Golden Upgrades is a special type of upgrades that begin dropping within specific intervals after the player reaches 15% Achievement bonus.
Drop rate
Golden Upgrades will drop every X number of zones starting from zone 1 depending on the player's Achievement bonus, infinitely.
| Achievement bonus | Drop every X zones |
|---|---|
| 15% | 50 |
| 100% | 45 |
| 300% | 40 |
| 600% | 35 |
| 1000% | 30 |
| 2000% | 25 |
| Upgrade on zone | 50 | 45 | 40 | 35 | 30 | 25 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 50 | 45 | 40 | 35 | 30 | 25 |
| 2 | 100 | 90 | 80 | 70 | 60 | 50 |
| 3 | 150 | 135 | 120 | 105 | 90 | 75 |
| 4 | 200 | 180 | 160 | 140 | 120 | 100 |
| 5 | 250 | 225 | 200 | 175 | 150 | 125 |
| 6 | 300 | 270 | 240 | 210 | 180 | 150 |
| 7 | 350 | 315 | 280 | 245 | 210 | 175 |
| 8 | 400 | 360 | 320 | 280 | 240 |
200 |
In addition, if one's achievement bonus is above 2000%, then one will receive 1 free Golden Upgrade for every 500% above this limit every time one portals. For example, if your achievement bonus is 2860.5%, you will start each run with 1 free Golden Upgrade.
Rewards
Each time Golden Upgrades drop, they appear in a set of three. The player then has the choice of picking one of the three upgrades. Once the upgrade is picked, all three of them disappear. The bonus from all Golden Upgrades disappears after using the Portal.
Each time any Golden Upgrade is purchased, the general strength of them increases, and the next set of Golden Upgrades will be stronger.
| Golden Upgrade | Description | Gain when purchased |
|---|---|---|
| Helium | Increase helium gain by | (1% * [Golden Upgrades bought + 1]) |
| Battle | Increase Trimp attack and health by | (3% * [Golden Upgrades bought + 1]) |
| Void | Decrease the minimum amount of enemies between Void Map drops by | (2% * [Golden Upgrades bought + 1]) |
Below is a table showing the gain increase in practice for a select number of Golden Purchases bought. The Total column assumes that only that particular type of upgrade was being purchased in that run. The player can purchase the upgrades in any order - the gain increase still applies to every upgrade.
| Golden Upgrades bought | Gain from purchasing | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Helium | Battle | Void | ||||
| This upgrade | Total | This upgrade | Total | This upgrade | Total | |
| 0 | 1% | 1% | 3% | 3% | 2% | 2% |
| 1 | 2% | 3% | 6% | 9% | 4% | 6% |
| 2 | 3% | 6% | 9% | 18% | 6% | 12% |
| 3 | 4% | 10% | 12% | 30% | 8% | 20% |
| 4 | 5% | 15% | 15% | 45% | 10% | 30% |
| 5 | 6% | 21% | 18% | 63% | 12% | 42% |
| 6 | 7% | 28% | 21% | 84% | 14% | 56% |
| 7 | 8% | 36% | 24% | 108% | 16% | 72%[1] |
- ↑ Note that Golden Void is capped at 60%.
For example, if the player bought the Helium Golden Upgrade three times in a row from the start, and then bought a single Battle Golden Upgrade, then a single Void Golden Upgrade - their Helium gain would be increased by 6%, attack/health by 12% and Void map drop chance by 10%.
All three of these factors stack multiplicatively with the other factors that increase that particular statistic.
Exceptions
Void
If the player unlocks Golden Upgrades before unlocking Void maps, the Void upgrade will not appear.
If the multiplier for the Void upgrade were to reach above 60%, the upgrade will be grayed out and will not allow the player to purchase it with the following message:
This upgrade would put you over 60% increased Void Map chance, which would destabilize the universe. You don't want to destabilize the universe, do you?
Helium
Golden Helium is grayed out and can't be purchased if the player is doing a Challenge².
You can't earn helium while running a Challenge²!
Abandoning the challenge allows the upgrade to be purchased. It is possible to stockpile a bunch of Golden Upgrades and then buy Golden Helium in a bulk after abandoning a Challenge² for the bonus.
Trivia
- Reaching a new achievement tier mid-run causes golden upgrades to immediately adjust to the new tier.
- In patch V3.6, Golden Upgrades were added.
- In patch V4.1, a new Achievement breakpoint was added at 2000%, for Golden Upgrades every 25 zones.
- In patch V4.3, after purchasing 300 total Golden Upgrades over the course of the game, a new feature known as AutoGoldenUpgrade is unlocked. This allows one to automatically purchase the specified Golden Upgrade once it is available.