The Blackstar Castle update is here, with new content including a brand new area, attachments, relics, crew members, ships, mechanics, and various improvements and bugfixes.

Important note: This update IS compatible with older saves, so any progress will be kept.

MAIN FEATURES

A new area, Blackstar castle, has been added with includes a new boss, new enemies, and new challenge levels. The enemies in this area follow different spawning and combat rules, adding extra variety to the run.

Blackstar Castle: A 4th, new area in the furthest reaches of the Vortex

• 6 new enemies to defeat
  
• A new multistage boss
  
• A new challenge level
  
• 2 new music tracks

A new attachment class, Volatile, has been added along with 5 new attachments. A new ship, 2 new crew members, and 35 new relics have been added, greatly increasing build potential.

An expanded Order: New content to outfit your starfighter

• 2 new crew members
  
• A new ship: The Shortsword
  
• New attachment class: Volatile
  
• 5 New attachments
  
• 35 new relics
  
• 3rd Synergy Level for all classes

The Void Crystal ascension system has been completely reworked. The drawbacks and buffs have been changed to curses and blessings, with further Void Crystals having more curses. While early crystals remain relatively unchanged, allowing for new players to ease into and learn the game, later crystals are now much harder, adding a challenge for even the best players.

Void Crystal Ascensions: Greatly increased the difficulty and challenge of mid to late void crystals

• Added new curses to 10 Void Crystals
  
• Most Void Crystals now have 2 curses
  
• Last 2 Void Crystals now have 3 curses
  
• Total of 12 new curses
  
• Rebalanced existing blessings and curses for a better difficulty curve

OTHER ADDITIONS AND CHANGES

Game: Core game systems have been changed or reworked

• Increased base movement speed by 15%
  
• Ability to restart save file
  
• Levels per area decreased from 6 to 5
  
• Enemy health decreased roughly 15% to compensate for less levels
  
• Synergies:
  
  • 2nd Repair synergy decreased from 5 -> 3 extra health
    
  • 2nd Summoner synergy decreased from 33% -> 25% damage
• Shop attachment chance rework
  
  • Already owned attachments are now weighted based on affordability
    
  • Unaffordable upgrades are less likely to appear
    
  • Affordable upgrades are more likely to appear
    
  • Extremely affordable upgrades are very likely to appear
• Massively buffed contact damage to enemies
  
  • Base contact damage increased from 100 to 500
    
  • Battering ram contact damage: 1000
    
  • Serpent contact damage: 250
    
  • Dinghy contact damage: 1
• New additions to the Codex
  
• Changed intro text crawl
  
• Added time left for powerups is displayed on top right
  
• Added stagger and sound effect to end level stats
  
• Increased rate at which kill X enemies challenge level scales per area

Enemies: Various balance changes and additions to existing enemies

• Extra attacks for two demon enemies
  
• Demon Realm enemies drop +2 credits
  
• Increased Swarm launcher health: 600 -> 800
  
• Decreased Swarm Spitter health: 850 -> 600
  
• Later demon enemies health increased
  
• Demon boss health increased

Attachments: Many attachments have had balance changes or complete reworks

• Seeker Dart:
  
  • Alt upgrade path adds Volatile class
• Trishot:
  
  • Alt upgrade path adds Volatile class
• Credit Locator:
  
  • Base spawn rate increased 12s -> 15s
    
  • Alt path: No longer AOE
    
  • Alt path: Time between credits increased
    
  • Alt path: Credit value increased 1 -> 2
• Collector Drone:
  
  • Base chance decreased 25% -> 15%
• Speed Booster:
  
  • Decreased how quickly speed and firerate increase
• Energy Rings:
  
  • Rather than spinning rings, is now an aura around the player
    
  • Alt path reduces enemy contact damage
    
  • Useful for aggressive playstyles or enemies that get too close
• Levy Fighters:
  
  • Decreased base stat boost: 5% -> 3%
    
  • Decreased how quickly stat boost increases

Crew Members: Some crew members have been tweaked

• Rebalanced unlock requirements of some crew
  
  • Arms Dealer: 300 -> 500 credits
    
  • Vampire: 400 -> 500 kills
    
  • Pacifist: 2000 -> 2500 total kills
    
  • Collector: 8 -> 9 relics
    
  • Lone Wolf: Void Crystal 3 -> 7
• Knight now doubles shield strength

Settings: New settings allowing for greater customization of your gameplay experience

• Add outline to player ship
  
• Turn off the background stars
  
• Turn off the background spacedust

UI/UX

• Pause Menu
  
  • Added more info on player and game stats
    
  • information is now tabbed/organized
• Shop
  
  • Sell button now displays how many credits

FIXES

• Healing Aura not giving Merchant synergy for alt path
  
• Poison dart not affected by poison damage multiplier
  
• Updated various incorrect/outdated codex info
  
• Text appearing too small in the pause menu
  
• Crew is no longer reset when changing ships or void crystal
  
• Issues that appeared if enemy firerate was too high
  
• Corrected burst spitter firerate from 1s -> 2s
  
• Contact damage is now shown
  
• Bug with Speed Booster that increased firerate much more than expected
  
• Fixed typos in some attachment descriptions

I'm very excited to be able to share that the release date for the Blackstar Castle update is April 11th 2025. It's been a long way since the Early Access release so this announcement will be also go over all the new content and changes to expect with this update. While there have been a couple of minor updates in the past, this is the first major step outlined in the roadmap. A more detailed patch notes will come with the update's release.

A new area, Blackstar castle, has been added with includes a new boss, new enemies, and new challenge levels. The enemies in this area follow different spawning and combat rules, adding extra variety to the run. Prepare to learn new attacks and face new foes as you traverse the old headquarters of the Order. The former Grandmaster of the Vortex awaits you...

A squadron of enemy fighters fly in formation


A new attachment class, Volatile, has been added. This class is built around critical hits, allowing for massive damage. 5 new attachments have been added, and a couple of previous attachments have had their alt paths changed to upgrade into Volatile attachments. Furthermore, almost every attachment has been changed or rebalanced in some way, from balance tweaks to complete mechanical overhauls.

A new Volatile attachment slings an asteroid at an enemy and scores a high damage critical hit


The Void Crystal ascension system has been completely reworked. Through playtesting and feedback, one of the major issues that has come up is the lack of substantial difficulty increase as players progress through the Void Crystals. The drawbacks and buffs have been changed to curses and blessings, with further Void Crystals having more curses. While early crystals remain relatively unchanged, allowing for new players to ease into and learn the game, later crystals are now much harder, adding a challenge for even the best players.

Some of the reworked Void Crystals


With this update comes a new ship, the Shortsword, and two new Crew Members, the Priest and Technician. Previous crew members have also been rebalanced or changed, with some gaining more unique abilities. The amount of relics has increased from 60 to 95 with 15 common, 15 rare, and 5 legendary relics added. These new additions allow for a wider range of build opportunities and new ways to play.

A handful of available relics


This update brings dozens of smaller improvements and additions, such as a third tier of attachment synergies, new music tracks, economy rebalances to make it easier to get more credits in later areas, rebalances to enemies and bosses (including new attacks), and more. Not to mention a host of bugfixes and optimizations to make playing a more fun and smooth experience.

A complete changelog will be released with the Blackstar Castle update on April 11th.