Red Solstice 2: Survivors News

[h2]Manual shooting and Overwatch[/h2]
We have greatly improved shooting in TRS2. All three firing modes have been polished and given extra kinks to make them more distinct and useful in different situations. Manual aim grants additional damage but slows your marine down, making it specially suitable for holding positions or slowly pushing forward.

Example:


In overwatch mode marine automatically targets nearest monster. Targets are selected based on range alone without any consideration of armor or other parameters and target selection is not as fast as manual targeting often is. It might not be suitable for intense combat situations, but it allows for uninterrupted access to strategic elements of the game making it ideal when planning your next move, observing the environment, scouting the corridors where there is a considerable chance of something slimy jumping at you from the dark, or executing certain tactical maneuvers.

Both modes can be improved and changed with various upgrades


[h2]Armor system and damage resistance[/h2]
Armor acts like an additional (often quite large) HP pool that has to be shot through before health can be damaged. There are certain items and skills with the "armor shred" ability that can be used to remove it.

You may choose to try and gun an armored monster down, but throwing a simple grenade at it will completely destroy it’s armor, saving you tons of ammo.

Some monsters have more than 1 block of armor, and their armor can regenerate, so you will have to find adequate tactics in order to destroy it.

Example:



[h2]Suppression[/h2]
Every bit of damage the enemy takes will add up into the suppression bar. Some damage types are more efficient at suppressing enemies, and some hardly cause any suppression.
Once the monster reaches full suppression it is drastically slowed and becomes vulnerable to certain combos that can be done to punish it even further. For example, using a big burst of energy damage on a suppressed creature would result in fully stunning it for awhile.

Suppression can help a lot in slowing down a horde or a particularly tough boss.

Example:



[h2]Enemies and executions[/h2]
Monsters have been made much more distinct, both in terms of behaviour, vulnerabilities and attack types… Each one is like it’s small puzzle, there will always be the most efficient way to kill it. Killing the monster in that “right” way (like throwing a grenade at an armored mutant to break it’s armor before gunning it down with bullets or a few shotgun shots) will save you tons of time and resources.

Dying has always been a large part of The Red Solstice experience. Executions are a new thing that makes it even more fun. It feels much better to be brutally stabbed and having your head chewed off by a monster rather than just collapsing on the floor from a little parasite that grabbed your leg.

The idea is that most monsters will have some kind of an execution attack. While they are executing your comrade you can use that time to kill that enemy, and turn the tide of a very bad situation into a somewhat good outcome. An example of one of the most notorious monsters - "fluffy" executing a player is below.

Instead of finding out the exact solution to the puzzle of each monster by trial and error, player can also capture monsters and thus gather information on them in the bestiary.



There are 2 ways to finding the exact puzzle and tactics on how the creatures will react, one way is that you go in by yourself and explore and battle your way through until you've gathered all the information, another way would be to capture the enemy, send it to your base and research it.
You will then gain an entry into the bestiary which will describe best and most efficient ways into defeating that enemy, as well as additional bonuses and it's behaviour on the field.


[h2]Explosives and handling[/h2]
As in the first game, players can fast-activate explosives in the order they are placed in. Since one of the primary goals of our game is to provide clear tactical information players can react to, this time we improved this system in two ways:

• Other players can now see when the owner of the explosive has the intention of detonating it.
  
• The moment the explosive is activated there is a short delay in which the radius of the explosive fills in with red in order to give a bit of extra notice before the explosive detonates.
  

Example:


Reason for this was to give more information in multiplayer on who is doing what, the result of selecting and detonating to an effect looks like this. One of our pillars for this game is that a lot of tactical information is known so that other players can react accordingly based on that, and that this information is easily read.


[h2]Semi-procedurally generated maps[/h2]
We now can confidently say that most maps in The Red Solstice 2 will be semi-procedurally generated. Each map has a basic set street and spawnpoint layout, but types of plots (buildings, open plazas etc.) that spawn will be randomly selected. This system still enables players to still get better with experience, learning how to adjust their strategy for each plot type, but also have a distinctly different experience on every playthrough.



[h2]Barrel throwing, because we have it in our every game![/h2]
There is nothing more fun then throwing a barrel at a zombie (and accidentally debraining your friend in the process). We just had to include it, now better then ever, Enoy!





We had some delays when it comes to the alpha build of the game. There will be some more news soon. We really want you to fall in love with the game the first time you try it.

Stay frosty marines! Alpha is coming soon!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/768520/The_Red_Solstice_2_Survivors/

SIGN UP FOR ALPHA AT: theredsolstice.com

Gamescom is over and (sadly) so is the summer vacation season. It has been a pleasure showing the game, meeting our old friends and making some new ones. We have received a lot of positive feedback, got some great new ideas, and some very interesting future possibilities have been opened. We are now once again at full speed, pushing the game forward on numerous fronts.

First of all, we would like to announce a gameplay trailer The Price of Failure that is now live on Youtube.

https://youtu.be/s5WDPYi5s-M

This is the second of five planed pre-release trailers that follow a common storyline and showcase game features as they are completed.

We are also happy to announce that we will soon be starting alpha testing. You can now sign up to take part in the alpha tests at www.theredsolstice.com

As mentioned the game is progressing at a steady pace and is already shaping into a product we hope to create. Among other things, we are working a number of different level types, each presenting a distinct type of gameplay challenge. Some of the levels that are nearing completion are:


Where marines must navigate corridors of a claustrophobic installation while facing a constant threat of both regular monsters and a specially tough hunter creature lurking from the shadows. You don't want to be caught with your pants down on this one or else...




Where players must defend a number of positions along a route of a retreating civilian convoy, trying to save as much survivors as possible while making sure not to let any of the infected slip by.




Of course, The Red Solstice would not be The Red Solstice without a good old Tharsis level.
It is now prettier then ever, providing a diverse open ended gameplay, featuring both open exterior areas, narrow streets and numerous buildings to die in explore.




We have received a lot of good suggestions regarding the character build creation UI and are currently in the process of implementing the second iteration of the armory


Want to tell us what you think about it? Got any other ideas? We often hang out at our discord channel. Join us at https://discord.gg/theredsolstice

Hello everyone.



First thing to say is that we will be at Gamescom in the business hall 3.2 A011, so if you know any journalists/streamers that would like to play and see the game exclusively, they can join us at our booth there and talk to us!


We've been hard at work on The Red Solstice 2: Survivors and yes we know that you are all eagerly awaiting any news.

One new thing is that the player will take the role of the Executor, a corporation appointed individual who is in charge of executing important missions across planet and striking the STROL in order to change the war in humanity's favor.

Soon we will show the new trailer and also announce the alpha testing for all willing to get in and become the best marine they can be.

We will talk more about the alpha when the trailer is out.

In the meantime we will show you an additional teaser for the new trailer which will be crazy, and it also continues the story where the last trailer ended.





Marines, are you ready to defend the planet?

Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/E4g3hJ2-nrA

Dear people of The Red Solstice,
after months of hard work, shaping The Red Solstice 2 into a game we are all proud of, we are very excited to present you a little slice of what we have acomplished so far. Moments ago we have uploaded our first teaser trailer for the game. It should give you a bit of the feeling we are going for. We hope you like it.

Here are also some screenshots of the systems that are being worked on:





Armory is of course where you customize your marine's equipment and weapons before sending him into action. This time arround you'll have much broader scope of customization options. You'll be able to pick different firing modes for your weapons, choose to pick more passive abilities at the expense of some active skills, pick one very powerful system instead of few weaker ones, or perhaps just leave more room for ammo, explosives and other items. You'll probably die anyway, but at least you can give some monster a bit of indigestion with the right setup.



Strategy layer is a new feature in The Red Solstice 2. It allows you to choose your missions and play in a more campaign like way, capturing and loosing teritory, securing resources, and joining up with your friends in order to crack those hard missions. You are fighting for entire planet now.


We are starting to do regular mini updates on our progress on Facebook, so if you want to be updated regularly, join us at: https://www.facebook.com/TheRedSolstice/
or come chat with us at discord: https://discord.gg/Fd7x7us

Join us and give us your feedback and suggestions so we can shape this game into a masterpiece.

Ironward

Dear community,
we have some bad news and some good news.
Let's start with the bad. Solstice Chronicles: Survivors is no more. We killed it, cut it to pieces and fed it to a pit of angry zombies we keep just for such occasions. But there are good news also, bear with us for a bit longer.

When we started working on the Solstice Chronicles: Survivors it was because the community asked for a multiplayer mode in the Solstice Chronicles: MIA and we were unable to provide that with the original game. It was supposed to be a standalone multiplayer game built upon the expanded MIA framework featuring more open gameplay similar to the survival mode.

Guided by our previous experience with the Unreal Engine and some great new talent we were lucky enough to acquire, we started peeling back layers of old code, improving old assets, playing with new gameplay elements, and the more we worked, the more we liked what we saw and more ambitious we got. But the more we worked, more often we got “wow, this is so The Red Solstice” moments.

The turning point happened when we started experimenting with the controlls as we felt the pure twin stick scheme just did not feel right in a big open map. It felt somehow static and tiring and someone half jokingly suggested we try the The Red Solstice like RTS type controls. We actually tried it, and after a few days of intense discussions and multiple further rounds of testing we decided it was actually much better. It was then we finally said, “This is The Red Solstice 2!”.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/768520/The_Red_Solstice_2_Survivors/

So it is our great pleasure to officially announce that we are now working on a full fledged sequel called The Red Solstice 2: Survivors. It is a tactics oriented shooter game made for multiplayer squad tactics but fully playable in solo mode. Basically all that The Red Solstice offered, but improved by years of experience our team has gained, combined with the perks of a modern Unreal 4 engine.



The game will feature well known but improved mechanics such as skills, energy management, combat suit management, weapons with different modes of fire, explosives, tactical squad control, randomly generated missions…. But will also include some new elements such as the biomass, a terrain based manifestation of the virus infection that slowly spreads throughout the map impeading the players progress in a number of ways, making the enemies stronger and more aggressive and if not contained making the successful completion of the primary mission all but impossible.

Some of the old enemies will be making a come back, some new ones will be added, but all of them will be much improved from the way they were in either of our previous games. They will now jump over the barricades, climb through the windows, hunt you in packs, use the sense of smell, hearing and sight while patrolling the map…





There will also be a strategic metalayer where players will be able to upgrade their equipment, choose their missions and advance their personal campaign, defending the colonies of Mars. It is also planned for other players to be able to join others games in progress (yep, you’ll be able to drop into your friends game as reinforcement and save his backside).


Although the core systems are already in, there is much still to be done, so due to the upredictable nature of our work, we are still unable to talk about the release date with any kind of certainty, so it has to remain in the “when it’s done” realm for now. We will keep you informed with more and more information as we get closer to completion and are looking forward to working with you to make The Red Solstice 2 into the best game possible.
For now, enjoy these images, spread the word and as always...Stay frosty!