ACE Arena: Cyber Evolution
ACE Update v0.5 Notes
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NEW RUNNER - CAPTAIN SMOKE
A new runner has entered the arena! Captain Smoke is the poster boy of the local peacekeeping solutions offered by InSec.
Combining his nerve gas and his trusty Drones, he can control and pacify the most unruly crowds.
ABILITIES
- Right-Click: Launches a gas grenade at a location and significantly slows down all opponents hit by the gas.
- Spacebar: Launches a drone that will try to control the ball, pass to you and your team, and score goals.
Captain Smoke is free to play this week, so test away and please report any bug you find in the Steam forums!
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COMMUNITY-REQUESTED CHANGES
- Further clarified which characters and hats are locked (not owned) in the lobby.
- Removed the video that played in the background of the menu. This is now a static image, which should greatly improve performance in the menus on lower-end computers.
- Matchmaking will now search for 180 seconds instead of 120 seconds before filling the rest of the spots with bots.
- Removed the high-pitch 'hum' in the ambient menu sound.
- Reduced the power of the Grab Range implant.
COMMUNITY-REPORTED BUG FIXES
- Parties should not longer get split across different teams when joining a game. If a game does not have room for your entire party to be on the same team, another game will be joined instead.
OTHER FEATURES/CHANGES
- Free Runner Rotation is now implemented. The Negociator and Vengeful Star will always be free to play, but an additional two Runners will be available for free and will rotate on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. This week's free rotation is VexWrecker and Captain Smoke.
- Updated all the "off-screen" thumbnails displayed when Runners are out off-camera during gameplay.
ACE Update v0.4 Notes
Version 0.4
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NEW CONTENT
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- New SHERIFFINATOR skin for The Negociator.
- New Cowboy Hat
(comes with the Sheriffinator skin, or can be bought separately).
- New Fireman Hat
- New Straw Hat
- New Helicopter Hat
COMMUNITY-REQUESTED CHANGES/FEATURES
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COOLDOWN VISIBILITY
- The in-game mouse laser/cursor now turns green when your Secondary (right click) Power is ready to be used. The laser turns white when it is on cooldown. This is only the first pass of an overhaul of the player HUD, there is a lot more coming to make all of the game's events and actions more clear.
GAME SPEED
- Slightly reduced size of players and their collision.
- Slightly increased movement speed.
- Slightly increased shot/pass strength.
IMPLANTS
- Reduced the effectiveness of the "Power on Pass" implant.
COMMUNITY-REPORTED BUG FIXES
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"STUCK ON LOADING SCREEN" BUG
- This bug should no longer occur. If you still run into it, please report it via the Report Bug feature AND post about it in the ACE Steam forums (in the Bugs subforum). Thanks!
SCORING THROUGH GOAL
- We have reinforced the collision around the goals, so scoring through a goal wall should no longer be possible.
VENGEFUL STAR
- Fixed Vengeful Star's Hyperdisk (right click) power on clients.
CONTROLLER SUPPORT
- Fixed a bug where the characters would face the opposite direction of the movement direction when using a controller.
- Fixed a bug where the Back To Home Menu button would not appear at the end of a game if you played a game by yourself with no bots.
- Fixed hats sometimes appearing at characters' feet for clients.
OTHER NEW FEATURES/CHANGES
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Both teams will now see the victorious team's dance at the end of the match.
ACE Update v0.3 (24151) Notes
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Version 0.3 (24151)
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COMMUNITY-REQUESTED CHANGES/FEATURES
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REPLAYS
- Many players find that the replays are too long and eat up too much of the gameplay time and we agree. While we work to improve the replay system, we have temporarily removed replays completely. Please continue to provide feedback on the forums about the replay system and how you would like it to work. For example, we could show replays only when the teams' scores are 2-3 points or less apart, or only if there has been 1-2 passes X number of seconds before a goal is scored, etc.
MATCHMAKING
- Players with lower spec PCs can no longer host a game when using Find Normal Game. They can still host Custom Games, and will still be able to JOIN games using Find Normal Game or any other method. This will help prevent instances where a player with a slower PC is picked as the host, which would make the game laggier for everyone. The current cutoff for when a PC is considered "low-spec" is if you have less than any of the following: 2 CPU cores, 2.2ghz CPU speed, 2GB RAM.
FRIENDS LIST
- In-game friend list cap has been increased to 150. This should fix instances where you were not seeing all of your friends that were currently online.
OTHER
- Removed the 'say' and 'teamsay' console commands. These were not intended to be there and people were abusing them and harassing players with them.
COMMUNITY-REPORTED BUG FIXES
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"STUCK ON LOADING SCREEN" BUG
- Added additional logging to help us find the cause of this issue. Please use the Report Bug feature if you run into this issue after this update.
CUSTOM GAMES
- Fixed a bug where you could not host two Custom Games in a row without rebooting the game.
PARTY SYSTEM & MATCHMAKING
- The matchmaking system now takes into account Party size correctly when deciding which game to join. If there is not enough room in the game for the entire Party, the game will not be joined and that Party will wait for other players instead. Note that there is still a bug where if there is enough room in the game for a Party, but not enough room for them on the same team, that Party will be put on different teams. We are working to fix this issue on the next update.
- Parties will no longer be able to join Custom Games that do not have room for all of the Party's players on the same team.
CUSTOMIZATION
- Hats now disappear correctly when using Stalker's Invisibility.
GAMEPLAY
- Stalker no longer keeps the disc when he teleports. This worked correctly on the host, but clients were able to teleport with the disc.
- Fixed instances where the player model's rotation was not always facing where the mouse was aiming.
- Fixed instances where players on one team would not be facing the correct direction upon disc reset (after a goal).
CONTROLLER SUPPORT
- Fixed controller right stick getting inverted depending on which team you were on.
- Removed Ouya controller support. This MAY fix a problem where the game was detecting certain computer as having an Ouya controller when they did not, which resulted in their W and A keys are always active. Note that this is a bit of a 'blind' fix since we do not have an Ouya controller and are unable to reproduce this issue on our side. If you had this W and A key problem before this update, please try again and let us know if it's still occuring.
OTHER NEW FEATURES/CHANGES
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SKINS
- New Shinobi skin for the Stalker.
BOTS
- Nitrogen Queen Bot AI has been added and she is now added to the pool of possible bots that will be randomly picked when bots are enabled.
- Fixed bots not grabbing the disc sometimes even if they were 0 distance from it.
GAMEPLAY
- The Goal/Passes/etc stats at the end of the match have been hidden because some of them are not tracked properly (for example if you shoot at your own closed goal, it will add one goal to your player stats, same if you hit the pole on the enemy goal). We will reactivate them once we have fixed them. Right now it's just causing confusion more than anything.
Patch Notes v.0.2
COMMUNITY-REPORTED BUG FIXES
- Stats (goals, saves, etc.) are now tracked for clients as well.
- Tutorial Part 2: objective will auto-complete if AI fails to pass 10 times
- Genetic Mods now refill when the match starts if they were used during practice mode
COMMUNITY-REQUESTED CHANGES & FEATURES
Gameplay & Balance
- Bots now replace players who leave during a match
- Added small coodown to all ultimates to prevent accidental double-tapping
- Reduced range of Teleport Genetic Mod to be as intended
- You can now "dunk" (run into the goal holding the disk) in the opposing team's goal.
- Reduced collision size of Vengeful Star on par with Stalker
- Movement can be controlled with arrow keys as well as WASD.
Metagame
- Players now receive more Cyberbux :
- Some Cyberbux given at every level
- Repeatable Missions give Cyberbux every 2 matches
- Reduced upgrade costs for some Implants
OTHER BUG FIXES
Audio
- Fixed a bug that had indirectly disabled nearly all of the gameplay sounds.
Performance
- Ice Event VFX performance optimized
- Minor performance optimiziation for Core i7 CPUs.
UI
- Games start when all players are ready, even if there are bots in the game.
OTHER NEW FEATURES & CONTENT
- Terms of Service have been updated with the actual terms of service text. Players will need to re-accept the Terms of Service before playing.
- Added a list of Known Issues when clicking Report Bug in the Pause Menu. Please refer to this list before reporting a bug, since we may already be aware of it.
- You can now open the Pause menu (Escape) when in the loading screen. This will allow players to use the Report Bug feature without rebooting the game (and therefore erasing precious data in the logs) if they get stuck on a loading screen.
Early Access Launch!
To celebrate its arrival on Early Access today, we finally got rid of our working title and found a proper name to our precious baby!
Starting August 18th, Arena: Cyber Evolution becomes available to download for free to everyone on Steam!
if your last memory of the game comes from PAX East (or even just from 1 month ago), I think you’ll be mighty impressed to see how the game looks now!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4tM3UNMBrM&feature=youtu.be&utm_source=ACE+Mailing+list&utm_campaign=ebe33ff0f8-Early_Access_Launch_public_8_19_2014&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_7cd882dc2a-ebe33ff0f8-164307373&goal=0_7cd882dc2a-ebe33ff0f8-164307373
Our work is not done yet!
Please help us to improve Arena: Cyber Evolution by giving us your feedback on Steam, your involvement makes a huge difference!
Head over our support page to get your EXCLUSIVE DLC!
Watch us on Twitch every weekday at 7PM ET for instructions and live games. www.twitch.tv/spearheadgames
-The Spearhead Games Team
Production Update (Week 19)
Hello Spearhead honorary members,
This is Simon speaking!
After 3 months of absence on a secret mysterious mission (that apparently took place all around the world - real and fictitious), I finally got back to the Spearhead HQ and I am ready to rock!
Honestly, I am really, really impressed by how the game has progressed in the last 3 months and I just LOVE the new art style and characters of the game :)
The next step will be a very important one: we are on the verge of really opening the game to everyone through Steam Early Access!
The Early Access launch will happen next Friday, on August 14th. It's coming up very soon!
We are getting ready for the big challenge we will soon be facing: getting the game to be known and played around the clock!
We are still figuring out the plan, but we can confirm it will involve the following topics:
- Organizing tournaments
- Figuring epic one-liners to describe our game
- Creating viral marketing material
- Harassing journalists
- Trying to make friends who have lots of friends
- Getting drunk (ok, this is not specific to the communication strategy, but it’ll help us to make new friends)
- And much more!
Help us out and spread the word about Project Cyber on Facebook, Twitter, Twitch.tv, at the water cooler, etc. Propose your marketing ideas to the Steam forum.
We can already announce that Project Cyber will be presented at PAX Prime (August 29th to September 1st) and that we will hold daily tournaments! This will be a chaotic, hardcore and also super fun experience for all involved!
If you're around, please come by and say hi. You'll find us at Booth #6016.
WE NEED YOU!
You are our very first core players and we will need your help for the coming push towards Early Access and afterwards! Join us on the daily Community Stream on Twitch (7PM Eastern) and invite your friends to watch as well.
Report any issues you see, which is as easy as pressing the Report Bug button in the pause menu on the Twitch build.
And as I mentioned before, if you have any ideas, contacts or advice on how to get the game better known, let us know on our Steam forum.
Cheers guys, see you on Twitch!
It's great to be back home. :-)
-Simon
A Message from the Original Spearhead (Games)
So for the sake of avoiding confusion, here’s a quick compare and contrast between us, Spearhead Games, and them, Spearhead.
How Spearhead Games is similar to Spearhead:
- We make video games (obviously).
- “Continuous innovation” is a pillar of both companies.
- We are passionate about pushing online sports gaming forward (with our Project Cyber, and their FIFA Online 3).
How Spearhead Games is different from Spearhead:
- Spearhead Games is NOT an EA studio; we are an independent studio of 14 people.
- Spearhead Games is located in the hockey-worshipping town of Montreal, Canada, not the horse-riding dance-district of Gangnam in Seoul, South Korea.
- Spearhead Games is pushing game development forward via a communal development process. Our latest project, Project Cyber, is in pre-alpha and is free for anyone to play by registering at www.spearheadgames.ca/cyber. Players can lend their voice and shape the game through our daily 7:00 pm ET Twitch live-stream, Steam forum, or even by commenting directly in our public design documents.
So what’s next for Spearhead Games? On the game front, the Steam Early Access build of Project Cyber launches on August 14th, with a ton of new features including new playable champions, a robust character-progression system, and most importantly, redesigned gameplay with a better focus on cooperative play.
Also, we are looking forward to years of answering players’ emails about FIFA Online 3 and fielding online job requests for our brethren from across the globe. Apologies ahead of time to Spearhead for all the Steam key request emails and Tiny Brains fan art. We can send you guys locally-brewed beers if you want to send us some makgeolli!
Production Update (Week 18)
Only a few weeks left before the Early Access launch on Steam and yet still so much to do. The team preparing to switch to “ludicrous speed”.
FYI As always, you can preview all the changes mentioned in this email by switching over to the Twitch build. This is the build we playtest live every weekday at 7PM. Instructions on how to switch builds can be found here.
Prepare to be chemically augmented!
We now have a new implant category, the BioMods, which unlock after you reach certain levels. When activated, each BioMod will grant you a special ability that will work once per match. But to make things more interesting, each time your team gets scored against we recharge this implant. The 3 chemically-enhanced abilities available (so far) are:
- A short teleportation ability (blink)
- An ease at turning 180 degrees
- An instant reset of your secondary power’s cooldown
As always, tell us what you think about these, and Project Cyber in general, in the Steam forums.
Tournament!
If you seek some team competition thrill and excitement, the pre-alpha tournament is the perfect place to find it. Register your team here on Challonge. Rules and conditions can be found here. The deadline to register your team is July 23rd. The finals and some matches of the competition will be broadcasted on our Twitch channel at twitch.tv/spearheadgames. This tournament’s prize is a copy of the awesome game Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons.
Good luck to all!
Vengeful Star is getting revamped
The Star has been remodeled from the ground up. She now sports brand new boots with rockets allowing her to hover over the terrain and a new pistol for her projectile freezes.
What do you think? Let us know in the Steam forums.
Improved cutscenes and ice event
More polish has been applied to all of the games intermissions and cutscenes. With more dynamical effects and the return of a crowd-favorite event, the ice event, we can’t wait to hear what you think.
Simon’s current location is Alor Setar and yes he still is on his bike.You can follow him on Facebook. By all means if you are on it's way stop him and say hi!
The Spearhead Community Team
Production Update (Week 17)
As we approach our next milestone and prepare for our major public release, we are hunkering down and focusing on bug fixes and visual polish. But even though the dev team’s focus is no longer on new features, that doesn’t mean we aren’t making any!
FYI You can preview all the changes mentioned in this email by switching over to the Twitch build. This is the build we playtest live every weekday at 7PM. Instructions on how to switch builds can be found here.
She was already cold-hearted, now she is smoking cold. Keisha has been hard at work on the visual effects of the Queen. Warning: don’t look her in the eyes for too long! As always, tell us what you think about her, and Project Cyber in general, in the Steam forums.
If you seek some team competition thrill and excitement, the pre-alpha tournament is the perfect place to find it. Register your team here on Challonge. Rules and conditions can be found here. The deadline to register your team is July 23rd. The finals and some matches of the competition will be broadcasted on our Twitch channel at twitch.tv/spearheadgames. This tournament’s prize is a copy of the awesome game Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons.
Good luck to all!
Custom hats are back! Now not only can you win, but you can do it with style. Speaking of style, why not trade the Stalker’s cyborg look for a more comfortable friendly zombie look? That’s right, we are introducing Skins too!
Our engineers are hard at work to revamp the bot AI system. These changes will enable the gameplay team to teach you new concepts and bring you faster to that pro status you deserve.
Well, we finally caught up with Simon, one of our co-founder. It seems that he is coming back from Singapore by bike(!), you can follow his insane adventure on Facebook.
The Spearhead Community Team
July 2014 Update Is Live!
It's a complete revamp of the game! If you've been following the Community Streams on our Twitch channel, you know what has changed since PAX East.
We'll be sending out an email on Monday with a complete list of changes, but here are some of the major ones:
- New look!
- New character: Stalker
- Disc grab/pass system
- Characters have new secondary and ultimate abilities
- Tutorials for new players
- Player progression system with unlockables
- Implant system
- Goal replays
- and much, much more!