• Added 2 new levels: "Blackhall Bakery" and...  "Chillville"? Check the Level Select!

• Added trophies!

• Added rebindable controls! (keyboard only, controllers can't be rebound)

• Added checkpoints!

• Touched up some level design...

• Overhauled the Level Select menu!

• You can change the options and skip cutscenes in the pause menu!

• Added hints to various rooms of the secret level.

• Made an off-screen drop more clearly not a death pit.

• Re-added the Halloween versions of the victory jingle and intermission music.

• Moved the secret level Q&A menu to the Gallery.

• Improved looping on various songs.

• Auto-run is now enabled by default.

• Fixed the camera in one of the secret level's cutscenes.

• Fixed a bug regarding coyote time that allowed you to jump twice.

This is likely to be the final update for this game, so it feels like a good time for a (rather scatter-brained) retrospective.

Honestly, my biggest problem with this game is the level design. Most of the levels in this game are just empty hallways, with Cool Points, Propel-O-Bots, and maybe even the occasianal Robowind, going for 5-10 rooms, and then you're done. It's not really engaging, is it? Back in when this game was still in development (mid/late 2024 to early 2025), my major focus was on pretty art and not much else. Combined with time stress, and that naturally leads to the levels you see in game.

Even at the time, I was becoming aware that the game was sorta getting stale, since I had the thought of a pulley gimmick for Chillville (that I didn't have enough time to implement).

That is, until I started working on V2.0.

---- SPOILERS FOR SECRET LEVEL AND V2.1 ADDITIONS - START ----

Now, Starspace was started on June 2025. It was going to be the same design philosophy as the other levels, but I left it alone and started doing other things until around September 7th, 2025-ish. It had three finished rooms, and I realized this was an opportunity to <i>finally</i> shake things up. So, I made the bounce target (the red ones), and I also had the idea for the latch targets (the orange ones). Fun fact, they used to just have the same stars as the red bounce targets since I wanted stars to be a visual theme for the level, but I changed it to a diamond for color-blind players.

I was really proud of actually having a level gimmick, so I started working on the level and trying to do new things with not just the targets, but the level design as a whole. (What if I put bounce targets and latch targets together? What if I give the level a branching path? What if you could fling off latch targets?)

Mid-way through development, I considered making Starspace have themes of growing up and moving on from the things you once loved...   but I had already made half of the level, and it felt weird to try to cram symbolism into something that wasn't created with it in mind.

Starspace was going to have the layout of "20 normal rooms > Touhou segment > Ending", but by the time I was finishing room #8 I realized the level was starting to drag, so it became "13 rooms > Touhou > 2 epilogue rooms > Ending". The latter half of the level is the part I'm not super proud of, mostly because it's not really a big final challenge of all the stuff you've learned, it's just a dropper with the alternating spike block patterns I don't apologize for, a rushed Touhou stage, and then the ending...   I probably could've done that better. But even still, Starspace turned out to be almost objectively the best level in the game.

Speaking of the ending, by the way,  it was based on back in early 2025 when I thought of the line "He had been on quite the birthday expedition".

I knew I had to use it. Come on.

Anyway, onto the V2.1 stuff. Let's start with the first new level added to the update.

Blackhall Bakery was made alongside my sister, since I wanted to do something with her. I did the programming, chose the music, while she made the level design, drew the art, and wrote the dialogue. The level was going to end with a picture falling out of Katie, and it would show a close-up of her and Whirlwind as kids...    but neither of us were willing to draw that LMAO

And now, Chillville act 2. Once we were finished with Blackhall Bakery, it was December 13th and I wanted to make another level for Christmas. The very first thing made for the level was the re-colored background and weather effects, followed by basic level design, then the cathedral background, etc etc. Honestly, the temperature gimmick feels a little minor and keeps the level feeling like the others from 2024...

That's all for the new levels...     Not that there's nothing new in a starry-eye place I talked about a lot. ;)

Outside of the new level design, though, Version 2.1 is thankfully an objective improvement with it's QoL features (rebindable controls, new Level Select menu, etc.) and bug fixes. Hope you enjoy the new update!

---- SPOILERS FOR SECRET LEVEL AND V2.1 ADDITIONS - END ----

Thanks for reading! I wish you a merry Christmas...    and an UNHAPPY new year! Hehehe...