Polish update: Flame of Hope v1.1.0

I had this for while on my computer but finally released it: a “polish” update for Flame of Hope, combining cosmetic and quality-of-life improvements!

The big changes:

• Intro & Mood: more dramatic silent intro with character walking into the dark, silent room (with step SFX). Then show title and play BGM on first ignition
• Visual & Mood: flickering lights with step-gradient disc edges (thx to Ikenfell for the inspiration!)
• Ending: static end credits
• Tiles: add animated bridges with SFX on appearance
• Tiles: replaced blue flames with proper doors
• Animation: Fix character walk cycles
• Gameplay: thrown fireball is faster, making the last room much easier

Full changelog

Added

• Intro: Character automatically enters first room, which is dark and without torches at first until first fire pit is lit (first flame never goes off and cannot be thrown to avoid soft lock)
• Intro: Igniting first fire pit shows Title for 2s. Strip title and version from release to avoid redundancy.
• SFX: Play walk step SFX synced with Walk animation
• Ending: Add static end credits

Changed

• Gameplay: Fireball: Increase thrown fireball speed
• Gameplay: Torch: Keep flame forever after all of them have been lit in a room
• Sprite: Fixed outline pixels in Character Swing
• Sprite: Fix character swing animation sprite order for Swing Left
• Animation: Fixed character walk cycle + a few pixels on Idle pose. Adjust Rod Flame position accordingly.
• Animation: Step-by-step “bridge appears” animation with SFX at each step
• Font: Switch to pixel art font: Silver (CC-BY 4.0)
• PFX: Spawn explosion when fireball hits something
• PFX: Play ignite PFX when igniting rod or ignitable props. Fire Pit uses bigger PFX.
• PFX: Add light off PFX on Rod and Torch (elevating smoke)
• Camera: Fix camera staying in place when entering room and immediately going the other way, by separating Room Entrance areas by at least 4px
• Light: Smooth light disc edges using step gradient
• Light: Light masks now flicker scale and disappears with tween scale to zero
• Light: Start with Fire Pit off more darker room, add additive Room Light to Fire Pit
• Level: Room 1 uses bridge before door
• Tilemap: Room 1 now only uses 3 levels of cliff tiles so it appears as deep as the other rooms
• Tilemap: Increased Room Entrance area size and adjusted Room Entrance and Door positions to fit
• Door: Prevent fireball throw behind door by adding invisible blocker between rooms
• Door: Replace proto blue flames with actual door sprite with flame runes engraved
• BGM: Fixed BGM loop. Also cut BGM to fewer beats to save space.
• SFX: Balance SFX volumes
• SFX: Attenuate SFX volume with distance from camera center for things that happen in other rooms (torch lit off)
• SFX: Play light off sound when fireball hits wall
• Intro: Replaced fixed collider at bottom with door that closes once character enters a certain area
• Intro: Do not play BGM until igniting first fire pit
• Ending: Fade out BGM at the end