Style Maps, Save Profiles, The Armless, gameplay improvements and fixes

Hi everyone!

The first update / patch of 2025 is live.
Here are the most important changes and improvements.

[h2]Highlights[/h2]

• [h3]New Style Maps (Kick, Spear, Dash, Dagger)[/h3]
  As before, even if you've already discovered some of the moves, it's worth trying to repeat all the moves available on the Style Maps to understand the move and how to repeat it consistently. Style Maps are unlocked in pairs when you reach the four main hubs:
  
  • Ignorance (Jump & Sword)
    
  • Hubris (Slide & Bow)
    
  • NEW Obsession (Kick & Spear)
  • NEW Wrath (Dash & Dagger)
  
• [h3]Save Profiles[/h3] You don't have to reset your save to start over, just choose one of two additional save slots in the new Profiles menu located on the Title Screen. Your best time and score will be submitted to leaderboards regardless of the current save file. Your settings remain the same across all save slots.
  
  
• [h3]Renewed behavior of The Armless Knight[/h3]
  The original version was too focused on backstabbing + his inability to do much against an airborne player made him seem rather passive for a boss fight. Now, The Armless acts more like a proper enemy, with a number of new additions to his move set and fewer opportunities for cheese to make the fight feel fairer. Experienced Knights can still style the hell out of our old friend ;)
  
  

[h2]Player[/h2]

• Improved grapple auto-aiming in the air. Previously, the grapple would prioritize grapple points over enemies over objects (barrels, the orb). Now the object/enemy closest to your aiming direction wins.
  
• Added a special sound clue when the dagger cooldown ends.
• Added a Flawless icon during gameplay. Appears above the rank letter when all enemies are killed + no damage + no falls with a special sound. There's a little gray area with falling and burning enemies, they are still presumed dead when the orb is destroyed, but the icon will ONLY show when all are actually dead.
  
• Pullable enemies can't block your dagger pull from behind. For example, you can backstab-pull a Blessed Lancer or Blessed Deadman if you're fast enough to catch them from behind.
  
  
• Soul Dash (dashing to a weapon right through an enemy) now works on knocked out enemies. No one will ever use it intentionally, but it's now possible :)
  
• Bow throw charge time reduced. Throwing a bow still takes a bit longer because it is the only weapon that stuns enemies on collision, but it should now feel less like a forced delay.
  
• Fated Strikes are followed by a special sound and quick a dark vignette. The effects are subtle so as not to interrupt the existing flow, but to give a few more clues as to when such a special move was performed.
  

[h2]Options[/h2]

• Small rearrangement. I moved some of the newer gameplay settings to a new Advanced menu to make the gameplay options less overwhelming by separating the fine-tuning settings.
  
• Added the Show Timer option to the new Advanced menu. Now you can turn on the speedrun timer once and for all. Especially less hassle with Steam decks/controllers.
  
• Optimization of the in-game timer, as we can now enable it in the options to stay on screen indefinitely.
  

[h2]Fixes[/h2]

• Fixed eye-poking launch direction (Rising Vertigo). Now it’s not possible to send yourself flying backwards when stabbing the eye with a spear, the direction of the launch is based on your look direction and not relative to the center of the eye.
  
• The Lancers' skyfall strike is fixed. They won't sit and wait in the void forever if you don't move.
  
• King Ballista arena tweaks. Fixed navmesh for enemies and bigger collider for the exit portal to make the final move a bit less stressful.
  
• Added an experimental fix falling through the floor physics bug (usually would happen upon landing between wooden platforms from a height).
  
• Fixed a camera bug when performing a chain dropkick very close to an enemy. Slightly improved Heavies' model clipping when dropkicking by increasing the distance from enemies with larger proportions.
  
  

[h3]Shady Discord[/h3]
If you want to help me with the future patches/update by playing them earlier feel free to join my Shady Knight Discord Server

• Don't forget to #pick-your-role @BETA_builds to be pinged when there's a new build.
  
• The BETA builds discussions are on #experimental-shady channel.
  

That's all for now, and as always, thank you so much for playing I will see you in the next update!

Yours,
cptnsigh