Early Access improvements across the board continue with today's Update #186. We have a new map and objective proc-gen combo (Decommissioned Core X Assassinate VIP), improved program/talent/item coloring in the HUD, big improvements to navigating the Matrix HUD with keyboard or controller, ability for Matrix Talents to exceed screen size and still scroll to them, some very important progression and balance updates, and another round of polishing for Blueprint crafting.

It is a heavy haul of an update with a lot going on! We've detailed it all below for you to read in detail.

Thanks for playing and posting and our small team especially thanks you if you choose to leave a review!

VIP Down in the Decommissioned Core

With Update #186, we're continuing to buff the mission map list available for the Assassinate VIP proc-gen objective. The Decommissioned Core is a larger interior structure with many paths through it, so you'll have to contend with distance and limited sight lines (Snipers are crying) to take out the VIP on the move. Try to stay stealthy as long as you can, or else the VIP will start moving quickly and then it's going to be a loud, explosive footrace to the end.

This update also includes a ton of other fixes for new maps, including some big rework in Flooded Tunnels about enemy starting positions, counts, and siege setup. We've also fixed a few places where Matrix Terminals had SCU that were not linked to any devices.

New HUD Colors: Talents, Programs, Items

To help increase the visual distinction between Talents, items, and Programs - we have added a slight color shift to these lists in the mission and matrix HUD. Talents retain the original blue coloration, while Items have taken on a gentle orange tint and Programs are now an oceanic green-blue.

We're moving toward automatically placing all items on your Talent bar all the time, so shifting color will help set them apart. It is nice to have them pop more in the Matrix and make a clear break between program (load / unload) and talent (use!).

Matrix HUD is Nav, Scroll for Too Many Programs/Talents

We've adjusted the Matrix HUD to allow you to scroll (with the D-pad, mouse wheel, etc.) to reach any additional Programs, Talents, or Items that go off the edge of your screen. Along with this, we've improved the navigation in the HUD so that it is more open and easier to move between the different button groups. And finally, we've made the navigation in the matrix tree directly linked to the connections between the nodes, so you can walk the three with a keyboard or controller without having to try to free scroll around.

Also, if your program list is sorted to have Sleaze 2 first and Sleaze 1 second, then your actions under the IC will follow the same sort - Sleaze 2 first and Sleaze 1 second. We were previously failing to honor your sorting decisions in these action buttons.

Thanks to @brian and all of our Steam Deck players sending in F10 input and helping us improve here!

Blueprint Crafting UX

We're hard at work improving the NanoFab UX to make the rules for Blueprint crafting clearer. A few updates ago, we started with some text updates and now we've moved on to some larger UI improvements.

With Update #186, we've split out the costs for crafting into the top right of the screen to plan a Blueprint craft. This gives us more space below to pick your Cube allocation and also lets us show discount and time reduction % directly inline.

It is a small but important step in the right direction that lets us reduce 2 to 3 lines of text from the old blueprint rules shown below the crafting recipe. This is in prep to help us focus that text solely on describing the type of recipe you're currently crafting and the Intrinsic bonus rules for that recipe.

Difficulty and Progression Adjustments

We are at a (good) point in the cycle where difficulty and progression are now more and more of the focus of the community and our team. The game has many hours of content, hundreds of pieces of equipment, and a growing list of maps and, not surprisingly, will benefit from an ongoing focus on balance, progression, and difficulty.

So, with this update, we've made a few changes to help in these areas!

• Progression: We have adjusted the mission payment scale, "squeezing" it a bit. The lower-level missions are now better pay and the highest-level missions had 5-10% trimmed off their top-line pay (when the missions start hitting for $1.5m each).
• Difficulty: We've adjusted the Casual and Easy Difficulties for all new games - they come with negative values to Power Level scaling for matrix and mission, meaning that these elements of the game will stay lower challenge longer before starting to ramp up. Casual has a -2 Power Level applied to Matrix and Missions while Easy is a -1 and then Normal is +0, bog standard.
• Difficulty:We've widened the range of Power Level boosts you can do up to -5 to +5. This can help if there are parts of the game you're not loving, and you want to breeze them. You can hit Matrix with a -5 Power Level and keep it simple for the entire game.
• Progression: We have adjusted the proc-gen map rules to cull the harder maps from appearing too early in the game. Maps like Rooftop Ziggurat and Flooded Tunnels are too big and hard for a Team Power Level 1 team to be riding into without care. These harder, larger maps now slowly appear over a scale from Power Level 1 to 4.

Other Fixes

We've also taken time during this release to hit a lot of small issues around key bindings, odd things with controllers, and other small bugs. Check the full release notes below!

v1.9.47 - Update #186: - 12/11/2024

- Added Decommissioned Core to Assassinate VIP objective for new proc-gen combo (now 89!)
- Many improvements to enemy start locations for the new Flooded Tunnels map, fixed terminal bugs, unliked SCUs in Matrix
- Improved proc-gen to prevent high-challenge maps from being selected early (before Team Power Level 1-3)
- Improved starting Casual and Easy Difficulties - with -2 or -1 Mission and Matrix Power Levels
- Widened difficulty options for Mission and Matrix Power Level adjustments from -5 to +5 from -4 to +4
- Squeezed mission payment scale - lower-level missions pay a little more, higher level pay a little less
- Improved Matrix / Talent HUD with new tints - talents are blue, items are orange, programs are green
- Improved Talent hover in HUD to be clearer about the number of Turns until the next recharge
- Improved Matrix Talent list in HUD to horizontally scroll is too many items to show on screen at once
- Improved Matrix HUD navigation - more easily move between sections, matrix node map navigation follows node paths cleanly
- Improved NanoFab blueprint recipe screen, giving cost its own space, making discounts more obvious, improved help text
- Improved Matrix action list under IC to match the sorting of your program list (if programs Sleaze 1, 2 then actions Sleaze 1, 2)
- Hovers over contacts in sale/purchase offers now over the entire row, not just contact face
- Improved timeline prompts for all proc-gen missions to highlight and identify their objective type (spike CPU, bodyguard, siege, etc.)
- One-time services (E-Rifle) are much more tolerant to low Trust issues - will still offer to sell
- Improved Cold Storage screen for Accounts, Blueprints, and Files where Sell is primary (A or spacebar) is now yellow button
- Fixed issues with multi-class screen and hard-to-find training button in the bottom right (removed)
- Fixed issues with Font Scaling and training screen display of implants overrunning
- Fixed issues with the controller (B) key in the load screen
- Fixed issues with controller/keyboard Mint hotkey (space/A) breaking after changing files
- Added enemy description for FSC mecha infantry Po-Bots