Rocketcat and Madgarden’s Death Road to Canada ($14.99) has been one of the biggest releases of the year, and is so gosh darn good that there’s no doubt in my mind it will be very high up on the list of games we’ll be discussing for our Game of the Year and Best Games of 2017 coverage in December. That said, the initial release was already pretty fantastic but the developers have been continuously adding new stuff through updates since the game’s release back in March, making for an even better experience. Their forthcoming update, dubbed the “COCCYX" update, is by far the biggest yet though, so if you can’t get enough of trying to make your way to Canada to evade the zombie apocalypse (and probably dying before you get there most of the time) then you’re going to want to check out part 1 and part 2 of the huge list of update details that Kepa has put together in our forums.
The update description is SO big it actually surpassed the character limit for posting and had to be split into two posts, which goes to show that they mean business with the “COCCYX" update. If you’re too lazy to click the links above, the biggest change in this update is the new unlock system which will see you earning a new currency called Zombo Points by surviving siege and gauntlet events and then using those points to unlock “new perks, traits, a special Gnome Trader, and passive bonuses!" You can also earn even more Zombo Points by playing on harder difficulties and for successfully making it to Canada. The previous Perk unlock system should transfer all your progress over into the new Zombo Point system automagically, so don’t worry if you’ve sunk a bunch of time into unlocking things through the old way.
There’s also changes to the ending, a TON of new characters, new text events, new weapons, lots of UI and system changes, and plenty of bug fixes and tweaks. So stop being lazy and go read the full change log in the Death Road to Canada forum thread and be on the lookout for the just submitted COCCYX update to land likely sometime this month.
In OTHER Rocketcat/Mardgarden collaboration news, an update is all set and ready to release for their fantastic endless puncher Punch Quest (Free) which will bring it into 64-bit compliance and mercifully save it from the impending 32-bit Appocalypse. If you’re somehow unfamiliar, Punch Quest is something of a hybrid between old-school beat ’em ups like Final Fight and Streets of Rage mixed together with a side-scrolling auto-runner. Basically, it’s amazing, and if it wasn’t going to survive the Appocalypse I would literally cry about it. We thought the game was amazing when it launched in the fall of 2012, but were afraid the free to play system in the game was maybe TOO generous, and that it might not make enough money to sustain development. Well, that’s pretty much what happened! Rocketcat pivoted to a paid game not too long after release, but eventually with enough tweaking they settled into a nice free to play model and the game did pretty well after that.
In even more exciting news, Rocketcat says that they are investigating the possibility of doing another actual content update for Punch Quest, which would put me over the moon. There’s also more in store for Death Road to Canada following the COCCYX update, so look for another big content update for that most likely sometime in August. AND there’s the Paladin update coming for Wayward Souls ($7.99) in the not too distant future, and if we could convince Rocketcat to go and update Hook Champ (Free), Super QuickHook (Free), and Hook Worlds (Free) then everything would REALLY be coming up Milhouse. For now, though, I’m quite happy with what’s in store for Death Road and Punch Quest, so look for those updates to land in the coming weeks.
