THE FINALS News

[h2]Update 6.5.0[/h2]

[h3]Drop In, Dance Out[/h3]

We’re keeping things stylish (and a little silly) this week with a fresh store rotation and the return of one of our most fabulous World Tour events. Just in time to loosen up before the mid-season madness hits next week!

[h3]World Tour: Strike a Pose 2.0[/h3]

ENGIMO is bringing back the boogie!

In this event, dancefloors light up the Arena every time a cashout is started, stolen, or secured. Drop an emote while you’re on the floor to earn extra cash for your team. Style matters, and now it pays.

Arenas in rotation:

• Bernal
• Fortune Stadium
• Las Vegas Stadium
• Monaco

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

This Week in the store we’ve got cardboard and carbs:

Spud Slinger Set

“Serving up the perfect side dish for total annihilation.”

Launch the legendary Spudnik CL-40 skin, complete with the Tuber Trooper charm and This Means You weapon sticker. Mash the competition, literally.

All Boxed In “Sharp lines, edgy style.”

A hand-drawn cardboard headpiece for contestants who prefer to think inside the box, and wear it too.

Flatpack Bundle “Looks fragile. Hits hard.”

Includes the Krafty Crackshot Minigun skin: a corrugated cardboard carnage machine with absolutely zero chill.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

No gameplay changes or fixes this week, just a bit of fun and flair before next week’s mid-season update, which brings some fresh new content..

Now strike a pose, collect that cash, and we’ll see you on the dancefloor.

[h3]Update 6.4.0[/h3]

Chaos Refined, Carnage Redefined

This week’s update is all about controlled chaos. Tuning weapons for precision, flipping the switch on full-blown gameshow madness, and suiting up in some of our most stylish sets yet.

Gameplay-wise, we’re making targeted balance changes to two of the Arena’s most talked-about weapons. The CB-01 Repeater gets a boost to its environmental damage, making it far better at dealing with deployables and ziplines, while the Minigun receives a notable accuracy upgrade when focus-firing. We’re not touching the spin-up mechanic just yet, but it’s something we’re actively evaluating as the season progresses.

Week 2 of Bunny Bash is also live now, with a new circuit of event contracts for you to complete for some amazing rewards!

[h3]World Tour: Protocol Overdrive (Sponsored by ENGIMO)[/h3]
ENGIMO is redefining chaos - again.

In Protocol Overdrive, gameshow events don’t just show up once per match - they hit back-to-back, dropping contestants into a relentless gauntlet of environmental hazards and alien mayhem.

Expect short moments of calm between bursts of absolute madness, with Meteor Showers and Alien Invasions shaking up the mid-game and forcing players to adapt on the fly. There’s barely time to breathe before the next disaster hits.

Arenas in rotation:

• SYS$HORIZON
• Bernal
• Kyoto
• Las Vegas Stadium

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Over in the store, we’ve got a wild lineup of new cosmetics ready to drop:

Night Munchies Set “Carrots optional, casualties guaranteed.”
Suit up in the Predator Payload outfit, complete with Assault Rabbit headgear and glowing Warren Glare eyes. Fluffy on the outside, ruthless on the inside.

Arena Vision Set “For contestants who see every angle in THE FINALS.”
Featuring the Sappy Ending skin for the Cerberus, Sledgehammer, and SR-84. Because every story should end with a bang.

Opulent Heavy Bundle "Devastating luxury, tailored for destruction."
Dominate the battlefield with Skullbound Oblivion skins for the Shak-50, Flamethrower, and M60 - dark, ominous, and absurdly stylish.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Now, let’s check out the balance changes (with dev notes) in detail:

Balance Changes

Weapons

CB-01 Repeater

• Increased environmental damage from 8 to 18

Dev Note: With the previous environmental damage value the Repeater had a tough time destroying ziplines. This change should help to address that.

M134 Minigun

• Decreased bullet dispersion when standing still and ‘focus firing’ (secondary fire) by approximately 10%, making the weapon more accurate
• Decreased bullet dispersion when moving and focus firing by approximately 10%, making the weapon more accurate

Dev Note: We really like that the spin-up time of the Minigun encourages players to adopt a different style of play to other weapons when using it, such as making use of various shields to protect while spinning up, or using Proximity Sensors to provide an early warning that gives time to spin-up. Because of this, despite some feedback that the Minigun is a little underpowered, we’re reluctant to address that by reducing the spin-up time and making the gun more responsive, as this risks it simply turning into another LMG. Instead, we’re making an adjustment to the weapon’s accuracy to make it slightly more effective at range. Performance wise, our data is showing the Minigun performing somewhere in the middle of the pack, so we’re reasonably happy with how it’s behaving.

We do feel that ‘juggling’ and maintaining the spin-up state while moving is a little too easy right now, so it is our intent to review that and potentially change it later this season, as we do really want using the Minigun to commit players to being prepared in how they play, but it’s likely that if that change does go ahead, it will come with some other tweaks to offset that change. We’ll see exactly where we go with that as the season goes on.

Update 6.3 – Bunny Bash is Back! 🐰💥

Outfits fluffed, basket loaded—Bunny Bash returns!

Our egg-cellent spring event is back, and this time it’s taking over Power Shift! For the next two weeks, you’ll be hopping into a version of the mode with locked loadouts, hand-crafted for chaos. Each class brings a different flavor of mayhem, from Miniguns and Mesh Shields to Glitch Grenades and Thermal Bores. It's time for some seasonal fun, and a chance to rack up egg-cellent rewards.

Bunny Bash takes place across: 

• 
  Horizon
  
• 
  Monaco
  
• 
  Skyway Stadium
  
• 
  Kyoto
  
• 
  Bernal
  
• 
  Las Vegas Stadium
  

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

You’ll play through two circuits, each with five reward milestones, the first is live now, and the second hops in next week!

What can you earn?

• 
  Punk Bunny Ears – Good Hare Day
  
• 
  Punk Chicken Outfit Pieces – Coop Core Vest, Nest Runner Pants, Fowl Fingers, Cluck Kickers
  
• 
  Charm – Rebel Hatcher
  
• 
  Weapon Skins – Rapid Scrambler for the CB-01, ARN-220, and M134
  
• 
  Goo Grenade Skin – Tama Easter Fling
  

Bunny Bash is live for two weeks until the 24th of April!

See you in The Arena, let's get bashing!

[h2]Update 6.3 - Bunny Bash is Back! [/h2]
Outfits fluffed, basket loaded. Bunny Bash returns!

Our egg-cellent spring event is back! For the next two weeks, you’ll be hopping into a version of Power Shift with locked loadouts, hand-crafted for chaos. Each class brings a different flavor of mayhem, from Miniguns and Mesh Shields to Glitch Grenades and Thermal Bores. Time for some seasonal fun,and a chance to rack up some amazing rewards!

Bunny Bash takes place across:

• SYS$Horizon
• Monaco
• Skyway Stadium
• Kyoto
• Bernal
• Las Vegas Stadium

You’ll play through two circuits, each with five rewards. The first is live now, and the second hops into action next week!

What’s at stake? What’s the rewards?

• Punk Bunny Ears - Good Hare Day
• Punk Chicken Outfit Pieces - Coop Core Vest, Nest Runner Pants, Fowl Fingers,Cluck Kickers
• Charm - Rebel Hatcher
• Weapon Skins - Rapid Scrambler for the CB-01, ARN-220, and M134
• Goo Grenade Skin - Tama Easter Fling

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Spring Twitch Drops are LIVE!
Watch any THE FINALS creator on Twitch for 3 hours total to earn the Green Shoot skin for the ARN-220, CB-01 Repeater, and M134 Minigun. Cute, springy, and just a little too fresh for your enemies.

Ruby Rank is now unlocked!
Think you've got what it takes to stand with the best? Ruby Tier is now open in Ranked Tournaments, climb your way into the Top 500 and prove it. The grind just got steeper.. and a whole lot sweatier.

ENGIMO takes the stage!
ALFA ACTA have ended their generous sponsorship in the World Tour, and now the seasoned veterans over at ENGIMO takes the stage!
They'll kick off their sponsorship with some Standard Cashout.
Pure Competition, Perfectly Broadcast, Perfectly Connected - just the way ENGIMO wants you to see it!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

On the gameplay side, Update 6.3 brings a nerf to the Sword’s secondary attack, aiming to reduce the frustration many players have felt when facing this very sharp stick.
We’ve also rolled out a wide slate of bug fixes and improvements across UI, animations, performance, and more.

Finally, Balance-wise, the meta’s looking more stable than it has in a while, but we’re still keeping a close eye on standout contenders like the Cerberus, Pike-556, FAMAS, and the Season 6 newcomers: M134, CB-01, and ARN-220.

We’ve also got a stacked store rotation this week. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Nope, that’s a snuke!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Now, let’s hop into the full patch notes below, before we hop into Bunny Bash! 🐣

[h3]Balance Changes[/h3]

Dev Note: This week's balance changes are fairly light as right now, the overall meta is looking more stable than it has for a while. We are monitoring several items based on their performance at present though and are likely to make some adjustments to them in the coming weeks. These include the Cerberus 12GA, Pike-556 and FAMAS, as well as each of the three new weapons, the M134 Minigun, CB-01 Repeater and the ARN-220.

Additionally, we’re continuing to monitor the performance of the respawn system in Cashout mode and expect to have some refinements to make to the system in the 6.6 update.

Weapons

Sword

• Decreased secondary attack damage from 140 to 105

Dev Note: The Sword has increasingly become a source of frustration for a lot of players, especially Light players, who feel its ‘one-shot’ potential when combined with Quick Melee is too oppressive. Over time, we’ve been trying to reduce the potential for one-shots in a lot of places in the game and we feel it’s time to address that here. We believe the sudden rise in frustration with the Sword is also partially due to the removal of the Stun Gun, which was many Light players’ answer to a fast lunging Sword user in the past. This change removes the essentially one-shot potential of the Sword.

Longer term, we’re going to continue to monitor the Sword and explore some alternative changes that might allow us to nudge the lunge damage back up, but that will take more time and we’d rather try to address this issue now than wait. We’ll also need to see how things change once the re-worked Stun Gun returns, which should be around 6.6.

Additionally, there are several exploits and bugs we’ve become aware of related to performing extra or ‘phantom’ attacks, which we’re aiming to fix in the near future.

[h3]Content and Bug Fixes [/h3]

Animation

• Fixed an issue on the standard reload for the AKM where the magazine was flicked in the wrong direction, it now flicks forwards as intended
• Fixed an animation issue where the Haptic Reload animation for .50 Akimbo looked broken from another player's perspective
• Fixed an animation issue where cancelling the Wild Draw inspect animation for the Throwing Knives by attacking looked broken from another player's perspective
• Added missing shell eject for the CB-01 Repeater lever action animation
• Updated the M26 Matter reload animations to move the reticle less when aiming down sights
• Fixed a rare issue where the upper body on the third person contestant could become out of proportion
• Fixed the recurve bow’s animation breaking when swapping to another item while the bow is charged
• Fixed an issue where the Dual Blades was offset from the contestants hands in third person while sprinting
• Fixed the left arm looking broken in third person when equipping the breach charge while crouching
• Fixed an issue where the hammer for the CB-01 Repeater changed position when sliding and aiming down sights

Badges

• Removed faulty tier indicator number from the Ruby Badge

Characters & Customization

• Fixed a lighting issue on the contestant cards
• Fixed a lighting issue with some of the hairstyles
• Reduced the frequency of Moolah charm mooing, with a lower chance of the sounds playing on eliminating an enemy
• Updated frontend size of riot shield, making it easier to preview skins on shields

Clubs

• Browse Clubs screen now hides full clubs by default
• Filter toggle added to include full clubs

Controller

• Fixed an issue where the controller rumble was turned on when spectating other players

Gadgets

Barricade

• Fixed an issue with the text looking wrong on certain skins

Game Modes

General

• Fixed an issue that would previously lead to incomplete information when inspecting your teams loadout at the start of the match

Cashout Modes

• Cashboxes that are hidden, due to being carried, are now briefly visible when a contestant spawns

Team Death Match

• Fixed a rare issue where the wrong loadout was selected in TDM when entering the round
• Fixed an issue where if backfilling into a Team Death Match game the user would not have all their loadout options available
• Fixed an issue that would make backfilling not work after the first round in team deathmatch and further tweaked the rules for backfilling
• Adjusted map borders for the OSPUZE and ENGIMO locations on Las Vegas Stadium so they no longer cut-out the jump pads on the street next to the spawns
• Fixed an issue on Kyoto where you could bump your head against invisible collision above the Hillside building

Practice Range

• Fixed an issue so that bots that got respawned by players now always show their correct animations
• Changed so that bots in the practice range stops firing against each other if the player is too far away from them
• Improved the responsiveness of bots reacting to player and dynamic behavior

Gameplay

• Added more thorough environmental kill tracking for winch claw, attributing kills when the pulled object pushes another player out of bounds
• Fixed an issue where gateways could be used to end up outside the Arenas boundaries on several locations in Team Death Match
• Fixed a rare issue where picking up an interactable item would cause the mouse to be blocked for the rest of the session
• Fixed an issue where picked up objects could sometimes drop inside geometry in an incorrect way
• Prevent items from being teleported infinitely when gateways are placed closely together in a confined space
• Fixed an issue with ammo showing up as 0/0 after respawning
• Fixed a rare issue where after an elimination the flow would not proceed beyond the kill-cam, the contestant can now respawn while stuck in kill-cam if it were to happen
• Fixed another issue that could cause sights and scopes to appear misaligned
• Fixed issue where the first person weapon would cover the screen after teleporting through the gateway while holding a carriable
• Fixed an issue where players could vault onto obstacles while holding interacts

Arenas

Bernal

• Fixed a staircase in the Hotels (ISEUL-T) area being slightly too steep, causing odd movement behavior when jumping into it in specific ways

Monaco

• General polish on collision, materials, and destruction
• Fixed an issue with missing polygons in attic floor in one of the Monaco House
• Removed tree from path that players often got stuck on
• Improved and fixed some minor issues with ground collision

Las Vegas Stadium

• General polish on collision, materials, and destruction
• Fixed an issue with decals on Las Vegas Stadium that covered jump pads

Kyoto

• Fixed an issue where paper walls in Kyoto would sometimes not get destroyed right away
• Fixed issue with missing holes in Kyoto Temple floor leading to basement
• Simplified some collision on Kyoto to reduce memory cost and increase performance

General

• Fixed an issue with streaked lines appearing on billboards based on customization
• Reworked billboards to be more cosmetic accurate and less error prone from visual artefacts

Performance & Stability

• Optimized GPU performance in high-load destruction scenarios
• Fixed some of our more common crashes

Private Matches & Spectator

• Added global kill-feed to spectator slots
• Fixed an issue with VOIP where players in a party could still hear each other through VOIP in a private match when placed in different teams
• Allow for opting out of game show events in private matches
• Fixed distant outlines not showing up in spectator mode
• Fixed an issue in the Lobby when too many players joined at the same time they could start duplicating
• Fixed the spectator keybind info not being accessible in Power Shift.
• Added Original Las Vegas as a selectable map in private matches

Rendering

• Fixed an issue where volumetric effects appeared black on lower quality settings

Settings

• Added support for NVIDIA DLSS 4, including multi-frame generation, and the latest SuperResolution models. See the updated DLSS related options in the Video settings.
• Added an option to choose between "CNN" and "Transformer" models for NVIDIA DLSS in the Video settings.
  • "CNN" is the model coming from DLSS 2 and 3 versions. It's a fast and high quality method.
  • "Transformer" is the new model introduced with DLSS 4. It's even higher quality, but more GPU intensive.

UI

• Fixed a rare issue where the scoreboard could be viewed in an incomplete state at the start of the match
• Fixed an issue where the reload times were incorrect for ARN-220 and CB-01 Repeater in the weapon overview screen
• Improved the frontend equipping functionality to ensure the correct parts are selected and equipped when purchasing a bundle
• Fixed an issue where you could scroll the text area of a player card
• Fixed issue where some in-game UI elements could get drawn on top of menus
• Rich presence status now correctly displays 'Editing Contestant' while in the Contestants menu
• Fixed an issue with the “My Outfits” tab where the inspect action would sometimes preview the incorrect customizations
• Fixed an issue with outfits created after you have reached the limit of allowed outfits
• When renaming outfits there's no longer a warning message when the name of the outfit is the same name as you started with
• The tiles in My Outfits feature a new hover icon for better visibility of the options menu
• The expressions tab no longer resets to the top category when re entering the screen from inspect/battlepass/store
• Removed Quit button from "game summary screen" and improved the skip/next flow in the end of round/reward flow
• Fixed badges getting cropped incorrectly in the reward card
• Fix player cards sometimes not updating after editing outfits

Weapons

Minigun

• Winding up the minigun no longer uses the secondary fire input action. Instead winding up the minigun uses the same keybind as aim down sight (Hold or Toggle)

SR-84

• The scope movement when aiming down the scope is now toned down to more accurateLy reflect where the shots will land when firing
• Improved the camera motion when crouchiNg or stopping after moving while aiming down the scope
• Fixed first person sniper scope visuals flicKering when going into crouch

Revolver

• Fixed an issue where the Horizon Hammer skin was slightly misaligned when aiming down sights
  
  

Security and Anti-cheat

• Improved messaging for forbidden tools
• Refined detection systems

This week on the World Tour, the spotlight, and the pressure, lands squarely on the top fraggers.

ALFA ACTA signs off their seasonal sponsorship with a new twist for Season 6: Head Hunter. During this special Game Show event, the player on each team with the highest number of eliminations will have a bounty of $5000 placed on their head. The better they play, the bigger the reward - and the bigger the target.

Every elimination they score boosts their bounty by $2,000. Take them out? Their bounty goes straight to your team. Let them live? They’ll cash in that full amount when the event ends at the 2-minute mark.

Stay sharp, move smart, and watch the scoreboard. This week, glory and greed go hand in hand.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

[h3]ARENAS:[/h3]
Monaco
Seoul
Skyway Stadium
Fortune Stadium