Hello there, Landlords!



Today's the day, and we couldn't be more excited! As we mentioned in the teaser, we've been working on the new district for almost a year, and in the end, we're really happy with how it turned out and can't wait to see you all try it. It's both three times the size of the Slums or Suburbs and an order of magnitude denser in detail and content than the other two.

The Manhattan Update doesn't just end with the new district itself; in fact, we've managed to build a few brand-new and exciting features to go along with it. As it is the last major update in The Tenants Early Access before the 1.0 release slated for later this year, we wanted to use this opportunity and shake up some of the core gameplay aspects. We're adding a whole new secondary progression system in the form of the Target Cards and encouraging players to explore Wondersville up close by scattering a host of new pickups and collectibles in all three districts.



Another big change is the Apartment Upgrades & Subscriptions system, which changes the way basic utilities work in properties. Don't be surprised that upon loading up your old save file, you'll have to install the Water upgrade in all your units and configure all three of the core upgrades. We hope that the reworked and expanded system will introduce more depth into planning out your apartments along with more interactive options to make it more interesting.

Together with Makeship we're proud to present you with the official Uncle Steve plushie! Doesn't he look cute? Just look at that lil' cap!



The campaign will last for 21 days starting from today. During this time, you'll be able to order your own Uncle Steve Plush in all his tiny glory. Don't own the game yet, or have a friend you'd like to get into it? You'll be happy to hear that with each order of the Uncle Steve Plush, you'll also receive a Steam key for The Tenants!

For more information, head over to the Makeship campaign page: Uncle Steve Plush

The crown jewel of the update itself, the third district, is officially open as of now! Available to those who have finished all their main story missions in both the Slums and the Suburbs. Once you buy the property mentioned in the last Suburbs mission, you'll be prompted by Uncle Steve, who will get the keys to Manhattan for you. Keep in mind, though, that you can always use Creative Mode to reach the new district faster!



Apart from the new environment itself, accompanied by new flats to buy and do jobs in, we wanted Manhattan to feel special in comparison to the other two districts. After all, it's the late-game area in which players who "finish" the game (reach the final mission) spend most of their time.



One of the main features that the last district introduces is the property classification system, which splits apartments into two types: residential and business. The former are your regular apartments that you can rent out to tenants. The latter opens up the possibility to rent your properties to whole companies that will then bring their employees along and start using your apartment as a new office. Business properties require a different set of items to host an open house, and each company type (there are 5 different types at the moment) requires a different set of workstations.

Office spaces will also come with their own set of events (ever dreamed of solving a missing yogurt case?), a new tenant archetype (say hello to the Politician!), and apartment subscriptions. Ah yes, the subscriptions. More on that later.

With the Manhattan Update, we're adding a new type of progression system, in which you'll receive random Target Cards that you can complete at your own pace. The first set will be fully randomized, but then when you complete a card, you'll be able to choose one of the three new random cards for your next target. The system becomes available at the same time as you receive the cash flow goal.



These cards will range from signing a particular type of tenant into one of your apartments to performing a given number of sabotages on unsuspecting tenants. On completion, they'll either give you plain cash, Landlord Points, new items, a random gift/service/sabotage, or the brand new Tenant Solver Token, which allows you to solve a chosen apartment event without your intervention.

With the new and beautiful district of Manhattan, we wanted to entice players to explore Wondersville from up close, instead of just jumping from one apartment to the other. With the release of the new update, we advise you to start looking under those bridges and into the chimneys scattered across the city. You might end up finding one of the two kinds of pickups we've implemented in the game.



Respawning pickups - simpler items that can be found in various parts of the town, on pickup will grant either money, Landlord Points, Tenant Hearts, and occasionally a rare epic item that will go straight to your player storage.

Collectibles - split into different sets that range from 7 to even 20 pieces. Some can be found only in a single district, while others may be scattered around all three. Each set on completion rewards the player with something different. So, for example, when you collect all Uncle Steve cards, you will receive a permanent move speed buff for Uncle Steve, and picking up all the graffitis will reward you with a set of them to use in your own interiors.

Go exploring and let us know which of the collectible sets you liked the most!

And now, let's move on to the new apartment Upgrades & Subscriptions systems. We were never quite happy with the old utility system, and we've had various ideas on how to rework it. The rework was originally planned for the Renovation Update, but as we sat down to design it in detail, it only grew in size and scope with each iteration. Eventually, we had to push it back a little to ensure it was fully ready and compatible with the rest of the game before releasing it to the public. Well, it's ready now!



Each apartment has a plethora of various upgrades that can be installed in them, along with a selection of subscriptions that can be turned on and off whenever the player wants to. The three core upgrades that are required to rent a unit out are electricity, heating, and water. Apart from installing them, the player will have to use Uncle Steve to configure each upgrade and place corresponding outlets on the property. Most of the outlets have a limited range in which they work, so it's good to plan ahead where, let's say, the fridge, is going to be placed.

On top of that, there'll be a bunch of additional upgrades that may increase the value of the apartment for some tenants and clients, like the automatic cleaning robot (yay!), dispatch stations, and such. Meanwhile, subscriptions do not require a permanent installation, and they can be switched on and off whenever, although cutting off your tenant's high-speed internet connection will definitely not make them happy.

We've gathered the courage and finally overhauled the furniture colliders along with a code rework that held them back. Previously some furniture had these surface slots that could be used to place small decorations and other items in them, and then we had some such as tables or kitchen counters, where you could freely place smaller items on.



From now on, you'll have much greater freedom in decorating your places. On top of the increased grid density when placing surface top items, we've also changed the item colliders and collision detection by getting rid of the old, clunky box colliders. Now you should be able to organize your interiors more fluidly.

We couldn't release a completely new district without a new tenant archetype that'd be unique to it. So here come the Politicians in their sleek suits and impeccable manners!



Apart from a bunch of custom actions that they can perform in your apartments, they also have one (for now at least) unique event that can only appear for Politician tenants. So be prepared when they call you in for a little rehearsal before an important speech.

This one's been a long-coming feature, but it finally found its way into the game. With the new update, we're now counting door prestige scores when calculating given room appraisals.



Along with many new door designs, we've also implemented a color variant switch option, similar to the one we added in the past for furniture items.

It wouldn't be a proper major update if we didn't add a metric ton of new items and categories. This time, however, we're also significantly expanding on the walls and floors roster, essentially doubling it in size.


Design provided by a community member - @Sisquinanamook.

On top of that, we went over some of the older items and added color variants to those that didn't have any to choose from. We can't wait to see the beautiful interiors you'll design with this new batch of items!


Enough about renovations; let's talk tenants. The idea for this feature has been brewing for a long time in our minds, and we agreed that it's the right time to build it. Coming in this update, your tenants will not only react to your actions but also to what other people in their apartments do. This introduces an interplay mechanic between different archetypes, as they will now get along better with selected tenant types and quickly get tired of annoying actions performed by the others. All of which contribute to their overall happiness.


Since Manhattan is the last district in the game and it'll take some playing to get to, we wanted you to feel its magic right from the get-go upon loading up the game. That's why we remade the main menu screen from scratch, featuring our very own skyscrapers in the background making for a peaceful city center look.

But those are only the biggest changes. Alongside them, we're also introducing a big batch of QoL improvements and tweaks. One of the more notable ones is the renovation UI optimization, which should make switching between various design tabs and furniture categories much faster than before. No more lag spikes when accessing your kitchen!

We're also finally expanding the soundtrack with 5 brand new chill tracks for you to enjoy while looking for those pesky pickups or renovating your places.

Another small feature worth mentioning is the new ability to discard jobs from the Jobs app (you'll never have to see that train job ever again!). A tiny yet impactful change has been made to the renovation checklist. Now requirements that are not yet complete, but are in progress, will feature a small, yellow dot instead of staying empty until the requirement is fully complete. This should allow you to gauge your work progress at the first glance.



One last thing to mention before we let you get your hands on the game itself, is the new feature to extend a tenant lease without negotiations. We've heard your feedback on how sometimes you might just want to carry on with your current terms without bothering to renegotiate, and, well, now you can! No more haggling just to get the same money.


We can't wait to hear your thoughts on the last Early Access major update in the comments below or on our official Discord server, which can be found here: link. If you encounter any in-game issues, please post them either on our forums, our social media platforms, or using the in-game feedback tool. This is a truly giant update, and we'll do our best to polish it and patch it up whenever anything comes up in the next few weeks. Have fun!

• Implemented apartment upgrades (Electricity, Heating, Water, Monitoring, Cleaning Robots, House Share License).
  
• Implemented apartment subscriptions (Better Internet, Better TV, Earthquake Insurance, Water Damage Insurance, Extended Appliance Warranty, Cleaning Service, Coaching).
  
• Implemented Target Cards - a new progression system with 26 unique goals.
  
• Implemented City Pickups - new discoverable objects on the map with 7 random pickup types and 7 collectible sets.
  
• Implemented Business properties with the ability to rent them out to Manhattan-based companies.
  
• Implemented door color variants with over 75 new options for your doors.
  
• Implemented tenant reactions with each tenant defining over 40 actions they react to with their roommates.
  
• Implemented the ability to extend a tenant lease without renegotiations.
  
• Implemented the ability to discard jobs.
  
• Implemented a new audio slider for Ambience sounds.
  
• Implemented the ability to set Open House duration.
  
• Implemented a hint system for all main missions.
  
• Implemented the ability to sell storage items without entering renovation.
  
• Completely reworked item collider system to allow for easier placement of objects on top of other surfaces.
  
• Revised renovation checklist to showcase requirement progress.

• Added a new district: Manhattan.
  
• Added 34 new residential buildings in Manhattan.
  
• Added over 120 new jobs in Manhattan.
  
• Added 7 new Elite Contracts in Manhattan.
  
• Added 7 new missions in Manhattan.
  
• Added 2 new missions in the Slums.
  
• Added a new tenant archetype: Politician.
  
• Added 3 new tenant events (mostly related to the Politician or to business apartments).
  
• Added 20 new player levels (max level is now 95).
  
• Added 3 new skills to increase sockets' maximum range for utilities.
  
• Added 2 new furniture categories.
  
• Added over 400 new furniture items.
  
• Added over 80 new walling and 80 new flooring options.
  
• Added 5 new tracks to the in-game soundtrack.
  
• Added tenant archetype information to Uncle Steve's Guidebook.
  
• Reworked 10 babysitting/open house variants in the Slums to serve as inspiration for your designs.
  
• Remade the in-game menu featuring the Manhattan environment.

• Updated engine version.
  
• Tweaked how the camera works when navigating to properties.
  
• Revised the credits screen.
  
• Optimized renovation item list UI.
  
• Simplified Properties app UI to show both upcoming and ongoing auctions on the same list.
  
• Tweaked creative mode game creation UI to be easier to navigate.
  
• Fixed a number of issues allowing players to move or place items in rooms other than the one being worked on during a tenant request.
  
• Fixed an issue with items sometimes appearing in incorrect places when reloading the game.
  
• Fixed an issue with the Happy Tenant main mission not being properly completed when already having a tenant on the specific lease term.
  
• Fixed a number of furniture issues.

• Rebalanced prestige values for all items to be more consistent.
  
• Rebalanced some of the item prices.
  
• Rebalanced Landlord Point cost and Happiness gain for all gifts and services.
  
• Made the doors count towards room/apartment prestige scores.

Thank you,
Ancient Forge Studio

---

Greetings, Champions!

We are super excited to announce that we will be holding our very first Closed Beta test event! The Closed Beta will be focused on our upcoming update, focusing on the addition and testing of:

• 5 playable characters: enter Redeye, the Monster; Crystal, the Spellslinger; A.T.A.C.R, the Techie; and Tori, the Evangelist! Alongside the Warrior Lee, they make the roster of characters that you can choose from to join your fight. Which one will be the first?
  
• Character progression: upgrade your characters to the max! Each one of them has 5 levels to advance, and best of all: rewards upon leveling up! Including bonus cards, character objectives (that once completed will help you unlock new characters), and character-specific cosmetic upgrades.
  
• Unlock Tokens: it’s our gift for you when your first log in! Use them to unlock more characters, and get more by completing objectives. The more you play, the easier it gets to try out more characters!
  
• Character Missions: 5 characters, 5 stories to explore. Unravel their lore under special rules and gameplay elements that flash out the many possibilities Death or Glory has in store!
  
• Arena game mode: no easy mode! Engage in battles with increasing difficulties, complete Arena Objectives, and earn Honor Tokens! A set of 15 opponents are ready to challenge you, and each won round takes you closer to the final boss, Hatranos the Fire Dragon!

Now is your time to join the battle! The Closed Beta Test will start on July 28th (9 AM CST) and it will be ongoing until testing has been completed.

To sign up, join our Discord and head to #beta-sign-up! Fill out the form and we'll reach out to the approved candidates and grant them a Closed Beta Key for Death or Glory!

The first round of sign-ups will close on July 27th (12 PM CST), make sure to fill out the sign-up form before it’s too late!



We are eagerly looking for your feedback and improvement suggestions. Beta testers will be able to voice their insights on a specific Discord channel, which will be closely followed by the devs. Help us create the best fighting card game experience for you!


Catch you in the arena! 👊

Distilled Gaming Company

Hi everyone, hope you're doing fine during this hot summer. We are doing this announcement to talk about our progress but also to announce our presence at the Steam VR Fest. This kind of event is a big opportunity for us.

A new demo of Bad Dreams will be available on Steam during the Steam VR Fest from 18 to 25 of July.
Our team tried its best to came up with this horror experience. With our indie team, we are working on this game for almost 2 years.



Player

The player was really tricky since we're attempting to offer a full body solution. We added a whole animation system that gives more immersion and we finally succeeded to smooth the body postures according to hands positions & rotations.
We're still working on the hands to make them beautifull but we didn't had time to integrate them yet.
This new mecanism was tested but can still show some bugs so don't hesitate to report them.

Large scale optimisation

Our devs worked hard on multiple aspects of our game's optimisation :
They improved our many shaders, redesigned the AI system & fixed a big amount of scripts.



New staging
We redesigned and added some staging & cinematics.

Renew of the madness system

We add wristband that indicates the level of madness with a light and a bip. The faster it is, the craziest you are.
The player has a cigarettes pack on his chest and he can smoke cigarette to diminish his madness.
The madness is managed differently than before and is more scripted to offer a more balanced experience.



New grab & ungrab system

That fixes some bugs with physics & hands positions. Now, when the player is forced to ungrab, the hands resume their original pose. It is way more complicated than it sounds but we're still working on this.


Add some puzzles into our levels


Surprise ! We wanted to add "specials" things.

New special level : the Maze

Redesign of the "Hotel Room" as a "Lobby"
that the player will see more than one time.
We integrated some puzzles inside the room itself.

Integration of our narrative design & back story



Bad Dreams has a story that goes beyond zombies and nightmares. It is linked to an event that shook but and entire nation before the 80's.

We started to integrate this story in our environments but also in some items that the player will find.
Stay aware to understand this spun metaphor that glues every pieces together.

__________________________________

It is true that this may not seem like much, but we only note here the work that has been done on the demo.

We also worked a lot on the part of Bad Dreams that's not in this demo. All of our levels are in place and the major part of our gameplay is here but we need a lot of tests and fixes without even talking about balance.

This is the biggest project of our studio. We're taking our time to shape the best horror game that we can make.

Even if it was tested, again & again, you can experience some bugs during your play session.
We have a special thread in the hub community for them. Don't hesitate ;)


We hope you'll enjoy this free demo that will be available during the Steam VR Fest !

Beta version is now release! Change your current version into beta branch (Tutorial) to start testing the new features and bugs!

Here's something new about beta version:

• You can borwse and download mod from workshop.
  
• You can custom your own config into files, which will be saved to Steam Cloud.
  
• You can use SDK to upload your mods.

Friday! Weekend! And weekly news!

Be sure to check the full weekly report following the link there will be a screenshot of the new weapon/tool.

Today we want to share a little information about how the navigation from the player's perspective will work. First of all, the map already has a lot of details and yet more to come to make every location unique, so remembering the location will be a much easier task.
Compass will be a tool that can be picked up, it will unlock the usage of the UI compass, so you will now see the compass UI, so it gives you a hint about how most of the UI will be working currently. To unlock specific UI you will need a tool for that. So if you want to look at the map you will need to have one or draw it yourself.
The compass was the first step in this line of work and we are planning to do more, our main goal is to make as many tools as we can, and make them as useful as it could. So next time when you see a pack of play cards doesn't scrap it or throw it away, maybe play some card games with your friends.

As you may know, we were migrating from UE4 to UE5 and one of the UE5 benefits is Lumen, which allows you to get a pretty awesome view in terms of light and environment, once we saw how our game could look with UE5 we decided to rework the map. Unfortunately, it is a complex task, because the UE5 also provides a system called world partition, and to make it work we need to revisit every level and make changes.
So right now our goal is to finish the migration of the world map and once it is done we can start to work with the levels.

Don't forget to have fun on the weekend and cya guys next week! :)

Tiny improvements after customer feedback like slightly less police on the streets and more things to move or throw around. Some more sounds and more lights to school scene as in this picture.

Hey Zeepkisters!

Recently it's been brought to our attention that there's been some trolls on the loose in Zeepkist servers, annoying other players with mean, inappropriate, or abusive chat messages.

To deal with this we've quickly developed a small hotfix, adding a menu to the online pause menu that will allow you to mute unwanted players!



Muting players put them on a local, personal to you, blacklist that will mute them in every room you find them in. Muted players will not be told they've been muted, so for them it just looks like they're being ignored.

Feel free to mute any annoying players you come across :)

As always, I hope we didn't break anything.

Happy Zeepkisting!!

The WolfQuest server is currently offline -- apparently a failing power supply.... We hope it'll be back online very soon, but don't have an ETA yet. This means that you cannot log into your WQ account in the game until the server is back online. Very sorry about that!

Server is back online!

Early Access Patch #13 is here and Royale mode now starts with a moment! This as well as balance changes, and a few new looks in both tour and Royale continue our expanding of Riff City! Hope you enjoy and can't wait to hear your thoughts!

Starting with this patch every Royale starts with a quick interview with Sky moment; every band will be offered the same set of choices and get a glimpse at what the bracket and shop has to offer. We think this will get the Royale started with a bit more excitement!

• Better initial band/match distribution logic to help prevent 1st round human v human bands
  
• Ability to see all bandmember decks from lobby/vendor screen

• "Side-Buzz" hairstyle added to Store Pool.
  
• "Wavy Jangler" Guitar added to Store Pool.

Royale:

• Round 2 bots will be less likely to have upgrades and more likely to have more quicks, no chance of "Super Fan" and a few other strong cards removed.
  
• Round 3 bots will be less likely to have as many upgrades and strong cards.
  
• Round 5 Bots will be more likely to have upgrades and a few extra low tier cards.
  
• Round 6 Bots will be more likely to have upgraded cards and fewer louds and quicks.

Tour:

• Sirens Call: Tour Level 1 -1 energy, Tour Level 2 -1 energy and "Wail Of The Sea", Tour Level 4 +1 card draw, Tour Level 5 +1 card draw & +2 max hand size, Tour Level 6 +1 energy.
  
• Skidmarks: Tour Level 3 +1 card draw and max hand size
  
• Coin Ops: Tour Level 1 -1 energy, Tour Level 3 +1 energy.
  
• Bardbarians: Tour Level 2 +1 energy, Tour Level 3 +1 Card draw, Tour level 6 +1 card draw. Card weights adjusted.
  
• Caper Crew: Tour Level 3 +1 energy, Tour Level 4 +1 Stolen Riff +1 Card draw and Max cards, Tour Level 5 +1 energy.
  
• Jackal Brothers: Tour Level 3 +1 energy, Tour Level 4 +2 card draw and Max hand size.

• "Quick Head Shake" upgrade "More" replaced with "Jacked Up" upgrade.
  
• "Scream Self Raw On Key" -max Energy now only lasts 2 turns.
  
• "Distracting Glare" requires 2 more plays to upgrade.
  
• "Calming Lick" -2 hype and bot weight updates.
  
• "Titanic Smash" -4 energy cost down to 3.
  
• "Peaceful Riff" no longer ignores protection.
  
• "Little Mallets" -1 hype no longer exhausts.
  
• "Kind Chorus" -2 capacity to 5.
  
• "Well Timed" upgrade weight adjustments.
  
• "Super Fan" is now tier 4.
  
• "Loyal heckler" cost -1 energy, requires 1 more play to upgrade.
  
• "Truck Driver" upgrade "Disruptive" replace with "Vindictive"
  
• "Production Manager" requires 1 more play to upgrade.
  
• "Embarrassed" now lower priority than quicks.
  
• "Broken Things" now lower priority than quicks.
  
• "Hot hook" bot weights updated.
  
• "Groovin With The Beat" (All) bot weights updated.
  
• "Soft Sticks" bot weights updated and fixed.

We are incredibly grateful for all of your feedback and we hope you continue to enjoy Battle Bands!
If you are looking for other players to play against or with or just for all the latest news come check out our Discord!

• The health bar now does not indicate that you would be healed from rolled hearts while the Demonologist is in demon form.
  
• Fixed an issue where the health bar would sometimes show an inaccurate prediction when you would overheal from your currently rolled faces.
  
• The random run button now behaves correctly when switching between normal mode and hard mode.
  
• Fixed a soft lock related to enemies dying from Windrider's Bow triggers.
  
• A frozen Sunstone Guardian now shows the correct text prompt when attacked by a piercing attack during the day.
  
• The damage preview is now calculated correctly when a sun face with an attack multiplier is among the rolled faces during the day.
  
• When a frozen illusion face is kept, the copied shop face no longer retains the frozen debuff.
  
• Mindwarping an attack symbol onto an attack face with different properties now works correctly.
  
• Performer's hat no longer allows you to lock faces with more than one symbol after using Glimpse the Future.
  
• Random run can no longer select locked classes.
  
• Wurfus's Saturday Stein can no longer add melee symbols to its faces if the Monk hasn't been unlocked.
  
• The "mouseover for more" text on cursed bosses is now readable (it's shown in white rather than black).
  
• Imp assistant now works correctly with Wurfus's fork.

• Illusion faces now appear less frequently in the shop for all classes except the Illusionist.
  
• Yin now deals piercing damage in order to help the Monk deal with enemies that have shield or barrier.
  
• Imp assistant's sacrifice trigger has been changed from "Gain a red and a wild gem" to "Add a random symbol to each moon face on this die".