Genome Guardian News

[h3]Currently focused on cleaning things up, fixing bugs and overall making sure the game is stable before I do any big content updates. On that note...[/h3]

[h3]⚖ BALANCE[/h3]

• The following weapons are having their Damage adjusted based on their base Homing strength:
  • (weapon) AATT Homing Mine Launcher: 67 → 56.
    
  • (weapon) ACTT Anti-Air Torpedo: 62 → 59.
    
  • (weapon) CGTT Bubble Burster: 72/s → 66/s.
• (perk) Ferrofluid, Tooth: I'm going to make it so that Ferrofluid's Shield removal doesn't override Tooth and see how it goes. Will change back if everyone decides it's just busted, but as it stands there's not much use for Tooth otherwise.
  
• Homing now properly scales with Shmup Mode (it was extra strong but shouldn't have been).
  
• (turret) Helios: Burst-Fire weapons now scale Cooling Delay accordingly (so that weapons with Burst Fire aren't just straight-up superior to other weapons).
  

[h3]🔄 CHANGES[/h3]

• Homing behaviour has been significantly improved! No longer will you witness Homing projectiles curve away from a target they were headed straight towards - Homing now prioritizes targets based on angle to the projectile, instead of simply which target is closest to it. The old behaviour lead to situations where Homing projectiles would try to curve around to hit something behind them instead of something in the direction they're travelling solely because that enemy behind them is technically closer.
  
• (turret) Viper: Cosmetics like tires, wings, etc. will now always face the direction that Viper is pointing (it just looks more "correct" this way).
  
• Added informational popups for:
  • Activating a power-up for the first time (which shows you what they look like).
    
  • Informing you that you can replace mods once all slots are full during Endless (goes away after you replace a mod).
    
  • Starting a wave with 0 Heat Max (only shows once).
    
  • Starting a wave with 0 Health Max (only shows once) (perks like Shell and turrets like Crane still work though).
    
  • Informing you where you can find the cosmetics menu (on the RESEARCH menu).
    
  • Informing you where you can find the cosmetics menu (on the TURRETS menu).
    
  • Informing you that you can change cursor, crosshair, barrel light and heat style in SETTINGS (on the RESEARCH menu).
• Unlock pop-ups will be a bit more noticeable for (and only for) new players.
  
• The "MOD WILL DO NOTHING (click after 3s to add it anyways)" popup will say (and be) 1.5s in Classic Mode since you may be forced on occasion to do something like this in that mode.
  
• (turret) Inferno: The Burn DPS on weapon hover-over stats now accurately reflects Inferno's doubled Burn DPS. (note that this value still won't reflect any sort of conditional Burn DPS increase).
  
• I've stated some noteworthy perk override scenarios in some perk descriptions (ex. it's now stated in Tooth's description that it overrides Ferrofluid and Stone).
  
• Health Max +/- Turret Mods and Mutations now state clearly that they're based on the Health Max of your turret when you started the run (it needs to be this way, even if it feels yucky sometimes - it means that, if you start a run with 4 Health Max, then use Amaryllis to grow to 100 Health Max, picking up a "Health Max +50%" Turret Mod will only bring your Health Max to 102).
  

[h3]🔨 FIXES[/h3]

• The first button on the MUTATION ALERT screen was extra dark for no reason…
  
• Endless: Some Endless Mutation effects wouldn't take effect until you went into the shop (and thus could be subverted entirely if you simply kept skipping shop).
  
• (turret) Maw: If you've been experiencing issues in Shmup Mode with the Magnet perk, I think they're resolved now.
  
• (weapon) CGTT Bubble Burster: Previously, the seeking Area bubbles would change target after hitting an enemy, but now they'll be willing to focus on the same target.
  
• Homing now scales with Speed much more consistently - what I intended for from the start was for Speed reduction to not help Homing weapons, and for Speed increases to not hurt them; This is what has now been achieved.

[h3]⚖ BALANCE[/h3]

• (turret) Demon: Its "Burn Chance +10%" now only applies to the first hit you make per microbe (which means Demon is no longer biased towards high Firerate weapons), the Burn DPS caused by this is halved (as it would be if the weapon you hit with had Burn), but the chance is now 20%.
  

[h3]🔄 CHANGES[/h3]

• Endless: Microbe Speed will stop increasing after wave 100, but Microbe Health & Weight will grow at an increasing rate as you progress past wave 100. This will mean that something like wave 150 after this update is more or less just as impressive as wave 400, and I want to reduce the chance that you exit an Endless run simply out of, well, boredom, because your build is simply that good - that should never be happening. The in-game GUIDE has been updated with these details, and highest wave records above 100 have been set to 100.
  
• Settings: You can now toggle on "Arachnophobia Mode", which changes the appearance of spider-like microbes into something else.
  

[h3]🔨 FIXES[/h3]

• The save system has been overhauled so that it's impossible for save data to be lost via save file corruption. If your save file already has been corrupted (which would have occurred if, say, you lost power while the game was saving), unfortunately you're going to have to start fresh - there's literally nothing I can do, your save file is either completely unrecoverable or just full of space characters. If you're in this situation, follow these steps to be able to play again if you currently can't:
  • Make sure the game isn't running.
    
  • Delete everything in C:\Users\your Windows username\AppData\LocalLow\Alpherior\Genome Guardian.
    
  • Disable Steam Cloud for the game (right click on it in your library).
    
  • Start the game.
    
  • You can re-enable Steam Cloud again if you want now.
• Endless: If you tried doing Extract Endless (at any Depth) while at the stage in the story where you could find your true purpose, Endless would be a broken mess.
  
• A (non-functioning) toggle for Auto Heal would appear when you toggle on Skip Shop from the pause menu in Classic Mode.
  
• The width of the trail on projectiles that grow as they travel (ex. all flamethrowers) sometimes wouldn't match up with the projectile when using certain perks (like Chloroplast).
  
• Burn:
  • (turret) Guardian: Was dealing x1.5 Burn DPS to all enemies instead of just the one in its post-purpose-knowing description.
    
  • Now factors in while-overheated Damage modifiers (ex. Burner perk).
    
  • A microbe's Burn DPS wouldn't reset even after it stopped burning, which meant that it could never get lower than its highest value it experienced.
• (perk) Calculator: If a perk like Shell has removed all of your Health (but you're still alive), Calculator will be active.
  
• (turret) Saturn, Riptide, Psyker: Hitscan weapons on these turrets will have proper full 360 Accuracy in Shmup Mode now.
  
• The warning pop-up for adding Pierce/Bounce/Sticky to a weapon that already has it would sometimes not appear when it should.
  
• (mode) Abyss Microbes "warm up" to full Speed/Size/Weight a bit quicker in this mode now (fully warmed up by wave 4 instead of wave 6) since you start with lots of extra Biomass.
  

[h3]Some "emergency" fixes (as expected) for Endless Descent, plus some other things.

Some more people have informed me that they can't reach the main menu - still trying my best to figure this one out and hoping to have a fix in the next few days.[/h3]

[h3]🔄 CHANGES[/h3]

• Burn DPS is now very clearly indicated when hovering over mounted weapons during play (the Arsenal will still just show "+(Burn icon)" since it wouldn't fit otherwise).
  
• Moving turrets can now also move with arrow keys.

[h3]🔨 FIXES[/h3]

• Endless: I meant for the scaling to be higher (+2% to Microbe stats per wave at Depth 5, not +1.5%), whoops.
  
• Endless: In Brood Mode, you were never given any choices for Endless Mutations, which meant you'd have to retreat.
  
• Endless: Pausing quickly after the ENDLESS MUTATION ALERT menu appeared would make the pause menu appear in the bottom left corner and not function, softlocking the game.
  
• (perk) Firewall: Accidentally made the limit only 5 per wave instead of 40, but I'm also making the limit be 30 now instead anyways.Look pal, you're not gonna get sympathy from me complaining that your perk that lets you build 30 Shield in 1 wave was nerfed twice
• (turret) Saturn, Psyker: Projectiles with Bounce will no longer orbit after they hit something.
  
• (turret) Saturn, Psyker: Fixed weird things occuring if you unfocus the game and re-focus while projectiles are alive and while the game isn't paused.
  
• (I can't test this one myself, to let me know if you HAD this problem and whether or not it's FIXED now!) You can now control the in-game cursor with a controlled plugged into your Steamdeck while it's docked.
  

[h3]🎨 FAN ART[/h3]

[h3]🆕 ENDLESS OVERHAUL[/h3]
One of the most consistent pieces of feedback I get is that Endless was, well, kinda bland. You had no means of getting stronger, and oftentimes it was simply a test of how long you could tolerate the slog while your brain enters auto-pilot mode.

Endless has been given a huge make-over: It's now much more challenging, interesting, and rewarding:
The above can be viewed in-game on the updated Endless GUIDE page.

That's right - once you enter Endless, you'll be able to replace weapon & turret mods with mods from the shop. This will give you the chance to further refine and improve upon your build, or undo mistakes you made during your journey to wave 30.

There are also 40 new mutations specific to the Endless experience which will seriously test you...


[h3]WHAT'S COMING NEXT?[/h3]
The next big update will be the introduction of turret and perk variants - many of these will need to be bought with Research. These two major updates will go hand-in-hand, since Endless will be the best means of acquiring Research - you can build up your stores of Research ahead of time by playing now!



[h3]⚖ BALANCE[/h3]

• (mutation) -50% microbes, Microbe Health +85%: Microbe Health +85% → +75%.
  
• (turret) Shuriken: Various changes.
  
• (weapon) CGT Splitzooka, CCGT Rail Splitshot: If these don't have Bounce or Pierce, the initial, un-split projectile won't deal Damage.
  

[h3]🔄 CHANGES[/h3]

• Various fixes & additions to the in-game GUIDE.
  
• Power-ups will now be triggered when they come into contact with your turret. (it reaching the bottom in Shmup Mode won't count)
  
• The bars/pips beside the Shield and Health icons during play will display at most 160 for Shield and at most 400 for Health. The values themselves will not be capped, just the bars/pips.
• (weapon) Bouncewave Repeater: Sprite has more green on it.
  
• The shake / screen-darkening you experience when hit is more noticeable now, and scales better with damage taken and remaining Health.
  

[h3]🔨 FIXES[/h3]

• (perk) Tape: Would cause any weapon with projectiles that slowly grow in size as they travel (such as flamethrowers) to always just be tiny. Those same projectiles will now always be at their final size once Sticky triggers, too.
  
• Sometimes the hover-over weapon stats card would still be showing after entering the ARSENAL or clicking a weapon's name to see the evolution menu.
  
• When using a gamepad, you'll no longer fire off a shot after clicking Ready in the shop, resuming from pause, etc.
  
• (turret) Boomerang: It could be unlocked by achieving victory at Depth 5 with a AGTT Bubble Blaster that doesn't have Pierce (not that Pierce would do anything on this anyways).
  
• (turret) Jester: I let many things slide when it comes to the Jester experience, but you'll longer face weird, softlockish consequences when your turret gets destroyed while in the shop but Defibrillator resurrects you.
  
• (turret) Crane, (perk) Shell: Increasing Health Max during a run is still possible/allowed with these, and works, but it wouldn't show your Health before.
  
• If you had saved a turret's cosmetics and then removed them, they would appear again after restarting the game.
  
• (perk) Hammer: Now affects child projectiles (split projectiles, explosions, areas, etc.).
  
• You may have noticed that some sprites for microbes and other things have weird inconsistencies such as gaps where they don't belong or unexplained asymmetry - this has been fixed (had to change a setting when saving .svg files).
  
• (perk) Mirror: Will no longer deactivate when hit while something else is protecting you from hits.
  
• (weapon) CGTT Bubble Burster: I broke it last update.
  
• Checking or starting a Turret Trial was removing the cosmetics you had set for that turret.
  
• (turret) Riptide: Will no longer drain Fuel during, uh… "cutscenes"…
  
• Things that hurt you when you overheat will only do so once while overheated (such as Helios' reaching full Charge).
  
• When the "Skip Shop" toggle first appears, it would sometimes not show the "Auto Heal" toggle when it's activated (of course, this will never occur in Classic Mode though).
  

[h3]Getting this update out since it fixes a critical exploit.[/h3]

[h3]🔫 WEAPON CHANGES[/h3]

• (weapon) GTT Molotov, GGTT Moloflak, GTTT Megatov: Speed stat modifications were changing how long the Area sticks around for (which was never intended).
  
• (weapon) CGT Splitzooka, CCGT Rail Splitshot: The un-split projectile can now damage microbes when these weapons have Pierce.
  
• (weapon) AATT Homing Mine Launcher: The shot initially fired from the turret can now deal damage when this weapon has Pierce or Bounce.
  
• Weapons with the Flak trait now produce flak pellets per pierce or bounce.
  
• (weapon) CGGT Splitter Spitter: Found a mistake in its Damage calculation. Its Damage (which is kinda misleading on the stat card anyways but this is moreso for comparison purposes) has changed from 93 → 62. I'm sure that sounds severe but, let's be real, this weapon is still going to absolutely destroy everything.
  

[h3]⚖ BALANCE[/h3]

• (turret) Guardian: If you've defeated you-know-who, Guardian gets a permanent +50% Damage bonus against his ethereal form.

[h3]🔄 CHANGES[/h3]

• The turret you have selected on TURRETS will now be made clear with a green button (which won't react if you try to select your currently-selected turret).
  
• (turret) Jester: Fixed Jester's description.
  

[h3]🔨 FIXES[/h3]

• Fixed various mistakes in perk and mod descriptions for turrets that use Fuel.
  
• (perk) Blossom, Prism: The interaction between these is now how you'd expect.
  
• Actually fixed that Research-related bug I mentioned in last update now…