Lets Get Greedy!

ill start this post off by once again letting you all down, there will be no release date announced in this post… i know it feels like im really fucking with all of you at this point but trust me when i say that this weeks delay was simply due to the inability to nail down the specific release date on steam and since we are still actively working on getting that in stone.. i had to once again delay the post.. instead ive got an even better post for you.

Lets get Greedy! in Greed mode! a totally new game mode in afterbirth that is a hell of a lot more fun than even i expected it to be…

when i was designing rebirth i was very aware that one of the most requested features people wanted was a “boss rush” or “mob rush” mode. i couldnt quite nail down a full mode without it feeling really tacked on, so my compromise was “Boss rush” and i called it a day.

during afterbirth dev i started playing around with the idea of a true boss/mob rush mode that could have more depth than just being a mega man style “fight all the bosses again” mode, or just some kinda endless mob survival mode you see added to a lot of smaller games these days.

i decided to look at what i believe to be all the games existing short comings that simply coudnt be fixed due to story/structure/balancing issues and attempt to design a new game around those that included a “survival” theme, much like zombies in COD.

i personally believe the biggest short comings in isaac are:

the mom and moms heart fights - knowing who you are fighting and always fighting those boss every single run flys in the face of random gen. and even though those bosses have alts it still feels less fun always having to fight them in every run.

the items system feels “too random” - the most fun runs ive had in isaac were ones that allowed me to have a few options when constructing my “build” when it came to how i wanted my run to go. focusing on collecting contact damage items + HP items, going ultra protective with tons of orbitals or simply becoming guppy were all things i wish the player had a bit more control over making happen.. but aside from adding “more options” items, there wasnt a good way to fix this without the game getting busted fast.

risk reward feels a bit too luck based - now i know this aspect of isaac is probably the reason why its so popular, the fact that if you get lucky on your first run and get tons of OP items that just destroy everything you touch is a very appealing aspect of the game for sure.. but i miss the more strategic risk reward systems that ive used in my past games and always saw isaacs luck based ultra rewards as a minor flaw in the game.

so when designing Greed Mode, i focused directly on these issues and essentially made a totally new game that uses isaacs structure but addressed all the flaws i mentioned while at the same time attempting to wrangle a fun and more fully realized mob/boss rush game mode that people seemed to really wanna play.

so here is how greed mode works.

the basic layout of each floor looks like this:

a double wide store, 2 treasure rooms, cursed room, exit room, possible devil/angel room and the games main focus a double height room with a button in the center.

the game starts with the store, one treasure room and cursed room unlocked. once the button is pressed all doors become barred, the first mob spawns into the room and a timer appears under the button and the button turns red, grows small spikes around it and becomes the “stop button”

once the time runs out, or the mob is killed, the next mob spawns in and this continues till you have cleared x waves, you press the stop button, or you die.

this may seem simple but its a lot more crazy than youd think, dealing with randomly generated mobs in isaac isnt something you see at all in game and there is a really interesting dance around killing mobs while keeping an eye on the timer and making sure you have the ability to hit stop when things start getting out of control.

but the real thing that makes greed mode totally new is that, there are no “lucky drops”, in fact there are basically no drops at all. see each wave that spawns also spawns pennies, depending on how many waves have spawned without having hit the stop button.

this new risk reward or resource system makes for some fun strategic planning when it comes to how you tackle each run, money is vital in this mode.. but so is life seeing as you will lose a half of a heart each time you stop the waves from spawning.. but how do you gain more life if there are no drops aside from coins?

the store system for greed mode is the games foundation. this is where you will buy pickups to survive, keys for treasure rooms and a lot more options when it comes to how you build your character.

we are still actively balancing, tuning and adding visuals to greed mode so expect some changes when you finally get your hands on it.

but how do waves work? what about bosses? how do we open devil rooms? where does this mode end? will there be new bosses? how will item pools change? what about rooms!? tell me something!!!!

i guess youll find out next week (maybe)