Welcome to the first edition of Straight from the Pond, our monthly newsletter that covers all the latest happenings at AFP and our in-development projects. New editions will be announced across all our socials, but you can also get these directly to your inbox by subscribing at the bottom of this page.
What have we got in store today? We’re showing an early look at the first two of Waterjacked’s four major updates: The Visibility Update and the Elephant Graveyard Update. The Visibility Update will arrive in February, followed by the Elephant Graveyard, which has yet to receive a launch window. We have two more updates planned after these, the Prophecy Update and Endless Update, but we’ll cover those later! So, without further ado, let’s get into it!
The Visibility Update
Hey y’all, Jacob here! The Visibility Update is all about improving the experience of, well, playing Waterjacked. From those that provided feedback, we heard you loud and clear: what in the world did the modules do? This was a great question, and we decided to find out for ourselves by adding a handy tooltip system. As a quick aside, the screenshots we’re sharing below are still work-in-progress and may change between now and the update’s launch.
New players were left in the dark on module behavior, which made it impossible to intelligently engage with Waterjacked’s mechanics. Now, whether in the shop or in-game, you can see exactly what your modules do. Additional icons appear for power cost and how the module affects the pathing of your projectiles. If a module has multiple power tiers, those will also be displayed in the tooltip.
You might have noticed the small [i] in the shop and backpack. That button will take you to the encyclopedia, an all-in-one resource where you can view all modules, enemies, and augments (more on those later). The encyclopedia can be accessed from anywhere, so even if you’re mid-game, you can pop it open and find whatever information you need. We’re currently working on integrating icons to save space and provide easy keyword references.
Next on the chopping block was the in-game player interface. We received a handful of notes on problematic elements like the toolbar, stats, and fire button. So, we went a little overboard and ended up refreshing the entire HUD. The GRID also got some fresh sprites during this process. There are still a few extra points of polish, but overall, we’re happy with how this turned out. For example, we aren’t married to the current look of the editing buttons on the left. We also want to add some extra visual feedback to the fire button.
We also added cost previews while editing modules. The cost previews for rotation and deletion are anchored, but placement costs and move costs float dynamically with the cursor. The previews also update in real-time, so any surfaces (more on this later) that adjust costs will have those effects accounted for. It is now possible to know exactly how many actions it will cost to place a module. If you played an early demo of Waterjacked, you may have noticed we also switched from using AP (action points) to just ACT (actions). This was a stylistic choice due to how nicely it matches DMG.
Earlier, while showing off the tooltips, you might have noticed some changes to the Fabricator’s Shop. We did away with the original backpack design to match the in-game UI. We also refreshed the rugs and cost banners to match their rarities. Some of Wyatt’s beautiful programmer art can be seen in this screenshot.
The trash can has been converted to a grinder to help visually explain the refund that you can get while scrapping modules or augments. A new stats HUD is anchored in the bottom left, which will be very helpful when deciding what augments you’d like to purchase. We also added new buttons with custom icons to help navigate between the different menus. The Waterbill is still going to be added, but has undergone some design changes, which coincide with those weird augments I keep mentioning.
Although the Visibility Update doesn’t have a lot of content, it does come with some gameplay changes. The shop, overall, will be more expensive and feature smaller quantities of items. The number of slots was reduced from nine to eight, and we’ve altered the weights for what appears in the shop. By default, a shop will always have at least three modules, one augment, and one herbal item. Since augments (and their little brother herbals) won’t be in the Visibility update, those slots will be left blank. After the minimum items have been considered, the shop rolls the remaining slots to determine what will appear there. Don’t think we’ve forgotten the map though!
The scenario icons on the map had their visual state tightened down. Available scenarios have a highlighted border when you mouse over them, while unavailable and completed don’t to prevent confusion. The lines between scenarios have more drastic color changes to help show where you’ve been and where you can and cannot go.
Although we’re happy with how the map itself looks, the UI around it needed some love. The scenario preview got a major facelift and now looks like a wanted poster. We swapped out the full enemy characters with stylized icons. Before, the preview would show all enemies present in that scenario. Now, the preview shows an icon if that enemy will appear in the level at least once. There could be more than one, though! The rewards you’ll get from a scenario are displayed now as well. Do note that enemies can drop additional rewards while playing, and the final total can be seen at the rewards screen after clearing the scenario.
The Elephant Graveyard
Now, onto a sneak peek of the next update, the Elephant Graveyard Update! The reason it’s called that can be summed up as “Narrative ✨” (according to our designer Mia). This update focuses exclusively on new content. We have some exciting plans for enemies, but they will be revealed in a later edition. For now, we want to showcase a new system called Augments.
Augments are a gameplay feature we are very excited about. They can be obtained on your runs from the shop, rewards from a scenario, and, perhaps, as rare drops from enemies. What do they do? Well, the sky’s the limit. These run-specific upgrades will have a huge variety of powers (some of which will come at a cost, and not just scrap). Augments lay the foundation for builds, which is a core part of any roguelike experience. How will the drops and items you obtain influence your strategies?
That’s it for sneak peeks of Waterjacked! For a little bit of news on the studio side of things, we are bringing Waterjacked to a local college campus for playtesting in February. There are a few other events that we have in the works, and we will share more information once we have the final details hammered down. I’d also like to give a thank you to all the people in our Discord who gave feedback on the initial demo; it helped us get to where we are today. See you on the playfield!
