Hey there! No news yet, we're still actively working on Cantata right now. I really want to return to the game at some point though, maybe after we release Cantata 1.0.
I think we definitely always want the game to never have a specific win condition, but I do think like you mentioned there would be ways to spice up the king of the hill style play we have in the game now. I don't think players would be able to directly drop the crown, but I do think that if a player with a crown dies, they drop some portion of their total collected gold and other players can rush towards to to try to get ahead!
I also like your suggestions for player items! Both right now are definitely trap like, and we definitely want more item diversity (and maybe even loadouts??). Something offensive for example we though of was the ability to spawn a shark in the water the leaps from the water to attack seagulls near the water's edge. Or an RC car that pushes seagulls in it's path. So we're definitely thinking here as well. I also like the spreading wings idea. Very goose like :)
We also DEFINITELY want different birds. We haven't really considered them as having different skills, but that's totally possible. What we do want is cosmetics though, so maybe those can have properties instead and you equip them?
And there is a secret squak button we added in the latest version! Press Y on your controller or G on your keyboard for a random squak sound.
And thanks for your support and thoughtful comments in general! We're definitely keeping this game on a slow burn as the team focuses on other projects, but want to see if we can get more people playing it over time (it's free!) and start to iterate more as more players come in.
Thanks for the nice comment! Really glad you're enjoying THE BEACH. No Discord yet as the game slowly comes to life after this first release, but it will surely happen Soon.
I think right now what we'll do is try to schedule times to play via our Twitter and then loudly Squak about that there so everyone gets on at the same time.
Would also love to hear any feedback you may have!
