Version 0.4, officially the Brutal Update, is a major update to Dead Cells that was released on the 14th of November 2017 to PC.

Important features

• The world has changed. We're now preparing the final form of the game. Most levels have been updated to reflect this, including their difficulty, or their location on the world map. 
• The Beholder boss is now a mid-game boss, while the Assassin new boss becomes the final encounter. Note that the current game ending still isn't the final one: we plan to add the real game nemesis in a later update.
• 2 new biomes have been added: the infamous Clock Tower and the mysterious Slumbering Sanctuary. Both include new enemies and loots.
• The old tier system (ie. Strength/Skills/Health) has been replaced by Brutality / Tactic / Survival. 
  • Brutality (red): includes all weapons (except shields) 
  •  Tactic (purple): include all active skills 
  • Survival (green): include all shields
  • Some items (weapons or skills) are Dual colors, which means they can rely on 2 different stats, and use the highest value.
  • You may also encounter random Colorless items: these ones will always use your best stat. 
• Here are the effects of these new 3 stats when you augment them:
  • Brutality (red): raise all red items damage, add +18% life
  • Tactic (purple): raise all purple items damage, reduce all active cooldowns
  • Survival (green): raise all green items damage, add +40% life
• Your level-up decisions are much more important than ever.

• The way item stats/affixes are generated has been changed:
  • based on their level, all offensive items (ie. item that deals damage) now have a "Damage +X%" stat, while all non-offensive items (ie. all other items) now have a "All damage received -X%" stat. 
  • "Tier +1" affixes on Weapons and Skills are now only found from very specific sources (Treasures or shops) and are to be considered rare.
  • Talismans have a guaranteed "Tier +1/+2/+3", on item level III or more.
• The Collector can no longer upgrade items using Cells. For now, his only role is to unlock new content. A whole new upgrade mechanic will come back in the next update, which should come shortly after this one!
• A new special grenade can be unlocked at the collector (it will then appear in the Prison Cells). It allows you to hunt specific blueprints when the RNG is not being nice to you. Throw it on a mob that has unknown blueprints on him, fight him and right before killing it, use your grenade extracting ability to get your blueprint. No one said it would be easy.
• All Cursed treasures now drop Colorless items. Right now, it's the only way to get this kind of item.
• (Community suggestion) You can now ask for specific item categories in Shops (like bows, or melee weapons) and reroll shop content if what you see is not interesting to you. However, these options are upgrades you have to buy using cells at the Collector.
• (Community suggestion) New Shield gameplay! You can now hold any shield as long as you want! If you hold a shield, a specific amount of damage received will be absorbed (around 75% for most shields). If you short-press and don't hold your shield, you'll attempt a PARRY. Like before, this technique allows you to negate all damage received, as well as most of the negative side effects of being hit (like being repelled). A successful parry is now a critical hit. It's a risk-reward mechanic: hold and take a small amount of damage, or try a full Parry with the risk of missing.
• (Community suggestion) You can now reflect enemy arrows using any shield! The amount of damage you deal depends on your Survival tier.
• 10 new items, including weapons, shields and active skills!
• 4 new enemy types!
• A Castlevania inspired diet has been added in your game options :)

Balancing

• (Community suggestion) Ammo stuck in a mob will now drop automatically after a few seconds, even if you don't kill him. It's still always faster to kill the enemy directly or use a grenade with the proper affix, but this should avoid stucked situations with "bow only" builds.
• (Community suggestion) The Tonic is now an item that can be refilled using Healing Fountains, so you can now use your tonic once per level. It can also be used even if your health is full. More "consumable active skills" will probably come later.
• (Community suggestion) All bows now have a slight auto-aim. They still shoot horizontally, but it's MUCH easier to shoot small enemies or mobs standing on lower platforms.
• The Electric Whip is now a cool weapon again: its damage has been buffed up.
• Horizontal turret and Ceil turret now have 1.5x longer range
• The game timer is now paused when visiting Shops, Treasure rooms or Cursed Treasure rooms.
• The Decoy active skill now explodes after a short time, dealing lots of damage to all nearby enemies.
• Teleporting is now blocked if the caster is rooted (applies to some teleporting mobs or to the Phasing skill).
• The Biter Swarm worms are now much much more resistant (like 10x stronger). The active skill cooldown has also been reduced.
• (Community suggestion) The Toxic Cloud skill is now twice faster to cast.
• (Community suggestion) The amount of HP recovered through the Rally Effect (the HP you recover when attacking immediately after being hit) is now capped. This cap can be raised by augmenting your Survival tier.
• The Phazer skill now buffs the next attack, even if it's not a melee attack.
• The Frost Blast weapon now inflicts lots of damage if the target is not frozen when it hits (it deals 0 damage if the target is already frozen).
• Corrupted Power now adds extra damage instead of adding a fixed percentage. This extra damage is now scaled with the Tactic tier.
• (Community suggestion) Food items now restore a fixed percentage of your max HP.
• The Phazer enemy is now a little bit faster. It's melee attack hitbox has also fixed.
• Enemy grenades you repel with a shield do way more damage to enemies.
• The Quick Bow deals a little extra damage.
• Quick Bow now behaves like an autofire weapon (like the Repeater Crossbow). You can hold fire button to shoot quickly.
• New shield affix: better damage absorption 
• New shield affix: bullet absorption
• Sturdy shield: stun duration is now twice longer on successful Parry.
• Knockback shield: the bumping effect is now much more powerful on successful Parry.
• Force shield: the force field now only triggers on a successful Parry. It also lasts much longer.
• Blood shield: the bleeding only affects the blocked victim when holding the shield. It affects all nearby enemies on a successful Parry.
• Spiked shield: inflicts much more damage.
• The dash shield has been adapted to the new gameplay, including some balancing and minor bugfixes.
• Situations where the player was standing on the edge of a platform and got bumped away off a platform by walking/idling enemies should now occur more rarely.

Level design

• New rooms added for all levels
• All rooms have been reworked for "WallGrab" et "StompJump" mechanics

Graphics & UI

• Graphic improvements for all biomes (fog, particules...). 
• The "sewer depths" now have a corrupted skin.
• The "Zombie-Worm" in "The old sewers" now has its very own skin.
• The "Zombie-Fly" in "The Graveyard" now has its very own skin.
• Fixed incorrect damage displayed on shield tips.
• You can see now the number of monsters left to kill during Challenge.
• The HUD has been updated regarding the new Brutality / Tactic / Survival system (still work in progress)
• Some weapon and skill icons has been updated

Bug fixes

• Fixed a bug that cancelled shield bearer mobs attacks when they jumped away from the player.
• Throwing a grenade in the middle of a Fly pack will now deal damage to all flies in the group.
• Blocking an arrow using a global shield no longer bumps the archer mob
• Blood Shield should now properly trigger on parried ranged attacks
• Incomplete One shockwave attack can no longer be parried using a shield
• (Community suggestion) Cells dropped from cell shrines are always automatically picked up, even if you run away.
• Aura of Laceration no longer make you float for 1 sec when activated

References