Neckbreak News

Greetings everyone.

The first Early Access update for PDF is now live. And with it quite a bit of content, features and fixes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vBKFXy7fnI

Please let us know what you think, either here or on the Steam forums! We'd love to hear from you, be it good or bad. Because without honest feedback we won't know if we are headed in the right direction.


The game will also be discounted by 20% until we add more content to make the full price more justifiable. PDF will most likely go back to regular full Early Access price in a update or two (circa 1-2 months) when we add more levels and the free-roam hub.

Edit:Unfortunately a discount is not possible due to Store rules. This is on me, as I should have checked if there would be no issues earlier. we hope to make this up by adding more fun content and improving aspects which would need it.

Oh, and I will be showing the game at PAX East this week, so if you would be in town do stop by if you'd like to try out the game!

So without further ado, let's move on to what's new:

MAJOR UPDATES:

-Updated gore system. Weapons now deal more diverse visual damage. Ie a shotgun blast to the head might result in spraying skull fragments and grey matter, or a berserk punch to the chest might punch a hole right through. A lead pipe might crash a skull (literally), various arterial sprays and a lot more. This is the first version of the updated gore system and is going to be tweaked for a while.

New pill: the HD (Heavy Duty pill). Commony known as the blue pill. Used for physical labour. Makes fist attacks lethal, cost less stamina, take less damage.

-New Level: It's personal. You tell Olga you are leaving on a business trip, but really you have matters to attend elsewhere.

-New Stage: transition stages between tutorial (genesis) and the level 1. witness. Travel through the station and find a place for the night.

-New Stage: Package stage 3. The final stage of the package. Once the player retrieves the package he will be ambushed at a familiar station

-New Stage: sabotage stage 3: enter the executive offices and confront the high ranking Svoloch mobster and steal the evidence. Spoiler: this will be a non linear breakpoint if he is spared and only evidence is taken. The alternative paths will be added within a few updates, till then killing mobster is mandatory.

-Added shooting range to level select hub

-Added unlockable weapons to level select hub with short description

-New npc's (barman Olgiert, Cop and Eastern thug in station, Joy in the skinhead brothel, Pietro and Janusz in the Package. Pavlovich senior and junior.

-New impact force logic. Kill or stun enemies with mutlpiple elements- oild drums, glass walls etc This will be tweaked further to clearly indicate/show which elements can be used as lethal projectiles.


-ingame quality settings.



GENERAL FIXES AND TWEAKS

-added mutliple spawnopoints in the players apartment with plot progression, to avoid confusion the game has restarted.

-Added arrow to items dropped by enemies, they should stand out and be easy to spot in the darker levels now

-Tutorial is mandatory now and the first level now called genesis. It fluently progresses to level1. Witness.

-Basic non linearity added: Spoiler, related with Olga and level5. Few paths prepared for alternate routes/paths. These will come in future updates, once said levels/paths are added.

-Multiple adjustments to npc's, placement, logic.

-tweaked weapon drop ammo count

-New street ads, prefabs and props.

-Updated back alley in first stage of rising high. Now the gatling shotgun will be hidden in a garbage container.

-updated package first stage certain layouts and added new subtle light sources to start

-updated rising high skywalk AI sight and closed off back of map, added door from which the player came.

-Updated rising high last stage exterior and added new AI with precision rifles. Tweaked difficulty for nightmare.

-added extra light for teddy in level1.witness.

-Added dynamic rain change, example in level1 witness. Rain will dynamically stop when entering building with Teddy.

-added stamina to jump. No more bunnyhopping.

-Majority of slide doors replaced with new, updated script

-Majority of hinge doors replaced with new, updated script

-Added barrel in witness-can be kick to kill enemy

-fixed olga chat/interaction colliders.

-Added time of day variants to apartment story progress

-Increase button axis sensitivity. WSAD should be more responsive now. If you preferred the previous version more, let us know and we'll try to add it as an option in the game settings.

-add emtpy mag sound/click

-Updated logic/chronology of unlocking witness. (Now after tutorial there will be an intermission leading directly to the bar from which the player exits at the start of lv1.Witness

-Updated Precision AR impact forceAdded

-light variations for 3-2 sabotage (dancefloor) to make it lighter in casual-normal difficulties. Will remain as it was for Nightmare difficulty

-Remember toggle state for running.

-added scanline variations 6: 4 scanlines variationg in brightness and contrast, resolution. 2 CRT effect ,regular and dark.

-Updated enemy pistol (alternate) for possibility for longer distance of attack (used in new 2-3 stage)Updated pistl tracer. Thinner and should be easier and more visible to track the bullet trajectory/spread

-enemies will burst through hinge doors when killed and pushed by force of weapon.

-added red handles to door that can be kicked open/superkicked.

-multiple smaller fixes and adjustments to levels (ie specularity and material of doors in street level select hub, remodelled doors, adjusted collisions etc)

-mutlpile other smaller tweaks, adjustments and fixes.

Hello Everyone,

Popping in with some quick information on the Release build of Project Downfall and plans for future updates.

Release time and date is set for 15.III.2019 17:00 CET

As some of you might remember, during the closed beta we had given a preview of some work in progress levels. These are shaping up nicely and as promised will soon be good enough to be re-added to the public release.

Before I move on to the estimated updates and notes, sharing the new EA Release trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSTtO1rwKWU

So, moving on to the topic at hand:

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22-24 March 2019: First update. 1 new pill(berserk pill), 1 new level (Level6. It's Personal) with dedicated dynamic tune and updated gore system. Lots of other smaller tweaks, fixes and adjustments (ie itemdrop pickup arrow making it easier to spot pickups in dark areas, adding quality setting presets to game settings … more detailed info will be in the update notes).

Also worth noting is that the update will be on a newer version of Unity.
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6-10 April 2019: Second update: 1 new level(Level7. Less than zero), 1 new pill(combo pill) and possibly also a part of the freeroam hub. Tweaks/fixes/adjustments

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After that, we plan to add at least one new level a month, along with dev and implementation of features set for the full version. However, most likely will be adding smaller updates in between. And just to be clear: the upcoming gore update is not going to be the final word in this regard. The first upcoming update will feature gore effects depending on where strikes/bullets connect/weapon etc. So a shotgun blast to the gut might result in shredded intestines spewing out, a lead pipe or precision rifle to the head might smash it into little bits with other fun variations and so on.

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Casual difficulty is the least tweaked difficulty setting. The major focus was for Normal-Hard-Nightmare difficulties, which ought to rack up completion time significantly.

And for the sake of clarity it's worth noting, that currently there is no end-game. One of the first possible endgame routes is planned around level 17, so this will still take a while.

And obviously, the current build does not represent the final quality and refinement we are aiming for-we want to make it better and will continue to do so throughout the dev. So revisiting levels will be recommended!

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Note on localisation: English is the main focus right now but the majority should be playable and understandable both in simplified Chinese and Polish. So as dev progresses, English will have the first priority followed by Polish and Chinese.

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And last but not least...just a heads-up, we are a pretty small team: it's only my 2 friends from Solid9Studio who are doing the programming and me doing all the rest, so keeping the deadlines we set for ourselves for PDF is pretty time consuming. Due to this I won't be able to attend the forums like a regular community manager, but I'll do my best to keep you up to speed and be in constant touch on the Steam forums. After all, this is crucial, because without your feedback and interactions, we won't know if the game is headed in the right direction.

Thanks for tuning in!

First off thanks to those who took part in the private/closed Beta! We appreciate the feedback and hope you enjoyed the ride.



Due to the upcoming release, temporary Work In Progress levels will soon be removed from the main build. This includes:

-The freeroam hub level (accessible after completing level 3)

-Associated levels with the freeroam hub (Kyoncha exterior, Chinatown and Talltrees)

-Levels 6 & 7

But fear not: this is only temporary and they will return during Early Access, once they are polished up enough. Not to mention the game will continuously be updated with even more cool stuff (as stated in the Early Access and Steam description): such as more multi-staged levels, new combat moves, finishers, weapons and so on..



If you were taking part in the closed Beta and you'd like to get access back to the WIP levels, feel free to get in touch and I'll arrange a private Beta branch and password.


So right now the STEAM Early Access Release is set for the 15th of March. The biggest changes revolve mainly around multiple tweaks, fixes and optimisation. Many of you complained about the lighting in the toilet in the first Sabotage level-this has been fixed as well as more visible bounds in the following club level. Lighting has been also adjusted in one of the skinhead level(Rising High): as not too venture too much into spoiler territory, those who played it, ought to see the improvement right away. Basic Polish language has also been added (very basic and will still need some work) as well as smaller visual tweaks and details in majority of the Release ready levels. Oh yeah, AI has also been tweaked and difficulty differences are even more varied now and there are some new bullet hit particle effects. So there's that, and a whole lot more. But let's leave it at that, otherwise everybody will skip this wall of text;)



Apart from that, as some of you might have noticed, Project Downfall shares the Sinless lore, albeit is taking place before the Ports became mandatory. You can be sure there will be even more tie-ins as dev progresses.



So that's it for now. Getting back to the dev & till the next one!

Sharing another feature-mechanic explanation clip from Project Downfall. This time it's the combo system and the basics around it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeqR-Nsx4Yk

It's pretty basic: String 2 kills quick enough succession to activate the combo meter. Racking up kill before the combo gauge runs out will continuosly multiply the score of additional kills. Mix it up a notch to gain style bonuses as well, be it a headshot, environmental kill, brutality kill, nutshot...the usual;)

This will be expanded further after the Early Access release with new fun ways of disposing of the bad guys.


The final level score will also be affected by the amount of medication used (none for the clear mind bonus) and completion time and final health per stage. During Early Access leaderboards will be added, aiming to have them accessible from a PC within the players apartment and dedicated per level/difficulty.

Following up with a brief explanation on how Akimbo works in Project Downfall.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEjig2t5niA

It's quite simple really. All you have to do is kill a bad guy and grab his firearm BEFORE it hits the ground.



Now what's the catch:

1. time window is pretty narrow so best self-medicate to get some focus. Be warned: popping pills will hurt your end-level score (especially the clearmind bonus)

2. This only applies to single handed weapons

3. And finally: you must have the same kind of single-handed weapon in your possession before attempting the air-grab. Otherwise you will just receive a regular pickup.

Alrighty, that's all for now. The Early Access Release is slated late Febuary-early March. A concrete date should be known with the next update. So stay tuned and hope to see you in the mentally deranged world of PDF soon!