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How Spiral Knights has grown since 2011.

(pic taken from the official Steam group)
(pic taken from the official Steam group)

So, Spiral Knights's second anniversary has just passed recently. It isn't really the most popular free-to-play game out there, so it surprised me that it has survived for this long! I haven't been playing much of it myself, nor have I spent much money on it, but I do enjoy the game very much and wish the best for it.

One great thing about the game is the large amount of changes the game went through in this past couple of years, and since there hasn't been much discussion on the game here, I'd like to share some interesting ones to maybe convince some of you to give this game another chance! Some of these updates are kinda old (like, last-year-old) but I want to talk about them anyway..

(I won't be discussing the core game very much because if you haven't played this back in 2011, what are you doing reading this, it's a free game just go play it.)

New Monsters and Levels

This is pretty much a Zelda boss battle. (pic from a Google search)
This is pretty much a Zelda boss battle. (pic from a Google search)

When Spiral Knights first came out, there were... two bosses? Well, now they have a whopping number of FOUR bosses, which is twice the old number. Okay, maybe that's not too impressive, but one great thing about the bosses in Spiral Knights is that they have a set of levels and a core mechanic associated to each set. The boss battle in the image, for example, has switchable barriers that blocks out missiles, and the boss battle itself is to switch the barriers at the right time to get them shoot each other. The levels before the boss play with this new mechanic a lot to prepare you for the boss.

This type of levels is not restricted to boss levels either, there are new sets of levels that play differently than the usual fight-and-then-move-on levels. They are similar to the old Graveyard level in a way. One set of levels make you run from large unkillable spookats (the ghost cats) and light candles that scare them away, and another recently released set includes small monsters that attacks in swarms. These levels keep the game interesting and challenging, as the simple combat-focused gameplay can get a bit tedious after a while.

There are also more difficult versions of those four bosses in the deepest levels, and a few more bosses in the missions, speaking of which...

Missions

No Caption Provided

Missions are basically a tutorial feature that gives you a set of static levels that focuses on one or two things. All you have to do is press a button to pull up the mission list; it's pretty convenient. The missions tells you what sort of monsters you are going to face, what sort of mechanics will be there, and even give you gear recommendations and the recipes associated with them. At one point they let you into a room where you can straight-up buy most of all recipes too (before, you'd have to reach a vendor in the depths that has a randomized inventory). I think there is at least one mission associated to most sets of levels available, boss levels included.

I think the missions are nice! They give a good structure to the originally almost fully randomized game that smooths up the learning curve quite a bit. I still remember how shocking Tier 2 was as a new player, and this teaches things new players would want to know without needing them to read the wiki. It has some nice story moments too, like paying respects to an unknown knight's grave and rescuing imprisoned NPC knights.

There is an expansion pack for the missions, which I haven't played myself, and although it is an interesting direction for the game it was quite ridiculously priced. I was fortunate enough to have someone gift it to me but I can't see myself or many other people buying it, so I doubt that another one will ever come out, at least not at the same price point. (That expansion pack came out February 2012. The price has went down since then actually.. I think it was $15, now it is less than half that).

A Bunch of Other Stuff

UI Changes

Check out that shield meter.
Check out that shield meter.

This had just came out for the anniversary, actually. I personally think that it does not look as good, but it does communicate a lot of things better. Now the monsters' health can be clearly seen above their heads, our own healths are more visible on screen, and there is a shield meter that shows our shield's health right below it! Way better than just "feeling" it by the shield color. When targeting a monster, its health, attack type and weakness is also shown. Neat! Also, it doesn't have the energy meter constantly up to remind you to buy more of them anymore.

Accessories

Bunny ears are available too. (image from the wiki)
Bunny ears are available too. (image from the wiki)

Now you can wear cat ears on top of your helmets. =D

These are pretty rare and you can only equip them once, I think. They usually come in different colors too!

Guild Halls

Customizable Guild Halls. Pretty cool stuff. Too bad I'm not an active guild because it takes money to maintain them.

Auction House

I guess this was inevitable. Came out pretty close to release, actually.

PvP

Yup, it's Bomberman alright. (image from the wiki)
Yup, it's Bomberman alright. (image from the wiki)

It's pretty interesting, but I don't know much about it. There are two PvP modes now, Blast Network and Lockdown. Blast Network sounds and looks a lot like playing Bomberman. Lockdown is a team-based game where you choose a class with a special skill and gear bonuses associated with it and capture control points for your team. You can get rewards you can use in the normal PvE game.

Events

There's a lot of them. There's one going on right now for the anniversary. Usually there are missions and special monsters associated with it that give you coins for accessories and such.

Other small things

  • 4* and 5* items are bound by default.
  • An NPC will randomize Unique Variants for money.
  • The crafting prices were changed so that 1-2* items are cheaper and curves way more after 3*.
  • There are more gear choice now, of course, but not that many (I guess new weapon behavior would be like a new fighting game character or a new Monster Hunter weapon in this game).
  • I think there are pets now? And they fight along with you and level up?
  • They added prize wheels that pops up after you finish a level but I think it's bugged out now.

What hasn't changed

Still a bit janky sometimes.
Still a bit janky sometimes.
  • The lag can still get pretty bad, unfortunately. This is mainly the reason I don't play the game as much as I would like.
  • Core gameplay hasn't changed much. Shield-cancels and shield-bumps and such are still useful, and progression is still entirely gear-based.
  • Energy is still around, still only 100 Mist Energy per 22 hours and still 10 energy per level. I guess Crystal Energy is more valuable since high-level crafting cost way more and the lowest depths are super expensive to get into. Since there are missions now, energy should not be a hurdle to getting into a specific set of levels you want to play anymore.
  • The art and music is still pretty good.
  • Still pretty unique. I can't think of any game like it that has come out in the past 2 years.

Thanks for reading all of that! I hope this has been interesting to anyone, and I encourage you to try the game again if you didn't like it before! Maybe your opinion of it will change, who knows? If you have been playing the game recently, feel free to add in whatever other updates you think is important or elaborate on some points I glossed over.

(By the way, please give feedback on my writing! I'm actually trying to improve my English by writing on the forums, because it's not my first language. Any advice will be much appreciated!)

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