Write Warz News

Hi Everyone!

Eager to check out the next theme coming to Write Warz? Make sure to sign up now to be the first to experience High Seas Adventure 🏴‍☠️

Set sail with Write Warz: High Seas Adventure on December 14th at 12pm PT | 2pm CT | 3pm ET!

You can sign up on our Discord server:
https://discord.com/events/1092866675809996861/1309544654202732686



Also, if you haven’t already – don’t forget to wishlist Write Warz here on Steam! Our current Early Access window is Q1 of 2025.

Embark on a Swashbuckling Writing Journey
Ahoy, storytellers and adventurers! The horizon beckons with tales untold and treasures undiscovered. Write Warz: High Seas Adventure invites you to dive into an immersive pirate-themed experience where your words chart the course of epic voyages filled with treasure hunts, ship battles, and mysterious islands.

Exciting New Features

Dynamic Trading at Ports
Become a savvy merchant of the seas as you visit diverse ports randomly selected at the start of each round. Buy low and sell high while trading goods like rum, citrus, and cannonballs. Each port boasts its own unique economy:

⦁ Unique Markets: Some ports offer rare items or better prices. Keep an eye out for lucrative opportunities!

⦁ Strategic Decisions: Will you stock up on essential supplies or invest in valuable commodities? The choice is yours.



Epic Plot Points

Unlock Mini-Games & Challenges
Embark on thrilling adventures with six new plot points that introduce interactive mini-games and challenges inspired by legendary pirate tales:

⦁ Davy Jones’ Assault: Team up with your friends to fend off Davy Jones' cursed ship in a fast-paced group typing challenge.

⦁ Treasure Hunt: Test your memory in a grid-based game to uncover hidden treasures and possibly the elusive Black Pearl.

⦁ Walk The Plank: Balance your way to victory in a reflex-testing mini-game that could cost you your life! (Or just some resources.)

⦁ Fountain of Youth: Engage in high-stakes bidding wars against your fellow pirates to turn back the clock for an exclusive buff that can turn the tide of the game.

⦁ Treasure Map: Decode clues to find the correct location and earn massive rewards, but beware of the journey's costs.

⦁ Lost in the Fog: Navigate through dense fog that obscures your writing area, challenging your typing skills under pressure.

Resource Management and Items

Gear Up for Adventure
Manage your resources to survive and thrive on the high seas:

Gold Doubloons:
⦁ Earn gold through victories, trading, and plot points.
⦁ Spend wisely: Use gold to purchase items and convert it into points at the game's end.

Items and Supplies:
⦁ Word Bounties: Buy extra bonus words to use in your sentence.
⦁ Good Judgment Bounties: Gain extra points for accurate voting.
⦁ Winning Bounty: A high-risk, high-reward item for confident players.
⦁ Attack Orders: Use cannonballs to damage other players ships.
⦁ Planks, Rum, Citrus: Essential supplies for repairs and missions.
⦁ Unique Items
⦁ Spyglass Increase your chance of avoiding random hazards.
⦁ Fishing Nets Collect fish to sell at ports, with a chance to find the valuable Black Pearl.

Crew Missions

Rise Through the Ranks
Complete escalating in-game missions to earn rewards and advantages: Gain extra votes, bonus gold, and resources, Random Events, Sea Shanties and more!

You don't want to miss out! Join our Discord community and sign up for the Closed Beta now! If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to let us know here on Steam, Discord, Reddit, or social media.

– Boltz Entertainment

Hi Everyone!

We just wanted to share the newest characters we’ve been working on: Faye and Brighthorn!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Vy-2eyguuM

New Character: Faye
Ability: Pixie’s Prank

When Faye wins a round, one of her playful fairy friends will sweep across the screen, scattering magical fairy dust on all players. This dust causes chaotic, trippy visuals – distorting colors and scrambling non-protected bonus or player-specific words.

Players must decode and use these distorted words in their next writing round, or Faye gains +5 points for each word left unused (which is capped at 2 points per player). Meanwhile, other players who successfully unscramble and use their words will earn +5 bonus points per word.

This effect kicks in right after the score summary ends to keep the game flowing smoothly!

Gameplay Improvements and Fixes:

• Word Bonuses UI: Boxes are now wider, and words appear larger for better readability.
  
  
• Plot Point Selection Overhaul: Now, each player is assigned a unique plot point in the prequel round with a specific prequel word. Winning the round triggers your assigned plot point!
  
  
• Voting Bats Reduced: Lowered to improve performance and reduce lag.
  
  
• Round Timing Adjustments: Added +5 seconds to the first few rounds to improve pacing.
  
  
• 10-round Games: Rounds 1-4 now have 50 seconds, with time incrementing by 5 seconds each round after.
  
  
• 6-round Games: Rounds 1-3 have 50 seconds, with time incrementing by 5 seconds in later rounds.
  
  
• Better Story Visibility: The story text will never be blocked by sentence suggestions.
  
  
• Keyboard Voting: You can now vote by pressing keys 1-6 instead of clicking.
  
  
• Transition Improvements: Fixed bug where letters could be typed during transition away from the writing panel.
  
  
• Cursor Lock: Cursor will only lock when in exclusive fullscreen mode.
  
  
• Bot Voting Timing: Bots no longer go over time during voting.
  
  
• Start Sentence Fix: You can now enter a start sentence after lobby creation.
  
  
• Plot Point Adjustments: Improved processing of plot point sentences to avoid accidental retries on failed attempts.
  
  
• AI and Lobby Stability: Resolved issues with AI sentence processing and lobby player visibility when someone leaves.

Miscellaneous Updates:

• Ignus Character Update: Changed Ignus’s burn letters to less common ones, making it easier for players to switch their words.
  
  
• Kira Autocorrect Symbol Resized: Rescaled to match the new UI; more Kira updates are coming soon!
  
  
• Ability Information Streamlined: Now only one ability text explanation will appear per round to reduce screen clutter.

But that’s not all! We also have another character in the works: Brighthorn! Learn more about him here:

https://youtu.be/63bNj4obv5Q
New Changes

Here are the new changes in the latest update!

• Voting Bats are now less laggy.
  
• Sentence suggestions will now never cover the story.
  
• Cursor is now only locked to the game when on Exclusive Fullscreen.
  
• Tweaked AI Voting Prompt.
  
• Added more words/phrases to the bot retry list.
  
• Game UI should look much better on non-16:9 or 16:10 screens.
  
• Now only one ability text per round.
  
• Replaced Brighthorn's Base Portrait with the final version.
  
• Replaced Keystroke's icon sprite.
  
• Profanity filter used to check usernames is much smaller with more intense words.
  
• Names from Steam are no longer cut off, but now just shrink instead.
  
• Tweaked the scary background.
  
• Window resizing no longer available in windowed mode.
  
• Fixed – AI bots going over voting time.
  
• Fixed – Not being able to type the starting sentence after the lobby is created.
  
• Fixed – Lobby settings not being copied correctly when switching between 6 and 10 rounds.
  
• Fixed – Plot point sentences continuing to generate after the sentence gets put into the story.
  
• Fixed – AI sentence processing bug.
  
• Fixed – Players box in lobby being cleared out when someone leaves the lobby.
  
• Fixed – Keystroke bug where points would sometimes be double counted.
  
• Fixed – Voting portal sound being desynced from the animation.
  
• Fixed – Kira's autocorrect disable symbol being off scale with the regular one.
  
• Fixed – Curse of the Mummy's ankh laser firing at the wrong spot.
  
• Fixed – Selecting the lowest resolution when selecting highest resolution.
  
• Fixed – Name clipping in bar breakdown.

Character Art Timelapse

We also recently shared a timelapse of character art for an upcoming character, Dr. Alistair "Chronos" Caldwell – planned to join the game during the Noir story theme season. Did you know that all art included in Write Warz is hand-drawn? Our art team works hard to create striking and unique art for each character, so we wanted to share a look at their process:

https://youtu.be/OJ26b7vm29I
Background: A brilliant physicist and inventor, Dr. Alistair Caldwell dedicated his life to unlocking the secrets of time travel. After years of tireless research, he finally achieved his goal, creating a device capable of traversing the timestream. Now known as "Chronos," Alistair has embarked on a series of temporal adventures, witnessing firsthand the great events of history and exploring the unknown reaches of the future.

Personality: Alistair is a curious and inquisitive soul, driven by a thirst for knowledge and a desire to unravel the mysteries of time itself. He possesses a keen intellect and a knack for thinking outside the box, allowing him to approach problems from unexpected angles. Despite his brilliance, Alistair is also a deeply private individual, often keeping his true motivations and goals hidden from even his closest friends.

Skills: As a time traveler, Alistair possesses an unrivaled understanding of the intricacies of temporal mechanics and the flow of history. His knowledge of future events and advanced technology make him a valuable asset in any situation, while his ability to move through time allows him to gather crucial information, prevent disasters, and even manipulate events to suit his own ends.

We hope you enjoy the new character and update! Let us know if you have any ideas for other characters you would like to see in upcoming seasons :)

– Boltz Entertainment

Hi Everyone!

We’re thrilled to share that we’ve just pushed through another update to the demo! Check out the changes:

Voting

Bug Fixes:
• Resolved issues with voting logic where votes were not being counted correctly in certain edge cases.

Improvements:
• In games with 5 - 6 players, any extra time remaining at the end of the first voting round will now carry over to the second voting round.
• Transitions between voting rounds have been sped up for a smoother experience.
____________________________

Score Screen Breakdown

Overall Enhancements:
• Significantly sped up the score breakdown process to improve game flow while maintaining transparency on point sources and player abilities.
• Reduced or eliminated small delays and wait times to accelerate the breakdown.

Specific Changes:
• Character Abilities: Retimed and accelerated character abilities (see Characters section for details).
• Pillar Animation: Drastically increased the speed of pillar animations.
• Reshuffle Animation: Replaced the horizontal movement with a new animation where player portraits pop out from the bottom of the frame during position shifts after the score screen.
• Point Pop-ups: Adjusted point pop-ups to be slightly smaller for a cleaner look.

____________________________

Menus

Scriptorium Updates:
• Introduced a new, streamlined design for character descriptions, enhancing readability in both the main area and character selection screens.
• Added new randomization options for characters, fonts, and font colors.
• The game now remembers your selections for the character skin, font, and font color between play sessions.

Layout Adjustments:
• Made minor spacing adjustments for improved menu aesthetics and navigation.

____________________________

Characters

General Updates:
• Informational pop-ups now appear in the center of the screen when a character ability is activated.
• Character abilities no longer interrupt gameplay.
• Simplified and clarified character ability descriptions for better readability and understanding.
• Accelerated all ability animations where possible to enhance game pacing.

New Characters:

Elara:
• Based on the character word system.
• Gains extra character word bonuses each round.
• Grants all players an additional word when she wins.

Brighthorn:
• When he wins a round, he burns a letter.
• Players who type the burned letter grant him extra points.
• Note: Brighthorn's main portrait is currently a placeholder.

Character Ability Adjustments:

Eli:
• Soul-stealing now occurs during the voting round.
• The action is only visible to Eli and the affected player.

Giselle:
• Point-stealing animations now occur during the voting round.
• Only visible to Giselle and the affected player.

Javier:
• Now requires only a single win to obtain his Magnum Opus.
• The Magnum Opus no longer grants additional points on subsequent wins.

Evelyn:
• Now haunts all players only when she wins.
• Added a new animation to support this change.

Kira:
• Now hacks all players only when she wins.
• Adjusted hack animations for consistency across the writing area and player portraits.

____________________________

Plot Points

Witching Hour:
• Implemented a ramping point system:
• Players lose more points for multiple failures.
• Players gain more points for multiple successes.
• Improved tutorial clarity.
• Players can now type during the tutorial.
• Added new ingredient words.
• Reworked visual elements for better user experience.
• Receiving the Arcane Anecdote now grants a flat 50 points.
• Word bonuses are no longer awarded during this event.

Cursed Manuscript/Mysterious Stranger:
• Sped up the intro animation to reduce downtime.

____________________________

AI Improvements
• Introduced a new system to prevent AI from generating inappropriate content or breaking immersion by becoming too meta.
• Enhanced AI voting logic to more accurately select the best sentences.
• Testing a new AI model: Your feedback on sentence quality is appreciated!
• AI names are now pre-generated to eliminate extra wait time when entering a lobby.
• If AI is enabled, the AI will now generate plot point sentences.

____________________________

Miscellaneous

Profanity Filter:
• Adjusted to run only at the end of words or upon submission, reducing false positives.
• Autocorrect will no longer change words into profanity.

Gameplay:
• Players can no longer be kicked from custom games for being AFK.
• Applied a validator to the starting sentence to prevent exploits.
• Increased the time allocated for the story readout to enhance readability.

User Interface:
• Removed the top-left UI element for a cleaner screen layout.

Thank you for your continued support and feedback. We hope these updates enhance your gaming experience!

Make sure to share any feedback in the Steam Community Hub or the Discord server.

– Boltz Entertainment

We continue to make improvements on our bot system for solo players. But be warned, they’re still in early alpha, so you might encounter some odd (but hilarious) behavior. Report anything inappropriate, and don’t forget to share your favorite stories!


[h2]Major Additions:[/h2]
[h3]New Characters:[/h3]





[h2]Avatar changes[/h2]

• Kira: Fixed sound issues with her abilities.
  
• Giselle: Can now gain points from Eli when his shield is active (without Eli losing points).
  

[h2]Progress Panel Update:[/h2]

Major Changes

• Progress Panel Update
  
• The Progress Panel has been removed to prevent spoilers for round winners.
  
• Voting progress and required votes are now shown directly in your word box or on a new panel on the right side of the screen.
  
• 
  
• Word Bonus System Overhaul
  
• Regular Word Bonus Box
  
• Durable Word Bonus Box: This box is protected from disturbances (e.g., Vixen’s abilities) and is used for plot point mechanics.
  

The Progress Panel Update and Word Bonus System Overhaul were introduced to streamline the game interface, making it cleaner and more intuitive for players. The goal was to prioritize key gameplay elements like word bonuses and prequel words, while reducing potential distractions.

One of the main reasons for this change is the introduction of characters like Vixen, whose abilities can manipulate or affect gameplay. The addition of the Durable Word Bonus Box ensures that certain critical aspects, like plot point mechanics, remain protected from Vixen’s attacks or similar future character abilities.

This update ensures a smoother user experience by focusing attention on what’s most important for each round, without giving away spoilers, and keeping vital gameplay mechanics secure and intact.


[h2]New Visuals & Animations:[/h2]

• The "Winning Sentence" panel sprite has been updated to match the theme better.
  
• Notifications for Plot Point rewards now reflect the origin of the points.
  
• Player-selected font settings are now reflected while writing.
  
• The Pirate Theme is now available in lobby creation (not yet playable).
  
• Added a QR Code on the "Save the Story" scene that links to the Write Warz Steam page.
  
• Point notifications now stack upwards instead of combining.
  

[h2]Tweaks:[/h2]

Plot Points:

• Fixed an issue with "Cursed Manuscript" icons resetting prematurely.
  
• Made "Evil Fog" easier to see through and improved performance.
  
• Upgraded "Mysterious Stranger" plot point character to a 3d model.
  
  Miscellaneous:
  
• Adjusted various fonts for in-game texts, menus, and match scenes to better fit the themes.
  
• Resolved problems with bot names that were previously generating inappropriate names.
  
• Additional Tweaks
  
  AI Improvements:
  
• Greatly improved advanced AI’s sentence outputs.
  
• Bot names are better generated with fewer repetitions and inappropriate words.
  
  Lobby and Menu Updates:
  
• The Scriptorium is now selectable in the lobby
  
• Improved theme headers in the lobby and adjusted skin/character name displays.
  

We have some awesome bot improvements for our solo players along with general bug fixes and a fix quality of life updates.


[h2]Bot Improvements:[/h2]

• Further refined bot behavior to ensure it stays on track with the story and avoids inappropriate references.
  
• Bots now have better sentence generation, fitting the context of the story more accurately.
  
• Adjusted bot voting logic to prioritize story cohesion when casting votes.
  
• Bot names have been improved to be more readable and less cringy (fewer numbers and l33t speak).
  
• Bots have been enhanced to better recognize the end of a story and provide more satisfying conclusions.
  

[h2]General bug fixes:[/h2]

• Fixed an issue where players could select unavailable characters in the demo.
  
• Resolved a lobby glitch when creating multiple lobbies in succession.
  
• Corrected issues with unintentional words being allowed during the Moonlight Inspiration plot point.
  

[h2]Tweaks:[/h2]

• Character Ability Tooltips: Now updated to reflect changes in ability values due to round/player count.
  
• Kira’s Grammar Overload: No longer hacks the same player multiple times in a row.
  
• Abilities During Plot Points: Character abilities now trigger during Plot Point events for more strategic depth.
  

[h2]Quality of life and other changes:[/h2]

• Game mode buttons now activate instantly without needing to press play again.
  
• The game will notify you of updates while it’s open.
  
• The scriptorium now correctly hides unavailable characters in the demo.
  
• Updated profanity list to improve gameplay experience.
  

This patch ensures smoother gameplay and more polished Bot interactions, keeping the fun and creativity flowing in every session!