Well, it took a lot longer than I'd like, and v0.6 is still going to be a ways off. But despite everything, Dash Blitz continues to update, marching slowly forwards towards the big 1-0!

And with the advent of Steam Remote Play, it's the perfect time to share the gift of a holiday's beating with your friends and loved ones! Don't forget there's an extensive free demo you can try out.

Now without further ado, let's get into it.

New Content

• Characters now sport thick, juicy outlines! It's a very different look, and still in need of some refinement for the future, but it makes it easier to track the action at Dash Blitz's trademark high speeds. Feel free to tweak the outline thickness to whatever you're comfortable with in the menu.
• Characters have faces now! This was a part of an extensive retexturing job going on behind the scenes, which led to a number of small details being added to the cast. In the future these will be animated, but for now it's just a little splash of life.
If you'd prefer the original minimalist vision, you can opt out in the menu. There's some growing pains here, tied to the outline implementation, so you might see some black spots in people's faces, and regardless their faces will appear during cutscenes.
• The all-new Magna System! Magnetic energy is a resource that every fighter can use. Magna Pulse to pull your foes towards you, or Magna Burst to escape a combo! Your Magna gauge will refill over time, and like charging your shots, it refills faster when you're on low health, so don't be stingy. You'll find these options discussed in the tutorial, and you can of course remap them freely.
• The new health bars sit snugly on the top of the screen. This is a very minor thing but I think they look snazzy.
• There's now an announcer on the character select screen, calling out the name of your choices. If you don't like it - first of all, rude. But you can just finetune the voice volume in the menu.
• You can now change the song that plays in every fight! You can set it to a specific track, or even have it change according to the fighters. You'll even see a new theme for Bluster in there!

General Improvements

• The same input can now be set for Pause as for Back. Pressing Mouse Right will also act as Cancel in the pause menu.
• The default key for Pause and for Back is now set to Escape, which should feel more natural.
• Added mouse controls to the lobby for the main keyboard player. This is a small one but it's a very nice quality of life improvement, especially if you're sitting at the desktop and playing (such as, y'know, if you were playtesting). Mouse Left acts as Select, Mouse Right acts as Cancel, and the scrollwheel allows you to change colour.
• Made a number of cling swings stronger - these are the hardest attacks to land consistently and their damage potential should now better reflect that.
• Allowed most swings to destroy fully-charged projectiles - in practice the most common ranged attack is the full charge shot, so swings beating out projectiles wasn't really happening. Now throwing out charged shots is marginally less safe and well-timed melee swings are better rewarded.
• Added more arenas for Onslaught, so there's a bit of variety in the platform layout.

Characters

#1

• Increased stagger on forward throws, making them easier to combo off of.
• Besides Run Swing, ALL swings now reflect projectiles. To compensate for its gimmick being stolen, Standing Swing now reflects with much more speed and power. These changes are reflected by the Baseball Bat item.
• #1 can continue to reflect projectiles with his Item Standing Swing, albeit less effectively than usual.
• You can now hold in the Swing button to extend a Jump Swing. In the future this might see some more tweaks, but right now, it makes it that little bit easier to time your hits.

Edge

• Edge's repeating kunai shot has been drastically weakened, with the scatter shot being removed. In future the scatter may come back, but not at the same CPU-destroying scale. Hopefully the kunai's current power level brings Edge back to where he's meant to be - a fast, dangerous melee fighter whose ranged attacks can open you up to melee.
• Dash Swing does not interact with projectiles at all now. Not so much a nerf as an oversight, it'd be a bit weird blocking a bullet with your pinky toe.

Nomad

• You can now hold in the Swing button to extend a Jump Swing, exactly like #1.

Arrhic

• Removed damage on Arrhic's initial grab, adding more damage to his throws to compensate. Fixed a few bugs with his grapples.
• Cling Swing no longer interacts with projectiles at all. Throwing your chest at people is not a defense, Arrhic.
• In a unique case for a grapple, Ground Forward Throw DOES block projectiles. Throwing other people's chests at them is an acceptable defense.

Rondo

• Due to Rondo's weak stature, he has retained an inability to block charged shots with his swings.
• You can now hold in the Swing button to extend a Jump Swing, just like #1.

Valerie

• No changes… this time. We'll see if Magna Pulse mitigates the issues with airdash spam.

Sherpa

• Jump Swing now deals more damage per hit, making it one of the deadlier multi-hits.
• Item swings now deal much more damage, on par with Sherpa's raw swings. I'm not sure why they weren't already, probably just an oversight on my part.
• Lasers now trap in place, then launch with force. The same change has been made to the Laser Rifle item.

Puffin

• As a unique property, Puffin's grab can now destroy projectiles.

Kero

• Improved damage on Jump Swing, making it more rewarding to land.

-1

• Increased stagger on forward throw ala #1.
• Made changes to swing reflection as with #1. Charged Standing Swing does not reflect projectiles, either.

General Fixes

• Fixed an issue where it was harder to escape grabs than intended.
• The player input screen now correctly shows the player whose input will be changed.
• Fixed race handling on Hustle Harbour so a teleporting Nomad doesn't get lost on the track.

As for me, if you'll permit me to blogpost for a second, anyone paying attention may recall I'm going through some hand trouble. And you may have noticed the year-long gap in between updates.
Believe me, I know. I'm more frustrated than anyone. I've only recently been able to get back on the keyboard regularly, and even then, only because I'm out of work.

Things are improving, in some ways. I still haven't got a real diagnosis, but I'm able to medicate and spend some time at the desk, and I'm getting by without voice recognition, thankfully. I still can't return to work proper, but I'm hopeful that I'll be able to do some part-time gigs.

And of course if you buy my game and share it around, maybe I'll be able to move back out of my parent's house and live my life again.
Jokes aside I'd love to get back to working on this game regularly. It's difficult, and I can't really play test, but this is my passion.

If you're enjoying Dash Blitz, it'd really mean a lot to me if you shared the game, liked this post or even let me know how you feel about the game. Even now I'm monitoring the inbox and this Steam community, so if there's anything you'd like to see changed, it's all up for discussion.

Please enjoy yourselves, take care, and Happy Blitzing!