Critical Shift News

Merry Christmas! ✨

On this joyous holiday, we wish you peace, harmony, and confidence in every day. May your home be filled with warmth and comfort, and may you always be surrounded by loved ones whose smiles brighten your life.

May every moment of this season of miracles bring joy, and may small surprises be only pleasant ones: may gifts find their recipients, and may holiday cookies not disappear too quickly. May laughter be light, and may your heart be open to new experiences and inspiration.

And, of course, a special hello from Hive Porter, he’s already warming up and can’t wait to meet you in the game!:)



With warmth,
Rhinotales Team

Hello, everyone!:)

We decided to show how we improved our character lighting!
Unity’s default settings weren’t giving us the results we needed - characters looked flat and cut out from the environment, so we had to build our own solution.



Quick breakdown of our rendering improvements:
- added SH compensation for better environment matching
- implemented a custom shading model for more artistic control
- enhanced with retexturing pass
- finally integrated volumetric lighting.

It sounds a little complicated, but the main thing is that the before/after comparison at the end speaks for itself.
What do you think?

[p]Hello, friends! [/p][p]We are alive. And that is the first piece of good news![/p][p]Our Critical Shift was in information silence for some time, and we did not share progress, good or bad news.[/p][p]We are fixing this! 🫡

What has happened to us in the last few months?[/p][p]The last news was that we participated in Gamescom, where we showed gameplay video. In October, we conducted closed playtests of the alpha version among focus groups and… after it, we decided to do a complete rework of the combat system. We will tell you in more detail why we developed the "concentration system," how it was supposed to work, and why we abandoned it.

The second piece of good news. In November, we created an updated version of the gameplay and conducted a new playtest with 60 people. Most players said that it was interesting to play and that the project has great potential (Phew - we exhale)!

Now we are preparing a big update for the demo. Development and polishing are ahead, and we will gradually show you gameplay and allow small groups to play (first in Discord, then on Steam), improving the feeling after each update.

What is difficult? Funding. We have been developing the project for more than 5 years. The project grew from the initial idea of making a small project in 1–2 years, and the budget grew tenfold. We were not prepared for such an increase in the budget, and for the last few years, the founders have genuinely been working at the limit of their abilities to support development and launch the project.

What else is good? We are preparing a lot of interesting information for you about Critical Shift and ICHOR. We are doing everything in our power to let you get your hands on the demo as quickly as possible and tell us if the 6 years of life we spent on development are worth anything. 🙏

Stay in touch. Coming soon.[/p][p]Director Tim. S[/p]

[p]Hey, everyone![/p][p]We’re excited to share that Critical Shift is taking part at Gamescom!


This is a big milestone for us, and we’re truly grateful for all the support that helps us move forward ❤️[/p][p]One of the founders will also be at the event - a great chance to connect in person, talk about the project, ask questions, or just get to know each other better. We’re always open to new ideas, conversations, and exchanging experiences.


We’ll be around until Friday, so if you’re attending Gamescom too - let’s meet and chat![/p]

[p]! This event is not related to our game Critical Shift ![/p][p]Rhinotales was honored to support and partially fund the sound performance in the city of Karaganda.
[/p][p]
On July 12, a powerful and emotional sound-art performance titled "T 1/2 (Time of Half-Life)" took place in Karaganda, dedicated to the memory of nuclear testing at the Semipalatinsk Test Site.[/p][p]The number 498 refers to the 498 nuclear explosions conducted there between 1949 and 1989 - one of the gravest and least acknowledged human-made disasters of the 20th century. [/p][p]Artists Kamila Narysheva (kz) and Vicki Clarke (uk) created the work after a research trip to the former test site. Kamila expected desolation, but instead found a paradox: contaminated, restricted land coexisting with wild, living nature.


The piece opens with real sounds from the site a dog barking, snow crunching raw echoes from a haunted landscape.[/p][p]At school, many of us were briefly told about a test site and shown disturbing images.[/p][p]Then we turned the page.[/p][p]Few of us grasped the true scale.[/p][p]Hiroshima and Nagasaki - 2 bombs.[/p][p]Semipalatinsk - 498.


Some of our own team at Rhinotales have family roots in nearby regions - 80 to 130 km from the epicenter.[/p][p]People were told: “Lie down, cover yourself with a felt carpet (koshma), and when the wind dies down, you can get up.”[/p][p]And they obeyed.


This is not just a story for those in Semey.[/p][p]It is part of our shared past, our collective responsibility, and a legacy we must acknowledge if we hope to move forward.[/p][p]“While working on this piece, Vicki Clarke hadn’t initially considered the UK’s role. Britain didn’t test on its own land. It tested in Australia far away. But it was involved.”[/p][p]Nuclear tests conducted:[/p][p]UK – 45[/p][p]France – 210[/p][p]China – 45[/p][p]USSR – 715[/p][p]USA – 1,054


We chose to support this performance not because it's related to our game, but because it took place in our country, and because it speaks to something much deeper.[/p][p]Art can give voice to silence, and remembrance to tragedy.[/p][p]We are grateful to the artists and everyone who attended.
[/p][p]Let us remember and protect what remains.[/p]