May 13, 2020

Deep Rock Galactic - Soren - Captain of Ghost Ship

Hello Miners!

It’s fantastic to finally be welcoming you all to Deep Rock Galactic 1.0!

This marks the end of more than two years of Early Access development and It has been an amazing journey! We could not have asked for a better community to have along for the ride. And, if you are a new player, rest assured that hard work in the mines awaits you, alongside high adventure, big guns, fancy beards, alien monsters ... and of course - all your fellow dwarven miners!

We are super, super excited to leave Early Access and seeing where the game will go from here. And fear not...we are far from done adding to DRG!

Rock And Stone!

With Love,
The Ghost Ship Crew

--- 1.0 PATCH NOTES ---

SOUNDTRACK VOL. II

For the last year we have been working on a Vol. II of the soundtrack for DRG - and it is finally here - allowing you to mine, fight and groove to 14 completely new tracks of synthy, bassy goodness! Deep Rock Galactic needs to invest in some bigger speakers… NOW!

NEW PROMOTION TIERS

Believe it or not but now there are 3 more Tiers above Gold, for when you are promoting your dwarves: PLATINUM, DIAMOND, LEGENDARY! This is mainly a show-off thing for super veteran players who have been investing blood, sweat and a lot of time in Deep Rock Galactic. We salute you!

PRESTIGE ASSIGNMENTS

As you increase your Player Rank, you will get access to special Prestige Assignments. Completing them will reward you with full sets of Pickaxe parts, Armor skins and new Helmets. Prestige Assignments are unlocked at Player Rank 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 75 and 100.

A couple of months ago we were toying around with awarding you vanity on the promotion itself (some of you might have tested it on the Experimental build), but we were not totally happy with the system and have instead gone for an approach with unlocking Prestige Assignments based on your Player Rank.

BIOMES

Crystalline Caverns have gotten more crystal variations. It’s now crystal clear why it is called by that name!

COMMUNITY REQUESTS

Here are a bunch of features we have added by popular demand:

We have added a sweet Golden Paintjob for your trusty Pickaxe to the Supporter Pack
We have added a separate volume slider for Mission Control. Don’t tell Management!
We have improved head bob scaling to now affect more animations
We have added a separate Camera Shake slider, to be able to scale down camera shakes to your liking
We have added an option to invert x-axis for the camera when you are downed

MISC.

For the 1.0 launch, we have focused on fixing bugs and various issues, so this part of the patch notes is a bit longer than usual. It includes all fixes done while 1.0 was on the Experimental Branch. Thanks to all who helped us test the game up to launch!

Added a few missing Laser Pointer names for the Machine Events
Added Patch Notes to the Escape Menu
Machine Events now explode if the Drop Pod lands on them
Added new miscellaneous ambient sounds throughout the game
Added new sounds to the Terminals in the Spacerig
Added slanted hex crystals to the Crystalline Caverns biome
Updated and improved the sound of the Lootbug
Replaced the old chairs in the Medbay with new models
Spacerig performance optimization
Reload animations now play in third-person when you are sprinting
Added an extra collider on the Minehead of Point Extraction missions to prevent Aquarqs from disappearing in the drills below the Minehead
Added a new dance move
Added Production Babies to the Credits
Button input prompts that do not have icons no-longer show a long name but just the button's character itself
Resolution now cycles back to the lowest resolution if the player cycles forward from the highest resolution available in the Graphics options
Grenades and Glyphid Bulk Detonator cluster bombs now bounce off the protective barrier of the Shield Generator rather than go straight through
Readded the much requested blue goo around Spitball Infectors
Renamed Basic Pickaxe to Pickaxe
Languages in the UI Options are now sorted by their English names
Added a Tutorial Hint that explains how to restart the tutorial for players that don’t actively skip or complete it
Improved Bosco’s digging logic which should reduce his tendency to prefer detours and digging from the opposite side of Compacted Dirt
Improved the Vanity Icons to properly show effects and color of light sources
Reduced the objective of Kursite Infection Machine Event to 13 for the Mactera encounter
Tweaked the spawn rate of Kursite Infected Mactera enemies in the Kursite Infection Machine Event to ensure it's always possible to complete
Fixed a bug that caused secondary gather objectives to not always count what you deposit correctly. This would often cause premature completion of the secondary objective
Fixed a bug that enabled large waves of enemies to spawn in Point Exactrion while fighting a Machine Event
Fixed a bug that caused the Reinforced Power Drills to not make sound on first use in a Mission
Fixed a bug that caused the selected character to sometimes switch back to a previously selected one when returning from a mission
Fixed a bug that caused a Red Rock Blaster label to be visible in the Character Selection Terminal without the buff
Fixed IFG Grenade displaying as a Support Tool in the Equipment Terminal. It is now correctly categorized as a Throwable
Fixed a bug so Exploding Barrels now have a name when pointed at with the Laserpointer
Fixed a bug that made jumping from a Zipline very unreliable as client. Jumping and pressing forward makes you jump off the Zipline while just pressing Jump will drop you from the Zipline
Tweaked font size & color for the Assignment Complete window
Fixed bugs in the terrain generation causing tunnels to not lead completely to the caves.
Fixed a mesh error in the Personal Cabins
Fixed a bug that prevented players from hosting games after resetting progress
Fixed a bug that caused the collider of unwoken Spitball Infectors to be too big when using the Laser Pointer
Fixed a bug that caused Spitball Infectors to shoot in weird directions if you step behind cover just as it starts shooting
Fixed a bug that caused weapon fire sounds to linger if a player disconnects while shooting
Adjusted the pathfinding capabilities of the Naedocyte Breeder to better avoid clipping with terrain
Fixed a bug in the sound of the ceiling rocks in the Salt Pits region
Fixed a bug that enabled the player to salute while aiming the Laser Pointer
Extended the duration of the invulnerability effect for latejoining players to a few seconds after landing
Fixed a bug with decals showing in the Terrain Scanner
Fixed several collision-related issues on the Space Rig
Fixed a bug that enabled Glyphid idle sounds to play while frozen
Fixed Cryo Cannon charge gauge to not jitter so much
Fixed a bug that caused the Hazard Level setting to not update for clients if the host only changes the Hazard Level and not the entire mission
Fixed a bug that enabled Mini MULEs to spawn on top of Machine Events
Fixed a bug that enabled the Drop Pod to land below Machine Events and other similar objects
Fixed a bug that caused the Graphics options menu to not fit 4:3 aspect ratio
Fixed a bug that caused the Loadout slots to overlap description texts
Adjusted the location of the Promotion Terminal activation prompt
Fixed a bug that caused some Spacerig Terminals to not show a title on their monitor
Fixed several 'New Item Available' notification issues on various Spacerig Terminal monitors
Fixed a bug that caused BET-C to be overly aggressive towards newly tamed Glyphids by continuously shooting at them after being tamed. Calm your jealousy, BET-C.
Fixed a bug that caused players to be unable to be revived if they died while on a Zipline
Fixed a bug that enabled the Escape Pod to land in impossible to reach locations like the top of a Resupply Pod tunnel
Fixed a bug with Dash activating unreliably for players with hold-to-sprint preferences
Fixed a bug that enabled the Laser Pointer to be equipped for downed players
Fixed a bug that caused Cryo Cannon and Flamethrower particles to suddenly disappear if you unequip the weapon while firing
Fixed a bug that caused players to be unarmed if they are interrupted while doing certain actions
Fixed a bug that caused Mixer nametags to have collision and block bullets
Ebonite Glyphids can no longer be targeted by Bosco or Sentry Guns
Fixed a bug that enabled the Impact Axe to damage yourself at certain angles
Fixed a bug that caused Tutorial Hints related to Bosco to show without Bosco being in the mission
Fixed a bug that prevented Pickaxe animations from playing in third-person after a Power Attack
Fixed a client-sided synchronization bug that enabled the Shield Generator to fall through walls
Fixed a bug related to the statistics of how many Matrix Cores the player has forged
Removed a black artifact on the Pickaxe Terminal
Fixed extraction music stopping too early if a wave hits just before you press the button to call for the Drop Pod
Fixed pricing for the Armor Breaking mod on the Breach Cutter
Increased the draw distance of Alien Egg debris
Fixed a bug that caused the character preview of the Scout and the Engineer in the ESC menu to be angled differently than the Gunner and the Driller
Fixed a bug with the “Key already bound" confirmation not working
Adjusted the description of the Bezerker Perk to be more precise
Fixed the 'Restore Save Game' prompt to be a little less obtrusive
Fixed a bug that enabled BET-C to shoot through the shield of the Shield Generator
Fixed a bug that caused you to keep shooting indefinitely when returning to game after pressing ESC
Fixed a bug that caused the Resupply Tutorial Hint to not always show
Fixed a bug that caused the Bosco Laserpointer Tutorial Hint to be incompletable
Fixed a bug that caused the Mineral Shop Terminal text to be uncentered
Fixed a bug that caused the Latejoin Drop Pod to not move downwards when joining a game
Fixed the Forge Mastery reward display to show correct cores if you have all Overclocks and/or all Vanity Cores
Added Romanian and Vietnamese to the list of languages supported (WIP)
Fixed a bug that caused Flaregun flares shot at players to leave a small collider behind that could block other players
Fixed a bug that caused Pickaxe Power Attack to not deal any damage if you hit the air or a non-terrain non-enemy mesh
Fixed a bug that caused Pickaxe Power Attack to not damage larger enemies if you hit the parts furthest from the body
Fixed a bug that often caused Machine Events in Sandblasted Corridors to float in midair
Fixed a bug that caused Jury-Rigged Boomstick’s Special Powder OC to not provide same force and airtime as previously
Fixed text overflow and various spelling mistakes in the Miner’s Manual
Fixed a spelling mistake in the Flex Them Guns Victory Move description
Fixed a gap under the Barrel Hoop Game on the Spacerig
Fixed the sizing of the Claim Union Reward prompt on the Miner Community Terminal
Tweaked Pickaxe and Flares to be less enormous in the Equipment Terminal previews. They now actually fit on screen
Fixed a bug that caused the graphics on the Miner Community Terminal to cut off
Fixed a bug that caused a black screen to display in place of the “Steam is not running” warning on game launch
Fixed a bug that often blocked the Reinforced Power Drills when digging terrain. They now prioritize drilling terrain over hitting enemies if you are looking at terrain right in front of you
Fixed a bug that caused bomb spitting plants to not spawn properly in Sandblasted Corridors
Fixed a bug that caused the Spacerig loading screen to display in between Deep Dive stages
Fixed a bug that prevented Stun animations from playing on the Mactera Goo Bomber
Fixed a bug that caused oddities when latejoining in the latejoin drop pod
Fixed a bug to prevent enemies from attacking or grabbing players through the Drop Pod walls
Fixed a bug that enabled the Glyphid Oppressor to knock around downed players
Fixed a bug that caused burst fire weapons to resume in the middle of a burst if unequipped before a burst could fire all of its rounds
Fixed a bug that caused Impact Axes stuck in terrain to not have a name when pointed at with the Laserpointer
Fixed displacement of the gravity button in the Spacerig
Fixed a bug that enabled Lootbugs to move while frozen
Fixed a bug that prevented the Laserpointer Tutorial Hint from working correctly in a multiplayer session
Fixed a bug that caused Super Slim Rounds OC to not display its stats correctly
Fixed a bug that caused Impact Axes to not have any sound when picked up
Fixed a bug that caused Deeptora Honeycombs to not be properly affected by poison, radiation and cold
Fixed a bug that enabled BET-C to fire weapons while inside a wall
Fixed the thumbnail for the Incorruptible Pickaxe Paintjob
Fixed Medbay stat displays not working for clients
Fixed the description of the Beastmaster perk to reflect the new activation method
Fixed a bug that caused certain characters in game server names to not be visible on the Server List

EXPERIMENTAL PATCHES

BUILD 39791 (1st Patch to Experimental)

Added Romanian and Vietnamese to the list of languages supported (WIP)
Improved Bosco’s digging logic which should reduce his tendency to prefer detours and dig from the opposite side of Compacted Dirt
Readjusted the cost of the last 3 Promotion Tiers
Updated the Patch Notes with more stuff including names for the last 3 Promotion Tiers
Added slanted hex crystals to the Crystal Caverns biome
Fixed a bug that caused the Mineral Shop Terminal text to be uncentered
Fixed a bug that caused the Latejoin Drop Pod to not move downwards when joining a game
Fixed the Forge Mastery reward display to show correct cores if you have all Overclocks and/or all Vanity Cores
Fixed a bug that caused the M.U.L.E. to move slower and more hesitantly
Fixed a bug that prevented the Dreadnoughts from carving
Fixed a bug that caused Dreadnought cocoons to have a weird offset on the Terrain Scanner
Fixed Spacerig Terminal text not scaling down when switching languages
Fixed a bug that caused the Resupply Tutorial Hint to not always show
Fixed a bug that caused the Bosco Laserpointer Tutorial Hint to be incompletable
Fixed a bug that caused secondary gather objectives to not always count what you deposit correctly. This would often cause premature completion of the secondary objective
Fixed a bug that caused the Miners Union logo to cover up the text in the Miner’s Union Terminal
Fixed a bug that caused you to keep shooting indefinitely when returning to game after pressing ESC
Fixed changing loadout in pickaxe terminal does not refresh view of pickaxe and parts selected
Fixed the Scout’s Regal Aegis Paintjob to now use the correct material
Fixed a bug that enabled BET-C to shoot through the Shield Generator. Grenades now also bounce off the shield rather than go straight through
Fixed miscellaneous typos

BUILD 39816 (2nd Patch to Experimental)

Fixed a bug that caused the Reinforced Power Drills to not make sound on first use in a Mission
Fixed a bug that caused the selected character to sometimes switch back to a previously selected one when returning from a mission
Fixed a bug that caused a Red Rock Blaster label to be visible in the Character Selection Terminal without the buff
Improved the Vanity Icons to properly show effects and color of light sources
Fixed IFG Grenade displaying as a Support Tool in the Equipment Terminal. It is now correctly categorized as a Throwable
Fixed a bug that enabled players to activate exploded Machine Events
Fixed various typos in the Miner's Manual
Tweaked the material on the new crystals in Crystalline Caverns
Fixed a bug so Exploding Barrels now have a name when pointed at with the Laserpointer
Fixed a bug that made jumping from a Zipline very unreliable as client. Jumping and pressing forward makes you jump off the Zipline while just pressing Jump will drop you from the Zipline
Fixed a bug while using a controller which prevented B from properly registering when purchasing accessories in The Shop

BUILD 39926 (3rd Patch to Experimental)

Fixed a bug that caused Flaregun flares shot at players to leave a small collider behind that could block other players
Increased invulnerability after latejoining slightly
Added Production Babies to the Credits
Fixed a bug that caused Pickaxe Power Attack to not do any damage if you hit the air or a non-terrain non-enemy mesh
Fixed a bug that caused Pickaxe Power Attack to not damage larger enemies if you hit the parts furthest from the body
Fixed a bug that often caused Machine Events in Sandblasted Corridors to float in midair
Fixed a bug that caused the Kursite Infection Machine Event to explode in fear if a player dared to get close
Fixed broken particle effects on the new crystal debris in Crystalline Caverns
Fixed a bug that made certain confirmation prompts unresponsive with controller input
Core Infusers now also disappear if a Machine Event explodes from the Drop Pod landing on it
Fixed text overflow in the Miner’s Manual
Reduced the objective of Kursite Infection Machine Event to 13 for the Mactera encounter
Tweaked the spawn rate of Mactera enemies in the Kursite Infection Machine Event to ensure it's always possible to complete
Fixed a spelling mistake in the Flex Them Guns Victory Move description
Fixed a gap under the Barrel Hoop Game on the Spacerig
Fixed the sizing of the Claim Union Reward prompt on the Miner Community Terminal
Fixed a bug that caused a music track to not loop properly
Tweaked Pickaxe and Flares to be less enormous in the Equipment Terminal previews. They now actually fit on screen
Renamed Basic Pickaxe to Pickaxe
Fixed a bug that caused the graphics on the Miner Community Terminal to cut off
[COMMUNITY REQUEST] Glyphid Bulk Detonator cluster bombs now bounce off the protective shield of the Gunner’s Shield Generator
Resolution now cycles back to the lowest resolution if the player cycles forward from the highest resolution available in the Graphics options
Fixed a bug that caused a black screen to display in place of the “Steam is not running” warning on game launch
Fixed a bug in the Promotion Terminal and Character Selection Terminal which prevented players from exiting the Terminal with B
Fixed a bug that often blocked the Reinforced Power Drills when digging terrain. They now prioritize drilling terrain over hitting enemies if you are looking at terrain right in front of you
Fixed a bug that caused bomb spitting plants to not spawn properly in Sandblasted Corridors
Readded the much requested blue goo around Spitball Infectors
Fixed a bug that caused the Spacerig loading screen to display in between Deep Dive stages
Removed the 'Milestone Reset' warning from the info screen as it is no longer relevant
Added a Tutorial Hint that explains how to restart the tutorial for players that don’t actively skip or complete it
Fixed a bug that prevented Stun animations from playing on the Mactera Goo Bomber
Fixed a bug that caused oddities when latejoining in the latejoin drop pod
Fixed a bug to prevent enemies from attacking or grabbing players through the Drop Pod
Fixed a bug that enabled the Glyphid Oppressor to knock around downed players
Fixed a bug that caused burst fire weapons to resume in the middle of a burst if unequipped before a burst could fire all of its rounds
Fixed a bug that caused Impact Axes stuck in terrain to not have a name when pointed at with the Laserpointer
Fixed displacement of the gravity button in the Spacerig
Fixed a bug that enabled Lootbugs to move while frozen
Fixed a bug that prevented the Laserpointer Tutorial Hint from working correctly in a multiplayer session
Added a new dance move!
Fixed a bug that caused Super Slim Rounds OC to not display its stats correctly
Fixed a bug that caused Impact Axes to not have any sound when picked up
Fixed a bug that caused Deeptora Honeycombs to not be properly affected by poison, radiation and cold
Fixed a bug that enabled BET-C to fire weapons while inside a wall
Fixed the thumbnail for the Incorruptible Pickaxe Paintjob
Tweaked text in the how-to-restart-tutorial prompt

BUILD 39999 (4th Patch to Experimental)

Fix rare audio crash.
Tweaks to several Pickaxe Paintjob thumbnails
Fixed hanging airvent on spacerig + updated patchnotes with most recent fixes
Fixed Infirmary stats not working for clients
Fixed, some screen displays on the spacerig had duplicates, causing z-fighting and slight performance loss
Fix Flaregun flares would pass through the wall on clients.
Fixed Flaregun flares impact FX was not working on clients
Fixed Sticky Spiderweb had become bulletproof

BUILD (5th Patch to Experimental)

Removed more duplicate terminals in the spacerig (causing Z fighting)
Updated Credit list
Beastmaster Description: Changed 'Press E' -> 'Hold E'
Tweaks on space rig
Fixed a bug where controller input did not work after first promotion
[DRG-1436] Fix for " in servername.
Tweaked volume on all the new pieces of level music
Languages in 'Language Selector' option sorted by their english names
Turned volume up a bit more for some of the new background tracks
Fixed Boomsticks special powder OC not providing same force as before

May 8, 2020

Behind the Soundtrack

Deep Rock Galactic - Mekill (DRG Dev)

Hi Everyone,

Mikkel Martin Pedersen here, Game Director of Deep Rock Galactic! The game will launch soon and along with it the second volume of the soundtrack - with more than 50 minutes of new synthy goodness!

To introduce the new soundtrack (and because I really want to!) I'll be telling you the story behind DRG's Soundtrack Vol. I + II, as well as diving into some of the inspiration and thoughts behind it.

I have put two links in the text with samplers of Vol. I + II, so you can listen to bits from the soundtracks while reading. First sampler is right here.

Let's press play and get started!

https://youtu.be/MfjiyvRuVA8

Finding a Musical Direction

It was 2016. Ghost Ship Games had just been founded and we were working on DRG and had reached a point where we needed music for the game. But what kind of music? What would be a good backdrop to the gameplay? What kind of music would fit the Darkness, the Danger and the Dwarves?

I began my research simply by playing the prototype of the game while listening to a bunch of different music. This helped me out a lot in getting a feeling for what felt right.

I tried out everything from big epic orchestral fantasy music - like you'd find in Lord of the Rings - to tense action-thriller music, to heavy metal (Doom 2016 -style), and western music - spaghetti or otherwise.

The first thing I realized was that using epic orchestral fantasy music didn't really cut it. It felt too much like a cliché and was counterproductive to our intentions for the game. Even though we have dwarves as our main protagonists, we wanted to have our own take on the dwarves, not just blindly copy paste traditional fantasy dwarves - and epic orchestral music wasn't really helping to set us apart.

Secondly, if the music was too upbeat, it would ruin the tension of exploring dark caves.

The one track that stuck out while testing was the main theme from one of my all-time movie favorites: The Thing by John Carpenter.

The main theme is built around a super simple bassline that just goes BUM BUM - pause - BUM BUM. This generates a very strong feeling of you facing your destiny, that the clock is ticking and that unavoidable doom is coming ever closer. The feeling of all hope being lost in this isolated and godforsaken place. And that was it!

That was exactly what I was looking for. To make the camaraderie between the dwarves stronger, the game needed a backdrop of music that emphasized the feeling of isolation and awaiting doom. Where the best thing you can hope for is to not die alone - or at least die while saving you friends and where the only thing that keeps your spirits high is you and your fellow miners wisecracking and friendship and the code binding you together: Leave No Dwarf Behind.

Though the soundtrack for The Thing is actually composed by Ennio Morricone it has a very straight John Carpenter feel to it. And I really felt that the synth music worked well within our heavy industrial take on sci-fi.

So I started looking into the direction of 80s synth soundtracks aka what John Carpenter had been composing. We actually briefly toyed with the idea of asking the Maestro himself if he would make the soundtrack for us, but chose against it in the end. We had no money to spend and highly doubted he would do it for free, and we simply didn't want the game to become "John Carpenter's Deep Rock Galactic".

At this point in time, Stranger Things had just hit Netflix with a soundtrack that was very inspired by John Carpenter’s work as well, and I feared that we would be compared too much to that. So the goal became to head in that direction, while still finding our own voice and niche within the genre of 80s synth music.

Gathering of the Team

When we founded Ghost Ship Games in April 2016, we were six people on the team: a CEO, three programmers, an artist, and me as Game director, game and level designer, and finally sound designer (since nobody else was around to lift the task). So we had a lot of great intentions, but we didn't possess the skills to make the soundtrack ourselves.

Our first office in 2016 was just a modest room with no composer or sound designer in sight.

A couple of months after we started working on DRG, it was time to add some music to the game, but how were we going to do this with no funding in place and no money to spend?

Well, music finds a way, and as we were spreading the word about us founding a company and working on DRG, my nephew Sophus Alf Agerbæk-Larsen heard about what we were doing, and he contacted me and asked if he should try to make some music for us. At first, I was like "Nah, that's never gonna work!" - don't mix work and family, but after debating it with the other founders, we agreed that it couldn't hurt to try to let him make some music for the game. He was trying to start his own rock band (and unemployed) and had the time and passion for giving it a shot. I would actually say he was unstoppable.

The many faces of composer, Sophus Alf Agerbæk-Larsen. Leadsinger and guitarist in his old band Polio, that later developed into Sunraker. Rock'n Roll!

I told him that we wanted a synth soundtrack and pointed him in the direction of John Carpenter and the theme from The Thing. He came back with his first composition ("Into the Abyss"), which made it clear to us that the direction for the soundtrack would work, and that Sophus was the right composer for us. We quickly saw that we needed some more up-tempo music for fighting waves of enemies, and Sophus came back with "Attack of the Glyphids" which we also ended up using for our E3 Xbox Reveal/ and most recently our 1.0 Launch Trailers.

A month after Sophus started composing the soundtrack, we hired Troels Jørgensen as sound designer. Troels came from the TV and movie industry, with a ton of titles within the LEGO Star Wars and Ninjago universe behind him. At the time, he didn't have any experience with sound design for computer games, but he was exceptionally talented and eager to learn, and he also just happened to have a big taste for synth music.

Our musical dream team was in place!

Troels Jørgensen putting his magic touch to the music and sound of DRG. If you want the grenades to make bigger KABOOM's - he is the one to ask!

Categorizing the Music

At the same time as Sophus was composing, I was trying to figure out how we should use the music in-game to generate a dramatic narrative throughout one mission. I ended up dividing the music into different categories based on the situations that they were going to be used in. These are the main music categories:

Level Music
Level Music is continuously playing in the background. This is the steady drumming on a Roman slave ship, where you are rowing to the beat. This is music for exploration and mining! Usually, these tracks are around 5-8 minutes long.

Wave Music
When Mission Control announces a wave, we step up a gear, and the music supports the tension and pressure from the wave hitting you. Wave music is among the most intense music you will find on the soundtrack. Tracks are around 2 minutes long, which supports the length of you fighting a wave.

Boss Wave Music
A variation of music for the Dreadnaught fights that is more epic than normal wave music.

End Wave Music
Endwave music setting the tension for you running to the Drop Pod. These tracks have a feeling that the clock is ticking and they have passages where more Heroic and grand melodies are elevating the drama - Are you going to make it before the timer runs out? Will you turn back and jeopardize the mission to save a fallen comrade?

Misc. Music
"The Deep Dive" is used as Level Music on the Space Rig, "Ode to the Fallen" is used in the Memorial Hall and "Beneath the Crust" is used on the Mission Complete screen. A variation of "The Last Ascent" is used in-between stages on Deep Dives. And finally, before you all start pinging me for why the Jukebox music isn't on the soundtrack, let me tell you that all the Jukebox music is pureply stock music and it would be kind of weird (besides propably illegal!) to but it on the Original Soundtrack.

Making Vol. I: All Tracks Needs a Signature

After Sophus had composed the first bunch of tracks, we had established the baseline for the soundtrack. Still, in order for the soundtrack to feel fresh and original, I started dictating new elements I wanted to hear in each of the tracks that he was composing. This could, for instance, be a feeling, an unusual sound, an instrument, or a music or movie reference. I felt this approach was needed, so we didn't have too many repetitions, and it made it easier to distinguish the different tracks.

Take "Fathomless Tomb", for instance. It started out with me asking for music to play at the deepest, darkest and most lonely place on Hoxxes, and Sophus came back with the track and the great use of the single note playing in the beginning that resembles a sonar - making you think of submarines and emphasizing the feeling of being deep beneath the surface.

An example of where we used original instrumentation could be "A Matter of Skill and Ammunition" that has a very moody spaghetti western harmonica (beautifully played by Troels) mixed in with the synths. This track was also partly inspired by the main theme of The Untouchables.

And finally, an example of a music reference could be "The Descent" that is partly inspired by The Cures - A Forest or "They're Here!" where the track surprisingly goes full euro-techno at the end.

Sophus was excellent at taking all the references and ideas we came up with and mixing them with synths and dwarf quirkiness and creating something entirely new and original. While Troels was so skilled at giving the tracks that special 80s synth sound, that we could easily do a lot of far-out things with the music and still have consistency between all the tracks.

Making Vol. II - Let's go Crazy

After we finished the soundtrack and launched Deep Rock Galactic into Early Access, we thought we were done with the soundtrack. But after the success of DRG and due to all the praise we got for the soundtrack, we felt that it could be very cool to expand it. Furthermore, we thought that the game could need more musical variation when you are fighting waves - especially since you can easily encounter three waves during a single mission.

So we rehired Sophus to compose more music and this time around we had all the principles in place. The baseline was already established and we were ready to take the soundtrack further than before. We wanted to make it even more playful and fun - with the confidence that no matter how far we pushed the envelope, Troels would keep the soundtrack coherent through his arrangements and mix.

Now it is time to listen to Vol. II of the soundtrack!
https://youtu.be/RpaVY-hQuxQ
Below is a list of all the references and ideas we used to make the new tracks for Vol. II stand out and have their own signature. If you try to keep the pace you can read about each track as they are playing in the sampler.

I Welcome the Darkness: This is our take on a spy theme in the vein of Mission Impossible, The Saint or James Bond. Dwarves on a mission ...with a license to drill!
A Distant Terror: For this track, we were playing around with the idea of making a unique piece of music for the different types of waves you can encounter. This one was made for the pure Mactera waves. In the end, we decide not to split up the music for the specific waves simply to have as much variation as possible in the wave music category. When you listen, think of a swarm of Macteras attacking you!
Follow Molly: The inspiration for this track is Fascination Street - again by The Cure (Both Sopus and I are big Cure fans if you haven't guessed it by now!). Troels applied the very techno-like WAOP WAOP melody towards the end of the track. At first, I hated this and thought it was too intruding when playing the game. But sometimes musical elements that at first sound off to you can grow on you and become the element you genuinely love about a song. And this is one of those cases.
Let's Go Deeper: This one was inspired by Blade Runner and was an attempt to make a more atmospheric and moody piece of music - it's probably one of the most relaxed tracks of Level Music we have in the game.
Absolute Zero: Here we toyed the idea of making unique Level Music to the different biomes. This one is made with the cold icy caves of Glacial Strata in mind. Again we went away from the idea of unique biome music simply to prioritize variation.
Echoes From The Past: We need humming Monks! This is our take on a choir bourne track. The first sketch Sophus composed was too much fantasy and too little synth, so to tame this track, Troels had to apply a lot of work. This is probably the closest we will ever come to music in the style of Diggy Diggy Hole. But I really love that the rules we established for the soundtrack allow us to do tracks like this.
Dance of The Dreadnought: Let's use some distorted guitars! This track is a full-blown rock song with inspiration drawn from Queens of the Stone Age and other artists in the stoner rock genre (how appropriate when you think about it!). The harmonica also made a return here, and towards the end of the track, you will find a drum break that sounds familiar to fans of Killing in The Name by Rage Against the Machine. Good stuff!
Interstellar Nightmares: The dramatic and grand-sounding organ used in this track is inspired by classical music by Bach, and the organ works very well in a sci-fi setting, I think. The organ sound is also found in "Fighting the Shadows" on Vol. I and it works very well at emphasizing the opposing threat you are facing when fighting a Dreadnought. This is pure Boss Music.
The Core Infuser: When we designed the Machine Events, we needed a unique piece of music to stress you out as the clock is ticking. Troels composed this one.
Deceived by Light: This one has a good deal of the fatalistic mood you would find in a Terminator movie, but it also has a great melodic section. The massive double drum-slams you hear in this track are also used in other tracks. A storm is coming!
In the Belly of the Beast: This track is a piece of Wave music and has an intense groove and a spacy midsection that is inspired by Pink Floyd's On the Run.
The Last Ascent: This one is one of my favorites! We were looking at the main theme from Where Eagles Dare and the way that track is building up with a single military march drum rising in intensity and then going big and epic. This is the team embarking on an impossible mission. At first this track was building up slowly, but it became to boring in-game, and we rearrarranged it, so there is more bang for the buck in the beginning. For the melodic hero theme towards the end, we drew some inspiration from Bon Iver's Perth.
RUN!: Here we tried to infuse some of the energy from Prodigy and make the drums very tense and in your face. This is another track where we really push the limits of the style of the soundtrack.
Axes Out: For this track, we were looking at colorful horror music like what you would find in the themes from Addams Family or American Horror Story. At first, this was too silly, but we played around with it and made it darker, and it worked out great in the end.

...And that is the end of my small walkthrough of Vol. II. After playing and developing DRG for 4 years, I can wholeheartedly say that all the new tracks from Vol. II are breathing a lot of fresh air into the whole game experience, and I'm very excited to hear all your reaction to the new soundtrack, when we go 1.0 on the 13th of May ːsteamhappyː

Closing Comment

A lot of the fun we’ve had when developing DRG is due to one thing: The Dwarves!

The Dwarves add a colorful twist to the deep space isolation sci-fi theme in the game and it allows us to do a lot of funny stuff without breaking the suspension of disbelief - simply because all the dwarf tropes are already established.

When it comes to the soundtrack, the dwarves also helped us be creative and push the boundaries of what you usually would expect to hear in 80s synth soundtracks.

I am super proud of the soundtrack. Just like we set out to create a mix of L4D and Minecraft and create something new and original through the game itself, we used much the same approach for the soundtrack. We tried to find our own space within the 80s synth music genre, by combining and introducing original and unexpected elements into the music from movie references to rock music and out of left field instrumentations - and so we found our own sound - the sound of Deep Rock Galactic.

I’ll let you be the judge as to whether we succeed or not, but either way I am extremely proud and happy about the end result.

Thank you, Sophus and Troels, for the Music!

Rock and Stone, Miners!

With Love,
Mikkel Martin Pedersen

Apr 29, 2020

BLASTING OUT OF EARLY ACCESS!

Deep Rock Galactic - Soren - Captain of Ghost Ship

Hi Miners

This is it!

On the 13th of May, two weeks from now, we can all celebrate the launch of 1.0 of Deep Rock Galactic!

Before we head into the details on ALL the things that are happening today, the next two weeks and on launch (and beyond), we first need to thank all of you for supporting us. Some of you have been with us from the very beginning of Closed Alpha back in late 2016. Some of you have joined in since Early Access Launch in February 2018. And some of you just recently joined the ranks. But all of you should be proud of what we have accomplished together in the true dwarven spirit of a co-op first game. Deep Rock Galactic is today owned by more than 1 MILLION players and daily played by more than thirty thousand people. This keeps blowing our minds so much that we hardly have any cells left to think with!

So, from the bottom of our hearts: THANK YOU!

Now, what will happen today?

PRESS RELEASE AND LAUNCH PRICE

First of all, we just released a press release with the launch date news. So we expect to see some news pop up later today and tomorrow on our launch day announcement. Included in the press release are some important news on the release itself. We have decided to stick to the price we set a year ago (29.99 USD), so the game will NOT increase in price for launch. We believe that the current price is a good entry point and makes it easy to get new players to try out the game.

EXPANDED SOUNDTRACK AND DELUXE EDITION DLCs

The new soundtrack will be added to the existing Soundtrack as a Volume II. As this adds more than 50 minutes of music, we will at launch increase the price on the Soundtrack a bit from 7.99 USD to 9.99 USD. So, if you are considering buying the soundtrack, now would be a good time.

At launch, we will also release two new cosmetic-only, no-gameplay DLCs. Together with the game itself, those two DLCs, named MegaCorp and Dark Future, will constitute the Deluxe Edition of the game. This will be set up using Steam’s user-friendly Bundle format, so if you already own the game, you still get a small discount on buying the DLCs together. During the next two weeks, we will release more information about the content of the Deluxe Edition, but for now, we can tell that it includes a brand new Weapon Framework for all 16 weapons as well as a unique Armor Framework for all four dwarves.

OFFICIAL NARRATED TRAILER

Along with the press release, we have premiered a brand new trailer, produced in-house at Ghost Ship Games. We have for a long time felt that we lacked a good video to showcase the game to new players and simply tell what it is all about. And who better to do that than Mission Control himself?

You can watch the video here and we encourage you to share this video to spread the word on the upcoming 1.0 Launch of Deep Rock Galactic

COMMUNITY TRAILER COMPETITION

Speaking of trailers, we have now finally watched and evaluated all the entrants to the competition. More than 200 trailers were submitted and we’ve been absolutely humbled with amazing quality and creativity in the videos. Initially, we only had prizes for Top 4, but we clearly needed to expand that. Therefore we decided to give away the two soon-to-launch cosmetic-only Deluxe Edition DLCs to all who contributed with a trailer! We also decided to award the Top 40 even more. Instead of just one set of DLCs, every participant in Top 40, receives four sets of the 2 DLCs in the upcoming Deluxe Edition.

But who won, you might ask? That is not disclosed just yet. We have selected a ranked Top 15, and each day up to launch, we will showcase a video and slowly count down ending with the runner-ups and the winner on the day before launch day. You can look forward to some amazing trailers - ranking them has not been easy.

To start this off, we have created a playlist with videos in the Top 40 that did not make the cut into Top 15. These videos are not ranked but can be viewed in this playlist.

LEGACY HATS GIVEAWAY!

In the live build on Steam (that is Update 29), we have activated a special gift for all of you. During these 2+ years of Early Access, we have created some limited runs of special vanity hats for Oktoberfest, Halloween, X-Mas, Yearly Anniversary, Steam Free Weekend, and Steam Awards. Some of you missed those and some of you missed the weird thing that you had to claim them for each character. From today, and until the 12th of May, you can claim them ALL with one simple click. Go CLAIM!

1.0 IS NOW ON EXPERIMENTAL BRANCH

Today, we also uploaded the upcoming 1.0 build of the game to the Experimental Branch. The 1.0 launch build includes the 14 new music tracks, Prestige Assignments, and 3 new Promotion Ranks as well as a long list of bug fixes, some QoL improvements, and quite a bit of optimizations. We hope quite a few of you will help us test the 1.0 build and report bugs, so we can have the best build possible for all the new players at launch. Read about how to get into the Experimental Branch here. And the patch notes for the 1.0 Experimental build can be found here.

BEYOND 1.0

After we launch 1.0 of Deep Rock Galactic, we, at Ghost Ship Games, will continue to support and expand the game. Expect major updates with focus on new content for the game. We aim to release an updated roadmap a few weeks after the launch with more details on what to come. The important message here is that the journey has just begun!

SO, WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

For the coming two weeks up to launch, we will do our best to create hype and attention
around the game. But we will need your help as well. There is nothing more powerful than a community of like-minded people that all work together. Help us spread the word and together we will give Deep Rock Galactic the best launch ever. One way of really helping out is by sharing and posting in communities outside of Deep Rock Galactic. Another way is to stream the game and watch others stream the game. And, as always, just play the game and take good care of the Greenbeards.

It is finally time to say ROCK AND STONE to the world!

cheers
Ghost Ship crew

Apr 27, 2020

Update 29 - Hotfix 8

Deep Rock Galactic - GSG Mark

HOTFIX 8 LIVE NOW!

Hello Miners,

This hotfix includes a moderate boost to the health of the Glyphid Praetorian as well as several weapon fixes and tweaks, especially to the Experimental Plasma Charger. Read the patch notes below for all the juicy details!

--- PATCH NOTES ---

Fixed a bug that caused your character model to turn into a grenade in Terminals
Further improvements to prevent the Droppod from landing on Machine Events.
Fixed a bug that could make other players animations look laggy if their net connection was poor
Enabled network smoothing on the server when looking at clients
Beast Master now actives by holding the Use button
Fixed a bug that caused Glyphid Praetorian / Glyphid Oppressor / Dreadnought attacks to only damage players and not tamed Glyphids
Fixed a bug that caused enemies to attack tamed Glyphids even after they are dead
Fixed a bug that enabled the Glyphid Oppressors attacks to trigger after death
Increased the damage from Temperature Shock
Made Temperature Shock activation more reliable and responsive
New temperature shock icons and added a sound to improve feedback
Fixed a case where enemies would not spawn from waves if you buried yourself in a tiny room so small that it has no nav points
Added new crystal formations to Crystal Caverns

ENEMY TWEAKS
----------------------------

Added a 25% health boost to the Glyphid Praetorian

Having diverse enemies (in terms of speed, size, health, attack rate, etc.) is what we think creates interesting action and makes target prioritization relevant and worth mastering. We have units with radically different properties so the mix of enemies, together with the level layout, will often generate small combat “puzzles” that are fun to engage with.
One element we always considered vital is having enemies with a significantly larger health pool. That’s the reason why Praetorians can be found in every mission. An enemy that stays alive for longer is likely to produce situations in which the player has to reevaluate the combat circumstances. For instance, you might need to engage another target before finishing this one off. It makes smaller and more aggressive enemies shine because they synergize. They also incentivize teamwork, since they encourage joining forces to be defeated.
We felt that, with the current firepower, Praetorians are not playing their part. They die too fast for these things to happen. A moderate health boost should allow the Praetorian to perform the role we envisioned for this enemy.

GENERAL WEAPON FIXES
----------------------------

Fixed Warthog crosshair showing a dot in the middle
Fixed BRT mod that stuns on all bullets hitting the target not working for clients.
Fixed a bug that caused the crosshair to disappear
Fixed Sticky Grenade for client
Fixed return to sender being able to reverse the projectile speed multiple times
Fixed Explosive Goodbye not being activatable for clients
Fixed line projectiles with Explosive Goodbye not exploding if you pressed again too quickly
Increased the size of the plasma field left behind by the Explosive Goodbye mod on the Breech Cutter

EXPERIMENTAL PLASMA CHARGER TWEAKS
----------------------------

Changed the two charged shot damage mods to affect both AoE and direct damage
Replaced the Bouncy Plasma mod with the Plasma Burn mod that heats targets up potentially setting them on fire or extending the burn time of enemies that are already on fire
Made it so that the Thin Containment Field mod now also affects the heat generated by normal shots
Decreased the charge speed bonus from crystal capacitors
Lowered the radius bonus of the Expanded Plasma Splash mod
Flying Nightmare projectile now continues through all targets but no longer causes an explosion on impact
Reduced the base radius of the Flying Nightmare projectile
Flying Nightmare radius is now increased by the Plasma Splash mod and Overcharger OC
Updated the stats display to more clearly communicate the damage of a Flying Nightmare projectile
Increased the direct damage bonus and added an AoE damage and range bonus to the Overcharger OC and the penalties are now charge shot ammo cost and cooling rate
Increased the damage bonus and ammo penalty of Heavy Hitter OC
Increased the size of the field left behind by the Persistent Plasma OC and extended it's life
Replaced the cooling penalty on the Heat Pipe OC with a penalty to the heat generated by normal shots and added a small bonus to charge speed
Fixed the Persistent Plasma OC not triggering when a Thin Containment Field shot was detonated
Fixed Flying Nightmare damage not being affected by the Overcharger OC

Apr 8, 2020

Update 29 - Hotfix 7

Deep Rock Galactic - Bjorn - GSG

Bulldog Revolver Tweaks
- Elephant Rounds OC now has a bit more of a kick
- Elephant Rounds OC now lowers the revolver's capacity to 3 rounds and extend the reload time a bit
- Added a base accuracy bonus to Elephant Rounds OC.
- Five Shooter OC is now Six Shooter and has a rate of fire bonus, a bigger ammo bonus and a slower reload
- Feather Trigger OC has been replaced with the Volatile Bullets OC which deals massive damage against burning targets
- Increased the reload speed bonus of the Quickfire Ejector mod

MISC
- Fixed bug with GK2 Bullets of Mercy OC sometimes stacking it's damage bonus

Thunderhead Autocannon
- Increased the chance to poison enemies with the Neurotoxin Payload OC
- Added a small range bonus to the Neurotoxin Payload OC

BRT Burst Fire Gun
- Fixed the crosshairs not showing the weapon spread accurately
- Added a Blowthrough Rounds mod at T1
- Added a base spread reduction bonus to the Floating Barrel mod
- The Homebrew Powder OC has been replaced with the Lead Spray OC which gives a big damage boost at the cost of base spread
- Increased the ammo bonus of the Compact Mags OC
- Increased the spread-reduction and mag-size bonuses of the Micro Flechettes OC

Gatling
- Extended the effective range of the Burning Hell OC

"Warthog" Auto 210 Overclok tweaks
-Light-weight Magazines
Reload speed bonus increased
- Compact shells , Renamed to Stunner
Complete rework, renamed as Stunner. With this overclock, the weapon can stun after hitting any body part, not just weakpoints. There is also a damage bonus when shooting already stunned enemies.
- Magnetic Pellet Alignment
Bonus damage for weakpoints, magazine penalty removed.Rate of fire reduction now applied as a percentage.
- Stunner: Bonus damage to stunned enemies reduced. Fixed a case in which a part of the shot stunning the enemy was also benefiting from the Stun damage bonus. This was producing an unintended random damage output. Now only the damage dealt by subsequent shots after the stunning shot will receive the bonus.
- Magnetic Alignment: Rate of fire penalty slightly increased, bonus damage on weakpoints reduced

Electrical SMG
- Added small cooldown to EMPDischarge OC for the electrical SMG

"Stubby" Voltaic SMG
- Turret EM Discharge: Cooldown reduced
- Overclocks' descriptions updated
- Stun is now applied after all damage, so if you hit an enemy with a shotgun, stun will only apply after all pellets have been calculated. This makes for more consistent experience when weapons also have damage bonuses based on stun.

General Fixes

MK3 heavy/light armors renamed ingame to MK3 and MK4 - also fixed a few typos in their descriptions
Fix one of the Point Extraction maps that had terrain that did not connect to the rest of the cave system
Fix Pheromone grenades not working (Visually) correct on clients
Fix paintjob not updating third person correctly if it was changed because of an incompatible default paintjob
Added overlocks and item upgrades to the escape menu
Fixed not being able to zipline while carrying an explosive barrel
Fixed errors in terrain generation causing tunnels to not lead completely to the caves.
Bombers no longer requires to hit cave walls to explode and wont be stuck dead forever on for example the minehead
Fix glyphids sometimes (more with heavy lag) not playing ragdoll.
You can no longer open the map while saluting. (Caused alot of issues)
- Fancy new Temperature Shock mechanic
Fire and Ice are now best friends, sort of. They still cancel each other out but now whenever you force a creature out of either the Frozen or Burning state they will take a good chunk of damage.
Step 1 - Either set a creature on fire or freeze them.
Step 2 - Procede to apply fire/heat damage if frozen or ice/cold damage if burning
This works with any elemental fire or ice damage and also with strong heat / cold sources
Step 3 - Keep at it untill the target stops being frozen / burning
Added weakpoint damage modifier stat display for combat shotgun
Droppod carves around it just before it leaves, to remove any platforms that could be in the way
misc audio optimization (Glyphids)
Improved Tritolite deposit collider to better match with the model
Re-Enable some idle sounds on glyphid grunts
Escape Menu: No tool tip when hovering over an unlocked or blank gear mod
Fix Bosco loadouts not working correctly. (It was using your characters loadout index)
Fixed Perfectly Tuned Cooler OC not affecting Flow Rate
Fixed the Burning Hell OC affecting teammates
Fix getting multiple rewards from crates