Hello, Mercenaries!
We are participating in the Steam Next Fest from Wednesday, June 16 (10 AM PT, 1PM ET, 7PM CEST) until Tuesday, June 22 (10 AM PT, 1PM ET, 7PM CEST) .
You will be able to play a demo of Nine to Five throughout the entire week of the Fest and we also have various streams and other events planned. We will share more information as we get closer to the event, but there are a few things we can share right now:
Gameplay Stream - June 16 at 7 PM CEST // 1 PM ET // 10AM PT
Join us as we play Nine to Five at the start of the Steam Next Fest. Live on Steam, Twitch, and YouTube.
Q&A Stream - June 18 at 4 PM CEST // 10 AM ET // 7 AM PT
A bunch of developers will be joining the stream to answer questions from the community. Live on Steam, Twitch, and YouTube.
What’s New in This Test:
If you didn’t play in the second Beta Weekend a couple of weeks ago, a great place to get started with the new changes is by watching this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqRclv6TGQs
Since the Beta Weekend, we have been working hard on bringing more content to the game as well as rebalancing the existing elements:
New Weapons
The biggest craving we’ve heard was for the mighty Merlin LMG, to bring back the havoc of mid to long-range suppressing fire as well as the armor-melting closed quarters madness. The second weapon is another old and well-known friend, the Double Barrel shotgun “Old Salty,” fitting well with the secondary weapons for those who want to quickly resolve ultra-short-range combat with breeze and Ahoy!
Weapon Balancing
We addressed your feedback from Discord and surveys and the guns from the second Beta Weekend were rebalanced. For example, The Canary SMG, a very popular, but overpowered all-rounder, now received a slightly different damage profile and range to fit better with the mid-range SMGs, effective as PDW and still delivering enough firepower in the long-range combat with enemies on the move.
We also know that the beloved “Old Patchy” from first Beta Weekend was a bit of a downer this time. For the Steam Next Fest, we improved its recoil, keeping the kick while giving players more control and reliability to hit the first three bullets in short to mid-range.
Another major weapon update was reworking the hip fire, allowing the first few bullets to fly somewhat straight, and losing the control over time. We have also added light glint for long range scopes, forcing snipers to be more careful in holding positions.
Armors, TTK and Items
Aside from the weaponry, we also added the newly rebalanced and refitted the impenetrable Juggernaut armor. We have also slightly decreased the durability values for the default armor sets to better fit the gameplay and TTK (Time to Kill) and give space for the behemoth of protection, which is the Juggernaut armor.
We have also adjusted items and A.S.S. available for each armor set, removing some of the "ultimate combinations". No more grenades and Medkits bundles, you will have to choose carefully this time!
While talking about items, we heard your concerns about turrets, medkits, and laser mines. To address that, we have decreased the number of available laser mines, while adding more spring traps. Medkit can only revive one player, and the revive time was increased. Turrets have a lower rate of fire and lower accuracy. We will still monitor the item balance and push it where it belongs!
Audio Updates
Last but not least, we have addressed the most obvious issues and problems with the audio. Yes, we are talking about the ladder sound and the footsteps positional audio. Both changes as well as the new audio mix are implemented already and are waiting for your feedback.
Other Improvements
It would not be a new test without fixing a bunch of issues and bugs or introducing some smaller usability improvements as well. Expect improvements to general stability, UI, in-game settings, and ping markers to name a few.
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Congratulations for making it through the whole thing, usually no one gets to end of the memo. That's all we had in store for now, we will be sharing more information about events during the Steam Next Fest on our social media as we get closer to the event.
If you have any questions or comments, feel free to reach out to us on any of our Social Media accounts or Discord. We would love to hear your thoughts about the demo!
Looking forward to seeing you in the Steam Next Fest!
