• Add Review
  • Subscribe
  • Nominate
  • Submit Media
  • RSS

Bloodstained Hands v5.9.5 Launched!

  • Strak
  • 07/24/2022 03:08 PM
  • 543 views
Okay, I wish I had done this two weeks ago with the last update, but it's fine, turns out there were some bugs in the last version that needed to be fixed anyway. So here's another update!

What's included? Here's a brief list.
- Modified the Party Selection screen
- Modified the final boss battle
- Concentrate now adds a 10% evasion bonus
- Battle Cry now adds an 8% critical bonus
- Fixed a bug where the side mission "Haunted" would not trigger
- Minor dialogue modifications
- Minor bug fixes and graphical enhancements

Most of these are just simple quality of life improvements, but I'll discuss why I made some of these changes in greater detail. First off, the Party Selection. If anyone has played this game before to the point where you end up with more than four party members, you'll remember the party selection screen. It was... well, maybe not bad, but old. It was entirely evented, it was slow, it was inconvenient, and a lot of players didn't even know how to find it. I got to thinking, what if you could just change your party from the menu any time you're on the overworld? Would that break anything? And honestly? No, it wouldn't. All it would do is save time, since if you're on the overworld, you can get to the place where you change your party without getting a single encounter. It would just be more efficient. Then I went even further and thought, what if I could create my own custom scene using everything I've learned about Ruby over the last decade? So I went ahead and did that.



I've modified player names, portraits, and sprites in the above screenshot to avoid any spoilers, but basically this is what the party selection looks like now. Selecting the grayed out character will send them back to reserve, and selecting a full-color member will add them to your party. You can't have an entirely dead party, or less than four members, but you can arrange your party any way you choose. And the game will remember your party order for any sequences where the player has to go solo. This can be accessed at any time during New Game Plus, or after a late-game mission in the base playthrough.

NOTE: There may be some minor bugs the first time you use the party selection if you've already progressed to this point on an existing save. Simply reset your party using this scene once and it will resolve any issues. None of the bugs should be game-breaking.

So, with the new party selection method, I thought of something else that I could do to spice things up. However, it has to do with the final boss, so I don't want to go into too much detail. All I'll say is that the final boss is about 5x more fun and creative than it was before. I'll leave it to you to figure out why!

I also modified some class skills that only give stat boosts to give an additional bonus. The idea behind this is, why would you use a stat boosting skill if you've already maxed out your character stats? This kind of thinking is only for the really hard-core players, but now Concentrate will give a boost to evasion, and Battle Cry will give a boost to critical hit chance. These stats can't be maxed out with tonics, so it's the only method of increasing them other than through equipment.

And there are a plethora of other bug fixes and quality of life improvements as well! I hope you enjoy this latest update, and happy playing! I likely won't be releasing any more content for a while, unless a serious bug comes up that needs to be fixed. All saves should be backwards compatible, simply move them from the old game folder into the new one. If anyone experiences any bugs, please let me know and I will fix them ASAP!

Posts

Pages: 1
I'm not going to make a whole new blog post for this, but version 5.9.6 is now available. It's a fairly minor update, but has some cool enhancements based on some player feedback. Here's what's new!

Concentrate will no longer regenerate MP, but will now add a 4% critical hit bonus instead. The reason behind this is twofold. First, the MP regeneration was causing the skill window to refresh every time it triggered, causing players to accidentally select the wrong skill. That's fixed now. The other reason is that in my mind, Assassins should have the highest critical hit chance of any other character. Now they can. With Concentrate, Assassins can hit a maximum critical hit chance of 20%, as opposed to the previous cap of 16%.

The second change comes from some player feedback regarding Shroud. As useful as this skill is, it can seem like a waste of a turn if all it does is negate physical damage when an enemy HAPPENS to target them. Now, Shroud will increase the likelihood of being targeted by enemies, by a significant amount. As in, twice as likely to be targeted than any other character. This makes the skill far more useful, but also increases the risk of being targeted by spells, so it's a tradeoff. I've also updated the targeting algorithm, so fighter characters are the most likely to be targeted, with mages being the least likely.

I also added some graphical updates, but they're pretty basic. Overdrive gauges will now turn iridescent when full, signaling that the skill is ready to use and calling attention to it. Also, I've added valves to the Tower of Lux to make it easier to navigate and figure out how the switches work.

Finally, I added a bit of character interaction right before the final dungeon, and enabled party selection for that dungeon, so you can basically take your whole party with you for the last trek. To avoid spoilers, I won't say any more.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback! Happy to keep improving this game and make it even more fun for you all. Happy playing!
Pages: 1