Survivalist: Invisible Strain News

I've released a new patch, v94, which means all the stuff I've been putting in publicbeta for the last few weeks is now in the main branch for everyone. This fixes a crash people were seeing in the Join Game menu, among other things.

The biggest change is just that I've updated to the latest version of Unity, which I hadn't done since before I started the beta test over a year ago, in the hopes of fixing an unexplained crash from deep in the Unity dll that a few people were seeing. A side effect of that is that the dialog you used to get at the start asking you to select a screen resolution and quality level is now gone, because they no longer support that. Those options are now in the Graphics Settings menu in-game.

Note that if you have multiple monitors and you want to change which screen the game displays on, you can use the Windows shortcut of Windows Key + Shift + Left Arrow or Right Arrow.

Here's the full change list again:

[h3]v94[/h3]

• Added Quality Level to Graphics Settings

[h3]v93[/h3]

• Crash fix from previous patch

[h3]v92[/h3]

• Fix for pathfinding not working when finding resources in a building where one door is accessible but the other isn't
  
• Fix for bug where you couldn't take a pot from a campfire of a dead community where cooking was still in progress
  
• Fix for bug where, if you tried to climb over a rock and a zombie bit you at the same time, you would get stuck in a grappling state you couldn't escape from
  
• Fix for enemies sometimes flying a long distance from you when you hit them in multiplayer
  
• Renamed Portuguese translation to Brazilian Portuguese, because that's what it is
  
• Crash fixes

[h3]v91[/h3]

• Fix for game time in multiplayer running faster than it's supposed to
  
• Added Fullscreen option to Graphics Settings menu
  
• Fix for two people being able to pick up a body at the same time
  
• Fix for kiln sound volume not being affected by volume slider, and fire sound volume not fading off correctly
  
• Another fix for cooks getting stuck in a loop depositing stuff in buildings
  
• Fix for sometimes not being able to spar with people you like
  
• Crash fixes
  
• Fix for crops rendering glitch
  
• Made tree falling sound quieter

[h3]v90[/h3]

• Upgraded to Unity 2020.1.2f1
  
• Fixes for characters not eating food in some situations, such as while they are assigned to cook something
  
• Fix for Memory Editor not showing the types of the memories
  
• Made tree falling sound less loud
  
• Updated Japanese
  
• Crash fix

It's.. another stability patch in publicbeta! I've realised that for v90 I introduced a bug in multiplayer which meant when you hit someone with a melee weapon they would sometimes go flying a really long way. So this patch fixes that, but because of that bug I can't move the previous patch to the main branch. However, I'll move this one to the main branch within in a day or two though (instead of waiting a week like I normally do) because it turns out there's another bug (in main right now) which causes the game to crash when you're browsing online multiplayer games, if any of those games are using a mod you haven't downloaded. ːsteamfacepalmː This patch will fix that so hopefully all should be well soon.

On the positive side it looks like a few people have now submitted mods to the workshop, which is how that bug came to light!

Anyway here's the full changelist for v92:

• Fix for pathfinding not working when finding resources in a building where one door is accessible but the other isn't
  
• Fix for bug where you couldn't take a pot from a campfire of a dead community where cooking was still in progress
  
• Fix for bug where, if you tried to climb over a rock and a zombie bit you at the same time, you would get stuck in a grappling state you couldn't escape from
  
• Fix for enemies sometimes flying a long distance from you when you hit them in multiplayer
  
• Renamed Portuguese translation to Brazilian Portuguese, because that's what it is
  
• Crash fixes
  

EDIT - Just released another patch to fix a new crash, so it's v93 now. (This is why I have publicbeta!)

[h3]What's this publicbeta thing?[/h3]
v93 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a few days, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using that branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".

I've put a new patch in the publicbeta branch. This fixes a few issues from the Unity upgrade in v90, such as the crops that seem to dance all over the place in the wind. Also Unity removed the display resolution dialog in their update, so I needed to make the fullscreen option available in the graphics settings menu. Because of those issues I won't move v90 to the main branch.

The other main thing in this patch is a fix (I think) for a bug people often reported as "enemies rapid-firing the bow like a machine gun". It appears that since sometime back in the beta testing days there's been a bug that often made time run faster than it should in multiplayer, and this was most noticeable when enemies shot at you with a bow. (It didn't make the animations run faster though, just the underlying time, which is why I didn't notice).

Here's the full change list:

• Fix for game time in multiplayer running faster than it's supposed to
  
• Added Fullscreen option to Graphics Settings menu
  
• Fix for two people being able to pick up a body at the same time
  
• Fix for kiln sound volume not being affected by volume slider, and fire sound volume not fading off correctly
  
• Another fix for cooks getting stuck in a loop depositing stuff in buildings
  
• Fix for sometimes not being able to spar with people you like
  
• Crash fixes
  
• Fix for crops rendering glitch
  
• Made tree falling sound quieter
  

[h3]What's this publicbeta thing?[/h3]
v91 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using that branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".

I've made Steam Workshop support available for everyone, so go and subscribe to the Example Story! It's kind of like a mini Story Mode ːsteamhappyː



Here's the full changelist for that patch (v88/89) again:

• Added Portuguese!
  
• Added button in Editor menu to create a new story, and a bunch of small editor features and fixes
  
• Added the ability to upload stories, created in the editor, to the Steam Workshop
  
• Fixes for characters getting stuck if they are unable to reach a well or a river when trying to get water
  
• Fix for people's mouths not moving when talking in CJK languages
  
• Translation fixes
  
• Crash fix
  

Meanwhile in the publicbeta branch I've uploaded v90, which is basically just a stability patch. A couple of people have reported sporadic crashes in Unity.dll, so I've upgraded the latest version of Unity in the hopes that will fix it. It shouldn't result in any noticeable changes but every time I upgrade Unity something seems to go wrong so let me know if you see anything weird.

v90 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while first, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using that branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".

I've enabled Steam Workshop support! I meant to release it last weekend but got a bit carried away making an example story to demonstrate how it works. Anyway, in v88 (in the publicbeta branch) you can now download a mod from the workshop (which I'm referring to as a Story), and you can create your own stories in the editor and upload them to the workshop! ːsteamhappyː


There are still a lot of editor features that need adding, such as the ability to create rivers, and making this small map also drove home the need for much more variation in building types. Also please note: you can use the editor to create new stories with their own maps, quests, dialog and so on. You can't really create new weapons (unless they use the same model as an existing weapon) or new houses, props etc. I know a lot of people want to be able to do that! So this is just a start with hopefully a bunch more features to come in future.

Here's the full change list for v88:

• Added button in Editor menu to create a new story, and a bunch of small editor features and fixes
  
• Added the ability to upload stories, created in the editor, to the Steam Workshop
  
• Fixes for characters getting stuck if they are unable to reach a well or a river when trying to get water
  
• Fix for people's mouths not moving when talking in CJK languages
  
• Translation fixes
  
• Crash fix
  

These features will be available in the "publicbeta" branch for a while first, before pushing them to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using that branch. But keep in mind:

• Because it's the bleeding edge it'll be less stable
  
• If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
  
• If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".

I'm also moving v87 into the main branch! Here's the changelist from v87 again:

• Added Korean and Japanese translations, and partial French (UI only)
  
• Added outlines and fixed some bugs with the Asian fonts
  
• Added fonts that support Polish characters
  
• Added a bunch of small features to improve translations
  
• Added Pause/Resume options for movement zones
  
• Added a box next to the progress indicator that shows how much of each material you have used when building something
  
• Fixes for gate and equipment policy dialogs not working with gamepads
  
• Various fixes for equipment policy
  
• Fix for icons getting mixed up if you have a large number of clothes in one building
  
• Fix for maps sometimes being generated with no zombie or rabbit spawnpoints on them
  
• Fixed various bugs regarding height of overhead icons
  
• Crash fixes
  

Let me know how it goes. I will be updating my editor guide shortly to explain the new features, let me know if you have questions.

EDIT - there was a bug in v88 where roving hordes and raiders etc weren't spawning in Sandbox mode, so I've released v89 to fix that. v89 also includes Portuguese! Many thanks to Carlos 'Reaction' Vicenzi for translating it ːsteamhappyː