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9 Kings News

Patch #06: Hot-fixes, Improved Calendar & Preparation for performance update

The patch #06 is a very straightforward one. In the next few days, we want to focus heavily on improving Endless Mode's performance, but we wanted to address other core issues you've been reporting before that. We also tweaked the initial order of game events after hearing your feedback.

[h3]Steam Reviews: Your Feedback Matters[/h3]We've been reading through all of your Steam reviews and we appreciate all the feedback we've been getting. We'd love to continue seeing more of your thoughts! It helps us know what to focus on for each upcoming patch.

Here's the full list of changes (0.7.30):

Hot-fixed a glitch that caused Converter to get INSANELY OP after the final boss.
Prophet now appears one year earlier
First Merchant now appears one year earlier
First Diplomat now appears one year earlier
Improved Splicing & Gentrify performance
Concabulator now only levels up one level of every unit, as originally intended. The megalomaniac Lab Rat domino effect still works normally in all usual situations.
Broken Cabulator is now a level 1 card (as originally intended)
Made sure upgrade pop ups don't keep spamming, visually, forever (specially on Reinforce builds)
Fixed a respawn issue that caused some Boars to not leave their plots.
You can no longer keep playing on Stats screen after ending a run during a battle
Added a safeguard for saved data after specific reported crashes.
If you've had a data issue before this patch, the game will now load a backup file.
Added a safeguard to mitigate an issue that sometimes made cards to appear before the expansion event was over.
Fixed a visual glitch that caused you to see through a few pixels in some cards.

After downloading the patch, please start a new run, as previous runs won't have the updates saved and may cause conflicts. If you experienced data loss before this patch and for some reason our safeguard didn't fix it, please email us at [email protected] and we'll provide you with a new save file.

We'll be on the lookout for any possible bugs, and we'll now focus on the performance side of the late game. Expect updates soon!

Love,
Sad Socket team

Patch #05: Base cards revamp, Cauldron tweaks, EXPLOSIONS & More Fixes

Time for patch #05. In this one, we’re focusing on fixing the remaining core glitches, making major improvements to base card balancing, fixing some explosion mechanics, and giving our beautiful buff Golem King a little love. Performance patches are coming soon.

[h3]Steam Reviews: Your Feedback Matters[/h3]We've been reading through all of your Steam reviews, crushing bugs, and we appreciate all the feedback we've been getting. We've reached over 2,000 Steam reviews, and we'd love to continue seeing more of your thoughts! It helps us know what to focus on for each upcoming patch.

Here's the full list of changes (0.7.28):

Increased level-up buffs of all base cards (let's make those castle builds viable!)
Treant attacks now heal AND cause damage by default. Effect size decreased by 20%.
Treant healing numbers is now displayed in green.
Palace level ups now also increase its attack speed.
Cauldron now properly works with ALL bases, towers, and summon buildings
Increased Trapper damage
Trappers now stay in the backline
Increased Wall HP
Gunpowder decree now works properly with all AoE units (we're recklessly making everything go boom, keep us posted on any performance issues)
Improved explosion performance
Congratulations screen once you beat King difficulty (there are more to go, but hey, you deserve it)
New kings are now unlocked even if you don't finish your current run.
Added safeguards to a rare bug that causes troops to stand still before battle (this ain't the time for peace)

After downloading the patch, please start a new run, as previous runs won't have the updates saved and may cause conflicts. Bear in mind, King unlock animations might be triggered again the first time you finish a run after the patch.

We'll be on the lookout for any possible bugs, and we'll now focus on the performance side of the late game. Expect updates soon!

Love,
Sad Socket team

Patch #04: Quick Fixes, Stronger Spores & Rats, Crash Safeguards

Patch #04 brings a handful of quick but important updates.

Here's the full list of changes:

Increased Sporeling (Mycelium's summon) damage
Increased Lab Rat HP and damage
End screen now shows you your difficulty (no more bragging on Peasant difficulty you guys)
When using Earthworks on a level 3 Concabulator, you will now get two Concabulators and one Broken Cabulator.
Added a save file guardrail to prevent meta data issues after crashes
Fixed an occasional bug that caused cards to be displayed before the previous event was over (causing overlapping).
Fixed a save issue that caused a new game to not start properly after a crash
Localization improvements
Font processing improvements
Fixed a Chinese character glitch

After downloading the patch, please make sure to start a new run, as previous runs won't have the updates saved and it might cause conflicts. If you had a crash issue that messed with new runs, please reinstall the game, the issue should be fixed for good after this patch.

Keep in mind we're also actively working on the performance patch to improve endless mode and playthroughs with a high unit count. Once we address all the reports (we're close), we'll go all-in on making late late game smoother. More news soon!

Love,
Sad Socket team

Patch #03: Hotfixes, Balancing, Updated Fonts

Patch #03 is a quick one: there were some issues we really wanted to fix asap and gladly we did!

More patches are coming soon, with improved features and also addressing other reports you've given us. We read all of your feedback, thank you for taking the time to help us improve the game.

- Ultragravity decree is now working properly
- Increased Lab Rat damage
- Fixed an issue that caused King of Blood saves to mess with future runs
- Fixed Chinese font display issues
- Improved all other language's fonts
- Some graphic tweaks

The first weekend of 9 Kings has been freaking awesome. We're about to hit 100k COPIES SOLD! If you wanna help us out, make sure to leave your Steam review, share your thoughts in the forums, and stick around. This is just the start!

Love,
Sad Socket team

Patch #02: Hotfixes, Performance, Balancing, Timer

Hey, everyone!

We've been super stoked about all the feedback we've been getting. Now, here comes a very important patch. Please keep your reviews coming, they're extremely helpful to us.

We're working hard to fix all the unexpected bugs you've been reporting, and hopefully we'll address all of them in no time. We're also working hard to improve performance on late game and you can expect a dedicated performance patch soon. Thanks for all your support!

Here's the list of updates in 0.7.21:

*Please make sure to start a NEW run after updating so that the changes can take effect!

New players now start with the first three difficulties unlocked
A timer has been added to the pause screen
Time scaling has been fixed (you can now properly beat So You Think You Can Speedrun)
Fixed the main issue that caused high numbers to crash the game.
Mycelium has been further rebalanced (it's even stronger, spawns a little slower)
Rebalanced Lab Rat: it has fewer units but it's now MUCH stronger. Rat supremacy lives to fight another day.
Ongoing Lab Rat performance improvements.
Rebalanced Converter: spawn's base stats are now in line with Lab Rat stats.
Improved Blessing plot display (for better visibility)
Fixed an exploit that occasionally allowed you to "duplicate" a card if you placed it in between two plots (pretty fun one though, ngl)
Fixed a bug that caused perks not to work on some specific situations (it should be gone for good, but please keep us posted on this one)
Turned Splicing into a special decree (like Gambling, that can only be picked once)
Fixed performance glitches (ongoing)
Fixed a bug that caused the Trebuchet to stop shooting at very high attack speeds.
Improved an occasional glitch with plot selection
Localization improvements: We're currently investigating and working to fix problems with display of characters on certain systems, we have made some fixes and will keep working hard to resolve all issues as soon as possible! (对不起!另外也非常感谢玩家 Akelyds 花时间提供详细的反馈,帮我们一起排查这个问题。)

And that's it for day 2. We're rebalancing the game in real time as we gather feedback. Please keep it coming and know this is a work in progress. As you know, some decisions will be made with performance in mind, but we can tweak what's not working at any time, so please let us know your thoughts and leave us a review.

Expect a substantial performance patch for Endless Mode soon!

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Love,
Sad Socket team