Jaws of Extinction has received several exciting developments over the last couple of weeks. A new electrical system has been added which is currently being tested on our live staging branch as well as a recent rigorous focus on bug fixing and GPU optimisations
Just a reminder for anyone interested in playtesting updates: the staging branch can be accessed through Steam on the Betas tab. This branch is updated almost daily with the latest fixes, adjustments and experimental content. Please remember to give us feedback on our Discord.
Normal updates on the main branch will always be as stable as we can make them following feedback from the testing branch.
Unreal Engine 5 Updates
Firstly, a quick notice about progress with UE5. In our last What’s In The Pipeline post, we discussed how we are going to be moving over to UE5 and updates may take a while or be sporadic while we do so.
We are currently waiting for certain third-party features to be updated so that they are compatible with UE5. Shifting engine versions will require these third-party updates first, but we don’t anticipate that this will take very long.
Since we have had time to wait, there will be a further update to the main Steam branch with the latest content, fixes and optimisations ahead of us changing the engine version.
Electrical System
The all new electrical system has been introduced. In addition to building a base, you can now power your homes to enjoy some post-industrial era respite.
You will first need to build and place a wind-generator. This will produce an output of power which you can connect to.
Gather some Cable (a new resource) and equip a Multimeter in your hand to start building cable connections between appliances.
To keep things neat and tidy, you can use wall-connectors and post-connectors to string your cables arounds. Each item you put power through has a small power cost though.
Use Three-way Connectors to split up your cable routes. Power will be divided between the outputs.
Switches can be used to toggle power on and off by hand. Time Switches allow you to specify specific times of day that power should be allowed to run through the system. Lights also have this functionality built-in, meaning you can set them up to run at nighttime only if you wish.
All sorts of appliances can be powered by electricity. Various light fixtures can be installed, as well as powerful UV anti-Infected spotlights. Additionally, Heated Wash Stations now require a powered connection. The time to wash is significantly lower when heated.
You can now also construct a homemade refrigerator. This appliance will keep your items cool which prevents decay. Store fruit, vegetables and other perishables to keep them from spoiling. Just remember to keep it powered or else you might find your items have defrosted.
Optimisations
We have continued work on improving the performance situation. Recently our focus has been to improve GPU rendering and memory.
Most notably, shadows were identified as a main factor of high GPU rendering time so optimisations have been made to improve this.
Additionally, we periodically review the game’s textures to ensure that they are rendered at a suitable resolution. This technique has relatively little impact on the game’s visuals but improves the cost of texture streaming and the overall size of the game.
A number of additional CPU optimisations have been made where possible as well.