Skillshot City News

This version completely reworks the skill tree and the progression system. Kill coins are the main way to unlock content in the game, but they are now only used to unlock skills. This means that all other content that was previously unlocked via coins is now free. All players now have access to every weapon, chemical, and vehicle in the game.

Important: Because of this drastic change, I have refunded everyone's kill coins. This way no one will have wasted their coins unlocking weapons which are now given for free. With all your coins refunded, you can start unlocking some of the new skills in the new skill tree!




The skills have been rearranged into a groovy new skill tree. This tree not only looks cooler than the old hex grid, but is far more flexible. If you see someone use a certain skill in-game, you are only a few steps away from unlocking it. This is far nicer than the old system, where you simply had to grind through the hex grid until you reached a certain skill. Players now get to decide what skill to get next, and whether they should focus more on damage, healing, or utility. A well diversified selection of skills gives you more versatility in the battle field!


Wanna play with your favorite skill? Well now you can! Up the top of the skills page is a new Skill Builds feature. This lets players force skills appear at specific moments in the skill draft. For example, you can guarantee that the Self Repair skill will show up when you hit level 9 in-game. If you own the Supporter's Edition DLC you can configure a skill to show up at level 3 and level 6 as well.




You may notice in the screenshot above some little badges on the skills. These are skill medallions. They are purely cosmetic, but you can rank them up by completing skill specific challenges. For example, you need to get 5 Plasma Ball kills to rank Plasma up to level 2. When you do your main account will gain experience, and your badge will improve in appearance. These badges go all the way up to level 20 and are visible for other players to see at the end of each match. A great way to show off your skills.


- ILLICIT INCOME: Increases the cash and health you gain from killing enemies. This increases further based on your wanted level. By default, player kills give +50 health.

- MANIC MECHANIC: Allows you to shoot out the window of your car while driving (with worse accuracy). Also continuously restores the health of the vehicle and all passengers inside it.

- CHEMICAL BOOST: Makes you jump higher when standing in your chemicals. Also makes your chemicals restore charges faster.

- CLUSTER BOMB: Spawns grenades that spin around you. These grenades will be randomly tossed at nearby enemies over time. If you have Skill Shot charges you will throw 1 extra grenade per charge, and then lose a charge.

- SOUL DROP: Whenever you fall onto the ground near an enemy you will reduce their rate of fire. Enemies killed in this state will drop an extra heart piece on death.

- TOXIC BLOOD: Whenever you kill an enemy they will leave a pool of toxic blood on the ground. Any enemies who step in this will become poisoned and take damage over time.




Cosmetics used to be unlocked with kill coins. Now they are given to players for free, but based on your player level. Every 5 levels a new cosmetic will be unlocked. This finally gives your account level a purpose. It actually does something now. It makes you look pretty.

There are also new cosmetics. There are 7 head types to choose from. You can stick with the original Dragonball Z style hair, or go for something a little less extreme. Eventually you'll unlock a police helmet and an assassin's hood. There are other cosmetics too. The Supporter's Medallion now changes in appearance as you level up, glowing gold once you reach level 100.




Geneshift now has helicopters! Why? Because they're damn cool that's why. They also create a much needed "point of interest" in the map. They shoot out free bits of loot every few seconds and slowly travel across the map. This creates a natural hot-zone that players flock to. Free loot and a guaranteed place to get some kills. Zombies are coded to spawn next to these helicopters to further increase the action.


Rare loot crates now fall into these things called Loot Spawners. A loot spawner will sit on the ground and display a 60 second countdown. When the timer hits 0, a rare loot crate will fall into it. Destroy the crate and you'll get +3 score, a heart fragment, and some high value loot. A tier2 weapon, chemical, perk, or phase shift. Half of these loot spawners are hidden on rooftops only accessible via parkour puzzlery. The other half are out in the open, making high stakes zones to fight over.




The scoring system has been reworked to place a much larger emphasis on survival. Specifically making it to the final 6. Of course winning the entire round gives more points, but making it to the final 6 is now a well-rewarded achievement. You'll get +10 score once you hit the final 6, plus your name will display in a mini-leaderboard above the mini-map showing all the remaining survivors.




To heighten the stakes of being in the final 6, there is a cool new feature - zombie betting. When zombies walk into the red zone they now become spectators. They cannot shoot or be shot at. But they can watch and they can also click on a survivor to place a bet that that player will win. If they guess correctly they will receive a cash reward!


A simple change but a very important one - zombies no longer lose their hearts fragments on death. This means that to resurrect you no longer need to kill 4 players in a row without dying. This was far too difficult for new players and needelessly frustrating. Now you can simply collect heart pieces at your own pace and death isn't as punishing. Every second player you kill drops a heart piece, and there are plenty of zombies at the helicopters. So get to the choppa to farm hearts quick!




There's so much crime in Geneshift the the cops have gotten a little lenient. It is now much easier to escape the cops and lose your wanted level. All you need to do is leave the blue circle. You no longer need to wait an extra 30s for the timer to fade away. Also, you will only get a wanted level when you KILL a cop, not when one of your stray bullets hits one. The cop AI has also been coded to go easier on players who are currently fighting other players, simply taking cover and waiting till the fight is over.




A few weeks also went towards just making the game FEEL better. Netcode has been recoded to be as responsive and steady as possible. The lighting engine got reworked with more realistic and softer shadows. Shaders now give dynamic contrast and more overall colour. Bullets are easier to see and have more OOPH when hitting enemies. A lot of QoL features were added to the HUD to help new players as well. You can now see vendors in the minimap. Weapons will display their tier next to their name, and you can toggle the zoom of the minimap.



- Removed fall damage from the game.

- Survivors now receive a passive income of $600 per minute. Zombies do not get this.

- Tweaked the cop spawning algorithm to no longer spawn cops on you when you're mid-combat against players.

- Improvements to pathfinding and AI. Cops are smarter at taking cover and will do so to avoid overwhelming you in big fights.

- Players now display their level above their heads, and the amount of cash and XP you get for a kill scales up based on their player level

- There is a now a $1000 bounty for killing a player who has gotten a quad kill (4 kills in a row without dying).

- The scoring in BR is now a first to 100 instead of 50, and you get a lot more score from supply drops, missions and making it to the final 6 survivors. More interesting objectives.

- In PvP modes zombies no longer give +1 score. They are treated like cops and civs and give score every 4th kill.

- Big reworks to various areas of the map, improving both the gameplay and the graphics. Other improvements to graphics and bullet feedback to make the game just FEEL better.

- A big focus on netcode stability, which should minimise warpiness while increasing responsiveness.

- Removed the Genetic Heart and replaced it with a new supply drop that pops out 6 heart fragments.

- Supply crates now burst loot out into a larger area, up to 12m in all directions. This makes it harder to shift through and steal all the loot at once.

- At the end of a round you can hover over other people's names to see their score breakdown and what skills/weapons they used.

- Superweapons have 2x as much reserve ammo in them, but ammo cost has doubled ($2000 instead of $1000 to fully refill).

- Vendors are now shown on the minimap, as are the new loot spawners. Your allies are shown more clearly when off the edge of the map.

- Zombies are now shown in purple instead of yellow (to avoid confusion with the yellow buy zones on the minimap).

- The circle of death is now green instead of yellow. Looks better and matches the thematic "toxic goo" colour in the map.

- Added an option in the menu and a new hotkey to toggle the minimap zoom. Default is Z. Useful for escaping the cops.

- Reworked the default controls for gamepad.

- Improved vertical auto-aim by making it prioritise whoever is closest to your crosshair.

- In the buy menu it now says the tier after the weapon name, like MP5 (TIER 2). Helping new players upgrade their guns properly.

- Reworked a bunch of the civilian missions as well as the daily challenges. Making sure everything is fun and achieveable.

- Removed the critical damage after shifting, and put this into a skill instead (called Critical Shifting).

- Synthetic Shop now ensures discounts on any chems that appear, and makes it more likely to provide chemical buy options.

- The word "active" now shows in hot pink when you see it in the skill draft.

- Changed the colour of bullets to make them easier to see against the map.

- Countless bug and balance fixes.

- Invisibility now increases your move speed by +10/20/30/40%, in addition to increasing the invis duration.

- Spike Trap has been given a new feature. After 5s, instead of the spikes expring, they will slide back along the ground towards you, damaging enemies they touch.

- Shockwave no longer dispels enemies, but instead slows them to 70/65/60/50% speed.

- Frenzy ROF is now 120/125/130/140% but the cooldown is now 20/18/16/14s.

- Self Repair cooldown is now 15s instead of 10s, but healing amount has been buffed to 20/35/50/70hp.

- The damage of Force Field now increases the longer you keep them active, instead of being 50% and then suddenly 100% if exploded in the final second.

- Radiate now deals an initial burst of damage the moment it hits the ground, dealing an instant 10/15/20/30hp.

- Plasma Ball speed is now fixed at 54 instead of 50/52/54/58.

- Energize bullet speed and range are both now 115/120/125/135%, whereas before bullet speed was 120/130/140/160% and range was 110/115/120/130%.

- Black Hole renamed to Energy Vortex and the lifedrain is now 4/6/8/10 instead of 3/4/5/7.

- Added vertical auto aim on Parasites and Venom.

This version focuses on making the core gameplay loop as smooth and fun as possible. The biggest change is to shifts. I always found it frustrating to run out of shifts mid-combat. You want to dodge an incoming bazooka shot only to hear a "brrrrr" error noise and die instead. Well no more! Players can now spam shift as much as they like. The game will never deny your movement. This helps you escape, chase, jump and dodge, and really makes the game live up to the name GeneSHIFT.

To prevent players from just spamming shift non-stop we each have 3 shift charges. If you have a charge available and shift, you'll deal bonus critical damage. But if you try shift without any charges remaining you will lose health instead. You can still move, but it'll cost you. You'll lose 10hp every time you shift while empty. This creates interesting tactical decisions. It's still a wise move to dodge an incoming bazooka shot, but not something you want to spam in combat.




Bazookas now firing homing missiles that seek towards you. This is fun because the bazooka is now the weapon of choice for cops. 75% of cops will fire a bazooka at you, and I've tweaked the speed to be juuuust right. Fast enough to pose a threat, but slow enough to dodge if you shift at the perfect moment (and you can always shift now!).




Survival mode also got plenty of polish this version. There are now only 2 difficulty levels, Standard and Hardcore, and hardcore mode is hard indeed! A lot of playtesting was done to smooth out the difficulty curve, especially in co-op mode. In hardcore lives are rare, bots are more accurate, and you have to survive a bonus 5th round where zombies will swarm you in increasing intensity right up till the final showdown. At the end of each round a special civilian vendor will appear giving you a choice of 3 bonus perks as well. You'll need to choose wisely to survive the onslaught at the end of the match!




Another big focus was making the game easier for new players. I got my gf to try the game and she was.. confused, to say the least. The tutorial now has far better pacing, by letting new players choose when they're ready to proceed instead of automatically throwing them into the next lesson. The HUD now indicates useful information like the time remaining on your wanted level and the number of shifts you have remaining (shown as triangles on your crosshair).




Players hitboxes are smaller so we can now hide properly behind cover. The skill drafting algorithm is now pseudorandom to ensure you see all skill equally over the last few games. Cops drop more loot, cash, score and XP. Vendors won't automatically shoot you if a stray bullet hits them. Blast Cannon has been reworked into a super shotgun, and can now be charged up over 1s to deal 2x damage. Black Hole now has lifesteal, and can be used to farm health off clusters of civilians. Plenty more balance and bug fixes are mentioned in the changelog below!





--- BIGGEST CHANGES ---

- Players can shift even once they run out of charges. Your movement is never denied. However if you shift without charges you will lose 5, then 10, then 15hp per shift.

- There are now only 2 difficulty levels across the entire game. Standard and Hardcore. This affects the campaign, survival and in pvp mode. Hardcore mode is now extra hard.


--- SURVIVAL CHANGES ---

- You progress through wanted levels 50% faster in hardcore mode (applies to both survival and pvp)

- You start with only 1 bonus life instead of 4 in hardcore mode, and quarter-hearts drop every 3 instead of every 2 kills.

- You no longer get +10 placement score per round in survival

- Civ missions now give +5 score instead of +3 score in survival mode

- Hardcore survival mode now has 5 rounds, and in the 5th round you will be swarmed by zombies

- If you become a zombie in coop survival mode you can no longer collect hearts from kills. The only way to rez is to capture a genetic heart (or wait till next round).

- Coop zombies in survival are no longer killed off at 0:00, but they cannot respawn after 0:00

- Zombie humans can now fire guns inside the red zone in survival mode (in coop)

- Fixed a bug where the entire server of bots would swarm the heart in survival mode

- The amount of cash and xp earned from kills now increases with the number of players in coop survival mode. 200/300/400/500 cash and 20/30/40/50xp

- The $1000 assassination bounty is now awarded to all players in coop survival mode, to prevent competing over it

- Tweaked the AI to make them spread out far more evenly across the map, instead of clustering in one area

- The price of blood bags increases by $1000 everytime you buy one.

- Reduced max hp in survival to 150. Reduced the rate that you find health kits to compensate

- The amount of XP you get for selling a life with a skill syringe now scales up based on your level. Instead of being a flat +300xp it is now 300 + Levelx20


--- GENERAL CHANGES ---

- Increased the amount of blood when shooting people.

- Made shifts look cooler. The crosshair now shows small triangles to indicate how many shifts you have left.

- Played a handy noise so you know when your shifts come back online.

- Critical bullets and critical damage are now shown in purple

- Changed the demo restrictions for free accounts and survival runs. Free accounts can now play multiple times per day, but are limited to just the first round.

- Added an option to disable music in pvp modes

- Holding tab now displays the number of rounds, game mode, and difficulty of the server

- The camera now shakes when you crash your car into a wall

- Added a handy QoL feature where if you try to cast a skill and it's on cooldown, the timer will flash briefly in your target

- Changed the colours of various bullets so that each weapon is easily distinguishable.

- Enemy bullets are now sped up slightly on the client to account for the clients ping, showing more accurately where they are on the server and allowing players to dodge

- You can now see how many lives your allies have above their health bar

- Got my gf to playtest the tutorial and realised that it's no where near nooby proofed enough

- Simplified the tutorial and made it far less overwhelming (AI won't shoot at you mid tutorial item)

- Plenty of bug fixes


--- GAMEPLAY CHANGES ---

- Updated the megamap with @GelatinOverlord's amazing map changes. Thanks man!

- Tweaked the skill drafting algorithm to prioritize showing skills that you haven't seen in the last few games or so

- Setting a civ car on fire so the dude runs out works better, because the fire automatically goes out when the civ ejects

- Reduced bullet speeds of regular weapons slightly

- Max recoil is now 10 instead of 15 degrees on all guns

- Shifts now take 3.5s to recharge instead of 4s. Same for the passive regen.

- The cooldown time between shifts is now 0.35s instead of 0.6s

- Critical damage is now applied for 0.8s after you start shifting, instead of 0.5s after you finish shifting

- Wanted levels are now removed when a BR round is finished

- When fleeing the cops, a timer now shows the exact number of seconds remaining

- Damage numbers now show up when you hit vehicles

- Buy menus now have 2 ammo options, allowing you to buy ammo for both your guns

- Player hitboxes are slightly smaller, making it easier to hide behind 2x2x2m boxes

- There are once again 3 supply/heart drops per round, landing at 5:00, 3:00, and 1:00

- You can now see civ vendors and missions givers as you fall from the sky

- The leveling curve is a tad slower once you go above level 20

- The cost of perks from vendors now increases by $2000 whenever you buy one. So it goes $4000, then $6000, then $8000, etc.

- Reduced the chance of getting an upgraded silver/gold perk in PvP modes by 50%

- Purple lootboxes can now be shared by allies (but fewer of them spawn)

- Cops now give $150 and 15xp instead of $100 and 10xp. They also ocassionally drop ammo.

- You now get +1 score for every 2nd cop you kill instead of every 5th. You get +1 score for every 4th civ instead of every 5th.

- Vendors will only get pissed off once they get below 75% health


--- CHEMICAL CHANGES ---

- Fission Mine damage is now 60hp instead of 80hp and range is slightly reduced

- Sonar cells reveal radius is 60m instead of 40m

- Synthetic Shop now costs $5000 instead of $3000

- Supply Beacon now passively gives +20% cash instead of +10% cash, but the crate won't always drop super high value items like perks/chems/guns etc

- Laser Tripwire duration is now 30s instead of 20s, and passively it also slightly reduces the spread on shotguns

- Each Damage stimulant also increases the max critical damage by +10% (default is +50%, so as you stack them you can get up to +60/70/80/90%)

- Damage stimulant kills only increase by 1% per kill and don't work against civilians. They can still be stacked up to +4% per kill if you bought 4 of them


--- SKILL CHANGES ---

- Made plasma ball no longer disable your weapons. Cooldown is now a flat 10s at all levels.

- Plasma Ball speed is now flattened to 50/52/54/56 instead of 45/50/55/60

- Plasma explosion graphic looks crisper and cooler, making it easier to see the explosion radius

- Phase Drifting now has a flat 8s cooldown for all levels.

- Reduced venom range from 100 to 60

- Mirror image has a flat cooldown of 8s per level instead of 10/8/6/4s

- Increased Frenzy buff radius from 7m to 10m

- Shockwave freezes bullets for 2s instead of 1s

- Black Hole now also has lifesteal. It will steal 3/4/5/7 hp/s from each enemy inside the blackhole, simultaneously dealing damage and restoring health to the owner

- Invisibility now shows a ring around you indicating the reveal radius.

- Xray vision no longer reveals invisible players beyond the usual reveal radius.

- Force Fields now explode if you remove all their health, instead of just fading away


--- WEAPON CHANGES ---

- Bazookas are now homing missiles with seeking.

- Increased bazooka damage from 40 to 50

- Flaregun now costs $3000 instead of $1000 and isn't spammed all over the map

- The movement speed buffs on guns is now +15/30/45% instead of +20/40/60%, and only appears in survival mode

- Deagle rpm is now 270 instead of 240

- Minigun damage is now 15hp instead of 16hp.

- Movement slow while firing machine guns has improved, going from 50% to 70%

- Nailgun has very slightly faster move speed, bullet speed, and accuracy

- Blast Cannon has been reworked. It no longer lobs in the air. Instead it behaves more like an M3, but with the ability to charge up. If you hold it for 1s then it will do double damage, 100hp instead of 50hp. The bullets are still explosive and you can still use it to blast up walls.

- Superweapons now cost $12000 instead of $15000

- SPAS clipsize is now 8 instead of 10

- SPAS damage goes from 56 to 50

- MP5 now has 11 clips instead of 10

- MP5 damage is now 7.5 instead of 8.0

- Flashbang no longer deal self damage

- UZI now suffers absolutely zero movement slowdown, either while firing or moving generally. Slight buff to recoil too.

- USP spread goes from 0.2 to 3.0, and bullet speed from 80 to 70

- M3 damage goes from 64 to 70

- AK47 bullet speed goes from 100 to 120, and bullet range goes from 50 to 55

- M249 damage is now 11 instead of 10, and total ammo is 480 instead of 300

- M60 magazine size is now 40 instead of 50, and damage is now 12 instead of 11

This version taps into that fun feeling of discovery and exploration in GTA. You find a random staircase, climb onto a rooftop and discover a cool item as a reward for your efforts. Geneshift now does this with the addition of rare loot crates. These boxes glow in purple and contain extra valuable items such as superweapons, chemicals, $5000 perks, life fragments, etc.

The megamap has been updated with over 50 spawn points where these rare loot crates might spawn. Each location has been designed as a puzzle, which requires some form of parkour to get to. In the screenshot below you can see a rare loot crate has spawned in a new balcony area. This balcony is too high up to access via normal jumping, and requires you to parkour your way up there, as shown with the arrows below.

The idea with these puzzles is to provide players a change of pace from the fast-paced combat of Geneshift. They also make exploration more fun, and get you using your brain to solve puzzles in completely different ways.




Everytime you shift there is now a brief window of time where your gun will fire critical bullets. You see an enemy, shift towards him, and then have 0.5s to fire off a few rounds with extra damage. This window of time is small, so you better make sure those critical bullets hit!

Critical bullets deal +20% damage, which can be increased to +50% damage via looting ammo kits. Previously, critical bullets played a fairly small role in the game as they were only available as the final bullets in your magazine. But now they're relevant to every single fight as long as you have the quick aim and timing to use them effectively.



+50% damage is a lot! It can easily decide the winner of a fight. A well timed shift might give you the extra damage needed to secure the kill. But you might instead choose to save your shift so you can escape to safety at the last minute. By giving shifts both an offensive and defensive use, shifts are far more interesting to use.

To offset this huge buff, shifts now regenerate a lot slower (once every 4 seconds). We're also capped at only max 3 shifts at a time - so use them wisely! It is possible to bring that max up to 5 shifts, but only if you find them in the purple rare crates mentioned above. Basically shifts are now a lot more powerful than before, but a lot rarer too - so use them wisely!




A big issue with survival mode was how to cater to players of different skill levels. Generally it was too hard for newbies and far too easy for veterans. This has been solved with a whole new economy around lives.

For starters, bots are a lot harder. More accurate, bigger guns, more skills, etc. There is also a minimum number of bots you must "assassinate" each round, to force players to take action and not hide on a rooftop somewhere. You're now going to be in a lot of tough fights, and are going to lose lives in the process. This keeps things far more engaging for skillful players.



To offset this increased difficulty there are new ways to gain back these lives. You can now buy them for $3000 at vendors, and you can find them in the new purple loot crates. Lives are now your main "resource" in the game, and you'll need to explore, farm cops, get sick combo kills to earn enough cash to buy the lives necessary to survive.

There are additional incentives for skillful players to play their very best as well. If you manage to survive a round without losing a single life, a free supply drop will land next to you which gives bonus score and goodies. You can also SELL your lives for extra XP if you're feeling risky and don't think you'll die anyway.




Survival also has a new zombie swarm stage that happens at the end of each round. After you kill all the players, zombies will respawn and swarm you with their meaty fists. This can be quite challenging, but really rewards skillful usage of area of effect skills and chemicals, because the combo-kill potential is insane.





--- BIGGEST CHANGES ---

- For a brief 0.5s after shifting, your gun will fire critical bullets. This gives shifts a new offensive usage and makes them worth saving up for tough encounters.

- Added over 50 secret loot areas to the megamap. These loot areas will occassionally spawn a RARE crate with expensive loot. However, they are often hidden or require you to figure out a jumping puzzle to get them.

- If you avoid losing a life within a survival round, a bonus supply drop will land next to you at the end of the round

- Survival mode is quite a bit harder, but you can now buy extra lives from vendors for $3000

- In survival mode you now have the ability to SELL lives from vendors for 300xp per heart

- Bots no longer respawn as zombies in survival mode, but instead will spawn as a special "zombie swarm" at the end of each round


--- OTHER CHANGES ---

- Rare loot crates are hidden in hard to reach places and will drop one of the following:
A) 2 quarter hearts
B) A random perk
C) $2000 in cash
D) 10 xp vials
E) A chemical
F) A tier 2 weapon
G) A crate full of 4x nades

- Survival mode now requires you to assassinate 8/12/16/20 targets each round (randomly chosen enemy players)

- These targets show with a little crosshair above their healthbar, and will not be attacked by other bots - ensuring you MUST fight and not camp till the final showdown

- One of these targets will be a primary target with an arrow pointing towards him. Killing this guy gives $1000 bonus bounty

- Supply Drops now give +10 score instead of +5 score in survival mode

- At the end of each survival round you will gain bonus cash based on how many lives you lost

- Nades now cost $500 instead of $300, and lob slightly faster in the air

- Capped the amount of money from a kill combo at $2000 per kill (won't affect civs at all, but prevents broken amounts of cash from player kills)

- Fixed a bunch of bugs with AI

- Superweapons now cost $15000 instead of $10000

- Shifts are now considered a rare loot type, only showing in the special purple loot boxes

- Max number of shifts is now 5 instead of 8

- Warp Fields now passively increase shift regen rate by 50% each, instead of giving +2 max shifts

- Cooldown time between shifts is now 0.65s instead of 1.0s

- Shifts take 4.0s to regen instead of 3.0s

- Survival mode lets you collect up to 8 lives instead of 5, and you start with 4 instead of 3

- Civ vendors now have 300hp instead of 500hp

- Civs no longer spawn in survival once the timer hits 0, to prevent infinite civ farming

- Changed the sound effect and reduced the duration of losing a life

- In survival mode it is now possible to get quarter hearts from looting crates

- The option to pay off cop bounty is now in a dedicated 6th slot in the buy menu, and doesn't replace the 5th slot

- Losing a life in survival mode no longer removes your unfinished life quarters

- Some cool map changes made by player GelatinOverlord, mostly own the bottom right of the map, adding some much needed gameplay and graphical improvements. Thanks!

- Bots in coop survival mode squad together tighter, making them harder to take down

- Survival bot hitpoints increases by +25 each round

- Nerfed BT slowdown to 25/20/15/10%

- Nerfed MP5 recoil a touch

- You now lose 2 score whenever you die in survival

- Sonar Cells reveal range is now 40m isntead of 30m

- Fixed a bug where bots wouldn't look at mirror image

- Xray vision now reveals loot crates

- Shifts now look cooler, leaving a little blue trail behind them

- Deagle damage is now 20 instead of 17, with a rpm of 240 instead of 300

- All guns now start at +20% critical damage instead of +50%, and go up to +50% instead of +100%. This is to offset the increased frequency you can use them now via shifting.

- Plenty of bug fixes


And a happy new year!

Have fun!
bencelot

For a "GTA-inspired" game it sure took a long time to add cops - but they are finally here!

We have cops, cop cars, special forces and more. If a cop sees you commit a crime your wanted level will raise - with an increasingly larger force trying to take you down. Cops add plenty of flavor and action to the game, with emergent car chases, vehicle explosions, chain reactions and new cop-centric missions.

Cops provide a whole new level of risk/reward decision making to PvP games. You can intentionally farm waves of cops for bonus loot - but you might not survive. If you want to lose the cops you have two choices. Pay a bounty at a vendor, or escape the blue circle on your minimap. If you go for the later you better bring a car, because the cops will chase you down, sirens blaring.




PvE is more exciting not only with the cops but also with the addition of kill combos. If you kill two enemies in a row you'll get a double kill which pays out 2x XP and cash. Triple kills give 3x, Quad kills 4x, and Multikills 5x. You need to kill within 2.0s to maintain your combo, and while multikills are rare, they feel VERY satisfying.

This change makes cop and civilian combat far more interesting. Sure you could just fire a bazooka at a cop car. But if you wait a moment you can line it up to kill a nearby civilian as well, getting 2x the reward. This quick decision makes every civilian or cop and opportunity to test your skills and get rewarded for it.

As you level up in-game your weapons and skills get stronger, which makes it easier to pull off these combos. This creates a sort of farming engine, where the stronger you become the faster you can farm, similar to farming creeps in MOBAs. All the skills have been given bonus damage modifiers against civilians, and civilian combos brings a whole new way to use the existing skills in the game.




This version places a large emphasis on PvE combat in preparation for the upcoming roguelite mode. Scoring has been reworked to give points for killing cops and civilians, as well as completing missions. If you want to play GTA and fight an army of cops with a minigun you can do so - and get score for it. This creates new paths to victory and viable new playstyles.

A new scoretab shows when you hold TAB which shows you exactly what your score is, how it was calculated, and what else you can do to maximise it. This should help new players understand how to win the game.




There's also a focus on sandboxy, explosive GTA mayhem. There are a lot more civilians in the map, and more cars driving around as well, making the city feel far more alive. This version really redefines the role of cars in the game as well - to go BOOM! Cop cars will chase you but their hitpoints are low. A well placed bazooka will set off chain reactions of explosions as the cop cars detonate.



I've reworked the lighting engine to not only run faster but look better too. The cop sirens look pretty great as they zoom along, reflecting off the fog and shiny metal objects. Bullets are cleaner, muzzle flashes brighter, and explosions bigger. Turn on high GFX mode and enjoy!




There are plenty of other neat changes. Health upgrades no longer reset when you die, Smoke Bomb has been reworked to turn you invisible, QoL improvements, a new arrow in the HUD directs you towards the nearest civilian mission, better vehicle handling, and the usual balancing and bug fixing. Read the changelog below for the full list!



--- BIGGEST CHANGES ---

- Police now exist in the game. They will patrol the streets on foot or in a car, and if you commit a crime nearby they will start hunting you

- Added a new kill combo system that makes civilian kills more fun. If you get kills within 2.0s of eachother you'll gain a combo multiplier and earn more cash and XP.

- Completely reworked scoring. It's still first to 50 points, but you can now get score for killing civilians, cops, and doing missions. Much more of a PvE focus.

- Significant peformance optimisation as well as beautiful graphical improvements made to dynamic lighting (try High GFX!)


--- POLICE MECHANICS ---

- Wanted levels go up when you kill cops. Wanted 1 = fists, wanted 2 = pistols, wanted 3 = primary weapons, wanted 4 = special forces, wanted 5 = civilians riot.

- To lose your wanted level you must escape the blue circle on the minimap then hide for 30s. If you damage a cop the timer will reset.

- You can also lose your wanted level by paying a bounty at civilian vendors. It costs $500 per wanted level.

- On wanted level 4 cops will start spawning as "special forces" types and be able to cast skills. Each wave of cops will cast a randomised skill (a wave of Plasma users for example)


--- OTHER GAMEPLAY CHANGES ---

- Max hitpoints, critical bullets and phase shifts no longer reset when you die. They last the entire match.

- Health kits now give an instant +30hp in addition to +5 max hp.

- Vendors are more likely to sell T2 and T3 guns than T1 guns.

- Removed all the collision tiles in the map, meaning you can jump anywhere.

- Twice as many vehicles and civilians spawn in the map, making it feel more alive.

- An arrow now points you towards the nearest civilian mission giver.

- Sped up the leveling curve so you get to spend more skill points.

- Added a new option to automatically open the vendor buy menu when you stand next to him (default on)

- Kills give +1 score instead of +2 score.

- You get +1 score for every 5 civs/cops that you kill.

- A round win now gives +10 score instead of +20.

- Supply drops now give +5 score instead of +10.

- Survival/Placement gives +1 score instead of +2 score on 10/9/8/7/6/5/4/3/2/1 players remaining.

- Civ missions now give +3 score instead of +2.

- Added a new scorecard that shows your score progress when you hold TAB.

- Civ missions now give either a random perk OR they give +$2000 and +100xp.

- Some civilian missions have been reworked to now focus on cops instead. For example knifing 4 cops, or killing cops with grenades.

- Added vertical auto aim vs cops and civilians.

- Civs now have 50hp instead of 30hp and do a bit more damage (33% instead of 25%).

- Civ kills now give 10xp instead of 5xp.

- The BR circle now shrinks at 2:00 mins remaining instead of 3:00 mins remaining (but shrinks 1.5x faster).

- Supply drops and the heart now begin falling at 1:00, 3:00, 5:00 minutes, and land at 2:00, 4:00, 6:00 minutes.

- Loot now falls every 60s instead of 120s, but half as much each time.

- In squads mode the score chart is now sorted by individual score instead of by squads, and it awards kill coins this way too.

- Bots buy superweapons less often.

- Zombie rezzing is now easier. Heart drops are no longer randomized, but guaranteed to drop a half-heart every 2nd kill.

- Zombies no longer take 2x damage in the red zone, but can no longer cast skills inside it (just as they can't fire guns).

- The red zone is now graphically brightly visible when you're a zombie.

- Replaced the "collect health kits" civ mission with "get quad kills".

- Movement speed while in the air is now 100% instead of 50%


--- VEHICLE CHANGES ---

- You are now 100% immune to enemy bullet damage while inside a vehicle. However the driver can now only fire your gun while the car is stationary

- Vehicles have far less hitpoints than before, but only do 20hp damage to passengers when they explode.

- There is now a 0.8s delay when you enter or exit a car before you can fire your gun. Same delay is applied when you change seats.

- Improved the acceleration and reverse speed on vehicles.

- Reduced the cost of vehicles down to $500 to $1000.

- Added a new cop car called a "Patroller". Left click to turn on the siren.

- Empty vehicles take 50% more damage, and regen 3x faster

- Vehicles will no longer explode you into the air unless you're actually standing on a car (or have done so in the last 1s)

- Vehicles now have a 0.5s buffer from when its hitpoints hit 0 to when it actually explodes and make a cool "whiiirrrrt!!" noise


--- WEAPON CHANGES ---

- Superweapon ammo now only costs $1000 to fully refill instead of $4000, but supers only have 50% as much reserve ammo in them

- Bazooka now does 320hp vs vehicles instead of 200hp.

- Ruger now penetrates players/civs one time.

- Nailgun now pierces up to 3 enemies instead of bouncing bullets.

- Deagle damage is now 17 instead of 15. It does x1.5 damage vs civs and cops.

- Capped explosives at 4 instead of 5, reduce explosives rate of fire.

- Minigun does 23% more damage, but spread goes from 3 to 10 degrees (spray and pray baby).

- Spas damage is now 56 instead of 42, but fire rate is now 120 instead of 144.

- USP damage is now 10 instead of 9

- Blast Cannon damage is now 27 instead of 24, but rof is now 200 instead of 240

- The movement speed gain on weapon perks is now +20/40/60% instead of +15/30/45%


--- CHEMICAL CHANGES ---

- Changed the Synthetic Shop icon to a dollar sign

- Goo Traps will slow civs/cop to 10% speed

- Laser Tripwire duration is now 20s instead of 10s

- Laser Tripwire will fire upon chasing cops instantly, without the 0.5s activation time

- Damage Stimulant now gives +1% crit DMG vs civs/cops

- The activation time for chemicals is now 1.5s instead of 2.5s

- Warp Fields now come with 4 instead of 2 charges.

- Supply Beacon chemical now has 1 charge instead of 2

- Supply Beacon no longer drops a health kit (too OP)


--- SKILL CHANGES ---

- Skill cooldown perks are now -20/30/40% time instead of +30/60/90% speed

- Smoke Bomb has been reworked. Smoke bomb no longer fades your enemies screens to black, but instead makes you invisible as long as you stay inside the smoke.

- Self Repair cooldown is now 2s longer.

- Plasmaball no longer blasts you up into the air

- Blade Fury slashing DPS increased from 50 to 60 hp/s

- Blade Fury no longer disables your weapons upon firing, but it does less damage and bursts after 2s instead of 1s

- Venom now does a flat 10hp/s damage, and the duration grows 2/2.5/3/4s. It used to be a fixed 4s duration with a total 20/25/30/40 damage dealt. Venom is able to kill players yet again and doesn't cap at 1hp.

- Clip Magnet and Ammo kits no longer give less ammo to superweapons

- Radiate no longer disables weapons upon firing, but it does less damage. Duration is 1s longer for all levels

- Radiate now only does 5hp/s damage to self

- Vampirism gives 50% more healing vs civilians.

- Spike Trap does +5 damage per level (30/35/40/50).

- Venom Shot does 2x damage vs civs and cops.

- Shockwave duration is now 6s vs civs/cops

- Skill shot now has a 10% chance to trigger vs civs/cops

- Black Hole duration is now 5s instead of 10s

- Black Hole does extra slow vs civs/cop: 70/50/30/10% speed

- Backtrack healing per level is 40/60/80/100% instead of 25/50/75/100%

- Xray Vision range vs civs/cops is now 20/40/60/100m


--- BUG FIXES & TECHNICAL IMPROVEMENTS ---

- Significant improvements to framerate and netcode warpiness

- Significantly improved pathfinding speed of AI

- Reduced the filesize of the Geneshift install by 800MB

- Improved the loading time and memory usage of the megamap.

- Fixed a bug where you could fire skills while standing on black tiles

- Fixed a bug where rerolling wouldn't work

- Fixed a bug where ex-vendors would have too much HP after a round restart

- Fixed a bug where vendors could offer the same car twice

- Fixed a bug that made zombie AI too aggressive

- Fixed a bug where you would join as a zombie in a coop survival game



Geneshift is on sale this week, so like, subscribe, and smash that buy button. Next version will be focused on gang mechanics and territory warfare!

Have fun!
bencelot

Geneshift is borrowing from the roguelite genre to massively increase the game's replayability, variety, and adaptability. The idea is to give players different guns and skills each round so that each match feels unique. No two matches will ever feel the same, and players will need to adapt to new items to survive.

To do this, the old skill menu and buy menu have been removed and replaced with brand new systems with limited choices - skill drafting and vendors. Players are now rewarded for thinking on their feet and creating a smart build on the fly. Let's explore!




Whenever you level up you'll now be given a draft of just 3 skills. You can level just 1 of these 3 skills, and will get a fresh set of 3 every time you level up. This is of course a huge change, as you can no longer choose whatever skills you want anymore. But it results in every match feeling completely different as your build is never the same. You'll discover new skill combinations and have to adapt as you play. If you don't like any of the 3 options, there is an option to reroll for another set of 3, but you can only do this once every 120s.

For example, you start the game and for your first skill point see Plasma Ball, Blade Fury, and Vampirism. Which do you choose? If you take Plasma, you'll want to look for other skills and guns that suit the long range playstyle. If you choose Blade Fury, you better go searching for a shotgun. Lets say you decide on a ranged build and take Plasma Ball. Then you level up again, and are offered Plasma Ball (level 2), Energize (level 1), and Self Repair (level 1). What do you choose now? When you choose one, you might not see the other options again. So what's more important? An extra powerful Plasma, or the ability to heal? Decisions decisions..

Drafting not only adds replayability and adaptability, but it will also do wonders for the new player experience too. No longer will newbies be overwhelmed with 30+ choices. There are just 3 skills to consider at a time. Furthermore, skills now go up to level 4, and this 4th level is STRONG. But the drafting algorithm won't show you the 4th level until you hit level 10, making this a nice milestone.




The buy menus have undergone a similar change. Instead of heading to a buy zone, pressing B, and choosing from the entire buy menu, players now must explore for Civilian Vendors. These are specials civilians with a yellow speech bubble above their head. Pressing E on them will open up a small buy list up the top right of the screen, with just 5 things for sale. Typically each vendor will sell: 1) ammo, 2) grenades, 3) a gun, 4) a chemcial or vehicle, 5) a special perk.

Each vendor sells a different set of items. and players are now rewarded for exploring the map and checking out a few vendors before making a purchase. If you don't like what a vendor has for sale, find another one. Vendors will sometimes sell items on discount, such as a Minigun which is 30% off. Nothing feels better than finding a vendor who has the perfect weapon for your skill build and it's on discount. Even cooler, vendors now sell perks as well! Previously you could only get these perks by completing missions. But now you can buy them directly for $5000. For example, a vendor might be selling the +20% Firerate perk for SMGS, which works great if you've managed to buy an MP5 elsewhere.

The end result of these two huge reworks is that special feeling you get in a roguelite where everything just comes together (or not). The addition of level 4 skills, discounted guns, and perks allows for some insanely overpowered combos if you ge lucky. But you won't get this everytime, so it feels extra special when you do.




Another neat change is the ability to capture enemy chemcials. Previously you could destroy enemy chemicals by standing on them for 3 seconds, but now you will capture them instead. This is way more fun, and can result in some really interesting emergent gameplay. For example, you are walking along and discover an enemy has placed down a Health Stimulant (which gives you health regen when standing nearby it). It's out in the open and your enemy is guarding it, but you turn on Force Fields to protect you while you capture it. Now it's yours and you have the health regen. So your enemy throws down a Molotov Cocktail to get you to retreat and tries to reclaim it himself. It creates a very interesting king of the hill mechanic.

Now you might be thinking "why should I place chemcials when my enemy can just steal them from me?" Well another change solves this. Chemicals are now hidden from enemies unless they step inside them. So you can place a Health Stimulant in an obscure corner somewhere, and get the health benefits from it, and as long as your enemy doesn't see you do it they are unlikely to walk there and discover/capture it. A well placed chemical can really give you a hidden advantage now.




The way difficulty scales in survival has been changed as well. Previously bots would just gain +25% damage each round, which was a bit bland. Early rounds were too eash, and later rounds had some OP situations where they could 1-shot you with an M3. So now bots always do a flat 100% damage like normal. Instead, each round they will level up their weapons and skills. Round 1 has them using tier1 weapons, round 2 gives tier2 weapons, and round 3 has them using superweapons. They'll also gain more powerful skills each round too. This is hard, but a lot more interesting to play against. In the final round all the bots unite against you, and you'll need to take on an army of superweapon wielding enemies to survive. But if you draft a good build and buy some nice perks, you might just have what it takes.




The M4 has been changed to a burst fire gun. There are new skills in the game like Counter Shot (which turns enemy damage into health for a short duration), and Skill Shots (which makes you skills recharge faster whenever you get a skillful non-gun kill). Other add-on skills like Spike Trap, Mirror Image and Smoke Bomb are now their own separate active skills and have been buffed considerably. Weapon recoil has been improved, lives have been buffed and are now exclusively earned via the Genetic Heart, and plenty of skill, weapon and chemical reworks based on player feedback. Check the full changelog below for details!





--- BIGGEST CHANGES ---

- Skills are now leveled via a draft of 3 each time you level up. You can reroll the 3 choices once every 120 seconds.

- The buy zone no longer exists. Instead, players buy items from civilian vendors who sell items on discount.

- Civ vendors now let you buy mission rewards (the perks you get from completing a mission). These cost $5000 each and are never discounted.

- You can now capture enemy chemicals by standing on them for 3 seconds. Doing so will make that chemical your own. This replaces the concept of destroying enemy chemicals.

- Chemicals are invisible to enemies when you first place them down (but will revealed if the enemy steps into them).

- Every skill can now go up to level 4, and the level 4 values are extremely powerful. These only appear in the skill draft once you hit level 10.

- Bots in survival mode no longer gain in damage. It is always 100%. However, they will gain power by unlocking more powerful guns (tier 1, 2, 3) and skills instead.


--- OTHER GAMEPLAY CHANGES ---

- Capped the number of lives a player can earn in PVP to 1, and this can only be earned from the Genetic Heart.

- When you consume a heart you are now able to keep firing your gun. But you're no longer invulnerable. you'll simply gain all your health back and take 50% damage for the next 3s.

- Civilians can now drop loot.

- Reworked the way skill information is displayed in the HUD.

- Repositioned the final red zones in BR, limiting them to bigger more open areas with fewer rooftops around.

- Grenades now fall into the red zone in overtime along with other forms of loot.

- You gain +5% DMG when you loot the same gun, and this caps at +50 instead of +30% DMG (on critical bullets).

- Survival bots now have randomised skills, like in PvP. They don't all have the exact same skill (which is too repetitive).

- Improved bot AI to no longer prioritize humans over other bots.

- Killing a bot at max wanted level extends the timer by 3s instead of 1s.

- Added a cross to the center of the crosshair.

- Vehicles now have 2x as many hitpoints, but when they catch fire, they stay on fire for 10s (forcing players out).

- Improved the quality of gun sound effects.

- Increased the sound range so you can hear enemies shooting in the distance.

- Killing survivors now awards $500 while killing zombies now awards $200.

- Warmup rounds now have superweapons in them, and players no longer keep their guns when the warmup ends.

- Supply Crates visually look bigger.

- Supply drops are now guaranteed to drop a weapon always, which will be glowing to indicate that its critical bullets do +50% more DMG.

- Fixed a bunch of bugs.


--- WEAPON CHANGES ---

- The M4A1 is now a burst fire weapon, firing 3 fast bursts at a time.

- Buffed molotov's radius, while reducing duration from 5s to 4s.

- Weapons in general have less recoil.

- Deagle now costs $3000 and rate of fire is now 300 instead of 275.

- Improved the movement speed of rifles.

- Improved the range of machine guns.

- Tapping doesn't work as well for controlling recoil, but bursting works better.

- All guns have +40 zoom range (including snipers).

- Bazooka flies 90% as fast through the air.

- Grenades, flashbangs and molotovs now cost $300 instead of $500 (or cheaper if found on discount).


--- CHEMICAL CHANGES ---

- Chemicals now have a 2.5s activation time before they do anything.

- You can now carry up to a max of 4 chemicals.

- The benefits of the three stimulants now last for 8s instead of 3s.

- All chems now have 2 charges max instead of 3.

- Warp Fields now last in the map for 20 mins instead of 6 mins. They also have a 1s warp time instead of 1.5s.

- Sonar Cells now have a "discovery radius" of 5 meters. But they will reveal enemies with a 25m range. This lets you hide it in a corner and get vision benefits, without the enemy standing inside and discovering the chemical.

- Fission Mine's no longer give extra throws (too OP). Instead they'll give +1 free grenade every 60s.

- Only one of your fission mines can be activated at a time.

- Laser Tripwire now has a 0.5s activation time before it can do any damage. Once an enemy steps into it, it will activate and become visible to everyone in the server.

- Once active, Laser Tripwire has an 10 second duration where it will deal damage to any enemies who step inside it. After this 10s is over it will expire.


--- SKILL CHANGES ---

- Skill cooldowns are in general faster.

- Players can now go up to level 30, and the leveling curve is now faster.

- Bionic Charges has been replaced with a new pure passive skill call "Skill Shot", which works like so: Whenever you kill with an enemy with a non-gun damage source (eg: skills, vehicles, knife, grenades), you'll gain a charge. These charges speed up your skill cooldowns. Charges reset on death.

- Clip Magnet is now called "Rapid Refill" and works slightly differently: When Frenzy is active, each bullet you fire has a chance to not reduce your ammo count.

- Smoke Bomb is now its own active skill with a 15s cooldown. It is completely independent of Black Hole.

- Mirror Image is now its own active skill with a cooldown of 10s, and buffed duration of 4/6/8/15 and buffed clone health of 25/50/75/100hp.

- Assault Armor renamed to Counter Spell, and it will now also block enemy grenades, in addition to skills and chemicals.

- Ignition Orb is no longer disabled when an enemy steps inside it. Only when the owner steps inside it.



Geneshift is on sale this week, so like, subscribe, and smash that buy button. Next version will be focused on gang mechanics and territory warfare!

Have fun!
bencelot