MENACE News

MENACE Demo Update #5 (v0.5.9)

[p]With the start of STEAM NEXT FEST the MENACE demo will get a substantial update. Most importantly, we added a second Pirate operation with 10 completely new and fresh missions to beat. Whenever starting a new game the operations will start alternating so you can just restart to get the operation you want.[/p][p]On top of that, we added a difficulty slider that allows to change the demo difficulty from Normal to Challenging to Expert. Each difficulty level will change the player Squaddie Numbers, available Supply Points and the enemy Supply Points. The full game will most likely have more sophisticated difficulty options. [/p][p]Finally, we added lots of smaller fixes, balancing changes and improvements based on your feedback and reports! [/p][p]Thanks again for all the support, feedback and ideas![/p][p][/p][h3]New[/h3]

[p]Added difficulty settings: Normal, Challenging and Expert.[/p]
[p]Added "Thwart Invasion" operation as an additional alternative operation with a pool of 10 new missions.[/p]
[p]Added new items, Light Walker, Autocannon and 40 more promotion points.[/p]

[h3]Improvements[/h3]

[p]Changed perk description font color for better readability.[/p]
[p]Showing more info in non-player unit tooltips.[/p]
[p]Showing icons for capture and defend objectives in unit HUDs and unit tooltips[/p]
[p]Showing status effects in unit tooltips.[/p]
[p]New icons for fleeing, wavering, suppressed, suppression, armor penetration.[/p]
[p]New icons for unit stats.[/p]

[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

[p]FIXED Removed line of sight blocker on factory connectors.[/p]
[p]FIXED Greifinger's unique perk used the wrong icon.[/p]
[p]FIXED various typos and descriptions.[/p]

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

[p]Rebalanced most pirate mission army points and reinforcement points.[/p]
[p]Changed Pirate Army lists to not spam Outcasts any more (makes the game harder).[/p]
[p]Made sure reinforcements stop spawning at certain round numbers.[/p]
[p]Reduced Rocket Truck Suppression from 60 down to 40.[/p]
[p]Rebalanced Pirates slightly, especially increased Discipline by 5.[/p]
[p]Buffed Long Barrel Tank Gun to be more accurate and do more damage.[/p]
[p]Increased Pipe Gun Armor Damage to 25. [/p]
[p]Reduced disposable AT supply costs to 10, increased damage to 120.[/p]
[p]Decreased range of R10A6 "CQB" K-PAC from 8 to 7.[/p]
[p]Reduced flamethrower supply costs from 25 to 15.[/p]
[p]Increased damage to armor durability of R14A2 ARC rifles.[/p]

[h3]Known Issues[/h3]

[p]Perk 'Run and Gun' doesn't update AP cost after shooting once.[/p]
[p]The UI for the offmap ability 'Unguided missile strike' is not visible when using the offmap ability 'Strafing Run' first.[/p]
[p]Combat Drugs don't refund all of the AP when used by a Suppressed unit.[/p]

[p][/p][h2]Engage, Explore, and Stay Informed[/h2][hr][/hr][p]Be sure to check out our tips and tricks thread for more tactics to help you out in-game.

There's also the The Beginner’s Guide explains how to manage squads, prepare missions, and handle combat. For more details, you can also visit the community wiki, and follow our how-to-play video.

You can find us on Discord, BlueSky, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Reddit for discussions, updates, and feedback. You can also subscribe to our monthly MENACE newsletter on our website — just scroll to the bottom of the page to sign up. [/p][p][dynamiclink][/dynamiclink][/p]

Grimdark XCOM-like Menace expands its demo and nerfs its tanky space pirates

I feel like I talk about nothing else but grimdark XCOM-likes these days. Whether it's official Warhammer games (as you can see in my Mechanicus 2 preview) or games with a healthy serving of 40k inspiration, it's a popular genre and setting mashup that clearly does well. Thankfully for games like Menace, players aren't tiring of the combo. But that won't stop developer Overhype Studios from keeping things fresh by delivering requested balance changes and more missions in a big update for its hit free demo.

Read the rest of the story...

Dev Diary #36: Demo Recap and Next Fest Update Plans

[p]These last two weeks have been among the most intense during the whole development of MENACE, with the Tactical Combat Demo release.

Let’s spend a moment to recap the past week!

[/p][h2]By the Numbers[/h2][hr][/hr][p]So far over 100,000 players downloaded the MENACE demo, sent in over 1,300 feedback and bug reports, and left over 600 reviews that amount to a Very Positive rating.

[/p][h2]Feedback and Discussions[/h2][hr][/hr][p]The feedback and response to the Demo is almost overwhelming, with our Discord and the forums being active day and night. We try our best to be present, reply, and engage with the community, but we also have to collect, filter, sort, and work through bug reports and feedback, which takes quite a while. On top of that, the game's normal development has to keep going at the same pace. We can highly recommend joining our Discord server to directly chat with us, leave feedback, and get in touch with other community members. Check it out here. We also have a thriving community on Reddit as well, r/MENACE.

[/p][h2]Patches[/h2][hr][/hr][p]We already patched the game five times in the past two weeks, addressing some of the most urgent and prominent issues, mainly focusing on bugs that stop the game from progressing. We also started to add some balancing changes, for example, reduced the armor and hitpoints of the dreaded pirate flame truck. You can read up on the changelogs here: [/p]

[h2]Biggest Topics[/h2][hr][/hr][h3]Bugs[/h3][p] The game has been running surprisingly well for many players, and total game crashes are rarer than we expected. Still, with a massive influx of testers, lots of edge cases and rare issues pop up. Our priority is now on fixing the most severe issues as quickly as possible.

[/p][h3]Lines of Sight[/h3][p] The LoS system in the game is intentionally very simplistic and abstract. This clashes with the high fidelity of the models and graphics that make it look a lot more complex than the underlying engine actually is. This creates a mismatch between how LoS works and how players expect it to work. Unfortunately, there is no quick fix for this, but we have making the LoS more intuitive and match expectations better high on our list!

[/p][h3]Balancing[/h3][p] Many players had a hard time with the defense missions in the game. While they are still hard, and supposed to be, we increased the time to capture and also made pinned units not captured in one of this week's patches.

[/p][h3]Lack of Information[/h3][p] Many players noted a lack of info, especially in enemy tooltips. This can make it hard to play the game effectively when you don't know what weapons an enemy unit carries, for example. We do have a tooltip rework and expansion in the works to give players the info they need to be more effective on the battlefield. This also extends beyond the enemy tooltips and will be addressed by us.

[/p][h3]UI/UX[/h3][p]With a game as complex as MENACE, with its different systems and interconnected mechanics, creating an easy-to-use, informative UI that looks good and doesn't overwhelm players with size and numbers is very hard. We did collect lots of valuable feedback this week about how to improve it, and we will start working through it.

[/p][h2]Next Fest Update – New Operation![/h2][hr][/hr][p]With Next Fest starting on Monday, we are also updating the game with an entirely new Pirate “Thwart Invasion” Operation with 10 all-new missions and loads of new equipment to experiment with, from light walkers and autocannons to disposable AT launchers. This should give you a fresh taste of MENACE and provide even more amazing feedback to help shape development.

We know that MENACE challenges the established rules of many turn-based tactics games, which is bound to create a sometimes painful learning experience.

We want to thank all players who still gave it a chance and took the time and effort to get into the game's unique way of depicting modern firearms-based combat. We are doing our best to communicate the game's design better and make it easier to get into it. It will be worthwhile to come back regularly and check for improvements!

[/p][h2]Engage, Explore, and Stay Informed[/h2][hr][/hr][p]You can find us on Discord, BlueSky, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Reddit for discussions, updates, and feedback. You can also subscribe to our monthly MENACE newsletter on our website — just scroll to the bottom of the page to sign up.[/p]

MENACE Demo Update #4 (v0.5.8)

[p]Patch 4 for the MENACE demo is now live.[/p][p]Make sure to leave a review for the demo and join our Discord server or forums to connect with fellow players, leave feedback, and share the most powerful tactics.[/p][p][/p][h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

[p]Applied Unity engine fix to close security vulnerability[/p]
[p]FIXED Darby using Rewa's voicelines to respond to Greifinger[/p]
[p]FIXED Units teleporting to a random tile caused by moving them directly from inside a vehicle to a tower or vice-versa[/p]
[p]FIXED Units automatically ending their turn when a player vehicle was on fire[/p]
[p]FIXED Skill 'Plow Through' freezing the game when the destination tile was covered in fog of war[/p]
[p]FIXED Damage reducing accessories (e.g. ERA) causing the game to freeze[/p]
[p]FIXED various typos and descriptions[/p]

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

[p]Changed units with 'Wavering' morale no longer have to act last in a round[/p]
[p]Reduced Autocannon ammo to 8[/p]

[h3]Improvements[/h3]

[p]Reduced Arc AR icon size[/p]
[p]Better 'Encumbered' icon[/p]

[p]Slightly lowered Auto Laser volume[/p]

[p]Towers can now be entered and exited via all directions[/p]

[p]Vehicle damage effects are now shown in the armory and mission prep UI[/p]
[p]Renamed vehicle damage effects 'Weapons Damaged/Destroyed' to 'Weapon System Damaged/Destroyed'[/p]
[p]Fire defects on vehicles are now removed at the end of mission[/p]
[p]Perk 'Scavenger' will now spawn the ammo box on an adjacent tile if the original tile is blocked[/p]

[h3]Known Issues[/h3]

[p]Perk 'Run and Gun' doesn't update AP cost after shooting once[/p]
[p]The UI for the offmap ability 'Unguided missile strike' is not visible when using the offmap ability 'Strafing Run' first[/p]
[p]Combat Drugs don't refund all of the AP when used by a Suppressed unit[/p]

MENACE Demo Update #3 (v0.5.7)

[p]Patch 3 for the MENACE demo is now live.[/p][p]Make sure to leave a review for the demo and join our Discord server or forums to connect with fellow players, leave feedback, and share the most powerful tactics.[/p][p][/p][h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

[p]FIXED Game freezing when a unit gets stuck after destroying a transport vehicle[/p]
[p]FIXED Game freezing when drone couldn't reach its destination[/p]
[p]FIXED Game freezing after destroying half cover[/p]
[p]FIXED Bloom Quality Setting was displayed twice[/p]
[p]FIXED Some SMG skills have the AoE tag and thus interacting with the perk 'Fragmentation'[/p]
[p]FIXED Various Typos[/p]
[p]The game now displays a notification if antivirus software prevents writing save files or player settings[/p]

[h3]Improvements[/h3]

[p]Changed ARC Assault Rifle icon to better match tier 1 power level[/p]
[p]Tweaked line of sight settings for some bigger buildings[/p]
[p]Some smaller UI adjustments[/p]

[h3]Known Issues[/h3]

[p]Perk 'Run and Gun' doesn't update AP cost after shooting once
[/p]

[h2]Engage, Explore, and Stay Informed[/h2][hr][/hr][p]Be sure to check out our tips and tricks thread for more tactics to help you out in-game.

There's also the The Beginner’s Guide explains how to manage squads, prepare missions, and handle combat. For more details, you can also visit the community wiki, and follow our how-to-play video.

You can find us on Discord, BlueSky, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Reddit for discussions, updates, and feedback. You can also subscribe to our monthly MENACE newsletter on our website — just scroll to the bottom of the page to sign up. [/p][p][dynamiclink][/dynamiclink][/p]