The Plucky Squire has introduced two new modes in its latest update, the Challenge Mode and the Iron Squire Mode, giving the game's difficulty a major bump. This comes as a welcome change for those Plucky Squire fans looking for a tougher challenge.
When The Plucky Squire came out in September 2024, it was showered with praise by critics and became one of the more highly rated indie titles released that year. Since then, two major updates and a slew of minor ones have been incorporated into the platform game, offering players an incentive to continue playing and enhancing the overall experience. The first of the two big updates brought Streamlined mode for The Plucky Squire players, which optimized the game for a speedier playthrough. On the other hand, the second big update, which is also the latest, has now been rolled out and has added two different modes with increased difficulty, alongside some new achievements and a quality-of-life improvement.
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PostsIn The Challenge Update, tons of fresh additions—including new enemies, harder mini-games, and more—have been incorporated as part of Challenge Mode in The Plucky Squire. Among the new enemies are the book-exclusive Rock Golem and the metamagic versions of Barfer Bug, Rat, Goblin, Spear Trooper, and Popuff. On top of that, more unforgiving variants of existing enemies, namely the Tough Goblin, Exploding Goblins, Metal Goblins, Exploding Jumper bugs, and Tough Namastarlings, also made the cut. Additionally, all the mini-games in The Plucky Squire, except Fish Grabbing, Sneak C09 game, and C04 Fantasy Card Game, feature new difficulty settings as well as new layouts. Such layout changes have also been made to the game's pages that involve combat. The Challenge Mode also boosted Humgrump's abilities, resulting in enemies being teleported not just in the book sequences but also in the desk sequences. The Plucky Squire's in-game achievements list also received four new entries exclusively for the Challenge Mode.
CloseFor those who want even bigger stakes, The Plucky Squire has introduced the Iron Squire Mode, which is akin to playing the Challenge Mode but with permadeath enabled. In it, once a player dies in the game, their save is deleted, and they are redirected to two newly added "game over" screens—one for the desk and one for the book. The latest update also contains a quality-of-life tweak, which enables Plucky Squire players to skip dialog boxes by simply pressing and holding the X button or the space bar as opposed to pressing it for each dialog box.
The aforementioned game modes, which offer higher levels of difficulty, should give new players as well as those who have already finished The Plucky Squire in its default mode something worthwhile to check out. It will be interesting to see how much the newest update helps the game retain its players and boost engagement.
Plucky Squire The Challenge Update Patch Notes (June 26, 2025)
New Challenge Mode
Challenge Mode is a new game mode designed to test your skills with increased difficulty. This mode includes:
New enemies Harder minigames Harder bosses Some layout changes for levels The ability to fast forward through dialogue and New AchievementsRemixed Pages
Pages with combat on have been reworked and side scrolling levels have new layouts.
Humgrump Desk Spawns
In the previous version of the game, we had Humgrump teleport some enemies into the level using his metamagic, but only in the book. We've now added these sequences to the desk too. These spawn in with VFX and a bubble that contains Humgrump's face. Additionally, Jot can get electrified on the desk.
New Metamagic Enemies
Following on from the above, we have the glowing metamagic variants of some of the base enemies. They have their own effects and materials on the desk, and new sprites in the book.
Barfer Bug Rat Goblin Spear Trooper PopuffChallenge Mode Enemy Variants
We have some upgraded versions of the existing enemies. These are all across both desk and book.
Tough Goblin (just harder) Exploding Goblins (run at you and explode) Metal Goblins (indestructible) Exploding Jumper bugs Tough Namastarlings (just harder) There's a new tough book-only enemy, the Rock Golem, which appears from Chapter 2.More Difficult Minigame Patterns
All of the minigames, apart from the Sneak C09 game, Fish Grabbing and the C04 Fantasy Card Game have new difficulty settings and layouts. Buttergrump also has new patterns. There are little bits of extra functionality in some of these games as a result, such as ghost Archery bugs and new projectiles in Buttergrump.
New Iron Squire Mode
The Plucky Squire with permadeath! This is essentially Challenge Mode but with no continues. As soon as you die in Iron Squire Mode, your save is deleted, and you are sent to a new game over screen. We have one each for desk and the book.
Four New Achievements
There have been five Challenge Mode-specific achievements added.
Complete Challenge Mode: Pops up at the same point that the Adventure/Story Mode one pops up. It also auto-completes the Adventure/Story Mode too. Get to Artia in Iron Squire Mode: This triggers at the end of C04 when the camera pans across to show Artia. Complete all corrupted (Humgrump) Challenge Mode minigames (without skipping) Boxing Volleyball Potion popComplete the Big Brawl at the end of C09 without dying.
Dialogue Fast Forward
You can hold the X button or Space Bar to fast forward through all dialogue without repeatedly pressing for each box that pops up.
