PATCH 2026.02.20.0925
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[/p][p][/p][p]This patch is primarily focused on bug fixes, performance improvements, tuning game mechanics, and accessibility features. We will continue to focus on game stability and obvious balance issues, but high priority features for future updates are: Target Practice, spectators in lobbies, lobby level select, and a new character. Thank you for your patience as we continue to improve the game.
FIXES
Fixed various crashes
COLLISION
- Fixed getting stuck in walls on throw
- Fixed angled bullets teleporting through walls
- Fixed explosions causing kunai to tunnel into walls
- Improved algorithm that pushes entities out of walls
These changes should address a lot of the weird collision edge cases, if you find any after the patch please continue to let us know!
VISUALS
- Fixed Hayao’s sprite turning upside down during wall run near sticky blocks
- Fixed sprite shake looking incorrect when Interpolation is on
- Fixed wrongly colored background pixel on moat
- Improved some font glyphs
- Fixed text character conversion occurring on certain OS language locales
- Fixed unrecognized unicode characters breaking the text layout
If you are in a non-US area and the game’s text looked totally busted, this was why. Sorry about that! This should also fix player profile names looking weird. In the future we’ll have a multi-font rendering solution for crazy Unicode characters.
AUDIO
- Fixed certain audio mixes getting deep fried if the audio device was not set to 44.1KHz sample rate
- Fixed various audio mixing issues
- Fixed ambience tracks not playing
- Fixed missing music on Depths B-side
- Fixed cloth tear sounds duplicating too much
- Added missing sound elements to showdowns
ENHANCEMENTS
PERFORMANCE
- Music now loads without blocking the main thread
- UI Music is now preloaded during the load screen
- Packed all level data into a single file for better loading performance
We noticed that users playing on machines with poor filesystem performance would stall for a long time during level loading. The game accessed music files when starting a level, so this could cause disconnects if loading the music took longer than the network timeout window. The music now loads in the background, so this should cause level transitions to perform much better and be more reliable in netplay. We also reduced the file count for level data, so the game should load faster on systems with bad disk performance.
ACCESSIBILITY
- Added Accessibility options menu
- Added Blood Effect toggle to accessibility options
This one's for the parents.
- Added Camera Movement toggle to accessibility options
We got some complaints that the camera movement on certain levels caused motion sickness, so here's an option to turn it off.
NEW ANNOUNCER LINES
We’ll leave these for you to discover…
ADJUSTMENTS
CHARACTERS
Slug
- Can only fast fall during ceiling run
Slug's ability to instantly trigger a fast fall at any time gave him one of the strongest movement options in the game with no drawbacks, which was heavily abused in high level play. We want players to focus on using the character's signature abilities, ceiling running and kunai tilts, rather than relying on a powerful neutral movement option. Tying the fast fall to the ceiling run strengthens the character's identity and allows opponents to predict when Slug is likely to fast fall.
Hayao
- Reduced dash distance by 15%
Hayao's base move and dash speed make him very powerful by default, but he doesn't have a bag of tricks like the other characters so we're trying to find the right balance for him. His large dash distance gave him the ability to control huge amounts of space in the neutral game, so the reduced dash distance reins him in just a bit without taking too much of his identity away.
UNIVERSAL MECHANICS
- Sword clash priority is now based on current speed
- Losing clash tumble time increased to 45 frames
- Tied clash tumble time decreased to 23 frames
Previously, sword clash priority was determined by the timing of the button press; the player who pressed the sword button most recently won the clash. Now, a character who is moving significantly faster than the other character wins the clash, otherwise it is treated as a tie and both players are tumbled for a shorter time. We feel that playing passively is a bit too strong right now, so we are hoping that this change along with the increased tumble time will favor aggressiveness and cause clashes to give an aggressive player an advantage over a passive one.
- Throw tumble time increased to 60 frames
Throw attempts are highly risky so the reward needs to be worth it. Increasing the tumble duration gives the thrower a better chance to follow up with an attack while still giving the opponent a chance to spend a bullet and dash away or escape if the thrower misreads the bounce.
- Dash startup increased from 2 frames to 4 frames
- Added slight acceleration time to bullet velocity
- Base hitstop on bullet deflects increased from 2 frames to 4 frames
Instant movement changes are very strong in rollback netplay, so this change should allow players to read dashes just slightly better in netplay while still preserving the power of the move. This change does not affect the timing of super bullet charging. Similarly the bullet acceleration and deflect hitstop should provide a bit more reaction time.
- Bunt initial active frames reduced from 20 frames to 8 frames
- Bunt active frames after a bullet deflect is still 20
- Bunt can no longer trigger a throw after deflecting a bullet
Our intention was for the bunt to act as a “guard point” to counter multiple bullets being fired in quick succession. The initial hitbox ended up being way too active which allowed crazy air throw shenanigans. It is now reworked to be out for 8 frames, which should still give plenty of time to deflect fast-moving bullets, and the deflect hitbox is extended after deflecting a bullet. There was also an unintended interaction where a character could be thrown after a bullet deflect, which is now fixed.
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FIXES
Fixed various crashes
COLLISION
- Fixed getting stuck in walls on throw
- Fixed angled bullets teleporting through walls
- Fixed explosions causing kunai to tunnel into walls
- Improved algorithm that pushes entities out of walls
These changes should address a lot of the weird collision edge cases, if you find any after the patch please continue to let us know!
VISUALS
- Fixed Hayao’s sprite turning upside down during wall run near sticky blocks
- Fixed sprite shake looking incorrect when Interpolation is on
- Fixed wrongly colored background pixel on moat
- Improved some font glyphs
- Fixed text character conversion occurring on certain OS language locales
- Fixed unrecognized unicode characters breaking the text layout
If you are in a non-US area and the game’s text looked totally busted, this was why. Sorry about that! This should also fix player profile names looking weird. In the future we’ll have a multi-font rendering solution for crazy Unicode characters.
AUDIO
- Fixed certain audio mixes getting deep fried if the audio device was not set to 44.1KHz sample rate
- Fixed various audio mixing issues
- Fixed ambience tracks not playing
- Fixed missing music on Depths B-side
- Fixed cloth tear sounds duplicating too much
- Added missing sound elements to showdowns
ENHANCEMENTS
PERFORMANCE
- Music now loads without blocking the main thread
- UI Music is now preloaded during the load screen
- Packed all level data into a single file for better loading performance
We noticed that users playing on machines with poor filesystem performance would stall for a long time during level loading. The game accessed music files when starting a level, so this could cause disconnects if loading the music took longer than the network timeout window. The music now loads in the background, so this should cause level transitions to perform much better and be more reliable in netplay. We also reduced the file count for level data, so the game should load faster on systems with bad disk performance.
ACCESSIBILITY
- Added Accessibility options menu
- Added Blood Effect toggle to accessibility options
This one's for the parents.
- Added Camera Movement toggle to accessibility options
We got some complaints that the camera movement on certain levels caused motion sickness, so here's an option to turn it off.
NEW ANNOUNCER LINES
We’ll leave these for you to discover…
ADJUSTMENTS
CHARACTERS
Slug
- Can only fast fall during ceiling run
Slug's ability to instantly trigger a fast fall at any time gave him one of the strongest movement options in the game with no drawbacks, which was heavily abused in high level play. We want players to focus on using the character's signature abilities, ceiling running and kunai tilts, rather than relying on a powerful neutral movement option. Tying the fast fall to the ceiling run strengthens the character's identity and allows opponents to predict when Slug is likely to fast fall.
Hayao
- Reduced dash distance by 15%
Hayao's base move and dash speed make him very powerful by default, but he doesn't have a bag of tricks like the other characters so we're trying to find the right balance for him. His large dash distance gave him the ability to control huge amounts of space in the neutral game, so the reduced dash distance reins him in just a bit without taking too much of his identity away.
UNIVERSAL MECHANICS
- Sword clash priority is now based on current speed
- Losing clash tumble time increased to 45 frames
- Tied clash tumble time decreased to 23 frames
Previously, sword clash priority was determined by the timing of the button press; the player who pressed the sword button most recently won the clash. Now, a character who is moving significantly faster than the other character wins the clash, otherwise it is treated as a tie and both players are tumbled for a shorter time. We feel that playing passively is a bit too strong right now, so we are hoping that this change along with the increased tumble time will favor aggressiveness and cause clashes to give an aggressive player an advantage over a passive one.
- Throw tumble time increased to 60 frames
Throw attempts are highly risky so the reward needs to be worth it. Increasing the tumble duration gives the thrower a better chance to follow up with an attack while still giving the opponent a chance to spend a bullet and dash away or escape if the thrower misreads the bounce.
- Dash startup increased from 2 frames to 4 frames
- Added slight acceleration time to bullet velocity
- Base hitstop on bullet deflects increased from 2 frames to 4 frames
Instant movement changes are very strong in rollback netplay, so this change should allow players to read dashes just slightly better in netplay while still preserving the power of the move. This change does not affect the timing of super bullet charging. Similarly the bullet acceleration and deflect hitstop should provide a bit more reaction time.
- Bunt initial active frames reduced from 20 frames to 8 frames
- Bunt active frames after a bullet deflect is still 20
- Bunt can no longer trigger a throw after deflecting a bullet
Our intention was for the bunt to act as a “guard point” to counter multiple bullets being fired in quick succession. The initial hitbox ended up being way too active which allowed crazy air throw shenanigans. It is now reworked to be out for 8 frames, which should still give plenty of time to deflect fast-moving bullets, and the deflect hitbox is extended after deflecting a bullet. There was also an unintended interaction where a character could be thrown after a bullet deflect, which is now fixed.
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