Nova Drift News

Updated localization for Brazilian Portuguese, Traditional Chinese, French, Japanese, Korean, and Polish

Hello Drifters,

We've just launched another major update aimed at increasing build diversity and run variety. Encounter new huge bosses on your journey or jump right into late game with the new Draft Mode, pre-constructing a 35 upgrade build. We've also continued to refine the difficulty curve based on your feedback.

The Breakdown:

• New Challenge Mode: DRAFT
  
• Three new alternate bosses can be encountered with Challenge Mode: NEMESIS enabled
  
• Mine overhauls and a comprehensive Drone rework
  
• Ultra-Rare Wild Mods: Ricochet and Challenger have been added to the game
  
• Super Mods: Charged Shields, Infuse, and Strafing Strikes have been added to the game
  
• A huge amount of game balance changes
  
• New power ups
  
• New background music
  
• Spanish localization
  
• Steam Deck is now fully supported!
  

The complete changelog: https://steamcommunity.com/app/858210/discussions/0/3658515990056189069/

Read about new content in detail:
Blog: https://blog.novadrift.io/nova-drift-2022-upcoming-content/
Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/858210/view/3345626689187069638

Next Up: Enemies 2.0, Part 3
Including more alternate bosses and Challenge Mode: Boss Rush!

Join Our Discord
We've got quite an active discord with a very chill and inclusive community. This is our main hub of player communication, and our devs are also pretty active there. We've got channels like #ask-the-devs, #weekly-discussion, #frequently-asked-questions, and #feedback. I'm also quite proud of the #game-dev-help channel, which is a space for current and aspiring developers to learn and collaborate. So... come chat with us!

Want to help Nova Drift grow?
Steam Reviews really help! As a tiny operation, Nova Drift relies on its quality and reputation to sell, and reviews also encourage the Steam algorithms to show the game to more people. Please do take a moment to fill out a short review, even if it's only a few words. It just might make a big difference.

Thanks for reading. Best wishes,

Chimeric / Jeffrey Nielson

Hello Drifters,

The next major update is upon us, and if all goes as planned, it will be launching in a couple weeks. In the meantime, if you want to give it a go, head on over to the BETA branch on Steam, which should give you version 0.33.22 at minimum.

Here are the patch notes: https://blog.novadrift.io/patch-notes/

The major bits:

• Challenge Mode: Draft has been added to the game! Jump into end-game (wave 120) with 35 upgrade points to spend. If Draft mode is enabled, it will use separate leaderboards for "Draft" and "Wild Metamorphosis Draft"
  
• Added three of the five alternate bosses that may be encountered instead of standard bosses if the NEMESIS Challenge Mode is enabled:
  
• A new alternate boss: Ceratotitan (wave 20)
  
• A new alternate boss: Crucible (wave 80)
  
• A new alternate boss: Glaucus (wave 100)
  
• Added new BGM & SFX for all new boss fights
  
• Ultra-Rare Wild Mod: Ricochet has been added to the game
  
• Ultra-Rare Wild Mod: Challenger has been added to the game
  
• New Super Mod: Charged Shields has been added to the game
  
• New Super Mod: Infuse has been added to the game
  
• New Super Mod: Strafing Strikes has been added to the game
  
• Added a new power-up to the game: Armor Fragment
  
• Steam Deck is now fully supported
  
• You can now enable "Large Text" from the settings menu. This also compacts the upgrade layout, which is also useful for very low resolutions or window sizes. With Steam Deck, this will be enabled by default
  
• Spanish localization has been added
  
• Drone Reworks
  
• Mine Rework & Balance
  
• Construct Quality of Life
  
• Balance tweaks, bug fixes and more...
  

As usual, leave us feedback and bug reports on the Steam forums or on Discord: https://discord.gg/Zp2MkPJ

-Miles @ Pixeljam

My drifters, it has been a long while! Too long. But I am happy to say that the radio silence has been for no other reason than that we have been working very hard. On fun things! So, without further ado, I'm excited to share with you what we've been creating for the next big update, which will enter beta testing as soon as possible.

[h2]Overview: Enemies 2.0, Part 2[/h2]



Draft Mode is a new Challenge Mode that can be unlocked at Rank 50. Enabling it allows you to jump right into wave 120 with 30 upgrade points to spend. This is a great way to test build concepts before committing time to them, or for veterans to simply skip to the fast-paced, blood-pumping late game.

[h2]New Major Features[/h2]

[h3]Three New Alternate Bosses[/h3]

This update introduces alternate bosses. Three of the five that will be added are in this update, potentially encountered at waves 20, 80, and 100. Alternate bosses are more difficult (but also more rewarding), so you will only encouter them if you've enabled Challenge Mode: NEMESIS.



The Ceratotitan is a melee attacker, encountered at wave 20, that can move surprisingly fast given its size. Its pincer attack deals a lot of damage and will test your mobility and positioning. Additionally, it can spawn and attract swarms of offspring to assail you or charge up a radial projectile attack.

As for the other two alternate bosses coming up, I won't spoil them just yet. And two more will appear in the update following this one. Additionally, all new bosses have their own original sound tracks.

[h3]New Upgrades[/h3]



Ultra-Rare Wild Mod: Ricochet

• When your weapon projectile would be destroyed, it instead rebounds an additional time toward a nearby target
  
• -15% projectiles
  
• Recursive: This mod may be taken multiple times
  

Supermod: Charged Shields (Requires: Charged Shot + Focused Shields)

• While charging your weapon, 25% of your charge value applies to your shield effect radius and shield effect power, up to a maximum of +100%
  

Ultra-Rare Wild Mod: Challenger

• Summons a challenger, a champion or boss enemy bearing increased power and orb drops
  
• Each subsequent challenger is stronger and grants more orbs than the last
  
• If the challenger is destroyed, it will drop a random power-up
  
• If the challenger is destroyed, you will gain +1 level
  
• Recursive: This mod may be taken multiple times
  

Supermod: Infuse (Requires: Discharge + Magnitude)

• Discharge now deals 15% of your current shields self-damage to you
  
• When you fire your weapon its base damage is increased by the amount of self-damage dealt by Discharge divided between projectiles fired
  
• Discharge's bolts of energy originate from your weapon projectiles instead of you, when they are destroyed on impact
  

[h3]Construct Overhauls[/h3]

Drones were feeling dated, and so we have given the trees a major overhaul, allowing them to better compete with the perils of Enemies 2.0. Additionally, many underperforming mods have been folded into existing mods. For instance, you don't have to purchase Formation: Pursuit or Formation: Rampart anymore. They just come with the Assault Drones and Defense Drones mods, respectively.









We've also made many QoL changes to constructs. For instance, for specialized Drone and Ally types, you no longer have to make it to the bottom of the tree. You can get Assault Drones, Defense Drones, Interceptors, or Allies right after buying the root mod.



[h3]More Construct Love:[/h3]

• Mines have been reworked to provide a low-investment, alternate option to Loaded Mines. Mines (without Loaded Mines) now spawn 6-9 bomblet explosions moments after detonation. Each bomblet deals a portion of the mine base damage. Additionally, Minefield and Retribution have received large buffs.
  
• Turrets have been given much better scaling from mods and improved missile damage and base hull.
  
• Other construct support mods, like Self-Destruction and Burnout Reactors have also been made stronger.
  
• Construct AI is being looked at, especially in regards to their behavior in the presense of a Bulwark. They will soon regard the business-end of a Bulwark as a bad target, and a bad place to hang out.
  
• Formation: Battalion and Formation: Rampart track more firmly with the player, like the default formation does.
  
• Carrier has been given a pass as well, and we'll be watching during beta to make sure its performing up to par. Carrier has lost its malus to rate of fire and gained a shield durability buff. Additionally, it's got some newly refurbished mods to play with...
  

[h2]More Overhauls, Big Buffs, and Balance[/h2]



As with all of our updates, we'll continue improving the quality of the game. Here are some of the other buffs and features you can look forward to:

• Ataraxia has been reworked, providing bonus powers for threhholds of stored upgrades.
  
• We've continued to address complaints of spikey difficulty, especially for new players. Particularly unfair waves and enemies are being iterated on.
  
• Many dozens of player buffs have been included, especially for underperforming Supermods, shields, weapons, and bodies.
  
• Cargo Train boxes now drop four different types of power-ups.
  
• Power-ups and experience orbs are now highly resistent to the pull of singularities. Rejoice!
  
• Raycasting has been implemented for Railgun, allowing you to strike enemy weak points with precision.
  
• A visible list of banished mods can now be seen on the upgrade menu.
  
• We've made dozens of bug fixes and optimizations.
  
• Spanish localization has been added.
  

[h2]What's Next?[/h2]
Enemies 2.0, part 3, follows this upcoming update. That will add the last of the 2 alternate bosses, as well as Challenge Mode: Boss Rush, where you will face all 10 bosses, one after another, and earn large upgrades inbetween. As usual, other features and reworks will also arrive, such as new weapon gear and a glow-up for the Ally trees.

[h2]Discord Upgraded! Come Hang[/h2]
We've got quite an active discord with a very chill and inclusive community. The dev team is also pretty active there. We recently opened up some new channels like #weekly-discussion, #ask-the-devs, and #feedback. The latter allows you to submit feedback to a bot that lets players upvote or downvote the suggestion. I'm also quite proud of the #game-dev-help channel, which is a space for current and aspiring developers to learn and collaborate. So... come chat with us!

[h3]Want to help Nova Drift grow?[/h3]
Steam Reviews really help! As a tiny operation, Nova Drift relies on its quality and reputation to sell, and reviews also encourage the Steam algorithms to show the game to more people. Please do take a moment to fill out a short review, even if it's only a few words. It just might make a big difference.

Thanks for reading. Best wishes,

Chimeric / Jeffrey Nielson

This week we gathered feedback from players regarding the increased difficulty of the game, especially for newer players, since the Enemies 2.0 update. We agreed there was quite a bit we could do to alleviate the steepness of the learning curve and have made some changes in today's patch. Enemies 2.0 introduced dynamic waves, which, like any procedurally generated system, is famously difficult to tune. I'm sure it will take some time to get it just right, but I'm confident that today's changes are a step in the right direction.

* We tuned the exp curve to be slightly more like to the old one, which means a few more level ups during early game. I believe this small change makes quite a big difference to the new-player experience, which can be a bit exp starved due to the relatively low enemy quantity.

* Many of the more dangerous things that dynamic waves does are now gated behind the Challenge Mode: Elite Enemy, instead of being in the "core" experience.

* The new enemies introduced in Enemies 2.0, which tend to be tougher and more dangerous, are also introduced later if the Elite Enemy Challenge Mode is not turned on.

* Several of the more dangerous enemies introduced in the previous update have had their difficulty tuned in such a way that allows slower and less "glass-cannon" builds to deal with them.

* Many other small changes have been made to enemies that tend to be dangerous to new players, for instance, enemies that attack using beam weapons are now easier to escape.

Thanks for your patience as we continue to refine the game and approach release. We'll keep working to ensure that Nova Drift has something for everybody!