A small hotfix for some missing translations for French, German, Russian and some other languages. While there still might be strings missing, we’ll cover them in an upcoming hotfix.
Today we’re releasing one of the last major planned features for the networking stack: Spatial Physics Culling. What this means practically is that other players and the objects they interact with no longer simulate physics when far away to save performance. Until today, if you and your friend were standing at opposite ends of New Park City, you would still be simulating their player. That’s all of their bones, muscle forces, and resulting poses - which doesn’t make a lot of sense considering you won’t be interacting with them from that distance and most likely can’t even see them. Now with the new Spatial Physics Culling, we’re finally saving performance on those far away objects and players, and seamlessly transition them back to a simulated state when you approach them or begin interacting with them. All of this results in allowing Quest lobbies to scale further in terms of player and object counts, and you shouldn’t even notice a difference in synchronization quality!
Alongside this major networking improvement, we’re also shipping the final original map rework. Warehouse has been a long standing performance challenge on Quest due to its structure and design, so we had to take it back to the drawing board. This new iteration of Warehouse leverages the new Physics Culling to push objects counts further than ever before while maintaining its open battle-arena layout. It’s not the final iteration by any means and we expect to keep dialing in the layout based on your feedback, so please let us know what you think!
Finally, we’re also shipping an Empty World facelift to bring it more inline with the new graphical standards we’re setting with the reworked maps alongside some new props, and an assortment of bug fixes. I’d also like to mention that work on Map 3 (Labs) is now well underway and we can’t wait to show you what we’re cooking. Speaking of cooking, does anyone feel like the new Warehouse is getting a little uncomfortably warm? ;)
Physics objects now sync with less intense forces, resulting in softer, smoother object sync.
Roughly 4 frames of latency have been removed from the time it takes a synced object to reach its synced position. Objects will now reach their synced locations in a single frame.
Object interpolation and extrapolation have been completely rewritten to perform better at lower send rates.
All together these changes provide major improvements to object sync smoothness, bandwidth usage, and performance. They may introduce small edge case bugs so please submit a bug report (ideally with a video clip) to our Discord if you run into any issues or weirdness!
Player:
Improved player sync, players will no longer jitter over time and should be more stable overall.
Held objects now have improved collision detection
Improved foot placement (no longer slightly floating off the ground).
Fixed a hole in the shoes of the player.
Fixed an inconsistency with the collision between held objects and players.
Maps:
The warehouse has been rebuilt, it is now more open and should allow for more interesting gameplay.
Empty World has received some visual adjustments and new ambience audio to improve the overall vibes.
Added start/finish line to New Park City.
Props:
Added a traffic cone.
Added a pallet.
Added a start/finish line gate.
Updated barrel model.
Sandbox Gun:
Fixed sandbox guns being able to be respawned when welded to.
Fixed spawn menu closing when other players switch sandbox gun modes.
Weapons:
Fixed magazines being able to be reused when welded to.
We're beyond excited to have HiKing Mind Studios' upcoming debut title, Follow the meaning, be part of the Future Games Show Spring Showcase! Watch the show:
And you can play the free-to-play demo as part of their Steam Sale Event!
If you like what you see, don't forget to wishlist Voidwrought, join fellow Simulacrums in our Discord, and follow us on social media at @VoidwroughtGame!
Lush Forest 2 redecorated and renamed to Sacred Shrine - Added more details to the Lush Forest map - Fixed book collision so players don’t get stuck in Giant’s Tower
New Cosmetics!
Banana Mobile
Space Cosmetics
- Added the ability to see all future leveling rewards - You can now purchase all leveling rewards
General Improvements
- Performance is MUCH better now! - Added the option to choose who the cop is going to be - Added infinite boost option - Added an arrow pointing where to drop off the flag in CTF - Boosts charge faster when you are more drunk, encouraging more drinking :) - Increased how fast boosts recharge - Bombs are now easier to see when they are going to explode - Added survival time XP to the bombs gamemode - Reworked how XP works to make it more balanced - Drunkenness now decreases much faster - Increased max number of players in a lobby to 100 - Made the trails in lines easier to see - Added audio to help players know they are charging their jump - Jumps now charge faster and max height is higher - Collision on car is now different (more quirky)
Bug Fixes
- No longer get XP when waiting for players - Made players invincible in cop gamemode when waiting for players - Some props are no longer invisible on low graphics - Some hats now change colors in game correctly - Cops no longer get XP for picking up alcohol - No longer get double XP when depositing flags - The top players on the leaderboard are now visible - When you’re a client, the back button after inviting now works properly
Take control of the newly-born Simulacrum in our upcoming 2D action-platformer Voidwrought. Delve into the thawing ruins of the First Civilisation to strike down the primeval gods that dwell there and absorb their power for yourself.
The Simulacrum is driven to collect Ichor, the blood of the gods, from the monstrosities who hoard it. It is your fate to conquer the old gods and collect the sacred Ichor that has empowered them since time immemorial.
In Voidwrought, you'll get to navigate levels, discover new empowering abilities, and take on a variety of challenging and horrific bosses. Customize your playstyle using powerful and enigmatic Artifacts, excavate the rubble of the Gray City, and restore a shrine for your loyal followers, who will pray for your success.
Voidwrought features dramatically realised hand-drawn locations, from the star-scorched Surface to the biomechanical Abandoned Expedition, inhabited by over 70 enemies and 10 formidable bosses.
Powersnake consists of 3 developers based in Sweden, sharing a love for all things touching on cosmic horror, passive souls-like narratives, and intriguing mysteries. Among us, we've worked on titles ranging from adventure games, city-builders, and 3D platformers to horse riding games. Regardless of genre we strive to put gameplay first, be it fluid combat, responsive movement, or engaging exploration. Voidwrought is our love letter to the metroidvania genre and such greats like Hollow Knight, Castlevania, Crowsworn, and others.
We're also excited to announce that we'll be partnering with UK-based publisher Kwalee to release Voidwrought!
Want to stay up-to-date on the latest news about Voidwrought?
Join fellow Simulacrums in our Discord and follow us on social media at @VoidwroughtGame!
