Oct 28, 2021

Primal Carnage: Extinction - dinosauriac

A nerve-wracking, bone chilling new update has just launched for Primal Carnage: Extinction on Steam!

Today marks the start of our Halloween Horrors event, bringing not only a shiver-inducing collection of ghasty new looks, but a monster-sized shakeup to gameplay.

Here are all the gory details…

THOSE SPINE-TINGLING SPITTERS...

Every major update we tend to take a class family and focus our energies into trying to improve them the best we can. For this update, we felt it was time to give the Spitters a good polish up. For starters, spit detection has been greatly improved, with Dilophosaurus now consistently blinding people no matter where their venom spray hits the target.

Movement speed for both Spitters has been increased, allowing the softest targets on the dinosaur team to outpace the humans and make a quick getaway if they need to. They also have a new ability that is sure to leave you positively petrified…!

CHILLING CHARGED SPIT!

Adding another layer of depth to Spitter gameplay, Cryos and Dilos can now “charge up” their special attack to hock up a giant corrosive loogy that explodes with a huge splash radius. Holding down alt fire will begin the charge-up process, and reveal a targeting indicator when it is ready, showing roughly where it will land. You can go for AOE coverage to blind several people at once, or try to get a direct hit for massive damage.

A fully charged Cryo acid glob has the potential to melt a human on direct contact, burning them down to the bone and leaving behind a discoloured skeleton. Spooky…

The humans do have a fighting chance against the acid rain though. The large spit globs can be shot out of the air if you see them coming, even awarding a few bonus EXP for doing so. Shooting the spit renders it harmless, if your reaction time is good enough.

ENHANCE

Finally, there are some aesthetic improvements to Spitters such as new animations to further differentiate Cryo from Dilo, and different coloured spit slime that appears around their mouths. Cryo has persistent glowing green drool, whereas Dilo has bold purple drool that shows after it has used its venom spray. There are now sounds for spit projectiles with different impact cues for acid pools, venom pools and charged spit.

For more info about various quality of life improvements and other Spitter enhancements, see the full change notes at the bottom of this post.

HORRID HUMANS

For balance reasons, we have adjusted the movement speed of humans this update. They are now slightly slower than before and cannot sprint for as long. However, their stamina will regenerate faster and not have so much of a delay before it begins to come back.

Weapon damage ranges have been reduced across the board, so that dinosaurs aren’t being harassed by a wimpy pistol from several miles away. Shotguns are now legitimately close quarters weapons, whilst the spread of certain weapons like the flaregun has been improved so that you can hit targets more accurately.

On the flipside, the sniper rifle has seen a heavy reduction in accuracy when not scoped in, which is magnified by persistent fire and when moving. This is intended to be a long range weapon, and though it may still need tweaking, it should be harder to pop off an easy headshot on something that’s mere feet away from you.

We have been focusing a lot of our energies on Survival mode, so we have made sure that the latest weapons actually work in Survival now (solo mode) and can be upgraded. Weapon upgrades in Survival are also more meaningful compared to in the past, where previously the v2 version of a weapon was sometimes less powerful due to mismatched stats.

DEVILISH DINOSAURS!

Even after so many years, finding the right spot for Tyrants within the game still proves difficult. Bullet sponges are generally not super fun to fight, but at the same time these are meant to be rather tanky individuals. For the October update, we’ve provided them with more situational advantages.

When eating a human, a Tyrant now receives a 30% armour bonus (that applies to their whole body), until they have finished swallowing their meal. This helps “hit and run” Tyrants to get out of the danger zone while they consume their prize.

Unfortunately, some hidden animation errors caused Tyrants to be unable to reliably land attacks last update. These issues have now been resolved, so biting and swiping should feel a lot more natural and precise. For the Bruisers, we resolved a rather devious control lock problem where you could not use your secondary attack if you had also just used your bite.

We have been watching closely how our recently added Pachycephalosaurus has been performing since it went live. This update introduces some changes to reign in its abilities somewhat. Pachy can now only slide once it’s up to a certain speed, requiring you to properly initiate a sprint instead of doing it from a near-standstill. It also now costs stamina to drift in this way.

On the other hand, the handling of Pachy during a charge has been improved a bit, so that it’s slightly easier to angle yourself towards enemies. Bracing is also more effective than it was previously, though consumes more stamina as a result.

THE CURSE OF CAPTURE THE EGG

Some of you may know that we’ve had a beta running for Capture the Egg mode (CTE) over the last few months. The community has been really helpful in helping us experiment with several different win states, lose conditions, how many eggs are needed and more to find the final setup for CTE.

This update brings a new level of polish to the mode, with extra details such as humans wearing egg-filled backpacks and dinosaurs being able to stuff eggs into their mouths to return them to the nest. All maps from legacy CTE are now also fully updated with the latest version, having the entire level in play instead of a small portion of it and dedicated dino / human bases.

You can now play Capture the Egg on the following levels:

PC-Docks
PC-TheFalls
PC-ForestChasm
PC-ForgottenOutpost
PC-UtilityBase

To avoid potential griefing from players just never capturing the egg, it now has a finite lifespan. You must return an egg either to the human base or to its nest within 90 seconds, or it will “hatch”. A little dinosaur will pop out, dead from being away from the warmth of the nest for too long. You monster.

The final rules for CTE are as follows:

There are always two eggs, spawned in randomized locations around the middle of the map.
Humans need to capture both eggs to win the game, by bringing them back to base.
When you are holding an egg, you cannot sprint. Nobody wants to make scrambled eggs.
If you take damage while carrying an egg, you will drop it at your feet.
Dinosaurs can grab a dropped egg and return it to its nest, earning EXP in the process.
If the dinosaurs exhaust the human team's respawns, or the humans fail to capture, dinos win.

Each team has 30 lives available to them. Every time a team member dies, this number goes down.
If one team respawns enough that they use up all their lives, the other team wins. This means the dinosaurs can potentially claim victory if they take out enough humans. On the other hand, if both eggs aren’t captured, the humans have failed to meet their quota and dinosaurs will win by default.

The dinosaurs have a limited roster, Tyrants and Flyers cannot be used in CTE for balance reasons. There is a minimum required playercount of 4 for a match to start, and the mode has a max player limit of 16.

SURVIVAL SPOOKTACULAR

Our second major focus for the October update has been to resolve all of the lingering bugs with Survival mode and make it a much more playable gametype. This meant tackling everything from minor annoyances like your weapon skin getting applied to your arms when you upgrade, to always being forced to respawn as a Commando regardless of what class you were just playing when you died.

Players can now choose any class they want when they re-spawn in Survival, however, if you select a new class you will lose any weapon upgrades you purchased.

The turrets in Survival mode are also ALWAYS upgradeable now, whereas before there were restrictions on when and which ones could be bought. To help lessen frustration with those sneaky Compies, the last 5 dinosaurs left alive in Survival are now highlighted to help track them down. And as a final added bonus, kill assists now grant cash in Survival mode.

MORTIFYING MAPS

We have given all of the Survival mode maps a major overhaul this October, with a big focus on adding more verticality and points of interest.

WhiteForest and VisitorCenter now feature new elevated positions that you can use to get the upper hand on the dino horde.

Be warned though, it can just as easily lead to your doom if a Carnotaurus gets a lucky head swipe on you 50 meters up.

All of the Survival maps now have more gates to unlock over the course of a match, restricting the movement of the dinos and providing more opportunities to spend your earnings. These unlock pathways to the new elevated areas such as clifftop outposts and the dam causeway on White Forest, or the rooftop defence points on VisitorCenter.

GET READY FOR THE RENAISSANCE!

With this update we have introduced a fourth Survival level – AI-Renaissance, named after the colossal shipwreck that dominates the view wherever you are on the map. You start off on a white sandy beach, before unlocking the way into a fortified campsite and moving back to a clifftop overlook.

The beached tanker holds a horrifying cargo, waiting to be unleashed. Hold out as best you can by unlocking higher routes to rain down fire on the approaching dinosaurs. Watch for movement in the thick jungle, too dense for humans to venture into, where lithe agile raptors and spitters are waiting to attack.

We hope you enjoy this new addition to the Survival map rotation, and all of the enhancements that are now part of the legacy Survival maps!

TERRIFYING TRANSFER

Outside of Survival mode, the Team Deathmatch map Transfer has received a major upgrade this October, both in gameplay and visuals. The jungle has started to creep in, with greater foliage density and small trees dotted around the facility. There is much more cover, both natural and man-made, breaking up the extremely long sight lines that were there previously.

New routes have been opened up to sneak around certain areas of the map, and there are two extra acid pits for Pteras to drop their catches into. And if you need a cooling bath after being set on fire, there are a few extra water puddles on Transfer as well.

HALLOWEEN HORDE O’PLENTY

We couldn’t let the spooky season go by without including some frightfully good new looks. The in-game store has a horrifyingly huge selection of scary skins, terrifying taunts and mortifying mutations available. Not to mention, a ghoulish new gift box containing yet more terrors to be unleashed!

We've picked out a few highlights below, but you can see all of the shocking new looks added to the game on our special event Trello board here: https://trello.com/b/FXE3SzJo/special-event-items

SHUDDER AT THE STRANGE

Halloween brings two new Strange effects for use in crafting, which complement the previously added Kilowatt and Thalassic ultimate skin lines. Applying the Tesla Tool leaves a trail of golden lightning behind you and makes your eyes burst with sparks, whereas the Energy Tool applies an ionizing effect with gaseous clouds left in your wake and spectral energies emitting from your skull.

These new crafting tools are obtainable as drops while playing, as rankup/evolution rewards, and challenge completion rewards.

We are still investigating a way to directly apply Strange effects to items instead of relying on the lucky dip of crafting, however this may be quite a way off. The programmers are pretty busy these days with the porting process for PS4. Certain PC niceties that were planned will have to be set aside / delayed in some cases as we get deeper into that process.

SPOOKY SPRAYS

Time for some Primal Fear (animated)...

A chilling collection of new sprays is now available as free drops in-game. These range from ghoulish green skull faces to legendary motion sprays. We’ll be cranking up their drop rate during the Halloween event, they’ll become much rarer after the spooky season is over.

UNLEASH YOUR INNER FOSSIL

Everyone has a free time-limited set of skeleton skins to parade around in for the duration of the Halloween event. These critters were re-vivified in a freak lightning storm accident at the island’s museum, and are now loose in the jungle, their bones held together by some unholy force that science has no answer to – except bullets!

FUTURE SHOCKS

Keen observers may notice our AI has learned a few new tricks in Survival mode. We are putting more energies into upgrading them going forwards, and hope to have bot support for ALL game modes in future. This means AI versions of all the dinosaurs that don’t currently feature in Survival mode (but will in future updates) and further improvements to our AI behaviours.

The idea is AI bots will be something server owners can enable to fill up empty matches until real players join to replace them, but we are toying with the idea of allowing offline practice versions of gametypes such as TDM, GTTC etc. when the bots become more advanced.

We also have a new map in the works for Team Deathmatch, built in close collaboration with the community. PC-Waterlogged is planned to be added this winter! A moody atmospheric research facility, this map houses the fabled Atrium B, where experiments were performed on marine reptiles. Now, flooded and abandoned, the sea threatens to swallow the facility up.

We’re really looking forward to bringing this map to fruition and can’t wait to show more of it!

FULL FRIGHTLOG:

Capture the Egg

Disabled the use of Tyrants and Flyers in CTE mode
Players can now join late and start playing when a CTE round is already in progress
2 big egg possession icons are now shown up top to say who has the egg
Humans are now shown with a bagpack that gets filled with the egg in CTE
CTE now uses set amount of LivesPerTeam instead of LivesPerPlayer
BOTH eggs need to be captured now, not just one
A stillborn Compy ragdoll appears and your egg "dies" if it is not returned soon enough
added animations for Spitters and Raptors holding eggs in their mouths
prevented roaring while dinosaurs are carrying the egg
added new hint message that the player can not run when picking up an egg
fixed sprint camera effects playing if someone attempts to "sprint" when holding the egg
fixed egg locator icon becoming stuck in CTE (making it look like there's 3 eggs)
egg possession icons at top of HUD are now hidden when the round hasn't started yet
Made vital info message text larger and more noticeable
Fixed "wait for players" still showing after the round has started in CTE

Survival

AI can now use special jump points to leap higher
The last 5 dinosaurs left alive are now highlighted to help track them down.
Fixed the Survival / Solo scoreboard not working
Kill assists now reward cash in Survival mode
You can now press B to throw cash
Fixed some weapons being worse after upgrading them in Survival mode
Added upgrades for recently added primary weapons in Survival mode
You now keep your weapon upgrades when respawning as the same class in Survival
Fixed turret upgrading being inconsistent, should now work in all maps.
Fixed turret log spam & turret-related server crash
You can now change class after a wave has completed in Survival mode, however, you will lose your weapon upgrades if you decide to swap (a popup warns about this)
Fixed always respawning as a Commando in Survival, even if you were a different class beforehand
Fixed spectating not working properly in Survival mode
Fixed secondary skin is applied to your primary weapon after upgrading in Survival mode
Fixed missing / incorrect HUD weapon icons in Survival mode
Fixed accidentally accepting class when sending a message on ready-up screen
Alpha Nova boss now has its correct skin in multiplayer
Alpha Nova boss can no longer be netted
Alpha Nova boss is now larger than a regular raptor
Updated hunt raptor cloaked skin effect
Updated the VisitorCentre map:
- now has multiple accessible rooftops via ramps
- main statue raised area is no longer blocked off
- generator is now located on second floor of a gated building
- various lighting and detail adjustments
Updated the WhiteForest map:
- you are now able to walk on top of the dam outflow area
- added ramps and walkways to elevated positions
- added purchasable gates to unlock sections of the map
- added more points of interest to the level

DINOSAUR CHANGES

Spitter Changes:

Spitters now run faster than before
Higher sprint stamina consumption rate for spitters
Cryo roar recharge time reduced to 30 seconds
Increased base damage for Cryo acid hits to 50
Reduced regular spit cost for dilo from 25 to 16
Reduced regular spit cost for cryo from 25 to 22
Reduced blind time for Cryo acid direct hits
Fixed dilophosaurus spit projectile collision cylinder, should now blind much more reliably.
Fixed spit overlay effect on human models not working in some cases
Fixed spitters being able to spit behind themselves
Spitter stamina bars are now split with a dividing line to show when charged spits are possible
You now see a targeting indicator after fully charging your spit to see where it will roughly land
If you don't have enough stamina for a charged spit, you'll just spit normally
Stamina regen is locked while charging spit
Charged spit uses more stamina than regular spit
Charged spit projectiles can be destroyed when shot at
Added new EXP bonus for shooting charged spit out of the air
First set of updated animations for Cryo and Dilo, fixing some minor glitches and differentiating them further
Added new spit impact sounds for dilo and cryo
Updated cryo sounds, featuring new pain and death cues
Cryo now has persistent green drool hanging from its mouth
Dilo now gets purple drool after spitting which persists for a few seconds
There is now a dissolve effect on human ragdolls when they die to Cryo acid
Spit is now destroyed when player leaves, gets auto-balanced, etc. to prevent friendly fire
Fixed dinosaurs seeing the venom overlay effect when standing in dilo spit puddles

Other Dino Changes:

Dinosaurs now have 40% damage reduction for strongpoint hits (previously 30%)
Increased Tyrant roar effect buff duration from 10 to 20 seconds
Increased effectiveness of Acro heal buff from 12 HP/sec to 15 HP/sec
Doubled the radius of Acro stomp attack
Moderate increase to Acro stomp damage
Reduced netted time for Tyrants from 9 seconds to 5
Increased damage of Rex tailswipe from 100 to 125
Tyrants take reduced damage when eating someone now (30% extra armour until they swallow)
Sliding as Pachy costs stamina now
Pachy must be near max sprint speed to initiate a slide
Made the Pachy charge turn speed a bit quicker
Can no longer taunt while sliding as Pachy
Fixed the attack timing and trace distance for raptors and Spino, should hit much better now
Fixed an issue where Cerato's tail whip would not deal damage if used directly after its primary attack
Increased bonus health of Carno ravenous bite, from damage +50 to damage +100
(+140 if secondary attack)
Fixed a lighting issue that was present on nearly all Spinosaurus models
Optimizations to dino master shader
Fixed jump landing animations not really playing
Updated novaraptor run animation head posture
Fixed a couple of Tyrannosaurus skins
Updated the Teratus Rex mutation model
Tweaked bodyfall sounds for tyrants
Updated subsurface scattering mask for Flyers so it's not just the wings that let light through

Human Changes & Fixes:

Minor reduction to human ground speed
Increased sprint stamina consumption rate for humans
Shorter delay before stamina begins regenerating as humans
Fixed being able to charge up heavy melee with machete if you don't have stamina
Halved max range of standard pistol
Faster damage falloff for desert eagle
Lower max range and faster damage falloff for default shotgun & double barrel shotgun
Reduced spread for unscoped flaregun
More intense spread values for the sniper rifle when unscoped
Sniper rifle now has less of an accuracy bonus when crouched
15% reduction to SMG crit damage
Minor reduction to desert eagle max range
Fixed default commando model absorbing its dogtags
Fixed a gap on the SMG model

MAP CHANGES

General:

Added foamy effect to interactive water waves
Improved collisions and removed exploits across several maps
Optimizations to multiple levels
Visual improvements and upgrades to Survival map lighting

PC-TheFalls:

Fixed the map not properly supporting new CTE
Widened one of the side entrances to the main atrium where the river flows out

PC-Docks:

added more dino corpses
added more cover and additional routes
removed most of the old CTE actors, started setting up new CTE
added dry grass to the level that transitions to lush grass inland
fixed main tower of the Docks ship not blocking spit
various level optimizations

PC-Transfer:

fixed some grass spots not being edible
added more deadly acid pits
added more Tyrant blockers
repositioned dino corpses to reduce line of sight at a distance
added way more cover and additional routes
placed more plant life, trees, bushes etc. around the main square
in-depth lighting pass, reduced height fog
fixed human exploit locations

PC-DesertionPoint:

fixed an invincibility spot that humans could wedge themselves inside of

VisitorCenter:

various level optimizations and collision improvements
set most of the cinematic raptors to use randomized models and skins
updated generic failure cinematic

UI AND MENU CHANGES

Added active server counts on server browser tabs (how many servers of each type are live)
Fixed incorrect weapon being selected when you are auto-balanced twice
Fixed party pistol and grenegg missing weapon icons in class selection screen
Fixed having your last custom first person weapon mesh still equipped after changing to another class (e.g. classic shotgun on commando)
Fixed L1/R1 gamepad buttons breaking class selection if used while in team select
Fixed stungun charging UI can get "stuck"
Added a separate ColorGrading off/on option to graphics menu
Removed the post processing quality option, as it has been split out into other settings

OTHER CHANGES

Fixed blood decals for ragdolls hitting the ground not appearing
Fixed taunt and attacking is possible at the same time as dino
Fixed issue where admin cheats would not work on server
Fixed several crashes across multiple game modes
Updated regular TDM maplist to have DeadTide map as part of it

Known Issues

Sometimes the Acro boss AI will fall out of the world on AI-Renaissance map
Survival AI can become stuck when dealing with gate obstacles on occasion
Older skins from several years ago may have incorrect patterning. We had to remove the old pattern system for performance reasons, but are working to remake these items in higher quality currently.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

That’s it for this latest update to Primal Carnage: Extinction! We will return with another patch once the Halloween Horrors event is over in a couple of weeks. After that it's Dinovember, where we will have retro store rotations that see classic items returning, followed by the epic Winter Update in December.

Until then, we hope you all have a scary good time!
-The Primal Carnage Team

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