ZeroDay.exe - A Cooperative, Deck Building, Dungeon Crawler

July Update - Testing, Testing, and more testing + Gen Con + Bosses!
about 1 year ago – Sun, Jul 13, 2025 at 02:58:42 PM

Hey Hackers!

We've been very busy the past couple months working on ZeroDay and getting ready for 
Gen Con, so we apologies for the delayed update. Let's jump right in!

Play Testing

We have been focusing hard on play testing and so far, it's been going great! We did notice that when T. is in the game, operations seem a bit easier, but not in a fun way. He's started boiling down to run in, stand in the middle, and take hits - which isn't very fun or interesting. So our focus over the next couple weeks is going to be finding a way to make T. a bit more interesting while also giving him a slight decrease in his defensive power. We've already tested a couple changes and we feel we are already on the right track to making this happen! Outside of that, we'll continue to play through each operation to make sure the balance is perfect for each one.

If anyone is interested in play testing, we definitely would love more eyes and opinions on the game's play and balance! We are hoping to be able to get at least one day of play testing in on the weekends with discord users. If you're interested, please join our discord and send a message in the "play test chat" channel saying you'd like to play test! If you are only available on weeknights, we can also schedule something to make that happen!

Gen Con

We will be at Gen Con again this year at booth 2133. We will have an early protoype of ZeroDay that we will be demoing at our booth. If you'll be there, we'd love for you to stop by and say hello!

Boss Artwork!

We recently received the artwork for the 3 bosses and are excited to share them with you. We love how they turned out and think you will too!

That's all we've got for now. If you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask in the comments!

-Hacker Kat & Zach

Pledge Manager Incoming!
about 1 year ago – Thu, May 29, 2025 at 05:40:16 AM

The smoke test hasn't revealed any issues on the survey, so we'll be sending out the surveys for the BackerKit Pledge Manager to everyone today! 

You should be receiving an email with a link to your survey soon! It’s important to respond to your survey as quickly as you can since we need this information to fulfill your rewards!

Once you receive your email, click the link and answer the questions about your reward preferences, provide shipping information, and purchase add-on items if you'd like.

If you'd like to change your pledge level - for example, if you're a $1 backer who now wants to get the base game - you'll need to click the "Switch your Pledge Level" link below the big green "Get Started!" button on your survey.

If you backed the "PudKat Games Collector's Pledge", the sooner you complete this survey and add your address, the sooner we can ship your copy of Davy Jones' Locker to you!

After you respond to your survey, you can go back later and change your responses at any time before we close the surveys. The surveys will stay open until we are ready to begin manufacturing, so you will have plenty of time to make any changes.

If you need to review your information or pledge status, you can return to your survey by clicking the link in your survey email. If you ever cannot find your survey email/link, you can get it here ->  https://zerodayexe.backerkit.com. Please note that you do not need a Backerkit account to complete the survey.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out in the comments or message us directly here on Kickstarter!

-Hacker Kat & Zach

May Update + Smoke-test for BackerKit Pledge Manager
over 1 year ago – Wed, May 14, 2025 at 06:21:06 PM

Hey Hackers!

Just a quick update to let you know that we are starting a "smoke-test" with the BackerKit pledge manager tomorrow. This means about 5% of backers will receive their surveys over the next few days, as a way to make sure everything is good to go before sending out to everyone. If you are one of those who do receive the survey, please let us know if you have any issues so we can get them resolved! We've also updated our page with a link to late pledges and have opened them up for those who may have missed the campaign or are ready to jump in now!

As for progress with ZeroDay, we have been working with Black Magic Inserts on our custom insert designed, as well as finishing up the miniature sculpts. We have 3 big focuses with the tray - minimizing set-up/tear-down time, saving campaign progress, and fitting components (including sleeved cards) nicely. We've worked with Bryce at Black Magic inserts previously and know he'll be able to nail it on all 3 fronts! 🦾

We are continuing to work through the art and we've gotten a few more mods completed! There are 4 Corporations that create the mods in the game - Kyushi Enterprises, Hanzo Cybernetics, Calypso Corp, and Iris Solutions. Each corporation has its own style, from the salvage-looking Calypso Corp to the sleek, almost alien design of Hanzo Cybernetics, each will have a distinct look. Below are 8 new Calypso Corp mods ready for install!

If you have any questions, want to give input or play test, or just come chat, we encourage you to join our discord!

Until Next Time!
- Hacker Kat & Zach

 

THANK YOU - We did it! 2 New Stretch Goals unlocked + Pledge Manager/Late Pledges
over 1 year ago – Tue, Apr 15, 2025 at 09:42:48 AM

WE DID IT!

Thank you all so much for your support throughout the campaign! We really appreciate each and every one of you and are so excited to start bringing ZeroDay.exe to your tables!

Over the last few days, we gained many new hackers and were able to unlock 2 new Stretch Goals - The custom insert and new enemy level cards!
 

Black Magic Custom Insert

We will be working with Black Magic Inserts (who we worked with on our previous campaign, Curse of the Ghost Ships) on this and have some great plans in place! The biggest benefits this will bring is allowing players to save their campaign progress using trays that will store their decks, mods, and items, as well as their player boards! We are also going to be using a tray system for any tokens and tiles, allowing us to reduce setup and tear-down time to just a few minutes! We'll be updating you as the design progress and if there is anything specific you feel should be included in the design, please feel free to share it with us!

New Enemy Level Cards

Each enemy has 9 level cards - 3 for each level (1, 2, and 3), and each of which has 2 abilities. The ability the enemy uses is decided by its Initiative. As you progress through an Operation and gain Threat from Initiative, enemies will begin to upgrade and become stronger. Each enemy has 3 "paths" of upgrades, but since they are randomly selected at the start of the Operation, they will rarely follow a single direct upgrade path, instead jumping to different paths and changing up their play-style as the Operation progresses.

With this stretch goal, each enemy will not have an additional "Upgrade Path", adding more variety to each enemy and more strategic thinking from players as they level up!

Late Pledges and Pledge Manager

Over the next week, we will be making our final decision on which platform to use for our pledge manager - whether that is staying right here on Kickstarter, using BackerKit as we have in the past, or going over to the GameFound platform. There are benefits to each, but we want to make sure we choose the one that will be best for ZeroDay and hopefully allow us to bring in more backers as we finish designing the game. After we've made our choice, we are hoping to have it open within a couple of weeks!

For now, late pledges are available right here on the Kickstarter page.  Backers can still pledge for the Base, Deluxe, and All-In reward tiers and we will keep this open until we close the pledge manager and we are ready to fulfill!

Thank you all again for your support and for helping us bring this game to life. We seriously cannot do this without you and we are forever grateful!

- Hacker Kat & Zach

Boss Fights, Campaign Rewards, and a New Miniature Sculpt!
over 1 year ago – Wed, Apr 02, 2025 at 06:01:37 AM

Hey Hackers!

Over the weekend, Katie and I re-evaluated our stretch goal plan and made a decision to move some things around so that we could hopefully unlock some more stretch goals during the campaign. We've moved up the more gameplay-oriented goals that don't cost as much to add (such as more cards) so that we could lower the amount needed and get more content added to the game!

We encourage you to check out the stretch goal section to see how close we now can be to unlocking new content. If you're a $1 backer or just still on the fence about backing the game, now would be a great time to jump in to help unlock more content for the game! If just half of our $1 backers upped to the base pledge, we'd hit our next stretch goal instantly! 🦾

Now let's talk a bit about gameplay and how bosses and campaign mode work!

Boss Operations

Boss Operations present unique challenges that are fast-paced and high stakes. While most Operations you'll be able to move through methodically and (hopefully) tough it out to the end, Bosses are stronger and their operation maps are smaller, giving them a more "do or die" feel. 

Bosses also have their own set of 6 attack cards (shown below). Each round they'll draw a new card, revealing their initiative, movement, range, damage type, and any other abilities such as Area of Effect (AoE) attacks or unique mechanics for the round.

Bosses are more advanced Ai bots, therefore they have more unique abilities than the normal enemies you'll face in most Operations. For example, they can tether players so they cannot move away, knockback players which could result in being pushed into hazards (like flesh-ripping laser lights), or punish players for having too many Hacks processing.

The Operation maps for Boss fights also have unique aspects to them, such as the lasers mentioned above, electrically charged water spaces, or terminals that you can access (if you can get past the guards) to weaken the boss.

Campaign Mode and How Upgrading Works

The overall structure of each Operation in Campaign Mode is the same as the One-Shots. You'll still upgrade throughout the Operation, downloading new hacks, building mods and items, and upgrading your skills and starting hacks. The key difference is that instead of starting completely fresh each Operation, completing Operations allows players to choose specific upgrades to keep going into the next Operation.

In the Operation Book, the left page will be the story for the Operation, while the right page will be the spawn map, showing where to place terminals and part piles, and where to spawn enemies. As you can see in the image, at the bottom of each story page we will have a list of rewards you get for completing it in Campaign Mode. These rewards are gained by each player and are cumulative during the campaign, allowing you to have more control over your characters progression path as you work through the campaign. 

As you progress through the campaign, enemies will also start Operations at higher levels, which means less upgrades and more enemies spawning as you gain threat.

Ollie Miniature Sculpt!

We also wanted to show another example of the miniatures that we are offering in the Deluxe and All-In pledge levels. Check out Ollie below!

If you have any other questions about gameplay or anything, please don't hesitate to ask us in the comments!

-Hacker Kat & Zach