Hi guys!

First of all, sorry for the delay! I usually try to push updates every two weeks but this one took much more than expected due to the complexity of some the new features that requiered significant changes behind the scenes. I plan to go back to biweekly updates from now on :)

Here is the list of changes, I hope you guys like it!

Physics grip - BETA!

• The physics grip is now the default option in the game. You can still disable it in the options menu if you prefer the old grip, but eventually this will be the only option. Please let me know what you think!
• Taunting!!! This is one of the most demanded features ever, you can finally taunt your enemies in the arena! (sorry it took so long!)
• Increased the minimum speed required to damage an enemy. Slashing now requires a min speed of 500cm/s (from 200cm/s previously). Thrusting only requires 300cm/s. This and the physics grip behavior makes much more difficult to just wiggle the sword to kill enemies.
• Modified weapons so they rotate around the hand. This makes the grip much smoother.
• Added snap distance depending on weapon speed so the weapon does not get stuck behind the enemy shield during combat.
• Disabled physics collision with weapons attached to the belt.
• Fixed stabbing with the physics grip.
• Sword white trails now appear at 600cm/s instead of 800, indicating when you are actually dealing damage to enemies. Red trail lowered to 950 from 1100.
• Increased stiffness of shield and sword when parrying or blocking
• Added Oculus Rift compatibility to the physics grip

Access through gates

• You can now access the blood arena though the gates! I plan to add the rest of the scenes in the next updates (training arena, market, Colosseum). For now, you have menus at the gates (placeholder until full access to gates is available)
• The option to go to the arena via menu is still going to be an option for those of you that prefer a faster route :)
• Revamp of the trackpad movement system so you can walk through ramps (to the blood arena and the ones in the market).
• Modified the crowd in the blood arena so there are less people watching (performance improved)
• Changed lightning of lobby (new openings on the ceiling)

Gameplay Improvements

• New "default difficulty" setting: this applies to the blood arena when you access through the gates.
• Blood arena enemies are now tougher. They have 1/2 of regular hp instead of 1/3 hp in the previous update.
• Food now stays within the fence in Day3
• New sword clang sounds for low and high speed impacts when parrying
• New sound when stopping a kick with the sword
• New sound when parrying mummy attacks
• Made impossible to stab with blunt weapons (e.g. mace or shields)
• Removed validation to make sure player has weapons before starting the games, you can punch them now :)
• Added another quiver in day 3
• Disabled physics grip for arrows
• The torch now deals 5 damage, you can take it with you to the blood arena.

New weapons

• Khopesh (available for 8000 gold at the market)
• New Katana (available for 5000 gold at the market)
• Added blood to remaining weapons (Gladius3, Axe and Spatha)

Training

• Added a new option in training to spawn only humans as you requested :). I will add this as a general option in the next update so you can also apply it to the blood arena.
• Added a new option in training to customize which enemies will spawn

AI Improvements

• Barbarian animation is x25% faster
• New die animation for the skeleton.
• AI Aggressiveness is now proportional to difficulty level
• Hero difficulty aggressiveness also increased
• Fixed enemies getting stuck circling the player
• Archer goes ragdoll immediately after killing them.

Fixes

• Fixed enemies snap damage.
• Fixed Torch, Kopis, Celtic and knife attachment rotation
• Fixed being able to go through walls in the lobby (You can still physically walk through them, I will fix that in a later update)
• Fixed equipping the helmet on would leave the hand locked
• Fixed weapons not going to training from armory (Spatha and spartan shield)
• Fixed Swordmaster getting knocked down sometimes when he attacks into your shield with physics grip on.
• Fixed Mace collider so it doesn't rotate forever
• Fixed Spartan shield collision box to better fit the shield
• Picking up food would lead to the hand being 'locked in' with an invisible item.
• Fixed Axe not unlocking in training random mode
• Fixed during the sword master phase, after the equipment is removed, you could still grab invisible items.
• Fixed completing Day 3 would send the player to limbo.
• Fixed flail being able to stab and getting stuck mid air with the physics grip
• Fixed blood arena thinking player was still inside the forbidden area
• Added extra blocking volume to the lobby floor so weapons don't fall through the floor
• Fixed shield hand controller vibrating constantly when reaching the swordmaster phase.
• Added extra controls to avoid crashes when using the bow in day 3.
• Fixed helmets disappearing from the rack when grabbing them with the physics grip on.
• Fixed horses making die sound when they are already dead.
• Fixed spawned skeletons and mummies not matching with total number of mummies to kill.
• Fixed some mummies disappearing from the sarcophagus
• Fixed concurrency sound with crowd cheering
• Added several controls to avoid crashes in day 3 using the bow.
• Fixed barbarian sword texture in the lobby
As always, special thanks to all the amazing people in the discord channel that helped with the testing and feedback. Thank you so much guys! :) Please let me know what you think either here on the steam forums or on our discord channel: https://discord.gg/63PBXdQ Cheers! NOTE: The physics grip now uses the great VR Expansion Plugin created by mordentral. For the UE4 folks out there, you can find it here: https://forums.unrealengine.com/showthread.php?116782-VR-(OpenVR)-Expansion-Plugin