Recently, we have been sharing some insights about the development of Achilles: Legends Untold. The posts were pretty well received, so we decided to officially make them into a regular thing! This is the first entry in a new series of Devlogs, that will show you some of the features we’re working on, as well as behind-the-scenes stuff happening at our studio. Let’s begin, shall we?
We’ve been working on a big content update for some time now.
One of the main and most requested features that will be making an appearance, is the in-game map. Well, we think you’ll be happy to hear that the hardest part is already behind us, and the basics are already in place!
The map in Achilles: Legends Untold will consist of a minimap on the HUD, and a bigger, fullscreen one, that you can scroll around to seek various points of interest.
Of course, it still needs improvements, but seeing it in a working state made us all even more motivated to work. We're still working on the visual design of the map, but we’ll have something nice to show you soon ;).
Another thing that’s in development right now, are the fight arenas.
It’s a new activity for Achilles to take on – the player will be able to enter a new level, where he will face a sequence of special enemy waves.
We grabbed a short gif of the place, to showcase where you’ll be fighting. Take a look!
The Arenas are all Hades-themed, with a slightly spooky vibe to them. You’ll get to fight unique, stronger enemy variants, tainted by the underworld’s energy.
Each arena can be visited once, through an entrance point on the main map, that will close after you successfully complete the challenge.
Tydeus
The next feature we want to talk about is our newest boss fight. The enemy in question is the mighty Tydeus, known mostly from the story of the Seven Against Thebes, who fought to take back the Thebes for Polynices.
The boss fight itself is still being polished, but if you’re curious how’s he going to look, here’s a concept art straight from under the pen of one of our artists:
Castor
That’s not all! We’re also still expanding on our current bosses. Castor just got more skills to aid him in defending his village. He’s a master in wielding his battleaxe - he’s able to perform a powerful 2-hit combo, swinging it at you, or rush at you from a distance. Be careful while fighting him, or you can easily get chopped in half.
The boss also received a second move - he can slam his shield against the ground, summoning a healing circle around him. His health will slowly regenerate while he stands inside, so better try and kick him out of there!
Castor will now pose as a greater challenge for heroes daring to cross the stone bridge, that the passage through he’s guarding so vigilantly.
We’re livening up the map a bit! Now you’ll not only encounter warriors and various beasts scattered around Greece, but also the villagers that live and work there.
They’re not really the combative type – when they see a fight, they get scared, scream, and run for their lives. See for yourself!
Killing them is completely optional, and it doesn’t grant any rewards, so it’s up to you to decide what kind of warrior you’ll be.
Apart from working on the new features, we’re still honing our current ones. The AI will be getting a new and improved player targeting system (see our previous dev post for more details!). Some items will be getting a bit of a rework, mostly new icons and descriptions. We’re also smoothing out the controls, squashing the leftover bugs and increasing the overall optimization.
It’s all hard work here at Dark Point Games! Our team’s morale is high, and we’re excited to let you play the update for yourself when it releases.
Achilles: Legends Untold’s setting is entirely based around Greek Mythology. It’s full of interesting stories, and we’d love to share some of them with you! From here on out, the Devlogs will have a special trivia section at the end - ranging from fun facts about our characters, through some lesser-known details about the events from the myths they partake in.
Did you know?
Tydeus was mortally wounded by Melanippus during the war. Athena, the Goddess of Wisdom, intended to make him immortal, but the seer Amphiaraus cut off the head of Melanippus and gave it to Tydeus, who proceeded to eat the brains of his killer. The Goddess, revolted by what she saw, changed her mind and left Tydeus to die.
Today marks the 15th Anniversary of original RTCW release on Steam. And on this day we decided to unleash the new massive update for RealRTCW.
The main focus of RealRTCW 4.0 - is polishing, adding QOL features and fixing bugs. Where is it coming from?
3.0 versions showed their lack of stability when it comes to handling big addons like "The Victors" or "Enemy Territory: Single Player" - crashes, fps drops, overall instability.
With that in mind I decided to sit down and take a closer look at my work and see if I can optimize it to the max. So, what's new in 4.0?
New HUD, Improved Menus navigation
A new highly customizable HUD made by William_Faure is definitely a gem along 4.0 changes.
Health/Armor values can be displayed with bars/digits/both. Stamina bar, diary notifications, ammo and weapon iconcs can be removed entirely and separately!
In addition to the new HUD - I reorganized all menus to make them easier to navigate and change needed options. A lot of previously missing options were added too!
New Enemy Types
Exclusive console enemies - Occult Priests and X-Shepherds are making their entrance in RealRTCW 4.0.
Massive thanks to theYoshik, Hellbaron, William_Faure and Eugeny for making it possible!
In addition to that Yoshik also provided a fantastic German Shepherd model - so prepare to meet those in the game too! New enemies are optional and can be turned off/on separately through the menu.
Rewards System for finding Secrets
Yet another part of missing console content is now available on PC.
Now, finding the secret areas is not entirely pointless. Because you will recieve specific set of rewards for finding ALL secrets on the specific level.
This includes weapons, ammo, armor, health and inventory items!
Rewards system is optional and can be turned off if you prefer classic PC experience.
Further weapons visuals improvements
In RealRTCW 4.0 I decided to finalize all of my High Definition weapon models efforts.
All animations were revised and improved with many minor improvements and collision fixes. A few animations were remade from scratch. Hands pose on all weapons was remade from total zero.
And some weapons like PPSH, TT33, Mosin and Snooper received new models.
You can look at the final result in the video below:
New pickup items models
99% of the pickup items models were replaced with new High Quality ones.
This includes food, ammo pouches and boxes and inventory items.
Weapon Arsenal Types
You can now switch between three types of arsenal:
Classic - features only stock RTCW arsenal.
RealRTCW - features stock guns + all RealRTCW weapons. Default value.
RealRTCW+ET - adds Nade Launcher, Gas Grenade, Airstrike and Browning MG.
AI Reinforcements
Wanna spice it up with increased amount of enemies? Go ahead and try new "Additional enemies" option. You can set it to "more" or "even more" enemies values.
Expanded modding possibilities
In RealRTCW 4.0 I decided to make modding more accessible for the casual players. Let's say, you don't like the balance. Maybe StG44 is too strong? Or lopers are too tough for your taste?
With the introduction of .weap and .aidefaults files - you can easily change weapon parameters and AI attributes by simply editing text files! Before it involved source code.
Take a peak into z_zzrealrtcw_scripts.pk3 and see by yourself! .pk3 can be opened with any .zip archiver.
In addition to that AI attributes like accuracy, health, reaction time, etc. are now randomized in certain range, depening on the difficulty level. So every walkthrough will be unique in a way. Ranges can be defined in .aidefaults as well.
New languages available! Improved localization system
In addition to the English and Russian versions - French and Ukrainian translations are now available!
All translations were made with the usage of improved key-value based system, which allows translators to easily translate the game by simply editing text files! All files what you need to localize are now located in z_realrtcw_localization.pk3
If you wanna translate RealRTCW to your language - go ahead and contact me if you need any help. Once you finished - we could possibly upload it to the Steam!
Steam Rich Presence
Your friends on Steam will now see what level and on what difficulty you are playing. Addons support is included!
Important bug fixes
RealRTCW 4.0 fixed a whole heap of long-present bugs. Just take a look at the list:
OpenAL lipsync improved. No more NPCs with chaotically flapping mounths.
A few compiler warnings fixed.
Prevent firing flamethrower and tesla in noclip or when leaning or when underwater.
Akimbo Colt muzzleflash is now working properly.
Wrong angle on deathcam fixed.
Stamina depletion rate is now independent from the max fps value.
Added clip check for the scoped weapons to prevent reloading with full clip.
Phantom weapon icons bug fixed. This allowed me to merge ETSP weapons into the main game.
Fixed health and armor bars getting out of their limits during overheal.
Fix low quality of the UI and levelshots on opengl1 renderer.
giveinventory script command now properly affects holdable items.
Added missing subtitles on tram and sfm levels.
Fixed very specific Dam crash.
Fixed a lot of signal 11 crashes. This one was an experience destroyer for many of ya.
New Addon available - Axis Vengeance
A few months ago Kane_Peterson released a new single-player campaign called Axis Vengeance.
It allows you to see a story from another perspective by playing as a German soldier. You can check it out on Steam Workshop.
…we’ve decided to release ongoing updates instead of a DLC2!
Ever since the Spaced Out! DLC launched in December, we’ve been exploring ideas for the next chapter of Oxygen Not Included. Those conversations started out as discussions about DLC2, but as we kept digging, we realized that a distant DLC2 release just wasn’t the right fit for our long-term goals.
We want ONI to feel like a true universe: infinite and ever-expanding!
And most importantly, accessible to our whole community.
While a second DLC would certainly expand the game, it’d limit our design choices. We’d have to decide which features base game players would have access to—and which ones they’d be left out of.
The more DLCs there are, the harder it gets for us to implement bug fixes and balance changes that are viable for everyone across all versions of the game. That sounds about as appealing as an all-mushbar buffet.
We want you all along for the ride! So we’re shifting our focus to building out a lot of the same content and systems you’d expect from a DLC, and releasing them regularly as free game updates that work for both base game and Spaced Out!
No colony left behind.
What’s next?
We’re working on a roadmap to let you know what to expect as we explore this exciting new chapter of ONI—we’ll post that here as soon as it’s ready.
Summary
We’re expanding the ONI universe through ongoing updates rather than a DLC2! These free, regularly scheduled updates will be designed for both the base game and the Spaced Out! DLC. Roadmap coming soon.
Our heartfelt thanks, as ever, to this incredible community! We’re overjoyed to be able to share our little corner of the cosmos with you.
Fixes: - Fixed an issue where Orcs would spawn and Amaya's dialogue would play before the event of the Orc War in Lvell. It should be possible now to continue forward.
Updates & Changes: - Electrogenic class now requires level 99 Paladin to be unlocked.
Other: - The Zodiac Overwatch can be entered from the Veil. Without the DLC installed, this location is empty. Tentative release date for Battle Series X is Friday, August 05, 2022.
* The first phase of the new enemy system has been added into the game with new more polished graphics and higher variety. * Some of the new Enemies have more than 1 attack animation.
Changes:
* The popup that you can switch servers has been redesigned to accommodate information about your characters on other servers. * The event information popup after the offline earnings has been removed so that you get faster into battle. * Further optimizations on the sound system and more sounds have been added into the game.
Fixes:
* Fixed the time zone bug that was noticeable in New Zealand. * The hotkeys will not work when settings popup is open. * Fixed the issue that some people were removed from the leaderboard. * Fixed several minor bugs.
We want to thank everyone for reporting issues you encounter!
В связи с установкой обновления 13.0.01.294 августа все игровые миры будут недоступны с 10:00 до 12:30. Время окончания работ является ориентировочным и может быть изменено.
We intercepted another interdimensional transmission: we’re looking for more testers to play the latest build of our retro-future roguelike. Just click the image below to register:
This new build features a smattering of UI updates along with some new graphical enhancements! As always, your feedback on the game's direction is invaluable to us! All of us appreciate you all taking the time to test and give feedback about your experience as well. We don’t just want to build this game for you, but with you as well. And, getting suggestions/feedback from these playtests helps a lot!
New Modulator UI in top right
Alright then, we got to get back to working on the game, but thanks again for reading!
Last time you managed to find some bugs and gave us a lot of helpful feedback. We seek your help again. Please, remember that the main goal of playtests is to detect issues with the game, analyze and fix them.
This Online Multiplayer Playtest is available until the 5th of August.
Playtest Key Points:
— To engage you more, we reworked the weapon and map selection compared to the previous playtest;
— A dev console will be available to help us gather feedback. Just don’t be afraid of it.
And the most important:
If you are facing an issue, please share the log files with us, as it will be easier for our team to analyze and fix a bug. Here is a short instruction on how to report a bug:
Option 1:
1. Press "Win+R"; 2. Paste it "AppData\LocalLow\Neverjam Studio\SpiderHeckApp" in the window that comes up. Press Enter; 3. Send us your Player file to the # bug-reports channel on our Discord server.
Option 2:
1. Please press the button "Open Log File" on the dev console; 2. Save the file as .txt or copy it and paste it into https://pastebin.com/; 3. Send the file to the # bug-reports channel on our Discord server.
❗️ Warning:
If you are using the second method, you should get the file before restarting the game. If you restart the game, the log is rewritten and the key information is lost.
In case you stumbled upon a bug, forgot to save a log file and exited the game, please use the first method.
HOW TO PLAY
You can join the playtest by clicking ‘Request Access’ on the game’s Steam page
Please make sure to wishlist SpiderHeck on Steam and follow us on Social Media to stay up to date with everything SpiderHeck related.