Poached : Hunt The Hunter News

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:

• 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]

Optimizations:

• Environment quality settings now affect the quality of skydome sphere polygon density.
  
• Optimized bone hierarchy for skinned meshes with skeletons that don't require parented objects in the hierarchy, such as birds and insects.
  
• Optimized polygon geometry for small insects such as dung beetles that don't require high detail due to their size.
  
• Optimized animator controllers for some birds, rodents, insects and other larger animals as they included numerous animations and blend trees not being used.
  
• Removed unused trigger volumes from pigeons, sparrows, owls etc. that don't react to the player such as when eating bugs or observing the player.
  
• Converted secret "Skip Level" snails from skinned meshes to static meshes, since they aren't animated thus no reason for extra skinning processing.
  
• Converted dragonfly animation system from old legacy system to new Mecanim system as well as optimized internal skeleton and hierarchy.
  
• Optimized texture memory of incredibly small entities such as flies, wasps & dragonflies which barely take up a few pixels even when zoomed in.
  
• Optimized geometry of Gardener planting flowers found in grow room Mission 1
  
• Optimized memory of shopkeeper animation controller
  
• Small optimizations to sky dome algorithm.
  
• Optimized shop keeper look IK algorithm.
  
• Programmatically removed all unused tags from project.
  
• Optimized internal hierarchy and memory footprint of enemy muzzle flashes
  
• Optimized a redundancy inside enemy controllers related to idle animations also used in non-idling characters.
  
• Numerous code refactors, tweaks & micro-optimizations for improved performance on lower end devices.
  
• Environment detail now affects the distance of tree billboarding for better performance especially when viewing large vistas from a distance such as on top of a cliff.
  
• Optimized handheld radio texture memory usage.
  
• Enemy footstep algorithm now calculated velocity of enemy with square magnitude instead of magnitude velocity.
  
• Enemy footsteps are now pulled from a pre-shuffled array instead of a randomized calculation.
  
• Optimized the sharing of various data attributes between multiple instances of duplicate classes with improved implementation of static variables, constants and scriptableObjects.
  
• Optimized use of magnitude calculations in all scripting and navigation entities in favor of a squared magnitude calculation.
  
• Optimized raindrops internal algorithm and codebase.
  
• Optimized car damage collision dealer algorithm.
  
• Optimized terrain shadow casting vertex count.
  
• Optimized horizon fog synchronization calculation algorithm.
  

Additions/Details/Changes:

• New arm accessory for Character #4 making each character arm set truly unique.
  
• Running Audio [Coins/Bullets jingling in pockets] now softer and more subtle for less audio fatigue. (from 0.25 to 0.15)
  
• Fixed weird tiling texture on shooting range operations table.
  
• Improved the animation blending between enemy idle states such as a poacher who is not patrolling but busy carving up an animals and their transition from that state into battle when alerted.
  
• Characters are now nameless as the names don't add any value, and the player can now decide in their own head what they wish the characters to be called.
  
• Improved quality of glass shattering when shooting out vehicle windows.
  
• Character selection rotation is now faster/more snappy.
  
• Improved quality of weapon wheel selection when using a mouse.
  

Fixes

• Fixed missing Vehicle Garage option from personal computer when using the upgraded mobile home instead of the caravan.
  
• Fixed an issue with knife in zebra ragdoll near mission 1 camp disappearing from certain angles due to misconfigured occlusion culling.
  
• When cinematic music is playing it is lowered when listening to the rock music station.
  

The game's Ostrich Racing mini-game has been expanded to a full championship with 8 races to complete, each unlocked by coming first place in the previous match. Win all 8 races to win an achievement, as well as the option to compete for fastest times in the global leaderboards.

In addition to this update, a few small other changes have been made as per usual.

Main Update Features:

• 7 New ostrich races.
  
• Unlockable race flow.
  
• Ostrich Race improvements.
  
• New per-track global leaderboards.
  
• New achievement.
  

Fixes:

• Fixed issue that allowed weapons to be brought onto the ostrich racing course, even though you aren't able to use them since friendly fire is disabled for NPC teammates and there are no enemies to fight.
  
• Small navmesh issues fixed.
  
• Turning on a radio in caravan/shebeen will now resume from whichever channel you were previously listening to.
  
• Covered up some more exposed tree roots without backfaces.
  
• Fixed fencing that allowed illegitimate entrance into the distant informal settlement.
  
• Fixed intersecting hat on one of the NPC ostrich racers.
  
• Fixed options page 1 'Reset To Default' setting HUD Scale to 0.
  

Details:

• Added new beer radio advert that can be heard upon entering the bar for the first time.
  
• Added new beer branding to the bar taps.
  

Other:

• Made music station and talk radio station relative volumes more balanced to each other.
  
• Added more trees in terrain quadrant 5.
  
• Offset animation frames for NPC ostrich racers so they are not always perfectly synced for realism.
  

Optimizations:

• Removed blood instantiation pool from memory in scenes that do not have any fighting. (Such as ostrich racing etc)
  
• Optimized ostrich animation controller and memory footprint.
  
• Removed an unused hat from character avatar memory resources.
  

Steam Page Updates:

• New box art cover that uses game screenshots for a more accurate representation of the games apperance as opposed to artwork that doesn't look exactly like the game.
  
• Updated Demo to use lastest media art assets in Steam.
  

Happy racing!

This update introduces a new music radio station, playable in your vehicle and other locations, featuring music from top South African bands such as Not My Dog, Ruff Majik, Fuzigish, Hog Hoggidy Hog, The Slashdogs, The Narrow, Boo!, Worsie van Wyk, Shameless, Kamikaze Test Pilots, ATFN, Hunter Kennedy, and more! With over an hour of voice acting, virtual ads with game tie-ins, and other surprises, this addition enhances your experience alongside the existing talk radio station, and even more on the way!

Radio Changes:

• The radio now features two stations instead of one, with more coming soon.
  
• Radio now has 3 states. Talk Radio, Music Radio & Off, which you can flip between using the reload button while driving.
  
• Radio stations can now also be heard inside other places such as caravan and bar as opposed to only while driving.
  
• Radio now has its own volume control in conjunction to game music and master volume controls.
  

Details:

• Increased texture quality of player arms.
  
• Improved poacher death animation as well as ragdoll reliability.
  
• Removed some trees growing unrealistically on slopes near far ends of the reserve.
  
• Increased detail of character #2 hair in character selection screen.
  

Fixes:

• Minor environment detail fixes.
  
• Fixed missing colliders on some metal structures.
  
• Fixed flashing shadows on arms.
  
• Fixed potential subtitle/voiceover overlap when activating drone recharge station before mission. briefing is finished due to loading a saved game near the drone station before activating it.
  
• Fixed rare issue where the end level stats popup could cause trees to turn into low quality billboards if player finished a level near an outskirt.
  
• Fixed a small inventory system issue that might cause player to select the wrong item when dragging quick.
  
• Fixed a rare error that could cause sometimes cause an armored poacher wearing a hat to become invincible to headshots if head shot with a shotgun due to the engine not being able to add a rigidbody to a component twice when making the hat fall off the poachers head.
  
• Fixed custom mouse cursor turning back into normal windows mouse cursor when the game is Alt+Tabbed.
  
• Fixed issue with next enemy waypoints not always working properly if a game was loading midway through dispatching an enemy wave.
  
• Fixed some other issues with enemy count when loading a saved game midway through an enemy wave that could possibly not load the correct remaining enemy count or score stats.
  
• Fixed new overlap of secret "time length" slider activated by cheat code since the menu had been adjusted.
  
• Fixed missing flag animations in ostrich racing caused by accidental deletion of blend shapes during optimization update.
  
• Fixed bug allowing player to pick up an ostrich.
  
• Fixed issue with HUD scale parameter not resetting properly when selecting default settings.
  
• Fixed issue where armor UI could display over the vehicle garage U.I.
  
• Fixed mouse cursor showing during "Sleeping" overlay screen.
  
• Fixed issue with HUD scale not loading correctly.
  
• Fixed a memory leak caused by asynchronously loaded fish remaining in the fishing hole when leaving the area.
  
• Fixed small issue that caused your weapon to be stuck in zoom mode if you got into a vehicle with the aiming button held down.
  

New Achievements:

• Crafting A Successful First Aid-Kit
  
• 100% Mission Accuracy
  
• Curing a snake bite on "Hard" Difficulty
  

Optimizations:

• Fixed memory leak issue with enemy bullets holes.
  
• Made normal maps for very small shell casing ejections much smaller
  
• Fixed more shadow casters that didn't cast shadows that were visible
  
• Removed unnecessary content size fitters on saleable U.I. elements.
  
• Removed 10 unused transforms from end level/death camera module.
  
• Replaced some more mesh colliders with box colliders in instances where it made no difference.
  
• Removed trees that were stuck inside rocks and not even visible yet still using memory.
  
• Removed unused tags from game system.
  

Balancing:

• Slight price increase on first-aid kits.
  
• Decreased max shotgun ammo holding amount.
  

Controller Support Changes:

• Added full controller support for vehicle garage.
  
• Fixed issue with main menu continue button staying highlighted when navigating menu with a controller.
  
• Game now auto selects "OK" button when tutorial popup opens when gamepad connected.
  

And as always, various other small polishes, fixes and optimizations and more importantly some things I simply just don't want to mention due to spoilers.

In this update, we unlock a new feature that can be used for customizing your vehicle by accessing the garage via the caravan PC.

Please note, that this is only the beginning of the garage and while you can only customize engine, tires, and paint for now - many more options are on the way, including improvements to the actual Garage U.I.

Main features:

• A new vehicle garage is now available through the PC in your caravan.
  
• 24 different paint jobs can be purchased for your vehicle.
  
• Tires can be upgraded to special anti-slip tires that improve grip by over 200%.
  
• The engine can be upgraded to level 2, increasing maximum torque.
  
• New accessories, decals, and other unlockable items will soon be available for purchase in upcoming updates.
  
• 2 new achievements are available to unlock.
  
• Various vehicle-related fixes and general quality-of-life improvements have been implemented.
  

Improvements:

• Increased poacher perception radius in locations with large flat planes and less dense vegetation for more realistic battle scenarios.
  
• Enemy hearing improvements.
  
• Improved poachers ability to hear which direction a shot came from if one of their teammates is killed with a sniper rifle from a distance, to prevent making it possible to camp and take out an entire squad with little to no effort.
  
• Improved poacher ragdoll death animation.
  
• Improved sniper rifle sprint animation position.
  
• Improved quality of rendering material for garbage bin found outside caravan.
  
• Improved drone charging station metal material appearance quality.
  

Bug fixes:

• Fixed an issue where the vehicle would shoot into the air when crouched on while stationary.
  
• Fixed goat/zebra ragdolls going invisible if you get too close as a result of a previous optimization.
  
• Fixed animal and poachers getting stuck when accidentally walking into your vehicle while it is stationary.
  
• Fixed another small issue with an invisible cigar collider causing the legendary ostrich to not run smoothly.
  
• Fixed a major issue with ragdolls that caused ragdolls to shoot up in the air if physics collisions occurred. A side effect of this is that dead animals/enemies can no longer be dragged, however since there is no stealth mechanic related to enemies seeing other dead enemies - body dragging is not required.
  
• Fixed issue with Field Of View preview not updating properly when first loading into main settings menu pre-game.
  
• Fixed reverse issues with vehicle that made it easier to get stuck after a head-on collision with thin static geometry such as tree trunks.
  
• Fixed issue that can cause the sniper scope effect to be overlayed onto a different weapon (even the radio) if the player zooms in as a weapon is switching.
  
• Fixed an issue causing leaderboard in main menu to not load since upgrading scripting backend to IL2CPP
  

Detail additions/Fixes:

• Fixed ugly terrain texture seam located near shebeen/bar.
  
• Improved smoothing appearance of arcade machine in shebeen.
  
• Improved shebeen electrical outlets.
  
• Removed some intersecting bushes stuck in a rock that looked ridiculous.
  
• Improved appearance of white borders around certain grass textures.
  
• Did some more work on covering exposed tree mesh bottoms with terrain detail where applicable.
  
• Did some more texture painting work on various parts of the terrain for better blending and realism.
  

Optimizations:

• Improved rendering framerate inside shebeen/bar.
  
• Optimized the (now rare) Combat Shotgun normal map.
  
• Removed an unnecessary basket detail from main menu scene.
  
• Fixed garbage collection issue caused by vehicle tail lights that aren't even being used but was reallocation a new material instance every frame while using the truck.
  
• Changed ranger walkie-talkie radio to a new radio model that isn't 2 million vertices, this is temporary while re-topologizing the old model but by reducing a model from 2 million vertices to 4,000 we not only improve rendering performance but general application memory pressure.
  
• Converted more animator strings into integer hashes for optimized animation state calling.
  
• Updated SteamWorks.NET library to a later version.
  

And that's all for now! I'll be back on the 24th with a new surprise that I am very excited to launch.
Happy hunting/driving, and speak soon!