Visceral Battle and Character Development

The latest rundown on progress covers developments with both the battle system and some of the playable content of Unto the Breach. Let's take a look!

Fire damage!

While I think the combat in Unto the Breach is pretty solid at this point, there's definitely room for improvement. Some of the major steps I've implemented recently include:

• Fixing an awkward pause between the generic casting animation for spells/abilities and the actual execution animation (everything would just pause for a second or two). Combat flows much more smoothly now.
• Fixing an issue where enemies would play the generic casting animation twice for...reasons.
• Adding a popup that indicates an enemy is weak to the element used in the attack that hit them (making it MUCH more obvious what abilities are working well, aside from the damage numbers).
• Color-coding the damage numbers for each of the different elements to more clearly indicate when that element is getting used. Their names in the elemental resistance window of the Status menu have also been changed to match these colors. The colors are:
  • ​Normal: White
  • Healing: Green
  • Fire: Red
  • Earth: Brown
  • Metal: Light Pink
  • Water: Blue
  • Wood: Green/Yellow
  • Dark: Dark Purple
  • Holy: Gold
  • Arcane: Turquoise
• Corrected some alignment issues with icons in some places, as well as fixing it so when stats are buffed/debuffed during combat it displays the proper icon (such as ATK with an up arrow if ATK is buffed) instead of whatever random icon it previously felt like showing.
• Added a screen color flash effect that happens when a critical hit is landed, making it more obvious.
• When a state/buff/debuff is applied to a battler, the icon flashes over the battler briefly to better indicate the new effect.
• An afterglow-type effect is applied when someone receives healing.
• If an attack is dodged, the defender engages in a brief motion blur movement to better indicate they avoided the attack.

I also plan on adding some custom animations for attack and counter-attack movements so you can more clearly see who's attacking who, and especially to better indicate a counter-attack happened (as-is it can be confusing when that happens, and is probably one of the biggest complaints I've gotten at shows from players).

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Character Quests

Progress has also been made on some of the character-driven side quests you can play over the course of the game. Aside from the main plot and side jobs you can get, you'll also sometimes get side quests specifically oriented around your various companions. Conrad, Lucy, and Ali each have a quest focused on them in episode one. While they're optional, completing them will reward you with additional XP and other rewards, improve your standing with those companions (which will have narrative effects), and may even lead to special unlocks.

Actually, on the note of standing, I should expound on that for a moment. Throughout the game, in addition to the character-specific quests, you'll be forced to make a variety of ethical and practical decisions. Even in the Solar Era, humans are gonna human, and your companions will rarely agree on what course of action to take. Therefore, the decisions you make (and technically which companion's side you take) will affect their opinions of you/Alex. It'll be impossible to please everyone at once, and your companions' opinions might factor into your decisions. You don't have to worry about anyone ragequitting the group if their opinion drops too low, but having companions pissed off probably won't be ideal. Or maybe it'll lead to some interesting narrative developments, who knows? *Whistles innocently*
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...Yes.

Anyway, that'll do it for this update. Thanks for reading!