Hello all! Let’s get to the big news...
We’re proud to announce our final Early Access milestone -
the Trivia Tricks Friend Pass! Friend Pass will allow you to invite 7 friends into any online lobby through room code,
without them needing to purchase Trivia Tricks!Inspired by games such as It Takes Two, Friend Pass will make it much easier to bring anybody into the Trivia fun, with no Remote Play necessary! Friend Pass players will be able to partake in all gameplay options, such as Co-Op Vs Boss or even Workshop Questions!
We’ll have more information on Friend Pass (including a release date) soon, but for now consider joining the Trivia Tricks
Discord to direct any questions to us developers. We’ll be happy to answer!
Most of the last 3 months of development has been laying the groundwork to make Friend Pass possible. This has required an update to the version of Unreal Engine used and a total rework of Trivia Tricks' network code, which is no small feat! However,
we’ve taken this rework as an opportunity to add many user-requested features and, because almost everything has improved, we're going to breakdown these changes by feature.
The Studio Stage was the first stage we made and after two-and-a-half years it didn't quite feel up to the standard of the others introduced since... so
we've given it a makeover! You'll find some new stage lights and an updated player stand for Tricksters to stand on.
New AI characters have been added for you to quiz against!
Please welcome
Mimi, Pearl, Claudia, Cap'n, Frosty, Fox, Bethany and Sarah to Trivia Tricks!
I wonder if anyone can figure out their favorite categories?
The Twitch Integrator has been reprogrammed almost entirely from scratch, giving us the opportunity to add many player-requested features...
- Twitch characters can now reach a majority during Chance Round Voting, meaning the game will progress without having to wait for the timer to finish. This majority is calculated from the number of active participants in previous questions.
- The stuttering when Twitch Chat characters were added has been resolved, and, if your connection ever goes down, Twitch Chat will now attempt to reconnect to the game.
- And, the change you've all been waiting for, the next time you collect a key from the Twitch Connection website... WILL BE THE LAST! Trivia Tricks will now refresh expired authorization tokens by itself!
We've been taking a look at how Trivia Tricks chooses its questions and investigating areas of improvement. While we’ve received praise on repeat questions being avoided we’ve heard your requests for more question variety during games, so...
- Trivia Tricks will now more equally divide the selected categories. Picking two categories? The questions you'll see will be much closer to a 50/50 split than before. Picking 20 categories? Everything will be represented!
- Additionally, Trivia Tricks will not ask a question from the same category more than twice in a row.
- Finally, we've extended every category with some new, relevant-for-2023 questions. Hope you've been keeping on top of things!
We are continuing to polish Workshop integration in accordance with your feedback!
- Only the host now needs to have question packs downloaded, meaning games will start much faster.
- We've adjusted the metrics behind 'trending' packs, as previously selecting a pack in a lobby of 8 players would count as an 8x boost.
- 'Friend-Only' and 'Hidden' packs can now be played with anyone, but the category menu will hide the details of those packs for players who don't have the rights to see them (being marked as a "Hidden Pack" to those players).
- The TV will now have an icon when a Workshop question is shown.
In preparation for Friend Pass' release we've overhauled several sections of online play, here's some of the more major adjustments...
- The 'Room Code' will be on-screen at all times in the top right corner of the screen instead of being hidden away in the pause menu. Don't worry! It still needs to be hovered to display the code.
- Lobby searching is much more responsive and, in the case of a failed connection, Trivia Tricks will now show a helpful message and a timeout timer. Previously this was just a black screen.
- We've removed the button to invite players, as this was causing confusion for Steam Remote Play and won't be compatible with Friend Pass. We recommend using Room Codes, which will work in all circumstances!
It doesn't stop there, here's a few other miscellaneous improvements and bug fixes available in Version 0.9.32.24!
- The Character Creator now has a 'randomize' button, allowing you to quickly see all sorts of whacky combinations. It will randomize to your unlocked items, meaning any generated characters are ready to be saved immediately!
- We've updated the icons in the Stage Selection menu to reflect the stages as they look today, as they were getting a little outdated with all the redesigns!
- The Chance Round joining section has had several UI elements polished, such as the thumbs next to players and the Twitch menus.
- The Achievements menu now works when Trivia Tricks is running without Steam. Additionally, we've fixed a bug where cosmetics tied to achievements weren't being unlocked in all circumstances.
- Fixed a crash that would occur if players failed to load another player's avatar.
- Fixed a rare softlock that had a chance to occur after failing to host a lobby.
- Trivia Tricks will no longer direct players between several menus with awkward transitions after failing to join a lobby.
- If, for whatever reason, Trivia Tricks cannot detect the monitor's information, the settings menu will now default to populating with 720/1080/1440/4k resolutions and 30/60/120/uncapped framerate options.
- Fixed any outstanding issues where particular textures would be displayed in low quality for a second.
- Fixed a bug where clients could see the Add/Remove AI buttons for a split second after joining a game.
- Fixed a bug where some sub-menus in the Workshop Browse Menu wouldn't close automatically after a game begins.
- Fixed a bug where the ‘Categories Updated!' text would stay on screen after players navigate away from the main lobby menu (such as Stage Select).
- Fixed a bug where a player’s inventory wouldn't immediately update upon using an item.
- Fixed an issue where shortcuts to Trivia Tricks would boot the game without a connection to Steam.
- Pre-emptively resolved a bug where Ganymede's Lab wouldn't have loaded during future seasonal events.
- During the development of this update Gustav picked a different color for their Bowtie. Who are we to argue?
Wow, you really read all the way down here? We'll let you in on a little secret! 👀
Open the Trivia Tricks' main menu to unlock the limited-time Lootbox and Jester Hat April Fool's cosmetics! But hurry, this giveaway ends April 6th!And finally, if you like what we’re doing, please hit the thumbs up below this news post! If you have more detailed thoughts then do consider leaving a
Steam Review letting us know what you think - they really help us out! If you want to reach out to us developers then we can always be found in the
Discord. Thank you for following Trivia Tricks!