Surviving the Aftermath News

Free game - Frostpunk meets The Last of Us in apocalyptic city builder

Survival strategy games like Frostpunk offer a glimpse of the fantastic tension that comes from holding out in a devastated post-apocalyptic world. Surviving the Aftermath captures that essence and blends it with the ever-present hostility of The Last of Us and The Walking Dead, along with colony sims like Rimworld, to create a harsh, punishing city builder that's yours as a free game, but only if you're quick.

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Surviving the Aftermath - Dev Diary #25 - Rebirth DLC

[h2]Greetings survivors![/h2]

Our third DLC is now available! “Rebirth” offers a new way to literally transform your colony into a post-apocalyptic paradise! Clear the waters and purify the soil with new terraforming discoveries to bring back the once green fields and lush forests. The journey is not without its perils though, as a new threat is on the rise. A mysterious fungal disease called the blight has infected both animals and plants, creating new challenges for the player. But their wild mutations also hold the key to victory!

IMAGE: Surviving the Aftermath: Rebirth

The DLC includes a modular Blight Lab, which allows players to advance in the new “Discoveries” tech tree. This can be used to unlock new buildings and permanent improvements for your fight against the blight, eventually turning the threat into an advantage. Seeing the colony’s grim and hostile beginnings turn into a beautiful and inviting landscape is truly something special.

[h3]Terraforming[/h3]

New terraformers allow players to transform the barren soil and murky waters into a healthy, vibrant environment. These advanced buildings can be discovered via the Blight Lab, which players unlock after completing a special quest. Once built, you can order its workers to plant new soil within the work area, transforming the very earth patch by patch.

The terraformers are fueled by blight samples that you collect from numerous sources during your fight against mutated creatures that seem oddly determined to stop your progress. In addition to striking visuals, terraformed soil offers superior production with fields and water wells in its area.

IMAGE: Terraforming the soil

[h3]The Blight[/h3]

The fungal blight is tainting the very soil and everything living on it. It grows fast, infecting animals and plants alike, centering on blight cores, which infect the soil and cause blighted nests, hives and lair to emerge. You’ll see its effects everywhere from strange-looking fungi to enemies that roam the lands. The blight is not without its merits though, as it can be studied and turned into beneficial discoveries in the blight lab. These blight samples can be collected from multiple sources such as carcasses, blighted trees, deposits and even farmable crops and mutated ranch animals.

[h3]Blighted creatures[/h3]

New blighted enemies are a constant, evolving threat to the colony. They spawn from nests, hives and lairs around the colony. The initial encounters with these creatures should pose little problems, but their dangers become stronger as the colony grows. The largest enemies can infect the colonists with an incurable condition with horrific consequences. These creatures can also appear on the world map and might attack your specialists if you cross their path. So stock up on weapons and build guard towers to protect the colony.

IMAGE: New enemies

[h3]New anti-blight buildings[/h3]

Rebirth has several new buildings which allow the player to fight against the blight and turn the rapidly mutating threat into an advantage. It all starts after unlocking the new Blight Lab by completing a special quest. This modular building grows in size as you unlock new discovery tiers by supplying it with blight samples to study.

Purification Posts clear blighted trees and corpses to extract blight samples from them, but can also clear small pollution patches early in the game. It’s highly polluting, though, so build it on the outskirts of your colony. Its "Exterminators" upgrade allows clearing enemy-spawning nests, hives and lairs for a brief respite from enemy attacks and as an additional source of blight samples. And finally, upgrading your Environmental Station to a new Hazmat Station unlocks the ability to clear the blight cores - the root cause of the infestation.

IMAGE: New buildings

[h3]Other Improvements[/h3]

Scout Towers and Guard Posts have been revamped and are now more efficient than ever before as a stationary line of defense. New attack animations have been added to emphasize their new role. On the world map, some of the early research outpost spots have been turned to regular science locations, allowing easier access to your first science points. Colony has more metal deposits than before and pollution spreads more evenly. Pollution overlay is also now clearer on which areas are affected. Several combat-heavy quests have been pushed back so the player has a better chance of completing them with multiple specialists.

IMAGE: Guard posts shooting at blighted creatures

On the visual side, buildings remove less foliage when placed, creatíng a nicer-looking colony. Various user interface and usability improvements include “Specialist ready” indicator pulsing faster, more visible blocked tile overlay in build mode, reworked soil overlay color with color-blindness in mind and an “exit vehicle” icon for the vehicle UI. Society list also shows all tradable resources instead of just the first five.

IMAGE: Community-created specialist

[h3]Community-created specialist[/h3]

A while ago we asked you to design a new specialist. After considering all your wonderful applications, we ended up with "Gloriosa"! She’s a born-and-raised doomsday prepper who turned scavenger and can be selected as a starting specialist in a new game.

We’re eager to see you turn the inhospitable wasteland into a lush and green paradise!

Surviving the Aftermath: Rebirth is now available both as a part of the Ultimate Colony Edition or separate purchase.

[h2]Change Notes[/h2]

[h3]General[/h3]

Added a new specialist to the game called Gloriosa.
- Gloriosa was created by you, the community. She is a born and raised doomsday prepper and can be selected as a starting specialist in a new game. A big thank you to all participants!
We’ve heard many reports from players that they cannot find enough metal. Because of this, we adjusted the way metal and concrete deposits spawn in the colony.
- There is now a higher likelihood that metal deposits spawn closer to the starting location. Scouting is still likely necessary, though.
- Some metal can also be scavenged in the world map.
Added six new Rebirth DLC related achievements.
- Tower Defence - Build 5 Guard Posts.
- Timber! - Cut down 100 blighted trees.
- Pest Control - Kill 40 blighted creatures.
- Core of the issue - Destroy a Blight Core.
- Rebirth - Complete “Rebirth” quest.
- Post-Apocalyptic Paradise - Terraform the majority of the map.

[h3]Gameplay[/h3]

Changed the way pollution spreads from pollution deposits and buildings. The pollution area remains mostly unchanged, but the intensity is now spread more evenly.
Blocked some achievements from unlocking in a custom game. Previously, some achievements could be unlocked by playing a custom game which was not intended.
Increased the amount of resources shown in the society trade menu. Previously, only six resources were shown, but now it shows everything a society has to offer.
Consoles only: Fixed an issue that caused Wind Turbine, Martian Wind Turbine, Lightning Rod and Lightning Tower to be unrepairable if Ultimate Colony DLC was enabled. This issue was already fixed on PC versions some time ago.
Fixed an issue that caused the meteor storm catastrophe to only drop one meteor.
Fixed an issue that caused the game to get stuck if the camera moved over a combat location when trying to confirm combat victory in the world map.
Fixed an issue that caused combat disasters (for example rat beetle or boar attacks) to stop working after the endgame quest started.
Fixed an issue that caused a colonist to get stuck if its workplace was close to the colony border and the colonist had no home.
Fixed an issue that caused deposit guardian animals to not return to the deposit properly after disengaging from combat.
Fixed a repair related issue caused by selecting a destroyed building right after a save was loaded.
Fixed an issue that caused a colonist to get stuck when multiple colonists were gathering resources and the deposit was cleared at the right time.
Fixed an issue caused by pressing the demolish mode hotkey while hovering a building right after loading a save.
Fixed an issue that caused the colonist cause of death to be incorrect if it died from combat damage.

[h3]Graphics[/h3]

Adjusted the colors in soil fertility overlay and in the circle around Water Well to be more color blind friendly.
Added a combat animation for the Scout Tower and Guard Post.
Made the red color brighter when placing buildings to make it easier to see unavailable building placement.
Buildings remove a smaller area of foliage and props around them when placed.
Added an exit vehicle icon to the vehicle panel.
Vehicles now show the correct amount of passenger slots available.
Made the overlay info panel darker and more readable.
Updated higher resolution icons to multiple places in the game, for example building info, top bar etc.
Updated two child portraits to higher resolution versions.
Decreased the light intensity of heatwave catastrophe in the world map.
Removed the by-product UI element from animals in the ranch that do not produce a by-product.
Increased the visibility of the wheat crops in fields.
Updated the model for the Lightning Rod and adjusted the build menu icon accordingly.
Fixed an issue that caused Martian Wind Turbine to not play animations during winter.
Fixed an animation issue that caused concrete extractor workers to move out of bounds instead of working in the cabin.
Fixed an animation issue when moving the camera very close to the radar building.
Minor polish to the following UI elements:
- Deposit info panel.
- Specialist ready indicator in the specialist bar.
- Specialist action done indicator in the world map.
- Buttons in the building info panel.
- Loading bar.
- Energy and water consumption/production icons.
- Repair/demolition/overtime mode tooltips.

[h3]Balance Adjustments[/h3]

Replaced some medicine, weapon and clothing scavenge locations with metal, corn and firewood locations in the world map.
Removed the lowest tier of science outpost locations and replaced them with regular science point locations that can be scavenged.
Added a minimum starting date for combat quests. This should make quests a little bit easier in the beginning of the game.
Adjusted the shooting and reload times of specialists and guards so that they cannot attack repeatedly. Stutter stepping allowed them to attack very quickly.
Reduced the patrol range of guards in the Guard Post.
Increased the attack damage and range of the Scout Tower slightly.

Surviving the Aftermath - Announcing Rebirth DLC

For the longest time, you strove to survive the aftermath on planet Earth. Now, thanks to your knowledge, skills, and leadership, you can finally look forward to a new chapter for humankind. “Rebirth” is your mantra, your goal, the dream that will make you overcome old and new challenges, for your survivors and all humanity...

Greetings, survivors!

We’re almost ready to release something we’ve wanted to share with you for quite some time - our third DLC, Rebirth! It features an all-new way to literally transform your colony via terraforming the very soil it’s built on as well as a new, ever-present threat.

Surviving the Aftermath: Rebirth launches on March 16th for PC, Xbox One, and Playstation4 at a suggested retail price of 14.99 USD / 11.99 GBP / 14.99 EUR.

More details are to come in the upcoming weeks, but here are its core features:

The Blight: from threat to resource
After decades of exposure to radioactive pollution, a new infestation called Blight has emerged. Mutated fungi have started to infect the animals, causing them to become aggressive and dangerous. This infection has spread through the wasteland and is threatening to take over. You will need to find a cure for the Blight to defend against it. Gather Blight samples, study them in a new research building and make discoveries to unlock new buildings, resources, and upgrades.
Terraforming: from a wasteland to green pastures
Let’s turn this barren land into fertile soil! With the Terraformer, you will be able to welcome new life: the more you terraform, the more your map will turn green and lush with vegetation and animals. Be aware of the blighted areas that you will terraform, here, blight monsters will spawn and attack your survivors.
Blight Lab - plus other new buildings and upgrades
“Rebirth” adds three new buildings, three building upgrades, plus an all-new multi-stage Blight lab with its own Research tree. Embark on a quest to find a scientist with the means of fighting against the blight and build the modular Blight Lab to make discoveries to aid and overcome the threat. A Purification post will allow you to remove small pollution deposits and it can be upgraded to an Extermination post to clear blighted nests, hives, and lairs. The Basic Terraformer turns the land into terraformed soil and it can be upgraded to Advanced Terraformer. The Environmental Station becomes the Hazmat station: with it, survivors can clear the blight cores and stop the creatures' attacks. While not a new building, the Guard Posts have received significant improvements and will now be more critical than ever when defending your colony.

Watch the reveal trailer on YouTube:

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Surviving the Aftermath - Shattered Hope DLC - Patch Notes

Greeting survivors!

We have just released our patch for the “Shattered Hope” DLC—including some bigger changes as well. Here we will go through them with some brief explanations as to why they have been made. As usual, the full patch notes can be found at the end of this post.

DIFFICULTY REWORKED

We have gone and reduced the DLC’s overall difficulty in many different ways. If you look at the Hope bar for example, you can see that it looks a bit different than before. The “safe zone” where no negative effects can happen is larger and the Hope levels have been adjusted accordingly. This means there are now bigger and clearer changes between the levels, but also much more time before Hope becomes a serious issue. This allows players to divide their attention to other things, without Hope constantly demanding actions by causing Anguish.

We have also done multiple smaller adjustments to balance the difficulty. For example, the negative impact of disasters and catastrophes has been reduced. Positive Hope effects have been added to accepting survivor groups and when gate combat is won without the bandits breaching the gate. Trauma centers now also offer two patient slots, which should alleviate the situations where many colonists are in anguish at once. The negative event results and the cost of feasts have been slightly tweaked to a more balanced direction as well.

Trauma centers now offer two patient slots instead of one.

HOPE AND HAPPINESS CONNECTED

One major rework ties Hope together with Happiness, which was heavily requested by our players. Previously we had a system where Hope would drop daily with no way to counter the nasty effect. Now, the player can counter this effect and even turn it into a positive, just by keeping the colony happy!

This is easier said than done however, and there is a catch. “Challenge” selected in the pregame determines how much Happiness will affect Hope. With harder difficulties, low Happiness also hits the colony harder. This is one of the ways we hope those players who like a bit of difficulty can still challenge themselves. Connecting Happiness and Hope also gives the players a chance to eventually progress into a situation where hope is less demanding when the colonists feel satisfied in the safety of the colony.

The daily Hope effect is now tied to the difficulty level selected in the pregame.

OTHER CHANGES

One of the smaller adjustments we made was to push the start of the DLC’s questline to appear a little earlier in the game. While this change allows the quest to spawn already at day 29, the random nature of the quests can cause it to be slightly delayed. Always remember to check your side quest status when waiting for a specific one—there can only be one side quest active at any given time!

We also want to encourage our players to use the building overtime feature to overcome the new challenges, which is why we added some lunar dust as a reward to the starter event. This allows the players to start boosting production in buildings right away!

The introduction event now encourages the player to start overtiming buildings with some free lunar dust.

If you want to know more details please refer to our patch notes and feel free to ask questions! Once again we thank all of you for your feedback and hope you’ll enjoy the new and improved experience with Surviving the Aftermath ”Shattered Hope”.

General

Daily decrease of hope now scales with game difficulty.
Easier difficulties still have almost the same baseline daily hope change, but harder difficulties now have a steeper daily decrease.
This is a way for us to provide a smoother gameplay experience for those who wish to play with easier settings, but still be able to provide a challenge for the daring.
Daily decrease of hope is now tied to colony happiness.
Unhappy colony loses hope faster while the hope for a happy colony increases per day.
The current daily effect of happiness can be seen in the hope bar tooltip.
Hope bar now functions more accurately.
Previously, there was some scaling which made the hope drops seem more drastic than they actually were when the hope bar was close to full.
Adjusted the thresholds for when anguish is given to colonists accordingly.

Gameplay

Added hope reward when accepting survivor groups.
Fixed an issue that caused gate combat to not give hope when defeating bandits directly at the gate.
Many text changes related to Shattered Hope features.
Added daily effect text to the hope bar tooltip.
Added overtime text to the Lunar Dust tooltip.
Tweaked hope description in the hope bar tooltip.
Tweaked anguish description in the help menu.
Tweaked the descriptions of Shattered Hope buildings.
And other smaller text changes.

Balance Adjustments

Reduced hope impact of all catastrophes and disasters.
Reduced catastrophe hope impact by around 30%.
Reduced pollution cloud and space junk disasters’ hope impact by around 30%.
Reduced moonfall, rat swarm and overcharge disasters’ hope impact by 50%.
Adjusted the hope impact of most events.
Reduced the impact of negative event results by 30%.
Positive event results mostly unchanged.
Increased patient slot count in Trauma Center from 1 to 2.
The Shattered Moon quest can now trigger after day 29, this was day 32 previously.
Please note that the Shattered Moon quest cannot trigger if you already have another regular quest active.
Slightly decreased the baseline food and plastic cost of the small feast.
Added and adjusted hope rewards slightly in multiple quests.
Slightly increased the negative hope impact when abandoning a quest.
The initial Shattered Moon event now gives 20 Lunar Dust.

Surviving the Aftermath - Dev Diary #24 - Shattered Hope DLC

[h3]Greetings survivors![/h3]

Our latest DLC “Shattered Hope” has just been released and we are excited to shed light on its features. Brand new challenges await as fading hope risks the entire colony’s survival. Other improvements include a new moon rock disaster, an ability to boost production with overtime and being able to hold special feasts! A new questline adds interesting buildings and resources to the mix, giving Surviving the Aftermath even more variety than before.

IMAGE: Surviving the Aftermath: Shattered Hope

Let’s first talk about the Moon and the features tied to it. As previously established, the Earth’s Moon shattered at the start of the cataclysm years ago and now the consequences of that can be felt in the colonies. Falling pieces of the Moon can be seen plummeting from the skies at night. However, these moon rocks are not just another hazard but can be gathered and turned into valuable lunar dust. This rare material is in high demand by societies and bandits alike, but its most interesting function is its ability to greatly boost buildings’ efficiency. It allows the use of overtime, hastening production and healing speed for 48 hours!

IMAGE: Lunar dust can be used to increase buildings’ efficiency

This all comes in handy when trying to overcome new hope-related challenges. Colonists’ hope for the future is constantly shifting from good to bad to worse. Colonists are disheartened by setbacks such as being defeated in combat, dismissing events or quests and especially catastrophes such as fallout or winter storms. If hope falls too low, the colonists can become anguished. Anguish cannot be treated in normal medical buildings, but requires special treatment at trauma centers. Anguished colonists can eventually become hostile, turning against their peers if they are not treated in time! Recovering from this condition is a lengthy process, so it is wise to try to keep hope from falling into dangerous levels.

IMAGE: Colony hope must be kept high to avoid negative consequences

Hope can be increased by completing quests, making the right decisions in events, combat victories and most importantly, holding special feasts. These can be held at the colony square, a new building fit for holding these kinds of festivities. The special feasts can be costly but drastically increase hope and happiness by providing momentary entertainment. To hold larger feasts for larger colonies the building must be upgraded, which can only be done after completing the new questline.

IMAGE: Feast selection at the colony square

“The Shattered Moon” quest opens the lore behind the broken moon and how the people of the wasteland have come to exploit its fallen riches. The quest also introduces the mysterious group of bandits some players might recognize from the main quest. These fellows can also sometimes appear at the colony gates demanding lunar dust with the threat of violence. Whilst uncovering their secrets you’ll be unlocking new buildings and resources, such as the med hut and mushroom farm, which can make recovering from anguish much quicker. The med hut can also produce antibodies for treating mutations much faster than before.

IMAGE: “The Shattered Moon” quest illustrations

Other improvements include new events, some unique to the DLC and others for the base game for everyone to enjoy. Events coming with the free update aim to make the early game experience a little more varied than before. The colony clock has also gotten a facelift visible to all users, making it easier to track the shift between day and night and when specialists’ action points are replenished.

The free update includes balance adjustments, quality of life improvements, bug fixes and new visuals. We have updated over 30 building textures to make them more recognizable and added more colonist portraits for women and children. Additionally, we present our special seasonal content in the spirit of Halloween! Check all improvements and fixes from the changelog(link below).

IMAGE: Halloween pack includes new decorations and spooky variations to existing buildings

We hope that you’ll have a great time with all the new features, buildings and other improvements in "Shattered Hope". It has a lot to offer whether you’re looking for additional challenges or just more buildings to construct. You can continue your old save or begin a new one to start boosting your production, hold great feasts and mend the broken hope!

Surviving the Aftermath: Shattered Hope is available now on Steam, Epic Store, the PlayStation™ Store and Microsoft Store on Xbox. It is also included as a part of the Ultimate Colony Upgrade with more DLC to come later.

[h3]Change notes - “Shattered Hope Xbox and PS4 release”[/h3]

General

Added Halloween content to the game. Spooky! The content can be toggled on or off in the settings.
Added Goo Cauldron and Scarecrow decorations that can be unlocked by Prestige.
Torch, Lantern and all Street Light decorations change to more Halloween themed lights.
Added jack o'lanterns and other halloween props to colony buildings.
Added halloween themed hats for colonists.
Added three new Shattered Hope DLC achievements/trophies:
Hero of the Wasteland - Complete "The Shattered Moon" quest.
Mean Boss - Overtime 100 buildings.
Beacon of Hope - Hold a special feast.
Memory optimization. These changes improve the stability of the game especially on consoles and low-end PCs.
Removed unused buildings, shaders and other assets from the build.
Improved memory management of tutorial popups and help menu images.

Gameplay

Added six new events. These should improve the early game event variation so that the same events don’t happen that often.
Improved the way that queued movement works when sending specialists to combat in the World Map. Specialists should no longer get stuck on each other when pathing to a location.
Happiness effects in events and quests now show an icon instead of the “+10 Happiness” text.
Added a tooltip for repair tool that displays the amount of resources required to repair a building.
Added a tooltip for demolish tool that displays the amount of resources gained when demolishing a building.
Improved the day and night meter to display when night starts and ends.
Notifications display hours instead of days when there’s less than a day remaining. Previously notifications had texts such as “0 days remaining” and that is now displayed in hours.
Changed the way that quick tool can be accessed on a controller. Quick tool now has a single button that activates it and then it’s possible to change between repair/demolish/overtime mode with another button.
Destroyed buildings can now be removed with the demolish tool.
Well, Well, Well event had a hidden effect that is now visible.
Fixed an issue that occurred in custom games when the animals option was set to ‘None’ and then selecting a resource deposit in the game.
Fixed an issue that caused pause and demolish hotkeys to be usable on construction zones that had those functionalities disabled e.g. Campsite could be paused during the intro and would cause a softlock.
Fixed an issue that occurred when saving and loading the game just as colony combat was about to finish.
Fixed an issue that caused disasters to disappear after saving and loading a game while the disaster was ongoing.
Fixed an issue that caused minor disasters and Winter Storm catastrophe to not update properly in the statistics menu.

Graphics

Added four new child portraits and seven new female portraits for colonists.
Updated textures for over 30 buildings.
Added and adjusted animation visuals in most entertainment buildings. For example, Stormdome now has colonists battling in the building while other colonists cheer the fighters on.
Added DLC icons to save game menu that displays which DLCs are enabled in the save.
Added a tooltip to main menu DLC buttons that displays if the DLC requires a new game to be active.
Added a popup to save game menu that informs if activated DLCs cannot be applied to a save that is being loaded.

Balance Adjustments

Changed the way that scaling works for catastrophes. The goal is to make all catastrophes scale better with game difficulty. Previously catastrophes had the same “effective phase” that affected conditions, damage and other factors.
Increased the happiness effects in The Great Unknown and Hidden Fortunes events.
Reduced the fiber cost of Basic Clothing.
Slightly lowered the protection value of Basic Clothing.
Very slightly lowered the protection value of Sturdy Clothing.
Increased fiber production in Fields.