It’s time for another Roadmap update, as well as more detailed info on Update 21!

We’ve redesigned the Roadmap to better reflect the reality we are working in - which is that, generally, the only thing we’ve planned in detail is the next Update (in this case Update 21). To illustrate this, we decided to jumble the future updates we know we want into one big box rather than attempt to lock down specifics. The way we look at the Roadmap internally is more like a weather forecast than a solid plan - we have some inkling of what’s going to happen next, but the further ahead, the more uncertain the specifics become. We also chose to remove the “And then maybe…” box, since it muddied the discussion. Those features are in no way gone from our minds or our backlog, but they are not part of the immediate update schedule. We’ll continue to keep a watchful eye out for wants and dreams voiced in the community, of course.

Our hope for this Roadmap is two-fold: We want to provide as much insight into the foreseeable future of DRG’s development as we can, while still allowing us to be flexible and agile without breaking too many promises.

As you might be able to see, we’ve also made some changes to our priorities. Most of the recent updates have focused primarily on introducing new systems into the game - upgrades, new weapons, Assignments, etc. While these have done wonders for the game in terms of retention and the overall game loop, we want to focus a bit more on cave content going forward - that is, the things that actually go into the caves and provide the bulk of the game experience.

Adding new enemies is an example of this. But so are new mission types, new types of cave rooms and improvements to our cave generation, random mission events, boss battles, new biomes, and new weird stuff to encounter in general. Our initial hope was to work on these while we developed the essential background- and meta-systems, but as our scope and staff (up from 6 to 20!) has grown, so has our ambitions, and that means two things: We can and want to deliver better and more ambitious stuff, but those things take longer to finish and get right. An example of this is Daily Adventures - a feature we definitely want, but which has been delayed several times now, because we simply did not have the overhead to get it right. And we want to get this right because we want it to be awesome, but that also means we can’t promise precisely when it will be ready.



As of writing, the target date for Update 21 is the 6th of February. If all goes well, the Experimental Branch should go up very soon, perhaps even next week. Watch this space for further information.

Difficulty 2.0
This is the flagpole feature of Update 21 and is more or less a full rework of how we handle Difficulty in the game. Initially, this was supposed to just be a new Difficulty - Hazard 5 - but as we dug deeper, we realized we had a lot of untapped potential here that we could utilize better - as well as some critical bugs to fix! So - in short, this is basically a complete revamp of global difficulty balance, which will likely have a fairly profound impact on the game experience. To this end, we want to mobilize as many of you as we can to give us feedback. If anything sticks out to you as too hard, too easy, or just plain weird or wrong, let us know. This is just a first implementation of the system and will be continuously tweaked as we move along.

New Enemies
We’ve been hard at work at a bunch of new enemies, and the first few will go in with Update 21. The exact number depends on the final testing phases, but expect two, perhaps three new enemy types. These are all new enemies, with their own models, animations, sound, AI behavior, and gameplay impact.

More Modifications
As a follow-up to Update 19, we are working on adding Modifications (upgrades) to the rest of the gear (traversal tools, grenades, armors, pickaxes, etc). We’re aiming to pack most of these into Update 21, with the last few stragglers arriving in Update 21.5 a bit later.

Weapon Mastery
This is a new feature aimed mainly at all the completionists out there, but everyone should be able to get a tasty piece of this pie pretty easily. As you unlock Mods for a given piece of gear, your Weapon Mastery bar for that piece of gear goes up, and at certain intervals, you will be given a prize. This system is not necessarily done and may be expanded on later, but for now, it will get you your first taste of our brand new Skins system - new color schemes for your gear. The Skins system is still pretty early in development, but we have lovely plans to expand on this later.

Finally, Update 21 will also introduce some a few new pieces of headwear to unlock and a few new types of flora for the caves. There’s also a handful of sexy UI enhancements, such as an enhanced mission overview while on the Space Rig, and an all new and more intuitive Health Bar system for enemies.



On February 28th, it has been a full year since Deep Rock Galactic hit Early Access, and we have a lot to celebrate! It’s been a crazy ride, with more than half a million copies sold, and a level of reception for the game we hadn’t even dared to hope for. It’s going to be party time on the Space Rig once more, and we plan to run events in the community, provide developer streams, and do everything we can to make this an event to remember. We’ll also add some new goodies to the Supporter Upgrade, just to show how grateful we are for your continued support of the development. Current owners of the Supporter Upgrade obviously get this for free.



A bit further into the future comes the next Updates - 22 to 24 - and there’s not that much to say about them just yet. The Roadmap should give you some indication of what the planned focus for them is going to be, and we’ll have more to say on it soon.

Until then,

ROCK AND STONE
From Ghost Ship Games

Happy New Year, Miners!

We have had a blast working on Deep Rock Galactic in 2018 and we are far from done yet! Thank you all for being part of what we think is the best community in the Galaxy - You are awesome, and we hope you will continue to follow us and the game’s development in 2019.

All the best wishes,
The Ghost Ship Team



UPDATE 20.1
----------------------------
The holidays have come and gone and all the seasonal stuff has been put away! We have fixed some crash bugs and you can now rebind controls to ‘P’. Otherwise, it is very much the same as update 20.

• Fixed an issue where waves would continually spawn if an Egg was freed while a wave was active in Egg Hunt mission

Happy Holidays Miners!

X-MAS has come to Hoxxes and we are bringing you a gift just in time for the Holidays! Furthermore, we’re happy to announce that it’s not a soft one! Actually, it’s loaded with HARD mods for Bosco, a Medibay, Revamped Weapon Models and a gazillion other cool features!

All the best wishes,
The Ghost Ship Team!

--- PATCH NOTES ---

Do you need Bosco to be a Medi Drone or a Killing Machine? Now it is all up to you!

Similarly to weapons, Bosco has access to mods that can be bought and equipped. These mods will let you customize the drone using some of the existing parameters like for example number of revives or weapon damage, but we are also introducing a special secondary fire. Once the mod is active, the player can point with the Terrain Scanner and press [RIGHT MOUSE BUTTON] or (LEFT TRIGGER) and Bosco will fire a rocket at the target.

When you and your teammates fail a mission, you will afterwards wake up in the Medibay. Fight Together, Fail Together!

All the old weapon have been getting a graphical overhaul and should be on par with the new ones. For those who think looks are more important than substance!

We couldn’t help our self and had to dress up the Space rig for the holidays. You can also buy a limited headgear and play Santa with your friends. Please don’t destroy the decoration!

On order from Management new recruits no longer have direct access to the Mineral Trade Terminal. Access is now granted by proving yourself worthy on completing an assignment! Besides getting access to the Trade Terminal, players will be rewarded with 50 Croppa and 40 Jadiz upon completion.

You can now restore your savegame from the Options Menu. This is just extra safety measures in the unlikely event that you should lose your save data. Management refuses this has ever happened though!

• Base damage increased.
  
• Supercharged Feed Mechanism mod rate of fire reduced, Bigger Pellets mod damage increased
  
• Base damage increased. Supercharged Feed Mechanism mod rate of fire reduced.
  
• Bigger Pellets mod damage increased
  
• Base reload time reduced from 2.3 to 2.0

• Tweaked Flamethrower Sticky Flames upgrades to be better balanced against direct burning of targets.

• Killing enemies with sticky flame and setting them on fire should now correctly reward a kill
  
• Fix sawed-off shotgun would always auto reload even if you did not have the perk equipped
  
• Fix dual pistol animation in loadout terminal
  
• New weapon sounds added
  
• Added new Mission control speaks for all weapon and promotion assignments
  
• Updated Weapon icons: Combat Shotgun, Pistol, Revolver
  
• Fixed m1000 does not reset zoom if reloading with full clip
  
• Fixed Dual Pistols fire animation could get stuck after revive
  
• Fixed Burst fire pistol would keep firing if changing weapons during a burst
  
• “Stagger” has been renamed to “Stun” since it caused some confusion.

• Removed flickering monitors from mission select
  
• Fixed Accessory Yes/No popup not responding to controller shortcuts
  
• Fixed Space Rig UI issue when changing character
  
• Improved late join flow - you can now select your character before the level loads and a - back button has been added.
  
• Fix crash related to walking on ice.
  
• Fix join in progress crash
  
• Fix late-join crash
  
• Fix crash related to freezing
  
• Fix crash when joining game
  
• Fix magma maggot not doing any damage
  
• Fixed Lava geyser doing 0 damage on explode
  
• Dreadnought can spawn more enemies
  
• Fix Jittery Revive for clients
  
• Improve Spawning on enemies feedback
  
• Improve exploder logic when about to explode and you headshot or freeze it.
  
• Fix some enemies can catch fire if they walk upon the mining platform in point extraction
  
• Fix Air and Lava geyser bubbling sound staying around after getting destroyed
  
• Kick animation added to third person characters. Barrel kicking has never been more realistic!

• Build 22056: https://steamcommunity.com/app/548430/discussions/9/3315110799623471318/

• Fix Trade Terminal Crash
  
• Save games restore will only use the Branch your playing on

• Save Game Restore message should no longer appear in levels
  
• Fixed a bug where Save game Restore counted promotions incorrectly, when determining if a save was newer

Hello, Miners!

Our surveys have told us for a long time that you wanted deeper character progression and a choice of loadout. We didn't anticipate just how much you guys wanted it!

This quickly became clear to us, though - as Update 19 went live, we saw a huge increase in concurrent players, reaching a peak we haven't reached in the last 9 months! That's beyond awesome, and it makes the extra effort we put into Update 19 feel very much worth it. You guys continue to humble and amaze us. :)

While that's all good, it did have some consequences for the roadmap. The wake of Update 19 can still be felt in the office, as we're right now hard at work getting ALL the existing gear and tools to work with the new Upgrade / Mod system, as well as finishing up the graphical overhaul for the remaining old models. So, to allow us to get this properly finished, we've had to push the next updates a bit. The revised Roadmap image above illustrates this, as well as several other additions/tweaks.

"Daily Adventures" needs a special mention here, as we have pushed this feature several times already. This is the last of the big, system-changing features in the currently scheduled roadmap (so not counting the Then-Maybe section) and we want to get it right rather than rushing the release of it. On top of that, the extra time is also extremely valuable to us in that it allows us to gather a lot more data and feedback on the recently added Assignment, Promotion and Weapon Modification systems.

Later today, Experimental Build for Update 20 should go live, and we expect Update 20 to release early next week - hopefully Tuesday the 18th, just in time for the Holidays.

Rock and Stone!

Thank you all for the feedback on Update 19 and especially for the weapon upgrade/ modifications.

As expected it’s been very hard for us to fully balance Update 19 and make it 100% bugfree. With this hotfix, we’ve fixed most of the upgrades that were broken (Grappling Hook is the only known one still lacking). We’ve also seen some comments on performance issues. We think it could be related to the introduction of videos on the character selection screen and those videos have for now been disabled for when you late-join a game.

We’ve seen some people being confused about the refund given based on the changes we’ve made to the upgrade system. Let me emphasize that you’re being refunded with all the credits and resources you’ve spent on buying weapon upgrades in the old system and that you should be able to re-upgrade the weapons to their previous state after the refund. However, since we’ve greatly expanded on the number of available upgrades (modifications) you cannot just unlock them all with the credits and resources you got refunded.

The new modification system is not just a rework but more an expansion of the previous system. If you had a fully upgraded weapon before, after the refund you should be able to reach a very similar state (perhaps even buy some extra modifications). A fully upgraded weapon from before Update 19 should be quite similar to a weapon in which one modification has been bought in every tier of the new system.

With Weapon Modifications, we aim to create a much deeper system that allows players to make interesting choices while they level up and to customize their loadout to suit their playstyle.

Again thank you all for the feedback, it really helps us make a better game!

Hope it all makes sense :-)

Patch notes:

• Upgrade UI tweak
  
• Fixed issue with yes/no upgrade prompt
  
• Overheat particle position tweak
  
• Shield generator audio
  
• Breach Cutter stats added
  
• "Warthog" Auto 210 first tier upgrades fo Clip Size and Fire Rate values increased
  
• Fix Pickaxe Damage upgrades
  
• Plasma Charger's area effect doesn't cause friendly damage anymore
  
• “Warthog" Auto 210 base recoil reduced
  
• Fixed ammo widget crash
  
• Following spelling/ naming errors have been fixed: M1000 -minus "bolt action" in assignment terminal + Retirement fixed to promote in perk unlock + Patch notes updated
  
• Fixed unequip crash
  
• Fixed campaign mission stats not counting
  
• Video now only shows on terminal
  
• Fix for Breach Cutter set deploy time for line
  
• Fix late join crash
  
• Fix a bunch of upgrades and stats
  
• Dynamic Lightning material optimized and consolidated
  
• "Lead Storm" Powered Minigun effectivity of the modification Cold As The Grave reduced
  
• Remove footstep particles on spacerig
  
• Shield generator sounds updated
  
• Fixed black screen when completing a level with a downed teammate

Changelist

• Fix for completed campaigns not being counted correctly
  
• Remove disable optimization
  
• Weapon Modifications can now be unequipped
  
• Make terrain scanner zoom speed a little higher
  
• After the first promotion of a character, all assignments can be taken at any level.
  
• Grappling hook stats added
  
• Attempt to fix crash when joining when the game is shutting down
  
• Autocannon's accuracy modification is now a 30% improvement to the base value
  
• Breach Cutter modification Flying Nightmare, damage reduced.
  
• Bombers now deal damage with their projectiles again
  
• Fixed Plasma Charger overheat particles would never go away
  
• Fix flamethrower could not burn spider webs.
  
• Tweak Det pack model size
  
• Updated weapon images for the assignments board-terminal
  
• Added Gunsling and reload first person and third person animations to the Grappling Hook.
  
• Foley sounds added to new dance moves
  
• Added third person sawed-off shotgun reload
  
• Rename Armor Penetration to Armor Break to be more clear
  
• Cobweb shader can burn
  
• More Croppa is spawning in magma caves
  
• Fix Error Cubes being affected by hazard level. You should never be able to get more than 1 from a map.
  
• Attempt to fix Dual Pistols being visible at the start of a mission
  
• The level requirements in assignment terminal will now be red if they are not met
  
• Hide weapon when a dwarf is taken by cave leech
  
• Fixed headlights being turned off when approaching escape pod
  
• Fix m1000 stays zoomed in if changing weapon while in focus
  
• Fix flamethrower particle FX can sometimes break

Changelist

• Fixed spelling errors
  
• Plasma Charger normal shot friendly fire greatly reduced
  
• Fix sound issues if you deposited an egg too soon after it was dug out
  
• Fixed Minigun and other fast firing weapons could do reduced or no damage at sub 30 fps.
  
• Fix burst pistol, burst damage bonus mod. Add missing burst pistol stats
  
• Fix crash when latejoining
  
• Pickaxe can once again help unfreeze your fellow dwarves
  
• Fixed laser pointer couldn’t point at gunners shield and radioactive crystal damage zone
  
• Player and character progress updated correctly on all terminals
  
• Changed Voice Volume options name to be more clear
  
• Assault rifle: Base accuracy improved. Floating Barrel mod accuracy, Increase value increased. Gyro Stabilisation mod description expanded.
  
• Fix last grenade warning triggering always for scout and that it did not trigger for other characters
  
• Fix inconsistencies with how many minerals are in your stash and cost of items. (Stash would round up, but the check if you could afford would fail because it did not)
  
• Fixed Equipment Upgrades, Bought missionstat not counting + savegame fixup
  
• Fix Minigun not doing damage when at max stabilization and not having the mod that tweaks that installed
  
• Fixed 'Assignment Complete' window not closing when countdown is finished

Weapon Modifications repricing
We have repriced most Weapon Modifications to create a more satisfying character progression. The previous implementation was slower than what we intended, especially taking into account that more purchasable modifications for tools and gear will be added in the future.

For those who bought modifications after Update 19, the difference between the old and the new price will be refunded.

Tweaks

• Revolver: Floating Barrel mod improved
  
• BRT7 Burst Fire Gun: Base recoil reduced

We got a fat, new update coming your way - this time with a massive upgrade to your armory, improvements to the upgrade system and an overhaul of the retirement system! Read all about it below! Lock n’ Load!

Update 19 Trailer
https://youtu.be/wDurNPFhaiE


DRG is happy to inform you that we’ve expanded on our list of suppliers, and a new, larger catalog of armaments has been made available! In order to obtain licenses for the new gear, you will need to complete Weapon Assignments. When a license has been obtained, you will be allowed to purchase access to the weapon in question. The following new weapons are now available:

NEW WEAPONS: GUNNER
----------------------------

• "THUNDERHEAD" HEAVY AUTOCANNON: A peculiar but devastating weapon. The slow rate of fire is made up for by heavy damage, delivered with glee by the belt-fed .50-caliber tungsten rounds. The Thunderhead is a somber weapon for the sophisticated executioner, delivering death as inexorably as the passage of time itself.
  
• BRT7 BURST FIRE GUN: More precise than an SMG, with the stopping power of a small shotgun, the BRT (or "Burt", as it's sometimes called) is highly prized among collectors and connoisseurs alike.

NEW WEAPONS: SCOUT
----------------------------

• M1000 CLASSIC: The original design for the M1000-pattern DRG-issue precision rifle goes back hundreds of years, practically unchanged. High damage, respectable fire rate...and that "Ping". A prime example of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".
  
• ZHUKOV NUK17: Never sophisticated, but never disappointing either. The NUK family of twinned micro SMGs has a long and treasured track record, yet Those In The Know generally agree that the 17 is among the very best.

NEW WEAPONS: ENGINEER
----------------------------

• "STUBBY" VOLTAIC SMG: So what's better than an SMG? An SMG that fires ELECTRIC BULLETS! The boys in R&D have wired a prototype ArcGen into the guts of this trusty Subata 312, meaning it now unleashes a storm of electrified DEATH! Word of warning: Keep away from water.
  
• BREACH CUTTER: The Breach Cutter releases directional blasts of sonically-charged plasma powerful enough to deal with most any alien in your path. Originally a mining tool, it's now been frequency-tuned to crack open flesh and bone rather than the sediment deposits it was designed for - often with quite spectacular results!

NEW WEAPONS: DRILLER
----------------------------

• CRYO CANNON: Mad geniuses have tried perfecting this implement for as long as anyone can remember, but our lads at R&D seem to have perfected it! Handily portable (for a dwarf, anyway), it does exactly what you think: It's a friggin' freeze ray. Let 'em have it.
  
• EXPERIMENTAL PLASMA CHARGER: Bullets are so last year. Instead, why not incinerate your enemies from the inside out with a highly experimental anti-matter-powered gun firing supercharged plasma bolts? What's the worst that could happen? (If you find out, please report to R&D).

The Weapon Upgrade System has been scrapped in favor of a brand new Weapon Modification System, and each weapon can now be customized and tweaked to your individual tastes! More than 200 new Weapon Mods have been introduced, a lot of them consisting of entirely new features. For example, “Blow-through” is now a thing - fire bullets straight through an enemy to hit enemies behind it! Or how about “Fear” - send enemies into a fleeing panic by sheer brunt of your firepower!

For this round of upgrades, the new system has been implemented for all new and old weapons, but it is not yet implemented on tools, grenades, and armors. This will happen with future updates.

Also, no more static still-pictures of gear on the upgrade screen - we’ve finally gotten a proper and rotatable 3D model viewer implemented!

KNOWN ISSUE: All non-weapon Mods are currently NOT showing the change in the UI stats.

All vanity items and weapon upgrades have been repriced! You’ll keep any vanity items already unlocked. All weapon upgrades have been refunded, leaving you open to explore the new system at leisure.

The Retirement system has received a fairly significant overhaul. The changes are as follows:

• “Retirement” has been rephrased to “Promotion” instead.
  
• The level cap for each dwarf has been raised from 20 to 25
  
• The last mission in a Promotion Qualification Assignment is no longer a forced solo mission
  
• Promoting your dwarf no longer takes any progress away from you! Yes, you read correctly - all weapon upgrades carry over! The only thing that resets is your character’s level
  
• You still have to clear your debt to DRG before getting a promotion
  
• Titles for player ranks have been extended to player rank 75 and a lot of new titles have been added

The Gunner has swapped his DET PACK for a SHIELD GENERATOR. It creates a force field that keeps the bugs at bay and protects everyone inside it. We got a quick comment from the gunner: “To be honest, sharing gear with Drill-boy ain’t for me, so I called in a favor with the eggheads up in R&D to make me something special - and they came back with a friggin’ Shield Generator! Now I can safely stand my ground while killing bugs galore! Good times!”

Digging an egg free in Egghunts now has a chance of spawning a group of angry bugs. The number of eggs you need to collect have been increased a bit.

TODAY’S SPECIAL: A Randomly chosen buffed beer will be available for purchase each “day” (it updates when the mission map gets new missions). Also, the buffs are actually working now! :-)

With the Terrain Scanner active, hit [SPACE] / (X) to spin your character around to face in the direction of the map.

Once in a while you can now run into pure waves of Praetorians, Macteras, Glyphid Warriors or Swarmers. Whether these waves are harder or easier than normal waves is for you to figure out.

• NEW ENEMY - THE GLYPHID VETERAN WARRIOR: The Veteran has 50% more health and much stronger armor than a normal Glyphid Warrior.
  
• Glyphid Praetorians have been to the gym! Their health has been buffed by 50% and they’re less susceptible to being shot in the head than before - getting behind them and shooting them in their big fat butts is now much more important.
  
• Sound has been added to Exploder footsteps. Listen carefully and you can hear them sneak up upon you!
  
• Removed fire particle effect when other enemies are hit by the Praetorians Acid Spray. It was not supposed to be there and was causing a significant frame drop.
  
• Tweaked the number of enemies spawning for 2-player games down a bit for Hazard 2 and 3.

• Small Character Videos added to the Character Selection Screen to give a quick impression of the different classes.
  
• Hints on the loading screen have been updated with 3 new hints for Milestones and Perks, The Terrain Scanner and Mision Mutators.
  
• Added some more motivational quotes for screens in Space rig.
  
• Bosco now determines the angle of which to dig tunnels in dirt from the players face, rather than their feet, to the point they pointed at. This should result in more expected results, especially when standing close to the dirt
  
• Damage multipliers on Physical materials changed to be on the physical material
  
• When someone late-joins your game, there is a grace period where their friendly fire is reduced so they deal significantly less damage to you and your teammates.
  
• Fixed Abyss Bar menu not closing correctly when pressing ESC
  
• Changed Acid symbol to Biohazard / Poison symbol.
  
• Better flare overdraw prevention
  
• Flares now cast shadows!
  
• Grenade Launcher grenades are much more visible while in the air.
  
• Purchase Item UI now show all required resources
  
• Heat cooldown on Minigun tweaked
  
• Mactera Spawn should now rotate correctly when shooting
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Bosco to abort his light task as soon as there were any enemies near the player
  
• Made Praetorians burn a bit later
  
• Memorial screen no longer stacks up names to spawn and spams them all at once if framerate is low

• Build 20912: https://steamcommunity.com/app/548430/discussions/9/1744478429673146548/
  
• Build 21008: https://steamcommunity.com/app/548430/discussions/9/1744478429677232873/
  
• Build 21061: https://steamcommunity.com/app/548430/discussions/9/1744478429680810765/
  
• Build 21130: https://steamcommunity.com/app/548430/discussions/9/1744478429692210372/
  
• Build 21231: https://steamcommunity.com/app/548430/discussions/9/1744478429696143659/
  
• Build 21295: https://steamcommunity.com/app/548430/discussions/9/1744479063986434899/

We're in Early Access, the game is being developed in chunks, with the help of your feedback, and we sometimes need to go back and rebalance stuff, while trying to avoid progress wipes. This will be easier for some updates, harder for others, but our goal here remains to make a kick-ass co-op game with dwarves. Now, onto the meat of this post:


In this post, I want to explain some of the challenges we are facing when balancing a live game. For players, and sometimes ourselves, it can be easy to forget that we are in Early Access. In a way, we are very flattered by this misconception, and we see it as a testimony to the stability and polish we try to apply to everything we do.

But Early Access is still the reality, and the majority of the challenges that we are facing in balancing the game is related to the following topics:

• Releasing unbalanced updates
  
• The game is constantly evolving
  
• Trying to avoid progress wipes
  
• Making a 1-4 player co-op game

We are striving to release updates for DRG on a regular basis. We were at update 7 when we released the game to Early Access, and today we are working on update 19. That is 11 major updates in 8 months time. The only way we have been able to have this rapid release cycle has been through releasing updates as soon as they are functional, but not necessarily balanced.

Let me provide an example:

With update 18 we released a huge system change with Assignments and Retirement of dwarves. Assignments were introduced to provide a smoother start for newcomers and are something we’ll use for players to unlock new content in the future - alternate weapons, for example. The process of retiring characters was introduced to create a sustainable end-game loop for experienced players.

Our goal is that the whole game experience is contained within the first retirement cycle (bringing a dwarf to max level 20). However, we’ve realized that getting your character maxed out happens a lot faster than we initially planned. Several things play into this, but probably the biggest factor is the recent introduction of Mission Mutators, some of which can leave you with an enormous XP hazard bonus.

In the future, we are adding more assignments, and we will introduce something we refer to as “Daily Adventures” and we need to contain all this new gameplay within one retirement cycle. (Please note that there is no guarantee they will be daily, even though this is how we refer to them right now). This means that we will extend the character level cap beyond level 20. Retiring a dwarf is something we consider to be for the few very dedicated players and is something that rewards prestige more than anything else. The first implementation worked, but not entirely as we hoped. So, with update 19 there will also be some significant changes to the Retirement System, including a name change!

The short of it is that discovering the issues with the retirement flow was impossible for us to foresee before we released update 18 and we will have to do tweaks and changes to the system. And some players will win, some players will lose when we do tweaks, and that is a consequence of releasing updates often and early.

We are not making everything at once but over time. Sometimes we add features that make the game easier, and sometimes we add features that make the game harder.

When we introduced the Mactera Grabber (a flying enemy that will grab a dwarf and carry him up and away from combat), the game became a lot harder. When we introduced weak points on enemies, the game became easier. And so it goes. Once and a while we need to revisit features we balanced in the past and give them an overhaul, and sometimes our players will feel that they lost something they had just become accustomed to.

When we introduce new weapons with Update 19, we will be in a similar state: The weapons will not be perfectly balanced, and we will have to rebalance them over the following updates. We expect you, our early adopters, to give us feedback and tell us bluntly when something is totally overpowered or laughably weak. But we also expect that you are patient with us and that you trust that we, over time, will deliver a balanced game.

In short, we are not producing features for DRG in a sequence that automatically creates a balanced game, and old game features will continuously be tweaked as time goes by.

We have so far avoided doing any global save wipes or progress resets, and our philosophy is that if possible we would like to avoid it. When we remove or change anything players have spent resources on - like vanity items or weapon upgrades, we strive to refund he resources. However, with the last update, we’ve seen some players having accumulated so much prior XP that retiring their characters boosted them to Player Ranks we never intended for the system.

At some point, we may encourage players to reset their save games to get the full experience of DRG, and we might even have to force reset them. With a game that is constantly changing and not yet complete, it may turn out to be too hard for us to continuously avoid save wipes. We will, however, make sure to give you fair warning if we go down that road.

This is all part of being an Early Access title, and something we consider part of the deal when buying DRG.

In the early days of the game, we made some key decisions that set us apart from most co-op games: We would not introduce bots to replace real players, and we would allow the game to be played by 1-4 players.

The biggest reason for not using bots is that DRG takes place in fully destructible, procedurally generated game world. Producing an AI to reliably traverse that kind of environment in a believable, “human” manner would simply be outside the scope of our small team. Instead, we chose to scale enemy difficulty based on player numbers. This works quite well for 2-4 player games, but making the co-op-style gameplay work for a single player game has been and continue to be very challenging for us.

To assist solo players, we’ve introduced Bosco - a multipurpose flying drone. Bosco can assist you in mining and combat, and revive you when you go down. Bosco is not the equal of a real player companion, but he helps to close the gap up to a co-op game.

We have several mission types that are not particularly solo friendly. If you are playing solo and you are facing a mission that is too hard, I recommend that you lower the difficulty of the game. If you are used to playing 4 players on Dangerous (hazard 3) maybe you need to be playing Challenging (Hazard 2) when playing solo. There is no shame in turning the difficulty up or down depending on which missions you play and how many players you are playing with.

DRG is first and foremost a Co-op game, and in the future, we will be introducing more enemy types and environmental hazards, where being more players will be an advantage. But whenever we do this, we need to consider how it impacts the solo experience.

We want to deliver a great experience for solo players, but not at the expense of providing an excellent co-op experience. Nevertheless, as we add features to the co-op game, we will revisit the single player experience and improve it. Just expect it to be co-op first, solo second.

That said, Bosco himself will be getting an overhaul in the near future. We are hard at work making him a much more useful partner, as well as developing an upgrade system for him, specifically aimed at making Solo play a more viable experience.

To sum it up: DRG is an Early Access game. That means that the game is not done yet! Our approach is to get new features into the game fast, and then get them into the hands of the players sooner rather than later. That means functional but potentially unbalanced updates, with continuous rebalancing based on the invaluable feedback we are receiving from the community. We are not trying to please specifically the hardcore or casual players. We are trying to make an excellent experience for everyone.

Early Access has been an awesome experience for us. It has helped us priority tasks, balancing the game and getting ideas for features. It is the best thing in the world to read all your comments, motivational posts, and crazy memes. It puts a big smile on our faces, and it makes all the hard work we do 110% worth it.

DRG is still an Early Access Game. We will let you know when it isn’t anymore! Until then….Happy mining!

Rock and Stone!

Mikkel
Game Director
Ghost Ship Games

PS: The Experimental Branch of Update 19 should go live within the next few days!

Update 19 is edging closer, and trust us when we say we're as eager as you are to see it go live! It's going to be our most significant update and systems-overhaul since we originally launched, and it includes a ton of changes and re-balancing. Our last update, Update 18, changed some very core aspects of the game, and it made it clear to us that we need more time to test core changes like that before we release them to the Main Branch.

Therefore, we've chosen to extend development a bit on this update, and pushed Daily Adventures to Update 20. Consequently, this will push later updates a bit as well.

We would love to give you a precise release date for Update 19, but "Late November" is the best we can do right now. However, we are working hard to make it available on the Experimental Branch ASAP.

The past few weeks have shown us just how tricky it is to develop on a live game (Early Access in a nutshell), and we expect to release a blog post on the subject sometime next week - keep an eye on this News section.

Until then,
Rock and Stone!

A very small hotfix for Update 18.5 has just been released.

Changelist

• Fixed a crash related to the terrain. Update 18.5 introduced several memory optimizations and this one went a little too far.
  
• Fixed the M button so the Mission Map shows the correct available missions after returning to the Spacerig.
  Note: We are aware that this bug was used by some players to repeat a certain mission, but we have no metrics on how much is was used. This was never the intention and have therefore been fixed.