Dead Cells News

Hey everyone,

We've just pushed the fifth patch for the alpha test of Update 35, including some Balancing works and Bug Fixes.

* This patch only affects the current alpha test, if you are not participating in the alpha, this does not affect you.

If you want to take part in the ongoing alpha, just check out here for instructions on how to access.

Here's everything we changed:

Balancing:

• Curser can now detect the player and shoot its projectile through walls.
  
• Fixed Mimic despawning when trying to jump a very long distance.
  
• Reduced Doom Bringer's speech frequency.
  
• Increased Doom Bringer's walking speed when targeting a player.
  
• Doom Bringer's stun attack radius was increased, and it can now hit through walls.
  
• Doom Bringer's attack now gives two curses instead of one.
  
• Alienation's minimum curse was reduced to 5.
  

Bug fixes:

• Fixed Death's instant death attack sending the player back to Prison when in Training Mode or Boss Rush.
  
• Fixed heads' particle effects sometimes not playing.
  
• Fixed some lore rooms still spawning in Dilapidated Arboretum with the "Disable Lore Rooms" option enabled.
  
• Fixed a crash when Dracula's Castle tries to generate a Cursed Chest.
  
• Fixed Giant sometimes getting stuck during the double fist slam attack animation.
  
• Fixed some ranged multi-hit weapons (Scarecrow's Sickles, Cross, Bible, etc.) not dealing any damage after hitting an unbreakable door.
  
• Fixed head unlock notification not replacing text variables with the right number.
  
• Ygdar Orus Li Ox can no longer be removed from the inventory by resetting mutations.
  
• Fixed Glitch head not unlock retro-actively.
  
• Fixed Boss Rush Servants just standing there when skipping the fight.
  

That's all and thanks for taking part!

Cheers,
XYZ, Matt, EE & MT

Hey everyone,

We've just pushed the fourth patch for the alpha test of Update 35 yesterday, including some Balancing works and Bug Fixes.

* This patch only affects the current alpha test, if you are not participating in the alpha, this does not affect you.

If you want to take part in the ongoing alpha, just check out here for instructions on how to access.

Here's everything we changed:

Balancing:

• Reduced Cursed Biomes chance and increased the number of Cursed Mobs in a Cursed Biome.
  
• Buffed Alienation's healing by reducing the curse threshold for a max heal.
  

Bug fixes:

• Fixed mob animations not being the right speed, when the mob was taunted or slowed.
  
• Fixed Smoke Bomb damage buff not affecting projectiles.
  
• Fixed Cursed Mobs replacing normal mobs instead of adding themselves to the list.
  
• Prevent Boss Rush modified Concierge from jumping when the other instance is also jumping or throwing a fire wave.
  
• Fixed not being able to roll in the other direction while holding the Morning Star.
  

That's all and thanks for taking part!

Cheers,
XYZ, Matt, EE & MT

Hey everyone!

During the past few weeks we've seen a bunch of different opinions on the new curse additions, especially the cursed mobs…

We fully understand the pushback on mobs that give curses, as curse and its instadeath effect has always been an optional experience that gave extra rewards if you chose to add some spicy danger in your run.

In this update so far, the cursed mobs were unavoidable at 2BC+, even with a low chance of them spawning, and they didn't give any reward for the risk. So the choice was removed. For people who want to consciously avoid instadeath – no bueno.

Well, we like to trumpet that we work with the community when we add updates so, 'toot toot', we've listened to you, we've had lots of discussions and have come up with a new solution.

New 'Cursed Biome' system

The previous system where, from 2BC+, cursed mobs could randomly spawn in a random biome is gone.

Instead, we have introduced a new type of biome, Cursed Biome, which features the new cursed mobs in exchange for extra rewards. NOTE: This is not a new biome, it is a new effect on biomes.

And of course, you can choose to go into the cursed biome with its rewards, or go to the other biomes that don't have any scary cursed mobs.



How Cursed Biome works:

• Cursed biomes only spawn in runs with a Boss Cell level 2 or higher.
  
  
• Just like biome incentives, there will be a specific icon above the exit to a cursed biome, so that you can have the choice of taking this challenge or just going to the other normal biomes.
  
  
• A cursed biome always contains 6 cursed mobs randomly selected from Curser, Sore Loser and Doom Bringer. This number might change based on alpha/beta feedback.
  
  
• There is, of course, a reward for that risk: all the items dropped in a cursed biome will drop 1 gear level higher, regardless of their source (shop, loots, etc.). The spawn chance of cursed chests also increases by 10% in such biomes.
  
  
• There is a cap to the number of cursed biomes that you can go through on your route, depending on the BC level, set as follows: from BC 2 to 5 respectively: 2, 3, 5 and 8 (i.e. in 5BC, there is no cap).
  This cap only limits the number of Cursed Biomes that you can go to in a run, it doesn’t mean that you must go through that many Cursed Biomes to finish your run.
  Once you have hit the cap, no more cursed biomes will appear in that run. Until you have hit the cap, cursed biomes will continue to appear.
  
  
• As long as you haven’t reached the cap, there can be only up to 2 exits to cursed biomes at once. There will always be at least 1 biome without cursed mobs at any point in your run, no exceptions.
  

This system has been implemented in-game with a new patch, you just need to update the game now to have it in your run.

We believe that this is a good solution that respects the feedback players gave us, while also honouring our vision for the update, but we are still in Alpha phase so we still need feedback on this new system.
The numbers are easily adjustable, so if this new setup works on a basic level then we can tweak chances, percentages, ratios afterwards - if it's mathematical, we can rebuild it, we have the technology.

We also made other changes!

Balancing

• Alienation rework. Instead of healing the player per curse reduced, it will now heal the player when the curse is lifted, with the amount of health recovered based on the max amount of curses they had (for that curse instance). The effect only starts triggering when the player had more than 10 curses.
  
• Slightly nerfed Anathema's damage.
  
• Reduced Dracula's Castle (late) scroll fragments count, to match other biomes at the same depth.
  
• Added a small cooldown to Emergency Triage forcefield.
  

Graphics & UI

• Tweaked the update banner to improve readability.
  

Quality of life

• Added a tooltip for Cursed Mobs in the Boss Cell Selection UI.
  
• The Tailor's Daughter will now create notifications for any head you might unlock when talking to her.
  
• Removed the "Leave the Body" prompt of the throne fountain, when at 5BC.
  

You can leave feedback in the comments here, or on our official Discord – there are two channels called update35-alpha-discussion and update35-alpha-feedback specifically for these conversations, so please use them!

As always, this patch only affects the current alpha test, if you are not participating in the alpha, this does not affect you.
If you want to take part in the ongoing alpha, just check out here for instructions on how to access.

Cheers,
XYZ, Matt, EE & MT

Hey everyone,

We've just pushed the second patch for the alpha test of Update 35 yesterday, including some Balancing works and Bug Fixes.

* This patch only affects the current alpha test, if you are not participating in the alpha, this does not affect you.

If you want to take part in the ongoing alpha, just check out here for instructions on how to access.

Here's everything we changed:

Balancing:

• Reduced the chance of having Cursed Mobs in a run to 40%.
  
• Increased maximum number of levels where Cursed Mobs can appear.
  
• Increased the spawning chance and the max number of Cursed Mobs per biome.
  
• Removed some affixes from Anathema's pool: Pierce, Super Pierce and Fire Bullet.
  
• Greatly increased Anathema's damage.
  
• Anathema now only applies one curse when hitting an enemy.
  
• Changed Anathema's legendary affix to Global Shield on Use.
  

Bug fixes:

• Fixed Servant Head not unlocking properly. It now unlocks after having killed all the servants at least 15 times.
  
• Fixed Katana's dash attack not doing any damage if it hits a door.
  
• Fixed Doom Bringer not dealing any damage when the player has more than 50 curses.
  
• Fixed text backgrounds appearing in undiscovered parts of the minimap.
  
• Fixed Deep Pockets not working with arrow or grenade affixes.
  
• Fixed Blue Hole head not unlocking properly
  
• Fixed custom heads' animation stopping in some situations.
  
• Fixed Sewer's Tentacle movement particles not being played enough and being the wrong color.
  
• Fixed a bunch of custom heads' horizontal and vertical offsets.
  
• Fixed Boss Cell head not unlocking retroactively.
  
• Fixed Anathema dealing melee damage.
  
• Fixed Anathema's AoE damage not scaling to player and weapon stats.
  
• Fixed a crash sometimes happening when reloading the game when the Owl was active.
  
• Fixed Damned Vigor not letting the player resurrect when killing a boss.
  
• Fixed heads having a downwards offset in the head selection UI.
  
• Fixed Collector's menu flickering when opening it.
  
• Fixed being able to use the flask at full health, when equipped with both Tainted Flask and Cursed Flask.
  

That's all and thanks for taking part!

Cheers,
XYZ, Matt, EE & MT

Hey everyone,

We've just pushed a new patch for the alpha test of Update 35, including some Balancing works, Graphics & UI change and Bug Fixes.

* This patch only affects the current alpha test, if you are not participating in the alpha, this does not affect you.

If you want to take part in the ongoing alpha, just check out the post yesterday for instructions on how to access.

Here's everything we changed:

Balancing:

• Increased Anathema's damage.
  
• Added a cap to the number of levels that can have cursed monsters. This cap is different per difficulty.
  
• Added a 50% chance for a run to not have cursed monsters.
  
• Dead Inside no longer lets you use the Health Flask.
  

Graphics & UI:

• Removed the crit display for Anathema.
  

Bug fixes:

• Fixed custom head animations not being updated after door transitions.
  
• Fixed exit doors sometimes facing the wrong way.
  
• Fixed Damned Vigor not working in training room.
  
• Fixed Sore Loser not dropping the Indulgence blueprint.
  
• Fixed the cooldown display of Decoy and Maria's Cat.
  
• Fixed a crash when exiting the game while Medusa was performing her Petrification attack.
  
• Fixed a crash sometimes happening when using the Leghugger or Serenade.
  

[h3]Cursed mob spawns[/h3]
We also wanted to give more detail on the system that manages the way the new mobs spawn. It wasn't finished in time for the initial open alpha patch, but the new one released today contains a first implementation of the system.

Here is how it works in any given biome:

• We start by checking if the run will have "cursed" mobs or not. This will be a 40% chance of happening (50% in the build you're playing on), meaning that in 60% of 2+BC runs, there won't be any cursed mobs at all.
  
• If your run contains cursed mobs, we then check to see in how many biomes you have encountered them up until now. If this value is equal to the cap, you won't see any new cursed mobs in the rest of the run.
  The cap depends on the BC level and is set as follows, from BC 2 to 5 respectively: 2, 3, 5 and 8 (i.e. in 5BC, there is no cap).
  
• Then, if you are both in a "cursed mobs" run AND you haven't reached the cap, we roll to see if any of the three mobs spawn. In the next alpha update, the probability of a mob spawning will be 60% (50% in the current build) and up to 2 of each mob can spawn in the biome.
  All of these are SEPARATE: I can very well roll and get no cursed mobs at all, or 1 Curser, 2 Sore Losers and no Doom Bringer.
  These values are the same across the board and do not vary between biomes.
  

As a reminder, please note that the cursed mobs start spawning in 2BC and never earlier. They start spawning after the first boss in 2BC, and then spread to the rest of the game as you progress towards 5BC, in which they can spawn anywhere.

That's all and thanks for taking part!

Cheers,
XYZ, Matt, EE & MT