Inside the Nuke Kids on the Block update

[h2]New Nuke Artifact: Nuke Dukem[/h2]

"I've been itching to get a giant nuke ability in the game for a while now, something that could wipe out an entire prime directive in one swoop.

In our previous update we reworked the Ultimate system into single use Artifacts. It seemed like the perfect time to dust off the nuke idea, especially because the single use means we can really pump up the damage numbers.

I had it all working fine but the little devil inside of me whispered, "Make it hurt the players too." This is the one exception to friendly fire in our game but I think it's an intuitive one. Nukes are dangerous!!"

– Art Director, Jason “Omg_Crangus” Stokes

Here's a look at our Art Director and Animator in co-op, testing out the Nuke Dukem Artifact.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

[h2]New Artifact: Fire Wall[/h2]

"We've been pushing to give stronger identities to our elemental damage types. The freeze and shatter mechanic really started to shine, but our fire builds felt underwhelming in comparison.

An obvious solution was to create persistent fire "damage pools" on the ground that hurt nearby enemies but we hadn't prioritized the technology for this so I left it alone.

The other week I looked at how our Meat Mush ability was set up and realized it was pretty close to what we need. With a few visual tweaks and some proc rate adjustments we now have a Fire Wall Artifact that you can bait enemies into. Stupid spiders!"

– Art Director, Jason “Omg_Crangus” Stokes

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

[h2]UI / UX[/h2]

[h3]Updates: Trader Mike
[/h3]
"We realized pretty quickly after introducing gathering tools and resources that we were going to need a way to convert those into useable currencies. Enter Trader Mike. He helps players to get the higher rarity resources and extra currency for upgrades.

He was pretty basic before but it was clearly a pain point for players who wanted to buy and sell more things, so we’ve upgraded him with new tabs and quantity controls to make player’s lives a little easier."

— UX/UI Designer, Omg_DirigiblePlums

[h2]Read the full changes in this update's Patch Notes.[/h2]

[h3]Updates: Inspect[/h3]

"One of the most important aspects of a run is being able to see what your abilities and stats are and which items are affecting your build. We’re still doing a lot of work on this area to get as much info as possible in front of the player, and our first step is to gradually add more to our inspect screen.
Stay tuned for more updates in the coming weeks, we’ve got a lot planned here!"

— UX/UI Designer, Omg_DirigiblePlums



We have a new gameplay feature in the works: Shrines!

Shrines are large monuments found around planets that players can interact with to gain a global Boon (buff) that lasts for a period of time, the duration of a stage, or the duration of a run. Shrines will change your run in fresh ways once you activate them, and give us the ability to create all kinds of um, interesting scenarios.

But be warned, if you fail to activate a Shrine, well, then you might have a problem.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

We’re actively working on Shrines now, so look for them in a future update. For now, here’s a peek of them in action.

[h3][h2]Read the full changes in this update's Patch Notes.[/h2][/h3]