Balancing Patch Notes 2026-01-28 (U0.4.1)

Hi :)

Now that the full team has returned to work (so good to be back), we’ve started by really taking a good look at the pain points of Arcade to provide a better experience for all players, whether new or old. 

Starting off, we’ve heard (and experienced) the issue with the right door. It’s a very nice door, but far too many characters decide that the right door is the only door for them, and it creates a dull bottleneck that affects variety and player engagement. With this in mind, we’ve added two new corridors: one joining the bottom half of the game hall to the Piss Cave (yes, we named that room the Piss Cave), and another joining the Idol Stage to the Storage Room. With these new corridors, characters have the opportunity to escape the right path, which should ease the bottleneck, as characters were moving from the left to the right, and then having no options to move back.

The next bugbear that was affecting a lot of players was, of course, clarity. We’d always planned on adding additional descriptions for the abilities, but weren’t quite sure how we wanted them displayed, but that issue has been resolved, and we’re very happy to say that there’s a new tab added to the side of the pre-level character descriptions that will give you a straightforward description of what each Saya ability does, alongside the symbol. 

We’ve also had a look at the character descriptions themselves, and changed some phrasing to further clarify some of the more problematic characters. No longer will Security Office Nile be a mystery, and no longer will it be unclear as to whether or not the Goons can be defeated by the humble door.

While adding descriptions to the abilities, we’ve also had a look through them, going off player feedback and our own experience, and have done some trimming, tweaking, and reworking. We’ve adjusted corruption values, added an additional ability for corruption healing, and removed some of the less useful abilities while buffing others.

The full list is in the patch notes, but the highlights are essentially that Alert now stuns the girl that triggers it long enough for you to see who it is, the lockdown now lasts longer, and the rather pointless teleport has now become a more powerful scatter ability that sends girls from one room to random spots on the map. 

We’ve also added a new character-specific Saya ability to Nightclub Ari, allowing Saya to hold the transformed Blood Moon Ari back for a few seconds, giving you precious time to think about what to do about her with your new assortment of tools. This new ability comes with the added benefit of giving us an excuse to add new animations for Arcade Nile’s Saya ability, which features the return of the Nile petting. We’ve also gone ahead and adjusted her ability to make it less extreme, so you can pet her without immediately making her come pounce on you.

In the continued spirit of clarity and helping all types of players enjoy the Arcade, we’ve added some Arcade-specific support to Assist Mode, namely in the form of icons on the map that indicate where the vents, fuseboxes, claw machine, and spawned objects from Security Office Kass, and Nightclub Ari are located. We’ve also gone ahead and updated the visuals for the Nightclub Ari moons to better illustrate what they are, and which character they belong to.

While we were looking at Assist Mode, we also went ahead and added a live score counter for the Nightclub, so if you want to really maximize your records, you’ll have all the data you need to succeed. 

Alongside adding a new ability to reduce corruption, we’ve made some adjustments to the Calamities to hopefully ease how devastating getting full corruption can be. We’ve reduced the amount of lives both the Queen of Hearts and the JubJub bird have, so you can finish them off with a single interaction rather than having to repeat your search, and while the number of tentacles you need to destroy for the Kraken remains at 3, we’ve doubled the amount of tentacles that spawn, making it easier to get rid of that pesky cephalopod.

Finally, just a few little things to cap off the Arcade stuff. 

Token rewards have finally arrived to the Arcade! So, if you’re trying to grind for currency, both the campaign levels and the custom night will provide nice payouts. Higher rewards are given for higher difficulties and more characters, so find the balance that works best for you.

We’ve added a peek animation for Nightclub Sammy, so you get to see her before she makes you fade to black for her quality time. We’ve also finally added audio to that little cutscene, so our devoted Sammy lovers can enjoy the moment with more than just their eyes. 

Those on NSFW mode will no longer be marrying the Goons, as the NSFW CG gameover screen has been added, and the existing renders have been touched up to make the Goons look a little more Goon-like. 

Obviously more bug fixes and little adjustments have been made, so be sure to check the detailed list below for the nitty gritty details. 

We’re going to keep working on adjusting Arcade with further feedback as we work towards Arcade Part 2, so we look forward to hearing how the changes suit you!

Until next time, thank you for your continued support, and, of course:

Happy Hunting!

XOXO MonsterBox

• Added Corridor between Idol Stage & Storage Room

• Added Corridor between Gaming Room & Piss Cave

• Added Nile SO + Sammy Goon Door Banging SFX

• Added Ari NC Gasp Subtitles

  • Notification about her entering a Room with a Moon Ornament

• Added Ari BM Saya Ability

  • Stuns her for a bit

• Added Assist Mode Icons to the CCTV Map

  • Shows Vents, Fuse Boxes, Claw Machine, active Moon Ornaments, active Kass Machines

• Added Saya Ability Information to the Level Information Screen for Campaign Levels

• Decreased Queen of Hearts Health from 2 → 1

• Decreased Jubjub Health from 2 → 1

• Increased number of spawned Kraken Tentacles

  • Number of Tentacles that need to be destroyed remains the same (3)

• Removed obsolete Abilities & redistributed others across the Map

• Alert now also stuns the entering Character

• Alert Corruption Cost increased from 5% → 10%

• Attract Time increased from 20s → 40s

• Goon Despawn Corruption Cost decreased from 50% → 20%

• Goon Despawn Psych Cost decreased from 90% → 70%

• Level Down Usage Limit decreased from 4 → 2

• Level Down Corruption Cost decreased from 20% → 15%

• Lockdown Time increased from 30s → 40s

• Lockdown Corruption Cost decreased from 30% → 20%

• Phone Therapy Corruption Cost decreased from 25% → 20%

• Teleport now moves Characters in the current Location to a random Spot on the Map

• Teleport Usage Limit decreased from 2 → 1

• Teleport Psych Cost increased from 30% → 40%

• Stun Time increased from 20s → 30s

• Stun Usage Limit decreased from 4 → 2

• Vent Restore Corruption Cost decreased from 10% → 0%

• Vent Defend Corruption Cost decreased from 10% → 5%

• Corruption Chance Ability added

  • Chance to decrease Corruption. Failure does nothing.

• Added Assist Mode Score Display

  • Displays current Customer, Score, and Total Rank

• Decreased CCTV Static Transition Time from 200ms → 100ms

• Added Kass Machine Destroy Particles

• Added Queen of Hearts Destroy Particles

• Added Sammy NC Office SFX

• Added Sammy NC Peek Animations

• Added Nile A Saya Ability Visuals

• Added Token Rewards

• Added Phone Therapy + additional Cheshire Sammy Subtitles

• Added NSFW Sammy Goon CG

• Fixed Sammy Goon Portraits

• Updated Moon Ornament Visuals

• Disabled MSAA Setting due to a current bug with our Outlining Solution

• Fixed Cheshire TV not ramping up during Boss Night

• Fixed Cheshire Sammy not advancing her Jump Attack Timer whilst despawned

  • Only relevant for Custom Night

• Fixed Cheshire Sammy & Nile SO peeking into the Office too early

  • Were clipping into the opening door

• Fixed Vent Defend SFX

  • Slap played way too late

• Fixed Bar Pickup Point being positioned directly behind a Saya Ability

• Fixed Poppi Bomb Microgame sometimes counting a loss even though the Parry Sound was played

• Fixed Paparazzi Panic allowing multiple Good Shots of the same pose

• Fixed Paparazzi Panic GAME OVER Screen staying open indefinitely

  • Game can still be played but the Player can't see anything

• Fixed Sammy 64 sometimes spawning multiple times on higher difficulties

• Fixed Sammy 64 Texture Quality

• Fixed Maddie Stockings disappearing if she's visible behind the closed Office Doors

• Fixed certain Videos being skipped breaking the Nightclub Boss

• Fixed Characters staying visible after the Death Taunt Fade