Soul Stalker News

Hi everyone!

I'm so happy to announce that Soul Stalker just released out of Steam Early Access! Developing this game been an amazing journey, and I look forward to expanding the game's universe both by continuing to update Soul Stalker, and by creating more entries in the series in the future.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1714240/Soul_Stalker/

The game is out now with a 20% launch discount, and if you own any other games directed by me (like The Outbound Ghost), then you can get an even bigger discount through a variety of bundles that the game has, such as the one below

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/39198/Outbound_Collection/

The game's final core update can be found below, but I've also made a devlog that you can find on my YouTube channel that goes over the game's full development! It spans 727 days (or almost exactly 2 years), and I would love for you to watch it to see how much the game has evolved over time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulP5yNBcQwE

• Added a new area that can be unlocked to the east of the map. The gate that blocks it requires you to have unlocked every single character, trinket, and weapon.
  
• Added the Master Crystal. It allows you to take on a new visual form with any character that you've beat Ascension 10 with.
  
• Added new NPCs.
  
• Added 5 new ascensions, the game now has 10.
  
• Added character 19.
  
• Added character 20.
  
• Added character 21.
  
• Added achievements for the remaining characters, as well as extra milestones that previously didn't exist.
  
• Added multiple new trinkets, the game now has 84.
  
• Added multiple new weapons, the game now has 35.
  
• Finalised Spanish localisation.
  
• Finalised French localisation.
  
• Added German localisation.
  
• Fixed bugs that appeared when you played with the German localisation.
  
• Added Italian localisation.
  
• Added Portugese localisation.
  
• Added Japanese localisation.
  
• Added Korean localisation.
  
• Added Simplified Chinese localisation.
  
• Added Traditional Chinese localisation
  
• Overhauled the graphics system to reduce GPU, CPU, and RAM usage.
  
• Overhauled the UI system to reduce RAM usage.
  
• Overhauled the UI system to make it easier to select smaller UI elements with a controller.
  
• Optimised all of the combat areas in order to reduce CPU usage.
  
• Improved the visuals of certain performance settings, while making them look better.
  
• Improved hitbox collision detection.
  
• Improved the enemy pathfinding system, while reducing CPU impact.
  
• Added an interactable to the overworld that allows you to toggle a retro filter.
  
• Added an interactable to the overworld that allows you to toggle a day-night cycle for the overworld.
  
• Added the final Kickstarter gravestone with every single backer.
  
• Fixed a bug that made it such that you could not open the first overworld chest if you had previously unlocked certain characters.
  
• Extended all music tracks to be double length.
  
• Adjusted some character animations.
  
• General stability bug fixes.
  

Thank you so much for sticking around the game's Early Access period (or some of you have been around since even before then, with the Kickstarter!), and I hope that Soul Stalker provides you with endless hours of fun! As always, if there are any bugs, issues, or anything else that you'd like to see changed in the game, let me know by posting on the Steam discussions, commenting below this post, or even by emailing me at [email protected].

If you like the game, I'd super appreciate it if you gave it a review, it. Once we hit 100 reviews, Steam will help us out with some visibility, so it's the best way you can support the game!

Anyways, thanks again for the support over the years, and happy Soul Stalking!

- Conrad, Lead Developer

Hi everyone!

In the last update I let you all know some of the key additions we made to Soul Stalker, but one of the main parts of the past 6 months of development has been optimisation as well! I've made a devlog that goes over the 5 core ways in which we made the game run buttery smooth on Switch (and by extension, every other platform as well), and you can find it below!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Hope you all like it, and I'm looking forward to finally releasing Soul Stalker on the 24th of October! Get the game in Early Access while you can!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1714240/Soul_Stalker/

- Conrad, Lead Developer

Hi everyone!

In the last post I let you all know that Soul Stalker would be releasing into 1.0 on October 24th! Now, I'm happy to announce that the final update is available RIGHT NOW on the beta branch!


If you're not sure how to access the beta branch but want to play right now, you can do the following:
Right click on the game in your Steam library.

1. Open Properties.
   
2. Click on Betas.
   
3. Select the "testing" branch.
   

That's it! There should be no code required or anything to access it. If you want to switch to the base version of the game, do the same thing again but select "default branch" as your selected branch.

Once we're sure that this update is bug free, we'll put it up on the main branch so everyone will be able to play it without needing to adjust their properties! And of course, soon enough that will apply to the players that start playing the game in 1.0.

The update has tons of little changes and optimizations, so these patch notes won't be as detailed as they usually are, but you'll be able to get an idea for what's different regardless!

I also just posted a new devlog going over release details, so watch it below if it sounds interesting to you!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Either way, here are the patch notes, it's the big one:

• Added a new area that can be unlocked to the east of the map. The gate that blocks it requires you to have unlocked every single character, trinket, and weapon.
  
• Added the Master Crystal. It allows you to take on a new visual form with any character that you've beat Ascension 10 with.
  
• Added new NPCs.
  
• Added 5 new ascensions, the game now has 10.
  
• Added character 19.
  
• Added character 20.
  
• Added character 21.
  
• Added achievements for the remaining characters, as well as extra milestones that previously didn't exist.
  
• Added multiple new trinkets, the game now has 84.
  
• Added multiple new weapons, the game now has 35.
  
• Finalised Spanish localisation.
  
• Finalised French localisation.
  
• Added German localisation.
  
• Added Italian localisation.
  
• Added Portugese localisation.
  
• Added Japanese localisation.
  
• Added Korean localisation.
  
• Added Simplified Chinese localisation.
  
• Added Traditional Chinese localisation
  
• Overhauled the graphics system to reduce GPU, CPU, and RAM usage.
  
• Overhauled the UI system to reduce RAM usage.
  
• Overhauled the UI system to make it easier to select smaller UI elements with a controller.
  
• Optimised all of the combat areas in order to reduce CPU usage.
  
• Improved the visuals of certain performance settings, while making them look better.
  
• Improved hitbox collision detection.
  
• Improved the enemy pathfinding system, while reducing CPU impact.
  
• Added an interactable to the overworld that allows you to toggle a retro filter.
  
• Added an interactable to the overworld that allows you to toggle a day-night cycle for the overworld.
  
• Added the final Kickstarter gravestone with every single backer.
  
• Fixed a bug that made it such that you could not open the first overworld chest if you had previously unlocked certain characters.
  
• Extended all music tracks to be double length.
  
• Adjusted some character animations.
  
• General stability bug fixes.
  

There are many more minute changes and additions that were made, but for now, I'll let you all discover those! If you want to support all the work we're putting into the game, leaving a review would be super appreciated! It really is THE best way to help us out!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1714240/Soul_Stalker/

That's it for this update, and see you in the next one :)

- Conrad, Lead Developer

Hi everyone!

I'm so happy to announce that Soul Stalker's 1.0 release date is now set to the 24th of October, that's exactly 3 weeks from now!

I'll be writing more update in the upcoming weeks to show you all what we've been working on in this time, but in the meantime you can watch my latest devlog which goes over some of the stuff (as well as console release information!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

I hope you all enjoy the game, and I can't wait to release it out in it's full form!

- Conrad, Lead Developer

Hi everyone!

It's been close to 2 months since the last update, and we've been super hard at work! Not only have we been porting the game to consoles such as Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4/5, and Xbox, but we've also been doing the final content additions, QOL changes, and balancing adjustments for the final update!



Of course, as I mentioned in the previous update, we added 3 new characters! I'll only be showing 1 for now, but they've all got super cool designs (especially the final one), and incredibly unique mechanics. For example, the one that I show below can't heal in campfires, and instead heals a bit after every single round. This sounds simple in principle, but you can make use of this ability incredibly well if you pair it up with some of the new trinkets that give you bonuses whenever you heal in combat (which this counts as)!



We've also added tons of trinkets, and below you can see an example of one of them! As you can see, it triggers an effect whenever you heal in battle... Can you imagine a character this pairs up well with? ;)



The new weapons we've added in this update are incredibly impactful, and some have more utility than just "deals more damage in a different way". My favourite one however is the Melee Chain, which starts off really weak, but you can power it up to insane levels - way more so than any other weapon in the game. If you have the right character (or one of the new upgrade-related trinkets), it might even be the best weapon in the game.



You'll need to make use of all of these new powerful interactions though, since the game now has 10 ascension levels! The changes in these range from basic power increasers like "enemies are stronger", to more interesting modifiers like giving you less time to beat bosses.



If you manage to beat ascension 10, not only will you unlock the final character, but also the final area of the game.





The interactable crystal that you can see above allows you to unlock a special skin for each of the characters that you've beaten ascension 10 with, so there's an added reward for being a completionist! The two screenshots below show how the new Robot character gets a pink skin, and Gale gets a fiery red skin.





Apart from raw content additions, we've also added ways to allow you to give the game some extra spice. For example, the ice area now has a hidden gadget that lets you turn on a retro filter!





Another one is that the sand area has a hourglass that lets you change the overworld's time of day as you can see below.





We've also added a new introductory cutscene to the game when you play it for the first time, which not only gives you a breakdown of what everything in the overworld does, but it also develops the worldbuilding a bit!



Other additions include a few minor QOL improvements like the adjusting of the menus buttons to make it easier to navigate with a controller (and it makes it faster on mouse + keyboard too)!



Finally, one huge thing coming to the game as a result of the console porting we've been doing is immense performance improvements! The Switch is quite underpowered compared to most PCs, and so we've made a variety of CPU-side and GPU-side optimizations that should make the game run incredibly smoothly even on potatoes! The optimization is actually what has been taking up most of our time since the last update, so that's part of why this one has taken a bit longer than usual.

Anyways, that's it for this update and we're excited to be releasing the final one soon to take the game out of Early Access! The game is on discount for just $3.99 right now, so it's an absolute steal, and it might be the cheapest you'll be able to get the game for a while given that we're launching out of Early Access soon! If you want to support all the work we're putting into the game, leaving a review would be super appreciated! It really is THE best way to help us out!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1714240/Soul_Stalker/

That's it for this update, and see you in the next one :)

- Conrad, Lead Developer