BeatAscend is finally living up to its name

Hey everyone, Kos and Yogurt here!

As you may have seen in the title, we’ve been working on BeatAscend! (Just… not many updates on this blog page, we’re sorry for that!)

We wanted to highlight a few things about what’s in the works: a big overhaul has taken place. And we have decided to revamp some parts of BeatAscend from scratch. We will go into more specifics about that in other blogs.

UGC (User-Generated Content)

We are preparing infrastructure and a carefully designed tech stack for a UGC system in BeatAscend.

You can expect accounts, trackmaps (user-made levels like osu! or Geometry Dash), leaderboards, an in-game track editor, a trackmap zip file format, and other such features.

Lua Scripting

We plan to integrate Lua into BeatAscend, enabling track creators to create a wide range of things within the game.

And who knows, Doom or BeatAscend might even be recreated in BeatAscend itself.

When we add scripting capabilities to BeatAscend Tracks, there will be BeatAscend-tailored Tweening capabilities.
We might possibly implement tutorials, but you can definitely expect OSTs and official trackmaps.

The BeatAscend Trackmap API will let you modify what happens in your track, like FX once you cross a certain point, or a sound plays once you press a certain key.

Cross-Platform Support

We want BeatAscend to feel natural on all devices.

Like osu!lazer and Geometry Dash, among many other titles. The separate PC and mobile versions feel like they belong on their respective platforms, not feeling wonky or out of place.

We’re also trying to keep it very polished, so please be patient with us.

External Tools

The in-game track editor will remain the primary tool for creating content, so unless you’re feeling extra creative, there’s no need to open our external UGC app.

That said, we’re also trying to make our UGC tools extremely powerful. We may branch our editor into a more fully-fledged program for creating more complex trackmaps.

We’re aiming to align the scope with BeatAscend’s long-term goals, so please be patient. Even with our small team, we want to make sure the UX (User Experience) of BeatAscend is polished and enjoyable, and that takes time.

BeatAscend Website

We’re considering the idea of launching a dedicated website for BeatAscend in the future, though nothing’s guaranteed yet.

If it happens, we’d like to make browsing intuitive, with previews, filters, and maybe even an embedded player so you can get a feel for a trackmap before downloading. You’d be able to browse trackmaps, view details, and download them directly from the site.

We’re also exploring the possibility of signing in and maybe even uploading or editing your own trackmaps right from the website, making it easier to share and manage your creations in BeatAscend.

The site might also host dev updates, patch notes, and community events, bringing everything BeatAscend-related into one place. But again, that’s something still in early planning.

BeatAscend Installer

We’ve been, and still are, working on a fully-fledged installer for BeatAscend, very much BeatAscend-branded and quite uniquely designed.

Again, we’ll share more details about the installer in one of our upcoming blogs, so stay tuned.

That’s all we have to say, until next time guys ☕