Hyper Light Breaker, Heart Machine’s 3D follow-up to moody action-adventure Hyper Light Drifter, smashed into Steam early entry earlier this month. But the preliminary response to it has been lower than stellar, with gamers complaining about particular points like body fee drops, lack of keybinding, and issues with the parry system, whereas typically being divided over its unforgiving fight and lack of in-game course.
All of this has led to Hyper Light Breaker garnering a combined reception on Steam. But developer Heart Machine has taken these criticisms in stride, responding final week that it accepted the “danger of damaging early opinions” and agreed most of the group’s complaints are “extraordinarily affordable”. It additionally promised to deal with the issues as shortly because it may.
After issuing a fast hotfix final week, Heart Machine has now launched a second, extra substantial replace that targets a number of of the group’s greatest bugbears, a few of which have been labored via with the help of stated group. “We made Hyper Light Breaker with Early Access in thoughts to have it develop and evolve with our group,” wrote lead producer Michael Clark within the replace’s accompanying Steam put up. “Today’s patch represents that as we made some fairly massive adjustments”.
Primarily, the hotfix patches up Hyper Light Breaker’s medkits. Following the sport’s launch, many gamers complained it was far too stingy when allotting well being gadgets. This hotfix makes a number of adjustments to in-game healthcare, firstly guaranteeing gamers now begin off with a medkit. In addition, medkits now “auto-refill on launch of run, as much as max capability”. So, in case you improve your medkit capability past one, you may begin a brand new run with the upgraded variety of medkits in your stock. Alongside medkits, the replace adjusts how harvestable medigems are used and consumed, which all look like geared towards guaranteeing sustaining your well being bar is just a little simpler.
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While therapeutic is the hotfix’s fundamental concern, the replace additionally makes a number of changes to Hyper Light Breaker’s enemies. For starters, “projectiles from weak enemies not hit-stun the participant”, a smart change contemplating how annoying I discover the mere thought of getting my stream damaged always by puny foes. Enemy aggro distance has additionally been diminished, which likewise is smart given what number of damaging Steam opinions complain about being swarmed. Finally, on the behest of the group, the replace eliminated “the tech croc brute and white dirks from the extraction spawn desk”. Having not performed Hyper Light Breaker, this reads like gobbledegook to me, however I presume Hyper-Light heads will recognise its significance.
Clark states this would be the final hotfix for Hyper Light Breaker “in the interim” because the crew shifts onto the “first deliberate Minor Update”, which is able to presumably be extra complete. Heart Machine additionally deliberate to launch the early entry content material roadmap this week, however Clark admits the studio wants “just a bit extra time to flesh it out and incorporate adjustments to it primarily based on participant recommendations”.
It’s price noting that, whereas Hyper Light Breaker might have its points, the final consensus on Steam skews 62% towards the constructive. Indeed, our personal Ted Litchfield had a grand time with it when he just lately examined the early entry model, stating, “Everything I’ve seen, skilled, or been instructed is thrilling and inspiring,” although he added the caveat that it is “going to take a while with the sport within the wild to see if its lengthy recreation has what it takes to supply the ‘infinite replayability’ Heart Machine goes for.”
