The Big Update is finally here!

3 years ago by Ouro

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Well folks, it took a good long while. This was a hectic year and thanks to ballooning goals and shrinking personal time, I fell WELL behind schedule. But the big content update, the Snake Agenda, is finally here! It more than doubles the amount of content in the demo. Everything the demo had before, this has given it more of that.

Important Note: This update changes so many structural things, in fact, that regrettably I have to inform that you won't be able to transfer any old save-data from the previous version to this new one. Doing so will glitch out your game, especially the parts regarding the Party and Memory Battle systems. So I'm afraid that this new version will have to be experienced with a fresh save. On the bright side, now that this update has established so much more base parts of the game, I expect all future updates to allow save-data transfers in the future.

PATCH NOTES

The Snake Agenda content update adds a lot of new stuff to the demo. It’s been a long time coming. But what exactly are we looking at here?

New Content

An extension of the game’s story from where the demo left off. This new bit of story will take you through some of the update’s new content but not all of it. The rest is a lot of optional exploration!
The Stillwater Lakes region present in the first demo was just a little stub of an area. It has now been extended into a large area in its own right, full of unique enemies, places to explore, sidequests and a smattering of NPC’s.
The Taroi Camp has been added to the game. You may remember it from the demo as that weird crater-tent thing on the minimap that you couldn’t visit. Well now you can! A mostly harmless area, it mostly functions as a mercantile hub though it has a few secrets of its own…
Mt Recludere, the big mountain to the immediate north of Threnody is now explorable! It’s a somewhat alarmingly large area with multiple stages of it that need to be unlocked. As a result, the kind of things you can find there range from basic earlygame content to dungeons to secret superbosses.
And rounding out our new areas, you can now visit Low Kallech as well. It’s somewhat of a stub currently, much like how Stillwater Lakes was like back in the old demo but with its inclusion, every spot you can reach on the demo map is now properly part of the game and can be visited in whatever order you see fit! Look forward to a lot more Low Kallech content to be added in the future.
New illustrations by my good friend, Gehn. In addition to that, Gehn is also contributing battler art for a very special and specific enemy. See if you can find them!
More music, most of it taken from the excellent royalty-free music resources of WinglessSeraph. There are also three (awful) tracks that I made personally, all of which are in purely optional content for your own safety.
New sidequests!
Extensions to old ones. There’s a whole lot more content continuing on from the Sprite Revolution, for example.
You can now, under the right circumstances, recruit certain NPC’s. Pay them what they want and they’ll join your party as extra muscle until you next use an Inn. With the new party system (see below in the General Game Changes section), having someone else to swap into when needed can seriously strengthen your party. One of your party members has been downed? Why waste time reviving and healing them mid-combat when you can swap in a temp instead?
There are four recruitable characters currently, plus a fifth one that you have to summon with a battle skill.
An unlockable way to hop along the lilypad paths, allowing you to finally go to all of those places that you couldn’t in the old demo and more besides.
A skill that lets you traverse the dreams of others! Visit the dreams of your party companions and dive into the dreams of certain enemies. Dreams can range from single rooms to entire dungeons with their own special enemy types, puzzles and bosses.
An item, the Gravity Feather, allows you a third new mode of traversal: falling. With this, you can simply fall distances you could never dream of before and potentially find whole new places.
With the help of a new game item, Memory Tickets, you can go back and relive old choices. This is mostly a way to see permanently missable content, much of which relates to time-sensitive companion choices. Spent time with Ria on the first Sprite Hive campfire break but now you want to know what she says if you take her on the second instead? This is the stuff for you.
You can also use them to unlock Memory Battles, which allow you to refight bosses that you’ve beaten before. You won’t get XP, G or item drops from them but Dorothy can learn new skills in the realms of memory as easily as she can in real life. Hopefully this makes reaching 100% skill completion a lot easier.
Speaking of which, there is now a skill-counter in the game who can keep you apprised of just how many more skills there are left and will reward you if ever actually reach 100% completion.
Over 60 new skills that Dorothy can learn!
Over 60 new types of enemies to find and fight. The days of fighting slimes and lobsters are over. Now you can fight snakes, frogs and apples as well.
18 new boss-fights, only 4 of which are required for plot progression.
Two new dungeons. The plot will force you to visit one but the second is hidden.

With the new stuff being added here, I’m trying to stay true to the Unborn Daughter promise of open world exploration. Story-related content aside, the bulk of this stuff is completely optional and can be explored in multiple different orders. Play the game your way and come up with your own strategies. And if you ever hit a road-block, explore somewhere else! Maybe you’ll find the tools you need.

And on top of the new content, the Snake Agenda update comes with the following changes:

Bugfixes

Fixed the bug where defeating the Stillborn God gave your screen a slight but permanent red tint.
Fixed a bug where being inflicted with Rage and having Unfurl active would stunlock Dorothy indefinitely. Now it only stunlocks her until the Rage’s turn timer runs out.
Fixed an issue where the Stillborn God’s name could turn white without you knowing all of her skills.
Fixed a bug where Hermetic Bullet could occasionally fire off the wrong element.
Fixed an issue where certain varieties of Fish could be consumed from the Inventory to absolutely no effect.
Fixed an issue in the old demo where you couldn’t fish in the water just outside of Ria’s ‘house’. Now you can.
Fixed an issue where the Frozen Helm garb was equippable as a shield instead of a helmet.
Fixed a bug in the ‘Storming the Walls’ event where, having gotten up onto the titular wall, you could simply walk off of it.
Fixed a bunch of instances where an enemy would use non-stackable self-status moves in succession, to no effect. If any of these are still in the game, please tell me whenever you see them!
Fixed an amazing intangible palm tree in the Nearby Shore.
Fixed a bug where, if you managed to add Jameson to the party before ever speaking to Azi, speaking to her for the first time would softlock the game.
Fixed a bug where enemies with the ability to absorb elemental damage were not doing so.
Fixed a bug where Toxogenesis’ animation wouldn’t play.
Fixed a bug where the skill Siren’s Lure used potions instead of bait as ammunition.

General Game Changes

You can now get a full downlow of status effects, enemy or ally, by hovering your mouse over the status sign. You no longer have to guess what status effects enemies have, no longer have to navigate to the Status menu mid-fight to get the details of something afflicting a party member. This also allows some enemies to have ‘notification states’, informing the player about certain invisible traits like Evasion, how many actions per turn they have and in some cases, specific boss events.
Added a state categorisation system so that now many curative effects may remove a whole category of status effects rather than just an eclectic handful.
Added an item into the game that makes it possible to filter Dorothy’s skills into subcategories beyond just Magic, Void, Special and Weapon. You can also turn this item off after acquiring it if you decide that you don’t care for it.
But beyond that, a universal skill ordering system has been instituted. Skills of each of the four types are now ordered by cost and not just scattered haphazardly in order of their addition to the game.
The counter system has been slightly changed. Skills now exist that can counter being targeted by anything, not just an attack.
The entire party system has been thoroughly revamped. Namely, we now actually have one. This will allow you to make use of the new recruits and summon mechanics, should you wish to.
You can now swap party members mid-combat, allowing you to effectively make use of more than four party members should the battle require it.
Dorothy is now locked in the party formation and can never be changed or removed. This isn’t just to preserve the point of the game, it’s also because not having Dorothy in the first position breaks a lot of shit.
Sped up the opening text crawl right at the start of the game.
Made a whole bunch of small dialogue edits all over the place.
Removed a few extraneous empty dialogue boxes that had popped up.
The combat tutorial when you first meet Ria is now skippable if you feel so inclined.
Changed the text of aforesaid tutorial to mention the new mechanics that have now been added to the game.

Map Changes

Lowered the random encounter rates in almost every region in the game, *especially* in Shallas Grove.
The soldiers guarding the Oozelord’s Den in Shallas Grove will now offer to send you back to the start of the maze if you want.
Made it so that when you leave Threnody via the south path you are dumped out into the Overworld in an appropriate spot and facing the right way. Hopefully this leads to less accidental instances of walking right back into Threnody again.
Made minor changes to the spacing of some of the teleporters in the Sprite Hive’s teleporter maze. Previously, players who made a wrong step could wind up getting trapped between incorrect teleporters and being forcibly teleported back to the start.
Added a bit more content and visual diversity to the Nearby Shore’s general terrain. Not a lot, just a bit.
Just tried in general to make some maps look a *little* better aesthetically than they had been before. Not by a lot, that’s not really what this update is supposed to be about. Also no, the Brack still looks like ass. That’s next update’s problem!
The places you can visit on the map are now marked with little animated stars. With it now made clear, the map is now full of a lot of other terrain that you can’t visit and never will and is just there to lend flavour to the Southlands. This is a big change so I’d like your opinions on whether this is better or worse than the previous approach.

Skill Changes

You can no longer use Eye of the Void while Blind. Blind makes you unable to gain the Learn status but in the old demo, you were able to still use Eye to zero effect. So now the ability to waste your turn this way has been fixed.
Trismegistus now has a new skill, Hylic, that lets her revoke her current Mastery and reset back to ‘default’ in exchange for receiving a small heal.
Ria’s skill, Split-Fist, now costs 15% of max HP instead of 10%.
If the Gathering Storm count ever reaches 20+, Dorothy begins to take side-effects from holding so much lightning.
Shaved 10 frames off Trish’s Thrice-Mastered animation. This skill eats up enough time as it is!
The Slumbering Beast skill now heals all DoT status effects in general.
Slumbering Beast can now only be used once per battle.
Quaver is now no longer an entirely useless skill. If Ria is in the party when Dorothy Quavers, Ria will do double damage on her next turn.
Wild Hunt has been buffed to make it Instant Cast.
Euphoric Tome’s cost has been increased from 20 TP to 40.
Cheerleader’s party-wide HP/MP heal has been reduced from 50% to 30%.
Buffed the damage by Explosive Brew by 150%.
Queen of Worms changed to inflict Shallow Grave on a single ally instead of all allies. This avoids the entire party exploding the moment the battle ends and causing an unavoidable Game Over.
Added eye-related animations for a bunch of eye-based skills such as Eye of the Void, Judge, etc.
Changed the description of Hermetic Bullet to hopefully make it easier to track what element it uses and how to change it.
Pinnacle is now Instant-Cast.
Juggernaut’s TP cost reduced from 5 to 1.
The TON spell now deals 400 extra damage. This is base damage, applied before the scaling damage is added.
The Royal Jelly skill now gives Ria the Drunk status if used when she is not in need of a revive. Just to be clear, this is a buff to the skill. Drunk is good.
Overclock no longer has a flat cost of 20 HP and MP. It now costs 3% of your max HP and MP. That should keep it around the same cost as the old version when you’re at Level 1 but now it scales up as the party does.
Slime Dance Music no longer gives an extra TP buff to the user. They get the same amount as everyone else.
The Enlighten skill no longer secretly deals Fire damage instead of Light damage. It’s description has also been changed to better communicate that it does damage at all.
Gathering Storm’s cooldown lowered from 2 to 1.
Desperate Blade’s MP cost has been reduced by 100.
The ‘Experimental Mishap’ skill changed to ‘Experiment Mishap’ to prevent clipping issues.
Similarly, ‘Smothering Invitation’ changed to ‘Coy Invitation’.
“Maddening Whetstone’ changed to ‘Soul Whetstone’.
‘Whirling Hexblade’ changed to ‘Hexblade Spin’
‘Abhorred Neutrality’ changed to ‘Neutral Foe’
Removed the reference to Holy Word from the dialogue you get for learning Unholy Silence, since it’s possible to proc Unholy Silence from other abilities besides Holy Word.
Fixed a bunch of skills being usable out of battle when that made no sense.
Chill Out’s MP recovery has been lowered from 300% LCK to 200%.
The Tome Skill ‘Cleanse’ now blanket removes all DoT status effects and all status effects that prevent you from taking certain actions.
Boil Blood now also inflicts 5 stacks of Ill as well as inflicting Rage.

Status Changes

Changed the Mega status’ duration from 1-3 turns to 2-3 turns. This helps mirror the Mini status’ duration, since they’re supposed to be equal opposites.
Being inflicted with the Born status now dispels the Void-Channeling status.
The series of Invoking status effects brought about by TETRA are now called Invoking I, Invoking II and Invoking II respectively. Hopefully this helps reduce confusion.
The Void-Channeling status now lasts for 10 turns rather than for the entire battle.
Ria’s Wild Rage state no longer makes her look she’s suffering or dying. That never made sense, did it?

Enemy Changes

Gave Kingdom Soldier, Lost Soldier, Scared Knight, Captain of the Guard and any future ‘just a dude in armour’ enemies an elemental weakness to Thunder.
Sweet Pepper Anne’s innate Evasion boosted from 5% to 15% in order to bring her in line with the regular Trickster Sprite enemy, which she is supposed to be.
Wildfire Sprite’s and Thunderbolt Sprite’s Evasion increased from 5% to 10% in order to bring them in line with the Evasion rates of all the other elemental sprites.
Awoken Sprite’s Evasion increased from 5% to 10% so that it is at least a little ‘sprite-like’ still.
Wicked Snowman is now able to take two actions per round.
Winged Torment’s Evasion has been increased from 10% to 15%. It’s DEF has been lowered from 35 to 20.
The chances of Old Visitor applying the Rot status on attack have been increased by 10%.
The Oozelord’s ‘True Oozelord’ form is now immune to the new Ill status, though the first phase of the fight is not.
The Old Visitor is now immune to the Ill status.
The Major Fish-Being now starts the battle with the ‘Blessed Scales’ status effect.
The Scared Knight ‘boss’ will now, under certain circumstances, eventually gather up the courage to fight a little more skillfully.
There is now a visual indicator that should hopefully make the Living Curse easier to discover.
The Living Curse’s ATK has been increased by 20.
In the prelude fight to the Stillborn God, the Elf Witch now receives more of a stat buff from the Coffin than she previously did.
The Slime DJ’s HP has been increased from 1000 to 1500.
Thunderbolt Sprites now have the ability to use the skill Stormbolt if the weather is stormy enough.
Made the Runaway Noa fight slightly harder by letting her consume a potion once she’s hurt.
Sprite Sentries no longer just spontaneously die when you reveal the Sprite Queen’s Sceptre to them. They just abort the battle instead.
The gold drop rate of certain enemies has been increased.
The Gelatin Lure’s M.DEF has been dropped from 50 to 30.
The Oozelord’s ‘True Oozelord’ form now has a passive that grants it +5 TP regen every turn.
The Major Fish-Being now looks a lot less blurry.

Item, Weapon and Garb Changes

The Panacea item has been reworked to remove all purely negative status effects from a target party member.
The Faeblade has been buffed by +20 ATK.
The Violet Umbrella has been buffed by +5 ATK.
The Slimy Mitts has been buffed by +5 ATK.

NPC Changes

The albino lady who buys alchemical consumables no longer buys brews that you can get from other stores. In hindsight this was an obvious infinite money exploit that was real silly. Now she only wants the rarer brews, most of which can only be found in chests or from Trismegistus’ Experiment Mishap skill. There’s still an infinite money farm there if you use Mishap a lot but that’s okay. That’s kind of the point of that skill, that it’d be there if you want to devote the time to do that.
Gave the Sprite Revolutionary an extra line to better hint that the party needs to visit her again when the party isn’t afflicted with Mini to get access to her questline.
Retooled Karmen’s pathing so that he should never block off the path to the left of Threnody’s gross blight pool.

Thank you so much for your patience. I hope you enjoy the update!