Early Access Update V0.8.9.7

Third update for 2026!

[h3]Terrain, environment, lighting, and visual polish[/h3]

• 1. Improved quality of extremely small rock textures found on terrain for a more natural and realistic brown with less bright white fatiguing pixels.
  
  
• 2. Improved the appearance of the light that comes off your braai/barbecue, especially at night for a more realistic orange glow.
  
  
• 3. Improved the visual quality of waterfalls.
  
  
• 4. Improved visual quality of debris found fallen from an exploded attack helicopter.
  
  
• 5. Improved visual quality of warehouse textures when up close.
  
  
• 6. Fixed a weird terrain texture seam near the water tower next to the first mission poacher camp.
  
  
• 7. Made bloom even more tamed than previous update, only affecting the very most bright pixels for further realism and less random glowing.
  
  
• 8. Made the entrance to the guest lodge easier to drive into when near the main entrance gate to the lodge via opening up a new section in the nearby fence.
  
  
• 9. Improved the appearance of the litter found near the camp used by the PIKITUP achievement for collecting litter.
  
  
• 10. Improved the appearance of a specific hill near Theta zone next to an elephant.
  
  
• 11. Fixed terrain tiling being the wrong size in the post-game state before & after the final boss fight.
  
  
• 12. Removed some trees that were growing into rocks weirdly at the very far outskirts of the terrain.
  
  
• 13. Fixed weird unnatural popping in of lighting on trees when driving at night with the vehicle front lights on, foliage now fades naturally into light when approached.
  
  
• 14. Fixed missing lantern glass on all breakable lanterns.
  
  
• 15. Fixed broken square fumigation particles when tavern is being fumigated in rare post-game fumigation event.
  
  
• 16. Fixed overly shiney wooden floor in guest lodge.
  
  
• 17. Improved the appearance of the terrain tiling when viewed out the windows from top floors in the guest lodge.
  
  
• 18. Improved visual quality of "Same-Day Delivery" delivery boxes found outside the caravan after ordering items off the internet.
  
  
• 19. Attack drone wing rotors are now animated.
  
  
• 20. Improved poacher leader face & skin material texture.
  
  
• 21. Improved material appearance of Character #3 wrist accessory and skin.
  
  
• 22. Improved material quality of groundskeeper character clothing.
  

[h3]Weapons, combat balance, and weapon visuals[/h3]

• 23. Improved accuracy of R1 FAL FN Scope/ADS position.
  
  
• 24. Added more dirt and grime to R1 FAL FN weapon when equipped for a more worn appearance.
  
  
• 25. Improved the appearance quality of R4 weapon pickup as dropped by enemies.
  
  
• 26. Fixed a quicksave/quickload related infinite sniper rifle ammo hack in Mission 3, as well as a logic bug related to collecting ammo from weapons you already own when the current magazine capacity plus the current amount of bullets exceeds the maximum ammo count mysteriously giving the player more ammo than what is inside the weapon on the ground.
  
  
• 27. Changed sniper rifle magazine size to hold 5 high capacity rounds at a time instead of 10 for more realism.
  
  
• 28. Fixed a pickup/drop related infinite RPG ammo hack in Mission 6, 7 and wherever RPG's are sold.
  
  
• 29. Melee weapons no longer make bullet decals when you strike objects. (lol)
  
  
• 30. Added proper high quality procedural recoil animations to General Gideon's firing mechanic when he is returning fire in the Mission 1 camping interlude ambush.
  
  
• 31. Made more blood when killing an enemy poacher in his vehicle before he gets out for a better indication that you have done so.
  
  
• 32. Added some more ammunition pickups to the very final boss fight back at your camp in the rare off-chance that you do run out of ammo. (Also to show the player that nowhere is safe, and even running all the way back to camp cannot save you - you will be followed.)
  
  
• 33. Fixed issue with RPG not saving if it was actually equipped when you saved.
  
  
• 34. Adjusted tranquilizer dart weapon textures & material for the 700th time, this time with a cool new Camo skin.
  
  
• 35. Improved R1 FAL FN on-screen position when sprinting.
  
  
• 36. Made the rare ZC75 pistol do more damage than it's counterparts.
  
  
• 37. Increased shotgun damage by 40%, although it is still only effective at close ranges due to it's high spread rate.
  
  
• 38. Fixed an extremely rare issue with some enemy weapons playing a silenced SMG gunshot sound when firing even though their weapons were not silenced.
  
  
• 39. Made enemy "Rate Of Fire" realistic and more akin to your own rate of fire when using the same weapons, especially for audio purposes. Balanced damage to match in a way that is fair.
  

[h3]Player interaction, vehicles, physics, collisions, and animation[/h3]

• 40. Fixed issue allowing you to walk through your braai/barbeque.
  
  
• 41. Fixed issue allowing you to walk through drone control station found in poacher leader hideout during mission 8.
  
  
• 42. Made collision detection with goats more accurate when driving in your vehicle.
  
  
• 43. Fixed an issue allowing you to fly under the terrain with a B.I.R.D. scout drone if less than 3 meters away from the drone deployment location.
  
  
• 44. Prevented enemies from being able to walk through the ruins of exploded helicopter.
  
  
• 45. Made pitched tents have a double sided material so that if you pitch it on the edge of a cliff in such a way that you can see inside it from the bottom, you can't see through the underside of the mesh face.
  
  
• 46. Fixed issue with player being able to make camera bob around weirdly when using the movement buttons while static sitting in the helicopter.
  
  
• 47. Fixed "Unarmed/Pick Up Objects" weapon slot 0 sometimes detecting the player itself when moving really fast and briefly showing the hand icon.
  
  
• 48. Added a sound effect when destroying foliage with your vehicle by driving over them.
  
  
• 49. Improved the density of "Fern" type foliage explosions when destroying them with your vehicle.
  
  
• 50. Improved Foot IK of Poacher Leader in Mission 4/5 when stationary and removed the ridiculous bag that was placed on his hip to hide the fact that his hip was intersecting with his coat, which is now fixed by the new IK pass.
  
  
• 51. Fixed an issue that allowed the player to walk through one of the boundary colliders by waterfall zone #3 that prevented the player from walking under water into negative space.
  
  
• 52. Fixed a "doom hole" near waterfall zone #2 that the player could fall down and get permanently stuck in.
  
  
• 53. Adjusted the player’s interaction/pickup distance from an unrealistic 6 meter “psychic force” range to a more realistic 1-metre range required to interact with or pick up objects.
  

[h3]Enemy A.I., stealth, combat behavior, and tracking[/h3]

• 54. Fixed a logarithmic audio curve issue that made it sometimes possible to hear enemies talking even when you were miles away from them, and made enemy idle chatter 3D sound propagation more realistic with custom volume curves.
  
  
• 55. Increased the amount of some idle banter from poachers, and made idle banter clearer - allowing you to better hear all the hard work recorded by the voice actors.
  
  
• 56. Some small various enemy A.I. improvements in regards to enemies who are hunting the player from start I.E. not from patrol/alert states, as well as some other general enemy navigation improvements.
  
  
• 57. Enemies now try less to take cover in as foolish a manner as before that leaves them extremely vulnerable to attack, in previous versions when searching for a player if they saw the player they would run to a cover spot which was often far away leaving them open to being shot. They now have a higher chance of first begin to attack the player while strafing or walking backwards and only then consider cover if it's available.
  
  
• 58. Fixed a bug that could cause enemies to sometimes forget which bush you were hiding in, even after seeing you kill one of their buddies and then hide in that same bush.
  
  
• 59. When hiding inside a bush, but your hidden status has been blown the on screen indicator will now state "[VISIBLE]" instead of remaining as "[HIDDEN]" so that you know the enemies can still see you and know where you are.
  
  
• 60. Enemies tagged with binoculars for tracking now use icons more in line with the games color pallet instead of standard default generic red.
  
  
• 61. Fixed some strange enemy behavior that in Mission 7 which could cause Mercenary type enemies (the ones with metal bullet proof armor) to freeze in mid combat situations when trying to take cover caused by no cover points marked in this specific mission.
  

[h3]Missions, interludes, story flow, progression, and achievements[/h3]

• 62. Improved animation realism of the poacher found carving up his kill in Mission 2, which is seen very well when using binoculars so that he is closer and his knife is actually touching/carving the animal, allowing the player to feel a sense of how bad things really are and add a sense of realism to the games antagonists. Also optimized the animation blend state tree for this character.
  
  
• 63. Fixed helicopter pilot legs intersecting geometry of helicopter in Mission Interlude #2.
  
  
• 64. Bonus missions for General Gideon are now accessed via the walkie talkie inside your caravan instead of the giant radio tower inside your camp after missions.
  
  
• 65. Improved the loading screen info text when loading the helicopter dehorning mission interlude #2.
  
  
• 66. Camping mission interlude now clamps day/night cycle during the dialogue scenes.
  
  
• 67. Improved death pose for poacher leader in Mission 8 and fixed an issue causing him to not bleed.
  
  
• 68. Fixed a weird delay that sometimes occurred in the Mission 1 interlude ambush after the commander tells you he hears an ambush approaching, as well as some other general balances for this particular mission interlude.
  
  
• 69. Fixed a very rare issue that could lead to player switching to radio with an empty hand if changing to the notepad in the middle of a briefing during the first few seconds of a mission under certain conditions.
  
  
• 70. Some essential environmental story telling changes in the later parts of the game that I don't want to talk about due to spoilers, but making a note of it anyways. If you know, you'll know.
  
  
• 71. Fixed a slight intro cut off from the Mission 1/Wave 1 poacher conversation when they raid your camp.
  
  
• 72. Fixed general Gideon's hand intersecting with walkie talkie inside helicopter mission Interlude #2, and some other small visual polishes during this mission.
  
  
• 73. Fixed a small pacing issue in Mission 7 with a drone warning being issued via the top left-hand corner info popup before the radio transmission comes in.
  
  
• 74. Fixed issue causing some new enemies in Mission one and 1 in Mission 4 to respawn after loading if they had been killed, if the entire wave had not yet been killed I.E. not saving like the other enemies.
  
  
• 75. Enemy vehicle in Mission 4 now also saves it's position and status to the save game file and won't respawn with each load if you decide to save/load in the middle of the mission.
  
  
• 76. Added further tutorial information about the rhino dehorning process as well as instructions on what to do inside the helicopter during the Dehorning Mission Interlude #2
  
  
• 77. Fixed a logic issue where the player would get an achievement for a perfect mission in Mission 7 essentially by default because there are no animals to protect or game to hunt.
  
  
• 78. Fixed an issue with map bounds being too close to one of the side quests, specifically the overturned chicken truck requiring assistance finding all the drunk drivers chickens and the player going delirious when walking out of bounds looking for them.
  
  
• 79. Fixed radio message audio being cut off too early when loading the General Gideon interlude mission #2, after accepting the mission. Also added missing subtitles for this transmission.
  
  
• 80. Fixed issue causing ostrich trophy to not appear when player has won all 8 ostrich races.
  
  
• 81. Made attack drone radio transmission and warning in Mission 7 appear sooner.
  
  
• 82. Fixed bug causing home computer to not work properly in the new mobile home if the player chooses to upgrade it.
  
  
• 83. Price of mobile home upgrade has been dropped from R100,000 to R50,000 while stocks last!!!
  
  
• 84. Improved the interior lighting of the mobile home upgrade, as well as the computer screen for the personal computer upgrade.
  
  
• 85. Fixed issue with chicken truck side quest mission zone spawning in not soon enough and popping in front of your eyes out of nowhere.
  
  
• 86. Fixed an issue where returning from Ostrich Races or the shooting range would send players back to the old caravan instead of the upgraded mobile home, if the new home had been unlocked.
  
  
• 87. Fixed bug causing the achievement for winning all 8 ostrich races to be achieved after only winning 7 races.
  
  
• 88. Fixed bug allowing inventory screen to be brought up during Ostrich Race soundtrack.
  
  
• 89. Removed an accidentally submitted #1 test score by me for Ostrich Racing for 01:28 that was impossible to beat, since the the final course can not be beaten in less than 3 minutes.
  
  
• 90. Brand new ostrich racing music from Poached official Soundtrack Artist Senkhane Montsitsi.
  

[h3]Audio, UI, options, and general systems[/h3]

• 91. Message warning you to turn on your lantern when exiting your inventory in the dark without doing so now appears 1 hour earlier as it should already be getting dark then.
  
  
• 92. Routed enemy gunfire through the game internal compressor/limiter/audio mixer DSP chain to prevent gunshot sounds from become painfully loud through headphones or speakers when many enemies are firing at once close to the player.
  
  
• 93. Fixed boombox radio not being able to be turned on again once it was turned off.
  
  
• 94. Balanced some audio where one specific enemy type was louder than the others.
  
  
• 95. Adjusted audio of squeaky tap without water in campsite to be less painful on the ears.
  
  
• 96. "Submit Score" option no longer resets back to true when resetting main options for security and privacy purposes. Whatever you choose here will always be your setting unless you clear game settings in the registry or move to a new computer.
  
  
• 97. Fixed U.I. issue with volume sliders minimum value not going all the way to 0 visually like the other sliders, even though their values did.
  
  
• 98. Weapon wheel now changes the label from "Sniper Rifle" to "Tranquilizer Rifle" when the dart gun is equipped in weapon slot #6.
  
  
• 99. Crosshair and other unnecessary U.I. elements will now be hidden while a main NPC such as General Gideon/General Van Jaarsveld is talking to you during an ingame cutscene such as the obstacle course of one of the General Gideon interlude missions.
  
  
• 100. Fixed issue of resetting advanced graphics options selecting the wrong default antialiasing.
  
  
• 101. Fixed issue with "Reset All Advanced Graphics Options" not resetting some values to their defaults correctly.
  
  
• 102. Fixed issue with main options page reset to defaults option not resetting "Scope Strength" and "Mouse Smoothing Options"
  
  
• 103. Added a graphics option to turn on/off weather changes & rain.
  
  
• 104. Optimized the raycasting algorithm used to detect pickups and interactive items for improved performance.
  
  
• 105. Fixed some targets and items in shooting range that did not make the metal ping confirmation sound when shot.
  
  
• 106. Fixed a raycasting issue that could cause some smaller items to explode when shot with a rocket launcher before the rocket actually hits the item.
  

[h3]Performance, optimization, and codebase cleanups[/h3]

• 107. Removed some unused leg animation libraries for a cleaner code base.
  
  
• 108. Removed some unused mesh faces from player GPS radio for optimization purposes.
  
  
• 109. Optimized foliage destruction system internal initialization mechanics to only instance new terrain datasets when needed, for optimization purposes.
  
  
• 110. Optimized the internal usage of strings used for labelling mission objectives, subtitles and other complex data structures so that all labels are not actually compiled into the build.
  
  
• 111. Fixed a null reference error caused by dragging your vehicle in unarmed mode, and then dragging another normal item causing the button to stick and not drop the object when you let go of the mouse.
  
  
• 112. Numerous other small internal script optimizations and codebase cleanups.
  
  
• 113. Re-balanced sprint stamina per character to make the vehicle and 2x sprint boost hiking boots purchase have more purpose again.
  

Happy hunting and stuff. See you next week for the next update!

- Rob [Ingozi Games]

A massive thank you to the soundtrack artists, bands and voice acting team for all their hard work - as well as the players and testers that help make this possible. If you enjoy the game and want to see it keep progressing, please consider joining the Discord using the links below. All feedback is incredibly valuable!!!

NOTE: With this update the free demo has also been updated, so all changes below apart from those pertaining to levels not included in the demo, as well as all updates since 21 Apr, 2025 can also be experienced by those who have not yet bought the game or currently own the demo. I have also added 3 basic Steam Achievements to the demo as well for completing the tutorial, completing the bonus mission and for completing the demo itself.