Early Access Update V0.8.7.7
While this update is relatively small in terms of content, it introduces a new system that paves the way for endless new content that is varied, exciting and provides a great new platform for the voice actors to express themselves as well as bringing life to the existing characters in the game.
Kicking off the new system is a short introduction scene that replaces the old cinematic introduction which featured a few fly-over shots with a voice over. You now get to meet in person the generals who are commanding you via the radio through the game, and one of them will communicate to you face to face. In future updates, you are going to be seeing a lot more of these NPC's and being able to interact with them directly and I firmly believe this is a necessary step for modern gaming to bring the world alive with living breathing characters.
The existing radio mission briefings will not be changed, only new content will be added featuring lip synced character NPC's, and will pave the way for hours of new content upcoming in 2025 and beyond.
Below are the main features, as well as other bug fixes, additions and optimizations as per usual.
Main Features:
Fixes:
Additions:
Optimizations:
Thank you everybody for playing! The next update V0.8.7.8 is going to focus on environment and wildlife, while I work towards a general large content update by V0.8.8. This is the beginning of an exciting new chapter, and I can't wait to share it with you all!
Keep those bug reports coming, and just general chats. You can always find me in the Discord or on the Steam forums, I look forward to hearing your thoughts!
- Twelv [Ingozi Games]
Kicking off the new system is a short introduction scene that replaces the old cinematic introduction which featured a few fly-over shots with a voice over. You now get to meet in person the generals who are commanding you via the radio through the game, and one of them will communicate to you face to face. In future updates, you are going to be seeing a lot more of these NPC's and being able to interact with them directly and I firmly believe this is a necessary step for modern gaming to bring the world alive with living breathing characters.
The existing radio mission briefings will not be changed, only new content will be added featuring lip synced character NPC's, and will pave the way for hours of new content upcoming in 2025 and beyond.
Below are the main features, as well as other bug fixes, additions and optimizations as per usual.
Main Features:
- New introduction scene.
- 2 New character models.
- New character creation pipeline system.
- Endless potential character faces.
- New lip syncing system.
- Over 50+ possible Facial expressions.
- Procedural blinking.
- More voice acting.
Fixes:
- Fixed a recurring issue that would cause your ostrich race course progress to be reset if you played an earlier race again.
- Fixed issue making it possible to shoot NPC's while scoped.
- Fixed missing NPC colliders in ostrich racing.
- Fixed some boss fight related issues that I won't list directly due to spoilers.
- Fixed issue with B.I.R.D. scout being able to fly off and under the terrain bounds.
- Fixed some issues with weapon wheel responsiveness when using a mouse.
- Fixed numerical keys not working on Caravan PC main menu.
- Fixed missing colliders near Mission 5 drone control station.
- Fixed some issues with drone control station not triggering the next mission state correctly.
- Numerous other small bug fixes.
Additions:
- A few environment vegetation improvements.
- A new 'Potjiekos' model. (Traditional South African 3 legged cauldron).
- New "MelkTert" model. (A type of delicious milk tart pie).
- New coolerbox model. (Gotta keep those beers cool).
- Added better fencing for informal settlement area.
- Improved terrain seams and various terrain texturing near borders of tiles
Optimizations:
- All player triggers used for asynchronous loading now exist in their own layer so that they are never triggered by other non-player entities, even though only the player can activate them now the trigger is never called unnecessarily.
- Added all remaining elephants and giraffes into the asynchronous loading system for improved memory usage, as these animals never venture into the main reserve area by themselves.
- Deep analyzed texture compression and found (and fixed) a 21mb normal map used for the vehicle cabin down to 5MB without any loss in visual quality.
- Optimized specular maps used for outside shebeen walls.
- Converted some read-only static variables to constants for better memory efficiency.
- NPC Gardener character in ostrich racing now uses a single instance repositioned per race instead of multiple instances pre-configured.
- Implemented dynamic texture loading from disk for less common weapons that don't need their textures permanently stored in runtime memory.
Thank you everybody for playing! The next update V0.8.7.8 is going to focus on environment and wildlife, while I work towards a general large content update by V0.8.8. This is the beginning of an exciting new chapter, and I can't wait to share it with you all!
Keep those bug reports coming, and just general chats. You can always find me in the Discord or on the Steam forums, I look forward to hearing your thoughts!
- Twelv [Ingozi Games]