- Welcome to Beach Ball Valley! - 10 October 2020
Beach Ball Valley 1.0 is out, after only 36 build updates since April 2016! It's been an adventure & we're happy to launch our super unique VR game into the world. Here's a list of the changes we've added since EA launch! Thanks to everyone for joining us in early access! We've had a blast playing & making it & tweaking from your feedback! We're now at a happy, stable, carefully polished release that's so small, it would fit on a CD! We've tweaked and changed a lot! photo based & hand painted graphics rebuilt and simplified the valley removed teleporting to make it super simple added tutorial graphics to show you exactly what's going to happen made all the beach balls come to you updated unreal engine versions to include better low latency balanced mind control around hand instead of head mind control two balls at once added a number of beach ball drops to make sure you had enough super…
- Beach Ball Valley out of Early Access - 4 October 2020
Prepare your pizza paddles, because Beach Ball Valley is releasing on October 10th, 2020! It's been a blast working on it and sharing it with everybody. Seeing many smiles & beach balls slammed skyward around the world. We've tweaked and polished many areas of the game, most notably graphics, sound and haptics! But wait, there's more! - achievements - trading cards - profile badges - beach balls - 5 tracker support (possibly up to 11, but we couldn't test that) - device support for pimax 8KX / index / wmr / rift / cosmos / quest (via oculus link). You can see the achievements right now, but you cannot unlock these achievements yet, they'll go live when the game releases!
- Ice Cream Cone - 3 July 2019
We've fixed a few little bugs due to user feedback! Keep it coming! - hjk keys start minigames when no other minigames are playing - strength game is named correctly! To play those minigames from in VR press the menu button and squish the button of the game you want to play.
- Update Ice Cream! - 30 June 2019
After over one year of testing and tinkering, we totally rebuilt the valley to put you right in the middle of the action, with as little confusion to new players as possible! This is the release candidate. Next release is out of early access! Balls come to you no matter what! Minigames are a bit different Pimax Support More hotkeys to amuse your friends New simplified mind control system Discord integration – so your friends can see how many beach balls you've hit! Want to know everything? Read the manual! Notes: Can be played with index controllers, but they're not modeled nicely into the paddles Tracker Support might not work due to issues in STEAMVR itself – should resolve presently The original valley will always be available – check it out under the original-valley branch in beta tab when you select game properties. Here's a handy guide.
- Beach Ball Valley Early Access - 12 February 2019
We're going to be out of early access soon, but we've made big changes which we will release this month! Here's a bit of back story behind our development! Beach Ball Valley started out a long long time ago. It started back when HTC was going to Release the vive in December 2015. We had 2 months to learn VR development and develop a game in VR. This game made a lot of people smile and laugh at VR demos in 2015, so we figured we'd build it out for a release with the Vive. Release schedules changed to April, and we shifted to work on a different game entirely - a castle defense crossbow game where you were being actively attacked by wizards and dodging shrapnel, as your castle was getting destroyed. The team behind that game believed that it needed to look AAA and be way more complex (skill trees, etc) if we were going to release. We didn't release, but instead I turned back to the crowd…
- Update Huckleberry - 2 December 2017
Hand Mind Control! You can wave your hand like a trademarked movie character and if you're holding the grip, and if you've touched a beach ball, you can influence it with beach ball mind tricks! Either hand works, so you can do two at once, or can you? Spectator Screen There are a variety of keys you can use to interact with your friends, now we show them on the main screen. Space to toggle on/off. No perf hit either way. Bonuses Big Beach balls show up now and then. Nobody really know where they come from or why they're here, but they're nice to play with. Rain Cloud is more happy and loves to water the beach balls. Fixes Minigames now end when you leave the area It's easier to make a shot that bounces off the castle roof and hits the hoops Paddleball is now always 8 proper hits away Balls pop less easily Music minigame launchers are better timed Tracking puck functionality isn't crash…
- Update Huckleberry - 2 December 2017
Hand Mind Control! You can wave your hand like a trademarked movie character and if you're holding the grip, and if you've touched a beach ball, you can influence it with beach ball mind tricks! Either hand works, so you can do two at once, or can you? Spectator Screen There are a variety of keys you can use to interact with your friends, now we show them on the main screen. Space to toggle on/off. No perf hit either way. Bonuses Big Beach balls show up now and then. Nobody really know where they come from or why they're here, but they're nice to play with. Rain Cloud is more happy and loves to water the beach balls. Fixes Minigames now end when you leave the area It's easier to make a shot that bounces off the castle roof and hits the hoops Paddleball is now always 8 proper hits away Balls pop less easily Music minigame launchers are better timed Tracking puck functionality isn't crash…
- Update Grand - 12 August 2017
Beach Ball Valley Update Grand! We've updated weather systems to reflect standard cloud diversity. There are now happy clouds and angry clouds. You'll know which are which! Also, there are now buttons to press to start games for all the games. To top things off, we've added a new beach ball! It's Grand! Oh, and one more thing. Try hitting a beach ball 10 times with the same paddle.
- Update Grand - 12 August 2017
Beach Ball Valley Update Grand! We've updated weather systems to reflect standard cloud diversity. There are now happy clouds and angry clouds. You'll know which are which! Also, there are now buttons to press to start games for all the games. To top things off, we've added a new beach ball! It's Grand! Oh, and one more thing. Try hitting a beach ball 10 times with the same paddle.
- Update Finnish Pancake - 15 May 2017
Exciting new features Squishy Buttons. Media Menus. Music Game. More Fluffy Clouds! Octopus Ready! Music game! Any song ever, on time, every time. Just tap the tempo! Pick scored or freeplay. Tap in a tempo, preferably to the music you're listening to; desktop music, the radio or even a live band! Hit beach balls with the beat! Retap the tempo when it changes, or tap the escape button to escape. Puck Tracker Support Vive Puck Trackers now work as extra paddles; stick 'em everywhere! Play with your friends or your cat, or you feet. Add 'em on your arms to basically become an octopus. You can use a lot of trackers, way more than 3. Just turn 'em on and go! If you have enough arms, because you're an octopus, you could play with 8 paddles at once. Squishy buttons. They're the best. They're highly robust and very squishy. Way better than springy buttons. They'll let you change music, start g…
- Update Finnish Pancake - 15 May 2017
Exciting new features Squishy Buttons. Media Menus. Music Game. More Fluffy Clouds! Octopus Ready! Music game! Any song ever, on time, every time. Just tap the tempo! Pick scored or freeplay. Tap in a tempo, preferably to the music you're listening to; desktop music, the radio or even a live band! Hit beach balls with the beat! Retap the tempo when it changes, or tap the escape button to escape. Puck Tracker Support Vive Puck Trackers now work as extra paddles; stick 'em everywhere! Play with your friends or your cat, or you feet. Add 'em on your arms to basically become an octopus. You can use a lot of trackers, way more than 3. Just turn 'em on and go! If you have enough arms, because you're an octopus, you could play with 8 paddles at once. Squishy buttons. They're the best. They're highly robust and very squishy. Way better than springy buttons. They'll let you change music, start g…
- Beach Ball Valley Update EMU - 10 February 2017
If you're trying to figure out the code, you may have noticed we've been releasing each update based on alphabetic animal names! This is pretty much accurate so far. Squishy Button Teleport System! Easy to squish Colorful Makes sense where you're going Open it up with the teleport button Fully haptic enabled squishery Squishy Squishy Button Desktop Play Control Easy to squish Control your happy tunes from in VR Sometimes tells you what music player you have Opens with the triggers! Coin Drop for your friends C on the keyboard Drops edible coins Don't drop too many coins, they don't grow on trees! Even more things! Nicer haptics Nicer graphics Softer clouds Tooltips on controller - look close! Activate a tooltip that points to a button with 1-8 (manual for details) Beach Ball Waterfall works from down the canyon Neater particles! Poof! Zero gravity is working! Beach Balls are way friendl…
- Beach Ball Valley Update EMU - 10 February 2017
If you're trying to figure out the code, you may have noticed we've been releasing each update based on alphabetic animal names! This is pretty much accurate so far. Squishy Button Teleport System! Easy to squish Colorful Makes sense where you're going Open it up with the teleport button Fully haptic enabled squishery Squishy Squishy Button Desktop Play Control Easy to squish Control your happy tunes from in VR Sometimes tells you what music player you have Opens with the triggers! Coin Drop for your friends C on the keyboard Drops edible coins Don't drop too many coins, they don't grow on trees! Even more things! Nicer haptics Nicer graphics Softer clouds Tooltips on controller - look close! Activate a tooltip that points to a button with 1-8 (manual for details) Beach Ball Waterfall works from down the canyon Neater particles! Poof! Zero gravity is working! Beach Balls are way friendl…
- Beach Ball Valley Update Dragonfly - 11 October 2016
We've added another minigame! Try to keep the balls out of the goal. Or in! Go for AN EXACT NUMBER! DECIDE YOUR OWN DESTINY! Or just enjoy huge flocks of beach balls rolling down the hill. We won't tell you what to do. (Well, we kinda did, but ignore that, aight?) Beach Balls don't get stuck in turrets, or stop in the minigame. General tweaking of programmy things behind the scenes. Small tweaks of graphical things including clouds and castle turrets and teleport arrows. Super fancy scoreboards with extra fun. Careful though; they're not tied together well, and can break apart if you treat 'em roughly. Mind Control: It's now semi-officially in the game. Somebody got over 1,000,000 points in the minigame. That's pretty rad. Shoot for the stars! Also, check out the manual! It has keys you can use to annoy your friends!
- Beach Ball Valley Update Dragonfly - 11 October 2016
We've added another minigame! Try to keep the balls out of the goal. Or in! Go for AN EXACT NUMBER! DECIDE YOUR OWN DESTINY! Or just enjoy huge flocks of beach balls rolling down the hill. We won't tell you what to do. (Well, we kinda did, but ignore that, aight?) Beach Balls don't get stuck in turrets, or stop in the minigame. General tweaking of programmy things behind the scenes. Small tweaks of graphical things including clouds and castle turrets and teleport arrows. Super fancy scoreboards with extra fun. Careful though; they're not tied together well, and can break apart if you treat 'em roughly. Mind Control: It's now semi-officially in the game. Somebody got over 1,000,000 points in the minigame. That's pretty rad. Shoot for the stars! Also, check out the manual! It has keys you can use to annoy your friends!
- Update Cuddlefish - 28 July 2016
Performance: We've cleaned up pretty much everything, so now you shouldn't be able to drop frames. The storm systems and beach ball exit has been reworked. Turns out they're getting smarter faster, but they don't all leave at once. Of course, we've made a new way to drop frames: Super Sampling! (resolution scaling or screen percentage) It's a very costly way to increase the visual fidelity by rendering more pixels and scaling them down to fit inside your headset. Numpad 1-4 set to distinct levels, 3 being default. Numpad +/- add or remove 25 to the screen percentage. (You start at 200) More details in the manual! Minigame: There are now combos. You should be able to score way more points! Also, it makes sounds. Who cares about points when you can make sounds? You can still make points in the minigame when the hoops are shrinking! Teleporting: Hold down the teleport button (menu button w…
- Update Cuddlefish - 28 July 2016
Performance: We've cleaned up pretty much everything, so now you shouldn't be able to drop frames. The storm systems and beach ball exit has been reworked. Turns out they're getting smarter faster, but they don't all leave at once. Of course, we've made a new way to drop frames: Super Sampling! (resolution scaling or screen percentage) It's a very costly way to increase the visual fidelity by rendering more pixels and scaling them down to fit inside your headset. Numpad 1-4 set to distinct levels, 3 being default. Numpad +/- add or remove 25 to the screen percentage. (You start at 200) More details in the manual! Minigame: There are now combos. You should be able to score way more points! Also, it makes sounds. Who cares about points when you can make sounds? You can still make points in the minigame when the hoops are shrinking! Teleporting: Hold down the teleport button (menu button w…
- Update Butterfly! - 8 July 2016
Beach Ball Valley Update Butterfly! Mostly just a bunch of stuff behind the scenes to allow us to rapidly test and implement new ideas, games, locations and Beach Ball Launchers. We've redone the hand controls so nobody accidentally teleports. Now you can use your thumbs to launch beach balls. We've added a few handy things: Score Boards! Try to hit 'em with a beach ball New zones: BEACH BALL WATERFALL Beach Ball Canyon Home of the future Beach Ball radio satellite telescope Graphics Quality (super sampling) Numpad 1-4 will give you 100% - 400%. Default is 200%, and higher end cards can run 300%. 400% isn't running on GTX 1080s. Yet, but when SMP for all 10xx card users rolls out, it'll be fantastic. Cheers! New Hotkeys for playing with your friends: Play with your friends: (Tell your friends to do silly stuff, and hit a key to make 'em think it's in the game) G – Toggle Giant Mode Z –…
- Update Butterfly! - 8 July 2016
Beach Ball Valley Update Butterfly! Mostly just a bunch of stuff behind the scenes to allow us to rapidly test and implement new ideas, games, locations and Beach Ball Launchers. We've redone the hand controls so nobody accidentally teleports. Now you can use your thumbs to launch beach balls. We've added a few handy things: Score Boards! Try to hit 'em with a beach ball New zones: BEACH BALL WATERFALL Beach Ball Canyon Home of the future Beach Ball radio satellite telescope Graphics Quality (super sampling) Numpad 1-4 will give you 100% - 400%. Default is 200%, and higher end cards can run 300%. 400% isn't running on GTX 1080s. Yet, but when SMP for all 10xx card users rolls out, it'll be fantastic. Cheers! New Hotkeys for playing with your friends: Play with your friends: (Tell your friends to do silly stuff, and hit a key to make 'em think it's in the game) G – Toggle Giant Mode Z –…
- Meanwhile in the beach ball central... - 1 July 2016
We're about 100 commits past update Alpaca (which, by the way, didn't include an actual alpaca, that's just the name we picked). We've been doing a lot of behind the scenes work. We're poking around and scrapping things that didn't work well, and we're updating things to be much more modular and easy to tweak. We've been tweaking them a lot. We've demoed it to over 100 people who have been quite amused. One player claimed that it was more fun than a room full of puppies. There's a lot of new territory to explore in beach ball valley. You can easily make a less than satisfying beach ball filled fen. The hills and ravines of beach ball legend are very carefully crafted. In other words, you probably wouldn't have this much fun if you went outside and hit beach balls at a local park. You'd need a Beach Ballin' Certified park constructed by a beach ball architect. This is also the reason why…
