Demo is live again!

Hey Prehistorians!

Tim here.
As many of you may have seen, the Clawed demo has returned. We hope you will check it out and let us know what you think!

This past two weeks we addressees some nasty bugs that were affecting players on lower graphical settings and this has now been fixed. We also took a look at some feedback and reworked the latter half of the demo to improve the overall experience. Hudson had some animation improvements, and we made plenty of environmental improvements too. We have been working really hard to get this demo back online so hopefully the extra time spent will have been worth it.


We want your feedback and appreciate it.

So, already we have received a lot of kind messages, constructive feedback and general thoughts on our community discussions. This is great!
Your feedback really does help us tweak and polish this experience, learn valuable lessons, and get this game right before its release this year.
So, if you have anything you want to let us know, please do! Even if we have not replied to you directly yet, we are absolutely taking down every bit of feedback and listening.

So, while I have the floor here, let me address some of the issues right now :)

First of all, the Flashlight system.

This one has been really interesting of us and in the spirit of transparency, I'm going to run you guys through our thoughts on the flashlight and what we're going to do next.

So, ironically, the original flashlight we had for a very long time was chest mounted and during internal testing, we received 2 main complaints:
1. that the flashlight didn't follow where people are aiming
2. The characters aiming animations blocked the light during certain circumstances and would cause flickering when the player was sprinting as the arms would enter the light.

So, to address this, the weapon mounted flashlights were born. Now, we appreciate that this is maybe the most important tool in the game, so we want to get this right. We have received a lot of feedback about this and are looking into the best solution as the feedback on the light has varied quite a bit. However, we're hearing that the main issue is that the light is useless when you're not aiming (please correct me in the comments if you disagree)
In terms of gameplay tweaks, this is our biggest priority, and once the solution is implemented, we will be patching the demo.


Secondly, some players are getting a little lost.

So, this one is a little trickier, but we are moving on this. The feedback we are getting is that some players are not sure what they are supposed to do next.
So, here it is on our end. In Clawed, we are doing our best to keep the Hud down to a minimum as we really do want this experience to be immersive. We also want the players to be able to progress by using the environment and exploration to figure out the best way forward. Things like park map boards and notes were implemented to help guide the player through the park and towards their next objective.

Now, for some, this has been no issue and players have made their way to Peir A without struggling to much, but we are seeing some players are getting a little lost - especially because the game starts at night. So, while I don't have an exact solution I can share right now (I think each area needs its own solution anyway), I can say that we are going to add a park area map item that you can find and pickup. We already do this in the large dinosaur enclosures in the main game, so we are going to see if this will help with finding progression easier.

Again, if you have struggled with progression - lets chat about it. We are listening :)

Thirdly, Rain is too loud and can't be turned down.
This one is simpler; the rain is too loud. We actually adjusted this prior to the demo releasing today, but we'll go back in and tune it some more. Also, the lack of a weather volume option was an oversight (by me actually if I need to point fingers). It will now get its own slider called "Weather Volume" in the audio volume section.

Forthly (is that a word?) Sprint toggle option is coming
Another easy one, we are adding a sprint toggle option to the control settings tab. Controller players we hear you :)


Fifthly (lets go with it), the pistol will get a slight buff
While exploring is very important to survival, I've seen that not all players are locating weapons like the shotgun or AR. And so, Hudson's 9mm will receive a small buff (not too much) but enough to feel like you are not firing potatoes a charging raptor.

Sixthly, the inspect item bug makes me fall through the floor.
Now that I think about it, this should be number one on the list here, but I'm committed so here we are.
There is a bug when inspecting items in your inventory that can cause the player fall through the floor when they exit the inspection screen. This is a doozy, we are sorry we missed this one, but this will be fixed in the first round of patches. For now, maybe don't inspect your inventory items till the patch is up.

Seventhly, thanks for helping up make this game better. We want this to be a great experience, so your voice really helps us do that.

Okay, just know, we are watching everything and listening as much as we can. Constructive feedback is always welcome here, so keep it coming. We can't do everything that people ask, but I promise we will do our best.

Co-op?

So, the plan for co-op is simple, once we get through the above-mentioned fixes and we feel the single player demo is in a happy place, we are going to open the co-op option up get all the feedback we can there too. Again, feedback really helps shape the game and getting it early is only going to help us make sure you enjoy the full game from the get-go. We will keep you updated! So, that's it for now. Again guys, thank you so much for the playing the demo. Let me know any thoughts you have on the discussion above or any other thoughts you may have :) Have a great day! Tim Flatrock Games


EDIT:

A NEW UPDATE IS NOW LIVE:

-Flashlight system has been reworked and is now mounted on the player.

-Pistol and Shotgun have received a small damage increase

-Main Gates now display the required key card on the control box to assist with knowing which key a gate needs.

We are hard a work addressing the remaining issues mentioned above :) Thanks to the community for the constructive feedback. We want this game to be a great time for you