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ZpellCatz News

Release Date Announcement

Hey there, fellow Catz! Exciting news today. ZpellCatz now has a release date and we're transitioning from closed beta to open beta.



Release Date Announcement

ZpellCatz will be released on June 5, 2024 here on Steam.




Join the Open Beta

The closed beta of ZpellCatz ends today, but we are smoothly transitioning into open beta. A big thank you to everyone who participated in the closed beta and provided feedback. You have helped ZpellCatz become a lot better.

The open beta starts today and will end a few days before release. Everyone is invited to take part in the beta test via Steam Playtest, so check it out and please give feedback.

Want to join the open beta? Visit ZpellCatz' Steam page and click "Request Access". Check out this screenshot:



Stay up to Date

Never miss an update? Follow & wishlist ZpellCatz here on Steam:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447700/ZpellCatz/

ZpellCatz "The Look" Update (0.101.3)

Hey there, fellow Catz! A new version of the ZpellCatz closed beta is available now. This version features a UI overhaul, a new tailor NPC and lots of balance changes. As with any new beta version, more players are invited. So, check your e-mails / Steam client if you've registered for access.

Also, there'll be an exciting announcement regarding ZpellCatz next week. Stay tuned!

New Features

The UI and especially the menus needed some polish. Nearly every UI screen has been updated in the version and I really like the new style. Have a look at the updated skill and inventory screens:





A new NPC joined the Greencat Village: Halge, the tailor. Halge offers a service to change the appearance of cat heroes. And the best part? The service is free of charge! So change your look as often as you want to.



This version also feature a ton of balance changes. As I've added more and more late game content over the last few weeks, it's become increasingly clear which classes were significantly stronger than others. After this round of balance changes, the power levels of each class should be in the same ball park.

"The Look" Update (0.101.3) April '24

*** New Features ***
- Added a tailor NPC to be able to change the visual appearance
- UI overhoal

*** General ***
- Quest items and essence no longer have notifiers
- Dungeon generation: added more shortcuts (bonus room connections)
- Dungeon generation: adjusted shape algorithm of "cave" and "tunnel" dungeons
- Adjusted item spawn animation for rooms
- Loca text adjustments

*** Audio ***
- Changed collect gem sound

*** Skills ***
- Rebalanced nearly all class skills and path skills to be viable in late game content

*** Epic Items ***
- 'Iron Forehead': +8-12% nature damage
- 'Skull of the Titan': +8-12% lux damage
- 'Shield Enhancer': +8-12% all damage
- 'Protective Branch': +1-2 to 'Gaia Rush'
- 'Tough Leather': +5-10% fire damage
- 'The Blocker': +5-10% lux damage
- 'Safeguard': +5-10% nature damage
- 'Stroll': +4-8% nature damage
- 'Rushing Spur': +4-8% storm damage
- 'Progress': +4-8% fire damage
- 'Hand of the Guardian': increased stats
- 'Permafrost': Removed fire res, added storm to cold conversion, increased stats
- 'Storm Runners': Added storm pierce to buff effect
- Added bonus damage as cold to 'Frost Burn'
- Added bonus damage as cold to 'Eternal Snow'
- Added bonus damage as fire to 'Eternal Flame'
- Added bonus damage as lux to 'Eternal Light'
- Added bonus damage as storm to 'Eternal Storm'
- Added bonus damage as nature to 'Eternal Grassland'
- Added bonus damage as dark to 'Eternal Darkness'

*** Enemies ***
- Early enemies are more dangerous / interesting now

*** Balance ***
- Increased the soft cap / cap of various stats (this is a buff)
- Trippled EXP gained from bosses
- Slightly increased EXP gained from enemies (level 15+)
- Increased sell value for items
- Adjusted merchant offer costs
- Reduced duration of enemy 'Root' buff
- Enemy mod 'Totem' now summons 2 totems near the center of the screen
- Rebalanced defense for players and enemies, defense now slightly increases blocked damage
- Reduced gem upgrade costs of rare gems (still higher than normal gems' costs)
- Rebalanced all gems
- Rebalanced blacksmith's "polish" and "blue chaos" values

*** Bug Fixes ***
- Fixed stat sorting issues in craft epic item tooltip (blacksmith)
- Fixed a bug where arena room drops were too low
- Fixed a bug where slowing curses could cause a complete cooldown time stop
- Fixed a bug that sometimes generated 'Palace' shaped dungeons with not enough rooms

*** Engine ***
- Game engine update
- Library updates

Full Changelog

Stay up to Date

Never miss an update? Follow & wishlist ZpellCatz here on Steam:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447700/ZpellCatz/

ZpellCatz "Sharing is Caring" Update (0.100.0)

Happy new year, fellow Catz! 2024 starts with a lot of new features for ZpellCatz: Highscore, (shared) stash, new game modes and lots of minor changes. In addition, the demo / prologue has been updated so that Familiars and local multiplayer are now available there. As with any new beta version, more players are invited. So, check your e-mails / Steam client if you've registered for access.

New Features

A stash has been added to the Market Hall. It has 6 pages, 2 personal ones (per cat hero) and 4 shared ones. The shared pages are, well, shared amongst all heroes, allowing you to give items from one cat to another. Each page has 30 item slots, so you now have enough space to store every tier 1 and tier 2 epic item (if you want to do that for whatever reason :-D ).



One of the features that I always enjoyed while playing Legends of Pixelia is now also available in ZpellCatz: Highscores! The score is calculated the moment you defeat a boss and there is a distinct highscore table per dungeon. Only dungeons with a boss room have a highscore table.

There's also a web version of the highscore table available if you want to share your excellent score with others.



Up for a challenge? There are new game modes available that increase the difficulty of ZpellCatz. Game modes can be selected when creating a cat hero and they are permanent. You get a small bonus to your dungeon score for beating a boss with active game modes selected.

- Hardcore: Your typical permadeath option as you know it from every other ARPG
- Cat-core: Similar to hardcore, but you have 7 lives instead of 1
- Challenging: Enemies have greatly increased stats, designed for players that love to grind

Do cats have 7 lives or 9 lives? This varies from country to country. In the culture I grew up in, cats have 7 lives. And since 7 is a wonderful number, we'll take that. :-)



Familiars and local multiplayer are coming to the demo / prologue. So if you don't have beta access (yet), feel free to toy around with Familiars in Autuna.



Requesting Beta Access

Want to join the closed beta? Visit ZpellCatz' Steam page and click "Request Access". Check out this screenshot:



"Sharing is Caring" Update (0.100.0) January '24

*** New Features ***
- Added a (shared) stash to the market hall
- Added a highscore system for dungeons with bosses
- Added new game modes 'Challenging', 'Hardcore' and 'Cat-core'

*** General ***
- Decreased 'Dark Wave' damage by 5%
- Decreased 'Frailty' damage by 5%
- Increased soft cap of elemental resistances from 35% to 40% (this is a buff)
- Renamed Bashu's 'Inner Light' to 'Inner Glow' to reduce confusion with a Twilight tree skill of the same name
- Minor loca text adjustments

*** Items ***
- Increased rare and epic item drop chance for lower levels
- Slightly buffed stats for 'Hunting Call'
- Buffed all items of merchant offer page 2

*** Gems ***
- Buffed rare gems
- Buffed low performing gems
- Reduced the level requirement for some gems sold by the merchant

*** Dungeons ***
- Main quest dungeons 2 - 6 now drop more fishsticks / dust
- 'Temple Ruins' boss now always drops a normal quality jewelry (ring or necklace)
- 'Mushroom Cavern': Minor wall design adjustments

*** Enemies ***
- Reduced defense and healing of zombie type enemies, increased their HP to compensate
- 'Flame Temple' boss: -20% fire totem damage, -40% full screen totem damage
- 'Temple Ruins' zombie miniboss: +25% HP / healing, increased spell aoe
- 'Temple Ruins' heron miniboss: +25% damage, +20% faster cast, increased spell aoe
- 'Dark Sanctuary' boss: +27% magic circle damage

*** Pumpkin Prologue ***
- Added Familiars and local multiplayer
- Adjusted exp curve to easier reach level 7 and level 8
- Increased enemy levels for prologue dungeons by 1 (each)
- Increased enemy HP and damage due to Familiars being available now
- 'Pumpkin Ruins' boss: +14% HP

Full Changelog

Stay up to Date

Never miss an update? Follow & wishlist ZpellCatz here on Steam:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447700/ZpellCatz/

ZpellCatz "Very Familiar" Update (0.99.0)

Hey there, fellow Catz! Familiars got some love in this new version of the ZpellCatz closed beta and local multiplayer is finally here. As with any new beta version, more players are invited. So, check your e-mails / Steam client if you've registered for access.

New Features

Local multiplayer is here! Connect a gamepad / joystick and enjoy playing together with your friends and family.





Familiars have been rebalanced, slightly shifting power from the cat hero to the Familiar with this update. They are no longer pure sources of passive stats through their talents. Also, the talents now provide a higher bonus to the Familiar and a smaller one to the cat hero. Lets see if talent choice will be more interesting now.



Requesting Beta Access

Want to join the closed beta? Visit ZpellCatz' Steam page and click "Request Access". Check out this screenshot:



"Very Familiar" Update (0.99.0) November '23

*** Familiars ***
- Familiar base stats have been rebalanced
- Familiars now gain stats from gems in your casket
- Familiars now have innate 'Life after Kill' that scales with level
- Familiar talents now give big stat bonuses to Familiars and small ones to cat heroes
- Familiar offensive skill cooldowns and damage increased (net buff)
- Loki is now available from the start of the game
- Increased Familiar base movement speed by 25%
- Familiars are now able to collect items
- Familiars controlled by AI now auto collect coins (and other items accidentally)

*** General ***
- Slightly increased enemy HP for low level (1-3) enemies due to Loki being available from the start
- Skill UI now shows a blue border for skills with max allocated skill points
- Adjusted enemy movement speed animation for slower enemies
- Adjusted room enemy bonus mod distribution to reduce the same mods appearing too often throughout a dungeon

*** Epic Items ***
- Added all resistances to 'Protective Branch'

*** Druid ***
- Increased life on hit bonus for 'Glaring Light'
- Increased mind gained by 'Radiance'
- Increased stats gained by 'Shield Mastery'
- 'Growth' no longer grants vitality, added life after kill
- Added vitality to 'Photosynthesis'
- Increased stats gained by 'Sylph's Gift'

*** Tranquility ***
- Increased mind gained by 'Herbal Guard'
- Incrased stats gained by 'Adaption'

*** Bug Fixes ***
- Fixed an AI movement issue
- Fixed missing audio for "Thorns" enemy bonus mod

Full Changelog

Stay up to Date

Never miss an update? Follow & wishlist ZpellCatz here on Steam:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447700/ZpellCatz/

ZpellCatz "Your Voice" Update (0.98.0)

Hey there, fellow Catz! A new version of the ZpellCatz closed beta is ready to be played. As with any new beta version, more players are invited. So, check your e-mails / Steam client if you've registered for access.

New Features

Having trouble to adjust the audio volumes to match your system in ZpellCatz 0.97.0? Audio volumes can now be controlled via slider to allow finer adjustments.



Cats shouldn't die with health potions left in their belt. A new "low on health" indicator helps players to notice that their cat hero is heavily injured. The indicator starts showing up at 50% HP and is getting more and more intense the lower the health percentage left.



It's sometimes easy to miss that your cat hero has skill points left or that you've just found a new gem. This version introduces pause menu notifiers for all kinds of stuff. Please give feedback which notifiers are helpful and which are annoying.
:-D



Requesting Beta Access

Want to join the closed beta? Visit ZpellCatz' Steam page and click "Request Access". Check out this screenshot:



"Your Voice" Update (0.98.0) September '23

*** Audio ***
- Audio volumes can now be controlled via slider to allow finer adjustments
- NOTE: If you adjusted the audio volumes previously, you have to increase your volumes in this version

*** General ***
- Increased movement animation speed
- Dungeon clear quests: dungeon clear accomplishment is now also saved for non-active quests
- Renamed "Talent to select" notification to "Familiar talent"
- Added a "low on health" indicator (red screen border) starting at 50% HP

*** Spells ***
- "Frailty" now deals damage within the whole circle, not with the pentagram shots only

*** Pause Menu UI ***
- Added notifiers to the pause menu for all kinds of stuff (points available, new item, ...)
- Added a "sort inventory" button to the pause menu
- Opening the quest menu now displays a recently updated quest by default
- Skill entries now have colored text whenever you have bonus points

** Bug Fixes ***
- Potion hover now shows the correct amount of charges
- Fixed multiple overlay issues when teleporting to town or returning to main menu

*** Special Thanks ***
- Thanks for your feedback / bug reports: Chamosmile, Denzi, Dysman, Godspeed, Quinque, ZoneMaster,

Full Changelog

Stay up to Date

Never miss an update? Follow & wishlist ZpellCatz here on Steam:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447700/ZpellCatz/