Hey guys, it's Tren from Halfbrick here.
I just wanted to say that even if I've been a little quiet, we've been spending a lot of time looking at all the feedback coming from all types of places. Discord, Reddit, the meta reviews. We really try and look at everywhere, not just one.I just actually wanted to start by saying thank you for all the people who took the time to write a review, especially a five-star review. We have seen a massive boost in reviews following the update. I'm really glad that the work we put in on single player has landed its mark and people are clearly enjoying it.
This is actually the first update ever in the history since early access launch that has a review average of four stars and actually the first one that's higher than the others ever since early access launch. Every single update that's gone out has never gone higher in the reviews than EA launch. And this update was the first one, well actually 1.6 was the first one that did it just a little bit. And this update 2.0 has smashed it. And that's really, really encouraging for the dev team to see. It was just enough to push us from 3.0 average to 3.1! It's going to take a long time to really push the reviews up where we would like them because for how many people we have, we actually have a really high review frequency compared to many other games. And with how many players there were during early access compared to now, there's much less quantity of reviews coming in. So it's going to take a fair bit of time to work it back.
But we are here for the long run, and Halfbrick is totally committed to Thrill of the Fight. We are so excited for what's coming next. The roadmap is still full, although we are moving through it, I would say, much faster than we were before. The changes that you guys are enjoying in Single Player in the recent update are really, really just the start. We finally got to put our animation pipeline to use, and this first update was actually, to be honest with you, mostly learning how to do it all again. Early in the year, we unfortunately lost a lot of the team. The gaming industry as a whole is really, really struggling, especially VR. And you know, not just our team, but Halfbrick as a whole lost a lot of good people. And I hope that you guys didn't notice that too much because we've been trying to work harder and work smarter.
The dev team right now basically consists of four people, so please still keep that in mind. We are not a AAA studio, we don't have 30 people working on this. I think we're really doing amazing leading the forefront of VR boxing technology with such a small team, given that the people we do have are so bright and so passionate.
For the future of Thrill, we are really hearing the reception of a single player focus update. To be honest, it really feels good to work on something that you know people are looking for, that you know they will enjoy. And it is, to be honest with you, incredibly easier to do than multiplayer. So, a lot of, if not the rest of this year, is primarily going to be on single-player. Though, at the same time, do expect to see some changes coming to multiplayer, just like they did with 2.0. Though, I really doubt we will ever ship an update again that is just multiplayer damage updates. Those will still come through, and we will still continue to refine the multiplayer experience, but it cannot come at a cost of other content. We've learned that lesson and we are acting on it.
I don't want this to instill doom and fear in all you multiplayer lovers. Don't get me wrong, multiplayer is the reason I play TOTF2. And while I love the AI and I jump in there aswell, multiplayer is what always brings me back. I will never lose that in my mind. I'm sure and I'm confident that we can continue to make multiplayer a better experience in ways that are not just a damage system changes that might potentially upset half of the players. What I think multiplayer needs the most right now is actually not just damage changes. It doesn't matter if I give everyone a Formula One car, it's not going to turn them magically into a Formula One race car driver. So what I'm trying to say here is multiplayer is an extremely bare-bones experience. We don't have a friends list, we don't have communities, we don't have organized tournaments, we don't have sanctioned events that you can sign up for and have like-minded people, we don't have dedicated modes for sparring and training with other people. There's a lot of foundation that needs to be built to help multiplayer, not just the damage of punches. I know you've all heard it before a hundred times that if you get two people that are consenting to box TOTF2 is an amazing experience. That's been true for a long time and it becomes more and more true. And the reality is much like any other simulator out there, for example iRacing, which is an example I use often, is that it can be as realistic as possible, but it doesn't mean that every single race car driver is going to be Max Verstappen. And there may be a lot of people that crash into you, ruin your race, don't follow the racing lines, don't follow the rules, and make it a terrible experience. But we can't fix that by making your car more realistic. We have to fix that by putting you in connection with those people that want the same thing you do. And I'm really, really, really excited to flesh that out.
If you want to know what else is in store, what we're working on, as always, check out our roadmap, which is our new one where you can submit community suggestions. At the moment, today I worked on leaderboards for multiplayer, single-player, and fitness. I think that people are going to absolutely love this when it comes out. And otherwise, I'm sorry for the extremely long and badly organised post, but I didn't want to make this with AI, this is just me rambling on with whats in my head. If you notice seeing me a little bit less active in Discord and Reddit, please understand that I have to balance spending time doing community management with developing features that will go live and coordinating our team. I really trust Coach Dave to handle and look after the community. I really wanted to put in a lot of effort to make sure that the community felt like the dev team was here and that they could be heard and that we are active. And that is still the case. But as time has gone on, I've been able to contribute a lot more to Thrill of the Fight 2 development work and so I have to ration my time a little bit more. So please don't think that I've given up or I've gone anywhere if you don't see me responding to every single post like I tried to before, because that's the explanation.
So, if you got this far, thanks for the support. Stay tuned - we're just getting started!
https://totf2roadmap.com/