The Beta for The Keys-to-the-City Update is starting this December!
[h3]Fellow officers,[/h3]
What a journey it has been since the release of the game. Two new districts, so many new violations, new cars, lots of quality-of-life improvements, a coop mode for two players, new tools, a bizarre amount of bug fixes... I could continue for hours but I doubt we all have the time for that.
We are now not far away from the next big content drop and now we're finally able to share some details with you.
Welcome to The Keys-to-the-City Update – coming to you in beta on December 14!
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
[h2]Ohhh, a new update! Please tell me more![/h2]
Uh... where do I even start?
New Features
One of the most requested features by the community is the introduction of a game mode in which you can roam through all three districts of Brighton with a lot fewer limitations. So, here we are: Welcome to Open Patrol!
Just like with other stuff in the game, you can unlock this mode after playing and progressing some shifts. If you, obviously, have already unlocked everything there is or at least all three districts, the Open Patrol is available to you from the very start! In Open Patrol, you will have all the time in the world to protect your city (no GET BACK TO THE PRECINCT NOW after 45 minutes).
In addition, new violations and tasks now await all Police Officers. You can now interact in new ways with your fellow citizens: Some of them will ask you for directions while you are now also able to greet them. Of course, you still have to look out for offenders: Drinking in public became a major problem and a bunch of wallet thefts has been reported to the dispatchers. Get out there and help your citizens!
More NPC Variety
In this case, more actually means MORE. I'm not even kidding.
We will now have both three new male faces and three new female faces - plus four new haircuts for female NPC and two new haircuts for male NPC. No more twins at every corner.
In addition, we will now have tenfold the number of names than we had previously. We're speaking of 733 female first names (previously: 77) and 754 male first names (previously: 75). Plus, we will now have 769 last names in total (previously: 60).
I'm not the best one at math but I think that's now about 1.100.000 possible combinations. Crazy.
Quality-of-Life Improvements
We have improved on some aspects of the game that were mentioned by the community most frequently.
For example, blipping now forces vehicles to stop on the right lane instead of looking for a parking spot - if an available spot is not immediately nearby. No more driving behind them for what feels like decades. In addition, blipped vehicles will now no longer brake abruptly when starting their parking maneuver. That honestly gave me a heart attack a few times.
Missing in the beta but coming with the full release
We are currently still in the process of recording new voice-overs in both English and German and we won't be ready with them with the start of the beta. This also means that new dialogue will also not have new voice-overs yet as long as we're still in beta. However, with the start of the full release of the update, they'll be ready.
Bugfixing
Once again, we are prioritizing bugfixing above all. Our backlog of tasks is quite long and the team has already ironed out a lot of them - but just like with every game, work is never done! Please continue to send us your bug reports as we collect and read them all.
We know there are some that cause bigger issues and are also aware that there are some very nasty ones, especially when it comes to clipping and AI. Fixing those isn't easy and very often, we can not reproduce them internally until we get that one piece of information that is so crucial.
[h2]Anything else?[/h2]
Nah, that's it for now. After all, the beta is not far away from now! If you don't want to miss any news, make sure to catch all news regarding Police Simulator: Patrol Officers by following us everywhere:
If you have not bought Police Simulator: Patrol Officers yet, the game is now 10% off during the Steam Autumn Sale:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/997010/Police_Simulator_Patrol_Officers/