Thanks for coming back with this, it’s exactly the feedback I needed. Answers to the mysteries first:
- Bosses run on a timer, not XP. A DEAD PIXEL surfaces about 3 minutes after the last fight ends. If it escapes, it comes back still carrying the damage you did.
- Every 5 DEAD PIXEL kills, the final boss PIXEL ZERO surfaces instead. Beat it and you get the REBOOT choice. You don’t need to max boss damage or pixel value to get there.
None of that was on screen, which is on me. The update fixes that:
- Between fights there’s now a countdown to the next boss, how much HP it has left, and how many kills until PIXEL ZERO.
- The welcome-back screen lists everything you unlocked while you were away.
- ARMOR PIERCING starts at 250M instead of 40B, and an escaped boss comes back after 90 seconds instead of 3 minutes.
I’ve noted the 50% background speed too.
Details here: https://alexdotcodes.itch.io/onepixel/devlog/1718621/boss-countdown-and-a-better-welcome-back