Howdy, everyone!

Welcome to the February 2025 Mini Status Update!

In this post, I'd like to share some new information with you regarding the upcoming party member system, as well as a showcase of some of the new spells you can look forward to using in v2.8.0!

But wait, there's more!! We're also releasing a new patch for the game today, v2.7.14b! This patch adds an improved local chat history to the game, which adds a separate "Room History" and "Server History".

In the "Room History", you can see the latest local chat messages sent within your current room, like the previous chat history did. But in the "Server History", you can see the latest local chat messages sent across the entire server!

There are also a few other improvements and bug fixes in this patch, so be sure to read the changelog below for the full details! But first, let's dive into the status update!

Status Update on DONTFORGET v2.8.0

Since our last progress report, we've gotten a lot of work done on v2.8.0, including finishing all animations for the game's spells (over 40 animations!), and making significant improvements to the party member system.

Let's start by talking about the party improvements!

Party Management

The first improvement I want to show off is the new dedicated party management menu, which can now be accessed at save points!

Previously, party management was done through the CELL, like with the old partner system in 2.7 and prior. However, the CELL was admittedly a bit cumbersome to use for party management, due to the limited menu size and trying to cram too many features into one menu.

As such, this dedicated menu has been added instead, to make the process of swapping out/removing party members a breeze!

So now, if you want to change your party formation, you'll just need to go to a save point to use the party management menu:

Of course, the CELL still lets you view your recruited party members at any time, and it's still used for giving them custom nicknames, gifting them items, and changing their costumes!

Party Bond and Unlockable Spells

The next improvement to party members is related to their "Party Bond" stat.

As mentioned before, the "Friendship Level" of your partners in 2.7 and prior is being repurposed as a new stat called the "Party Bond" in 2.8 onward. This stat increases gradually as you complete activities with your party members, such as winning battles, completing quests, discovering gold/diamond enemies, gifting them items, etc.

Up until this point, the "Party Bond" stat had limited purpose, as I had plans to utilize it more in future updates... but I decided to just go ahead and do it for v2.8.0!

Now, increasing your party members' Party Bond stat plays a much larger role in building up your parties!

Party Bond is now displayed as a percentage in-game. When a party member's Bond reaches certain percentages, special things will happen:

• At 25% bond, you unlock the ability to give a nickname to that party member.

• At 50% bond, your party member learns a fifth spell/skill to use in battles!

• At 75% bond, your party member learns a sixth spell/skill to use in battles!

• At 100% bond, your party member will provide a small boost in the amount of G received from battles!

That's right, instead of four spells/skills, every party member now has a selection of SIX spells/skills to choose from!

Your party members will start off with just four abilities, but as you increase your bond with them, they'll gain two more abilities to use in battles!

This gives the party member system an even greater sense of progression, as your allies will gain new abilities for you to utilize over the course of the game!

New Spell Animations

Speaking of spells, I'd like to show you some of them in action! There are over 90 spells/skills in the game, including a wide variety of elemental attacks, status buffs, enemy debuffs, healing spells, SOUL modifiers, status effects, and more!

For now, here are a few of the elemental spells, starting with:

Flame Roar (50% TP)

• Deals moderate FIRE-elemental damage to one foe. Has a chance to inflict the "Burning" status effect, dealing additional FIRE damage at the start of each turn.

Wave Surge (50% TP)

• Deals moderate WATER-elemental damage to one foe. Has a chance to inflict the "Soaked" status effect, which can cause the enemy to "slip" during their turn and accidentally damage themselves instead of the player.

Static Shock (50% TP)

• Deals light ELECTRIC-elemental damage to all foes. Has a chance to inflict the "Shocked" status effect, which can cause the enemy to skip their turn.

X-Slash (50% TP)

• Deals moderate FIGHTING-type damage to one foe, slashing the target twice. Has a chance to inflict the "Fatigued" status effect, which reduces the enemy's ATK stat.

Self-Defense (50% TP)

• Deals moderate NORMAL-type damage to one foe. (We've shown this skill before, but it has a new animation now!)

• The unique property of this spell is that it will never deal fatal damage - the enemy will always be left with 1 HP, making it a good option even for pacifists, as enemies with low HP will become "Tired" and susceptible to the "Pacify" spell!

Rude Buster (50% TP)

• Deals moderate RUDE-elemental damage to one foe

• Pro tip: if you press [Z] right before it hits the target, this spell will deal additional damage!

Light Decay (75% TP)

• Deals heavy DARK-elemental damage to one foe. Has a chance to inflict the "Clouded" status effect, reducing the enemy's DEF stat.

PSI Rockin (75% TP)

• Deals moderate PSYCHIC damage to all foes. Has a chance to inflict the "Unfocused" status effect, which also reduces the enemy's DEF stat.

• Pro tip: "Unfocused" can stack with "Clouded" to reduce an enemy's DEF significantly, for a time!

• This isn't the only PSI ability in the game - Paula, Poo, and Lucas also have PSI abilities they can use!

Erasure (200% TP)

• Deals fatal DEMONIC damage to all foes.

• This skill is exclusive to Chara, and normally can't be used because the TP cost is too high... but perhaps there's a way to reduce the cost...?

There are PLENTY more spells and skills to discover in the game, but I hope this look at a few of them has helped to get you excited about building your own parties in v2.8.0!

On that note, that's all we can share about 2.8 until the next progress report! This upcoming report will be massive, so at this time, we can't confirm when exactly it'll release - but keep an eye out on our GameJolt page, or join our Discord server, to be notified as soon as it's out!

Changelog for DF CONNECTED v2.7.14b

A new patch for the game, v2.7.14b, is available to download right now!

The main purpose of this patch is to update the game to the latest version of the GameMaker Server extension, as well as to add the new Local Chat History mentioned above. There are also additional changes and fixes, to help improve the game while development on v2.8.0 continues.

Here's the complete changelog:

• Added a new menu for the Local Chat history, replacing the old menu. This new menu features a separate "Room History" and "Server History".

  • With the Room History, you can see the last 64 messages sent by players in your current room.

  • With the Server History, you can see the last 96 messages sent by players across the whole server.

• The local chat history can now be viewed while the player is emoting.

• Updated the chat filter to censor additional offensive terms, including offensive terms from a few other languages.

• When using a SKILL, the text now uses the name of your vessel instead of referring to "you".

• Certain SKILLs now play different sound effects when used.

• The PvP battle themes "Strike You Down" and "Blooky's Hit Single" have now been added to the Sound Test and DF Editor.

• Kris and Noelle now receive a partner bonus when used together.

• Replaced some outdated sprites in the images for the "Treasure Hunter" quest, the "Cure the Corruption" quest, and for completed trophies.

• When using a monster SOUL, the SOUL displayed in the STAT menu will now turn upside-down to match its correct appearance.

• Changed the appearance of the background bars that appear in the C Menu.

• Improved the battle transition so that the player character no longer "snaps" into position when the screen cuts to black.

• The option to view the leaderboard in the Free-For-All menu now opens the web browser to view the leaderboard on GMServer's website, rather than display it in-game (temporary change).

• The option to view the leaderboard in the "Grand Theft Harlow" minigame now opens the web browser to view the leaderboard on GMServer's website, rather than display it in-game (temporary change).

• Fixed a bug with the snapshot feature where the screenshot would come out incorrectly cropped.

• Fixed a bug where the costume ID for the partner character wasn't reset when a new partner was applied.

• Fixed a bug where it was possible to convert 10 Undercoins into 80G from the DarknerNet menu even when the player's wallet was full, resulting in the player receiving nothing.

• Fixed a bug where a secret room was using the Light World's textbox style when it should have been using the Dark World's textbox style.

• Other minor fixes and improvements.

• Updated to the latest version of GameMaker Server.

Conclusion

Well, that concludes this month's Mini Status Update!

We hope you guys enjoyed seeing some of the new spells in action; we can't wait for you to start using them in v2.8.0! But in the meantime, we hope that v2.7.14b will help to improve your experience with the game even further!

With that said, thank you all so much for reading, and as always, stay determined!