Time flies and a lot has happened. I'll be going over everything I've been working on between August and now.
Pictured: The Quad Leg freelancer "Footsoldier" in a cold, snowy environment.
SCAVENGER ZERO Demo
My plan right now is to have a demo of SCAVENGER ZERO available in Early 2026, or some kind of public playtest of the game. Over the next few weeks I'm going to have some of my friends playing the game for the first time.
The current state of the Internal Playtest build is rough in some places. A lot of the content of the game is finished, but not properly integrated into the main progression of the game... OR the content is finished, but has a lot of bugs and potential blockers that I'm working to resolve.
Pictured: Morrison bugging out in front of the bathroom mirror.
My goal is that with the help of some friends and colleagues, I'll be able to easily identify what works with the game and what doesn't. There will be rewrites, balance changes, etc to create a more polished build for the public.
Pictured: A mech about to shoot down an enemy drone.
Anyway, onto some of the new content I've been working on...
NPC Pilot Overhaul
In the world of SCAVENGER ZERO, there are a variety of NPC pilots aligned to different factions. Depending on your reputation they can be your best friend, or your worst nightmare.
Pictured: My favorite Freelancer, HOTSHOT! He embezzled a ton of money from the Augmented Electronics Corp to make his rig.
In earlier stages of development these guys had zero personality. They'd deploy and attack you during missions at random with no motivation. Over the last few weeks I've been working to give each pilot a fresh new look alongside an updated backstory.
Pictured: Some of the newly updated Freelancer pilots!
In-game, you'll be able to read information about a target pilot during mission briefings. If you manage to defeat them, they'll be permanently added to the Records Menu. Collecting all of the records would take a very long time, given the number of NPC pilots. This is more for completionists and the lore-hungry.
Additionally the AI for the enemy pilots has been reworked completely. They can now fight each other!
Pictured: Two pilots battle amidst floating islands.
I plan on using this reworked AI for some larger-scale fights in the game. For example, what if the player makes enemies with two opposing factions? That would open the possibility for a three-way battle to occur during a mission. Or, alternatively, what if the player was allied with a faction, and they sent someone in to help during a mission?
There are a lot of possibilities with this to interact with the existing reputation and procedurally generated mission system, and I'll be working on fleshing this mechanic out leading up to the public demo.
Calendar
SCAVENGER ZERO takes place in September 3327, over the course of the entire month. Every day, the player does a mission. The player will have to use their time very wisely. You won't have enough time to do everything in the game in a single run. The end-game of SCAVENGER ZERO will likely involve finding the best possible way to optimize time usage to achieve specific endings.
I've added an actual calendar in the player's room that will help them keep track of their objective, and what day it is. It will also warn the player by marking days where a mandatory boss fight will happen.
Pictured: The new calendar menu! There's a deadline on September 16th for the end of the Pre-Alpha build, which will also be the end of the demo!
News Channel
Over the course of the 30 days, the world of SCAVENGER ZERO is constantly evolving. Factions will make decisions independently of the player. Some of these decisions are set in stone, while others are more dynamic. (ie. The war between GalGov and The Obsidian Fleet is always going to happen, but it might not play out the same way every run.)
In older builds of the game, news was given to the player through a very boring text scroll. Now? I've added a "Breaking News" popup that appears at the start of each day! A newscaster with multiple different expressions will appear on screen and read out what is happening in the world. They can also comment on the player's actions, if they are significant enough. (ie. Killing a high ranking pilot.)
Pictured: Breaking News!
Reputation Reworked
The game's reputation system has been reworked and two new factions have been added to the reputation screen: Lavender Co. and Mankind Interactive.
Lavender Company is the faction you work for. They are a part manufacturing company. If you lose enough reputation with them, you'll be fired and get an instant game over! Luckily, this is very easy to avoid. You will only lose Lavender Company reputation when you go into debt and lose money. Make smart spending decisions, and you'll be fine.
Pictured: The player speaks with REAPER, the CEO of Lavender Co.
Mankind Interactive is an AI / Web3 focused corporation that is widely hated by the general public. They want to replace all human workers with AI. They offer Freelancers a LOT of money to work with them, but... A lot of the people who work for Mankind Interactive sort of... disappear. They are one of the few factions that could be described as truly evil.
Pictured: The new UI for the reputation menu. It includes a guide for reputation states on the bottom left.
Major Milestone
A major milestone has been reached in SCAVENGER ZERO's development. The unique mission "The Gate" has been completed. The Gate is one of three quests that leads to the game's ending. I don't want to spoil that much about it, but it involves fighting a giant bio-organism alongside one of your co-workers at Lavender Company.
Linked: WIP Phase 2 music for the mission.
Pictured: Worm.
Teaser 2
One last thing. Today marks the 2 year anniversary of SCAVENGER ZERO's development. To celebrate, I've made another teaser trailer.
Development Update
A lot of work has gone into SCAVENGER ZERO recently. I am still looking for a publisher to help with getting more outreach, funding, and marketing for the game. I've realized that the timeline for the 2026 release of 1.0 is a bit unlikely, so I'm beginning to consider the possibility of launching into Early Access in 2026 instead.
Pictured: Reworked hub area.
In the meantime, I'm going to continue development on my own and I'm confident the game will be playable in some form in 2026. Whether that's a demo, early access, or anything in between. Anyway, that's all for this devlog. I'm going to continue working on the internal playtest build now.