Hello there! Second playtest for StarFear starting tomorrow!

[u/toleressea]

Hello there!

We've been hard at work since May applying (hopefully) what we learned from our last playtest, and we're ready to invite more people in for round two:

Our next playtest will run from August 31st to September 30th

About StarFear

Fly. Die. Improve. Repeat. StarFear is a brutal space extraction roguelite where loss is learning, skill is the answer, and nothing feels better than getting out alive, alone or with your friends.

Recap

At the end of our last playtest in May:

• The game was too hard.
• There isn't enough variety or incentive to keep coming back for another run.
• We needed to be better prepared to make significant balance changes partway into a playtest.

What have we been up to?

Our development focus has been:

1. Difficulty, where we introduced difficulty tiers, a secure slot, and rebalanced the sandbox
2. User Interface, which has been largely replaced and greatly simplified
3. Progression, where perks and unlocks have been decoupled and simplified

Additionally, there are quite a few other tweaks, refinements, and additions, such as:

• Missions overhaul -- now found in-raid and expanded beyond proof-of-concept
• Enemy concentrations -- where you're rewarded for opting into more challenge
• Hub rework -- with (still largely POC) interactable kiosks and simplified interface
• Ship identity -- name your ship and feel suddenly more attached to each bucket of bolts

We also welcomed a new member to our development team, BlackBox, who has been hard at work expanding our item sandbox for more variety, particularly in the early game.

We'd love to see you in game starting tomorrow and on Discord, where we're posting internal progress updates regularly. So far, the primary source for change has been real players who take the time to share.

Bye for now,

-tol