Friday the 13th players will be drowning in free updates very soon: there's a brand new map, a new Jason and smaller versions of current maps to facilitate faster rounds waiting in the wings.

IllFonic, developer of the asymmetric multiplayer slasher game, yesterday laid out its plans for the next wave of content without actually setting a date for when any of it will arrive. It was coy on details of the new map, only saying that it will arrive "sooner than you might think" and will be "ripped straight from the films". Interesting—any ideas? 

No unmasking of the new playable Jason either, we just know that he exists. 

There is more detail on the reworked maps, though. I like the idea: players will get smaller versions of Higgins, Packanack and Crystal Lake designed for a faster pace of play. So, perfect for those who find the current rounds too long, or simply want to switch it up. 

IllFonic is at pains to say it "didn’t simply shrink the maps and call it a day"—it's changed spawn and item locations, for example. They too are coming "soon".

There's free 'Emote DLC' incoming that will add eight emotes to help players communicate with their teammates. A thumbs up, saying no by waving your hands—the usual. (On a side note, I'm not 100% sure on where the line lies between free DLC and just, you know, a thing that's in the game. I don't know whether this will be downloaded automatically or you'll have to do it yourself. We'll have to wait and see.)

There's full patch notes for the next update in that Steam post as well, detailing bug fixes (plus a new site for reporting future bugs), map changes and gameplay tweaks.

I've saved the most expensive for last, because there's a $4 ($2 with a launch discount) DLC package called the Spring Break 1984 swimsuit clothing pack on the way. Expect bright bikinis and budgie smugglers. 

If you haven't played Friday the 13th yet and don't know if you should, then why not check out Tyler's review?

Most people who have watched slasher flicks like Friday the 13th have probably put together, in their heads, some idea of what they'd do if they were ever trapped and hunted by a psycho killer. In most cases, becoming a psycho killer themselves likely isn't part of the plan. But in the Friday the 13th videogame, it apparently is. 

"The biggest thing we’ve heard from our community with the game are issues pertaining to rampant team-killing that has unfortunately been abused by players on all platforms," publisher Gun Media said in a recent Reddit post. "While the mechanic’s intent is designed to promote life-or-death experiences into each and every game you play, the reality has turned into more of a Battle Royale scenario to a point our team feels a change needs to be made." 

That's right, instead of one maniac murderer and a host of victims, Friday the 13th is maniac murderers as far as the eye can see, one of whom just happens to be properly attired for the job. (And a little better at it.) Because of that, the developers are taking away your toys: The next patch will disable counselor team killing through the use of weapons, including the shotgun and machete, in public games. 

There will still be some ways for counselors to do harm to one another. Player-driven cars will still be able to run down and kill counselors (that actually wasn't possible in the beta, but it led to "abuse" by players who would simply stand in front of cars to keep them from moving), and bear traps set by counselors will still do damage to other counselors who step on them.   

"Our team believes that the ability to hurt other counselors is something that this game should have as it adds tension and requires players to make tough calls. However, we do not believe this should be a mechanic that is abused by players to the point where the vast majority of our current communications from fans are complaints of rampant/unwarranted team-killing/griefing/trolling," Gun Media said. "We will include this mechanic in private matches for now, with the hope of better options in the future." 

There's no word on when the update will go live, but the publisher said on Twitter that three new map variants designed "to promote faster-paced gameplay" are also on the way, as are eight new emotes. 

The many woes of Friday the 13th, from ongoing technical issues to fears that it's been abandoned, have been well documented and discussed. But in spite of its many travails, it turns out the game has actually been pretty successful: Wes Keltner, head of publisher Gun Media, recently told GamesIndustry that the Jason-goes-camping game has already sold more than 1.8 million copies. 

Keltner attributed part of the disconnect between the critical reception of Friday the 13th and its commercial success to his belief that influencers—that is, YouTubers and streamers—have a greater impact on game buyers than traditional media. "I think it's less about a mismatch and more about a complete upheaval of how consumers research and ultimately decide on purchasing a game. Metacritic scores used to be the lifeblood of games. For today's consumer, it's not as relevant," he said. 

"I think there are two reasons for this; Early Access and Content Creators. In my opinion, these are the two biggest disruptions in our industry, with Twitch probably being the biggest game changer. Five years ago publishers would be frantically hiring mock reviewers to try to get a good estimate of what their Metacritic score would be. Today, they have meetings where they ask the entire team: 'Does our game stream well?'" 

He also pointed out that many of the negative reviews and comments didn't take issue with the gameplay, but rather the performance and server issues—something we took note of in our review, which was on the whole quite positive. It's still far from perfect, but Keltner said the studio continues to work on it. 

"Our number one priority right now is stability and squashing bugs. That's what all of our engineers are focusing on. We've also nearly doubled our team size to help with this issue," he said. "But our content/art teams are free to work on new content, and that's what we've been doing. Players can expect new maps, characters, Easter eggs and other great updates in the near future." 

There was a ripple of panic among Friday the 13th players today when it came to light that developer Illfonic is working on a new project, a "multiplayer first-person zombie shooter set in a post-apocalyptic world" called Dead Alliance. In a statement posted on Reddit, however, studio CEO Chuck Brungardt said that stories about the game being abandoned are "100 percent not true," and explained that Dead Alliance isn't actually a new game at all. 

"Most major and independent studios have multiple teams working on multiple projects at the same time. This is critical for the survival of the studio, especially with the ups and downs with the game industry," Brungardt wrote. "Dead Alliance was started way before Friday the 13th: The Game. It was a co-development by Psyop Games and IllFonic then titled Moving Hazard. Psyop Games released Moving Hazard to Steam Early Access well over a year ago and it gained interest from Maximum Games for a console port." 

The Moving Hazard/Dead Alliance team has always been separate from the Friday the 13th team, he said, and in fact the Friday the 13th team has grown from about 20 people internally to 30. "We also have opened a second office that sole purpose is to support development of Friday the 13th: The Game. In addition we are continuing to staff up more team members for continued support of the game," he wrote. "So we assure you, continued support for Friday the 13th: The Game has not been abandoned, in fact, it’s quite the opposite." 

We actually spoke with Moving Hazard lead writer Christian Cantamessa about the game at PAX South in January 2016, and it hit Early Access a few months later. It's gone now, of course, but Dead Alliance sounds reasonably similar to what Moving Hazard promised: It's a multiplayer FPS in which zombies can be turned against opposing players. It's available for pre-purchase now for $25/£20/€25 on Steam, and slated to launch (in full, not Early Access) on August 29.