Monster Crown News

Hello Tamers!

You may have seen our recent post here, in which a very large polishing update, was set live on the beta branch for testing:
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/830370/view/4545912721048424996

Turns out this update is quite solid, and so we're now ready to set it live for all players to enjoy. Many longstanding issues have been addressed, which you can read about below, and there's a small special surprise for players as well.

The Philosopher Kings, the grand finale bosses of the post-game have received brand new art that shows much more character and distinction than what they had previously!



These awesome designs are thanks to Bennybotabota on our discord, who also has a tumblr you can visit to see more of their work here: https://www.tumblr.com/goliathgastropod

Benny did a great job of understanding the spirit of each of these characters, I think we'll be working with Benny again on future Monster Crown titles, so we can continue to bring variety and awesome designs for players to encounter.

This patch brings with it a rewriting or significant restructuring of the battle system, battle math, monster level up stat-gain, collision system, menus, stat orbs and game resolution along with tweaks to monster balancing, movesets, etc.

• Monster stat generation math and Battle math has been completely rewritten.
  
• Collision system has been completely rewritten. Monsters will no longer spawn out of bounds and many long-standing collision issues have been fixed.
  
• Minor graphical changes have been applied in various instances including overworld sprites for the Duchess and Rodney
  
• Menu behavior is now more clear and responsive
  
• Stat Orbs now raise your base stats by 0.1 instead of your derived stats which means you can now get a lot more granular with building a team
  
• Complete rebalancing for many monsters who were previously undertuned or overtuned, including movesets
  
• Various graphical tweaks/adjustments
  
• Improved state management
  

The battle math and stat gain systems are actually back-ported versions of the code developed for Monster Crown 2: Sin Eater, big thanks to Kyle and Ahab who are programming and design respectively on the new in-development game. If you'd like to see more about that title be sure to check out our twitter for screenshots/gifs:
https://twitter.com/crowns_dev

One thing I wanted to clarify as there seems to have been a bit of confusion around "Code Monsters". Code Monsters that were offered during Early Access that are no longer available are not truly new monsters. One example is holiday Echelk, which was made available via code before players could reach the Frost Province, this was our way of sharing some monsters early before those areas were opened up for players to explore. All of those monsters can be easily obtained since the game reached full release in 2021. Another example is "SENTINEL" who was merely a Taupsy bred with a Malicious monster to obtain that crossbreed, so you're not missing out on anything.

Next mission is to bring these updates to consoles
Discord: https://discord.gg/WwRvm9B

Hello everyone,

I've been hard at work on a new patch for Monster Crown to address some longstanding issues, and improve some systems that could use some quality improvements.

A 90% complete version of v1.2.4 is available on Monster Crown's ea-beta branch.

Full details are below on the patch and how to access it if you'd like to opt-in. Because the patch touches so many systems in the game we thought it was important to allow people to give it a whirl before we finalize it and make it the new default stream.

The battle math AND stat calculation system has been totally rewritten. The team working on Monster Crown 2: Sin Eater developed a much better implementation and it's now been back-ported to Monster Crown because it's simply better in every way. The implementation here isn't 100% exact, because the new game factors in a lot of additional new factors/systems but it's very close. It's a lot more fun to play and much more consistent, reducing the feel of a "grindy" experience as well. You can feel your monsters strength grow in a much more tangible way.

Monster spawns have had their code completely rewritten as well, it's no longer possible to have a monster spawn out of bounds, no more brilliants that remain out of reach!

Menus have had their underlying code for switching revamped, in particular the main menu and the options within it. The changes also improve various other systems like the move learning menu, the shop menu, etc. Because there are so many damn menus and features, let us know if you encounter anything odd that we missed, but the game has had 3-4 full playthroughs by the MC2 team and a lot of play from me, so I don't think there'll be much if any.

Feel free to join us on discord if you'd prefer to share your experiences or anything you'd like to report there:
https://discord.gg/WwRvm9B

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To access the branch, right click on the game in your Steam library, go to Properties then Betas. On the top dropdown menu for Beta Participation, select ea-beta - ea-beta and the game will reinstall itself as such.

A list of general changes:

• Monster stat generation math and Battle math has been completely rewritten. Your monster stats will regenerate on save load. This cannot be reversed. Do not load save files that you don't want stats to be regenerated on in the ea-beta branch.
  
• Collision system has been completely rewritten. Monsters will no longer spawn out of bounds and many long-standing collision issues have been fixed.
  
• Minor graphical changes have been applied in various instances including overworld sprites for the Duchess and Rodney
  
• Menus are (we really hope this time) now completely anchored and will never do the weird misalignment thing. PLEASE TELL US IF THIS PROBLEM PERSISTS: TELL US THE RESOLUTION YOU PLAY ON!
  
• Menu behavior is now more clear and responsive
  
• Stat Orbs now raise your base stats by 0.1 instead of your derived stats which means you can now get a lot more granular with building a team
  
• Complete rebalancing for many monsters who were previously undertuned or overtuned.
  
• Just a million trillion smaller annoyances have been quashed
  

Things that aren't in this version but will come in the full patch release:
Facade stat rebalance
A special surprise with the Philosopher Kings

Please let us know what you think and please tell us about any bugs you might encounter.
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Thanks Tamers!

Hello tamers,

A small update with some fixes today:

• Raptyl's flight path has been corrected
  
• Baby level up fix
  
• Overworld monster layering fix
  
• Missing hybrid for Shadrache, Machindra, added
  
• Kyro not registering in the notebook from breeding fixed
  
• Wiki link fixed
  
• Box monster navigation alignment fix
  
• Menu layering bug fixed
  
• Backer monster "Bombril" added to the duchess's garden
  
• Baby Apo OW sprite fix
  
• Non water monsters navigating on water fixed
  
• Undergrowth pass player layering bug fixed
  
• Slightly faster loading
  
• Creekeon palette fix
  

I still have not gotten my hands on a steam deck, however, I can confirm that if you're updated, it works on proton, and I confirmed this build on Ubuntu LTS this morning, which hopefully is helpful to steam deck owners as well.

I also added an indicator to the New Game button that makes it clearer how to start Mark's Quest, just press right on New Game (you'll now see Mark's face there too) to scroll through New Game, New Game+ and Mark's Quest.

Mark's Quest actually started as a New Game+ option where you started from Frobec, however, while working on it I thought it was a lot more fun to make a brand new Crown Island 4 years later - hope you agree :)

Thank you to user alivewater on discord for the tile error reports!

Have a good week everyone!

-Jason

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Deep in Flowering Province a new land has been discovered - Dino Land!

This discovery has lead to the findings of new, primordial beasts. Navigate the cliffs high above Undergrowth Pass to tame new beasts, including two mysterious fossils of monsters from even farther into the distant past of Crown Island. Find a legendary Bone Bow to add to your array of powers.

Baby Monsters now roam the wilds of Crown Island, be on the lookout for these rare appearances, and even breed your own! Use the Growth Stunter to keep your cute new pals around forever!

Head to dark back alleys of Nio Kio to find a dubious card supplier who can help you to obtain the dark beast Bant, the enigmatic ocean monster and more important monsters from Crown Island's history.

Other secrets await a daring player with a bow... be careful when monsters multiply - and double your caution when they combine!



Return to a brand new Crown Island four years later as the up-and-coming tamer Mark, from Frobec!

Inspired by the hero he once adventured with, Mark will set out with his baby Stamlanche to blaze his own destiny. Explore how the provinces and towns of Crown Island have changed since the hero's victory, catch up with old friends, and repair the nation's new Island-wide Train network to usher in a new era of peace and cooperation, and help the wounds of war finally begin to heal.

Make use of new powers, enjoy a vibrant new world and meet new provincial forms of old favorites!

With this final content update, Monster Crown becomes "MONSTER CROWN: RED KING" - a subtitle that reflects its place as separate but equal in a wider mythos yet to be explored, and also cements the official name of the game's protagonist in the Monster Crown universe.

From everyone at Studio Aurum; thank you for coming on this journey with us. We hope you'll stay with us as we dive even deeper into the world of Monster Crown in future!
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[h3]TCG Preorders:[/h3]
https://shop.monster-crown.com

Hi everyone,

Development of the long-awaited DLC is finally complete. There will be an announcement for the release date shortly, as well as images and teasers for the many new monsters and cool things included. I say DLC these days so casually I take for granted that it may not be clear, so just to be 100% clear, it's just a game update with a lot of new content, and is entirely free.

I wanted to share an announcement from our twitter today, which reiterates the above and gives a little update on the sequel project the rest of the Studio Aurum team is focused on:

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Development of Monster Crown's DLC has completed and is in final testing. A release date will be announced soon to bring the final chapter of Monster Crown to players worldwide. This update will be brought to all platforms including some additional fixes and fun.

Another exciting development, the Monster Crown Official TCG will be sent to the printers on November 25th, bringing another project I'm honored to be involved in to life, featuring the world and monsters and characters you've all gotten to know over the past 2 years.

As our journey on Crown Island nears its close, many of you have been asking about the mysterious, in-development sequel, Monster Crown 2.



Monster Crown 2 (Project NEXT) has been in full scale development for 6 months now, featuring a dedicated team, each excelling in their craft and area of expertise - the builds I've been playing with are nothing short of breathtaking and clearly show Monster Crown in a whole new dimension of quality.

While the first screenshots will not be shared until the new year, please consider this our announcement of the project, and enjoy the teaser image created by the game's director, and my collaborative visionary on the project.

I'll be taking a step back from hands-on development and art, serving as this project?s producer, but Project NEXT is a studio-wide effort and I can promise you that this team will take Monster Crown to newer heights and satisfy your monster taming thirst in ways you've never seen before.

Thank you for two years of Monster Crown!!

- Jason

https://twitter.com/crowns_dev/status/1724868526857412694

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I want to thank all of you for ensuring we had the resources and interest to have these totally separate threads (the sequel and the TCG) running in parallel to my focus on fixes and the DLC. the Monster Crown Series is about to get a whole lot bigger, and I'm absolutely delighted to bring this final "content pack" update to the game, some of you may remember the Content Packs back during Early Access, this experience gave me similar feelings, and was honestly nostalgic for me in that way.

My health has had plenty of ups and downs since then, and I wouldn't personally feel right serving as director on the next project with how intermittent I can be, that being said, I still keep a close eye on our projects and contribute plenty of ideas, lending a hand here and there to get things across the line.

I also wanted to thank the person on the last post who turned me onto Heavy Metal Poisoning, a very thoughtful and caring suggestion and while that's not what i have, just to rule it out, I followed the protocol and am so sick of broccoli now I would gladly sign up for a spicy glutovi steak :D

Stay tuned for the DLC feature post and release date coming up in the next couple of weeks!

See you soon tamers.