Welcome to the biggest content update ever for Abomi Nation! Not only is there the largest amount of new Abomis at once (22), but there are an extra 10 Abomis crossing over from Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling! It's been a great joy to work with the Bug Fables devs to bring these designs into Abomi Nation.
Firstly, the patch notes! This isn't just a content update. Fast battle mode! Easier-to-unlock Temporal Store items! Let's take a look:
•22 new Abomis have been added
•10 new guest Abomis from Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling have been added
•13 new Abomi variants have been added
•16 new attacks have been added
•19 new items have been added
•3 new abilities have been added
•A new biome, the Hilltop, has been added to the Temporal Store to unlock
•The ability to turn Battle Animations off has been added, allowing for faster battles
•A new NPC has been added that can reverse your Nature
•A new NPC has been added that can swap your Ability
•Abomis that get Soaked now use up 1.5x their normal MP
•Self-target moves can now never miss
•You can now unlock items in the Temporal Store by beating the game with a specific Abomi on your team
•The Temporal Boss fight now rewards 800 Temporal Pebbles instead of 400
•Abomi statues now appear as the Abomi's primary colour instead of a pure gray
•The level-up movesets of several Abomis have been reworked to include new attacks added in the latest updates
•Evolution conditions that required getting hit by certain attacks have had their threshold universally lowered
•The stat-change notification arrow now moves twice as fast
•Divonion and Rayviate can no longer appear in their "activated" forms anywhere unless on Total Chaos randomization
•The position of Temporal Caves have been altered to prevent them from blocking paths
•Fixed a bug causing the item Lightbulb Tail to have no effect
Alright, let's talk a bit about just a few of the new Abomis -- starting with two of my new favourites, Clampiper and Augerbill.
These Water/Air seabirds were inspired by the sandpiper. What better way to bite into a delicious clam than with a clam beak of your own? Augerbill's new Shell Drill attack is a piercing move with a high crit rate. A lot of personality comes off in their walk cycles, so I hope players enjoy running around as them.
Next up there's Caterbrawler! I tried to push my animation abilities with this Abomi and give it a "rubber hose" style, where its limbs can stretch to cartoony proportions. I think it gave Caterbrawler a lot of flair. Caterbrawler's new ability, Boxer, gives it a chance to raise its own Attack stat +1 when using a Punching move.
One of the more ambitious concepts I've ever done is Hermittle! This hermit crab Abomi wears a drab beige shell and is a pure Water-type. If Hermittle defeats an opponent in battle that has a shell, however, it'll steal its shell and gain one of its types!
Here you can see Hermittle stealing a Snappybara's shell and becoming Water/Fire-type! It can do this with all sorts of Abomis -- a Water/Plant Slogg shell, a Water/Earth Orocove shell, you name it. Hermittle can only do this for unevolved Abomis, though. It's just little, after all. If you want to steal the shell of a Tortobello or a Stampeak, you'll have to evolve into Hermittle's next stage: Clawbbery.
Alright, time to talk about the big news: Abomi Nation is crossing over with Bug Fables! Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling is a super charming RPG by Moonsprout Games in which you play as three bugs that form an Exploration Team in the land of Bugaria. During their adventure, they'll fight many different enemy types like the Seedling, Weevil, Psicorp, and (I swear I didn't make this name up) the Abomihoney. It's 10 of these enemies that you can now find as Abomis in any of your runs!
I say 10, but you can also find every variation of Seedling (Acornling, Flowerling, etc.) under the same Abomi Archive number, so it's more like 17... Also, one of these Seedlings may look unfamiliar even to avid Bug Fables fans. That's because I've worked with the Bug Fables devs directly to create new designs exclusively premiering in Abomi Nation! Meet -- for the first time ever -- Frostling!
It's been such a thrill collaborating on this crossover with Moonsprout Games. I think it's so cool to see these characters in Abomi Nation's style. I'd say they fit right in, wouldn't you? Let me know if you guys dig the crossover. It was a lot of fun for me, so I'm always open to talking to more indie devs. Hit me up with suggestions!
This update was a real doozy to make. My intention was to pack it to the brim in case it's Abomi Nation's last. Will it be the last one? I'm really not sure what the future holds. But either way, I wanted this update to make the game feel complete. In just under a year, we've gone from 100 Abomis to 162. The game's transformed so much thanks to player feedback and it's been a joy to continue supporting my first game as my full-time job.
Since Abomi Nation released, I've moved into a wonderful house, adopted a wonderful dog, and gotten engaged to a wonderful woman. It feels like the release of this game has allowed me to jump-start the rest of my life and I'll always associate it with that feeling. Thank you to everyone who's supported it and allowed me to continue doing a job that makes me happy every day.
I hope everyone has fun with the new Abomis, and be sure to check out Bug Fables if you haven't already!
Carl
(Oh, and if you haven't heard: Abomi Nation is coming to Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and PlayStation! Dates for those will be announced once we know them!)
