Patreon Weekly #46 - Apr 21st, 2020

Hey Patrons!

As I’m sure you’re all aware, 0.8.0 finally released last Thursday! I spent the first half of last week finishing up spritework, and after release I’ve been mainly focused on replying to a bunch of messages and tracking issues relating to the update.

0.8.0 is doing very well so far, honestly better than I expected, but there are always enough issues to warrant a patch. It’s not too pressing though, so I’ll likely wait until later this week or even early next week before releasing 0.8.0a, which should give me some time to include balance adjustments in it as well.

Aside from that, my focus is mainly turning towards 0.8.1, and I’ll be detailing what specific things that will include, as well as getting you guys involved in the process, over the coming weeks.

Read on if you'd like more details... 

How is 0.8.0 Performing?

It’s too early to make final decisions about balance and reception, but so far feedback on 0.8.0 has been very encouraging.

The chart above is Shattered’s installs per-hour on Google Play; 0.8.0 caused quite a nice boost! What is interesting is that these installs are predominately returning users, who are presumably coming back to the game now that there is something new to explore. More specific feedback such as messages from users has also been nearly universally positive. There are of course specific issues that I plan to address (such as the new red flash effect showing up a bit too often), but the overall impression of the update seems to be very good!

As far as balance is concerned, I need to wait for more numbers to be sure about specific things like items, but overall game balance seems quite good. The chart above shows death rates for floor 10+ among players who have won at least once. The regular floors are nice and smooth, and Dwarf King has already settled in nicely in terms of death rate. I plan to keep an eye on Yog and DM-300, but they are likely to go down as players learn the new mechanics.

The Next Few Content Polls

As mentioned before, one big focus of 0.8.1 is on doing a big balance pass over most of the game’s items once the dust settles from 0.8.0. The current analytics data for 0.8.0 isn’t precise enough to start making specific design decisions, but I can identify items that will likely need to be tweaked and start concepting for them.

Some items can just get numbers tweaks, but there’s a growing shortlist of items that could do with more extensive mechanics changes, either to improve their balance or to make them more interesting/fun. I can’t get to all of these items in 0.8.1 of course, so helping me determine which items to give priority to sounds like a great subject for some content polls!

It’s going to be a bit longer because I’m sure enough to start polling specific items, but there are some obvious candidates that have been mentioned in the past, such as the talisman of foresight, ring of wealth, ring of tenacity, and alchemy produce like magical porter. I can’t make any promises just yet, but please let me know in the comments or on the Patreon Discord if there are specific items you’d like to see as poll choices.