Valley 2 Beta .711 “Trimming The Fat” Released!

This one adds in limited context-based angled shots, as well as making a lot of strategy-related changes.  This will be the first round of several as we refine the strategy game during this month.  From the release notes, here’s my explanation of what we’re up to:

While we do feel that we have a solid strategic game here, we do
think that it can also be better. More engaging, more challenging (on
higher difficulties), more streamlined (in terms of how easy it is to
express your will), and more thought-provoking (in terms of how many
things you must consider at an advanced or semi-advanced level of play
when deciding what actions to take).

Additionally, we’re really trying to streamline the game itself a
little bit more — it was already extremely streamlined in the main,
especially compared to the first game, but this is trimming off some of
the last of the fat. The last thing we want is for any particular game
element to overstay its welcome; we’d rather you were hungry for more
and play a second game of it. All in all this is leading to a game that
is a bit shorter than it previously was, but also one that is going to
be substantially more intense given many of the overlord’s actions are
now not possible to undo (you can’t just rebuild what he knocks down).

There are more changes planned — or rather, we have a variety of
ideas that we think might work well to continue to bring this from
being a good strategy game to a great one. These will be something we
experiment with throughout the course of January before settling on
final mechanics by February. The game isn’t far off, and it’s just a
matter of getting all of the existing pieces we have to fit together in
the most ideal way possible at this point. Right now we’re just taking
the first steps with the strategic game, and then reassessing from here
(thus to better inform our further changes).

And as for the context-based angled shots, here’s what those are about:

• If you stand on a slope facing into the slope, and fire your
  spell straight forward, it will angle up instead (firing directly
  forward would accomplish nothing, after all).
• If you stand on that same slope facing away from the slope,
  any shots you fire go forward like normal. However, if you duck, then
  your shots will go down the slope at an angle instead of doing your
  normal low-shot.

More to come soon.  Enjoy!

This is a standard update that you can download through the in-game updater itself, if you already have any version of the game.  If you have the beta on Steam, it will automatically update for you.  When you launch the game, you’ll see the notice of the update having been found if you’re connected to the Internet at the time. If you don’t have the standalone game, you can download that here.  If you already own the first game, just use your existing license key to unlock the sequel for free!