PATCH NOTES

August 22, 2026 News Hub and Navigation Update

August 22, 2026 By Hot Chocolate Team

The new News Hub gives Hot Chocolate a full in-game home for stories and updates, alongside sharper campaign, loading, and leaderboard navigation.

Added a full-screen in-game News Hub with featured stories, News, Patch Notes, Developer Logs, Challenges, category filtering, and an article reader.
Featured stories rotate automatically, while the cleaner reader and close flow make it easy to dip in and return to the game.
Newsletter content is driven by published stories and is also available through a dedicated News Hub website page.
The News Hub no longer opens automatically at startup and is now a first-class main-menu destination.

Loading screens now use still imagery from the level being entered: the current campaign level when continuing, or the chosen destination from level select.
Future campaign levels can no longer be previewed before they are unlocked; completed levels and the currently available level remain inspectable.

Returned Leaderboards to the main menu beneath Achievements and rebuilt the page as a more interactive game-style interface with pagination.
Qualifying scores can be submitted, and an existing score for the same player and level is replaced only by a better run.
Stage progress no longer creates duplicate entries, and qualifying recent scores now appear reliably.