Ballest of Them All news & patch notes

We've made some huge improvements to visuals, audio, game feel, and track discovery. Full changelist at the bottom.

If you haven't played in a while, ball up and give us some feedback. We have 129 custom tracks in the Hub to check out.

We'll keep making small improvements, but now we're shifting focus to content:

• EA season 2

• More physics props (cannons, seesaws, bumpers, more!)

• More hats, skins, & explosions

• (I promise I will also fix controller nav asap)

If you have ideas (even the crazy ones!), let us know. I keep a big list.

If you find bugs (sorry), please report them. It's hard for us to catch everything 🙂

Happy ballin'.

Changelist (See bolded items for the cool stuff)

Menus:

• All new menus

• Customize takes you to a new locker room

• Added a real loading screen

• Added a wipe out of loading screens

Customization:

• Added the ability to tweak gloss & pattern power on the basic balls

Environment:

• Improved fog settings for better foreground/background separation

• Fog is no longer volumetric, slight perf boost

• Two big improvements to track readability:

• Near and mid-distance objects now have a soft outline

• Material improvements to roughness, contrast, and tinting

• Circuit tracks all received a paint job

Game feel:

• Hats now tilt when accelerating

• Added subtle speed fx when you're going 40+

• Improved camera probing so it can get closer to the ground

• Camera now tilts very slightly in response to lateral movements

• The smallest camera shake ever added to collisions

Hub:

• Filters are now available for Hub searches; select a tag to see more of what you want

• Added author time preview to the info panel

• Added difficulty preview to thumbnails

Editor:

• Now includes a checklist. Small improvements to publish flow.

SFX:

• Removed infinitely looping stadium music; it's now built into track finish choreography

• Water splooshes

• Greatly improved crowd ambience

• Goal explosions now have appropriate SFX

• The rolling sound is now attached to your ball instead of global, so you'll no longer hear rolling in your ears if you happen to freecam while rolling

• Stadium ambience now has attenuation, so if you happen to fly really far away, it'll get quieter. It's the little things.

VFX:

• Water now has splash VFX

Camera:

• Improved camera probing so it can get closer to the ground

• Small post processing corrections to color and shadows

Performance:

• We think we've greatly improved the hitches for first time users. 🫰

Other:

• No longer hiding author times until you have gold

Fixes:

• Hitting tab during gameplay no longer blocks your jump inputs

• Ambient volume should now correctly remember your preference

• Friends list no longer exceeds widget bounds

• Hovering a track in the hub before it loads no longer flies in bad information

• Fixed the dialogue on track publish so that the confirmation is no longer "Yes!"

• Fixed an issue where multiple goals could spawn in the Track Editor

• Fixed an issue where sounds would not resume after being set to 0

• Hid the "Map" tag from tracks

Ballest releases today in Early Access!

We've made huge improvements since our demo in February, but here's the big ones:

• It now costs money

• The Tower is back with a fresh coat of paint and twice the height

• The Track Editor is now available

We're stoked to see what kind of stuff y'all cook up in the track editor. Check out the hub for the real content.

This is a huge milestone, but this is only the beginning. We have to make this a ball game for the ages.

If you choose to support us in EA, please join the Discord and say hi!

THANK YOU ːsteamhappyː

tldr;

• Track 05 is now live!
• 9 patches in 6 days, plenty of Controller UX buffs
• 1154 finishes on Track 01
• 19 track 04 ninjas
• 6 Tower climbers

General:

• Added a first-time user "How To" controls graphic
• Adjusted the respawn camera angle
• Increased leaderboard preview to top100
• Leaderboard now refreshes automatically after you get a new high score

Controller buffs:

• Added separate controller inputs for forward/back, left/right.
• Added a "Center camera" input to redirect the camera towards your movement direction
• Increased default sensitivity by 20%

• Footer now shows focus and interacts like you might expect
• Closing popups now resets focus like you might expect
• B & Back buttons now navigate like you might expect
• B & Start now close the pause menu like you might expect
• Items in settings now show focus and interact like you might expect

The Tower

• Added arrows where the path was unclear
• Added a graphic fly-in that names each distinct section
• Fixed a handful of textures

Track 04

• Locked 04 behind author medals instead of gold. This track is way too hard for how easy it was to reach, causing a lot of frustration for players that cruised in and hit the wall.
• Added arrows where the path was unclear

Localization

• Adjusted Italian translations based on feedback

System:

• Turned jump sound volume up by 50%
• Turned default master volume down by 20%

Crashes:

Bug fixes:

• Fixed an issue where sensitivity and invert X/Y didn't apply until restarting the track
• Fixed an issue where pausing during hte pre-race screen caused players to get stuck
• Fixed an issue where menu buttons were hidden if the player changes settings and didn't restart before finishing a race
• Fixed an issue where setting a master volume saved it to your music volume preference instead