Monsters Loot Swag News

Valve has released an updated version of the Steamworks SDK to v.1.57, with the main change being how Steam ticket authorization works for the web API.

Monsters Loot Swag has been updated to version 1.7.6.8!

The [u]Dreaded Lurgy is a Rare SWAG Power-up. It is an Attack Based event which causes the targeted MONSTER to succumb to the Dreaded Lurgy. The infected MONSTER is highly contagious and will transmit the Dreaded Lurgy to any other MONSTER who they come into contact with. However, after receiving the dark gift of the Dreaded Lurgy, the victim is now immune from further infection.

Annoyingly this is also a thing in real life, and I have spent the last month suffering from The Langshan-Po Lurgy - a free internet to anyone who gets the reference, but Gen-X (greatest generation) here, is probably just showing his age.

Needless to say 3D vector maths, gimbals, quaternions, cpp and general cerebral activity, has been somewhat compromised with lurgy brain fog. In celebration at the cerebral degradation - which hopefully will only be temperory - I have revised, both the icon and the in-game activation event art, for The Dreaded Lurgy.

However during this time, Steam has snuck out a new update to Steamworks (v1.56) ... which broke previous coded SteamGameServer::getAuthentication ːsteamfacepalmː - thank you Valve devs for the code comments which gave a good explaination of the new changes. ːsteamthumbsupː

So, welcome to MONSTER LOOT SWAG updated ... errrr ... 14? Which features a few changes.

• Update 14: update to 1.7.6.5
  
• Change: Updated Steamworks SDK to 1.56
  
• Change: Swag Parcel SFXemitters no longer delete when used up.
  
• Change: Rare Swag Power-up The Dreaded Lurgy has icon and in-game event particle effect updated.
  

Also congratulations to the player who got a rather good score to finish in 3rd place on the leaderboards behind myself, the devleoper, and the Manx Monster who helped with testing in 2nd.

Welcome to the 13th Early Access update of Monsters Loot Swag!

There are a whole range of tweaks and bugfixes in this update, most of them dealing with how audio works, after the big openAL change in the last update - which can be seen here!

Whilst fixing some artifact issues on the portraits of the Level 7 Boss, Zorra, also made a small change and gave her a smile. You never saw Zorro sulk, so why should she?


Before ... and after!

On to the changelog!

1. Updated to version 1.7.6.2.
   
2. Fix: Swag parcel audio track and audio emitter were using the same local variable on creation.
   
3. Fix: Single Audio Description of reference distance was higher than maximum distance.
   
4. Change: All Audio Reference Distance are now half of maximum distance to give better transitions when moving quickly left to right.
   
5. Change: Swag parcel audio emitters no longer delete after use, as I was still concerned that the Out Of Range Array warning might once again rear it's ugly head.
   
6. Fix: Removed artifacts on level 7 loading screens.
   
7. Change: Portraits of Zorra the Level 7 Boss now feature her with a smile.
   
8. Fix: Removed debug console spam for buying swag.
   

That's it for March 2023, which has predominantly been a month of audio fixes.

First up, after a massive hunt through my code to try and understand why the audio falloff was so rapid that it made the audio sound like it was washing across your ears, I discovered that, actually, my code was fine.
Another indie dev suggested that it was actually openAL defaulting to an overly rapid crossfade, and sure enough it was. It may have taken over 9000 years to find this out, but it was a 2 line fix in a 1kb file. ːnotsohappychappyː

So that should save your audio balance, especially when using headphones.

And the second part of this update is a peak at a future engine upgrade. This upgrade should fix the occaisional loading jitter when newly networked objects arrive to the client - I currently have a custom preload group for each level to try and minimize this - but will also include PBR (physical based rendering), better known as fancy reflections for metal and shiny objects.

Behold the high poly version of the playable cosplaying catgirl Southern Hospitality using metalness and roughness maps in PBR.



And what's a PBR material test without a Cornell Box!



So that's all to come later.

If anyone finds any bugs, please report them in the forums with a description of what was happening - eg: "I was getting a Swag parcel on level 4 whilst being swarmed by a million enemies and the game made an oof sound and died" - these reports are very helpful and appreciated, cheers. ːsteamhappyː

This is PUMPKIN, she enjoys gently floating around forests, sipping mulled wine and blasting magic vegetables at anything that moves!

PUMPKIN is the first of the unlockable characters, available in the Early Access of the game; and she can be unlocked by the player getting the MARATHON achievement.



PUMPKIN is a mix ranged, playable character with a long ranged standard attack and decent strength for knocking monsters out of the way. Her special attack is a very high damage strike to the enemy to her immediate front, whilst her evasion stuns all monsters within half the screen with a slap of her broomstick. Whilst her healing and enery recharging is somewhat low, this is made up for with her exceptionally high starting mobility.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8sMd1qMSFc

Crosses off "cute witch" from his list of weibo meme characters.