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2023

Pier of the Unknown DLC Out Now!

Grab the new DLC for a brand new adventure in New Wirral!

I welcome you all, the time draws near…
Come one, come all, to Brightside Pier!

Without further ado, you can now grab the new Cassette Beasts DLC, “Pier of the Unknown” on all platforms! Just a reminder as to what comes with this awesome addition:

• A new storyline to unravel
• A spooky new location with three carnival-themed attractions to uncover and explore
• 12 new monsters that can only be found and recorded within Brightside Pier
• Five new character cosmetic options
• This DLC brings the total number of monsters to 141, meaning you can now form 19,881 monster fusions!

Check out the brand new launch trailer below:

Let us know what you think of the new content by joining us on Discord!


For those new to Cassette Beasts, you’ll collect awesome monsters to use during turn-based battles in this open-world RPG. Combine any two monster forms using Cassette Beasts’ Fusion System to create unique and powerful new ones!

Welcome to New Wirral, a remote island inhabited by strange creatures you’ve only dreamed of, nightmares you hopefully haven’t, and a cast of brave folks who use cassette tapes to transform for battle. To find a way home you’ll need to explore every inch of the island, and record monsters to your trusty cassette tapes to gain their abilities!

For those wondering, the Multiplayer Update is still in development and arriving as a free update for all platforms at a later date. Thanks so much for all your comments, reviews and kind words – the positivity from our community has helped make this possible! Once again, you can come and chat about Cassette Beasts with us and with our community on the official Discord server!

Until next time!

Pier of the Unknown, Coming Oct 4th!

Hey y’all!

We have some very exciting news for Cassette Beasts – just in time for the spooky season!

Charge your oversized flashlights and steel your nerves for Pier of the Unknown, a new DLC for Cassette Beasts, is coming to all platforms on October 4th! This DLC includes:

  • A spooky new location – Brightside Pier – which contains multiple attractions to explore!
  • A new storyline to unravel!
  • 12 new monsters that can only be found and collected within Brightside Pier!
  • Five new character costume options!

This new expansion for Cassette Beasts brings the total number of monsters to 141, meaning you can now form 19,881 unique fusions! (we don’t, however, recommend attempting this)

Check out the new trailer below!

This DLC will be available on all platforms for 6.99 USD/6.89 EUR/5.89 GBP/29 CYN/800 JPY.

You can wishlist the DLC on its store page here! Which monsters will you be bringing to Brightside Pier next month? Let us know in the comments!

~ Bytten Studio

Update 1.2 & the Cassette Beasts Showcase

Hello, everyone!

If you missed the Cassette Beasts Showcase, packed with new content announcements and news, check it out here:

Here is a quick recap:

The 1.2 “Catacombs” content update is now live!

The update also includes a series of performance and visual updates for consoles in addition to the new content coming for all platforms. You’ll get to delve deeper and discover a few treasures thought to be lost to the age of time!

  • A new hidden location – can you find the abandoned mine?
  • 8 new monsters to find, including 3 alternate remastered forms of existing monsters, 4 new monsters to discover in the world, and a secret unique monster!
  • 10 new moves, including a new attack, several moves centered around new status effects, and 4 new passives. 

If your update didn’t start automatically, make sure you have version 1.2.0 to be able to play the new content. There might be a slight delay on the update going live depending on the platform!

Multiplayer is coming to Cassette Beasts! 

Online multiplayer is coming to Cassette Beasts! Now in active development, we’re super excited to announce these features that will be arriving in future as a free update for all versions of Cassette Beasts:

  • Go adventuring with up to 8 friends!
  • Trade tapes with each other!
  • Challenge your friends to battles with various custom rulesets!
  • Team up in raid battles against Rogue Fusions!

Developing multiplayer is a big technical undertaking so we haven’t got any dates to announce just yet – we’ll update you when we can!

Venture to the “Pier of the Unknown”!

Announced at the Showcase, Pier of the Unknown is an upcoming DLC expansion for Cassette Beasts. What is this all about? You’ll have to just wait and see…

Cassette Beasts Soundtrack: Physical Release!

You’ve asked for it! We’ve partnered with Black Screen Records for a physical release of the Cassette Beasts soundtrack by Joel Baylis! With both a 2-disc vinyl and a cassette tape release (of course!) this is an awesome way to enjoy the bangin’ tunes of Cassette Beasts! You can preorder these releases here: https://blackscreenrecords.com/collections/cassette-beasts

Plushes!

We’ve had a lot of requests for monster plushes, so we’re happy to announce we’re working with the cool folks at Symbiote Studios on a line of Cassette Beasts plushes! On the Showcase, we showed a sneak peek at the Pombomb plush. We can’t wait for these – we’ll keep the community updated on what other monsters will be available, and when they’ll be available to preorder!


Wow, that’s a whole lot of stuff, huh? There’s a lot of cool stuff happening with Cassette Beasts, and we wouldn’t be able to do it without the continued support and enthusiasm from our community. Thanks for all the support so far – we’re really happy you’re all along for the Cassette Beasts journey with us!


If you want to discuss this in our community, you should swing by the official Discord, our official subreddit and follow us on Twitter!

Until next time!

Cassette Beasts is coming April 26th!

Oh look! Pombomb is here with a new message, he seems really excited about this one so let’s go ahead and rip open that envelope.

We are thrilled to finally be able to announce when you get to play and fuse monsters on Steam and PC Game Pass – April 26th! Cassette Beasts will be available on consoles this Spring. Mark your calendars as we prepare to embark to New Wirral, a remote island inhabited by strange creatures you’ve only dreamed of!

Join a cast of brave folks who use cassette tapes to transform for battle. To find a way home, you’ll need to explore every inch of the island and record monsters to your trusty cassette tapes to gain their abilities!

Oh wow! I can see why you ran so fast over here to deliver the news Pombomb! Thank you so much, you’re the best boy and deserve all the treats!


While we let him settle down after all this excitement, let’s check out our new trailer showcasing more from the game, a new awesome track and more fusions teased.

Read more about the game on our website or, to keep up with all things Cassette Beasts, follow our Twitter and Tiktok or pop over and chat with both the devs and fans alike on Discord!

We couldn’t be more excited to share this experience with you all; it would help us immensely to wishlist and spread the word with your friends!

Open World

Hey folks! Everyone knows that an open world is only as good as the things that you can do in that open world… So this week we’re giving you a peek at some of the things you can do in Cassette Beasts!


Collect Monster Forms

This kinda goes without saying! In Cassette Beasts you record monsters’ forms onto cassette tapes, which you can then use in battle to transform yourself into that monster. There are 120 monster forms to collect.

‘Professor’ Hoylake, who you might have already heard in our Friendship Games Week trailer, has taken on the task of categorising the monster species of New Wirral. However he seems reluctant to do the footwork himself, and leaves it all to you!

Rumours

The people of Harbourtown love to share rumours and hearsay – there are not many forms of entertainment available to them after all!

When you’re not sure where to explore or what to attempt next, the rumours you pick up in Harbourtown will always contain good suggestions. Every rumour you hear is tracked in a tab in your quest log until you’ve investigated it (or it has become irrelevant some other way).

Following up on rumours almost always leads directly to progress in your main quests, which don’t always on their own tell you where you need to go.

Rumours are our answer to the problems of open world maps littered with icons. As well as the issues of visual overcrowding and choice paralysis, some open world RPGs show icons that aren’t actionable, i.e. icons for activities that the player isn’t high enough level to take on yet, or doesn’t have the necessary movement abilities to even reach. Whereas in Cassette Beasts every rumour you hear is tailored towards your level and ability.

Of course if you prefer to stumble blindly around the island without a clue, that’s always an option! Collecting rumours is suggested for first-time players, but completely optional.

Archangels

If you’ve played the demo to the end, you will have seen the start of the main quest in Cassette Beasts. Skip to the section on Friendships and Romance if you prefer to avoid spoilers for the demo!

At the end of the demo Kayleigh and the player battle a strange otherworldly creature called Morgante, who is known as an Archangel to the people of New Wirral. With the last of her energy, Morgante gives the player a song, whose lyrics promise to show the way to leave New Wirral. However, most of the song is too quiet to make out!

To complete the song and find your way home you’ll need to encounter more Archangels, but well… nobody really knows where they are – or how many! Perhaps the rumours in Harbourtown contain some clues.

These can be truly difficult battles if you’re not prepared. Often it’s not enough to simply be a higher level. You’ll need to know your foe, and prepare a strategy in advance. If you’re smart enough to figure out the clues in the song you might not have to fight them all though…

Each Archangel has a dungeon of its own that becomes a new fast travel point after you discover it. Dungeons vary quite a lot in terms of size, puzzle, theme, and mechanics. We’re looking forward to seeing which dungeons and which Archangels players like the most!

Vampires…?

Again, if you’ve played to the end of the demo, you’ll have been introduced to these pale-faced fiends.

Are they really vampires like Eugene implies, or are they something much more nefarious? Helping Eugene clear out their ‘strongholds’ spread across New Wirral should reveal the truth… and help you get closer to Eugene!

Friendships and Romance

Kayleigh and Eugene are introduced as unlockable partner characters early in the game, but there are also four others you can find around New Wirral!

If the first step towards building a friendship with someone is finding them and unlocking them as a companion, the second is completing a quest with them! Completing their quest bumps you up to relationship level 1, which unlocks your ability to fuse with them in battle.

After that, battling alongside them and periodically camping or going to the cafe with them, can get you to higher relationship levels. This makes your fusions even stronger, and unlocks the powerful Fusion Power move in battle!

At relationship level 5 you gain the ability to romance your companion. It’s completely optional, with no gameplay benefits, but it’s cute!

We wrote a bit more about this in a previous blog post!

Join the Rangers

We also wrote about this back in January.

Harbourtown’s Rangers exist to support the community. They maintain the town, manage supply lines and deliveries, and keep important routes safe for travel. Occasionally, more dangerous situations pop up, and these fall on the Ranger Captains–the highest ranking rangers–to resolve.

The Captains are also responsible for training new recruits, and in your case that means battling! Each of the 12 Captains – stationed at different points around New Wirral – have tapes based around particular strategies they favour in battle. Like with Archangels, if you’re not prepared with a strategy of your own it can be a difficult fight.

Stationed in New Wirral Park, Captain Wallace is most likely the first Captain you’ll face. We first showed him on our stream in December. His preferred strategy uses walls to block incoming attacks, so consider setting up your tapes with moves that will let you take them down quickly, otherwise you’ll get nowhere!

Rogue Fusions & Bootlegs

Rogue Fusions – unnaturally strong monsters that have fused – spawn randomly around New Wirral. Battling them is optional (until the postgame) but they yield certain valuable resources, and have a higher than normal chance of containing bootlegs.

Bootlegs are rare type and colour-swapped variants of ordinary monsters. Bootlegs’ movepools are modified to match their new type, and they have a higher than normal chance of spawning uncommon and rare variants of moves.

When you battle a Rogue Fusion you first have to get its HP to 0 to split it apart into the two monsters that make it up. Then you can record them if you want, or otherwise just defeat them!

There are several different kinds of Rogue Fusions besides the basic ones. Some of them surround themselves with a swarm of other monsters, while others seem to become more powerful in other ways…

If you’re hunting bootlegs, you’ll definitely want to keep an eye out for these!

Upgrade Yourself

Ranger Wilma runs a little shop in the Town Hall that provides backpack and cassette player upgrades, as well as certain other items you can use to improve your character’s strength. This is the perfect place to spend the Fused Material that Rogue Fusions drop!

Ranger Wilma is an essential part of the Ranger’s organisation. Certain scarce items and upgrades, invaluable in the pursuit of Archangels, are stored and distributed by Wilma from the Ranger’s HQ in Harbourtown. The more your training under the Captains progresses, the more she’ll be able to provide you with.

Abilities

You’ll know this if you’ve played our demo, but recording certain monster forms also upgrades your human form with new abilities. In the demo, recording Dominoth gives you the ability to glide on butterfly wings.

There are six abilities to find in total. It may not be obvious which monsters give new abilities, or where to find them. But if you keep an ear out for rumours I’m sure you’ll be zipping about like a bullet and climbing sheer cliff walls in no time!

While you’re not technically required to have the abilities to complete the main story (besides Mothwing Glide), there are plenty of locations you won’t be able to visit without them.

Unique & Roaming Monsters

While we haven’t shown any of these to avoid spoiling the surprises, there are a number of unique monsters to find and record in Cassette Beasts. Each one has a special mechanic or gimmick all to itself, making them quite fun to face for the first time, or have in your party.

You don’t need to worry about accidentally defeating them the first time you encounter them. After a unique monster is defeated, it becomes a roaming monster. Roaming monsters spawn at different locations on different in-game days, and have a chance of spawning as a bootleg. Rumours may hint at their locations!

Postgame

The postgame in Cassette Beasts is surprisingly big! To give you a taste, here’s a quick rundown:

Optional Bosses: I won’t say too much, but there are a number of hidden bosses on New Wirral that can be battled when certain conditions are met.

Rematches: The Ranger Captains were holding back the first time you battled them. In the post-game you can rematch them at full strength. Expect surprises!

Ranger Noticeboard: If you’ve completed your training with the Ranger Captains and become a full-time ranger yourself, you get access to a new series of quests on this noticeboard. These quests progress a new story exploring the cause and origin of Rogue Fusions, as well as introduce new unique monsters, and brand new characters who have arrived on the island! The bulk of the postgame content is accessed through the noticeboard.

Of course anything you didn’t finish off during the course of the main story is also still there for you to find and take on!

Randomisation & Speedrunning

We wrote about this in more detail here.

Completing the game unlocks new custom game modes. This adds options like monster habitat randomisation, type randomisation, move randomisation, as well as permadeath.

Cassette Beasts has a built-in timer showing how long you’ve been playing your file on the screen – perfect for dipping your toes into speedrunning. For more advanced speedrunning players, the game also features LiveSplit integration (via the LiveSplit Server component), meaning the game can automatically send split commands when certain programmable conditions are met.


Whew, there sure is a lot to do in Cassette Beasts! Let us know what you’re most looking forward to in the comments. Or if you want to know more, why not swing by the official Discord! And of course, you can always follow us on Twitter for future updates!

Until next time!

Monster Showcase

It’s time for another monster showcase! You’ll have seen some of these before, but perhaps not all of them! Why don’t we take a look?


Sirenade #024
Element: Air

French: Sirènade
Italian: Sirenata
German: Sirenade
Spanish: Sirenata

You’ve already seen this one before if you played our demo – Kayleigh’s signature monster form Sirenade! Sirenades are particularly loud creatures, and can amplify their own singing voices through their microphone tails and wings. They don’t seem to have much awareness as to whether or not their singing is too loud for those around them.

Muskrateer #061
Element: Beast

French: Mousquerataire
Italian: Muschettiere
German: Moschketier
Spanish: Mosqueterrata

Muskrateers can often be found sharpening their swords on stones in the underground caves where they dwell. It is not uncommon to find them duelling any Squireys that happen to cross their paths. I also hear that they have remarkable balance!

Weevilite #012
Element: Plastic

French: Lumicrabe
Italian: Semaforello
German: Rüsselampel
Spanish: Semaforgojo

You might be able to guess – but this is one of the remastered forms of Traffikrab! The Weevilite’s long necks allow them to spot weaker monsters from afar, and by alternating flashes of their red and green eyes they can paralyse their prey with dizziness and mild migraines. This remastered form specialises in attack.

Terracooka #076
Element: Earth

French: Terracuisto
Italian: Terracotto
German: Terrakocher
Spanish: Terracocido

Terracookas are aspiring chefs, and will attempt to cook with whatever ingredients they can find in their subterranean cave habitats. Unfortunately this means that most of their practiced recipes include lichen, moss, or both lichen and moss.

Elfless #066
Element: Ice

French: Maskelfe
Italian: Introvelfo
German: Elflos
Spanish: Elfolfo

It’s a fun Christmas Elf! …It is fun, right? In order to hide their true emotions, Elfless fashion crude smiling masks out of tree bark. Unsubstantiated rumours claim that there is one day a year where all Elfless will assemble together to replace their old masks with new ones.

Macabra #028
Element: Beast

French: Macabra
Italian: Macabra
German: Makabra
Spanish: Macabra

What’s this fearsome thing?! The Macabra cannot see, but instead has the ability to “taste” the air around it for potential prey. It prefers to do so from a higher vantage point, and will often find a rock or animal skull to perch on whilst hunting.


OK, what does a fusion between Sirenade and Elfless look like, then?

Sirenless! Terrifying – I see! Well, that does it for this week. Which monster form would you transform into to battle? Come and let us know on our official Discord! You can always follow us on Twitter, too!

Until next time!

Partners & Relationships

Hey folks! This time we’re taking a look at the various human characters you can befriend and battle alongside…


It’s dangerous to go alone in New Wirral, so Rangers encourage prospective adventurers to travel alongside a partner. In Cassette Beasts there are 6 partner characters to find and unlock. Once unlocked, they will happily travel and battle alongside you whenever you want.

If you need to swap who you’re travelling with, just pop back to Harbourtown’s Gramophone Cafe, where everybody meets up.

Your partner will follow you around anywhere you go.

During local co-op multiplayer, the second player takes control of the active partner character. In battle, each player has exclusive control over a single character and gets to decide what move they use.

If you’re playing alone, you’ll have control over both characters during battle, of course!

Carniviper and Dominoth? It’s a good job Meredith is here to even the odds!

Let’s meet some of these partners!

Kayleigh
If you played our Steam Next Fest demo, you’ll have met Kayleigh. She gives the player their first tape and explains some of the basics of life in New Wirral.

Hailing from Ireland, Kayleigh is a kind and friendly ranger who wants the best for her friends and community. Her preferred monster form is the Air-type monster Sirenade.

Meredith
Meredith is a sarcastic and antisocial Londoner who occupies herself repairing Harbourtown’s electronics. She likes dumb action movies and bands with tragic backstories.

Eugene
Eugene, the self-proclaimed “Protector of Harbourtown”, also appeared in our Steam Next Fest Demo. When and where he’s from isn’t clear, other than his quest is to rid New Wirral of the undead… but something doesn’t quite seem right. Why are these vampires wearing suits?

As for the other partner characters, you’ll have to wait and see!


When you have a rest at a campsite (or in the cafe) your friend will usually have something to say. Every once in a while this triggers a social event that will progress your relationship with them to the next level. These social events increase the strength and abilities of your fusions by increasing the strength of your bond.

Choosing certain dialogue options can also lead to something more than friendship…


That’s it for today! Who is your favourite partner shown so far? Who will you romance? Come tell us on our official Discord! You can always follow us on Twitter, too!

Until next time!

Meet the Rangers

Hey folks! Have you ever wondered what the Rangers of Harbourtown do? Well, it’s time for us to go into more detail…


If you played our Steam Next Fest demo, you’ll already know the basics. At the beginning of Cassette Beasts, you wash up on the shore of New Wirral, an island on what seems to be another world. There you meet Kayleigh, a kind and friendly ranger, who takes you to Harbourtown and shows you the ropes.

Along the way, you and Kayleigh encounter a strange and otherworldly creature known to the residents of New Wirral only as an ‘Archangel’.

Finding more of these Archangels is the key to finding the way off New Wirral and back to your home world. But to survive them you’ll need to get stronger–and that’s where the Rangers come in…


Rangers

Harbourtown’s Rangers exist to support the community. They maintain the town, manage supply lines and deliveries, and keep important routes safe for travel. Occasionally, more dangerous situations pop up, and these fall on the Ranger Captains–the highest ranking rangers–to resolve.

The Captains are also responsible for training new recruits, and in your case that means battling! Each of the 12 Captains has tapes based around a particular strategy they favour in battle. If you’re not prepared with a strategy of your own it can be a difficult fight.

Stationed in New Wirral Park, Captain Wallace is most likely the first Captain you’ll face. We first showed him on our stream in December. His preferred strategy uses walls to block incoming attacks, so consider setting up your tapes with moves that will let you take them down quickly, otherwise you’ll get nowhere!

Ranger Wilma is an essential part of the Ranger’s organisation. Certain scarce items and upgrades–invaluable in the pursuit of Archangels–are stored and distributed by Wilma from the Ranger’s HQ in Harbourtown. The more your training under the Captains progresses, the more she’ll be able to provide you with.


Postgame

While I won’t spoil how the story ends, I will say there is a lot more to do in Cassette Beasts after it!

People don’t stop arriving on New Wirral after your appearance, of course. Just as you received help from the Rangers early on, after you’ve completed your training and become a Ranger, you’ll be helping orient some of the new arrivals yourself!

If you’ve seen these bad boys in screenshots and videos before and wondered what they are, they’re what the Rangers call ‘Rogue Fusions’. Rogue Fusions are unnaturally strong monsters that have fused in the wild. Some Rogue Fusions surround themselves with a swarm of other monsters, and others seem to increase in power in other ways… As a Ranger and a recognised combat pro it’ll be your job to keep them under control. But why do they form, and why are they becoming more frequent and dangerous…?

In the postgame, there are new monsters to encounter and record, and new bosses to fight. Each Ranger Captain can be rematched. This time they won’t hold back, and will unleash their perfected strategies on you!

And of course if that’s not enough for you, beating the game unlocks additional game modes, including permadeath, and various kinds of randomisation.


That’s all for now. Let us know what you think in our Discord! And of course you can also find us on Twitter.

Until next time!

Monster Showcase

Hey folks! It’s time to introduce some of the monsters of Cassette Beasts – including some you’ve seen before and some you might not have! Here we go…


Bansheep #019
Element: Beast

French: Fantômouton
Italian: Stregovina
German: Geisterschaf
Spanish: Beenshee

One of the two starting monsters you can choose from in Cassette Beasts, you may have already seen Bansheep if you played our Steam Next Fest demo back in October!

The eerie moans of the wild Bansheep at night have led many to believe that they are restless undead spirits, but this is untrue: they are very much alive, they just like to have a bit of a whine. Who doesn’t?

Candevil #014
Element: Beast

French: Gourmandiable
Italian: Zuccherello
German: Bonbonteufel
Spanish: Diablamelo

Candevils possess the peculiar ability to generate sugary sweets from their bodies, which can be used as gifts or as ballistic projectiles. Some find this quite charming, whereas others argue that it’s actually very weird and gross.

Candevil is the other starting monster. While Candevil and Bansheep both start with the Beast element, each of them can be remastered along two different branches, into more evolved forms that have very different elemental types.


Salamagus #059
Element: Fire

French: Salamage
Italian: Salamagus
German: Salamagus
Spanish: Salamago

The slippery Salamagus is a student of pyromancy and other arcane arts. It is able to breathe fire using fuel it stores in the pouches on its head – incidentally, these look like giant googly eyes to the untrained eye.

Squirey #034
Element: Beast

French: Écurikiki
Italian: Scudierrante
German: Drahtknappe
Spanish: Escuderazado

The common Squirey is often seen roaming the plains of New Wirral, searching for opponents to battle. Despite their cute appearances, they are dedicated warriors and driven by an innate desire for self-improvement.

Palangolin #036
Element: Metal

French: Palangolin
Italian: Lanciolino
German: Palangolin
Spanish: Palangolín

The Palangolin is the mature form of a Squirey who has remained true to their principles, and has become a knight of great virtue. Palangolins wield striking golden halberds, which they use to defend their allies in the heat of battle.

Manispear #035
Element: Metal

French: Chevalance
Italian: Malabardo
German: Manispeer
Spanish: Manistratega

Hey, wait… This one’s new, right?

If a Squirey gives in to their dark impulses whilst training, it is destined to become a Manispear. Hiding its face beneath a black helmet, the Manispear fights without restraint or self-control.


Wondering what a fusion of Manispear and Palangolin looks like? Well, together they form Manisgolin!

What is your favourite monster shown today? Come and let us know on our official Discord! You can always follow us on Twitter, too!

Until next time!

Randomisation & Speedrunning

Happy new year, folks! This week we’re looking at some of the features you can make use of in Cassette Beasts to spice up your playthroughs.


Custom Game Modes

Once you’ve beaten the game, Cassette Beasts has a number of options you can use to customise your next playthrough.

While we recommend playing the game through normally on your first playthrough, these options can also be unlocked with a cheat code–handy if you’re playing the game on a different machine at a speedrun competition! The cheat code will be shared after the game’s release.

Let’s go through these one by one:

First up, we have “Tapes Break Permanently,” which means that any tape with 0 hit points can’t be repaired and will be unusable for the rest of your playthrough! But don’t worry, as long as you have at least one usable tape in storage, you’ll be able to keep going after defeat.

If you want to up the stakes even more, turn on “Defeat is Game Over,” where a single loss in battle means game over – no matter how many tapes you have left. In Cassette Beasts, your party members take overspill damage when a tape breaks, so one big hit from an enemy could be enough to completely end your run!

Feeling adventurous? “Randomise Monsters” lets you mix up the habitats of monsters, as well as the starter and partner tapes. This is a great way to try out monsters you wouldn’t normally use in your party.

With “Randomise Types,” my personal favourite, you can randomise monster species’ types, as well as their colour palettes and movepools to match. This isn’t the same as making everything a bootleg–each species will always be a particular type, just not the one you’re used to!

If you want to mix up your opponents’ strategies, “Randomise Moves” is for you. This option can be used to randomise the default set of moves for monsters, as well as the moves you unlock by upgrading tapes. These moves are still compatible with the monster species, but the combinations can be surprising–a normally weak monster could become something to dread!

Finally, there’s the “Random Seed” option, which can be used to control all the aforementioned randomisation options. It can also control the randomisation of certain variables in the game, even when no customisations are enabled – perfect for speedruns. With this option, sticker merchants will always have the same stock on the same day, and chests will always contain the same items.

These options are our answer to the Nuzlocke and permadeath features the community has been asking for. While there aren’t currently any options that enforce the first Nuzlocke rule (only one monster can be recorded per ‘route’), we’ll be keeping an eye on how players choose to interpret that rule in Cassette Beasts’ open world.


Speedrunning & LiveSplit Integration

A small but dedicated speedrunning community grew around our last game, Lenna’s Inception, after its launch. We learned a lot from this community about what makes a game suitable for speedrunning and what does not, and factored this into Cassette Beasts.

On all platforms, you can enable an in-game timer in the settings menu at any time. This timer displays in the top left of the screen, and records how long you’ve been playing your save file for. It automatically pauses on loading screens and during character customisation.

While the in-game timer is enabled, you can hold the middle mouse button (or Y on a controller) to speed up dialogue, and automatically select dialogue options.

If you have LiveSplit installed (available for Windows only), you can connect Cassette Beasts to the LiveSplit Server component, and automatically send split commands based on certain in-game events. The game tracks numerous stats in your save file, for the purpose of achievements. These stats include which bosses you’ve defeated, how many species you’ve recorded, and so on. Any of these stats can be used to trigger splits.

The LiveSplit integration is fully configurable through an INI file, so you can create your own list of custom splits!

Example INI file on the left, and Tom’s best time achieved with it on the right. Spoilery details are censored. Jay and Tom had tons of fun competing for the best time. Note that the time shown isn’t representative of the length of a normal playthrough–this one was achieved with a lot of dirty tricks!

The configuration file makes it very flexible. You’re not locked to beating certain bosses in a certain order, or even starting and ending your run at the usual places. If you want the timer to start when you beat the first boss, split after you’ve recorded 3 Traffikrabs, and then finish when you defeat a certain NPC, you can!

We hope that this will make speedrunning Cassette Beasts fun and easy for people to get into.

More information about how to configure the LiveSplit integration will be published on the wiki after the game releases.


That’s all for this week, folks! If you want to know more, why not swing by the official Discord! As well as that, you can always follow us on Twitter for future updates!

Until next time!