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Patch 1 - Let's talk fair competition

Apr 1, 2019

New toys for speedrunning and various improvements in the new update for HA/CK!

Hello there, after some unexpected delays in the development process I am finally ready to release the new update for HA/CK. This update brings an ability to slow down time for those people who are persistent in their will to break the game and find new shortcuts. Many people will also appreciate a separate timer for individual levels. Consequently, a new Timewarp scoreboard has been introduced which can be viewed in the Steam Community. Additionally, various improvements and bug-fixes have been done.

The main motivation for the features introduced in this update is providing an option for freedom of play without reliance on third party software, which could be considered cheating. To provide a fair competition in the global level scoreboards, level playthroughs where Timewarp is used are not submitted and an option is provided to disable uploading of your scores alltogether (and I am naively hoping that people modifying the game to perform unintended actions will make use of it).

Regarding cheating - it is an universal issue concerning any game with online features ever created. As HA/CK is a single-player game without any real versus aspects, it would be foolish and even unfair towards customers to implement any anti-cheating measures, as they are known to occasionally cause issues for select people. Additionally, it does not align with my own philosophy to deliberately obfuscate game data. It is a product customers pay for and they have a right to use it as they please.

Added:

• Timewarp feature
○ Must be enabled manually in Settings -> Gameplay
○ Key can be set in game launcher
○ When activated, slows down time to a configurable multiplier from 0.01x to 0.99x
○ Can be set to toggle or hold mode
• Ability to disable score uploading
• Timer for individual levels (must be enabled)

Changed:

• Updated Unity to version 2018.3.8f
○ Nested prefabs - at last!!! (not relevant to players, I'm just happy)
○ This change forced me to update the post-processing component. As this made me lose the old configuration, everything will look slightly differently now. I think it looks nice, though!
○ Updated Json.NET library
• Disabled streaming of lightmaps
○ I don't know if this will change anything, but load times might become slightly longer, and stuttering on slow hard-drives might be reduced.
• Improved lightmap fidelity
• Removed Steam Audio spatialization engine
○ Overall surround sound quality will be reduced
○ People with weak CPUs can expect better performance
○ Fixes issues with audio cutting out or obnoxiously clipping
• Speedrun timer is fully paused while paused now (previous behavior WAS intentional, if not a bit awkward)
• First steps toward a more complete code refactor have been done.
• Implemented beautiful time formatting throughout the UI
○ No more junk like 3:6.22 - instead 03:06.22
○ Timed scoreboards are also displayed in formatted time instead of ms
• Removed collisions from hologram emitters in spawn rooms
• Adjusted layout of 09 - Kernel Panic
○ A jump towards the exit door platform should be easier to do now

Fixed:

• Local speedrun time now saves the longest instead of shortest time.
○ Even though this time never shows up anywhere right now, I might use it later.
• In the death and victory screens pressing "Retry" will now only restart the level instead of the entire speedrun
• Fixed softlock when a currently possessed turret gets destroyed
• Various crashes should be fixed now
• And sound errors should be fixed too
• Scoreboard reliability should be improved
• Level timer triggers were incorrectly set for most levels, expect slightly increased scores

Known issues:

• Log file contains many messages about materials not having a meta pass - this is an issue with Unity and is harmless.
○ This only happens in the main menu
○ The message is not spammed constantly, therefore does not fill storage with garbage
• Due to an unforeseen event of my testing Mac not wanting to co-operate, the OSX build for this patch is not tested on OSX. If issues arise, especially with Steam features such as achievements or leaderboards not working, please report them!

HA/CK

HA/CK release date announcement!

Feb 12, 2019

Hi everyone, hope you are having an enjoyable week! I know I am, because I will be releasing HA/CK very soon and cannot contain the excitement! I never imagined releasing something, which started as a project of hobby and passion on Steam, yet here I am!

So, without further rambling - HA/CK Remastered will be launching on Steam, on all three major platforms, on February 15, 2019! (factorial not intended)

Bundled with the announcement is also a shiny new trailer, now live on the store page and Gampixi YouTube channel.

I cannot wait to hear your opinions, see your speedruns, and attempt to beat your scores. The community of old HA/CK had already amazed me, I cannot imagine what I'll be seeing now.

HA/CK

Development update 1.4142 - Development speed and what's coming

Jan 31, 2019

Hi there! For this blogpost I'll assume that there are some people in the world who are anxiously awaiting the release for HA/CK Remastered, and explain what's taking so long.

So, what's taking so long?

First, the good news - the meat and bones of the game I consider finished, but various bug fixing and playability improvements are taking longer than expected. Shoutout to the awesome people helping me playtest this release before putting it out for the huge masses of potential players to scrutinize.

I am looking forward to making the release as polished as I possibly can, adding many playtester and community suggested fixes and improvements in the game. For example, playtesting with people not familiar with puzzle games showed, that while the later levels were intuitive to understand, the new and reworked tutorial still was a bit daunting, therefore that is an area I still have to work on, providing hints to the player, making sure not to spoon-feed the answer.

Another thing, which is proving to be a real challenge to implement well, is an in-game resolution selection option. I'm sure everyone will appreciate the freedom of choosing their preferred screen mode, and this is one step forwards to decoupling completely from the Unity launcher window, relying on it solely for control rebinding for now.

Speaking of new gameplay features - playtesting showed that softlocking a level in HA/CK is easy and frustrating, nobody likes restarting a level. As a result, I introduced a new element to the game. Every cube now has a parent platform, to which it's related cube can be transferred back by hacking it. This solved many softlock situations, and, in one case I observed, opened an opportunity for completing a level faster, though that I will leave for you to discover.

Thank you for reading, have a nice morning/day/evening/night and consider following me on Twitter, if you are interested in HA/CK or my ramblings! https://twitter.com/gampixi_LV

HA/CK

HA/CK Remastered - Rambling about the past

Jan 9, 2019

Hi there! Thank you for showing interest in the remastered and way superior version of HA/CK. The original game started as one of my yearly game development projects I embark on each summer to spend time and learn game development. I felt like I needed some community engagement here and there, so I settled on an introduction on HA/CK Remastered came to be.

In the beginning

In the summer of 2018 I started working on yet another project (HA/CK was released in 2017), however it snowballed into something way too ambitious so I put it aside. At this point, working on HA/CK seemed appealing again. It was the first ever project I actually considered finished. Considered is the correct word to use here, as by that point it did not seem finished any longer. After abandoning the new project, I decided to revisit HA/CK.

The abandoned project never went further than this, however it was supposed to be a procedurally generated survival shooter thing with emphasis on mechanics which encourage replayability.

Many factors influenced my decision to revisit. The primary goal for any indie development, I believe, is that the author/s personally feel involved with the project. I would never work on a game I would not enjoy playing, and while the new project began to grind to a halt, HA/CK seemed more inviting than ever. Although in the case I feel as the most influential factor was community response.

Unexpected outcomes

With all my games so far it's been 1) make game; 2) post some tidbits on Twitter and reddit during development; 3) unexpectedly release the game and hope it catches on somewhat. Most of the time, they go mostly unnoticed, only to fade into obscurity. It never bothered me personally, as my main goal is to release something about which I can say "yup, I made that". As expected, on release HA/CK seemed to slowly fade away. Though things took an unexpected turn - HA/CK got featured a few days after launch, as a result popular YouTube personalities noticed the game. The most valuable outcome of this boost was the amount of positive, negative and constructive feedback I received, and was the main driving force behind my choice to revisit HA/CK.

While the original definitely was a game, it lacked any sort of real character.

The future

After consulting with myself and the feedback I had received, my plan for the new HA/CK version was clear - upgrade EVERYTHING. A new look, more levels, more squish and crack and pop! Sounds ambitious, and it is, although I believe I've managed to pull it off with this paid re-release, and are certain that people who have played the original will not be disappointed.

I believe the strongest suit of this new release, in addition to looking and sounding awesome, is going to be the Steam integration. While the old HA/CK also had scoreboards implemented, they weren't tightly integrated with the game. In the remaster, you are reminded of scores each time you finish a level; you can compare them worldwide or with your friends. I hope this change will encourage more replayability and even wilder playthrough strategies (I was blown away by what the original HA/CK speedrunners had found). This also opens the possibility of launching a level editor further down the line by integrating Steam Workshop.

It's the same game, only not, because it's better.

Soon you too will be able to jump in the new and awesome edition of HA/CK. It just needs a few more coats of paint, a few more bugs squished and shines polished. Meanwhile, feel free to treat the original HA/CK as a free demo. Have anything to say? There is a comments section below!

HA/CK

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