Mechanics

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While each page on this wiki covers several parts of the game in depth, here is a place to discuss anything related to game mechanics that might fall through the cracks.

Difficulty

While the player has some choice of the order they encounter basic enemies, the difficulty increase of Picayune Dreams is mostly affected by how long a run is. Values such as Mortality and Peril will increase over the course of the game, causing various aspects of difficulty to rise in turn.

Mortality

Mortality is primarily used to show how far in a run the player is, and when the next boss will appear. Every 5.00 Mortality, a transmission will arrive. After all remaining enemies are defeated, a short cutscene will play before the next boss. This boss is predetermined unless the player is generating Peril, in which case the boss is chosen randomly. Mortality increases at a rate of 0.01 every half a second, and does not increase when the upgrade screen is open or a transmission has already arrived. This means that if the player never obtained an upgrade or paused the game, and killed every enemy instantly upon receiving a transmission, a new boss would spawn every 4.1666... minutes.

Mortality also determines how many total enemies are allowed to spawn. The formula for which is as follows: <stub>

Peril

Upon defeating the final boss, Peril will start to accumulate. Peril is a modifier that makes the game significantly harder as it increases, to prevent infinite stalemates and end the game by slowly overwhelming the player. Peril affects enemy HP, multiplying it by 1 for every 100% peril gained. For example, at 1000% peril, enemies would have 10 times higher HP. Peril is generated at a rate of <stub>

Curse

Curse is gained by dealing with certain Statues, and causes various unique Enemies to spawn.^{additional effects?} It is accumulated at a rate of 1% per statue interacted with, and 0.25% per statue destroyed.^{what does the rate affect?} The following statues raise the curse value: <stub>

Cleanse Hit and Hit Only Once

cleansehit is the number of frames before a damaging object can hit a given enemy a second time. This affects attacks that linger and are able to hit the same enemy twice (such as Chain Belt or Parasight), and not attacks like Horns (hitonlyonce is true, see below) and Core (the bullet is destroyed on impact and cannot hit more enemies).

This value is not affected by Cooldown Mod .

hitonlyonce is mutually exclusive with cleansehit. If hitonlyonce is specified in the weapon's hardware enhancement code, it means a particular instance of an object can only hit a given enemy once^(verify) (and not that it can only deal 1 instance of damage to 1 enemy). For example, if a Telecom explosion is created on an enemy, that explosion will continue to hit enemies that collide with it, but it will not damage the same enemy twice.

For example, the Demon Wings trail can hit enemies for as long as they stay in it, as hitonlyonce is not set to true in its code. Time between hits is 10 frames (from cleansehit).

Cooldowns

The "Cooldown Mod" stat affects anything in the hardware enhancement code with "cd" in the name^{(what about the iv bag?)}, except "cleansehit" variables. Since the Halo shield doesn't have "cd" in its name, it isn't affected by cooldown modifiers.

Cooldowns are written in frames, and the game normally runs at 60 frames per second.

Controls

Sneak

Default Bind: Shift
Sneak has two main functions: to slow the player's movespeed down and clearly show Cyl's hitbox. This is similar to "focus mode" in other shmups. The advantages of moving slower, micrododging (moving as little as possible around bullets), and tap-dodging (tapping the movement button to move less) depend on the scenario. For example, besides making some bullet patterns easier to handle, Angel Wings benefit heavily from tap-dodging and micrododging while Demon Wings are hindered somewhat. Animated visual examples of tap-dodging and a more in-depth explanation of various dodging strategies can be found here.

Auto Aim

Default Bind: Control

Speed Up

Default Bind: Q