Our precious Chapter 4: The Surface is coming soon, until then enjoy this trailer that we put together for you and let's dig into the details.
https://youtu.be/nuarEwSs49U
In this chapter, you get to escape the research facility and explore the surface for the first time. This is our first completely outdoor level which was quite exciting for our developers. They could utilize the “landscape” tool of Unreal, which lets you sculpt out the layout of the level.
This big open space really gives you the feeling of freedom and enhances the gameplay and immersiveness. Feel free to enjoy the view (climbing up the metal containers is highly recommended).
Have a look around because valuable loot is lying around all over the place!
The explorable area is huge compared to previous maps. It’s roughly the same size as Chapter 1 & 2 COMBINED (maybe even bigger), the scales are off the chart, everything is just huge. Starting in a dark and tight corridor, you flounder and search for your flashlight. Seconds later you get to escape the research facility and look around. Take your time to admire the view and get some fresh air!
This is art, isn’t it?
Enjoy the diverse red environment and beautiful stone rocks and cliffs but beware! Look out for bloodthirsty and aggressive mutant hordes coming in all shapes and sizes. Be creative, you can defeat them in many ways. Try to pick up the notorious Eden Baton and strike them off a bridge. Remember to look for loot, you’ll need it! What’s even better is that we’re introducing our new Sniper Rifle in this chapter. Exploit the landscape, use the altitudes. Look for a cliff, some high grounds, camp out and utilize the valuable scope.
Don’t forget that your feedback is very important to us. We would like to perfect the game together with the community and won’t stop developing until A-Tech Cybernetic VR becomes the best VR Fps experience up to date!
Evolution Trailer
Hey All,
Please welcome our new trailer for A-Tech Cybernetic. Our goal was to make an exciting, action-packed video that reflects the evolution our game went through during the past year.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GR_A06wdGPM&feature=youtu.be
If you haven't tried the latest update, you should definitely check it out. You will be surprised with how much the game has improved! Countless bugs have been fixed with your help and valuable feedback. You already have a wide range of weapons at your disposal (from a simple wrench to an eagle eye Sniper Rifle), and we're expanding the arsenal even further (one of our players mentioned a katana... we'll see).
You can already play the first three Chapters, and Chapter 4 (out of the final 6+1) is coming very soon. Co-Op gameplay with dedicated maps is also on its way! You as a community and your feedback are the first priority to us because our goal is to make one of the very best VR experiences to date and you can bet we will not stop developing A-Tech until that is achieved!
Don’t forget: Steam Summer Sale is ON, so don't hesitate, give it a try!
Update v0.14.0 - Out now!
Hi A-Tech Fans,
Our latest major Update (v0.14.0) is officially out now!
We have added new stuff, fixed a lot of bugs, fine-tuned the gameplay, optimized performance and so on. Many of you will be pleased, give it a try!
If you have any question we have good news for you: our FAQ has been updated too. If you still have questions don't hesitate to reach us!
Twitter Facebook Discord
Story and mood improvements
Major sound and music overhaul.
Tablet notes with additional story elements
We have added many Tablet Notes that you can pick up, scroll, read and immerse yourselves in the demise of A-Tech Inc..
It is highly recommended to take your time and have a look at them, they enhance and color our story beyond the narration.
Reworked narration
We can’t emphasize enough that your feedback is extremely important for us. Many of our players said that our narrator is a bit irritating so we reworked it and introduced a whole new character! Give it a try again, there are some surprises waiting for you!
Enemies and fights
New enemy
Our new enemy is called the Shotgunner – and he has a… wait for it… Shotgun! Watch out for those close encounters!
New look for zombies, multiple “levels” for enemies
This means the usual variation in hp and damage but there is something more in it.
It affects their priority: for example shooters will cull down lesser zombies now.
Zombie HP and damage reduced on easy.
Hangar fight rework (at the end of Chapter 02)
Weapons
Eden Baton – new “sword-like” melee weapon
It’s much longer and deadlier than our previous melee weapons. Get ready for the chopsticks you’ve always wanted for your zombie-sushi!
Adjusted melee weapon colliders (less likely to go right through the enemy)
Gun damage adjustments
A thrown weapon’s explosion damage has been reduced to 60% of its previous value (because of the new weapon selector).
Headshot damage increased on every difficulty.
New gun handling method
UX and Gameplay
New looting method
Loot are now automatically used on pickup. This actually means that the stomach-pouch is gone for good, making the game more arcade-ish, user-friendly and intense.
Achievements
A multitude of UX changes
Hard mode changes
Negative modifier for loot amount removed from Hard difficulty
Slight damage reduction for Hard difficulty.
Menus
New Inventory - Introducing the Weapon Selector menu
With the new weapon selector menu you now have a basic inventory. With every piece of ammo picked up you can spawn a weapon. Please note that only unlocked weapons can be spawned regardless of ammo. Just see the achievements for information on your unlocks. ;)
How to use it?
With an empty hand, Press and hold the trigger button.
Hover over the weapon you want to use.
Release trigger button.
The selected weapon is spawned into the nearest holster.
Reworked In-game Menu
Reworked Death Menu
Performance optimizations on all chapters and enemies.
Update v0.14 -- Coming on 06.06.
Story, Weapon, UX, Menu Improvements and New Enemy
Hey A-Tech Fans!
After a bit of a silence we're close to releasing our next huge update(06.06)! Below you can find summary about it's contents.
If you are into details do not worry, we will come back with an extended version when the update is out. Until then feel free to check our Twitter page and participate in our community on Reddit and Discord It contains many improvements, content and fixes based your feedback (that we're extremely thankful for).
Story and mood improvements
Major sound and music overhaul.
Tablet notes with additional story elements
Reworked narration
Enemies and fights
New enemy: Shotgunner (watch out for close encounters)
New look for zombies, multiple “levels” for enemies (more hp and damage)
Hangar fight rework (at the end of chapter 02)
Weapons
New melee weapon – Eden Baton
Adjusted melee weapon colliders (less likely to go right through the enemy)
Some gun damage adjustments
New gun handling method
UX and Gameplay
New looting method
Achievements
A multitude of UX changes
Swarm leaderboard
Menus
New Inventory - Gun selector menu
Reworked In-game menu
Reworked Death menu
Update v0.13.2 - WMR Support!
- Disclaimer:Please note that you SHOULD NOT ALTER Windows Mixed Reality config files (e.g. default.vrsettings) because if you do and move with that configuration the game might break logically. -
Hi,
It is here at last! After a long struggle with the sad state of the European VR economy and our local customs department we've finally been able to get our hands on a WMR headset. A quick (and painful) engine upgrade later we can now say that our game officially supports WMR headsets.
We've also fixed our latest update (v0.13.1) so you can also enjoy those features bug-free.
Unfortunately we have a second disclaimer that will hopefully be irrelevant to everyone but the most eagle-eyed of our players: The new Unreal Engine version is a mess. Like really-really frustratingly messy. Upgrading to it broke a LOT of things in the game, most of which are already fixed but there are a few graphical issues (these will require 1-2 weeks of our time and we didn't want to delay WMR support any more because of a few minor visual imperfections) and there could be some bugs that eluded our testing. We're trying to fix every issue in the shortest time possible, but we must ask for a little patience.
Known issues:
Game is not that beautiful as it was and will be 2 weeks from now :)
Some lights are 90 degree broken
Ammo pickups 90 degree broken
Enemy gun handling 90 degree bug
Landscape weird LOD near the end of Ch3
Thank you for your continuous support,
XReal Games
Reverting to v0.13.0 temporarily [fixed]
[update: We've fixed that pesky bug and if you download our latest update you can now enjoy the features of v0.13.1. ]
Bug Alert!!!
We had to pull our latest update (v0.13.1) and revert the live Steam version of A-Tech to the previous update (v.0.13.0) due to a particularly nasty, game-braking bug. The damn thing managed to not only elude our pre-release testing but we had to work all weekend to be able to reproduce it on our hardware. Fortunately we probably managed to fix it but we want to be absolutely sure that it's gone for good before we re-upload the new version.
If you're really anxious for that sweet smooth turn you can try downloading our public beta of the fixed update, it would also help us a lot in making sure that the next update is bug-free.
We want to apologise for everyone who was affected by this stealthy bastard, we hope a fixed version will be out soon.
The Devs
Update v0.13.1 - Smooth Turn
Our Anniversary Sale is still going until Thursday, but our next update is already live, containing the long awaited "Smooth Turn" option for both the Rift and the Vive along with another upgrade to the A-Tech soundscape.
Oculus controls reworked (turning)
In the options menu you can turn on/off and use the followings
-Smooth turning with right thumbstick. (This way you can teleport with pressing the right thumbstick)
-Snap turning with right thumbstick. (This way you can teleport with pressing the right thumbstick)
-Teleporting into any direction kept the same as before
HTC Vive controls reworked (turning)
In the options menu you can turn on/off and use the followings
-Smooth turning when touching right thumbstick. (This way you can teleport with pressing the right thumbstick)
-Snap turning when tapping on thumbstick left/right side. (Please note that you don’t have to press it. This way you can teleport with pressing the right thumbstick)
-Teleporting into any direction kept the same as before
Sound effect updates
We are transitioning to a fully spatial binaural audio system:
-A lot of player, enemy and gun sounds made binaural
-Chapter 03 got it’s nice ambient sounds
-Added reverb zones to story levels
-Better versions of some sound effects (e.g. barrel explosion, headshots, crystals)
We hope you'll enjoy the new features. You can look forward to our next Story Chapter coming in a few weeks! (worst case scenario:end of April)
Chapter 4 is quite a break from our usual level design, so we're very curious about your feedback!
See you in the comments,
The Devs
Dev Diary 4. - Chapter 4.
Hello there!
(...General Kenobi!)
It's Makrangoncias again. Today’s post is about Chapter 4. Working Title: “Surface”
Chapter 4 is coming in a few weeks and it's kind of a big deal for us. It’s the first level designed from scratch since the original 3, and boy can you feel the difference! The explorable area is roughly the same as chapter 1-2 COMBINED (maybe even bigger), the scales are off the chart, and everything is just huge.
Yep, that's a full-scale dump truck.
What made this easier to achieve is that this is a completely outdoor level, so we could utilize the “landscape” tool of Unreal, basically sculpting out the layout of the level instead of placing a ton of cubes.
Our next IP: Clay-Tech Cybernetic
What we were worried about though is that the size and outdoor nature of the level might affect performance. About performance: Vr-ready machines are basically the strongest PC-s commercially available on this planet, yet we still have to optimize the game as strictly as we would for a 5-8 year old hardware. Why? Because in VR games instead of just one, you have a total of 3 displays (2 for your eyes, and 1 for your desktop monitor). Each of them running around Full HD resolution (higher for the Vive Pro) and the two in your headset require at least 90fps. So it’s actually worse than rendering the game for three standard monitors, and that consumes a hell lot of hardware capacity.
Even a Titan starts to sweat under VR
But enough of the technicalities. The reason why most VR games play in very confined or at least well-separated areas is that these require much less resources to optimize. Nevertheless, we’ve tried implementing a truly massive, continuous map layout.
That circled area is the same size as the area of the hangar fight.
To our huge but pleasant suprise, the performance seems to be stable. What’s more it’s even more stable than on the usual indoor levels, so much so that we even managed to add some fancy new effects! Last but not least, the great render distance made is possible to utilize the new Sniper Rifle, and using it is a ton of fun.
A true beast for a wild map
From a design and gameplay perspective, Chapter 4 is a huge leap forward, but like everything else, it also comes with a price. We had to save time by avoiding events that require custom behavior, but I think the new environment, the sniper rifle and all the fresh gameplay that they bring will be more than enough to keep you entertained! We're crazy anxious about your feedback, you can expect Ch4 in the next few weeks!
Norbert (Makrangoncias) Game and Level designer
Anniversary Sale and Update v0.13.0
Before we start we'd like to thank you for your wonderful support over the last year since A-Tech was released on Steam, we couldn't have achieved this milestone without you. For this occasion we've decided to hold our first sale independent of the big seasonal Steam sales, if you're still hesitant about getting A-Tech this price is the best you'll probably ever have. ;) We are hard-at-work on as much new and polished content as humanly possible, with Chapter 4 releasing as soon as a few weeks! And now the Patch Notes:
Disclaimer:Please note that savegames had to be discarded (because we fixed a checkpoint issue) but we removed the level locks so you don’t have to restart the whole game.
Finally. With this update we can safely call Chapter 3 as polished as the rest of our game. We've had a few more major bugs than we would have liked this time, but thanks to your feedback we were able to locate and eliminate them as quickly as possible. You were extremely patient with our hiccups and for that you deserve our eternal gratitude. As a thank you we've hidden a little sneak peak of Chapter 4 at the end of the patch notes ;)
Highlights:
- Chapter 03 fixed after lava part and can be completed
- Locomotion improved to fully support weird landscapes like in the chapter 03 caves
-Added a lot of improved and high-quality sound effect
-Added even more particle systems
-New and much nicer hand-options menu UI
-New weapon: SUBMACHINE GUN! It's going to make an appearance in Ch4, but you can already try it out on the SWARM maps!
-On Oculus, fixed the one-eyed shader error flickering
-Optimized gameplay graphics here and there so you can expect a little performance increase
-Tutorial expanded with holster and looting mechanics
And now for that sneak peak:
(Ch4 is going to play out completely on the asteroid's surface!!! We're extremely excited as this will be the first time we venture out of the comfortable and performance-friendly rooms to the wilderness of the PX923 asteroid.)
A thousand thanks for your support and patience, you can bet that we will not stop developing A-Tech until we can say it really is one of the very best VR games to date!
1st Anniversary Giveaway
We have a Birthday Present for you!
It’s been a whole year since A-Tech came out on Steam and boy oh boy it’s been a long year. We’ve made a Story Mode with 3 Chapters along with brand-new Enemies, Guns and Swarm Maps. We’ve immensely improved upon locomotion, accessability, UX, compatibility and a ton of other stuff. Our dev team has also been growing considerably (you should read this post if you’re interested) and the next year might hold more than a few surprises for our fans. ;)
As a way of celebrating our anniversary we’d like to give out 10 FREE KEYS to the Steam Community. Entering is easy: Put A-Tech on your wishlist and write a comment on this post about how you usually discover new VR experiences. The deadline is midnight on March 18th (this Sunday).
On Monday we’ll randomly chose 10 person and if you’re one of the winners you’ll get a friend request and a message from us with your FREE STEAM KEY!
So don’t hesitate, our keys are eager to find new homes!
