Hello, fans of strategic city-builders!

We hope you are ready for unforgettable emotions during the upcoming celebration of games and gaming culture - PAX West in Seattle. The event takes place in the huge exhibition hall of the Convention Center, filled to the brim with the best industry games, recognizable publishers & studios, and guarantees an unforgettable experience.

Our team is already in Seattle and yes! - they present The Whims of the Gods to all interested parties while inviting people to visit the stand to test the demo of the trade show. You absolutely cannot miss this opportunity! Meet our people and play our production. Be sure to visit us!



Look for us in this location until September 2, 2024:


Join us at PAX West and try to turn a small village into a bustling ancient metropolis!

Hey all,
We've been working hard on finishing the game for our 1.0 release, so we're taking a break from Feature Friday next week to get some much needed rest. FF will return the following week.

Live and drink, friends.

207.98

• Clicking on an interactable object or hostile creature now advances one square before warning instead of preventing movement altogether.
  
• The accomplishment for donating books to Sheba can now only be engraved on your [redacted] once, if other deeds are available.
  
• Proselytizing a creature is now only an accomplishment if they have not previously been your companion.
  
• Fixed a bug that took some loot away from the ancient bones in the asphalt mines.
  
• Fixed an issue with metabolizing effects from cooked recipes not triggering properly.
  
• Fixed the character sheet description of Light Manipulation to properly show the PV and reflect chance of the next level.
  
• Fixed a bug with installing two onboard recoilers at the same time resulting in only one being usable.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the ceremonial vibrokhopesh to clack and buzz constantly on the world map.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused popups referring to the chime '_' to be incorrectly capitalized.
  
• [modding] Added float and double gamestate methods.
  
• [modding] Added several methods for getting properties from HistoricEntity and HistoricEvent.
  
• [modding] Fixed a bug that caused the Circuitry part to lose all charge on the world map.
  
• [modding] The IXP multiplier wish (xpmul:#) behavior is now stored as a float game state "XPMul" and will persist on save load.

Small Update to the Demo with some bug fixes and quality of life improvements. Thank you to everyone who's tried the demo, and extra thanks to those who've reported bugs and feedback. Mahalo!

- UI

• Added 'Idle' reminder above pause button to increase clarity
  
• Hovering over a stat in the level up screen shows explanation of the stat
  
• The screen dims behind the sync bar for a moment when it fully charges

- Cooking

• Ensured Autopause kicks in for a range of corner cases like gifts disappearing and dishes being lifted during cooking
  
• Fixed a physics bug allowing chefs with multiple move speed buffs to overshoot their targets or clip through scenery

- Tooltips

• Properly scale with screen size
  
• A tooltip now shows up in Lv1 explaining that chefs can be right clicked to view info
  
• Help text appears when you try to serve an unfinished dish

- Game Balance

• Tutorial gift appears a bit later to avoid conflict with the sync style tutorial
  
• Uncle's ability tweaked to partially fill the sync bar at the start of the level instead of just multiplying the incoming sync amounts
  
• Reduced ticket difficulty for early chapters/missions
  
• Increased time limits for early chapters/missions

- SFX

• Initial volume settings during first run should be reduced
  
• Tickets will play sfx when ready
  
• Autopause now plays sfx when pausing

- Twists

• Bad Twists cannot be discovered anymore (they're removed from the game for now!)
  
• Mastery effects on dish starting quality have been increased to compensate!
  
• Assisted Twists are now flagged as such immediately. No need for guess and check!
  
• The Skill Experimenter now triggers if you've discovered a perfect twist instead of a bad twist

- Customizer

• Autofill now prefers special stations to normal stations. Still random between types of special stations.
  
• Auto filling stations now correctly clears current stations to make room for new needed ones. Currently reshuffles station placement as well, might revisit someday.
  
• A trendy tag now shows up for trending flavored dishes (just for more clarity!)

- Misc other bugs and improvements!

Some additional bug fixes following our big update 1.4, also including a tentative fix to an issue that's been around for a while.

TENTATIVE BUG FIX - Tentatively fixing a rare bug that can happen after power surges or crashes, resulting in players losing their Spiritographer level and Spirit credits, and preventing them from progressing further. If you have been affected by this rare issue, please reach out via our Discord to get assistance!

BUG - Fixed eyes being open too wide in certain activity animations
BUG - Antique Lamp on bed sidetable is now unlocked by default instead of being purchasable, as it's an item used in the default room setup
BUG - Fixed eye movement at bed gaming activity to no longer give the player side eye
BUG - Fixed an issue where the pencil sound effect would trigger for every new letter typed when renaming a to-do list tab, instead of once when text is committed
BUG - Fixed an issue where some checked and deleted to-do tasks would show back up when reopening the game
BUG - Fixed an issue where the Spirit Credits amount shown in avatar and room customization would not update when given Spirit Credits every minute

• Save file optimization, resulting in a save wipe
  
• Knight had it's ability secretly named in the last patch, and now it has a fancy new animation
  
• Put the timer and time-of-day in a nice little box so they are a little more visible
  
• Ability charge icons are 50% larger and two-tone now to help make them more visible
  
• Enemy Bullets have trails now
  
• Player Abilities now have particle effects to visually tell the player they are active
  
• Class Perk Preview now lets you select which perk choices to compare
  
• Redesigned the Equipment menu to be less intrusive and annoying
  
• The tutorial now forces you to fire several coins before it goes away, and it shows up again the first time you max out your ability charges

• The game now starts windowed at 1280*720
  
• Alt-tabbing while loading no longer freezes the game on the loading screen
  
• Fixed health displaying "0" when you actually had more than 0 but less than 1 health
  
• Bombs no longer add coin data to coins that have coin data already

Commanders, lock and load - this update gives you an Arsenal of weapons!

Update 0.9.11, codename "Arsenal", gives you complete control over the action:
equip EVERY Commander clone with a weapon of your choice, take aim, and fire!

Mark enemies for your Mercs to direct their fire, create defensive perimeters, and break out of tight situations with deadly force - or not-so-deadly abilities.



IMPORTANT NOTE: Airstrike and SMG weapons do not fully work as intended, this will be fixed in an upcoming hotfix patch!
Read on for all the details, but first...

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This Major Update changes various core systems around abilities, and brings adjustments to Bunker Rooms, Traits, Level-ups & Skill Trees, balancing, and meta-progression.

We RECOMMEND you reset your savegame with this update.

The first time you start the game after the update, you will get a popup message that asks you to reset your savegame. If you do reset, you will start fresh and a backup of your last savegame is created in your local game folder.

You CAN continue with your old savegame.
Our tests did NOT show any issues. But the game is still in development, so bugs may occur, hence the recommendation to start over.

You can find a guide on how to restore savegames from older game versions here:
How to access & restore savegame backups (Steam Forums)

---

Let's get into the details of Update 0.9.11 "Arsenal":

Every Commander clone can now wield a weapon you can actively control.

Go to the Genome Lab, clone your next Commander, and choose your loadout from an arsenal of starting weapons, independent of Traits or other variables - for now.

The weapons are built in a classic twin-stick shooter fashion: aim & fire with your mouse or controller.



Each of the new starting weapons has a unique profile, behavior, and individual synergies with various stats. Some weapons evolved from Traits that used to give you an active weapon.

Weapons exist in parallel to your Dash, so you can combine them in creative ways with your Mercs, Traits, and Gear items.

With the new active Commander Weapons we separate Dash, Traits, and Weapons into distinct systems to prevent confusion and enable more fun squad build strategies.

The Dash is your default active ability based on your current movement direction.
Any other ability you can actively aim and trigger is now a Weapon.
From now on, Talent Traits will grant you passive abilities, or modify your Dash or Weapons by adding, removing, or changing effects and rules for those.

All Weapons are currently available immediately from the start:

• Leafblower - swoop enemies out of your way and mark them for a short while
  
• Marksman Rifle - fire high-powered projectiles to mark enemies for extended periods
  
• Riot Shield - block projectiles and enemies and clear a path with your shield bash attack
  
• Crippling Mines - drop multiple mines to damage and slow down enemies
  
• Melter Beam - decay armor and mark your targets for a short period
  
• Singularity Launcher - create black holes that pull enemies in and mark them
  
• Quaker Hammer - deal melee AoE damage and knock enemies away
  
• SMG - fire bursts that can punch through armor
  
• Airstrike - cut a swath through the horde

Traits that formerly enabled active weapons are now giving passive abilities or modifying your Dash, e.g. the Defender Talent modifies your Dash to shatter enemy projectiles into shrapnel.


The primary purpose of Commander Weapons is NOT damage but giving you ways to control your Mercs and manage the horde more effectively. The Weapons scale various parameters with different stats and partially use the new "marked" status effect.

Your Mercs stick to their individual movement & targeting behavior until a "marked" enemy comes into range - then they are focusing on the marked target.

The new "marked" effect and stat-scaling on the Commander Weapons add to the options to create Emergent Synergies. Our goal is to not only to create systems to stack & scale stats, but provide fun ways to control the frantic action.

We're exploring more ways to combine procs & status effects with active & passive abilities and rule modifiers, so please leave us your feedback and show us how you use the new weapons.

Update 0.9.10 "Bootcamp" introduced a new level-up system. This update adds refinement and adjusts the Merc's skill trees and specializations to have a more pronounced impact on your squad builds.

Mercs now use a unified structure for their Skill Trees, offering 1 base lane and 2-3 specialization lanes. The spec lanes are exclusive to one another, offer one additional choice for refinement, and result in an Elite Skill as the final upgrade.

The default choices for each level-up are now the Generic Upgrades. Every few level-up rolls will give you the option to pick an upgrade for your Commander Weapon, Mercs, or Gear items.

In turn, the upgrades for Mercs, Weapons, and Gear are more impactful and need fewer level-ups to max them out in total.

One of our main initiatives is building a more intuitive & accessible structure for the various game mechanics and systems.

The data and insights we gained from your player feedback shows that we over-complicated certain things in the game unnecessarily. This update is another step into building a cleaner mental model so you can focus on the action and your squad build strategies instead of digging through and remembering too many different variables.

We started work on two new Mercs since we removed specializations from a few existing Mercs where they weren't providing a competitive alternative to the other skill lanes. The new Mercs are meant to synergize much better with your squad and weapons with a unique profile.

The game is now available in these languages, in addition to English, German, and Chinese:

• French
  
• Spanish
  
• Italian
  
• Brazilian Portuguese
  
• Polish
  
• Turkish
  
• Korean
  
• Japanese
  
• Ukranian
  
• Russian

These new languages are available as a work-in-progess and aren't fully proof-read. We want to invite you to support us and are planning to offer the translation files publicly as part of a Community Translations Project.

You will receive exclusive access to that project via our Discord server to improve translations or add completely new languages to the game. In turn you will receive exclusive benefits, e.g. access to playtest versions and a direct channel to our dev team.

We are sharing more details soon!

• The Gym & Armor Workshop rooms grant multiplier bonuses instead of flat increases to HP and Armor. In turn, various Traits provide flat bonuses to Armor & HP instead of multipliers.
  
• Fixed an instance where pressing Esc just at the right moment before a screen animation started was locking up the game.
  
• Fixed aiming indicator snapping back to default position when releasing the input (e.g. on controllers), instead it remembers your last aiming direction.
  
• Fixed some rare instances where upgrades did not show the stats they affected.
  
• Fixed an issue where Charger enemies were leaving an invisible knockback zone behind after dying.
  
• PhenX should no longer clip out of its arena or push you through the walls when dashing around.
  
• GriftLift shrapnel projectiles can be blocked.
  
• Mammoth should collide with environment objects and Commander correctly.
  
• All enemies should show VFX for currently active status effects correctly.
  
• Scorch's flamethrower uses a more robust system to damage enemies and apply status effects & DoT correctly.
  
• Added "Radar" generic upgrade to increase View Range and Objective Reveal Range.
  
• Rooms have new build & upgrade animations alongside some idle animations.
  
• Info popups for Traits in the Clone Bay should show immediately.
  
• Fixed an issue where right-clicks could prevent other inputs for a few seconds in various circumstances.
  
• Fixed an issue where "missions" (unlock conditions) were resetting unexpectedly.
  
• Added a first iteration of the new dialogue screens with high-fidelity illustrations of Conduit.
  
• Improved performance in various UI elements and the shader for rendering the Commander in UI.
  
• Fixed various instances of VFX clipping with the ground.
  
• Fixed various typos and inconsistencies with UI texts in all languages.
  
• Adjusted the button UI sounds to be less annoying.

• Airstrike weapon does not fire multiple bombs as intended.
  
• The game's performance can potentially degrade heavily when playing at very high screen resolutions (UHD+), please lower the resolution to a maximum of 1440p if you encounter this. We are still trying to find the root cause of this problem.
  
• Menus may sometimes scroll erratically when the game falsely selects a UI element at the top or bottom, e.g. in the Bunker menu or the Awards room (anywhere you have scrolling lists). We already identified the root cause within the automatic input device detection and fixed some cases of that, but few occasions remain erratic.
  
• Automatic input recognition is still causing some nuisance with the mouse cursor sometimes interfering with controller input and vice-versa.
  
• Gear items sometimes show the same "utility" icon twice. They also don't show any damage type icon that may be affected negatively, e.g. Napalm buffing fire but nerfing other damage types.

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[color=orange]Commanders, we need your feedback![/color]

Although we test and adjust the game balancing constantly, you have proven more than once that you are the GOAT when it comes to finding OP squad builds and exploits.

Please share your findings with us. Help us spot where something is hopelessly underpowered or breaks the game in the not-fun way.

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"Arsenal" marks our 5th major Early Access update for Survivor Mercs.

There is much more to come, so "Follow" the game to be notified when the next Early Access Roadmap Update drops Soon™.

Our plans for the next updates include:

⏩ More emergent synergies and squad-build options between Commander, Weapons, Mercs, and Gear, specifically:

• additional proc effects, e.g. things that happen when combining different status effects
  
• adjustments to dashes, projectiles, or attacks to behave differently

⏩ Map & Operations overhaul to provide more varied challenges, new Objectives, and better tactical and strategic squad-building

⏩ a visual overhaul to improve UI, readability of the action, and immersion in the game, including high-fidelity illustrations for more characters

⏩ Story missions framing your operations and fight against the M.E.G.A. Corp. goons, and other narrative elements to highlight the Mercs' personalities.

⏩ Better performance and settings for input mapping and other accessibility options.

And, of course, we're always looking into adding new maps & bosses, enemies, Mercs, and other content as they fit in with future updates.

---

Commanders, we are really grateful for every one of you who is supporting us with input and feedback during Early Access.

[color=orange]Please don't forget that the game is still under development. All your feedback helps us make a better game![/color]

Even after this update there will be rough edges and bugs here and there. The balancing is a constantly ongoing process, and will change more over time.

We hope this update proves once more our dedication to listening to you and building Survivor Mercs into an outstanding game. Please, help us grow the community with a positive review and participate in the development by leaving your feedback, insights, and ideas on our Discord server.




Let's make a great game, together ❤

Lock, load, and loot, Commanders!

In Simon Says, you need to complete a random objective within the time limit to gain points! But beware, it gets harder and harder as time goes on.

There currently aren't too many challenges in Simon Says, but we will add more in the near future, so stay tuned! (we just wanted to release the update to get feedback, and improve it shortly after)

• There are now stats after each match to know how everyone did! (they are really cool)
  
• There is a death log instead of putting them in the chat (so it doesn't get cluttered)
  
• Added an option to turn off CTF overdosing when too drunk

• Added a flaming hoop to snowy forest
  
• Made the racing easier in magical library by moving the globe higher
  
• Moved the flag spawn of the blue team in dunes
  
• Made all types of being destroyed in hot potato take away the same amount of points

• Fixed scanner not working sometimes
  
• Fixed going to the top of chat history when dying/going to lobby
  
• Fixed a racing spawn in sacred shrine that spawned you in the tires
  
• Fixed plenty of places where through was spelled wrong (oops)

Plus as usual, there is more stuff that doesn't really need to be talked about. I hope you love the update as much as we do!

We have a lot planned for the near(ish) future, so stay tuned!

Patch 1.11 Hotfix

Hello everyone!
I would like to share with you the latest news about the development.

In the last report, we explored the extended behavior of NPCs. In this report, we will explore the World Impacted by Player Actions. Note: The Nightly Build is in active development and is not yet available to the public.



As stated in the last report, the job performance of all NPCs within a company influences the profits it can generate. Consequently, a company with a workforce of incompetent people will experience losses month after month. Only large companies that sell software and hardware are public and allow players to buy shares.

When a player acquires more than 50% of a company’s shares, they will take control of it, unlocking various management options as well as additional information about each worker’s performance through their employee profiles. If a player is not the majority shareholder, this information will be hidden. However, it can be discovered by reviewing the NPCs’ conversations and emails to learn more if desired.

Once a year, in-game time, companies will offer to distribute dividends among shareholders, allowing them to earn a portion of the company’s profits. The total profits will be distributed proportionally to the success each company is experiencing at that moment.

To avoid inflation by introducing more money into the world, in this case, the companies’ profits will be obtained directly from players’ purchases. For example, when a player buys a piece of hardware in any store, that money will accumulate and can be collected by all the company owners at the end of the year (in-game time) proportionally, reusing the already created money.

If a player’s companies gain a significant advantage over their competitors, they can adjust store prices, potentially impacting other players. Remember that to gain an advantage over your competitors, you can either do it cleanly or interfere with their networks to create chaos.



Players can also create their own stores as an alternative to NPC stores controlled by other players, where they can sell both hardware and software, with the profits going directly to the player selling them. Due to these changes, coupons will have much less prominence and usage in order to adapt to the new mechanics and not devalue the hardware.

Additionally, other secondary changes and additions will be introduced, such as a new type of highly competent administrator who can detect overflow attacks and interfere with returned objects, as well as a very expensive service that will be revealed during the public nightly build, which can only be acquired by the guild with the most influence at that time, promoting rivalry between guilds to gain access to certain exclusive features.

As always, all these new additions are subject to change and will be adjusted based on the feedback received during the public nightly build. Although there is still work to be done, we are more than halfway there, as the core of the new systems is almost complete.

Thanks for reading! More news soon!

Last patch for today, tomorrow I wont be available, but you can keep your suggestions coming :)

• added a secret fusion cheat sheet to the preparation section in the pause menu
  
• message about the epic relic limitation of one, will now only appear on the randomly rolled epic relic
  
• after winning a run, the game will save, instead of waiting for you to go into the main menu