Blade Symphony Free To Play Patch 3

More than a year ago, we released a patch for Blade Symphony’s Free To Play version, and admittedly, the reception was poor. We have been challenged ever since the initial transition, re-establishing the game’s former glory is tough work.

Today, we bring you a much needed, large update for Blade Symphony, Patch 3.

Thank you for all of the support and bug reports
We’re appreciative to the community for coming together on our Discord Server and helping identify and fix issues with Blade Symphony.

A big thank-you to those who have helped test changes, give feedback and report bugs on our Bug Tracker. We are so thankful for your time and patience, and couldn’t continue development without you!

Help Blade Symphony move forward
There’s still so much to do with Blade Symphony. We want to finish re-implementing the Steam Workshop, get the statistics server running again, and more.

We make less than $100 every 3 months on premium item sales. If you want to support further development, consider purchasing some items, contributing to our crowdfunding page, or maybe grab a copy of another one of our games?

Check out this awesome similar title, on Kickstarter!
Besides running our own campaign, a similar title, heavily inspired by Bushido Blade, is also running a campaign. Go check it out! They’re fantastic developers and reached out to us because they know our community has shown so much support in the past.

Changelog

Changes

• Added support to SourceMod (https://www.sourcemod.net/) to Harmonious Prelude engine branch, huge thanks to their developers for working together on this!
• Added experimental Vulkan support. Can be toggled using -vulkan launch parameter
• Added support for new Steam Controller system
• Changed Classic Style to always be default
• Added new Round Replay that occurs after displaying the finishing blow
• Changed finishing blow to have a dynamic camera angle
• Added icons for Sword Glows in Customization Screen
• Improved appearance of Summary Screen
• Added new transition going from the end of a Match to the Summary Screen
• Added ticking sounds to alert players of end of round while on Summary screen
• Changed spectator music tracks to shuffle if the player did not click continue on the Summary Screen
• Improved appearance of Overgrown Mask, Skin and Attachments (Thanks Jester!)
• Improved appearance of waving Emblems by using specular maps and better shadows
• Added support for maps to have their own combat and meditation music
• Added jigglebones to Pure's Furious Mask
• Added intro cameras for duel_box and practice box
• Changed the reset time for combo attacks to be 2.5 seconds from 1 second
• Changed Pure and Vanguard's Heavy taunt to draw a heart
• Changed Matches with only bots to shuffle their Style if more than one player is in the server
• Changed Matches to use the player's Style if there is only one player in the server
• Increased FFA challenge timeout from 10 seconds to 5 seconds
• Increased chat font size and made it proportional for higher DPI displays
• Changed ".sw.vtx" models to be optional for workshop submission
• Increase maximum map file download size to 300MB from a server
• Removed warning message informing player of switching to Classic Style
• Added more language translators to credits
• Added exclusive capes for 2017 Autumn Winter Tournament and Patreon supporters
• Changed the Discord Rich Presence party size to be the size of the server, instead of 5
• Updated SDK to use studiomdl, vbsp, vvis and vrad from CSGO Danger Zone branch added staticpropcompile
• Updated SDK to include staticpropcompile
• Updated Hungarian translation (Thanks Tamás!)
• Updated French translation (Thanks Charles and Alexander!)
• Updated Ukranian translation (Thanks Anatolii!)
• Added a community FastDL host as default for common custom community maps
• Move Round Win/Lose panel below the combo bar
• Reengineered end-of-duel slowdown to slow down only the current duel rather than the entire client
• Add small flash feedback effect on the final blow of a match
• Change FFA respawn time from 8 seconds to 5 seconds
• Added Discord lobbies to Blade Symphony
• Add feedback sound for outfit color, glow type, glow color, chat color, color picker and others on customization screen
• Added Steam Workshop support for legacy maps and client mods
• Disabled texture streaming to avoid crashes until new texture streaming system is finished
• Added self-illumination support to PBRStandard shader for content creators, use the alpha channel of the Albedo to modulate it
• Made game models load asynchronously, making things load faster
• Fix duel slowdown camera clipping through geometry or not looking correct
• Fix VPK not loading old file format properly while not breaking compatibility with the new VPK formats
• Added Steam Workshop support for legacy maps and client mods
• Made game models load asynchronously, making things load faster
• Fix bug where generic attachments would seem still selectable on entering Misc tab on customization screen while already having maximum count of generic attachments
• Added self-illumination support to PBRStandard shader for content creators, use the alpha channel of the Albedo to modulate it
• Fix transition effect not working on generic attachments in customization screen
• Skip duplicate colours on customization screen
• Add feedback sound for outfit color, glow type, glow color, chat color, color picker and others on customization screen
• Fix bug where you would actually get readded to a queue if you unqueue and wait for duel timeout on summary screen
• Fix rare crash during duel introduction if player is not fully initialized or doesn't exist
• Fixed players being able to remain on duel even after summary screen timeout
• Change FFA respawn time from 8 seconds to 5 seconds
• Fixed dead players and players of other duels being layered inside player's emblem flag
• Make announcer sounds play at correct volume
• Fix server crashing when changing bb_duelbots_numbots while ingame
• Add small flash feedback effect on the final blow of a match
• Fixed sounds feeling "crackly" when slowdown effect is active
• Disable texture streaming to avoid crashes until new texture streaming system is finished
• Reengineered end-of-duel slowdown to slow down only the current duel rather than the entire client
• Fixed ghost hits and lag compensation issues
• Fix rare case where "Round win" bar would stay painted permanently
• Fix shurikens' tracer being blocked resulting in it shooting upwards
• Move Round Win/Lose panel below the combo bar
• Added a community FastDL host as default for common custom community maps

Optimizations

• Add engine fixes and changes from CS:GO Danger Zone update
• Improved network latency by not transmitting data of invisible players in the same arena
• Improved client FPS by reducing engine-level copy function time for various operations
• Improved accuracy of calculation of scoreboard ping
• Improved per-pixel motion blur and made it simulate HDR overexposure
• Improved rendering pipeline (Citation needed)
• Improved game initialization time
• Improved 'fastpath' rendering method to improve rendering of level models
• Improved physically based rendering (PBR) shader to appear better and render faster
• Improved the Horizon Based Ambient Occlusion (HBAO) shader
• Upgraded to new Discord SDK for Discord Rich Presence
• Upgraded to Steam screenshot system when taking screenshots

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed issue where all or some players would suffer decrease in frames when other players join a server.
• Potentially fixed "ghost" hits occurring when a player would hit their opponent, but damage was not registered
• Potentially fixed players and bots potentially falling underneath the level
• Fixed instance where Texture Streaming system could freeze the game
• Fixed crash when game client attempts to create a physics prop without a model
• Fixed occasional crash due to rendering Sword Glows
• Fixed occasional crash when playing the Tutorial
• Fixed players being able to change their duel Style even after map time limit has reached.
• Fixed "My Hero" achievement not being given even if conditions were met
• Fixed players being able to suicide during opponent's death animation
• Fixed rounds not ending in a draw if both players die at the same time
• Fixed Round ending in a draw if a player died due to the environment
• Fixed footstep sounds not playing for Pure when walking on metal materials
• Fixed voice icon for local player not appearing when player is using the microphone
• Fixed Conical Cantata sounds being played in other arenas
• Fixed player being unable to upload custom spray images to server
• Fixed not being to able enable Cascaded Shadow Maps (CSM) from the Video menu
• Fixed character outlines being rendered at times when they shouldn't be
• Fixed issue causing Pure's Furious Sword Scabbard not to show
• Fixed various visual issues occuring on Style Confirmation Screen
• Fixed not being able to deselect an Emblem when one is equipped on Customization Screen
• Fixed various visual issues occuring after selecting a new Emblem on Customization Screen
• Fixed various visual issues showing if the Summary Screen appeared while the chat box was open
• Fixed Emblem's waving effect appearing distorted on character intro scenes
• Fixed Emblem's waving effect not appearing at all on AMD graphics cards.
• Fixed combo notification showing for a split-second during character intro scenes
• Fixed Inverse Kinematics (IK) not working when player is doing stances or sheathing
• Fixed black shadows on duel_box
• Fixed being unable to close in-game Main Menu after changing video settings
• Fixed being unable to go back to the previous menu on confirmation menus or the Video menu
• Fixed external Main Menu buttons for Discord, Forums and Steam not appearing while in-game
• Fixed missing lock icon texture when joining password protected servers.
• Fixed misaligned text in duel spectator menu if there is only one player in the duel
• Fixed various issues on Credits screen
• Fixed Discord automatically launching when client is started
• Fixed various issues with Discord Rich Presence
• Fixed the Crash Reporter's background not appearing and not wrapping text
• (Mac only) Fixed the need to double click on Main Menus
• (Mac only) Fixed disappearing cursor while using in-game or out of game menus
• Removed debug messages shown when sliding on walls
• Removed debug messages about clamping level of detail change speed
• Fix console input not working on Linux and macOS
• Fix duel slowdown camera clipping through geometry or not looking correct
• Fix rare case where "Round win" bar would stay painted permanently
• Fixed ghost hits and lag compensation issues
• Fixed sounds feeling "crackly" when slowdown effect is active
• Fix server crashing when changing bb_duelbots_numbots while ingame
• Fixed announcer sounds playing at incorrect volume
• Fixed dead players and players of other duels being layered inside player's emblem flag
• Fixed players being able to remain on duel even after summary screen timeout
• Fix rare crash during duel introduction if player is not fully initialized or doesn't exist
• Fix bug where you would actually get readded to a queue if you unqueue and wait for duel timeout on summary screen
• Fix transition effect not working on generic attachments in customization screen
• Fixed bug where multiple colors of the same kind could appear in customization screen
• Fix VPK not loading old file format properly while not breaking compatibility with the new VPK formats
• Fixed Lightmappedgeneric shaders rendering incorrectly in duel_temple and free_temple
• Fixed Water Rendering
• Fix bug where generic attachments would seem still selectable on entering Misc tab on customization screen while already having maximum count of generic attachments
• Fix shurikens' tracer being blocked resulting in it shooting upwards