Astral Gunners 1.0 Released!!

Jun 21, 2024

Astral Gunners

Get ready to push your skills to the limit against an endless sea of bullets and evil robots in Astral Gunners. Choose from five different gunners to master in this horizontal shooter. With the ability to dodge, reflect, delete, and convert bullets you are more powerful than you might believe.

The day is finally here! Astral Gunners is a feature complete video game. Thank you so much to everyone who has played the game throughout early access, and thanks to the incredible shmup community for being so supportive of our game. We're beyond excited to see players enjoy the final changes we've added to the game. Speaking of, here's everything that's been updated: [b]CAUTION: Upon updating, save files will be reset for Version 1.0[/b] [u][b]Dark World[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/1f3807ce325ae806ffc367b9fe906c0ce5e81823.png[/img] The rematch against Dark Gunner is finally here. And it looks like Gamma Gunner and X Gunner weren't done fighting you quite yet, either. Every run now ends with a nail-biting boss rush battle. Pay attention to how the stage changes based on how well you played through the rest of the levels. [u][b]System Hacks[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/467a991f8e6c4a5b9a6b32e865bcdf651ebb942a.png[/img] We've rebranded Power-ups to be System Hacks for this update. Instead stressing over trying to make a secondary mode that's also balanced for scoring, we decided to just focus on making playing with System Hacks fun above all else. There's still a System Hacks leaderboard, however, for those who want to try and find the most optimal combinations. Some old power-ups have been replaced but overall the variety is much greater now! [u][b]Botstiary Added[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/da25bd295f3b0f3afbf05a051ad53bcb7818e193.png[/img] Unlock Botstiary entries as you play through the game. These entries will allow you to look at the enemy sprites without all the chaos on screen, and include text with lore about the Astral Gunners world. [u][b]Jukebox Added[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/0abc63e34abf5401ac22e8796ec66adc843b9449.png[/img] Unlock songs as you play through the game, and listen to them in the Jukebox! [u][b]Full Soundtrack[/b][/u] Speaking of music, the entire soundtrack has been fully mixed and mastered, to the same quality as a professional studio album release. 11 new tracks have been added, including an updated theme for every stage boss. Heavy metal forever \m/ [u][b]New Achievements[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/55669095f615c6f69eb2406fdfe0afbcd2da20a1.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/25c8ff2e8186a1ac405d3fcf731fe470602233bf.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/d2670f21f6ed745025d0673f65125d1c30b1fd82.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/d758f00678e45af9dc3f9c8f9f584b9840d57db6.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/520bb93765873d5d4f5dea2d27b3c0c298e49bc3.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/75a1d45ac4f3b40ec4a8b906563b1663586ed656.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/fd9780198090d223e0596ac62f00d1518937847e.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/061cdc05987f4fffea3b53fa75e699c67579ada9.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/4ac07ec1662420e0e9dc22ffd11a9ba343748d8c.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/7f158c1a8e538f19ec3e36a8d27184ad383213e2.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/c00f002127edea9000edb2fdabe61030fd116e76.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/29c5d14e2c11ac2562192aa37b554ef926792bff.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/4521b25dfc918cefee139986fad8041233b947c5.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/aa0089c1ad1e91f043f6dc79dfd896d7c7c5b2b8.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/3b2c23e17b2770075efce505b3937a6f3c7afdcb.png[/img] Along with all these new unlockables, we've added achievements to go along with them. Now every achievement in the game, except for four, unlocks something. [u][b]Intro and Outro Cutscene Slideshows[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/e9968a70dcbfc6c04a95f3ed7b6d5a09232ebcc1.png[/img] It's not necessary, but it doesn't quite feel like a "real" game if you don't have an intro and an outro to a game. The basics of Astral Gunners' story is now conveyed in this manner. There are a few different endings, based on how far you get in Dark World and which character you're playing as. [u][b]Quick Save[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/93150475e5067a43264e9d678bf83764e85d1814.png[/img] We get it, we all have busy lives. Sometimes it's nice to be able to stop a game and come back to it later. Astral Gunners now features a quick save option that you can select from the level select screen. CAUTION: Using this will disable online leaderboards for that run! [u][b]Steam Avatars[/b][/u] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/f1bbfd1e37d06eedee4cf7fd3af4891001080901.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/19f66e95b30e47bcb870cb8959bd94c151fb9f6d.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/cfb8ae286edaa777e32747d4a81ad9a13a02651f.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/3b0287cb4f211ecbcefcdb34e716c38a71283ea6.png[/img][img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33219254/791d93b694256327117318ed724b763d09324b95.png[/img] You can now use Astral Gunners avatars on your Steam profile! [u][b]Other Changes[/b][/u] [list] [*] Bosses will now leave if you don't defeat them before the time limit. Additionally, their Astral Core will not be collected if they leave (I wonder what that affects). Boss timers have been updated to be significantly shorter and the score bonus for boss time has been significantly increased. Every second matters even more now! [*] NPC Allies have been buffed across the board. Castle will save you on hit, and converts bullets to multiplier pickups. Researchers will give you three supply boxes throughout the level at each checkpoint. Samurai was already very strong but attacks slightly more frequently. Orange Worker helps you fight any enemy with a health bar. Green Miners fly by and give you x100 multiplier. [*] Level ranks have been adjusted to be a bit more challenging. Easy mode also now shows you your level rank instead of simply saying "Good Job!" [*] Game tips have been added into the practice menu. People who played the earliest versions of early access might remember this feature. We figured it was best to put it back in. [*] Move list is viewable from the practice menu [*] The flamemobile part collection segment of Crimson Peaks was updated to include more enemies to shoot at and build special meter from. [*] The very end of the vertically scrolling section of Dystopia was updated to be a bit more interactive. [*] Violet Gunner's focus shot movement speed was slowed by 1 pixel per frame [*] Light Gunner's missiles do significantly more damage now [*] Green Gunner's defend while their Option is in follow-mode does significantly more damage and has a significantly longer cooldown. [*] Auto-Skip Story is now an option in the menus [*] Display Vs. Best is now an option in the menus (shows your previous high score compared to your current run) [*] Achievement Hunter is now an option in the menus (For select achievements, confirm if you still meet the requirements) [*] When clearing save data, there are more options than just "Clear All" [*] Co-op: When one player's meter is full, gems they collect fill up the other player's meter (with a slight penalty) [*] Co-op: Fixed bug where pickups would freeze in place sometimes when a player died [*] Co-op: Enemy health scaling changed. Previously it was x2 across the board, now changed to x1.5 only on bosses and mini-bosses [*] Tons of other QOL/Bugfixing changes. We tried our best to keep notes but we're sure we missed a few things here and there. [*] Cheat codes added. If you don't enjoy progression-based gameplay you can unlock all characters, difficulties, and stages in single level mode by entering the achievements menu and pressing left, right, up, up, down, down, A/Start/Enter [*] A selection of the online leaderboards are also now viewable in the Steam app under the global gameplay stats page. [/list]