Update 23: Coop in Hell Week
Update 23 marks the 3rd update in our new monthly update cycle! Technically U23 should be released the first week of November for monthly updates, but you’re ok if we get an update out early right? Now we have a bit more time to work on U24 before the (fingers crossed) first week of December.
HUD/UI ImprovementsWe’ve added more useful information to your hud and made it all around cooler with hit markers, teammate status symbols, and keep the information on-screen even when you ADS. It's now fully converted to Unity 5 which means we can add effects like blurry vision from exhaustion or suppressed fire, emp grenade scattering in the visor etc. Lots of cool things we can do in the future.
Improved Hell Week with teammate revive to reward teaming up even more, points are now shared among teammates requiring less thought about whose turn it is to get that gold box, and we’ve also got VOIP working again! Remember the real-time voice porting demo you saw from forever ago? Well we got that working so now you’ve got team voip and can also open your helmet and talk to any player in proximity to you.
Ever since upgrading the game to Unity 5 our current foliage and vegetation assets have not been fully supported. Therefore we have now started adding new assets called SpeedTrees! First map to get tested is Rupture and over time we'll add them on all maps.
We have added a few details to the CTRs; when it is dark they will now hunt and blind you with their tactical light and they also use a laser sight to assist with aiming. Speaking of lasers, remember how it used to switch off whenever you aimed your weapon? Even though it didn’t switch off to other players in 3rd person? Well now it stays on the whole time, making the transition from laser aiming from the hip to ADS a little smoother.
We’ve also got a lot of general improvements. Spawns are now protected by shields to help mitigate the problem with spawn camping until we are able to iterate on this further. We’ve fixed some sound issues, and your weapon configuration is now saved for when you’re revived or respawned!
We’re beginning to add more visibility to the progression elements in the game in preparation for item unlocks and RPG/skill elements. Detailed patch notes to follow.
Game RoadmapAs many of you know the part of the game we are currently working on is known as Prologue, and follows the player through training to be an Interstellar Marine before getting into the “real” story. Some are concerned we’ve shifted focus to pvp, and don’t understand why we’re creating coop using pvp instead of coop. Short version; spoilers. It’s a means to an end type situation.
That is where the crux of the problem is, we want you to have the best experience possible and not ruin the narrative of the game by revealing the story before the supporting elements are in place. But we still need to put in new tech that will be needed for the campaign while giving players something to do.
Here’s our strategy. First we create the tech foundation while funding development through Early Access sales. Once we have the immersion right, the progression and customization systems in place, more weapons, and the unlocks all planned out, then we start on the big campaign. We’ll keep expanding prologue in logical ways to keep people occupied while we develop the campaign, and will probably deliver it in chunks. Chapters if you will.
We don’t have a specific timetable for progress, time spent doing a thorough analysis to come up with a realistic and accurate estimate is time better spent actually working on the game. We know where we’re going, we know how to get there, and we’ll take it one update at a time.
Thank you for hanging in there and supporting us through development. We know it’s taking longer than some would like, but we’d rather get things right the first time to give you the best Interstellar Marines coop campaign experience right out of the gate.
Patch notes are available here in full: Media.interstellarmarines.com
FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME
Your team at Zero Point Software
What's NewADDED: Ability to revive players in Hell Week
ADDED: VOIP to Hell Week teams, when in same zone as other team members
ADDED: Hell Week ends when 3 teams are left. Note: a lone wolf player counts as a team
ADDED: Teams in Hell Week now share points between players
ADDED: Players respawn in new zone when killed during grace period in Hell Week
ADDED: Huge HUD update including a number of new icons, sprites and changes
ADDED: Three new Hell Week-related Steam Achievements
ADDED: Initial, very early, support for Xbox gamepad. This is experimental and likely contains issues/bugs
ADDED: TPs and TR info to right hand side of main menu (need to be over 1280 width resolution to see)
ADDED: Ability for coop servers to run the same game mode and game type on the same server
ADDED: Global chat in main menu. By default, press T to toggle
ADDED: Can no longer aim when crouched if blocked by an object
ADDED: Weapon settings are remembered after death, and on collected CTR weapons
ADDED: Speedtrees to Rupture
ADDED: AR CTRs use a laser when aiming, AR+SMG CTRs use laser when shooting
ADDED: List of team mates in the HUD when teamed up in Hell Week
ADDED: Numeric input for sensitivity sliders
ImprovementsUPDATED: Weapons' FOV, recoil, damage, handling, dropoff, magnification etc. have been tweaked
UPDATED: Hell Week teams to have a max of 4 members
UPDATED: Spawn protection to all multiplayer maps
UPDATED: Quick join to add confirmation pop up showing game mode, and high ping if it is enabled in the settings
UPDATED: Operations audio with reverb in spawn tunnels
UPDATED: On-death fade-to-black screen
UPDATED: Respawn time in Hell Week grace period is now 5 seconds
UPDATED: Nav mesh on all Challenge maps
UPDATED: Several server stability fixes, especially on Starcrown
UPDATED: Wetlands with new nav mesh and other tweaks
UPDATED: Starcrown with several fixes
UPDATED: Operations Survival and MP maps with new modules and various fixes
UPDATED: Hell Week server browser now shows 'Server starting...' instead of join button when there is a time desync between server and client
UPDATED: Resolution screenshot with different sizes, plus button to open screenshot folder
UPDATED: Removed completing The NeuroGen Incident Steam Achievements on easy, normal and hard difficulties
FixesFIXED: "VOIP in Coop"
FIXED: "Picking items up in Hell Week should work first time the majority of the time"
FIXED: "Changed max number of players coop quick join looks for to 2 from 1"
FIXED: "CTRs to minimise them being stuck on items or terrain"
FIXED: "Most instances of server browser returning to the wrong server browser page"
FIXED: "Footstep audio looping when stood still"
FIXED: "Nucleus so the escape door is not locked by default"
FIXED: "Light handler and light intensity issues which were causing performance losses"
FIXED: "Crates which were in, or on, water in Hell Week have been fixed"
FIXED: "Games no longer return to the incorrect server browser"
FIXED: "Spawn bug in Team Domination"
FIXED: "Flashing flashlights no longer flash improperly"
