Summary
This has been a long time coming. I want to first thank all our playtesters that worked hard testing out the Closed Alpha
You can read more about the benefits of becoming a playtester here: https://steamcommunity.com/games/676840/announcements/detail/1705064322646254341)
Thank you also to those that went in and tried out Update 3 Beta and gave us feedbackːsteamhappyː
Everyone's valuable input and bug reports were instrumental in getting this update out.
Is it perfect? Nah, I'm sure something snuck by us, but this is why we're in Early Access and we're going to use that excuse for as long as possibleːsteammockingː It's pretty nice though, lot of bug fixes, polish, user experience improvements and even a feature request or two were added.
Verfiy File Integrity
If something is really funky with your game (like Rift users with funky grips) and since this is a huge update, it may not play nice with your current files after updating. Please first try to verify your files, if that doesn't work, uninstall and reinstall the game.
If none of those options work, please let us know ASAP! Thanks!
Toggle Grip And More On Your Watch Menu!
Just a friendly reminder, you have a menu on your watch, use it :) Has things like Toggle Gripping (so you don't have to hold onto things always), Movement options and also some Input options, in future updates this menu will get bigger and you'll be able to do more things with it.
Slot Saving
For some, this was the most desired feature to get added into the game. I get it, the first mission is pretty long and there is a big dialogue sequence that sometimes just sucked doing over and over again. And then there were some of you that just died...a lot.
Well, here it is :) To learn more about it and how to use it, I highly recommend you read this: https://steamcommunity.com/games/676840/announcements/detail/2681220278460090735
Tutorial
For others, there was a big issue just getting started in the game. They had no clue how to play ːsteamsadː ! It was too crazy and too much to remember from just some tooltips and screenshots of controls. We heard you and we agreed! We had planned on doing something a little less than what we ended up with...but I don't think anyone's going to cry about the extra effort put into itːsteammockingː
The Tutorial can be found where the Outbreak mission diary was. The Outbreak mission diary has been moved to the kitchen. Eventually these diaries by the way(other than Tutorial), will be scattered around and you'll have to play finders-keepers (once found, they are shown in your apartment). Well, that's our original thought anyway.
Just pick it up and press TRIGGER to use any diary.
Localizations
Thanks to all the new localizers, we are proud to present the first of many iterations of localization in the game.
Firstly, the subtitles will only appear in the Tutorial, this was a good test to see how the workflow would work out, and it worked out wonderfully. The next step will be getting the first campaign mission localized and then elsewhere we may have missed.
The following are available currently:
- English
- Spanish
- French
- German
- Portuguese-PT
- Japanese
- Chinese-Simplified
- Chinese-Traditional
- Russian
The following will be coming soon:
- Portuguese-BR
If you want to help localize into your language, please jump onto our Discord (https://discord.gg/monochrome) and go to #forms-and-surveys channel and apply.
If you notice any issues with localized text in your language, please jump onto our Discord and go to #localization-errors
LIV Mixed Reality Support Added!
Currently only available for Vive users
Find out more about it here:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/676840/announcements/detail/1712943720180394413
Future support for Rift will come in an update.
Outbreak Mission Endings
There was a lot of confusion and it overall felt very rushed when we originally pushed that out. We spent a lot of time fleshing out the endings (there are three of them!) to the Outbreak mission. It should feel more polished and make more sense. If there are any issues still with understanding each of the endings, please let us know!
Grips and Inputs
Did another pass on all major HMDs: HTC Vive, Oculus Rift and Windows Mixed Reality.
All grips have been adjusted in preparation for User Defined Custom Grip Angles in the near future. They should feel pretty good overall for each controller though.
Everyone's hands/wrists are different so we want to make sure that you can play the way that feels more natural to you. So stay tuned for that.
WMR had some input love, again for preparation of a future update. WMR are basically mimicing Vive controllers. In the future they'll be an option (or just straight a up switch to the thumbsticks)
New Zombie Archtype: Soldier
The soldier zombie has more health than a regular civilian zombie, and his helmet makes him a bit tougher to deal with since helmet shots will inflict zero damage to him, so you must shoot him in the face to land a headshot. As you might have noticed, the soldier zombie might be carrying more than just the Contagion virus! The soldier zombie has a random chance to be armed with a primary weapon, a pistol, a grenade, ammunition, or all of them at once! Pick his pockets while he’s still “alive” or after you’ve dispatched him, the choice is yours.
Watch Alarm <25 HP
For all those that seem to die a lot, this feature request was added.
It is as simple as it sounds, if your face is being eaten up by zombies and your health is reduced to under 25 health points, the alarm on the watch will go off letting you know that you are about to die and you should probably run away or consume some pills, or both.
Experimental No Hands
Currently only works for melee weapons, you'll see the hands disappear. The reasoning behind this was due to how strange it looked with the hands visible (since they never would reflect how you truly were holding the controller with a bent wrist for example)
And So Much More!
I have probably forgotten a lot of things that we all did, this update reflects roughly 1.5 months of work from the various members on the development team. Audio quality was improved all over the place, animations and logic for the zombies and other NPCs were tweaked.
I'll update this announcement as needed.
The Future
Update 4 will be a smaller update and will come out a lot faster. We might not (probably) push out Mission 2 with it. Instead, it will come out in Update 5.
Stay tuned for announcements and sneak peaks!
Dev Blogs
You should definitely have our website bookmarked and tune into our "weekly" (not so much) dev blogs and news that you may miss out on since they don't get posted on Steam.
http://www.contagion-outbreak.com
Here's a link to all of them:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/676840/discussions/6/1746720717333580748/
Bug Fixes
I might be tempted to write the whole list down here later, or will post it in Steam Forums.
But there were a crapton of bugs fixed. Still a few pesky ones around. Little by little they will all get wrecked.
Reviews
If you haven't already posted one, please consider doing so!
If you have and it's old, please consider updating it to reflect the current state of the game! Thank you!
Discord
As always, if you have any bug reports, feature requests, feedback or just want to chat it up with over 1500 fellow Contagion VR: Outbreak Survivors and the developers, jump onto our Discord: https://discord.gg/monochrome
Twitch
Join Victor on Twitch, Hurricane Florence is out of the way, so he will be back at it daily! Watch live development streams: Provide feedback on the game, help shape the game in real-time by providing suggestions or ideas, or just ask questions!
https://www.twitch.tv/victorburgosgames