Update 0.3.2.9 is hot off the press! This update comes packed with new content including new bow-wielding enemies, new locations and a brand new quest line. Check out the latest NPC dialog interactions including the first introduction of voiced NPCs. Get your hands on some extra loot using the new lockpicking dynamics. Alternatively, take a break from the town and venture forth into the wild and track down new animal wildlife. This comes alongside heaps of gameplay updates and bug fixes.
Developer Comment:
It would NOT be advisable to use old saves on this build, pre 0.3.2.0a and to delete old game saves. Use at your own risk of extra bugs and crashes. Make sure to load all saves from DX12 version of the game.
0.3.2.9 Update Summary
Developer Vlog: Update 0.3.2.9a
Player
- Added skill based lockpicking for locked doors in high tier buildings and rooms. Locked doors which can be picked may have good loot behind them.
- Added simple chance-based lockpicking. As long as you have lockpicks in your inventory, press the action key [F] and hope for the best - just keep going until it is unlocked.
- Fixed arrows not visually appearing in the bow when used for the first time.
- Fixed situation causing arrows not to disappear from the bow if firing non-common arrows.
- Fixed situation where ammo selection would not always update unless the ammo was selected a second time.
- Fixed arrows not always being recoverable if they hit the ground.
- Fixed pressing [T] to answer the radio skipping the first part of dialogue.
- Arrows which are shot into the player will disappear after a short time, but can be collected.
- Sleeping system has been updated now with animations. Player has the ability to sleep at a sleeping bag or a tent as well as them being a spawn point and a way to store your loot.
- Character will no longer jump when pressing [Space] while in dialog with an NPC
- Fixed any items picked up using the vicinity search only giving one of that type of item.
- Fixed Trystan using female walking animation.
- Fixed weapon movement in hand when aiming in third person.
- Improved turning on the spot animation tolerances.
- Improved tightness of character turning speed when aiming with a weapon.
- Improved issues causing additional unnecessary movement when aiming with the bow.
- Fixed hearing equipment and footstep sounds twice while holding the bow.
- Fixed aiming with bow in first person after using the bow causing bow draw sound and an arrow to appear in the player's chest.
Developers notes:
Hot on the heels of the coop development, we want to make sure that we get a lot of the base mechanics down that we have been planning for a long while. In this update we are introducing lockpicking.
We have two systems in place to challenge you while you are under pressure. One is a chance based system for locked containers that just requires your patients and plenty of lockpicks.
The second system is for locked doors, this will require a little more skill. Work the pin around the lock using the left and right movement of your mouse then lock it in with the spacebar. The error tolerance will be different for each door that you encounter as well as the amount of pins you will be required to pick.
Other systems with the player character have been fixed and tweaked to improve functionality, playability and aesthetics.
Menu & User Interface
- Partial implementation for keyboard and controller support on the main menu.
- Dialogue UI system updated to make the conversation flow more naturally including a “SKIP” option in the bottom right corner of the screen.
- Character Tab in inventory has updated design. Not complete but testing the layout for feedback.
- Fixed an odd light band around Trystans neck in the main menu.
- Stamina/Overburdened warning has now been moved to the centre of the screen.
- Mini-map no longer rotates with the player. It now always faces north.
Quests & Story
- Sheriff Sen can now be found outside the medical center in Hanouten’s “Backwater Beacon” safezone. Talking to him will send you on your beginning journey with Sen.
- Reintroduced Sheriff Sen’s Car Wreck quest, with additional features and story.
- Added a new conversation system that shows your character speaking with NPCs. After conversing, a transcript of the conversation can be found in your player guide.
- NPCs will contact you via the radio just to chat or to give you quests.
- Added a new in-game cinematic camera system that will use cameras during dialogue with NPCs. This system is just a base system which we are building on for all dialogue and story elements.
- Fixed issue where the player can get a quest from Sen twice.
Developers notes:
Some changes to the main menu and user interface have been made, with the beginnings of UI control for keyboards and gamepads. We have made a start on the main menu making it fully controllable via key and button input. Currently we have only managed keyboard input control but controller support for both the main menu and in-game user interface will follow as soon as we are happy with the results.
As you may know, we have always intended for JoE to be a story based, RPG, survival style game, so now we are off the starting line with our quests system, we have started to introduce a new cinematic system. Without the aid of pre rendered cut scenes, this will be a way that we will immerse the player in conversations and points of interest regarding the story and interactions with non-playable characters.
Items and Crafting
- Players can now craft Lockpicks at a workbench.
- Zippo Lighter item now required to craft Molotov Cocktails.
- Solvent, Sulfuric Acid, Nitric Acid & Kerosene Lamp have been disabled from spawning temporarily.
- World item spawners and container loot items have been better balanced with amounts, types and chance of spawning.
- Balanced loot in containers to be more relevant to the type of container being looted and that chance for successful loot spawn.
- Updated visual appearance of various items when dropped by the player.
- Spawners will no longer spawn multiple of the same item (e.g. no more multiple can openers).
- Clothing repair kits have been introduced into world spawning.
- Additional lootable containers added to the world such as boxes, trash bags, safes, lockers and more.
- Fixed issue where spawned world items did not have the correct material / skin.
- Trying to loot containers (chest of draws, wardrobes, trash bags, tool chests etc.) in the line of sight of friendly NPCs (safezone only) will cause the NPC to bark at you (visual dialogue only at the moment) and stop you from opening the container. In future releases this will affect your integrity with the NPC and the safezone.
- Fixed Infected "Bucks" loot drop only ever paying one buck.
- Added sparkles to loot items to make smaller items more visible.
- CX Alaris description corrected to state that it takes .40 instead of .45 ammunition.
- Small items (including arrows) are slightly easier to look at for pickup.
- Old Rucksack now has a higher condition meaning it will last longer before breaking.
Developers notes:
There have been a variety of updates to items in the world, starting with the addition of craftable lockpicks at workbenches so that players can produce their own picks. Additionally, clothing repair kits are now available for in-the-field clothing repairs.
There have been some quality of life improvements for items. This includes updating out-of-date descriptions, the removal of currently unusable items, stat adjustments, as well as adding a sparkle effect in order to improve their visibility when on the ground.
Loot spawns have been rebalanced so that loot which spawns is more relevant to the type of container that it is found in. Furthermore, loot spawns will no longer spawn several of the same item, causing an abundance of the same object in the same place.
Vehicles and Horses
- Vehicle parts can now be repaired with a vehicle repair tool kit. They can be purchased, crafted or found in garages.
- Vehicle parts can now be looted from lockers and garage containers.
- Improved the handling of vehicles as well as allowing players to rotate the camera around the vehicle in third person or look around while in first person without having to hold down keys.
- Introduced a second Quad Bike vehicle with better handling and speed. Will spawn randomly in the world as well as can be purchased from Liam Orling in the Hanouten “Backwater Beacon” safezone.
- Players can now rotate the camera around vehicles with their mouse in the vehicle trader window.
- Horses will now have apple icons floating above their heads when they are feeding.
- Reduced the cost of horses to $750
Developers notes:
Based on feedback from the community, we have made some adjustments to the way vehicles handle and feel as a whole. Now with the ability to rotate the camera around the vehicle freely without the aid of pressing or holding keys, we feel that driving is a more pleasant experience overall.
With that said, parts can once again be found in the world as well as repair kits for the parts, so if your oil filter needs changing, remove it from the vehicle and use a repair kit to replenish it’s condition, ready to be placed back in the vehicle.
We have also added a second quad bike, that handles differently to the original one. Additionally we made it free to feed your horse in safe zones as well as reducing the cost of purchasing a horse from Brendan at the stables.
Enemy NPCs
- Added new ‘Exiles’ NPCs. The Exiles are people who care not for maintaining any kind of society and will gladly prey upon innocent survivors. They have claimed various territories across Eden Nadir. They are dangerous to encounter and may attack you with their primitive weaponry.
- Exiles will drop a variety of loot, but do not carry any military loot or modern weaponry.
- Fixed various situations causing NPCs to slide during their animations on entering combat.
- Fixed movement issue caused when punching an NPC who is crouched.
- Infected are generally more aware of their surroundings and will hold their interest longer on disturbances around them.
- Fixed infected weather behaviour. Infected are more aggressive when it rains but will not roam as much as they stand still in the rain to absorb moisture.
- Infected now move at different speeds reducing the amount they bunch up together.
- Fixed various issues associated with infected climbing.
- Fixed human NPCs making infected sounds when performing melee attacks.
- Fixed sleeper wake up sound playing as a 2D sound.
- Fixed some performance issues where NPC’s and their weapons would not cull at a reasonable distance.
Animal NPCs
- Added new wild rabbits.
- Added new wild boars.
- New animals are huntable and can be harvested for pelts, fat and meat. The amount received depends on what kind of animal is harvested.
- Fixed several circumstances which could cause animal NPC behaviour to lock up.
- Improved audio attenuation for several animal sounds.
- Fixed several animals spawning in trees.
General NPCs Changes
- Shooting firearms is more likely to disturb NPCs.
- Fixed circumstance which could cause NPCs to get stuck in a t-pose.
- Various significant fixes which improve NPC navigation and movement.
- Various adjustments to NPC spawners to aid in dynamic navigation generation.
- Friendly NPCs and Traders
- Vehicle trader window will now hide character when in use.
- Fixed some friendly NPCs rapidly moving between locations and always yawning.
- Improved NPC walking animations for male and female characters.
- Fixed ‘Buy All’ function in the trade window only charging players for one unit of the item rather than the full stack.
Developers notes:
In this update, we are adding the roster of NPCs threats you might encounter on the island. The Exiles are a hostile group of humans who have resorted to wilderness survival to stay alive. They are typically found on the outskirts of towns or in camps in the wilderness. Their choice to rely on dependable low-tech survival methods means you’ll be fighting against enemies wielding bow and arrows.
In terms of non-hostile NPCs, we’ve added new huntable wildlife across the island. In addition to deer, you may now encounter rabbits and wild boar. If you can catch them, they can be used as a source of meat, hide and animal fat.
There have been plenty of general updates for the NPCs as well, mostly regarding combat behaviour and navigation. Several movement and animation issues have been fixed which improve both hostile and friendly NPCs.
Environment
- Completed the “Supermarket” POI west of Hanouten, known as “Swanfield Supermarket ''. This is a high tier location with lots of enemies and high loot rewards. The building requires lockpicks to enter.
- Added “Orlings and Son” POI west of Hanouten. After the damage to the property and the death of his father, Liam left his business behind, leaving lockers of equipment and tool boxes full of goodies.
- Reintroduced “Tilley's Garden Center '' POI to north east of Hanouten with an abundance of high tier resources and tools. Explore the area and discover what happened in the past.
- Added a new and improved train model.
- Horses can now be hitched at safe zones and NPC living quarters. These hitching posts provide free replenishment for your horse.
- Additional world narrative scenes have been added for the player to discover and follow the trail of past lives.
- Fixed grass clipping through roads in safezone.
- Fixed decorative hedges around houses blocking projectiles (Bullets).
- Fixed rain appearing in Kenneth’s House.
- Fixed shooting range blocking projectiles.
Developers notes:
Some great new locations added to this update, with the re-introduction of Tilly’s Garden Center as well as “Orlings and son’s”, a large supermarket, new mesh update for the lighthouse and the new location for the old bath ruins.
The three main points of interest, each have a story to tell and will require you using the new lockpick system to gain entry. These will all come with high tier treasures waiting to be plucked.
We have also started to add in more world narratives. These are small scenes that tell a short story, but will be down to the player to discover what these are. In a future update you will be able to gather clues from these locations to uncover the story and anything that may have been left behind.
Systems & Performance
- Fixed issue with certain assets slowing down dynamic navigation generation.
- Optimised various assets interacting with navigation generation.
- CPU optimisations for NPC animation logic.
- Temporarily stopped train moving until CPU optimisations can be made.
- Updated in-game map [M] and mini-map to reflect new regions built on the island.
- Reintroduced doors into the world. These can be opened, locked and picked.
- Improved GPU-bound shadow generation for various assets across Hanouten.
- Optimised mesh animations for static NPCs such as birds on the ground and safe zone horses.
- Fixed issues with doors not saving and loading their properties correctly.
- Exit saves have been disabled due to save corruption, but you can still manually save and exit.
Developers notes:
A handful of general game systems have received optimisations and fixes this patch, starting with a variety of issues when saving and loading. Several major savefile related issues such as the locked states of doors and quest information are now saving and loading properly.
Performance-wise, our navigation system, along with several other high cost systems, have received attention due to their previously poor performance. Several animation systems have been optimised too. Performance improvements will, as always, continue throughout development.
Known issues & outstanding changes
- Various issues when interacting with a campfire.
- NVGs can clip with the camera when in first person perspective.
- NPC’s textures and LODs require updating for performance and visual quality.
- New startup video to be implemented in near future.
- New Protagonist character updates, textures and LODs require updating for performance and visual quality.
- Inventory does not add extra rows as it gets full causing issues when taking items at full capacity.
- Torch doesn’t illuminate directly towards the center of the screen making it difficult to examine objects in close spaces.
- Mouse wheel sometimes stops being responsive in the building menu.
- Game is missing left-handed support.
- Various issues with UI text in crafting menus.
- Discrepancies with save game names.
- In rare circumstances, the player's weapon may appear invisible or inside the character's head.
- Swapping an item with a Jerry Can in the fuel slot on the quad causes the other item to be placed in the fuel slot.
- Save files do not properly sort by date.
- Baseball bats cover too much of the screen in First Person perspective.
- When LED light runs out of battery, it unequips but does not re-enable belt chem-light.
- NPCs can have ‘black beams’ coming out of their eyes when running the game using FXAA.
- Occasionally, interacting with the bow causes pistols to reload one bullet at a time.
- Sleeping bags placed on foundations or flat ground can sometimes be placed at an unusual angle.
- Animals will scream like human-beings when run over with a vehicle.
- DXD3D Crash, Failed to create DXD Device
- Probable Solution guides: https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?p_faqid=772 https://www.drivereasy.com/knowledge/failed-to-create-d3d-device-solved/