Deceive Inc: State of The Build (Post Closed Alpha)

Good afternoon agents,

With the closed alpha coming to a close we wanted to share some of the immediate takeaways the team has and is already working on. Please note that this is NOT an exhaustive list, and does not include everything that is and will be worked on. With that said, let’s dive in! To help you navigate everything, this brief is split up into the following sections: Gameplay, Bugs, and Etcetera.

Gameplay
Thanks to our alpha agents and their many styles, the team has learned much about the current balance of the game and is making adjustments to help reign in outliers and bring them back more in line. Areas where the gameplay loop wasn’t as focused are also being touched up to encourage more healthy gameplay.

• Many agents are being looked at for balance. This includes adjusting their weapons performance as well as passive and expertise abilities.
  • A few highlights:
    • The high TTK of several of the scoundrel weapons has been noted and is being worked on
    • The low TTK of Hans and the dominating nature of his current slow is also being addressed

  
  
• Guards have made their way to the training room and their aim is improving, making them something agents will need to consider more
  
• The Briefcase will now drain intel faster when scanning for rival agents
  • Work is also being done to make it more noticeable to rival agents that they have been picked up by this scan

• The guards and staff have done a sweep of the place, and excess ammo and food are now a bit harder to find
  • This will have a greater impact on smaller missions such as Silver Reef

• Field upgrades that are underperforming are being adjusted
  • A few highlights:
    • Extraction Scanner is being looked at for additional benefits to make it a more viable option

  
  
• A new mechanic is being designed to make camping in the final objective room less desirable
  
• The Tripwire gadget is being made a bit larger so agents who look around more easily understand why their cover was blown
  

Bugs
This round of testing highlighted some key frustrations when systems did not work as intended to agents in the field. Where needed the QA team is digging in to reproduce and document as work continues to resolve these bugs and more.

• Fixes are happening to make melee hit registration more reliable
• Work is happening to determine the cause of newly noticed performance issues with servers believed to be behind some of the hit registration issues agents experienced
• Investigating Lobby Timers not shortening to 30 seconds once full
• Addressing Agent settings resetting between matches
• Investigating matchmaking and party invitation failures
• Addressing issues with the Bounce Mat gadget

Etcetera
Items outside the direct game loop are also being adjusted to help improve the experience for Agents.

• XP gain from defeats is being adjusted and should be more rewarding the longer you are in the game
• Shortening overall Lobby timer
• UI Improvements
  • The party invite notifications are being improved to be more noticeable
  • The end of match screens should be smoother for agents knocked out before the extraction
  • The Settings/Options menu is being reworked
  • Improvements to the item unlock, buying and and case opening scenes

• Engine/Performance
  • The team is continuing to optimize the game for all supported hardware and platforms

And the team is continuing to look into other feedback and reported issues from our alpha agents including:

• Mouse Sensitivity
• Additional requested settings
• And of course crash reports

To the agents that helped us with this alpha test, we can’t thank you enough. Please keep letting us know what you think and any bugs you encountered via Discord and the Forums. We hope to be able to share more details about your next mission: Beta Testing in the near future!