Not Dead Yet News

Hey there!

Today we are introducing a small patch focused on Quality of Life changes.

[h2]General Changes[/h2]

• Reworked the way wave rewards work. We've boosted the rewards between waves and now you have the freedom to choose from 3 different options!
  
• Now everyone receives 25 Health when they go to the Mefisto Pit;
  
• The Damage feedback when you shoot someone is being displayed at your crosshair instead of the target's head;
  
• Added Camera Shake for specific damage types Mefisto applies;
  
• Added animation while the player is scrapping, both first and third-person;
  
• Added feedbacks for when the character is running low on health;
  
• Added better feedback for when players are poisoned;
  
• Added animation and sound effects for when the player interacts with the Rewards Box;
  
• Added animation and sound effects for when the player interacts with the Weapon Shop;
  
• Added animations to the Car when it is repaired;
  
• Added better sound effects to the Car when it is repaired, and at the entrance of Mefisto Pit;
  
• Added different music for different circumstances of the game, to improve climax;
  
• Mefisto no longer vanishes after dying;
  
• Added Not Dead Yet logo to the 'Esc Menu';
  
• [Multiplayer] Added notification for when players connect/disconnect from the match;
  
• [Multiplayer] Added notification for when a player dies.
  

[h2]Bugfixes[/h2]

• Fixed a bug where bonus damage wasn't displaying accurately;
  
• [Multiplayer] Fixed a bug where servers could still see their own name above their heads.
  

[h2]What's next?[/h2]
The last two weeks were all about Quality of Life as you may have noticed. We realized we were postponing way too much to implement some "sugar" into the game and decided to take this time to polish things. Although still far from where we want to be, we are confident this is a good first step.

But now, for the next two patches at least, we have this plan of adding more content and features. In short, we'll be working on more Perks, the Sprinting Mechanic, and Grenades. Of course and like always, these patches will also debut Quality of Life changes - so do expect better game feeling and bug fixes.

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That's all, folks! Hope you like it!

Gui.

Hey folks!

First of all, thank you for your patience. Yes, v0.9.0 took way more time than we expected but we are confident it'll be worth it in the long haul. Long story short, we refactored several bits of our codebase and introduced lots of systems we'll be using from this patch and beyond, such as support for multiple maps, single and multiplayer map traveling, a better foundation to create game mechanics, and much more.

Anyways, let's get into the good stuff.



[h2]Notable changes[/h2]

• Say hello to our first boss, Mefisto! Once you escaped from the first map, you'll have to face Mefisto and its unique mechanics in order to beat the game. Here you go some screenshots of it and its level. Just to give you a taste. :P
  
  
  
  
• We added a Lobby Map. Now, by default, you always start at the Lobby (or the Bunker, you call). Currently, there's not much to do in there besides jumping into the combat map, but it serves as the foundation for incoming releases. And before I forget: this is the only place where you can invite friends to play. Outside the Lobby, you won't have the invite option available.
  
• We introduced the Poison Mechanic. Which is different from the Infection Mechanic you already know. Poison applies damage over time, and if don't kill zombies you're probably dead.
  

[h3]General changes[/h3]

• General re-balance of everything. We tweaked lots of numbers. From weapons, to how zombies scale and more. We won't list here in detail because it's too much and you won't remember anyway so...
  
• Reworked the way to escape from the first map. Prior to this patch, there was a Radio Station in the front yard of the first map (the "House") that you had to repair with certain amounts of scraps. This Radio was removed and now you gotta repair the car in the garage. The twist here is that you can do it in small chunks of Scraps, never requiring you to save huge amounts of Scrap to repair it at once. And oh, this car repairs itself after every succeeded wave - so you don't even have to bother unless you are in a hurry.
  
• Restarting the match is now persistent. Hell yeah, multiplayer players: you don't have to recreate the party when the match is over. By just clicking 'Restart Match' at any time, the match is restarted with everybody at the party.
  
• We added better-looking loading screens. That pitch black is now gone.
  
• We added a complete damage displayer. Prior to this patch, you had to do some math in order to calculate your damage output. We are now automating that task and displaying it to you right from your Character Info screen, accessible through the 'B' key.
  
• Several other UI changes.
• Improved multiplayer load times. We got frustrated for how long some load times could take, so we improved it. We now expect everyone to feel quicker load times, regardless of their hardware.
  

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

• Special zombies now are showing up gradually. Prior to this patch, our algorithm that chooses which zombie we're going to spawn was pretty random. Now, worry not -- complex zombies won't show up in early waves.
  
• Increased initial Scav Health. From 60 to 80.
  
• Buffed Perk Faster Scrapping. Scrap collection speed increased from 50% to 70%.
  
• Buffed Perk Scrapper. Scrap yielding increased from 10% to 20%.
  
• Buffed Scav Perk 'Finders Keepers'. Cash earned at every 3 scraps increased from 10 to 20.
  
• Added 'Vampirism' Perk. Every 3 zombies you kill, you receive 1 Health.
  
• Added 'Necroscrapper' Perk. Every 3 zombies you kill, you receive 3 Scraps.
  
• Added 'Meatshield' Perk. Every 5 zombies you kill, you receive 3 Armor.
  
• Shotguns got significantly nerfed. All the shotguns had their damage decreased. Hunters were abusing damage because of the way they scale.
  

[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

• Fixed Hazmat Zombies applying unreliable damage.
  
• Fixed Server Player seeing other players' hit mark.
  
• Fixed some achievements not triggering when they should.
  
• Fixed some achievements triggering when they should not.
  
• Fixed zombies' progress bar not reaching 0% at client players in a multiplayer environment.
  
• Fixed players not being able to interact with the Post Match Screen.
  
• Fixed players being able to see their own names when looking up.
  

Please, take into account that the following might change and will not necessarily land at the very next patch.

Our next goals are almost all related to polish. We know the game still lacks that 'touch of finish', thus we want to take some time to focus only on that so you, our player, can enjoy Not Dead Yet at its best. To manifest our ideas for the next patches here it goes some early planning - listed in no particular order:

• Improve weapons 'feel'. (better animations, sound effects, etc);
  
• Add some animations we judge essential;
  
• Add more sound effects and more contextual music to the game;
  
• Introduce some new, smaller mechanics our players were asking for;
  
• Expand shallow mechanics we have in the game;
  
• Rework the initial map of the game;
  
• And like always, bug fixes.
  

And oh, now that I mentioned the rework we're doing in the initial map of the game, here you go some preview screenshots we took from it. Please remember that these screenshots are a work in progress, were taken inside the engine, and don't represent the final version of the map.



The idea behind this map is to expand the possibilities early on in the game. It'll be bigger, have two floors and lots of things to unveil. It'll be super fun! o/ And don't panic: we'll be working in lightning and atmosphere as well, thus we believe the final version of it will be even better to the eyes. :D

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OK, I believe that's it. Hope you meet Mefisto and enjoy the update and the weekend!

See you next week!

Wholeheartedly,
VINCAE Entretenimento.

Hi!

This week we took a rough decision: no updates. But allow me to give you a quick explanation, yes?

Our schedule was to release v0.9.0 this week as usual, but one of the features it'd introduce required a refactor we were not expecting. Technically speaking, we could postpone the refactor - we could workaround to make the feature work - but that wouldn't be wise, specially because another feature expected to debut on v0.10.0 would also require this same refactor. That said, after serious internal discussions, we decided to postpone v0.9.0 to give us the opportunity to make the refactor right and prevent time bombs in our code.

We are sorry about this.

I know that this might not be a big deal [the delay] for some in our community, but I really don't want our game to look like 'yet another dead Early Access game' because we are working hard and with the heart here.
That's it.

See you next patch with good stuff.

Take care!

Hello everyone!

Welcome to our weekly ritual - a brand new Not Dead Yet's patch! Yay! Shall we?

• Introducing the Role System! Our goal with Not Dead Yet is to provide a fresh experience at every run. While a bit bare bones at the moment, we expect roles to give you unique experiences every time you start a new game.
  
  To give you a brief overview of our goal with this system is that each role (or class, as you wish) has one unique Perk to it (or its 'Signature Perk'). The main goal with roles is to segment play styles, meaning the game spins around the way you like to play it. Also, besides the Signature Perk, at the moment, the Perks available at the Research Table now depend on the role you are playing with.
  
  To greet you with this new system, we're introducing two simple starting roles: the Scav and the Hunter; respectively, one specialized on scrapping and crafting; the other specialized on... guess what... killing.
  
  Anyways, we don't want to spoil much on these notes. Go ahead and check by yourself!
  
  
• New Special Zombie! Meet The Smasher - he's big, strong, got a big hammer, and won't go down so easily! Good luck, we guess?
  

[h2]General changes[/h2]

• New algorithm for Health scaling. Zombies were way too weak, specially the special ones. On v0.8.0, we introduced a brand new formula that changes how they scale - and we expect you're going to like it, because the challenge just got further.
  
• We improved Multiplayer Shooting Registration. If you're a veteran multiplayer player, you probably noticed some lags/delays/inconsistencies while shooting in multiplayer matches, specially with automatic rifles. We improved that by 80% - to say the least.
• Some general UI improvements.
  

[h2]Balancing changes[/h2]
[h3]SKS[/h3]

• Damage decreased from 440 to 370 (nerf)
  
• Reserve ammo decreased from 60 to 30 (nerf)
  

[h3]M4[/h3]

• Damage increased from 200 to 250 (buff)
  

[h2]What's next?[/h2]
We anticipate a calmer next patch. Our team took the decision to take some time to refactor old technical debts we have, balancing stuff, expanding the Perks system, etc. This because the first Boss Battle is approaching, and with it, the conclusion of the Act 1 -- can't wait to share what we have in the oven!

That's it.

Have a great weekend everyone and talk to you next week! (Don't forget to follow us on Twitter to more quick updates).

Another week, another patch. Geez, time flies huh? Hope y'all are doing great!

Alright, in our totally non biased humble opinion, this week's patch is shining! It brings lots of good stuff, including a new zombie that changes everything Not Dead Yet you know so far and much more. Shall we, ladies and gentlemen?

Our favorite ones, heheh...

• The 'Slowpace' Zombie is among us! Things are about to get colder, folks. Yeah, family is growing. Also, Slowpace is our first ranged zombie ever -- and we advice you to watch your back. ;)
  
• A brand new mechanic: 'Slow'. We know it's already familiar to you, but not to Not Dead Yet... until today. Currently exclusive to the Slowpace zombie, we intend to expand it much, much more. You know, your better tool on Not Dead Yet is being able to move - and move quickly - what if things get slower? Yeah, you bet.
  
• 'High Performance' graphical settings. This is two in one. Some awesome Not Dead Yet players (thank you, guys - you rock!) reported how bad the game was performing in their machines. We swear we've been investigating the cause of that for weeks, but never really got into a conclusion. What we've done instead is: giving players the ability to lower their graphics quality. In-game, just press 'Esc' and go to Settings -> Graphics and tweak to whatever works best for you. We noticed performance bumps (in FPS) of >1000% (yeah - you read it right, one thousand percent).
  

[h2]General changes[/h2]

• No more repeated Perks! We know how frustrating it was to invest your precious Research Token and see it outputting 3 Perks of the same kind. Oh man, sorry about that. Anyways - that's now properly addressed! You won't ever received redundant options anymore!
• highfive*
  
• Several UI improvements. I mean, really - we improved lots of things in the UI. It is now supposed to be smoother than ever. Not only that, but easier for newcomers. Please, let us know what you think...
• Added the 'Joining Server...' indicator. Multiplayer people were always thinking they were not connecting to friends when trying to join their servers. Turns out it was just bad user experience. When one joined another game, we never really displayed a proper feedback. Not anymore, yep yep.
  
• Added an option to invert mouse X and Y axis. How could we forgot about people playing with their mouse at the left hand? We are really sorry, my friends -- but thanks to a specific feedback/report, this is no longer a problem! Just go to your settings and tweak how you want to invert your axes from there! (Thank you tons, Umbert!)
  

[h2]Bugfixes[/h2]

• Fixed a bug/exploit where players could buy the weapon they were already equipping. When used with the Sustainable Mind Perk, things were going wild (if you know what I mean).
  
• Fixed a bug where the Hazmat Zombie was applying damage across walls.
  
• Fixed a bug where people weren't able to pick rewards at their Personal Storages one by one - they only had the 'Take All' option.
  

[h2]Balancing[/h2]

Rescue Wave

• It now always last 120 seconds.
  

War Paint (Perk)

• It is now a Common Perk instead of a Rare (expect to see it more often)
  

Vulcan (Weapon)

• Damage: From 30 to 33 (buff)
  
• Headshot Multiplier: From 1.7x to 2.0x (buff)
  
• Cost: From 450 Cash to 400 (buff)
  

SKS (Weapon)

• Primary Clip: From 30 to 10 (nerf)
  

[h2]What's next?[/h2]

Our current mid-term goal is to finish the Act 1 of the game (#spoilers). That requires several subsystems to be released, including Boss Battles -- and that's exactly what we're doing. We are portion by portion releasing stuff that march towards that goal. We can't reveal everything right now, but we can definitely anticipate the Act 2 is approaching - and with it, the new map (almost) everyone (Not Dead Yet players) asked for!

Fasten your belts and be patient that we're just getting started. ;)

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That's it, people!

Have anything to share? Please do through our Discord Channel or give us a shoutout on Twitter!