The end of the previous week was full of emotions. Not only we’ve miraculously delivered the Friday report on time (we deserve a medal, or at least a cake!), but we also informed you about something very important.

We’ve postponed the PC premiere of Chernobylite to a later date. Thanks to this, we’ve got more time to polish the game, translate it into more languages and add additional content, which was originally supposed to be released as DLC. Everything can be summed up by the slogan "bigger, better, stronger"!

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1016800/announcements/detail/3043838585268106022

We hope to present you the progress of our work soon. In the meantime, you can read this report, where you can find our talk with Igor Khymynyuk, who told us about his work on the game... Wait, what?!


Recently, we were proud to unveil the news about re-recording all the dialogue lines of key Chernobylite characters. We even showed it on the gameplay we recorded. The response was largely positive, for which we thank you. It’s great to see that players like what we’re doing. In case you’ve missed it, have a look now!

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1016800/announcements/detail/3043838585267170745

But this is not the end of surprises on our part. We decided to show you what the magic of voiceovers is all about. And who can do it better than a professional voice actor.

Meet Ian Russell - award-winning voice actor, audiobook narrator, and most importantly, British. It is his voice that accompanies us throughout the entire game of Chernobylite, because Ian plays the main role of Igor Khymynyuk.



Ian began his adventure with The Farm 51 almost two years ago. As he says, for him, it has been challenging but an enjoyable and rewarding one.
‘The horror/survival genre is one in which I have some experience (eg: Remothered-Broken Porcelain, The Haunting - yet to be released) so having been cast in Chernobylite I could tell, early on that it was going to be a wonderful project with which to attach my name. I loved the mystery, the atmosphere and the music’ says Ian.



His first contact with the game was during the early trailer in which he provided a Russian / Ukrainian accent.
‘I thought that would be my only input into the game. But as the months went by, I was asked to voice a second trailer with the Russian accent and then some early access trailers in my natural British accent. All as Igor, the main character in the game’ recalls Ian. ‘Then came the Beta work, in which I was asked to provide the game voice for Igor. I took this as a real honor. It was clear to me, following the progress of the game, that a great deal of thought, dedication and commitment had gone into the environment (mapping Chernobyl), the storyline and the characters. The scripts were also beautifully written and dramatic.

‘In the Beta, I also voiced many other characters including Tarakan (watch him - he is a bit unhinged!) and various British, Russian and American NPC’s. I think it was 23 characters in all. I wanted the voices to be sufficiently distinct that if a player is in an encounter with two or more of my characters that they would not immediately know it was the same voice actor. I feel that can become distracting and even irritating if two characters are interacting and they sound the same. As an established gaming voice, these are the challenges I relish.’



One of the most important questions we asked Ian was how he was preparing for the lead role, Igor. He admits that Igor's voice in the game is close to his natural voice.
‘This means I can focus on his personality and storyline, which have evolved through the Beta and into the final version of the game. I can’t really say what has and evolved because I don’t want to spoil, too much changed for the players that might read this!’

At this point, we are giving a very important piece of advice to anyone planning a career in voice acting: stay hydrated!
‘You can lose a lot of water during a session. My recording booth has 3-inch-thick walls and is lined inside and out with sound treatments (foam, felt and in the case of the one window quadruple glazing) It can get extremely hot! In fact, during one particularly energetic session (for Tarakan) I had to take a break to shower and change my clothes’ says Ian.



Often, actors are asked if they identify with the characters they play. We asked the same question to Ian who answered like this:
‘Igor is a unique person; he is intelligent and has some survival skills, but the characters he meets along the way can help him, or hinder him, depending on the choices he makes. It was important for me (and will be for a player) to understand his motives and his relationships with other characters in the game. I am indebted to Wojtek and Lucasz for their time and insight into the inner workings of Igor's mind. Indeed, outside of the hiring process, we connected for about an hour just to discuss and practice his voice and character’ says Ian. ‘With a large role like Igor, it’s important to ensure your performance remains consistent. Like any muscle, your voice and vocal chords get tired so we tried to spread the workload across several days and weeks and had our sessions at similar times of the day. We typically kept sessions to a maximum of 2 hours. For the final game I think we had 10-12 sessions’ he adds.

How does the voice over recording look from his perspective?
‘It was a very refreshing decision for Farm 51 to bring multiple Voice Actors into the session together, albeit remotely, allowing the dialogue to evolve organically and the characters to interact. I feel the performances will be better and more realistic for it. In most cases, Voice Actors record game characters in isolation and are therefore ‘performing’ the other person too. That will almost always be a different interpretation than the one given by the other actor, so working in pairs and threes will benefit the game experience.’



At this point, we have to pay attention to one thing - 2020 brought a global pandemic that made our work very difficult. Especially in terms of organizing recording sessions. Ian felt the effects of this as well.
‘I’ve committed a lot of time and effort to ensuring my recording environment is excellent for my clients and consequently was ahead of the curve when in early 2020 the pandemic hit’ he says. That is why it was important to organize work on your own and in the privacy of your home. ‘Suddenly game makers needed talent with home recording capabilities. I have, for several years, had a dedicated 6 'x 4' recording booth in which I work. The main impact of the Pandemic for me, has been my ability to carry on when others that needed to go to a remote studio, could not. It certainly made working with Farm 51 easier, avoiding the need to travel to a studio. That said, I do enjoy the opportunity to work in a studio where you don’t have to be concerned about recording levels and whether local Gardeners or my dog ​​might interfere with sessions.’

Of course, the work of a voice actor, like any other, involves various unexpected situations. One of them was attended by Iana's daughter herself.
‘Chernobylite has also been significant for me in a couple of other ways. In an enormously 'proud father' moment, I had a recording session with my daughter, who also plays a character in the game, and her character and Igor have a lengthy dialogue. I think performance was wonderful, and it was such a highlight to work with he’ he recalls. ‘There was one session in which we needed to record what we call 'effort sounds' Typically these will be sounds a character makes when they are hitting something, being hit, running, walking and so on. Igor had the honor of being the first character for whom I needed to record vomiting sounds. The sound engineer was delighted with my efforts describing them as 'world class' We all had a good laugh and I hope players who experience this part of the performance agree.’

At the end of the conversation, Ian has a message to you
‘I hope playing Chernobylite gives you as much pleasure as I had working on it.’



Take care, Stalkers!

Winter has come and is holding on. The climate gave way to us, so we’re trying to suggest to the team to add the snowman-building option to Chernobylite - from mud? From metal? From stones? Sky's the limit!.

Of course, we reckon with the fact that nothing will come out of it. As you know we’re currently not adding new stuff to the game, but we’re mainly focusing on polishing what is already in it. This means more or less that we are in the final phase. Plus, don't forget that we’re also preparing console versions.

A lot of work is still ahead of us, but it’s always getting us closer and closer. We hope you’ll enjoy this report thanks to which you will, traditionally, learn more about Chernobylite. By the way, at the end of it, we included a specific material about something you’ve been asking for a long time*.

Enjoy!
* no, it's not about "The Heist"

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1016800/announcements/detail/3043838585268106022

Speaking of the polishing mentioned at the beginning, let’s have a look at the water. For a long time we have been trying to reproduce the outside world in the Chernobylite as faithfully as possible. That's why we were a bit bothered that the water in the game was too ... cloudy.

It’s not that the water in Chernobyl is or isn’t of top quality - we didn't drink it or bathe in it, so we don't know that. It’s more about the fact that the water reflection effect did not fully meet our aesthetic expectations. It’s definitely too dark, and the water looked artificial in some places. In order to fix this, we've made some tricks in our editor thanks to which the reflections work smoothier, use less resources and, what’s important, reacts with light better.

You can see the effect on an example from Pripyat Port. Here's the water before the changes:




And here is the water after the changes:




Let's stay with the graphics. While improving collisions to map objects so that the game would work more optimally and take up less memory space, we found a few things that are worth showing to future 3D graphic designers.

This example was taken from working on a metal hatch. You can see in the picture below that it all starts with assembling the model. Maybe you can see some similarities to a game from childhood, when you cut out paper into certain shapes and assembled into a specific object (remember those sticky fingers thanks to a cheap glue?).



And here you can see the texture work. Note the differences in the appearance of the hatch before and after putting it into the game engine.



Traditionally, we fight with the significant bugs - the ones you ‘ve reported on Steam and on Discord. Thank you all for your support!

We don’t forget about small novelties that are to make the game more enjoyable. At this point, it’s worth informing that we’re finishing the work on the quick save prototype and we're also working on something nice for trophy hunters - the achievement system. :)



Of course, the picture for this achievement will change. We'll try to make sure it doesn't end up looking like the picture below.



We've been flooded with suggestions for some time now to fix this and that. A lot of these voices are about… well, voices.

You've talked about how they are a bit unnatural, stiff, maybe a bit superfluous and indistinct in places. The fact is, not all of the characters' voices sound as if we want them to. So we decided to re-record ALL lines. And not only that - we've also improved every line of dialogues in the game. The effect is satisfying... as you can see for yourself.

We’ve recently posted a video on our social media with a gameplay piece from a version of the game that is not yet available to you (but will be soon!). This way, we were able to show you how the characters' new, re-recorded lines sound like. You may notice that not only do the characters sound different, but they have also some lines changed in order to make things feel more natural.


Under normal circumstances, we would record voice-overs in a studio, as we did with Get Even. However, due to the pandemic it would be difficult and complicated to organize. So we decided to record online via Google Hangouts. Wojciech Rutkowski reveals the secrets of working in new conditions. - Our writer Łukasz was at each recording session and was responsible for leading the actors during the sessions. We recorded all dialogues between the main characters and Igor with two actors at once, so that the interactions between them in the dialogue sound natural. The actors recorded their lines in their home studios with professional microphones.

In our opinion, it turned out great! Let us know what you think!

By the way - you can see a new indicator on the linked video, which shows the direction from which the player is visible to the opponents. We wrote about him in one of the previous reports. We tried to make it more noticeable, but not too invasive at the same time.



Take care, Stalkers!

Since the Kickstarter campaign and the Early Access premiere in 2019, we’ve been constantly and openly showing you our work progress by updating the game (Mega Patches), by patching it (fixes, minor updates), by Weekly Reports and daily publications on our social media channels. The time has come to share something that deserves special attention.
Both are good, but some of you may have expected a bit of other information.

The first news is that despite the pandemics hitting the world pretty hard, we were developing the game right on the schedule (remember Roadmap?). But then again, we will have to wait for the final PC version until Q2 2021.

Why is that good news? Our plans have grown bigger. We have decided to hold the premiere and not to focus on delivering additional content AFTER the premiere - and the most crucial reason behind this decision is to be able to translate the game into more languages than we’ve previously promised. Thanks to cooperation with our publisher, All in! Games, the Chernobylite plot and interface will be additionally translated professionally into Italian, Chinese, Japanese and Portuguese. Besides that, all language versions were fully rewritten and polished (stylistics mostly). As for the voiceovers (English & Russian) - we’re re-recording them from scratch in a professional studio with professional voice actors.
Thanks to that, the overall experience coming from the game should become incomparably more exciting and immersive. Unfortunately, due to how big the game is (Chernobylite has multiple times more plot text lines than any of our previous titles), the process of adding and testing new translations is time-consuming and that’s the reason we won’t be able to finish and polish it in Q1 2021.
is that most of the team, which doesn’t take part in the translation “business,” will not sit idle and wait. We’ve promised you that Chernobylite will have our constant support and development, even after we leave Early Access, and we’re going to prove it again.

Moving premiere to Q2 2021, simultaneously, we’re creating new content and gameplay elements that previously were supposed to be published as DLCs. This means that the final version of Chernobylite will be bigger and filled with new content, which will enrich the experience and make playing it even more pleasurable. Among these additions, you’ll find a new location, new weapons, new enemies, extended cooperation with other in-game characters and tons of fixes in the existing mechanics and tools.

All of you who bought our game in Early Access or supported us during the Kickstarter campaign will get that new content completely free of charge and as a part of standard Chernobylite updates. The nearest MegaPatch will appear as planned (winter). Still, after it you can expect at least one additional content extension before the premiere - not to mention regular fixes and updates, which will appear whenever needed.

We’d also like to remind you that the console version of Chernobylite is under heavy development and it should be finished in the following months. The PC version premiere, which will be close to the console versions premiere, will not only allow us to make more buzz around Chernobylite and reach out to players that didn’t yet come across our game but also to continue the development of the project as after-the-premiere support (more DLCs and MegaPatches in the months following the premieres).
At the very end, we’d like to really thank you all for your support - we hear many kind words from you. We believe that you’ll understand the decision. Its goal is to provide our game with the best development possible.

Winter surprised us a lot this year. It was snowing (at least in Poland and few other countries). In mid-January! Who would have thought? ;)

Anyway, we sit in warm houses in comfortable slippers, with cups of cocoa in hand and pamper Chernobylite. As usual, you can read about the recent effects of our work in this report.

And since we talk about the weather, briefly one of the coolest solutions that will appear in the game. When you’re on any map, if there's fog, AI will see much less - meaning they’ll have a harder time noticing you. Downside? You’ll have a harder time spotting them too.

And the sound is also important while trying to find unexpected guests - if there’s rain, AI will be less aware about all the noises around. So we can say they will “hear” less things, like steps or even shooting (depending on the distance).

We want the game world to have an even greater impact on the player - that’s why we are tweaking the system. Also, it would be unfair (and not very realistic) if the opponent could boast of a falcon eye during the very limited visibility. You know, it’s not a strategy game with Fog of War which covers the map only for non-AI players.

Now that we're having such nice views, let's show you a trick. If we take three-dimensional models and transform them into two-dimensional textures, and then frame them in appropriate frames, we get some pretty cool photos. They almost resemble those taken out of a camera film.





The last major update of the Unreal Engine was a godsend for us and a great opportunity to fix this and that. For example, one of the annoyances of life was a bug causing the engine to crash when we wanted to change the name of one object in the editor. Imagine if you decided to change your dog's name, and it suddenly explodes. Annoying...

Looking at this from the player's side, we also made some adjustments. These include adding missing textures to your notes, fixing the never-ending growls after killing Borderers and Chernohosts, and fixing a bug where exploratory music was not triggering in some events. In fact, we're reworking the ENTIRE sound system in the game. We hope to show off the results soon.

Another bug was very scary, but fortunately it has been already fixed - after exiting the portal Chernohosts sometimes began to disappear, starting from the bottom! This error only occurred if Chernohost did not notice the player when exiting the portal.



Why was this happening? From the technical side, it looked like this: when exiting the portal, Chernohost gets information about the location of the portal and which direction its front is facing. Then, with the help of this information, we were able to make the part of the Chernohost behind the portal in the opposite direction to its front, transparent. This helps in "selling" the player the impression that chernohost is really exiting the portal.



The bug has been fixed and it also fixes another one - when the portal is in the building on the upper floor and the player is below it, he won't see the legs suddenly appearing from the ceiling when the monster above it exits the portal. Which was a little bit creepy too.

We also have something for the fans of the bush shown last week, as well as the rest of the vegetation in Chernobylite. We have updated our plant documentation so that Chernobylite maps can boast even more flora diversity.



Ok, now something extra for the fans of military technicalities and future (hopefully) game developers. We have added a few novelties to the game and we’ll gladly explain the functions of them and show you how the work on their creation has proceeded.

Thermovision
Thermovision was already a bit cluttered with the last mega-patch. Places where you can find weapons (which already have modifications) have been added to the game. However, some of you may have gotten into the situation where your gun had a thermal imager installed which hit the game prematurely and didn't work. Oops.

We are currently working on a solution to make the new toy distinguish enemies from the environment.



Rafał Ściblak, our junior technical and fx artist, will tell you more about it: - There is a special function in the Unreal Engine called the CustomDepth buffer to which you can assign objects. They are then rendered in a special image that includes only those objects that have been tagged. Thanks to this, it is easy to distinguish objects that interest us from the rest of the scene. Underneath is the CustomDepth buffer visualization. This buffer also contains information about the pixel depth of the object (which we will mention in a moment). The closer to the pixel the camera is, the whiter it gets.



The only thing left to do in the material is to "paint" the objects in this buffer in some color, for example yellow, and the rest of the scene with gray. Finally, add the terracture of the sight and voila - the thermal imaging effect is practically ready. Magic!

Scanner and translucent eyes/object elements
You will come across various improvements in the game, like scanners. One of them is detecting enemies through walls.

Again, Rafał will explain how they work: - To make this possible, a special material had to be created that would bypass the occlusion test in the motor. The occlusion test is used to check if an object is obstructed by another. The invisible part is then not rendered.

However, this introduces a small error, as seen in the image below - you can see soldier's eyeballs and all vertices that would not normally be displayed.



How to deal with this? The CustomDepth buffer comes to the rescue again. - This time the information about the pixel depth of the object was used. In this way, we can compare the depth of the currently visible pixel with the depth of the soldier's pixel - explains Rafał. If the soldier's pixel is deeper than the currently visible pixel, its visibility in the material is set to zero. This is how we created our own occlusion test. Problem solved!



Take care, Stalkers!

Welcome to the new (and hopefully much better) 2021! Refreshed? Full? Ready for new challenges? We certainly do! Immediately after returning from a well-deserved rest, we went to work at full speed. This year will be especially important for us with the upcoming game premiere, so keep your fingers crossed for us!, so keep your fingers crossed for us!

Although we must admit that even during the holidays, not everyone was idle - we used the break to update the Unreal Engine to the latest version 4.26. Thanks to this, the game will work better on PC, and it will also be possible to release it on new generation consoles with raytracing and not only!

In the meantime, we invite you to share some information about what we were working on before we fell into holiday lethargy.

Of course, as usual, there are fixes for the major and minor bugs you caught. However, something invisible is worth mentioning at the beginning too. You can’t see it, but you can definitely hear it. Yes, the in-game sound design fixes are incoming!

We have slightly improved the system of additional sounds of the main character's steps - now you can determine the probability of hearing these sounds for each type of surface on which Igor moves (e.g. branches breaking when he walks on a grass, or a piece of glass on a concrete pavement). We are also testing the sounds of walking on various types of rubbish inside buildings. Igor will be much more likely to hit trash/glass/paper along the way.

On top of that, we've also worked a bit on the system that suits Igor's breathing sounds best suited to him, as well as fine-tuning Igor's responses in the Moscow Eye and Red Forest events. We've also added missing sound effects to fill each event action. Plus, we've included the sounds of rain dripping in puddles.

All this will make the experience coming from the Zone even better (especially with headphones).

You often ask us if we will ever post anything related to The Heist - the last mission in the game that will make it all clear!

Seems that any news about The Heist would be currently much more interesting for you than the Chernobylite release date itself! You are so into your early access game that you want to know the finale as soon as possible. It's amazing and we love how much you feel connected with the story! It is also a sign that you liked the game a lot and want more. It makes us more than just happy.

Well, that day has finally come. It is finally time to answer this most pressing question. It's time to give you a little but long-awaited sneak peek from The Heist.

Are you ready?

Here it is!



Ladies and gentlemen, here is a bush. The bush you'll see in The Heist.

Of course, it’s a joke. Sorry for being so cold-blooded and savage with our “readbait”. But believe us, if a higher instance gave us the green light, we would show you much more. However, we agreed on that, we want to provide you with a fully developed end product and at the same time protect you from spoilers.

Give us time and you will not be disappointed. Meanwhile, we collect materials and wait for the aforementioned green light.

But in order not to leave you with anything, in the picture below you can see how we worked on such a detail as hair. With this little trick, we make them look more realistic than before.



Here is another thing worth mentioning. See what tangle of connections we have to go through in the editor so that the hair on the head and on the chin behaves naturally. At the same time, we must take care of their optimization so that the movement of even one little hair will not "crash" the game.



It is no coincidence that the beginning of the report is devoted to the accompanying sounds in the game. Why? Because today we want to introduce you to a man thanks to whom you can "hear" Chernobyl.

Adam Dyrszka deals with the complete sound design of Chernobylite (worth emphasizing: not music! We will write about it later). - I make sure that the game world is filled with sounds everywhere. For example, in the woods trees rustle in the wind, when a soldier walks towards us we hear stomping, when it rains - drops break against windows and windowsills, if something explodes your speakers should shake the whole house. Generally speaking, I do my best to never be too quiet during the game - says Adam.

As he admits, it is quite a challenge to add audio to such mysterious places as the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone and the Dead City. - It is easy to thicken the sound environment with chirping birds, flying planes, street noise and other human activity. However, we must remember that this place is dark, lifeless as we know it - he explains. - Apart from the supernatural phenomena characteristic of the game itself, where you can get carried away with fantasy, creating zone sounds takes hours of searching for references, listening to authentic recordings on the spot and then time-consuming testing plus correction. Honestly, looking at the end result I am quite surprised that we managed to get such a varied and interesting background based mainly on the noise of wind, leaves and various crackles - he adds.

The question is how are the sounds for Chernobylite designed? Well, first of all, you must be aware that when designing all kinds of sound effects, we try to create unique content, unique for this project. What does it mean? Where possible, we try to record our own sounds. It is especially important to create your own library of sounds for the characteristic elements of the project - says Adam. - It is best to show it on the example of the title green crystals and any anomalies associated with them. In the game, they make a high-pitched, sometimes squeaky glass noise. I needed something one-of-a-kind, so I borrowed the crystal vases from my grandmother, all she had actually. And then hit them for a few hours with various objects and "played" them with a cello bow.



Another important and at the same time the most characteristic element of our game are the lines spoken by the characters wearing gas masks. In order to achieve such an effect, it was impossible (especially during a pandemic) to invite voice actors to put on masks and speak through them into the microphone. This had to be approached differently. - Our solution was to create a proprietary effect using bandpass filtering. For this purpose, I used several different gas masks and a small speaker from the computer set. I "dressed" this loudspeaker in masks, and then generated a specific sound impulse that I caught with microphones. After running such a recording through the appropriate software, I got a database of some extremely realistic effects that are applied to the dialogues in real time inside the game - explains Adam.





Adam admits directly that recording and creating unique sounds is a great fun and gives a lot of scope to show off. However, not all sound effects can be achieved on their own (e.g. explosions or the noises of certain vehicles), especially with the limited time for project implementation. - That's why we use extensive libraries of very high-quality sounds that allow us to create multi-layered and effective SFXs - he says.

Take care, Stalkers!

Can you smell the scent in the air? It isn’t a gunpowder smell. Also, it isn’t an unpleasant smell from the depths of the cellar. Or even the weird-ish but interesting smell of incoming dangerous adventure! It is the sweet scent of the atmosphere of the coming Christmas!

Christmas dinner with the family. Christmas tree. Presents. Eggnog. GINGERBREADS!

On this occasion, The Farm 51 team goes for a short but well-deserved rest so this Report will be the only one for the next two weeks. There is still a lot of work ahead of us, so we need to gather some strength for what awaits us in the following weeks and months. And that’s why the whole Chernobylite team is taking some days off - to be with our families, friends, significant others, rest before the intense work awaiting in 2021. Remember we are working now to finish the PC version as well as to prepare current-gen and next-gen consoles versions!

We won’t leave you with empty hands, though - although the report is more modest than the previous ones, it is filled to the brim with materials that are not available on the Internet. We hope you will like them.

Before you continue scrolling, we want to wish you everything best for Christmas and we hope you’ll spend this time happy & healthy. Also, we’d like to wish you that the upcoming year will be better than this one. Which, fortunately, will soon be behind us.

We know that we have 3D modelling fans among our players. You liked our sketches and designs of characters and items that we throw into the world of Chernobylite. That is why we decided to show you other, much more interesting samples of our works.

Let's start decorating your home. Literally. In the photos below you can see how an ordinary block transforms into a dingy building from which plaster and paint are falling off.





In the next photos, you can see the end result - in the end, we managed to adjust the facade of the building to equally damaged rooms. In this case: the room and the kitchen.






This slogan may not sound encouraging, but believe us, this kind of small thing has a significant impact on the reception of the entire work. Plus, contrary to appearances, it is extremely laborious. You can see the effects of these works below.



To prove that "sculpting" such an object takes a lot of time, we attach the following photo showing the belt after disassembling it, like a cutout for children. The next step is to smooth the object to give it more realistic shapes.



The next step is texturing and viola! The belt looks as it should. The coat shown in the photo was created in a similar way.




We move from object to character. More specifically to the mighty Borderer. As you can see, all the fun with it begins with the basics, i.e. drawing a bare (from the technical side, but also literally in this case) silhouette.




As you can see, we took care of even the smallest details.

Even. The. Smallest.



A few “tweaks” had to be added. Effect? Frightening.




Once again: happy holidays, Stalkers!

Christmas is coming soon! For many of you, it's a time of rest, meeting your family (even virtual), and of course - gifts!

Before we go for a well-deserved rest ourselves, we still have a few things to do. More specifically, it is about introducing a lot of corrections and novelties to Chernobylite to make this Christmas more enjoyable for you.

We will also take this opportunity to show you what the work of a game tester in our company is all about. We hope that it will be not only interesting, but also informative - after all, everyone who wants to take the first step in the gaming industry usually starts this way (but not necessarily).

First, we decided to do a little cleanup with the UI. For this purpose, we removed the weapon statistics in the recycler and fixed them not working in the storage. We also got rid of a bug where the gas mask was still visible in Igor's hand after removing the gas mask (e.g. after being moved to the storage).

This isn’t new yet, but we have already started working on updating the note system. We’re testing many solutions that are not only pleasant to the eyes but also useful. This includes the ability to resize notes and keep background effects while viewing notes. There is a bit of it so we will discuss it for a while but we think it will be worth waiting for the final result.

A little mention of something big. While making some adjustments to the game, we also looked at probably one of the most essential elements of the game - maps. As you can see, the Moscow Eye map will be greatly enriched with additional elements, making it clearer and more convenient to use. It includes adding a few missing buildings, water sources, fences, and a clearer outline of the level boundaries.



Similar changes await for Pripyat Port….



...and Kopachi.



This point looks like a gaggle to feast your eyes a bit. However, this is actually one of the effects of our in-game fix work.

We fixed a minor problem that was bothering us a bit. Namely, we have reduced the "strength" of the lights on the building, so that they should not shine through the trees.



Additionally, we reduced their brightness a bit, so they blend in better with the background. We also added missing lights on the chimneys.



And how about minor and major improvements and news that you suggested to us? Among them there are:

• removed unnecessary fill after removing sharpen option in advanced video settings
  
• fixed the pop-up that sometimes went out of frame
  
• added the ability to select/deselect a marker on the map with LMB
  
• moved the shader viewmode to F6 key
  
• added hero breathing status while sprinting
  
• updated stats for items used by companions
  
• fixed the button icons on the map widget

And perhaps the most important change: added quick save and quick load under F5 / F8 keys.

F5 will now save the game in the quick save slot, while F8 will load the game directly from that slot. The quick save slot is also available in the load game menu.

Every week we provide you with a solid dose of information about what stage Chernobylite is at. Most of the reports are descriptions of bugs that have been caught in the game. Of course, a lot of your credit for that is. However, we cannot forget about our silent heroes as well.

Meet Sebastian Rojek, our game tester. It is he who spends every day catching and reporting every, even the smallest, error in the game. But since we have such a huge help from your side (meaning our players), he also tries to find the ones you’re reporting. All this so that we can provide you with a product free of defects (hopefully).



It is said that the tester's work is repetitive and can be tedious. However, as Sebastian says, he is lucky that he didn’t fall into a routine during this project. To some extent, thanks to you as well. - We are working on Early Access, which slightly increases the dynamics and the way we run the project. Of course, we have a work schedule that we stick to, but at the same time we have to respond to feedback and errors reported by the gaming community - he says. - My day looks completely different a few days after the megapatch was released, when we focus on community feedback, and completely different a few days before, where we are still struggling with defects in completely new aspects of the game.

What is the tester's working day like? The first thing to do is download the latest version of the game with the latest fixes. Sebastian admits that there were days when he could afford to fence the whole project to see if previously reported bugs were fixed, and then he focused on specific mechanics or other aspects of the game that needed improvement.

- Currently, the project is so large that the work must be divided and organized. We devote part of the day to player reports because it is a valuable source of knowledge about the bugs and problems they encounter. Later, depending on the situation, either I make sure that our colleagues from other departments' corrections have had the desired effect, or we check if any of the patches have broken other elements of the game, or we perform functional tests of new or changed game mechanics.



It's time to deal with one of the biggest myths in the industry: a tester's job is not just about playing games and flipping a lot of money! Sebastian admits that such an image often appears in the minds of people outside the industry, and also, unfortunately, in some people already working in gamedev. - My work is largely based on previously prepared test documentation, collected information about the progress of work from individual departments, prepared checklists and a lot of organizational work so that the time later used for testing brings the best possible results - he says.

Speaking of bug reporting, each report should contain both a general description of the problem and the most accurate information about the steps leading to it, where it occurs, attach a screenshot or a video file with a record of the error. - Sometimes these are simple things that require looking at a given place, sometimes they are much more difficult cases, the reproduction of which requires a very specific positioning or reproducing even several dozen steps. It would probably be more difficult, but we have the right tools to make our work easier. Yes, we have cheats - admits Sebastian without any shame.



Do the testers, like the rest of the team, face difficulties in their work? According to Sebastian, in this case it is better to talk about challenges than difficulties. And he adds that in testing work, you are a bit at the center of everything that happens in the project. - Some departments cooperate with each other only to a limited extent. The tester works with everyone. It checks functionality, sound, graphics, optimization, compliance with design, etc. - says Sebastian. - You have to be careful with work and organize it well, because chaos can sneak in very easily. It may sound funny, but you have to "test" different approaches and learn from "mistakes" - he adds.

Reported defect priorities are reflected from two reference points. The first is to influence the project as a product that needs to be completed and released, the second is Early Access and the people who buy and play Chernobylite all the time. - We have to keep both of these things in mind. The defect, which may be small in the scale of the project, can completely spoil the gameplay experience of people downloading the new patch from Steam - emphasizes Sebastian.

Coming back to the issue of cooperation between the tester and the team, it is worth paying attention to one more thing: there is a belief that developers treat testers as a necessary evil. Because they catch bugs that need to be patched, and this only extends the game production process. Sebastian recalls having dealt with such situations over the years. - In my experience of working on games, there have been a lot of people who could throw meat at the tester, and "you just spoil, you would do something useful" isn’t the worst that can be heard - he admits. At the same time, he points out that the defects found by testers are the result of a mistake made, for example, by a programmer or designer, and they are often sensitive to their work being "picked on".



According to Sebastian, the cooperation depends largely on the tester himself. - It can build an atmosphere of cooperation and a common goal or conflict and criticism of someone else's work. You have to be in the back of your head all the time that you talk to people who spend many hours on their contribution to the project, so it's best not to be guided by emotions, and only consider arguments and dry facts - he says.

Of course - as he points out - the tester should have his own opinion and be able to assess many things himself. At the same time, it should also be able to shift the weight of the conversation towards solving the problem and extinguishing a potential conflict, not its flare-up. - You have to be able to conduct a dialogue in which the end result is a better shape of the project. I think people who can't handle it will only get frustrated in this profession or the industry in general, because it works both ways - says Sebastian.

- For me, working at Chernobylite is very fun in this respect, because we are a small team, so these relationships are in many cases direct and intense. We managed to develop a good workflow quite quickly and it has a good impact on the project. A lot of us are enthusiasts and sometimes you have the impression that they approach more interesting reported defects with curiosity than anger - he emphasizes.


fot. PatHecke

Are there any unusual situations in this job, as in any other? Naturally. In fact, it is required that such happen. And it's even better if game tester causes it himself. Sebastian admits that imagination is important in this work. - Sometimes you need a flash of genius and sometimes you have to do really stupid things. I can still remember the look of Arthur Fojcik who asked me why I was shooting dead bodies shortly after I reported a bug where shooting soldiers' bodies in Chernobylite was generating extra loot.


Sebastian brings up one more anecdote that gives shivers down his back: - I used to think that a new event was added to the game that made the level pools full of blood. When I tried to find out what the event was it turned out to be a water display problem. Maybe that was the problem, maybe it was fixed and gone. For me, this will forever remain one of the darkest events in Chernobylite.



We ourselves regret that this "bug" has been fixed. :(

Take care, Stalkers!

We come to you with another portion of the news about what is squeaking in the grass! But not only...

We noticed that in the previous report you liked the story of Joanna from the Exclusion Zone very much. So we're continuing our little series of behind-the-scenes stories, bringing you tons of unpublished photos from your zone along the way. We hope you will like it this time as well.

Enjoy reading!

At the beginning we need to show off: Chernobylite was nominated for the CEEGA 2020 awards in the Technology and Visual Art categories And it was revealed just this week that we’ve won in the Technology category!



We don’t know exactly what particular aspects of the game draw the jury’s attention, but we’re definitely happy about it. Congratulations to the other nominees and winners! More awards are ahead of us (hopefully) :)

And now something for the eyes. In the pictures below you will see the step-by-step process of applying textures to a super heavy soldier.







Below - a comparison of Tatiana's hair before and after changing the hair material. As you can see, before the changes, Tatiana's hair was more… straw. Light corrections made the hair structure and appearance more natural and closer to reality.

Oh, and don't pay attention to what's going on behind Tatiana in the background. We don't know ourselves. :D



Here in the form of a little curiosity - how we work with the vegetation in the world of Chernobylite. As you can see, we try to reproduce the real trees and shrubs as much as possible, not only in terms of appearance and variety. You can see in the photo that we take care to maintain the proportions of the height of trees and shrubs compared to an adult person.



Once again, we want to unveil a little behind the scenes of work on Chernobylite. Because you liked the story of our graphic model Joasia, we asked Michał Mierzejewski, our 3D artist and photogrammetry specialist, to tell you what it is like to take pictures of the environment.

Michał has been to Chernobyl more than ten times. The first trip took place in 2015 - back then Michał was in the team behind the Chernobyl VR Project. - The first trip happened in November. It probably lasted around five days, but we didn't visit too much. I spent the most time in School no. 3 doing scans. We were in a group of six people, travelling in our own car, and we could be in the zone from dawn till dusk. The school, which we lit up with our lamps (we had our own generator), looked amazing. Then the "tourist" traffic was completely different - he recalls.



Michał is a bit interested in urban exploration (exploration of the usually invisible or inaccessible parts of human civilization) and he has a lot of fun taking pictures of such places. The Zone once was his Holy Grail - At first, this place was overwhelming with the number of stimuli, frames in the context of photography. Everything was interesting and the neck hurt from constantly looking around - he says.



The biggest breakthrough was the 5th or 6th trip when he got to know this place better and could slow down for a moment. Thanks to this, he was able to closely experience places he only looked at from a distance so far. - Maybe I didn’t see the whole Zone, but I’ve tried more than once, so it's hard to say what I liked the most. Our trips are always organized in small groups, sometimes 2-3 people, which additionally helps, because you are not accompanied by 20 tourists. I explored all the iconic places as well as the less known ones. But I was most impressed by the silence near Caffe Pripyat. It was overwhelming, you could literally hear the grass growing. Nowhere else have I "heard" such silence - says Michał.

The best thing about this job is that the team visited places that are usually very difficult to access. The photo below was taken from the side of the power plant, which is not normally available for “tourists”.



And another photo from the zone, this time after dark.



There are also unforgettable, even historical moments. - We got permission once to fly over the Power Plant, moments before the Ark covered the old sarcophagus. A walk around the entire site was also something extraordinary - recalls Michał.

So the important question is how to transfer a place that you actually saw with your own eyes to the game. The easiest way to answer it is that: during a photo session, thousands of photos of an object or room are taken. Imagine taking a few thousand photos of only one chair! Michał says directly and with disarming frankness: - My job is not exciting. I can spend hours in a given place and take photos. Of course, I also visit interesting places and that’s pretty cool. Thanks to this, my work isn’t limited to just sitting in the office and that’s good because those trips are always an adventure in a way.



He found out himself that trips can be an adventure in themselves many times. He had some scary experience in the hospital, wandering around with a small team in the underground corridors. - We were there completely alone. We’ve reached a cellar where irradiated clothes were thrown into (some of them gathered from the fireman that were dispatched to the Power Plant shortly after the explosion). Suddenly, madness happened - dosimeters and their alarms screamed... It was really something - recalls Michał.




This, of course, doesn’t mean that everything has to be smooth and successful - exploring the underground is sometimes dangerous. While exploring one of the buildings in search of a good cellar to scan, Michał had a small… accident. - I saw a spot where I could move down through the metal staircase. I moved slowly: 1... 2... 3... 4… 5 steps. Suddenly it felt the next stair was bending like it was made of rubber. In a split second, I grabbed the railing. It crumbled and the rest of it was left in my hands. I don’t know how, but I’ve managed to turn and started to run back. Every step bent, crumbled, and in the end, all of them fell into a black hole where I wanted to go.

Another extremely important element of the journey is meeting people. As Michał says, visiting the same abandoned buildings 100 times does not make such an impression then. - Suddenly people and their stories come to the fore. For example, that guy Ivan talked about the boar he kept in his shed. But there are also guides, all that atmosphere and animals - all those stray dogs, cats, a car-sized moose you encountered, or a fox that thinks it's a dog.



- The kindness of these people, their openness is indescribable. During one of our trips, we recorded one babushka and when she started to tell her story, the memories came back and she cried. It really moved us - adds Michał.



The end of the tour always means a lot of control. After all, you come back from the area irradiated to a greater or lesser extent. When leaving the zone, you must pass the dosimetry control twice through special gates. Even then, it's hard not to run into problems. - Once some guy in front was passing through the gate and it just “screamed”.

The guards stopped him, of course. They told him to clean his shoes with special doormats, as they were the source of the problem. He wiped them, walked through the gate... and it yelled again. So he didn’t have much choice and had to leave these shoes. From that point he had to walk just in his socks - describes Michał.

Take care, stalkers!

So we made it! We've reached our destination! Here is a round 50 report before your eyes! <celebrating_cat_funny_hat.gif>

We filled 49 previous reports with our sweat, blood and the tears (of joy) we shed during our struggle over Chernobylite. All this to provide you with the most polished game that we hope will give you a lot of fun.

As you may have also noticed, we’ve recently jumped into December. It means we're getting closer to the end. But that doesn't mean we've slowed down. In addition to fixing the bugs you report, we are working hard on the most crucial elements of our game (THE HEIST!), And we are also preparing Chernobylite for the raid on consoles of the current (yet) generation and the one that has just arrived. So there will be more things to come before the premiere.

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1016800/announcements/detail/2905347823303760277

That's it for the introduction. We invite you to read the 50th report, in which we also included some behind-the-scenes curiosities. ;)
For starters, traditionally about the major and minor changes and fixes we're working on to make playing Chernobylite fun, not a chore. Errors can be really diverse, and these sometimes never cease to surprise us.



Of these smaller fixes, it's worth mentioning that we’ve taken care of the disabling of save and load options in the pause menu (if the player didn't have any "daily saves"). We have also turned on the pause menu during the dialogue - thanks to this, when you have to leave the game unexpectedly for some time, you don’t have to worry about missing an important thread in the plot.

In addition, we’ve fixed investigation boards order when hints or notes were collected in a random order, removed the adrenaline tutorial once slow-motion option ended, made the active weapon hidden if it was moved to storage.

From the bigger things, we can say that we are working on some essential animations and effects in the game. Below, one example: the effect of destroying a black stalker shield.

In our editor:



In-game:


Here we want to show you the backstage of Chernobylite development. However, it will be something completely different from what you have seen recently. So get ready, because we have a little surprise for you that comes with it.



As you know, we went to the Exclusion Zone many times because of the project with our luggage stuffed with photographic and video equipment. It was the perfect opportunity to take a lot of photos and videos, which were later used to create the world of Chernobylite. The trips to Chernobyl also allowed us to create assets that serve as narrative elements. Including the most important ones, related to one of the key characters in the game.

Tatyana Amalieva is a very mysterious and ambiguous character that the player gets to know at the very beginning of the game. Igor Khymynuk's fiancée, who worked with him at the Chernobyl power plant, disappears on April 26, 1986, the day of the disaster. 30 years later, Igor travels back to the Zone to look for her.



To portray Tatiana, we needed a suitable place, some props (including clothes), and most importantly - a model. And so our graphic designer Joanna became Tatyana. It’s her character that you see at the very beginning of the game's intro. And she will be happy to tell you what it was like in the Exclusion Zone and about working as a model!

The first trip to the photo session took place in November 2017. The team spent a day in Sławutycz and two days in the Exclusion Zone. - It was a very intense time. Wake up early in the morning, pack costumes, equipment and travel by train to Chernobyl. I was very excited because I had never had the opportunity to pose in such a specific place before. It was a big challenge - says Joanna.



As she claims, from her first trip she remembers mostly the peace and silence, the unique atmosphere and mystery of this place. - The centre of Pripyat made the biggest impression on me. The Ghost Town, which had a population of around 50,000 inhabitants before the catastrophe. And now nature has taken over the power in this place.

The first location where photos were taken was the Duga radar. Unfortunately, the conditions were difficult and the weather was not favourable. - I was only wearing a summer dress. I've never felt so cold before - Joanna admits. Subsequent sessions and recordings took place, among others, in the centre of Pripyat, the Amusement Park, the City Hospital No. 126 in Pripyat, the Pripyat Café, and the Kindergarten in Kopachi. During these few years, the team managed to see a large part of the Exclusion Zone.



The trips were also an opportunity to bring a lot of anecdotes from there. In one of them, the heroine was Joanna, or rather Tatyana, played by her. - Two years ago, during the session at the Polesie Hotel, we heard the voices of coming tourists. We made a little joke. I was wearing Tatyana's ghost costume, I was holding a doll in my hand, I was throwing my hair over my face. I slowly started walking towards them. When they noticed me, their reaction was indescribable! You never know what is hiding in an abandoned city. ;)





- We travelled to Chernobyl every year, I was there 4 times. We’ve also planned a trip for this year, but… you know. 2020. The pandemic thwarted our plans. I hope that we will be able to return there in the future - she adds.

It's time to answer the question of what 3D scanning of a character looks like from the inside. This happened in the company using photogrammetry. - It's a very interesting experience to be surrounded by 114 cameras. The most difficult aspect is to keep the chosen pose for some time - says Joanna admits. And she adds: - I stopped in time as a 3D model! It is an amazing feeling and a souvenir for the future.



Did you like Joanna’s / Tatiana’s behind the scenes story? We have MUCH more like this coming, so let us know if you’d like to read about it!
Take care, stalkers!

Before we get to the heart of the agenda, we'd like to announce something important. Our game is voting for the Steam Awards! As Chernobylite was released in Early Access in October 2019 (over a year ago. Where did that time go...) we are starting a nomination for the award in the "Labor of Love" category. We bow down and ask you: if you've had fun playing our game so far - vote for Chernobylite!

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1016800/announcements/detail/2905347189776333118

And remember that by voting you earn a special Steam badge! If you want to have the highest tier of this badge, you have to write or update a review for one of the nominated games. Of course, we would love if you'd do this for Chernobylite <3



The game has changed much since we've started Early Access, so if you wrote us a review 6, even 12 months ago, Chernobylite is a totally better game now. So hop in, play, see for yourselves and tell us what you think about the current state of the development!

Ok, no more grovelling! Here come our weekly specs!
We will start the report with significant changes that may not be noticeable to the human eye, but are actually crucial to the smooth running of the game.

The problem that we want to solve is that the game lagged after showing a dozen saved games (or more) with all these elements at once. We are trying to work out a solution that will fix it - we have a few ideas on how to do it so we’re testing them right now. We decided to do a little reorganization of the new load game menu by reviewing the user interface, screenshots next to each save and metadata. Such as current level, current quest, save timestamp, playtime duration, etc.


By jcden77

In addition, we are working on other improvements, which, although they are minor, have a huge impact on the gameplay and on how much you’re enjoying the game. This includes improving interaction with very small objects - this is not the pixel hunt level of old point'n'click adventure games yet, but we would like to avoid it anyway.

Also fixing the sound of footsteps that did not work well in some places, and the marker placed by our comrades who were in the wrong places or a bug that made the traps react to dead bodies. In addition, there are also some grammatical errors in the dialogues that we and you picked up.

The list of these minor bugs is much larger, so expect the bigger list when the update (Hotfix) will arrive on Steam.


By svid.vp
Our favourite little devil, a.k.a. Chernohost, also didn’t escape our attention. And there is always room for improvement. ALWAYS, believe us. For example, sometimes this enemy happened to be invisible, like Bilbo Baggins after putting the One Ring on his finger. It’s hard to fight a group of Chernohosts, so imagine being attacked by… nothing. Or at least nothing visible.

Another bug was keeping Chernohost glued to us all the time. Literally! To say that it looked weird is not enough... Apart from that, we are increasing and widening these creatures’ view range and - most importantly - we are giving them the opportunity to aggro their comrades. In the group, Chernohosts are the strongest, so if one will see & attack you. And the rest will probably do the same.



Time for a visual-auditory experience. We are currently working on the sounds made by falling bullet scales. We want the sounds to reproduce the fall of the scales not only to the ground, but also to other surfaces, such as heavy metal, glass, crystal, deep water and shallow puddles. Again, this is important to us because we want to make the game as real as possible.

Though we couldn’t show you that today, as we can’t publish any videos in Steam News, we will prepare some behind the scenes in the next month. You’ll probably be quite surprised how we can produce such sounds ^^

Among the more important visual fixes, we are working on the extremely annoying scene where you meet Tarakan in Pripyat Port. Why “annoying”? Because it doesn't work the way it should! Due to this, the quest cannot be finished - it has as many as four endings, which already mixes the whole thing up.

As for the other things, on the screenshot below you can see that we are testing various solutions in the Farm that can help us solve the problem of bad display of objects from a greater distance.



We are also working on different versions of new game objects (in this case: trees). No textures at the moment.



And finally, a package of assets from almost all sides. Enjoy!



Take care, stalkers!