Sipho News

It's finally here - Sipho 0.6 available for everybody to play!
First and foremost, we want to again congratulate our Halloween zooid design contest winner Scepti! The winning entry was a design of Soul Eater which charges its pressure up with eaten remains of enemies and blasts remaining enemies with harmful fluids. We have implemented this idea and it is now available to adapt in game!

We are very happy how it turned out and we will definitely are going to hold more community contests in the future!

As the Soul Eater was a recent leap in new game mechanics we had an another idea sprout some time ago. Back in version 0.5 we have added a Greaser - a unique part that buffed-up Range and Movement Power stats of connected zooids. And it was great - it deepened mechanical importance of part placement which spawned many new interesting Sipho designs. Inspired by your creations we wanted to dive deeper with such buffing mechanic. So deep that we did a bold move and have re-balanced all structure zooids to have more importance where they are placed. And the results are glorious:

The screenshot above shows some of new buffs that are applied by Structures. The changes in detail are as follows:

• Advena structure now costs 3 (instead of 2) nutrition and increases attached zooid damage by 1 and healing efficiency by 1 - zooids with higher healing efficiency will get more health points from healing effects.
  
• Saenus Beefuorus structure will now automatically cover neighboring zooids with protective shell.
  
• Buginis structure now adds 1 point of energy regeneration to neighboring zooids.
  
• Each Cra'than structure now heals 2 health points (instead of 1) and skill cost is lower, but increases with each zooid.
  
• Vagorian structure gives 10% movement speed bonus to attached zooids.
  

We hope these changes will increase strategic value in choosing which zooid to use and promote more experimenting with different zooid combinations. We want each part to be unique and beneficial in scenarios you encounter throughout the game.

We took a step further with buffing idea and have introduced three new zooids, two of which act in a similar way as Greaser:

In the screenshot you can see Squirter being buffed-up by two buffer zooids:

• Grinder will grind down your zooid weapons making them sharper and increasing their piercing abilities. This works for poison too - it affects more zooids!
  
• Agonizer imbues nearby zooids with acidic substance which increases their damage. Perfect to amp the damage up together with Advena structure!

To celebrate occasion of this update, we are hosting a sale on Steam store with 15% discount. The sale will last until 16th March, be sure to grab it in time.

If you want to chat with our team, share creations with other players and discuss legitimate strategies, come join us at Discord!


And all of the changes in detail can be found below:

• Track and report semantic game version numbers separately
  
• Log when damageable does not have a collider
  
• Don't show irrelevant stats. Gray out irrelevant stat buffs in tooltips
  
• Use nutrition icon to convey nutrition ungrow value in zooid tooltip
  
• Track zooid original prefabs and their base stats in Zooid Info
  
• Remove unused Zooid connector color as all zooids now have their own connectors
  
• Damage stat determines max stack count on target
  
• Each poison cloud now has Damage
• Penetration charges which determine maximum amount of stacks each poison can apply
  
• Poison cloud now scales from Damage and Penetration stats:
  
• Poison debuff now stacks and has duration of 0.9 seconds (down from 3s)
  
• Change how DOTs work: instead of dealing damage throughout duration, damaging buffs will now deal damage on stack timeout
  
• Update crop for stat icons to reduce mip bleeding
  
• Revert Aquarium UI icon change to old Sipho head icons
  
• Don't display buffs in tooltips with 0 stacks
  
• Update Soul Eater skill description
  
• Swap graphics of Agonizer and Grinder
  
• Use icons for skill descriptions
  
• Update icon bounds in sprite sheet
  
• Use new icons for stat tooltips
  
• Use named controller icon references without referencing specific TMP sprite icon sheets
  
• Reduce pixel bleeding for new icons
  
• Tidy TMP icon assets
  
• Use names for controller icons rather than indices
  
• Icons with padding
  
• Make Soul Eater projectiles non-solid, tweak and polish them
  
• Add concept of non-solid projectile. Add lose velocity on hit ratio to projectiles
  
• Make Poison Mine explosion more powerful
  
• Create TMP stats Sprite Asset
  
• Icon sheet import settings
  
• Icon sheet
  
• Add per-projectile extra damage scaling parameter
  
• Soul Eater effect improvements
  
• Create rotated chip effects when projectile dies
  
• Allow projectiles have no renderers attached
  
• Make Soul Eater projectile trail follow scale
  
• Add scale following to Following Effect
  
• Update Steamworks tools
  

• Update Soul Eater description
  
• Set Soul Eater projectile layer to Projectile
  
• Rename Advena structure buff to Acidic Metabolism
  
• Make Soul Eater available in Campaign
  
• Change unused Greaser range stat to 0
  
• Rename Phaser to Agonizer. Make Agonizer apply damage increase and make it available in Campaign
  
• Change Grinder effect to apply penetration stat buff and make Grinder available in Campaign
  
• Add Save Custom Data get method with default value override
  
• Only play one shot at a time of Soul Eater shot sound
  
• Soul eater shoot effect and tweaks
  
• Calculate steering direction from projectile rotation if velocity is close to zero
  
• Fix Flail outline and remove angular drag from Flail connector. Now Flail should have no drag at all
  
• Make flail do 50% of damage when retracted.
  
• Do not auto-save layout if layout exists with same content
  
• Add Built-in layouts to Layout Database. Initialize Layout Database on game launch and keep it warm when managing layouts
  
• Better Layout hashing
  
• Keep track of original materials when making copies in Zooid Graphics
  
• Soul Eater animations
  
• Reserialize Buffer zooids
  
• Fix max health debuff reducing more health than it should on apply
  
• Sparks for Grinder buff effect
  
• Fix flail power scaling
  
• Update Steamworks to 1.66 (Steamworks.NET 13.0.0)
  
• Fix player being frozen after death in Aquarium
  
• Stat buffers no longer buff themselves
  
• Added a more robust way to save/load custom data with base type support
  

• Move several test structure prefabs to disabled folder
  
• Make Flail weapon damage based more on impact velocity rather than time
  
• Increase Muck effectiveness against projectiles
  
• Fix Muck animation becoming off-sync when continuously using launch skill
  
• Increase Nervefiber healing amount from 1 to 2
  
• Chitin Shell buff sprites should not be affected by Greaser effects
  
• Despawn environment objects when they sink
  
• New buffers use new sprites
  
• Buffer zooid sprite metas
  
• Tweak Chitin Shell visuals and don't despawn them on level change
  
• Buffer zooid sprites
  
• Where does the sniper piercing keep disappearing?
  
• Try to make flail more fun by reducing its drag and boosting its launch force 20 times. Now you can sort of chase people around with it
  
• Set Greaser sac layer to Outline to make it ignored by Renderer cloner effect
  
• Hide the weird "zarnokas" sprite in the soul eater projectile
  
• Buff soul eater force per range from 150 to 220
  
• I suck at making particle effects, but I'm trying to improve the Grinder particle effect
  
• Projectile size scales from bonus damage
  
• An attempt to make a Grinder effect of some sort
  
• Serialize phaser
  
• Rename spike skill to "Impale" so it's not confused with pierce stat
  
• Slightly robustify shell code from weird states
  
• Shells don't expire and sea structures regrow shells every 7 seconds instead of 6
  
• Fix a bug (feature?) where dead zooids grew shells.
  
• Increased shell lifetime from 16 to 18 seconds and decreased spawn frequency from 4 to 6 seconds to make fighting sea boys less annoying
  
• Alien structure costs 3 instead of 2, but retains the 12 health so it's more robust for the price
  
• Add a regeneration efficiency stat description
  
• Update descriptions for a few structure zooids
  
• Vagorian structure buffs nearby movers with 10% extra movement force
  
• Reserialize the rest of the zooids
  
• Reserialize the two zooids that feel like it
  
• Heal skill uses less energy up-front but uses 5 more energy per-zooid
  
• Fix nothing healing anymore since the regenerationEfficiency got reset to 0 everywhere
  
• Skills can have an extra energy cost per-zooid
  
• Advena structures add a health regen efficiency bonus - heal more with less!
  
• Advena structure buff naming came back to its senses
  
• Shell lifetime extended from 15 to 16 seconds
  
• Saenus Beefuorus structure passively grows a shell over a single zooid every 4 seconds
  
• Fix exceptions when loading a save with a player skill that no longer exists
  
• Advena structure buffs nearby zooid damage by 1
  
• Update Buginis structure description
  
• Make Buginis structure give +1 energy regeneration to neighboring zooids. Decrease their max energy bonus from 10 to 5
  

Another content loaded update comes to [staging] branch. This time we are happy to finally introduce you to our Halloween contest winner's Scepti designed Soul Eater implementation! And we are also throwing in two new buffer zooids - Grinder and Agonizer!

Grinder will grind down your zooid weapons making them sharper and increasing their piercing abilities.
Agonizer imbues nearby zooids with acidic substance which increases their damage. Perfect amp the damage up with Advena structure!
And the star Soul Eater charges its pressure up with eaten remains of enemies and blasts remaining enemies with harmful fluids.

We will be tweaking and polishing new zooids before letting out them into the wild (default Steam branch) in future updates. This means that this update will too remain in [staging] branch. To get this experimental content you can opt-in in Sipho preference window found by right-clicking on Sipho in Steam Library:

All of changes that led up to this point are listed below:

• Update Soul Eater description
  
• Set Soul Eater projectile layer to Projectile
  
• Rename Advena structure buff to Acidic Metabolism
  
• Make Soul Eater available in Campaign
  
• Change unused Greaser range stat to 0
  
• Rename Phaser to Agonizer. Make Agonizer apply damage increase and make it available in Campaign
  
• Change Grinder effect to apply penetration stat buff and make Grinder available in Campaign
  
• Add Save Custom Data get method with default value override
  
• Only play one shot at a time of Soul Eater shot sound
  
• Soul eater shoot effect and tweaks
  
• Calculate steering direction from projectile rotation if velocity is close to zero
  
• Fix Flail outline and remove angular drag from Flail connector. Now Flail should have no drag at all
  
• Make flail do 50% of damage when retracted.
  
• Do not auto-save layout if layout exists with same content
  
• Add Built-in layouts to Layout Database. Initialize Layout Database on game launch and keep it warm when managing layouts
  
• Better Layout hashing
  
• Keep track of original materials when making copies in Zooid Graphics
  
• Soul Eater animations
  
• Reserialize Buffer zooids
  
• Fix max health debuff reducing more health than it should on apply
  
• Sparks for Grinder buff effect
  
• Fix flail power scaling
  
• Update Steamworks to 1.66 (Steamworks.NET 13.0.0)
  
• Fix player being frozen after death in Aquarium
  
• Stat buffers no longer buff themselves
  
• Added a more robust way to save/load custom data with base type support
  

We would like to announce a new era of Sipho updates - 0.6.x. This update contains changes to structure zooids which play a major role in balance of the game. As we want to get new content released as soon as possible for testing, it has not been prepared for inexperienced players and might make some parts of the game harder or easier. For this reason, we are only going to release this version in [staging] branch. Once tested and balanced, we will promote next version to default branch, which reaches everyone by default.

If you want to get new content and help us by trying it out, switch to [staging] branch through Sipho properties in Steam Library:
After switching you will be greeted with rebalanced structures:

• Advena structure now costs 3 (instead of 2) nutrition and increases attached zooid damage by 1 and healing efficiency by 1 - zooids with higher healing efficiency will get more health points from healing effects.
  
• Saenus Beefuorus structure will now automatically cover neighboring zooids with protective shell.
  
• Buginis structure now adds 1 point of energy regeneration to neighboring zooids.
  
• Each Cra'than structure now heals 2 health points (instead of 1) and skill cost is lower, but increases with each zooid.
  
• Vagorian structure gives 10% movement speed bonus to attached zooids.
  

We hope these changes will make structures a lot more useful and fun to play. Let us know what you think!

You can find changelist below:

• Move several test structure prefabs to disabled folder
  
• Make Flail weapon damage based more on impact velocity rather than time
  
• Increase Muck effectiveness against projectiles
  
• Fix Muck animation becoming off-sync when continuously using launch skill
  
• Increase Nervefiber healing amount from 1 to 2
  
• Chitin Shell buff sprites should not be affected by Greaser effects
  
• Despawn environment objects when they sink
  
• New buffers use new sprites
  
• Buffer zooid sprite metas
  
• Tweak Chitin Shell visuals and don't despawn them on level change
  
• Buffer zooid sprites
  
• Where does the sniper piercing keep disappearing?
  
• Try to make flail more fun by reducing its drag and boosting its launch force 20 times. Now you can sort of chase people around with it
  
• Set Greaser sac layer to Outline to make it ignored by Renderer cloner effect
  
• Hide the weird "zarnokas" sprite in the soul eater projectile
  
• Buff soul eater force per range from 150 to 220
  
• I suck at making particle effects, but I'm trying to improve the Grinder particle effect
  
• Projectile size scales from bonus damage
  
• An attempt to make a Grinder effect of some sort
  
• Serialize phaser
  
• Rename spike skill to "Impale" so it's not confused with pierce stat
  
• Slightly robustify shell code from weird states
  
• Shells don't expire and sea structures regrow shells every 7 seconds instead of 6
  
• Fix a bug (feature?) where dead zooids grew shells.
  
• Increased shell lifetime from 16 to 18 seconds and decreased spawn frequency from 4 to 6 seconds to make fighting sea boys less annoying
  
• Alien structure costs 3 instead of 2, but retains the 12 health so it's more robust for the price
  
• Add a regeneration efficiency stat description
  
• Update descriptions for a few structure zooids
  
• Vagorian structure buffs nearby movers with 10% extra movement force
  
• Reserialize the rest of the zooids
  
• Reserialize the two zooids that feel like it
  
• Heal skill uses less energy up-front but uses 5 more energy per-zooid
  
• Fix nothing healing anymore since the regenerationEfficiency got reset to 0 everywhere
  
• Skills can have an extra energy cost per-zooid
  
• Advena structures add a health regen efficiency bonus - heal more with less!
  
• Advena structure buff naming came back to its senses
  
• Shell lifetime extended from 15 to 16 seconds
  
• Saenus Beefuorus structure passively grows a shell over a single zooid every 4 seconds
  
• Fix exceptions when loading a save with a player skill that no longer exists
  
• Advena structure buffs nearby zooid damage by 1
  
• Update Buginis structure description
  
• Make Buginis structure give +1 energy regeneration to neighboring zooids. Decrease their max energy bonus from 10 to 5
  

With this update we bring several noticeable fixes to input. It will now be possible to bind any input device to any key bind which allows full customisation of key bindings. In the meantime we were working on many different things that will reach you in the future:

This is how our Mercurial repository of Sipho development looks like. It allows us to work on game in separate branches, which do not affect the default branch - the one that is shipped to you. While in rest of the branches we can thoroughly test and polish larger changes without slowing down update releases. As is it visible in picture above we are currently actively working on two major things:
[h3]Structure zooid rebalance[/h3]
We want to rebalance structure zooids to make them more useful and have distinct benefits. Having a single zooid grown should be impactful to the play style and this wasn't a case for structure zooids. We have learned from Greaser that neighbour buffs provides an interesting choice and strategic zooid placement. Having that in mind structures will give bonuses to neighboring zooids and other zooids that already had abilities will have their unique ability amplified.
[h3]Non-linear levels[/h3]
In current version of Sipho we are using a list of areas (scenes) which are loaded one after another. That happens in Campaign mode when you traverse the world through whirlpools. This has worked fine since the very beginning of development in 2017. To allow more interesting travels we have to rip out existing system based on list and re-create it in scriptable and more controllable way. This will allow traversing environments in more different order, maybe have a choice or even ability to skip or visit special areas. What we have currently achieved in the levels-nonlinear branch is the base-work for that. Once we are confident that we are able to replicate existing system with new back-end code, we will merge that into default branch and continue working on spicing up level traversal.

• Soul eater has a lerp animation for its belly
  
• Soul eater clips its sprite instead of using transform scale
  
• Soul eater uses 1 charge instead of all of them when used
  
• Save ZooidPhaserBuff asset stuff
  
• Reset Sniper penetration to 1
  
• Add penetration stat description
  
• Add a Phaser zooid test prototype that gives nearby weapons penetration
  
• Swarmer uses penetration stat for multiple attacks and swarm minions now tell the owner of their damage
  
• Volter uses penetration stat to increase max target count
  
• Poison uses the penetration stat
  
• Spike uses penetration stat
  
• Added a penetration stat. Soul eater now penetrates all zooids, but deals less damage
  
• Dirty assets after update
  
• Update Unity to 2018.4.14f1
  
• Invert the appropriate gamepad axes to workaround the new input system bug
  
• Finish up the rework
  
• Start reworking the input system to be less rigid and be able to bind anything anywhere
  
• Fix game skipping the head selection screen sometimes

Happy new year everyone!

It's holiday time Sipho homeland, but we have kept our inertia and got a decent bugfix update rolling. Thanks to our players reporting bugs on Discord we had a chance to quickly fix non-intuitive range stat effects and uncover a rare bug with soft body deformations.

In the meantime we are working on Halloween contest winner zooid Soul Eater which concept was drawn by Scepti and rendered by our artist Spin:

The inner red sack will expand with each charge to fill up the bone cage. The render shows fully charged Soul Eater.

And these are changes that make up this version:

• Add non-festive version of Santa Hat and use it off-season
  
• Don't scale winter zooid through graphics animations
  
• Make Sizzler linearly scale max affected target count with range
  
• Stop NaN propagation in soft body when there are almost no deformations for symmetric Siphos
  
• Add light pulsing to mines so they feel more live just after being spawned
  
• Scale mine and bomb size with range increase
  
• Increase Poison mine velocity increase for each range unit from 0.375 to 0.9
  
• Silently destroy pool objects if pooling is disabled
  
• Fix level end analytics not using level label
  
• CreateFollowEffect removes following effect on disable
  
• Slightly reduce soul eater range
  
• Some Grinder serialization
  
• Some soul eater tweaks
  
• Experimenting with a Grinder zooid that buffs damage similar to greaser
  
• Add a trail to the soul eater projectile
  
• Fix exceptions when loading a game with controller bindings for skills but no controller plugged in
  
• Fix any potential Sipho null refs in Growth
  
• Poorly integrate soul eater graphics
  
• Soul eater tweaks and fixes
  
• Reserialize sniper projectile
  
• Projectiles can now be set up generically and launched by the launcher
  
• Experimental projectile rework to fit into object launcher