Escape: Space News

Hello there, mercenaries.

This week, I was focusing on improving the game feel for Escape Space, while adding more content to make sure you add more things to do!

[h2]Patch notes[/h2]

New features:

• Added new spaceships to escort. Depending on the faction you're fighting for, they won't be the same!
  
• Added new enemies to the game.
  
• Added a new mod: Agility.
  
• Added a new priority mission: Medical Rally.
  
• Added a new priority mission: Big Blow.
  
• Added a new color: Wine Red.
  
• Current level cap has been moved from 30 to 40.
  

Improvements:

• Reworked the map designs. Added a few more designs to the mix!
  
• Reworked the save slots. Now, they display the reputations you're having with the factions.
  
• Reworked the customization menues. Now, press the button to equip something.
  
• Reworked the levelling system. Now locks your max level until you've completed the priority mission.
  

Fixed issues:

• Fixed a small issue with one specific screen's UI not working with a 16:10 display (Steamdeck).
  

[h2]Community spotlight[/h2]

• Check out this awesome review article about Escape Space!
  
• Thanks to Paladin Echo for their Youtube live review of the game!
  
• Thanks to ChaoticFear19 for their Youtube live review of the game!
  

Wanna be featured in the next update annoucement? Send us your videos/articles at shidygames[AT]gmail[DOT]com!

[h2]Thank you for reading![/h2]

As always, thank you a lot for the support. As a solo developer, it means a lot.

Please continue reporting feedback and/or issues on Discord, it helps me to better prioritize what the next move will be in terms of development!

And if you want to follow me on the journey of making this game, I'm streaming the process every Tuesday/Thursday at 9pm Paris time on Twitch!

Wanna discuss? I'm also on Twitter/X. Come say hi!

See you in space, mercenaries.
ShidyGames.

Hello there, mercenaries.

The past days have been crazy for me since the release of Escape Space in Early Access. I would like to thank all of you who played the game and sent a lot of very insightful feedback, you are legends!

Now, let's talk about some cool stuff! Here is a breakdown of changes brought by this new update.

[h2]Patch notes[/h2]

New features:

• Reintroduced power ups: depending on your faction reputations, new faction-themed power ups will spawn - if you've unlocked the related upgrade.
  
• Added new enemies to the game.
  
• Added a new weapon: Tandem.
  
• Added a new priority mission: Shiny Rubies.
  
• Current level cap has been moved to 30.
  

Improvements:

• Reworked existing enemies and waves! Forget everything you know about them and check out their new behaviors.
  
• Reworked the survival missions behavior: now, long press the input to tell the game you're going to stay, and exit the mission by default.
  
• Added 16:10 screen ratio support (Steamdeck).
  
• Reworked the options UI.
  
• Reworked the audio feedback of the main hub screen.
  
• Reworked the pause menu to include audio settings, quick mission summary and the ability to leave a mission.
  
• Changed the colors of friendly units's rounds to blue (applies to "Bill-E" and the units called by mods).
  

Balancing:

• Firestorm: increased damage, reduced rate of fire, increased heat generation.
  
• Hellstorm: increased damage, reduced heat generation, reduced cone of fire.
  
• Obliterator: increased damage, increased rate of fire, reduced heat generation.
  
• Devastator: reduced damage.
  
• Supremacy: increased rate of fire, increased amount of projectiles, reduced cone of fire, increased bullet velocity.
  
• Vainquisher: reduced damage, increased bullet velocity, reduced heat generation, increased rate of fire.
  
• Seeker: reduced damage, increased bullet velocity, reduced heat generation, increased rate of fire. Also added the ability for the bullet to aim for elite enemy weapons.
  
• Lancer: increased damage, reduced heat generation, increased bullet velocity.
  
• Oblivion: increased rate of fire, reduced heat generation.
  

Fixed issues:

• Fixed an issue where the game could be stuck with a time scale of 0, freezing it totally.
  
• Fixed a missing translation in the mods selection screen.
  
• Fixed an issue with the collect missions still spawning collectibles and an extra waves even if the amount of items to grab has been reached.
  

[h2]Community spotlight[/h2]

• Thanks to Jiti for their awesome article about Escape Space! You can read it here (in French): https://jiti.me/escape-space-un-shoot-em-up-independant-et-original/.
  
• Thanks to Matt From The Awesome Duo for a very cool video they made about the game (in English): watch the video on YouTube.
  

Wanna be featured in the next update annoucement? Send us your videos/articles at shidygames[AT]gmail[DOT]com!

[h2]Thank you for reading![/h2]

As always, thank you a lot for the support. As a solo developer, it means a lot.

Please continue reporting feedback and/or issues on Discord, it helps me to better prioritize what the next move will be in terms of development!

And if you want to follow me on the journey of making this game, I'm streaming the process every Tuesday/Thursday at 9pm Paris time on Twitch!

Wanna discuss? I'm also on Twitter/X. Come say hi!

See you in space, mercenaries.
ShidyGames.

After months of solo development, I'm pleased to announce that the early access of Escape Space is now out on Steam!





[h2]The game[/h2]

You're a mercenary that pilots a spaceship for a living. To do so, you can accept contract missions from 3 different factions:

• The Earth Military Conglomerate: the space military branch of the Earth's government. They usually have a lot of powerful assets and are considered as the powerhouse of the three factions.
  
• The Void Outlaws: as their name suggests, they are a criminal organisation operating in space and minding their own business.
  
• The Quantum Riders: a cult about technology, doing stange experimentations on their side. Considered as the most advanced faction of all three technologically speaking.
  

[h2]The customization[/h2]

Thanks to the rewards you'll get by completing contract missions, you will be able to either earn or purchase new equipment for your spaceship:

• Weapons: every weapon has its strenght and weakness, and a very different pattern from one to the other. Test them, and find out what weapons suit you the most!
  
• Mods: you can equip your spaceship with a mod that will enable you to use or benefit from a special ability in addition to your weaponry! E.M.P., passive healing, energy shield... there are a lot of possibilites that will totally change your gameplay experience!
  
• Colors: what about simply changing your colors? Well, of course you can!
  

[h2]The upgrades[/h2]

The game also features an upgrade tree where you can improve a lot of your items, and unlock some more specific features!



[h2]And that's it![/h2]

Enjoy handcrafted priority missions and procedurally generated contract missions!

Where is the 0.4? Well, the 0.4 wasn't good enough to be announced, as it got a few annoying issues to deal with. So let's skip it and jump straight into the action with the brand new 0.5 update of Escape Space's demo!

[h2]Reworked Upgrades' grid.[/h2]

Root node is now unlocked by default, for free. For players that are having an old demo save and never unlocked it, it will now cost 0 chipsets to do so.

Moved Bill-E upgrade behind Firepower I, and reduced its price to 2500 chipsets. It is now longer a blocker to get to the weapon upgrades.

Moved Unlock Magnet before Unlock Power-Ups, and reduced its price to 250 chipsets. I understood the magnetism is very necessary for players, so it is now really easy to unlock it.

Added orange colored buttons. Now, red will mean locked (either for demo or because requirements aren't met yet), orange will mean too expensive but unlocked for purchase, blue will mean unlocked for purchase and possible to buy, and green will mean that you've already purchased it.



[h2]Better gameplay flow.[/h2]

I've reconsidered the way the spawner of waves works and modified it slightly. From now, waves will spawn on a specified schedule and will never wait for you to get rid of the currently spawned enemies.

The more difficult the mission is, the faster the waves will spawn. So keep that in mind!

For that to work properly, waves' structure also got reworked. Now more being bullied by the enemies spawning in, unless you really want to and switch your difficulty settings!

Important note: starting at Medium difficulty, there is a possibility for elite waves to spawn. They act as breakpoints, so no more enemies will spawn until the wave has been beaten (otherwise it would become a real struggle to tackle them).

[h2]Bill-E 2.0![/h2]

Bill-E, the little autonomous drone companion, got buffed! It will now do x3 the damage it was before, being actually useful now.

[h2]Improved sound design.[/h2]

The way the audio effects are being played have been modified to better handle the moments when a lot of them have to fire.

• The audio system now pools from a list of available audio sources and use one when needed. This will be free again as soon as the audio has been played.
  
• If the audio sources pool isn't big enough, the game will make more audio sources and use them. This way, it will ensure all of the sounds can be played and properly size the pool depending on the need.
  

All of the music and sound effects have been normalized to ensure they'll not damage players' ears. Audio channels have been reworked to reduce some types of sounds and to prioritize the important ones.

[h2]Better end-of-game summary.[/h2]

The end-of-game screen will now summarize all of the useful information faster and keep them displayed, so that the player can review them and exit a mission faster.

Same goes with the failed missions, but with a twist: we're now displaying a sentence that gives insights to the player about how the game works to help them, or a sentence submitted by our Twitch's community (redeemed with channel points)! The selection is made randomly within the pool!



[h2]Fun stuff?[/h2]

The first big boss encounter for a scenario mission has been created from a live stream community redeem!



[h2]What else?[/h2]

Much more! A lot of small polishing everywhere, things that we fixed and so on. Try it, you'll feel the difference.

First...

Escape Space is going to be release in Early Access on August, 31st! Don't miss it!

This week, we've worked super hard on improving core components of the game. We needed to spend time on it to build the rest of the game, because it will heavily rely on that!

[h2]New game mode[/h2]

Escort missions are here! Factions might ask you to protect a spaceship for a ride!

[h2]Enhanced AI[/h2]

The AI of the enemies got totally changed. Now, they truely have their own patterns and tactics. Most of the enemies changed, be ready for some new challenges!

[h2]New content[/h2]

Enemies, map, missions... a whole lot of new things appeared it the demo! Find them all!

[h2]Steam Achievements[/h2]

The demo of Escape Space now features Steam Achievements! Collect them all!

[h2]Tutorial[/h2]

Feedback from testers said it was a bit confusing at first to get into the game. So, we made some tutorial frames and reworked the way the progress is for the first levels.

[h2]A whole lot of improvements and optimizations[/h2]

Performance should be way better in that version of the game, as we reworked a few component that were performance-heavy!

Consider wishlisting the game!

See you in space, mercernary!