SCUM News

[h3] Hello everyone, are you ready for Spooky season? The annual Halloween update is live, so be careful out there and prepare an extra pair of underwear. Check it out! [/h3]



We are all hands on the next bigger update with a lot of nice things coming your way, some of which you can already see through our Dev blogs. This, however, does not mean you will miss out on the regular Halloween update as we are still providing you with the much requested spookiness this season. For those of you that are with us for the first time here is what you can look forward to!

[h2]The Ritual[/h2]



The haunted house is active again, and with it the ritual is here! If you need a refresher, here is the riddle to help you out.

“When the midnight darkness comes to pass,
the bullish sword will show the path.
Down you go, just follow the stairs,
if you're lucky enough, you'll meet your death.
Around the corner, you'll find a light,
the gates of hell will shine so bright.
Seven lit candles around a puppet's head
will without question resurrect the dead.
Add ten bones and a couple of eyes,
and you'll get the chance to stay alive.”

So explore the catacombs, solve the riddle, complete the ritual, and claim your prize!

[h2]Jack-o-Lantern[/h2]

What is a true Halloween without proper decorations? We have 3 new Jack-o-lanterns for you to craft and make your home a haunted house.



And do not be surprised if you see some flying around, they are friendly we swear.

[h2]New Menu[/h2]

As is tradition, with the seasonal update comes a new seasonal menu. So you can get in spooky season from the moment you start the game!




[h2]New emotes[/h2]

We have 2 new emotes for you as well! Both to scare and bamboozle other players. The Imposter:



Where you can roam around like a puppet until it is your time to strike!

And the play dead, for when you pray they will not notice you.



All that and more surprises await!

- Beda

[h3]Hello hello, what do we have here? A return of the king. it was a long time since we all sat together and checked out your screenshots, videos content in general with of course everfunny caption by us. So let us check out the Community showcase![/h3]




You can't sit with us hombre.

• Link to original

Every girl I know has had the same nightclub experience.

• Link to original

Tough crowd.

• Link to original

Welcome to the zone traveler.

• Link to original

Highway to the danger zone.

• Link to original

Left if performance but right is style.

• Link to original

Tis but a flesh wound.

• Link to original

Nice.

• Link to original

That's not a knife, this is a knife.

• Link to original

Bearly made it out of there. (Yes the bear puns are back.)

• Link to original

And now for some videos,

First of all a shameless plug of our own creation, the Behind the scenes videos are back so check out the newest one!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Next up we have Fric with a nice little kill compilation. Do not have a clan war in the comments.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

And last for now, congrats to Dr Grant on 6k subscriber milestone, check him out as well.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]


That is all for now, but who knows, these might become regular again.

-Beda

[h3]Hey there SCUM aficionados! Hope Monday's treating you well. Here's this week's dev update for you to sink your teeth into.[/h3]





Our programmers have been hard at work on a variety of tasks. To start, they’ve been working on optimizations for post-processing effects, cloud shadows, and volumetric fog. Dropship encounters were also refined, and work has progressed on the armed NPCs. They’ve also continued to focus on the turrets, quests, quest world markers, and the cruiser vehicle. Additionaly the ladder-connecting functionality is being worked on. Last but not least, a lot of bug fixing was also conducted.



The level design team has really been at it! Last week, they prepared new foliage, made additional adjustments to the base building elements, and worked on landscapes for rock placements. The sawmill main building and hangar are being reworked, and distant LODs for the prison were modified, along with the machinery in the stone mine. Additionally, the team is making adjustments that will greatly improve indoor lighting in buildings.



The animation team has continued their work on the foliage, new pushing animations for bikes and the quad, and the new trailer. They’ve also put greater focus on bug fixing and preparing the Halloween content.

The hard surface team worked on the engine attachments for the quad, dirt bike, and cruiser, as well as on the malfunction graphics. Among other things, the tractor is being set up along with its dashboard and light emissions, and bike and RIS interactions are being improved. Also, work has continued on the turret models and texturing, which we teased in one of the recent dev updates, as well as on the rework of the improvised rifle and the TEC1 relay and jammer items.

The soft surface art team mainly continued their work from last week with the female inmate clothes, trash ghillie suit, and school bag, with added tasks related to the headlamp vertex color, armband slots, and high poly weapons for the tribal characters!

We have a small taste of the fan-favorite vehicle for you guys — the aforementioned dashboard of the almighty tractor!


(Here's hoping this speedometer will fare better than the RIS one when it launched...)



The sound team is still making sure that the sounds for the turret and for the quests pop.



These guys do what they do best — drink an inordinate amount of energy drinks, keep the cheaters at bay, and test out new features coming into the game.



Our game designers are keeping their heads down and ensuring that the quests are as awesome as they can be!


__________________

And now, it is time for Q&A:

• I'm fairly certain that's a regular person. There's no reason to put those fever dream gremlins as a reference.
  

• Combating cheaters is definitely our top priority. We'll make sure to eradicate the issue almost completely by the time we hit 1.0, but our current top priorities lie with fixing the most egregious bugs and introducing new features and reworks.
  

• Those will come a bit later. Our current focus is on the upcoming quests and new reworks that are coming in hot. We might have something in store for you in that regard very soon. ;)
  

• This will be part of the upcoming inventory rework. We understand the necessity for this improvement, and work has already begun.
  

• Those sound insanely cool and are definitely worth considering. However, they do seem like a big post-launch update, so it's best to be patient with this in particular.
  

See you next week!

Fratman

[h3]Hey everyone happy Thursday! Hope you are all good, this is a surprise post as we want to continue to keep you guys in the loop. So here are some news with the Horde we want to share with you guys. [/h3]



We promised you guys we will give you more news about the hordes as soon as we could, and on that promise we deliver. As you are reading this we have started testing new changes to the Horde system to adjust it properly according to your guys feedback and the issues we seen ourselves over time.

But not only us, as we want the community involvement in this as well. With the soft launch of Dropships we have some pretty good feedback, allowing us to adjust and tweak the feature before full release. So we are adjusting this approach to the horde changes, and all of our Alpha testers have access to the horde changes. And all of them will be adjusted according to their feedback.



The changes include both how and when the hordes get triggered and the puppet spawn proximity depending on the area. We do not want to share numbers at this point as the numbers are not what is important here, what is important is that it feels good and that is the feedback we want. To have it feel right. And on this we have our community and Alpha testers to rely on. For now let's have them check it out and break everything and adjust further as needed, and thank you all for your patience. You will hear from us soon!


- Beda

[h3]Hey there, everyone! You know how it goes. New week - new dev update on your favorite hardcore survival game![/h3]



Our code wizards have been hard at work on a variety of things, ranging from the very technical, such as researching rendering performance and optimizing post-processing, to the very specific, like the headlamp, armband, and turrets. As for the upcoming features, work has also progressed on the new NPCs, and significant strides have been made with the implementation of the quest system and its corresponding user interface. The encounter system is also being further tweaked, with a greater focus placed on the basebuilding encounters. Last but certainly not least, it goes without saying that bug fixing also made up a significant portion of last week's workload.



The level design team is doing their part regarding the quest system as they are setting up quest books and quest boards on levels. Apart from that, work has also continued on several POIs such as the castle, quarry, and prison interior, as well as new distant LODs for the Tuđman bridge and the weapons factory. River banks are still being polished, new basebuilding wall concepts were explored, and much bug fixing and even optimization through asset cleanup has been conducted.



The animation team has been working on the foliage and tree canopies, as well as creating new pushing animations for bikes and the quad. Work has progressed on the new trailer and the end credits, bugs were squashed, and preparations are being made for the Halloween update.

The rest of the art team has been hard at work on the new malfunction UI assets, the RPK and AKM rework, and the texture polish for the improvised rifle. Turrets have undergone texturing, and new lights for the sports bike and the tractor have been developed. Also, the TEC-1 quest items that we mentioned last week? Well, take a look at them yourself at the end of this section.

The soft surface art team continued their work on the new female inmate clothing items and textures for the armband. They've also made significant progress with the garbage ghillie suit, and the masks and materials for the school bag. Additionally, we saw some high-poly screenshots of some interesting tribal-looking characters and their weapons...

As promised, have a look at the rough models for the TEC-1 jammer and relay items that will be part of the new quest system:





As with last week, the sound team’s work has continued on sound designs for the turret and for the quests.



The QA team has been testing new features and ensuring that cheaters are not running amok on the game’s servers.



Our game designers have been setting up the functionalities for the headlamp and the new push functionalities for the dirt bike, RIS, and the cruiser.


__________________

And now, it is time for Q&A:

• First off, shout out to the great franchises that you've mentioned! As for the turrets, dropships, sentries, etc., they are closely tied to the dystopian, near-future theme of the game. There's a literal implant in the base of your character's skull that can reanimate dead prisoners. The turrets themselves are added as an additional means of protecting your base from the dropship and other players when you are away from it.
  

• We completely agree with you, and you'll be pleased to know that the team is actively working on the quests (missions) and that we'll have them ready for the upcoming update. The update is going to be quite significant, and we can't wait for it to see the light of day! NPCs are coming with the 1.0 version.
  

• We completely understand your point of view, and you are mostly correct. However, since the majority of SCUM's in-game systems are greatly intertwined, a fix for an issue today might be compromised by the addition of a new feature or a rework of an existing feature tomorrow. Also, we want to push out these new features as soon as possible so we can release them, test them out internally and with the community, and modify/fix them so that they work properly when we hit 1.0. Make no mistake, we aim to fix the issues that have persisted and introduce a host of optimizations that will make the game run as smoothly as possible.
  

• We're aware of these occurrences with inadequate puppet spawns, and the team is actively working to fix them. As for the puppets phasing through geometry, it's a more complex issue, but we'll also get that sorted out.
  

• The inventory rework is on the table, and we'll have that sorted out in one of the upcoming updates.
  

See you next week!

Fratman