Dear Community,

we want to thank you all for the incredible amount of valuable feedback you’ve shared with us over the past months – and especially for your patience. We know it took us a bit longer this time to release a new update. The reason is that we’ve been working deep in the core of the game, completely overhauling essential systems.

Because of this, we weren’t able to ship smaller interim updates along the way – which makes us all the more excited to finally deliver this big, polished update to you now! Highlights include a complete overhaul of controller support, noticeable performance improvements, and plenty of visual upgrades.

We’ve also added a brand-new in-game feedback system: just hit F6 at any time to submit your feedback, with or without screenshots. Your input goes straight into our project management system, which helps us receive and process it faster and more efficiently than before.

As always, you can find all the details in the Patch Notes:

Build Version 10338

This patch includes various improvements and fixes.

Gameplay

• Fixed a rare level-up bug and a save issue that could lose progress.
• Interactions are now correctly disabled during cutscenes, and sprinting no longer triggers interactions by accident.
• Death now returns you to the Main Menu.
• Time-of-day adjustments: game starts during the day; night lighting reduced; multiple fixes to sky/time-of-day behavior.
• Drinking game with Fiete and the “Twister Sisters” achievement now work reliably.
• Fixed an issue where the player could shrink after sleeping on a bench.
• Improved fall/kill volumes to reduce unintended deaths and respawns.
• Buff system: improved handling in skill checks; new and clearer buff/debuff icons; brightness and tinting corrected.

Controls & UI

• Full controller support polish: inventory, trading, inspection, and dialogues are fully navigable with gamepads.
• Added controller deadzone setting; fixed controller drift.
• Navigation and focus reworked across Settings, Load/Save, Skill Line, and other menus.
• “Apply” is no longer pre-selected when using keyboard/mouse.
• Cursor handling overhauled (hardware cursor, transparency) to prevent it from getting stuck or visible at the wrong time.
• Skillcheck widget focus/input issues resolved and added clearer button info.
• Compass toggle and “Case Closed” sound cues fixed.
• Fast Travel UI is now translatable and uses clearer visuals.
• Blocked access to the main menu while in dialogue to prevent conflicts.
• Shadow slider in Settings works as intended.

Quests & Progression

• “Light in the Dark” now completes properly after the finale.
• Fixed multiple confrontation info gates (e.g., Stine/Black Sheep, VanGroot, Pfefferminze detection) so clues appear when earned.
• Telegraph office key: door can be opened again; key no longer disappears from inventory after use.
• Corrected an epilogue flow for the mayor and several end-of-story sequence issues.
• Added quest for Jannis’ passenger register and integrated related dialogues.
• Numerous fixes to mis-ordered or missing dialogue lines, including mixed-up sequences.

Audio

• Menu sound issues fixed; sound classes and routing cleaned up.
• Level Sequence audio now uses proper cues and attenuation.
• Improved mixing for CYOA sequences, finale moments, ambient volumes (Kerker, Schäferhof), and narrator takes.
• Added feedback cue for spending skill points.
• Removed duplicate explosion sounds.
• Music system upgraded with smoother playback and fades.
• Added door sound at Schäferhof and corrected various dialogue sound cues.

Visuals & Environment

• Corrected overly bright lights, adjusted point light falloff, and reduced skylight leaks.
• Added lantern and candle lights (with proper flames) in key locations; multiple night-time tweaks.
• Fixed numerous material issues (wood reflections, negative scaling artifacts, decals/surfaces, brick wall textures, glass glow).
• Time-of-day/sky system stabilized and optimized.
• Corrected many object placements, overlapping meshes, and clipping in interiors and exteriors (church, harbor pub, harms villa, and more).
• Replaced a broken fence and adjusted gate orientation where needed.
• Reworked foliage and reed materials; reduced excessive wind sway; several LOD and texture fixes.
• Added/updated environmental details such as tracks to the harbor gate and signage.

AI & Creatures

• Monsters: multiple fixes to spawn/loading and trigger volumes to ensure encounters start and stop correctly.
• Cleaned up sequence actors on game start to prevent duplicates.
• Chickens: fixed T-poses and spawner behavior; trigger volumes moved and tuned (slight radius increase).
• General AI improvements: movement state fixes and saving/loading of actor transforms; dialogue partner rotation corrected.

Inspection & Interaction

• Item inspection now uses improved post-processing and consistent lighting for better visibility.
• Inspection during dialogue restored and stabilized.
• Fixed issues where inspection, crafting, and dialogue could interfere with each other.

Inventory, Crafting & Trading

• Inventory is fully usable with a controller; exchange/trading reliability improved.
• Crafting widget refreshes correctly; removed a duplicate poppy flower.
• Added missing item icons and improved icon clarity/sizing (including new temp-buff icons, blueberry icon).
• Category and translation fixes for several items.

Localization

• Broad localization update for “The Ebbing” and other content, including signage and fast travel labels.
• Fixed multiple text language issues, live language switching with controllers, and assorted spelling/grammar errors.
• Corrected missing or incorrect translation entries across dialogues and items.

Performance & Technical

• Reduced poly counts on selected assets; lowered particle draw distances.
• Disabled ray tracing; optimized Nanite usage on select meshes.
• Enabled virtual texture streaming on targeted materials.
• Navmesh resolution tuning and foliage optimizations.
• Lighting pipeline tuned for performance and consistency.
• Stability improvements to asynchronous loading and save/load flows.
• Various backend updates and cleanup to reduce build size and improve reliability.

Miscellaneous

• Boats: corrected positions/behavior in the level.
• Reset rotated actors correctly on load; actors won’t rotate unexpectedly if a save exists.
• “Start at day,” date/time consistency, and compass fixes applied.
• Numerous clothing fixes (skirts/trousers) to reduce clipping and LOD issues.

Thank you for being part of this journey with us – we couldn’t do it without you!