

• Improved UI flow for setting up local co-op multiplayer
  
• Bootleg monsters in the overworld have a glitchy TV static effect to make them easier to notice
  
• The mouse cursor now automatically hides itself after a few seconds of inactivity if you are mainly using a controller
  
• The controls are now displayed on the screen for a while when you start a new file
  
• When selecting a sticker from the inventory to apply to a tape, stickers incompatible with the tape are shown greyed out at the end of the list
  
• The minimap has been made larger
  
• Momentum is now preserved when landing after a short hop
  
• Fewer items are now lost upon defeat
  
• Many bug fixes and performance improvements have been made
  

We're happy to announce that yes, your save game from the demo will carry over to full release, so none of your progress will be lost. So please hunt bootlegs to your hearts delight. ♥

Be sure to ask us any questions you may have or even just share what bootlegs you've found!



Oh! It's Valentine's day tomorrow - and Pombomb has brought us a love letter! We'll have to find out what it contains tomorrow, I think!

Join Fiona and Raw Fury cozy game extraordinaire Matt on Wednesday as we play Cassette Beasts together! 🎮

Join for
🌞 Good Vibes
📼 Looking for Bootlegs
💛 Making BFFs
A̶̞̐ŗ̸͔̦c̷̗̱h̷͉̰a̴̰͂n̶̜̗g̸͇͒ḙ̷͕͚l̸̼̬s̸͚̰.̴̛͕.̶̼͖.̵̡͉

https://twitch.tv/rawfurygames Feb 8th @ 12PM EST/6PM CET

[h2]Cassette Beasts is now verified on Steam Deck![/h2]

That's right; we're so excited to announce that you'll be able to play Cassette Beasts on your Steam deck on release.

Explore, battle and make friends whilst on the move! Oh, and of course, keep an eye out for those elusive bootlegs! 📼

Hey folks! Have you ever wondered what the Rangers of Harbourtown do? Well, it’s time for us to go into more detail…



If you played our Steam Next Fest demo, you’ll already know the basics. At the beginning of Cassette Beasts, you wash up on the shore of New Wirral, an island on what seems to be another world. There you meet Kayleigh, a kind and friendly ranger, who takes you to Harbourtown and shows you the ropes.

Along the way, you and Kayleigh encounter a strange and otherworldly creature known to the residents of New Wirral only as an ‘Archangel’.



Finding more of these Archangels is the key to finding the way off New Wirral and back to your home world. But to survive them you’ll need to get stronger--and that’s where the Rangers come in…



[h3]Rangers[/h3]
Harbourtown’s Rangers exist to support the community. They maintain the town, manage supply lines and deliveries, and keep important routes safe for travel. Occasionally, more dangerous situations pop up, and these fall on the Ranger Captains--the highest ranking rangers--to resolve.

The Captains are also responsible for training new recruits, and in your case that means battling! Each of the 12 Captains has tapes based around a particular strategy they favour in battle. If you’re not prepared with a strategy of your own it can be a difficult fight.



Stationed in New Wirral Park, Captain Wallace is most likely the first Captain you’ll face. We first showed him on our stream in December. His preferred strategy uses walls to block incoming attacks, so consider setting up your tapes with moves that will let you take them down quickly, otherwise you’ll get nowhere!



Ranger Wilma is an essential part of the Ranger’s organisation. Certain scarce items and upgrades--invaluable in the pursuit of Archangels--are stored and distributed by Wilma from the Ranger’s HQ in Harbourtown. The more your training under the Captains progresses, the more she’ll be able to provide you with.



[h3]Postgame[/h3]
While I won’t spoil how the story ends, I will say there is a lot more to do in Cassette Beasts after it!

People don’t stop arriving on New Wirral after your appearance, of course. Just as you received help from the Rangers early on, after you’ve completed your training and become a Ranger, you’ll be helping orient some of the new arrivals yourself!



If you’ve seen these bad boys in screenshots and videos before and wondered what they are, they’re what the Rangers call ‘Rogue Fusions’. Rogue Fusions are unnaturally strong monsters that have fused in the wild. Some Rogue Fusions surround themselves with a swarm of other monsters, and others seem to increase in power in other ways… As a Ranger and a recognised combat pro it’ll be your job to keep them under control. But why do they form, and why are they becoming more frequent and dangerous…?

In the postgame, there are new monsters to encounter and record, and new bosses to fight. Each Ranger Captain can be rematched. This time they won’t hold back, and will unleash their perfected strategies on you!

And of course if that’s not enough for you, beating the game unlocks additional game modes, including permadeath, and various kinds of randomisation.



That’s all for now. Let us know what you think in our Discord! And of course you can also find us on Twitter.

Until next time!

Tom and Jay here again to welcome to our second roundup blog! Let's say hello to some new monsters and get a little more familiar with the systems in Cassette Beasts!



First, let's look at the element system in Cassette Beasts. How does it work? What is the Chemistry System? And how does fusion play into it? Let's find out!

[h2]Elements[/h2]
Every monster in Cassette Beasts has an elemental type. These represent the monster's nature and can be seen next to the health bar on the battle screen.

What are the elements in Cassette Beasts, then? let's take a look at the list!

Beast
Fire
Ice
Lightning
Plant
Air
Water
Earth
Poison
Metal
Plastic
Astral
Glass
Glitter

So we've looked at the elemental types - but what does it all mean?

[h2]Chemistry[/h2]
So how do these elements interact with each other? Well, the chemistry system allows these elements to create reactions that can be positive, negative or neutral! Here is an example of the air-type Cluckabilly attacking the fire-type Velocirifile.

If hit with an air-type attack from Cluckabilly then Velocirifle will be Extinguished, a reaction that lowers its melee and ranged attack power. The attack won't do extra damage, but it will negatively affect Velocirifle's ability to deal damage! What about the reverse, then?

This reaction is Updraft, causing Cluckabilly to receive an Air Wall status, which absorbs up to 3 incoming hits. Pretty useful, huh?

You can utilise many reactions in battle to give yourself the edge.


[h3] Cluckabilly #100[/h3]
Cluckabillies are defined by their antisocial attitudes. The force of their angry caws can be strong enough to create shockwaves. Whilst they may look unthreatening in their adolescent forms, it is said that they are capable of growing into something much more dangerous. They are well-rounded in battle, but their razor sharp blade tails give them a slight edge as melee fighters.


[h3] Velocirifle #042 [/h3]
The base of its skull has chambers full of gunpowder that it can use to cause explosions. It can fire objects out of its face this way, as well as quick blasts of fire and flame! Whilst weak in melee combat, it excels as a ranged attacker.



[h2]Fusion [/h2]
So how does fusion work with this element system? Well, a monster's fusion form inherits both elements from the two monsters that combine to form it!
How terrifying!

So when Mascotbilly attacks an enemy with a move that doesn't have an elemental type of its own, it'll use both elements that Mascotbilly has.

Against Velocirifle it triggers both the Smoke reaction (which increases the target's evasion) on account of the plastic-type, but also the Extinguished reaction we explained earlier.



So whilst Velocirifle took multiple debuffs, it also gained one buff from the attack. Interesting, huh? Some fusions must create some very interesting reactions...


[h3] Mascotoy [/h3]
Mascotoy proves that plastic-type beasts aren’t all fun and games. Once some sort of character costume, the Mascotoy is now closer to a shambling corpse. Whilst it’s slow, you wouldn’t want to be on the pointy end of its oversized claw. Perhaps if one were to record it, however, this unnerving entity would make for a formidable form to take in battle.



[h2]Bootlegs [/h2]
Ocassionally, in Cassette Beasts, you'll stumble upon an odd-coloured monster in the world.

Hey wait, is that Squirey... green?

This Squirey here is usually beast-type, yet it's appeared here with the wrong colour and element! This is a "bootleg" - signified by its name in red above its health bar. This is different from a monster using a coating move to change its element, which can be done in battle as a temporary element swapping.

Any monster has a small chance to appear with any element as bootleg.

The colour even matches its new element!

Bootleg monsters don't just have different elements - they also have a new move pool to match. This means a monster may have access to a whole selection of moves they wouldn't normally have. On top of this, bootleg tapes have a slightly higher chance to learn moves with uncommon or rare bonus traits.

Squirey cannot usually learn Woodcutter, but this plant-type bootleg tape form can!



[h2]Next Time[/h2]
Thank you for taking the time to read our quick roundup of some of the features and systems in Cassette Beasts. To see more in detail, you can view the individual posts below.
If you want to ask any questions, feel free to visit the official Discord and follow us on Twitter!

• Cassette Beasts Blog #5 - Monster Showcase
• Cassette Beasts Blog #6 - Elements, Chemistry & Fusion
• Cassette Beasts Blog #7 - Bootleg
  
• Blog #4: Show your Moves!