Changed various features to improve performance.

Fixed issues:
• Longbow no longer has access to the Relentless weapon upgrade ability
• Fixed an issue where Ammutseba, Devourer of Stars kills were wrongly attributed to the Zindarak, The Fiery Messenger (Gold) achievement
• Updated the Tutorial Completion achievement to unlock when the message, "That is all I have to teach you.", is displayed during the tutorial
• Fixed an issue preventing the Lightning Strike Kills (Bronze) achievement from updating
• Fixed an issue that was resetting the controller vibration setting upon starting a new run
• Updated some localization values

Balancing:
• The base chance to apply curse has been reduced from 80% to 50%
• The Tactician (Bronze) passive ability's active ability cooldown reduction has been increased from 1% to 3%
• The Tactician (Silver) passive ability's active ability cooldown reduction has been increased from 2% to 6%
• The Tactician (Gold) passive ability's active ability cooldown reduction has been increased from 3% to 10%
• Changed the character screen wording to better indicate that in-game achievements must be claimed to unlock new roles

Hey everyone!

After 6 months of Early Access we’ve finally reached 1.0! 🥳Big thanks to everyone who supported us along the journey, for giving us constructive feedback, and for helping to make the game what is is today. With the arrival of 1.0 we’re introducing a powerful new mechanic in the form of ‘Old-One’ pacts as well as localisation for German, Spanish, and Simplified Chinese.

To celebrate us reaching this milestone we’ve prepared a new trailer to showcase everything included in the full release.

New powers rise: Awakening the ‘Old Ones’

Your harrowing experiences in the endless wastes have revealed forbidden knowledge pertaining to the existence of the ‘Old Ones’, ancient and indescribable beings who will lend you their immense power, at a price…

A few updates back when we removed ‘The Ranger’ constellation to coincide with the rework of the meta-progression system. In this update, we’re reintroducing this constellation which you’ll now be able to use to unlock 6 x unique ‘Old One’ pacts.

Once unlocked via the constellation, an ‘Old One’ pact will appear alongside other dark magic abilities as an upgrade choice when you level up at set level milestones.

Pacts are potent new offensive abilities that will target all enemies on screen when activated. They are designed to be a kind of panic button and should be used to help turn the tide when the horde becomes too difficult to manage. Be warned however as each pact will consume a large amount of sanity when triggered, so be prepared to deal with any consequences that might arise!

The ‘Old One’ pacts included in this update are as follows:

Ammutseba, Devourer of Stars
A cluster of black holes appear and collapse, dealing damage to enemies caught in their pull.

Cthugha, The Living Flame
A rain of fire falls from the sky inflicting burn on your enemies.

Baoht Z'uqqa-Mogg, The Bringer of Pestilence
A buzzing plague of insects whose stings inflict acid on your enemies.

Yorith, The Oldest Dreamer
Random wormholes tear through the fabric of reality and swallow nearby enemies, immediately killing them.

Aphoom-Zhah, The Cold Flame
A violent blizzard descends freezing all enemies in place.

Zindarak, The Fiery Messenger
Distant stars manifest over your enemies and violently implode dealing massive damage.

We hope you’ll have fun unleashing these eldritch powers on your enemies and experimenting with new builds and strategies during your runs.

Additional language support

We’ve also added localisation for:

• German
  
• Spanish
  
• Simplified Chinese

So now you’ll be able to select your game language on start-up.

As always, here's the full changelog for 1.0:

Features

• Added Spanish, German, and Simplified Chinese translations
• Added new active abilities, god powers, to The Ranger constellation
• Ammutseba, Devourer of Stars
• Aphoom-Zhah, The Cold Flame
• Cthugha, The Living Flame
• Baoht Z'uqqa-Mogg, The Bringer of Pestilence
• Yorith, The Oldest Dreamer
• Zindarak, The Fiery Messenger
• Added various achievements for using god powers
• Added a player death animation
• Added language selection in settings and when players first boot the game
• Added all in-game achievements as Steam achievements
• Added a scroll for item descriptions when using a controller

Balancing

• Added text descriptions when hovering over pin, shuffle, improve, and banish upgrade options
• Allowed pinned upgrades to carry over from one stage to the next
• Added the ability to unpin a card that is pinned
• Modified The Ancient God constellation to remove the TBD node

Bugfixes

• Fixed an issue where the game would not scroll properly on the settings screen
• Ensured that level III upgrades always appear with their counterpart
• The freeze effect will now freeze the enemy's animation
• Moved boss health bars down a bit so they are not obscured by text in some languages
• Fixed a bug that, when pressing Esc on the in-game resolution confirmation screen, the confirmation screen failed to disappear
• Fixed an issue where multiple pointers could appear on the settings screen
• Fixed an issue where the conduct charge effect would not animate
• Fixed an issue where the narrative text at the start of a run did not proceed if different controller type was used to confirm
• Fixed an issue where boss health bars remained on the screen after the boss killed the player
• Removed the minus symbols from all upgrades and items to more accurately display their effect
• Increased font sizes to be more legible on Steam Deck
• Fixed an issue where longbow silver and gold achievement icons displayed incorrectly

Just a small note that while we have reached the end development we will continue to support When the Light Dies with additional patches as and when they are required, so please do let us know if you encounter any issues.

Enjoy!

PQube, Electric Monkeys, and Secret Level Studios

Hi everyone!

We’re just a few weeks away from the end of our Early Access journey, with the next major update being our 1.0 launch!

Before that, however, we’ve released a small update that contains the Lightning Rod weapon upgrade, conduct status effect, more achievements to discover, changes to how level 3 weapon upgrades are generated, visual and UI improvements, balance changes, plus bug fixes. Enjoy!

New weapon upgrade: Lightning Rod

The latest weapon upgrade grants projectiles the chance to inflict ‘Conduct’. Subsequent hits on enemies affected by the conduct status effect build up X% electrical charge. At 100% the afflicted enemy is struck by a bolt of lightning! Here is the full upgrade path:

Level 1: Chance for projectiles to inflict conduct
Level 2: Lighting strikes twice.
Level 3 (Effect branch): Electrical charge buildup increased by 20%.
Level 3 (Damage branch): Damage dealt by lightning increased by 30%.

Changes to Level 3 weapon upgrades

If you have a level 2 weapon upgrade, the next time you reach a weapon upgrade level milestone you’ll be offered both upgrade paths on the level up screen, where previously this was randomly determined. To use the Mind Steal example below, at level 3 you can now choose either the sanity or cooldown branch, giving you more control over your build for the run.

Additional visual and UI polish

We received a lot of requests from players asking for boss health bars, which we have now implemented! This combined with the boss markers from the last update, will help with planning and decision-making during the boss waves at the end of each stage, and make the fights less overwhelming. We have also added visual indicators for the Execute, Life Steal, Mind Steal, and Huntsman ability activations.

As always a full list of changes can be found below:

Features

• Added support for controller vibration
  
• Added Lighting Rod weapon upgrade
  
• Added boss health bars
  
• Added visual notifications for Execute, Life Steal, Mind Steal, and Huntsman ability activations
  
• Added achievements for Lightning Rod, Corrosive Rounds, and Cryo Blast weapon upgrades

Balancing

• Reworked level-up window UI to offer both level 3 weapon upgrades if the player has the relevant level 2 upgrade.
  
• Added elemental chance stat to all weapons which will vary and scale depending on the weapon equipped e.g. Low attack speed weapons gain a higher percentage chance

Bug fixes

• Level-up window no longer causes input to lose focus during the fade screen
  
• Virtual cursor no longer goes outside the screen
  
• Multiple cursors no longer appear when scavenging
  
• A new difficulty can no longer be selected after starting a stage
  
• Fixed an issue when using both controller and keyboard/mouse on pause menu were causing errors
  
• Fixed Double Tap III weapon ability icon
  
• Updated some weapon ability text

That’s all for now, but we’ll be back in a few weeks to reveal our final wave of new content and features for 1.0!

PQube, Electric Monkeys & Secret Level Studios

Hey everybody,

The light is in sight! We are almost at the end of our Early Access journey with only a few updates left until we reach 1.0. We’ve really appreciated your feedback and hope that you’re enjoying the direction that When the Light Dies is heading.

Today’s update introduces a new weapon in the form of the powerful Longbow, as well as some exciting new elemental weapon upgrades to help you keep the horde in check.

Longbow Weapon

This mighty weapon fires a single arrow which embeds itself into a target before its delayed charge explodes, dealing damage to all enemies caught in the blast. This means that one well-placed shot can make all the difference when facing down a large group of enemies!

The longbow can be purchased alongside the other weapons in the main menu by spending your hard earned beating heart currencies!

New Weapon Upgrades

We have added three new weapon upgrades which can all be levelled to improve their potency. To coincide with these upgrades we have also introduced the freeze and acid status effects to make your runs feel even more varied:

Cryo Blast: Chance for bullets to inflict ‘freeze’. A frozen enemy becomes encased in a block of ice and cannot move for a short period of time.

Level 2: If enemies are frozen when killed, they explode into razor sharp icicles.
Level 3 (Damage branch): Damage inflicted on frozen enemies is increased by 20%.
Level 3 (Duration branch): Freeze Duration is increased by 0.5 seconds.

Corrosive Rounds: Chance for bullets to inflict ‘acid’. Enemies affected by acid burns gradually take damage overtime and have their movement slowed.

Level 2: Enemies inflicted with acid have their max HP reduced by 20%.
Level 3 (Duration branch): Acid duration increased by 2 seconds.
Level 3 (Slow branch): Enemies are slowed by 40% when inflicted with acid.

Double tap: 'Extra shot' chance is increased by 20%.

Level 2: Whenever Extra shot is triggered, ammo is not consumed.
Level 3 (Damage): Damage inflicted by Extra shot bullets is increased by 20%.
Level 3 (Chance): Extra shot chance increased to 30%

Try experimenting with these new upgrades in combination with the longbow (we’re personally big fans of stacking acid with piercing >:D).

Please see below for the full patch notes:

Features

• Added Longbow weapon
  
• Added three new weapon upgrades with two new status effects (Freeze and acid)

QoL & polish

• Updated crossbow reload SFX.
  
• The game now remembers your last choice for character, weapon and difficulty.
  
• Added Achievement notification/claim sounds.
  
• Updated various texts for better clarity and consistency.

Balancing

• Updated Huntsman upgrade to affect reload speed instead of attack speed.

Bug fixes

• Crossbow no longer consumes too much ammo when used with certain upgrades.
  
• Bullet Damage meta upgrades now increase damage by the correct amount
  
• Critical damage now displays correctly where it previously showed critical chance.
  
• Screen effects (darkness lights, freeze) now scale in all resolutions.
  
• Can now claim achievement rewards after restarting the game.

We hope you enjoy the new content and if you do have any feedback please do share it in our feedback thread or contact us directly on Discord.[discord.gg]

If you have been enjoying the changes we’ve been making to When the Light Dies since EA launch, it’d be incredible if you could share a positive review here on Steam, they really do make a huge amount of difference for us!

Until next time,

PQube, Electric Monkeys & Secret Level Studios

Bug fixes:

• Experience points resetting to 0 when entering a new stage

Balancing:

• Updated the upgrade values for the stamina recovery and lantern oil consumption constellation nodes

Other changes:

• Added screen resolution options
  
• Updated several weapon and character stat displays

Bug fixes:

• Polished the effects of enemies affected by elemental statuses.
  
• Polished the level up screen appearance.
  
• Added boss icon indicators when bosses are off-screen.
  
• Added an animation for hearts gained when returning to the main menu and when claiming achievement rewards.
  
• Updated the results screen to display currency gained during the current stage and total currency gained during the entire run.
  
• Fixed overlapping upgrade names.
  
• Fixed broken pixels affecting the level up screen.

Bug fixes:

• Fixed an issue which caused passive upgrade settings to reset on future stages
  
• Fixed an issue with the pause menu passive upgrade list when exceeding the upgrade display limit
  
• Passive upgrade pins, re-rolls, upgrades, and banish counts now carry over to future stages
  
• Fixed an issue where banished upgrades appeared in future stages

Welcome back, everyone!

The wait is over, update 4 is now live! In this latest update we are introducing the long-awaited character classes, with each one having its own unique strengths and weaknesses to add even more variety to your runs. At the same time, we have added an in-game achievement system through which you can gain additional currency bonuses and character classes by completing specific achievements.

So let's check out the new cast of characters!

Character Classes Overview

We have introduced a total of 8 character classes, 7 of which can be unlocked by completing in-game achievements. Each class comes with its own unique stat line, which, depending on the character, will affect the following base parameters:

• Health
  
• Stamina
  
• Sanity
  
• Temperature
  
• Walk speed
  
• Run speed
  
• Run stamina cost
  
• Defence

Here is the full list of character classes to discover:

• Captain: Your trusty ship captain! This default class all-rounder has already helped you slay many foes in your battle against the darkness.
  
• First Mate: Face the horde head-on with the first mate’s high health and defence stats. But don’t get carried away, the first mate has lower sanity and movement speed than most other classes.
  
• Ice-master: The ice-master knows how to keep warm! Your sanity might be at a low point but a higher temperature stat means that you’ll be spending less time searching for bonfires.
  
• Surgeon: Always keep a clear mind. Sacrifice a little health, stamina, and temperature but keep your wits about you for longer when playing as the surgeon.
  
• Engineer: Running for your life just became a whole lot easier. Choose the engineer with his high stamina and put these gruesome enemies behind you.
  
• Cook: The cook is used to the heat of a kitchen and not this icy wasteland! Starting with lower temperature, his high stamina and sanity might just save him in the long run.
  
• Marine: Although slower than his fellow shipmen, the marine won’t be defeated easily thanks to his high defence stats.
  
• Ship’s Boy: Looking for the ultimate challenge? Start your run as the ship’s boy with significantly lower health, stamina, sanity, and temperature stats. Will you survive the darkness?

In-Game Achievements

There are now over 60 in-game achievements you can work towards completing during your runs! Rack up kills with a variety of weapons, inflict a certain number of status effects, kill a predetermined number of enemy types and bosses, and make it through the night on various difficulty levels to complete achievements and earn currency bonuses. There are even special achievements which unlock each of the new character classes!

As always please see below for the full patch notes:

Features

• Added an achievement system to the game that rewards both hearts and character roles
  
• Added a pop-up notification when achievements have been met during a run
  
• Added seven character roles, each with different parameter distributions and unique sprites

Balancing

• Several constellation nodes have had their costs updated to make progression feel better
  
• The constelation node increases for health regeneration and maximum defense have been halved

Bug Fixes

• The in-game script has been updated in several places
  
• Removed the redundant buff icons from the bottom-right of the screen

We hope you’ll enjoy the new content in this latest update! If you do have any feedback, suggestions or bug reports, you can leave them in our Steam forum feedback thread or join our Discord[discord.gg] to talk to us directly.

We’ve still got more content incoming in the next few weeks but if you are enjoying When the Light Dies so far, it’d be amazing if you could share a positive review here on Steam, it really makes a difference for us!

Thank you all so much for your ongoing support and we’ll be back with another update in September!

PQube, Electric Monkeys & Secret Level Studios