The Riftbreaker News

Hello!

It is time to roll out the first patch for The Riftbreaker Alpha and The Riftbreaker: Prologue in 2021. This update is a rather small one, not bringing any new game content, but it has a couple of important fixes and changes.



[h2]Here’s what’s new in this update:[/h2]

• The Arachnoid Boss behavior has been rewritten entirely. It should no longer get stuck in certain poses and it should be able to fight the player more effectively.
  
• The UI scaling for extreme aspect ratios (such as 32:9) has been fixed.
  
• Users will now get notified when they are trying to connect to Twitch, but the service is unavailable.
  
• New memory management system for DirectX 12. The game will default to the DX11 renderer on GPUs with less than 2GB VRAM to improve performance and stability. Systems with more or equal to 2GB VRAM will default to DX12.
  
• The EXOR Crash Reporter will now feature additional information about modified or corrupted content.
  
• A lot of crash and bug fixes.
  

And for those looking for even more info on the update, here are the unedited, uncensored, and sometimes illegible change commit messages:

• Fix building radius staying forever on the map
  
• fix crash in building system
  
• fix crash in EquipmentSlotScreen
  
• fix crash in CustomizeControlsMenuScreen
  
• moved section 'RemoveBlockedUnits' after the BroadPhase is finished
  
• Twitch : fixed crash on getaddrinfo failed
  
• added GameStreamingError::GSE_PLATFORM_CONNECTION_ERROR
  
• fixed render system resource cleanup
  
• deleted microsoft d3dx12residency manager
  
• new simple residency manager
  
• batched execution of command lists
  
• D3D11: implement multi _executeContext
  
• AudioLoader: fixed crash on corrupted audio file
  
• Added ConsoleService:Write(txt)
  
• added popup "gui/menu/streaming/connecting_error" on ExorGameStreamingGSE_PLATFORM_CONNECTION_ERROR error
  
• fixed SpawnEarthquake and SpawnAcidFissures methods
  
• Extended ZipArchive and AudioFileOgg logs
  
• Increased VfsZipArchive DecoderPool count
  
• AudioFiles: fixed code format
  
• VfsZipArchive: added debug log messages
  
• VfsZipArchive: fixed small buffer 'SEEKING_DECODING'
  
• RenderSystemCapabilities: log available display outputs
  
• Config: do not log commented out lines
  
• LogService: fix mismatched quotes
  
• DebugSystem: fix crash in `r_show_collisions` when passing invalid physics group
  
• MapGenerator: harden PrepareTiles
  
• CrashHandler: forward content modified flag to CrashReporter
  
• CrashReporter: add content corruption warning
  
• CrashReporter: update wording
  
• WaveSystem: temp add IsAlive check
  
• D3D12: add support for stretched-scaling modes in GetSupportedVideoDisplayList
  
• added NSight Aftermath crashdump library support
  
• Fixed crash in SynchronizeBindings/AugmentButton (90ab94d3-4a35-4732-af00-87c4b2e6a6ae)
  
• VfsZipArchive: testing support of local header extra fields
  
• arachnoid boss state machine upodated to the new animation graph
  
• TimeOfDaySystem: fix SetTimeOfDay/IncreaseTime/DecreaseTime
  
• Gui: added GuiScaleMode::STRETCH_OPTIMAL
  
• Gui: fixed horizontal viewport aspect scaling with GuiScaleMode::STRETCH_OPTIMAL
  
• GuiUtils: added ScaleToSqueezedAxis helper function
  
• Gui: fixed GuiSystem scalling
  
• Gui: scalling HudDialogs with GuiScaleMode::STRETCH_OPTIMAL
  
• HUD: fixed scale/size on ultra wide displays (action menu, augments menu)
  

Good luck deciphering what the programmers meant!
EXOR Studios

www.twitch.tv/exorstudios

Hi everyone!

Well-rested and pumped up for what’s to come, we are back from our holiday break! We hope you also had a chance to get some much-needed rest amidst all the chaos of the past year. Even though we spoke about our plans for 2021 already, we would like to bring you up to speed with what’s happening in the studio at the moment and what our short-term goals are.



First of all, the work on the campaign mode for The Riftbreaker is going really well. We keep improving on our initial design and introduce new ways to interact with the game world. It is an iterative process. It means that we prepare a prototype of a mission or a mechanic, play the game with that prototype enabled, take note of what is working and what isn’t, and then make changes. We even came up with some cool ideas on how to improve the campaign experience over the holiday break, but they have to remain a secret for now.



We are also expanding some of the game mechanics. Those of you who follow our Discord and the daily changelogs (www.discord.gg/exorstudios) already know about the new types of defensive towers that we added. The Riftbreaker arsenal now allows Ashley to make use of Minigun Towers, Laser Towers, Heavy Artillery… These new toys will most likely get their own spotlight article in a couple of weeks, but if you can’t wait to find out about them you should join our streams at www.twitch.tv/exorstudios.



That is actually the next thing we want to talk about - streams. Starting this week, we will stream twice a week - that doesn’t change. However, we received some signals that our usual time schedule - Tuesdays and Thursdays at 3 PM CET - could be improved. We are aware that we won’t be able to suit everyone, given how many people in various timezones follow us, but we could try to change the date of at least one stream per week. We’re waiting for your suggestions in the comments and on the Discord!



Our regular development updates are also coming back this week, so you can expect articles about the latest improvements we made to The Riftbreaker at least twice a week. One of the articles coming in the next couple of days is a deep dive into the raytraced ambient occlusion technique that we introduced with our DirectX 12 patch. There are a lot of interesting details in that one, so stay tuned! If you have some ideas or suggestions on article topics, please let us know.



There we go - we’re all up to speed with what’s going on. If you have any additional questions, suggestions, or requests, post them in the comments or on our Discord. We will make sure you get your answers as soon as possible.

Happy New Year folks, it’s the final stretch!
EXOR Studios

www.twitch.tv/exorstudios

Greetings!

Christmas and the new year are just around the corner. Just like every year, the whole EXOR team is going on a holiday break. This means a pause in new content and streams, as we focus a bit more on Christmas preparations and spending time with our families. That does not mean we will be unreachable, we will still check out the forums, messages and our Discord at www.discord.gg/exorstudios. Bear in mind you might have to wait a bit for an answer, though. We should get back on track with streams and articles in the second week of 2021.



Whether you celebrate Christmas or not, we wish you all the best in the coming year, especially when it comes to health and family. We hope that you can safely join your loved ones to celebrate the festivities, and if that is not the case, we wish you loads of video games to fill your time with. Fingers crossed that 2021 will be so good that it will make up for 2020.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
EXOR Studios