Necromunda: Hired Gun News

Hi everyone,

Necromunda: Hired Gun is OUT!

We'd like to extend a huge thanks to all of you playing right now! Hired Gun is at the top of the charts and the team is glued to all the streams and videos - THANK YOU!

We read and compile your feedback and reports already and are working on our first update to fix some of the issues you might have encountered.

If you encounter any issues with the game, please submit a ticket in our support center: https://support.focus-home.com/hc/

We’ll do our best to help you there, and it will help the team to fix the issue faster for all players.

Let's celebrate the launch of the game today with our Launch Trailer!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

As you're diving into the Underhive, everyone in the small team of StreumOn Studio has some words for you:

We are thrilled to finally welcome you to the dark and merciless world of Necromunda: Hired Gun.

Working on this amazing license has offered us the chance to bring to you several years of our hard work, combining all the ingredients that make up our favourite games: fun mechanics, intense and rewarding gameplay, and immersive environments.

We can’t wait for you all to embrace your new career as a fearless Bounty Hunter in one of the most dangerous worlds of Warhammer 40k.

Although it has been a very special year for everyone, we kept giving it our all to bring you an experience that we hope you will enjoy as much fun as we did creating it.

Necromunda is such a rich world that we want to keep improving and adding things to make your journey even better. This is why your feedback will be very important to us. We can’t wait to see all the creative ways you and your 4-legged friend will tear gangers apart.

This fast-paced FPS is full of possibilities and madness so we don’t mean to stop there. Let’s all show the Underhive who we are!

So grab your guns, get some augments at the Rogue doc, and give your dog a scratch behind the ear, because it’s going to be one hell of a ride…



Once again thank you so much for playing, and be sure that the team is working hard on compiling your feedback to release updates quickly!

See you in the Underhive,

The Hired Gun Team

The release day is coming fast Bounty Hunters! Plunge into our game’s Opening Cinematic Trailer to get an extended introduction to the treacherous depths of the Underhive!

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[h2]Hunt your targets, upgrade your arsenal[/h2]

Your first stop is Martyr's End - the sole relatively safe place in the Underhive. Here you'll find all the commodities you need: guns, ammo, cybernetics augments for your loyal Cyber-Mastiff and yourself, as well as high-profile contacts and fresh targets to hunt. Lock and load your Bolter, the hunt begins soon! Necromunda: Hired Gun is available for pre-order now on PC. All pre-orders receive the Hunter’s Bounty pack, unique cosmetics for your knife, stub gun, and outfit. Each has a Guilder theme, with a blue paint job and hard metallic coating. A new dog chew toy is included too, giving your best boy the extra incentive to chase down his targets.



Necromunda: Hired Gun arrives June 1st, 2021 on PC. Pre-order now and claim your bonuses!

Stay tuned for more info and follow our social media: Facebook, Twitter, Discord.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1222370/Necromunda_Hired_Gun/

[h2]Greetings Bounty Hunters![/h2]

We are thrilled to unveil our Friends Forever trailer! In this electrifying new video starring man’s best friend, get your blood pumping in expectation of Hired Gun’s digital release for PC on June 1st!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

[h2]Pick your contracts, hunt your targets, collect the bounty[/h2]

In proper RPG fashion, introduce yourself at Martyr’s End, the hub of all things bounty-hunting and more in your little corner of Necromunda. Choose your contract, prepare your loadout, and head out with your canine best friend to track down targets across one of the several despicable areas of the Hive. Alternate use of your grappling hook and wall running to close in on your prey across putrefied agri-farms, industrious chemlabs and more. Unleash destruction in dazzling sync with your loyal Mastiff to complete your contract, then return to Martyr’s End for a celebratory drink and a round of gear upgrades for you and your dog.



[h2]Augment your arsenal and deal with the Hive’s toughest contracts[/h2]

Signature power knife, rocket launcher, graviton gun… you’ll need them all and more to make a living within the ever-growing conflict between factions in the Hive. After each action-intensive trip outside Martyr’s End, take the time to exchange loot and rewards for cyber-augments to yourself, your arsenal and your four-legged best friend. Specialize your character, grow in power and soon enough, become your target’s unstoppable worst nightmare.

Our fast-paced indie FPS arrives June 1st, 2021 on PC. Pre-order Necromunda: Hired Gun now and get the Hunter’s Bounty Pack to bring the Underhive to hell in style with a unique knife, stub cannon, and outfit skin, as well as a new look for your mastiff’s toy.

Stay tuned for more info and follow our social media: Facebook, Twitter, Discord.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1222370/Necromunda_Hired_Gun/

[h2]Hello everyone![/h2]
In this last part of our blog about the music and sound of Necromunda: Hired Gun, we’ll dive into the sound creation process of the game. Happy reading!

[h2]Creating the sound of the Domes[/h2]

There are a ton of sounds to produce and implement, from the character and NPC weapons, to discreet ambient sounds and huge machinery, to animation and cutscene synchronization.

Being the sole sound designer on the team, I have to work on all aspects of the sound and know every tool of the engine. This includes for example the basic sound source in a level and the animation or sequencing tools for the character animations or cutscenes. It’s even necessary to be able to create tools to ease the design of the audio inside the levels.



So, no matter what the aspect of the sound I’m working on (levels, animation, etc.), we are working through an iteration process. For instance, Dimitri, our lead level designer, first starts the greyboxing of a level. Most of the time I take a look at this stage to know the size of the different spaces of the level. It allows me to work on the music with the design documents while he starts to iterate on the art and structure of the visual feeling.

During the evolution of the level, some of the sounds are implemented by default. The reason behind that is that we have some objects that already contain the 3D asset and the properly configured sound. Some of the sounds are placed by the level designer, and in some specific cases, important landmarks and peculiar structures or machinery. Some sounds are placed as “intent”.

Then, when the level reaches a standard that is close to the production quality we are aiming for, I start the phase I’m calling “audio design”, where I detail every aspect of the environment in the level. This involves: Tweaking potential sounds that were already placed; Adding a lot of details for the visual effects and particles; Synchronizing the sound with the interactive elements or animated assets; Checking “intents” and coming up with a custom sound for this specific situation.

With that done, we iterate and go back and forth from level design to audio design until the level is considered finished.



Another side of the audio design directly linked to the level design is defining how the spaces should sound. For that we rely on audio volumes that process the sounds when you are inside those volumes, adding reverb or other special effects. At first I created the volumes myself, but later on Dimitri or the other level designers took the responsibility of creating the volumes, being way more experienced than me with handling these elements. When the volumes are in place, we discuss what would be the best setup for the reverb and effects, and do playtests to see if it works or not.

In the case of Necromunda: Hired Gun, there are also the cutscenes. They are implemented after the level design process is finished and the structure of the level is considered final. Just like the level design process, I only start working on them when the cutscenes are almost complete from an animation or scripting point of view.

The cutscenes involve working on the ambient sounds, animations of the characters but also the voice over. Some of them evolve during the production, meaning I have to find solutions to disable ambient sounds of the environment that disturb the clarity of the dialogue. I might also need to manually redo / resynchronize some environmental sounds because they are too loud or too quiet in the context of a cinematic moment.

When everything is in place, I play through the maps several times and refine some details, especially the music which evolves during the whole production. Sometimes I’ll feel like music is too present or not present enough and tweak accordingly to obtain a good flow through the whole level and story.



I could go into further detail and keep talking about the sound of NHG for hours, but I’ll keep some in depth analysis on technical aspects of the design for future articles. Here at StreumOn Studio, we are all proud of this project and hope you’ll enjoy your journey through the Domes. See you all in the Underhives.

Necromunda: Hired Gun releases on June 1st on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC. Pre-order are open here: https://www.focus-home.com/games/necromunda-hired-gun#shop

-The StreumOn Team