New year, new you, new game feel. Speed Power-ups have entered the race loadouts!
Speed Power-ups
A new power-up category with 3 new power-ups have been added to the game. These are speed power-ups which are guaranteed to bring some heat to the track.
What are the Speed Power-ups?
Boost Speed
The classic Fun Run Speed Power-up. Heads on fire so obviously you run faster.
Blast Speed
A short, but powerful Speed Power-up. Blast of in the direction you are already going. You might not get as far, but you'll get there quicker. The blast is so powerful that any collision that makes you stop too quickly will leave you getting smushed a bit. Actually, a whole lot of smushed.
Jumpy Speed
What if jumping didn't slow you down, but instead gave you speed? This is the question we are finally able to answer with the Jumpy Speed Power-up. Each jump sends you higher, but also faster. Make sure to jump as much as you can when this one is active.
Kicking off races with speed
You will now drop into races with your selected Speed Power-up ready to be used from the start of the race. Will you be hitting the first obstacles and getting into the action faster, or saving it for a strategic move? That's for you to decide.
Your first Speed Power-up
Since Speed Power-ups haven't been in the power-up loadout yet, we're making sure everyone is starting off with a bit of fire in their pocket. By that we mean that everyone is getting the Boost Speed power-up from the start.
Are you still reading this? I guess you're here for some details!
- Speed and Shield power-ups will cancel each other. Balloons will be able to be used while having a Speed power-up active.
- Speed power-ups and Animal abilities will cancel each other. For example: Using Bears Ability while Boost Speed is active will cancel Boost Speed.
- Fox Passive is changed from starting with a shield power-up to getting a very short shield when using a speed power-up.
- Naturally, power-up drop distribution has been tweaked to make sure Speed Power-up fit.
- The new Speed Power-ups will now be used in the other game modes that have previously had Speed based power-ups in their custom power-up rules.
Other game-play changes
Balance
Sawblades
Both Sawblade power-ups have had their behavior modified. We've felt that they've never quite been as aggressive as we've wanted them to be. Therefore they have had their speed and acceleration slightly increased, but with a delay to when they start accelerating so that it's still reasonable to see them coming when thrown.
Thrown Power-ups
All thrown power-ups (offensives and traps) have had their throwing arcs changed slightly. The goal for this change is to make these power-ups more satisfying to use. They will not go straighter for the first moment they are thrown. This change also works nicely with the changes to Sawblades.
Balloons
When a balloon power-up pops it will get a few frames of invulnerability time. Being hit by two things at the same time has always felt a bit unfair with balloons. We've also seen and experienced that this can be a confusing thing as it's not always clear that two things hit you at roughly the same time.
- Balloon Invulnerability On Block: 0 s -> 0.2 s
Slow Grenade
Slow Grenade has been an outlier in high trophy races with some higher win-rates than other power-ups. We are making a change to the ability charge gained from the Slow Grenade hits in order to bring this back a bit.
- Ability Charge Gain: 120 -> 90
Notable Bug-fixes
Chameleon Direction Bug
We've fixed a bug that caused some actions to overwrite the aim direction of other actions. This has been mostly noticeable with Chameleon suddenly flying backwards when using a power-up after using the ability, but before hitting someone with it.
From now on Chameleon should always fly off in the right direction.
Robin Shield Bug
We've fixed a bug where the Robins passive ability could cause shields to not attribute Ability Charge from blocking power-ups. From now on, the blocking action with the highest Ability Charge will count the charge.
Other
Some animations have been updated to be more responsive.
Double Powerup pickup delay has been extended.
If you've been playing for a while you know this is a pretty big change to the game! We are excited to see how this evolves and will be keeping an eye out for anything that needs adjustment. We're looking forward to hear your feedback.