Yup, it’s here, and with the update comes quite a long list of changes. Buckle up, we’ve got a lot to cover in this massive 2.0 update.

Though Them’s Fightin’ Herds – a 2D fighting game featuring ungulates – works flawlessly through Proton, I’m happy to report that, as promised from their Indiegogo campaign, the Linux version has finally made it. After personally testing it I can confirm it runs just fine on Arch with NVIDIA; no stutters whatsoever throughout the time I played the game, and online multiplayer works. Just a couple of quick notes though:

• DualSense controller controlled both characters on screen. Xbox Series X pad works just fine though
• I have not been able to change the auto-detect feature for controllers; it just stays on Xbox 360-style regardless of what controller is plugged in

Interested in seeing how the Linux version fares? I recorded a few matches with a fellow Shanty player. His Shanty seemed equally matched to mine: https://peertube.linuxrocks.online/videos/watch/2d715bd6-809d-4668-b764-3ec54d7f8330

Shanty, you say? Who’s that? Glad you asked. She’s a goat. And a DLC character. Check out her moveset in the video:

She got released with today’s update and is priced at $4.99. Those who have backed the game during its crowdfunding stages, however, will get her for free. With Shanty also comes her stage (unable to use this stage locally though if you don’t own the DLC).

Another new stage has made it to the fray as well: the Hidden Waterfall.

Replays are now a thing. See how they work in the video:

Oleander got her own pixel lobby map, and along with that come new costmetic hats:

There’s been a overhaul in regards to character balances. Every character besides Shanty has been tweaked, either slightly or moderately. There’s way too many other things to mention here – including a revised UI and Tutorial mode, as well as the removal of the Targets mode – so more info can be found in the patch notes on the TFH forums.

While the Linux version was planned to ship with update 1.5, Mane6 had to wait until the 2.0 release:

Long story short, the general codebase is too far ahead of what’s currently on “live”. After months of rigorous 2.0 development, we’re past the point where those changes can be cleanly rolled back to make everything match up. The best thing for us to do in order to ensure a more efficient, stable release is hold back the native Linux port until it can go out safely alongside 2.0.

They also mentioned the Mac port will be based on the Linux port, and that they “want to give the Linux port some time in the wild first” before the Mac version becomes available. There may also be console versions after this.

There’s still plenty of updates to come in the future: level 3 supers, chapter 2 of story mode, and ranked online multiplayer. As I reviewed almost a year ago, Them’s Fightin’ Herds is a great 2D fighting game, and it’s exciting that we not only get to have a native version to be able to play on our hardware, but there’s still plenty of lifetime with the game left as updates continue to come in.

Interested in checking it out? The game is currently on sale on Steam and Humble Bundle for 40% off until March 29.