Beacon Patch 2.7 is here adding the final 14 Tinkered Weapons along with Item Notifiers, Recycling Balance, and many other fixes and balance tweaks!
In the new patch Recycling Weapons now has a failure chance, starting at 0% and increasing by 10% for every successful recycle. Recycling to get ammo mods has been one of the most fun additions to the game in a while, but in patch 2.6 too many ammo mods started to stack in longer runs throwing off the balance of later levels and making high fire rate weapons more powerful than intended. The longer your run goes now the more likely it is that your weapon recycles will fail, capping at an 80% failure chance making late game recycles more of a gamble.
Item Notifiers have been added to this patch as well, allowing you to mouse over all items to view their Name and Item Type. This was one of our most requested features recently, and should help players understand more easily what items spawn in caches and make it easier to decide which to pick up in the rare multi-loot caches without having to recognize the icons.
The final 14 Weapon Variants have been added as well, finishing the complete roster of weapons for the first release of the game with 114 total weapons. All weapons in the game have a Tinkered Variant now, and the Codex entries have been updated with prefixes to display weapons next to their tinkered versions.
Before going through the patch notes we want to update everyone on our new Patch schedule as well. Previously we were planning for patch 2.6 to be the final content patch with 3.0 following later this year, but following the burst of new players we have had recently from Itch.Io we want to add in a few more content patches to fill in the gap until the final release of the game. We don't plan for a ton of extra content to be added, but rather to split up some of the content that was being saved for 3.0 into smaller releases along with other fixes and balance tweaks based on incoming feedback.
A big part of our new release schedule is also moving up the release of Level 6 to the next content update, Patch 2.8. We want to get some feedback and testing on the final level before the full release, and it's been long enough now that the game kills you at the end of level 5 instead of having a proper ending. Patch 2.8 will only include 1 final boss and 1 ending, with the rest being added in patch 3.0 a few months later. Here's a peek at Level 6 which should release in August giving you the chance to fight the Prism Mainframe after descending a series of randomized catwalks.
Tinker Tailor Soldier Clone
Note: We’re aware the Map keybind is currently broken, but the map can still be accessed through the Tab screen. The keybind should be fixed and released in a minor patch within a few days.
New Weapon Variants
Pyro Cannon (Grillmaster) - Trail of fire left behind the projectile, reduced magazine size
Flametwhrower (Blazetorch) - Blowtorch style flame projectile with high damage, but greatly reduced range
Rotspore Maw (Three's a Crowd) - Fires a spread of Rotspore Needles with 3 Mega Needle per burst, reduced accuracy and removed charge shot
Helix Repeater (Double Helix) - Fires 2 shot bursts of Mega Helix ammo, with 1/4 the clip size and reduced fire rate
Helix Overcharger (Short Fuse) - Fires all shots in a 16 shot burst with Mega Helix ammo, with 1/4 the clip size
Hailshard Condenser (Deep Freeze) - Fires Black Ice projectile with 2x freeze duration, but longer reload time
Hailshard Generator (Permafrost) - Black Ice Clusters with 2x freeze duration, higher damage and more clusters
Rapid Rockets (Liberator) - 3 shot burst is removed, allowing the rockets to be fired automatically with increased attack speed
Laser Engine (Ace in the Hole) - Fires an extra wide powerful beam, but is only able to fire for a short burst before requiring a lengthy reload
Tesla Rifle (Super Spreader) - Increased damage multiplier for full charge, damage increases per bounce, and increased bounces
Energy Cannon (Bedlam) - Each bullet is split into 3 mini energy shots, firing 12 shots per burst instead of 4. Reduced accuracy but increased ammo.
Goo Pistol (Flubbernator) - Fires Acid Bombs and a Mega Cluster Acid Bomb on crit, reduced magazine size and slower attack speed
Gut Cannon (Blessed Mess) - Fires Mega Acid Bomb that creates a huge pool of acid
Starborn Sniper (Splitkill) - Double the splinters released when fully charged, half ammo
Balance
Recycling - Added Failure Chance to Weapon Recycling - Weapons now have a chance to fail when recycled, starting at 0% and raising 10% every recycle. Luck also affects the Failure Chance, reducing it by .1% per point of Luck (-30% at Max Luck)
Enemy: Tesla Spider - Changed Tesla Coil attack to Tesla Mini SFG balls, since the Tesla Coils were too random and often missed.
Enemies - Added low chance for Paramount DNA to drop from large Native and Uncharted enemies (Tritoraptor Patriarch, Chilopodrae, Icosatron, and Hexagoth)
Health Pickups - Increased size of pickup trigger to make it less likely for health to get stuck behind objects
Grenade: Fragment Mod - Reduced detonation time from 1.8 to 1.5
Weapon: Osteoblast (Bone Flinger Variant) - Fixed bullet colliding with targets multiple times, releasing many more Bonerangs than it was supposed to. Increased number of bonerangs released to compensate for the damage reduction from the fix
Weapon: Flamethrower - Increased flame projectile size to more closely match the particle, and updated Flamethrower effect
Weapon: Shotgun and Brass Beast (Variant) - Increased fire rate, decreased accuracy, increased time per shot reload.
Weapon: Starborn Weapons - Increased bullet collision size for all weapon types
Weapon: Magrail Weapons - Decreased detonation time for all magrail gib projectiles
Weapon: Laser Engine and Ace in the Hole (Variant) - Increased max ammo, decreased reload time
Passive: Holoshield Drone - Reduced orbit radius to make the drone closer to the player
Passive: Explosive Armor - Converted to a Pickup, moving it from the Ship Cache spawn to Ship Stockpiles (Large crates)
Miscellaneous
Added Notifiers to all items, displaying the Name and Item Type when moused over
Added prefixes to all weapons and weapon variants. Weapons should now all appear in the codex next to their variant.
Updated names of a few weapons and items
Added Player Lock to Flauros Teleport Pads to prevent moving while teleporting
Sped up Prism Cache close animation, making it more difficult to retrieve 2 items from the double loot spawn variant
Added new Flauros Jar Group prefab with a notifier, and replaced all jar clusters with it in Flauros zones
Added more Watchtower and Stockpile key spawns to Levels 1, 2, and 4
Updated Tesla Chain effect, giving a more clear indication of which targets the chain bounces to
Fixes
Fixed Crosshair parse issue that would sometimes cause Options to break for players on game launch
Fixed Dodge Roll key being invalid with certain inputs, causing errors for some players
Fixed null references caused by Debuffs on death rarely (This should fix the invisible flame debuff bug causing the game to break on death if it's applied)
Fixed Keybinds not saving if a key was rebound to the Mouse
Fixed timeout for player loading being too short, causing the level to fail generation on low end computers sometimes
Fixed certain controller keybinds not using unique button icons since the new Input system was added
Fixed Swap sometimes showing the incorrect Swamp prompt, causing the wrong item to be recycled or swapped
Fixed Platform Helper not clearing the platform you are tied to after falling off (Should fix Level 5 Vertical Conveyor jumps)
Fixed aim sometimes registering behind solid objects, such as the background walls in Level 5
Fixed codex not saving on level transition
Fixed codex not showing passives on Continue
Fixed challenge run bonus not being added to your existing bonus if multiple challenges are completed consecutively
Fixed +1 and +3 Mutation Life DNA Mods increasing the Mutation Life past 10
Fixed Minimap appearing on the Main Menu after opening Options
Fixed Waypoints being removed from the Map screen on discover
Fixed Containment Chambers sticking out too far in all Containment Landmarks and Loot levels, sometimes allowing the player to jump onto the small section sticking out and get stuck
Reduced size of Cliff Elevator kill trigger underneath to attempt to fix falling off sometimes killing the player again
Fixed Nematode enemy healing when exploded
Fixed Solus Prime Death Variant still applying outdated Poison debuff on contact with the player
Fixed Unfertilized Colony ammo mod spawning the wrong hatchlings, causing them to attack the player instead of enemies
Fixed some Ammo Mod debuffs still applying to the player when reflected
Fixed a few world debuffs not being applied to the player after disabling them on Ammo Mod debuffs
Fixed various explosions and flamethrower style weapons still having reflect enabled on their bullets
Fixed Flauros floating islands sometimes killing the player when a dodge is missed and you slide down the side of the island
Fixed multiple explosion sounds playing when Basalt Stacks are blown up in groups
Fix attempted for items sometimes falling through the floor on Ship debris bridges
Fixed aim position being too low on Firefly Mounds
Fixed error caused by Security Droid when the Pyro Champion mod was applied to it
Fixed Tritoraptor Patriarch enemy not having an Audio Player on its animator, causing errors during certain attacks
Fixed Droid Dropper (Magrail Pistol Variant) not being able to critical hit
Fixed Tesla Pulse balls particle sometimes staying behind after being removed
Miscellaneous Level Fixes
Minor Main Menu background optimizations
Beacon 2.63
Patch 2.63 is out including a new Codex screen on the Main Menu and Boss Bestiary logs! As usual another chunk of fixes and balance tweaks have been added as well. Thanks to everyone for their continued feedback!
Misc.
Added Codex screen to the Main Menu, allowing players to view their collected items and bestiary entries without being in game
Added Bestiary descriptions for Act 1 Bosses
Added Bestiary entries for Flauros Bloat and Native Karnak enemies
Set Beacon Locator trigger and notifier to disappear once activated
Set Beacon Locator to make the player invincible once it locks the player until level transition
Increased Mass and Drag of DNA drops to prevent them flinging too far from explosions
Added Player Lock to Prism Equipment Cache elevators to prevent dodging off while traveling
Added new Solus Infestation variant to Prism Shipping Container spawn variants
Balance
Player: Speed - Raised lower and upper speed limits slightly. They are still a bit lower than pre 2.62.
Champion Mod: Native Rotspore Champion - Added Rotneedle cluster that is released along with rotspore gas on enemy death
Champion Mod: Native Polluted Champion - Added Pollution pool that appears after the enemy dies
Auxiliary: Rotvine Whip - Decreased cooldown to 20 seconds, increased range of whip projectile slightly
Enemy: Nematode - Increased base health value and max health value. Bug still exists where explosion will sometimes heal instead of damaging.
Passive: Rotneedle Clumps - Reduced number of Rotneedles released per bullet when triggered
Weapon: Copycat (Grenade Launcher Variant) - Decreased magazine size to 4 and increased reload time per shot
Weapon: Mini Launcher and Splitshot (Variant) - Fixed max ammo not being increased as described in 2.62
Stormcell: Tesla Strike - Reduced chance of secondary Tesla Ring spawning after strike, and added force push for items/gibs on explosion
Stormcell: Hailshard - Reduced damage of impact and shatter explosions
Trap: Expunge Barrier - Added yellow flashing telegraph for the Expunge Barrier before activation to give the player a chance to dodge and decreased damage to 100 to prevent 1-hit kills unless your Health stat is low, and disabled barrier damaging if Dodged through
Trap: Broken Shipping Conveyor - Added broken telegraph to broken conveyors with shipping containers that can fall down and crush the player
Fixes
Fixed Recycle on Reconstitute screen not working since 2.62d
Fixed Paramount DNA not dropping from Act 1 Bosses 100% of the time
Fixed recent new items missing from Act 1 Boss drop tables
Fixed Pickup items existing on the Mirage/Stomach drop table and added new Passive items to the drop list for those loot spawns
Fixed Mining Laser heat hurt trigger being a bit too large
Fixed Bone Gates collisions being too complicated, allowing the player to get stuck inside the bones in some cases
Fixed Level 3 Power Off intro VO repeating sometimes
Fixed a few blockades on Level 4 Intro levels blocking progression depending on the cap tiles spawned
Fixed Level 4 exit elevator not descending once the Beacon Locator is activated
Fixed Level 5 Laser Redirector final node being able to turn off after triggered, when the Elevator continues to be powered
Fixed waypoint from Ship Equipment caches disappearing from the map after being found
Fix attempted for Cliff Elevator sometimes killing the player when fallen off when it should only kill when crushed by the elevator
Fixed dodge mutations being able to cause fall damage with their leaps (Rotspore Heels shouldn't damage when landing on a platform anymore)
Fixed a few Enemy bestiary model previews being offset
Fixed Solus Ward enemy not being able to fall off of the level
Fixed waypoint on Level 5 Trap landmark not marking as revealed when it's powered
Fixed some secret notifiers saying Destroy Transmitters on Flux variants
Beacon 2.62
Patch 2.62 includes dozens of balance tweaks, fixes, and a new Input system that should fix problems with controllers not registering for some users! This is the first minor patch responding to the feedback from thousands of new players following the Itch.Io Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality. The feedback has been overwhelming for a team our size, but we're doing our best to sort through everything and make tweaks as quick as we can!
Input issues have been appearing much more often with all of the new players, and we quickly wanted to fix them if possible since it prevents many people from playing the game. We've completely replaced the input system with Unity's new system, making rebinding and setting up new controls much easier on our end and hopefully fixing the issues some players were having with their input not registering correctly. If you still have a problem with your controller or mouse registering in game, please let us know.
Weapon balance is a big topic that has been discussed on our Discord server over the week. The biggest critiques have been many weapons feeling weak compared to the pistol, some weapons feeling overpowered paired with stacking ammo mods, and reload times being unsatisfying. Balance tweaks have been made to many of the weapons in the game this patch, along with a handful of reductions to weapon reload times for some types of weapons. Heavy weapons and a few other powerful weapons will continue to have lengthy reload times for now, but the power of a few of them has been increased. Since there's no ammo in the game, reload time is one of the few ways we can prevent over-use of one weapon in extended fights.
Ammo mods no longer reflect back onto the player either, meaning you'll no longer slowly die to your own radiation or stun yourself if attacking enemies from close up with Concussive Ammo. Ammo mods will get a few more tweaks in the future, but for now to balance them stacking with Recycling all ammo mods have had their chance to apply reduced.
We’ll be working on Patch 2.63 for release in a few weeks now, including some tweaks to the Recycling system and more fixes!
Patch 2.62
Controls
Replaced Rewired input system with Unity's new input system. This should hopefully fix many of the recent input detection issues and fix many of the rebind bugs, although new bugs may exist.
Default Weapon Switch key changed to Scroll Wheel on PC, with scrolling both directions fixed in the new input system
Options: Input - Added option to select Keyboard or Controller input. Game no longer needs to be restarted to select input, but Controller must be selected to use a Controller.
Ammo Passive Mods - Set ammo mods to not apply to the player when reflected. This should make Radiation stop reflecting onto the player and fix certain explosive ammo mods consistently stunning yourself
Ammo Passive Mods - Reduced chance to apply all ammo mods slightly to compensate for current Recycling stacking. Will probably be adjusted again in the future as more changes are made
Boss: Tritoraptor Matriach - Increased max health by 400, decreased Cloak cooldown, decreased Egg Lay time, decreased Egg grow time, added 2 Tritoraptor Patriarchs to egg burst spawn, fixed area of arena where Matriarch would get stuck while running around
Boss: Solus Hiveminds - Increased health by 400, Increased Stage 2 trigger health to 800, increased amount of enemies spawned during the fight, increased Quill Waves on Quill Hivemind to 5 and adjusted attack animations/timing, increased Quill and Acid Wiener healths by 20, added notifier to exit hole after boss is killed
Boss: Mega Pyro Spider - Added window during Pyro Hologram summons where they are disabled and you can enter to destroy the transmitter without catching on fire
Enemy: Native Rattleslug - Increased range it can leap from and decreased leap cooldown
Enemy: Prism Tesla Drone - Increased attack cooldown
Enemy: Uncharted Hexagoth - Decreased Spin Attack cooldown, decreased time before first Spin Attack
Champion Mods - Reduced health multiplier from 2x to 1.5x (+50%). 3 Crown Champions should now have slightly over 3x health instead of 8x, and lower level champions less health.
Champion Mod: Prism Tesla Champion - Decreased damage of tesla arcs, decreased attack radius, increased attack cooldown
Champion Mod: Solus Acidic Champion - Added Acid Pools that spawn every few seconds from the enemy and added Mini Acid Cluster globules from the death explosion
Champion Mod: Solus Globule Champion - Increased globules released on death
Champion Mod: Solus Fertilized Champion - Increased amount of hatchlings dropped, set up to cause the first hit on the enemy to spawn a group of hatchlings
Auxiliary: Deployable Turret - Increased health of Assault and Rocket turrets by 2x
Auxiliary: Menhir and Golden Menhir (Variant) - Greatly decreased delay before impact, increased damage
Pickups - Removed Pickup drops from small enemies, removed Passive Pickup drops from medium enemies, and reduced pickup drop chances from Large enemies. (LESS WRIST MONITORS)
Pickups: Health Pickups - Increased radius of health pickups and adjusted heal values of multiple health pickups
Pickup: Scorched Choker and Golden Scorched Choker - Increased health limit to 75, decreased healing speed
Pickup: Focus Injector - Decreased Accuracy stat bonus to 50
Pickup: Palier Stem - Temporarily removed Health from stat increase to prevent healing abuse bug, removed hidden stats being increased (Accuracy and Reload Speed)
Pickup: Bio-Extractor - Set Heal to be random between 1-3 instead of a flat 3
Pickup: Magrail Meteor - Improved explosion particle effect of meteor, decreased amount of magrail gibs spawned from cluster explosives
Passive: Hailshard Drone - Removed self-damage/freezing from the Hailshard explosion, reduced orbit radius to make it easier to position
Passive: Boneslivers - Reduced damage on Bonesliver hit from 80 to 40
Weapon: Plasma Pistol and Roadrunner (Variant) - Improved fire rate and burst speed of Roadrunner, increased reload times slightly.
Weapon: Assault Rifle and Swift Arbiter (Variant) - Decreased reload time, increased damage on Swift Arbiter projectiles
Weapon: Riot Shotgun and Brass Beast (Variant) - Removed distance limit on Riot Shotgun projectiles, increased projectile amount, increased knockback, reduced accuracy, reduced damage of Brass Beast flak ammo
Weapon: Mini Launcher and Splitshot (Variant) - Added light homing to mini rocket projectiles, increased magazine size to 9
Weapon: Rapid Rockets - Increased magazine size to 15
Weapon: Quill Revolver and Late Bloomer (Variant) - Increased magazine size to 20, increased ammo regeneration speed, decreased ammo regen start delay, decreased Quill Slug bullet damage slightly
Weapon: Quill Cannon and Thorn Dealer (Variant) - Increased magazine size to 40, increased quills fired per burst, decreased ammo regen start delay, reduced ammo regeneration speed
Weapon: Quill Gatling and Lance Keeper (Variant) - Changed Lance Keeper critical quill bullet to deal less damage, decreased ammo regen start delay, decreased ammo regen speed, reduced attack speed
Weapon: Rotspore Repeater and Seeker (Variant) - Decreased needle detonate time, increased needle damage
Weapon: Rotspore Blaster and Siamese Twins (Variant) - Replaced wave projectiles with a homing missile projectile type, increased amount of needles per shot, decreased needle damage
Weapon: Rotspore Maw - Increased magazine size to 3, added light homing to projectile, decreased amount of needles released, increased ammo regen delay
Weapon: Grenade Launcher - Reduced life of contact grenades and fixed grenades not exploding on contact with a few Act 1 Bosses
Weapon: Magrail Launcher and High Roller (Variant) - Decreased charge time to fire, increased accuracy, decreased reload time per shot, decreased amount of gibs on clusters
Weapon: Chaingun and Death's Door (Variant) - Increased attack speed charge time, decreased Chaingun magazine size, increased Death's Door magazine size
Weapon: Sonic Revolver and Hotshot (Variant) - Increased bullet damage slightly, decreased reload time
Weapon: Sonic Rifle and Audiophile (Variant) - Decreased reload time, increased magazine size of Rifle, decreased magazine size of Audiophile, increased accuracy of Audiophile
Weapon: Sonic Gatling and Leviathan (Variant) - Increased Sonic Gatling magazine size, increased bullets per burst, increased bullet damage slightly, increased accuracy, decreased reload time
Weapon: Sonic Shotgun and Tidal Wave (Variant) - Increased projectiles per wave, increased range, decreased projectile damge
Weapon: Tesla SMG and Livewire (Variant) - Reduced stun from Tesla debuff to prevent stunlocking enemies, increased magazine size of Livewire, reduced reload time
Weapon: Pulse Rifle and Electrocutioner (Variant) - Decreased reload time, increased Electrocutioner Mini Tesla SFG projectile damage and explosion damage
Weapon: Tesla SFG and Mjollnir (Variant) - Increased lower damage limit of Tesla SFG projectile, decreased reload time, fixed Mjollnir tesla coils attacking the player
Weapon: Flame Cannon - Increased projectile damage, decreased charge time
Weapon: Stygian Hunter and Hellhound (Variant) - Removed charge to increase fire rate (Fixes semi-auto spam bug), increased base fire rate to compensate
Weather: Stormcells - Increased cooldown between Stormcell spawn rolls and increased chance for Stormcell roll to 20%
Weather: Spore Lump - Decreased amount of health pickups for each lump burst
Miscellaneous
Added support for DNA Mods being saved and re-loaded on Continue
Removed Mechanic Diary system, Notifiers have replaced the main purpose of them and most players never noticed the existence of the previous mechanic diaries.
Beacon Locators now require you to activate them manually, and will freeze the player on use to prevent being able to jump off during the level transition
Added floor markers to Prism Beam puzzles on Level 5, showing the direction of the beam necessary to complete the beam puzzle.
Added more noticeable hologram deny to locked Prism doors that have no way to enter them
Audio
Added new Jackpot sound
Added new VO lines to Level 3 Landmark Reactors
Added new VO lines to Level 4 Exit
Added new DNA Research SFX that should be more pleasing to hear repeatedly
Fixed audio mixer being incorrect on many debuff sounds, making them too loud
Fixed loud audio change occuring after dying before the Reconstitute screen is loaded
Fixed fall sound stacking multiple times during some vertical drops, especially in tunnels
Fixed audio culling not working in the Tutorial level, causing waterfall sounds to stack and be overly loud
Fixed Basalt Stack explode SFX not having a pitch randomizer, making it sound worse when multiple are blown up
Fixes
Dozens of miscellaneous level fixes mentioned on discord and itch bug lists
Fixed overlapping items being difficult to pick up, weapons and pickups should have a higher priority now when health/grenades are stacked on them
Fixed Bio-Extractor, Ammo Synthesizer, and Mesmer Pickup items disappearing from inventory on Continue
Fixed Sonic Ammo Passive Item missing from the Prism list on the Recycle Manager
Fixed Minimap being offset incorrectly on 16:10 and other resolutions
Fixed Minimap being active on New Item and Memento screens
Fixed Minimap displaying in map disable zones and pause screens
Fixed Level 3 Boss Platforms dropping player off of the Boss Platform often if the player falls off during the boss fight
Fixed chunk of the Level 3 light bridge platform being left after boss fight is enabled
Fixed contact grenades bouncing off of Prism large turrets
Fixed collisions on Solus loot cavern entrance to prevent a few player stuck spots
Fixed Ship Cache crate trapping the player if standing behind the crate when it opens
Fixed a few explosive weapons and items having their explosions able to reflect when they shouldn't
Fix attempted for closed large Ship containers scattered in shipwreck environments often having player stuck spots
Fix attempted for Prism crates throwing weapons into the crate, making them difficult to pick up
Fix attempted for Solus and Flauros weather events sometimes causing enemies to spawn underneath the floor
Fixed Tesla ball projectiles using a 2,000 triangle sphere model for no reason
Fixed Trap Ship Crate not defusing with explosives, and reduced explosive damage
Fixed a handful of incorrect item descriptions and stats
Fixed Solus Ward and Wardling quills floating away instead of arcing downwards to the ground
Fixed Chaingun muzzle being mispositioned
Fixed incorrect descriptions on a few mutations and items
2.63b
Fixed Freeze caused by DNA Mods being saved to your Continue file
Mutation: Telemite Hooves - Increased Stamina cost from 20 to 30
A few more Level Fixes
2.63c
Fixed dodge mutations that use charge/release mechanics not working correctly with the new input system
2.63d
Fixed Continue Freeze caused by DNA Faction Bonuses saving incorrectly
Fixed shaders not being correctly pre-loaded (Should help reduce stuttering in many cases)
Minor level fixes
Removed missing scripts from Pollution reticules
Beacon 2.61
Beacon patch 2.61 is uploaded, making a few tweaks and fixes from feedback on the latest patch as well as adding a Minimap!
Miscellaneous
Added Minimap to top right corner of the screen
Added option to disable Minimap
Updated Flauros and Solus weather visuals and lighting
Raised Champion spawn chance on all enemies again, making double champions more common and increasing the difficulty slightly following the new power curve with Recycling
Brightened textures on a handful of enemies to make them more visible against the environment
Decreased default player camera scaling from 1.3 to 1.2, making the camera slightly more zoomed in
Mutation: Draining Maw - Reduced max lifesteal per crit from 8 to 5
Fixes
Fixed basalt columns and rock formations on cliff sides triggering the drop drone when the player falls and lands on them
Fixed Champion Spawn modifiers on difficulty settings having the opposite effect, making Easy have the most champions and Extreme the least
Fixed a few issues with Level 5 flux nodes and beam puzzles
Fixed a few Shipping Barriers having misplaced fall triggers and added more fall triggers to barriers missing them
Fixed Bloated Gland acid projectiles being reflectable, sometimes causing them to duplicate repeatedly on impact
Fixed some waterfalls and other splashes not moving correctly in Hydro Dam levels because of static batching
Fixed broken Rotspore Launcher in Level 4 Irradiated Sanctuary landmark
Fixed a few waypoints in pocket worlds not disappearing once discovered
Fixed a handful of pocket world waypoints showing on the map when they shouldn't
Fixed Bone Stockpile waypoints not showing on the map
Fixed waypoints missing from Uncharted crates
Optimized Beam Redirector particles
Optimized Shipping Drone jet particles
Beacon 2.6 - Kovus Salvage
Beacon patch 2.6 is released adding the new Item Recycling feature, a handful of new Ammo Mod Passive Items, and a 30% average performance boost!
Item Recycling allows you to recycle leftover Weapons, Grenade Mods, Pickups, and Auxiliary items in return for more useful loot. Ammo mods and grenades are much more plentiful now, and exploring for Stockpiles in later levels is more rewarding with the ability to continue stacking Ammo Mods from recycled Weapons. The full rules of the Item Recycling system are described below in the patch notes.
Many fixes and optimizations have made this patch, improving performance in many areas of the game by 30% or more. Even more optimizations will be done for build 3.0 as well, as performance still dips down in some of the larger areas and arenas.
With the release of this patch the team will return to focusing on the 3.0 release build which will include Level 6, Boss Mutations, and the final Act 2 Boss Fights. We’ll likely release one or two more minor patches before then so let us know if you have any issues with patch 2.6 or any balance suggestions!
Kovus Salvage
Item Recycling
A new Item Recycling feature has been added to make exploring for Stockpiles more rewarding. Duplicate or unwanted weapons, auxiliaries, and pickups can now be Recycled from the Swap UI allowing you to convert them into more useful loot.
Weapons - Recycles into a random ammo mod from its faction
Pickups - Recycles into one Grenade Ammo
Auxiliaries - Recycles into full Grenade Ammo
Grenade Mods - Recycles into +1 Grenade Container
New Items
Passive: Energy Casings - Gives your bullets a chance to penetrate through enemies
Passive: Sonic Ammo - Gives your bullets a chance to knock back and stun enemies on hit
Passive: Boneslivers - Gives your bullets a chance to deal heavy physical damage to the target
Passive: Rotneedle Clusters - Gives your bullets a chance to release a cluster of Rotneedles on impact
Passive: Nightshroud Pustules - Gives your bullets a chance to deal a heavy knockback on impact
Passive: Qullslivers - Gives your bullets a chance to release a cluster of Quills on impact
New Enemies
Prism: Repair Drone - The largest manufactured Prism drone, all Droids nearby are healed until the drone is destroyed.
Miscellaneous
Removed 20 items from the Research unlock list, making the max research reward level 100 now and unlocking more basic items to spawn in the game by default.
Added Crown icon near healthbar to indicate a Champion enemy
Updated Item/Weapon Swap UI visuals
Updated Options dropdown visuals
Added tooltips to Reset and Recycle on the Reconstitution screen when moused over
Statistics on the Reconstitution screen are now updated with statistic changes from any current Mutations
Health and Stamina stats on the Reconstitution screen have a lower cap of 50 now to match the in-game statistics lower limits
When Reset is activated, it rolls through your empty genome before continuing to a new life
Added Vibration option to toggle Controller Vibration on and off
Research is displayed as a percentage on the Index screen now
Added Explosion Radius ring notifiers to cluster grenades and a few other explosive bullets
Player fog replaced with Radial Fog for all weather types. This should fix fog not working for players on DX11 or lower cards.
Dodging and entering Water has a 100% chance to remove the Burning debuff
Added flashing red telegraph to malfunctioning Light Bridge pieces
Zipline now quickly detatches the player at the end instead of forcing a drop animation
Added secret bonus crate spawns to Start level accessible with certain Leg mutations
Added warning to Reconstitute screen if you sequence an empty genome while DNA is still in your inventory.
Factions now display correctly on all item and weapon index entries
Add animated ring notifier to Keys to make them more noticeable
Updated many Notifier descriptions to be more descriptive or fitting and fixed a handful of Notifier errors
Added initial support for PS4 button icons on the HUD
Removed Tesla Drone pickup item
Balance
Loot - Moved Auxiliary Item drops from equipment spawns into Munitions/Large crates. Exploring an Equipment Cache will almost always grant a Passive item now.
Loot - Removed Ammunition Mod drops from Munitions/Large crates
Loot - Removed 1-Handed Weapon drops from small crates
Loot - Adjusted placement and drop rates of Pickups from crates
Player - Increased Player minimum move speed after movement fix that slowed overall movement.
Enemies: Increased Champion spawn chances for all difficulty levels
Trap: Drop Pod - Decreased damage and radius of drop pod impact explosion (No longer a 1 hit kill for lower health players)
DNA Skill - Reduced Auxiliary Cooldown Paramount DNA Skill from -5 seconds to -3 seconds
Mutation: Rotspore Heels - Added landing impact explosion with minor damage and stun. Reduced horizontal boost distance to make it easier to jump up to close platforms and view the landing zone
Passive: Teleleech Ammo - Recuded chance to apply to bullet to 5%
Passive: Hailfrost Ammo - Increased chance to apply to bullet to 10%
Passive: Explosive Ammo - Raised explode damage
Grenades - Adjusted radius of many grenades and added ring notifiers to more grenade types
Grenade: Rotspore Sticker - Reduced detonation time
Weapon: Shotguns - Updated a handful of Shotgun weapons to use a flat bullet spread to prevent bullets flying over enemies
Weapon: Magrail Weapons - Increased size of bullet collisions and tweaked size of magrail gib explosions
Weapon: Explosive Crossbow and Quiverer (Variant) - Reduced explosion damage
Weapon: Laser Carbine and Last Word (Variant) - Decreased damage of both shot types and set base laser projectile to penetrate enemies and objects.
Weapon: Energy Weapons - Reduced upper damage values on all Ship Energy weapons
Audio
Weapon fire and explosions now duck ambient sounds
Ambient sounds duck more aggressively
Fixes
Fixed player movement being calculated incorrectly, causing moving diagonally and other situations to make the player move at the wrong speed
Removed Velocity Inherit function from many weapon types, fixing awkward situations that changed the bullet velocity too much
Fixed expensive garbage collection issue with debuff triggers and player hurt triggers
Fixed garbage collection spike during some UI animations
Optimized animators, model settings, particle settings, and light settings on hundreds of objects
Optimized all Item, Weapon, and DNA prefabs and replaced item indicators with new nested prefabs
Optimized many bullet projectiles
Optimized rigs on many animated models
Fixed positioning, scale, and materials on many Codex models
Disabled highlight on enemies when they are behind cover. The additional outline effect was expensive and rarely ever showed up
Updated navmesh generation to give pocket worlds their own smaller navmeshes
Fixed overly long basalts and fortress walls on many levels causing the navmesh to generate too large
Set up Level 3 to delete and prevent backtracking once the Boss arena platform is reached to improve performance
Set up Level 4 to delete and prevent backtracking once the final arena platform is reached to improve performance
Optimized Level 5 Intro and Core lighting
Fixed Level 5 intro area floor bouncing gibs and items around
Fixed Expunge Barrier trap in Level 5 killing Prism enemies, causing it to 1 hit kill the Spider Droids tied to the door lock
Removed enemies from the Level 5 exit lower containment shelves temporarily to reduce level navmesh size
Fixed Level 5 Map getting cut off at the edges
Fixed Gib Delete volumes below levels not deleting gibs or items when they fell off the map leaving them to fall infinitely
Fixed Level 2 rarely generating with outdated/missing cap tiles at the edges of levels
Fixed issue with Shipping Containers where if opened and the Prism small crate variant spawns it would break the highlight shader, draining performance and highlighting random objects in the scene
Fixed Containment Chamber doors being too tall after bursting open, making bullets hit them while on the floor
Fixed Shipping Conveyor wall holo barriers allowing the player to be pushed through them by containers, making the player stuck inside of the wall
Fix null debuffs breaking ShotDebuffItem, causing unwanted interactions between different ammo mods stacking
Fixed Start and Guide being rebindable on controllers
Fixed Critical Hit tooltip being incorrect on Tab Screen and updated Luck tooltips
Fixed Highlight shader not updating when an object is moving
Fixed orbiting player drones being targeted more often than the player
Fixed Radiation Debuff not hurting player when applied
Fixed Heavy Weapon indicators often being rotated in the world
Fixed Icosatron Uncharted enemy being too easily pushable by the player
Fixed Tesla Barrel and Pyro Barrel aim positions being too low making them difficult to hit in some scenarios
Fixed a few Crystal Prisms being mispositioned slightly, causing the energy beams meant to hit them not colliding and breaking them open
Fixed Level 3 Acidic Hivemind boss triggering on level start instead of when the Boss platform is reached
Fixed Level 3 Quill Hivemind Boss Brain skipping its unburrow animation after the first attack
Fixed many waypoints from Act 2 loot zones showing up on the map
Fixed Brass Beast weapon projectiles not colliding with enemies
Fixed Rotspore Cannon projectile not sticking into enemies or the environment
Fixed outdated fall triggers intersecting with areas of the Level 4 Hydro Headquarters fortress
Fixed a few item descriptions displaying the wrong amount of charges for pickup use
Fixed Waypoints for Stockpiles spawned inside of Shipping Containers not disappearing
Other misc. level fixes
Patch 2.51
Beacon patch 2.51 is out introducing a major update to the Controller Scheme, a new Notifier System, and Damage Numbers! Notifiers are one of the largest UI improvements added to the game to date, giving much more information on the environment including much needed hints at how to access Secret areas for newer players. Damage numbers help improve the readability of combat immensely as well, giving you more feedback on how well each weapon performs in different fights as well as giving much clearer feedback on when you land Critical Hits.
Controller players will be glad to hear we have finally updated the default Controller Scheme, making the game feel much more natural on controllers than the previous free-aim setup. After weeks of testing and referencing other twin-stick shooter controller schemes, we’ve found a balance that will feel much more natural to controller users while still offering the ability to free-aim while holding the left trigger for more accurate crosshair movement necessary for some actions in Beacon. We’ll still be watching for feedback if there’s any final requests for tweaks to be made to the controller setup for the 3.0 release of the game.
Patch 2.51 will be one of our final early access patches as the game nears its final form for the full release (Patch 3.0). The team has been hard at work on Level 6 and the final boss encounters for the game while finalizing this patch, and we’ll be able to begin testing the full 6 levels soon while we add a few final features to the game and prepare for release.
Check out the full Patch 2.51 notes below! Beacon is also on sale for 25% off for the next week (Starting March 26th).
Patch 2.51 Notes
Controller
Updated aiming scheme to a more traditional Twin Stick aiming style.
Left stick now controls motion and character direction when it's the only stick used.
Right stick controls aiming and allows the player to strafe if used in combination with movement.
Left Trigger activates Free Aim/Aim Lock. If not on a target, it allows you to aim anywhere on the screen for more precise Grenade, Pickup, or Auxiliary item use. If on an enemy, it will lock onto that enemy and hold your aim on them until they are killed or the trigger is released.
Added Aim Lock reticule that appears on enemies near your aim and lock-on animation when an enemy is locked.
Controller remapping option screen can now be navigated with the D-Pad
Fixed Xbox Controller button displays on the HUD not updating to match rebound keys
Fixed weapon switching when activating a Trigger Use on controller
Fixed phantom navigation when navigating the Main Menu with the D-Pad on controller
Fixed Dynamic crosshair not aligning directly left and right when using a controller
UI
New Notifier System: Notifiers now appear on almost all interactable items in the game, expanding when moused over to display a name and short description. The new Notifiers should help players more easily recognize what is destructible, lootable, or interactable as well as give more explicit hints at how to unlock Secret areas.
White Notifiers: Usable - Indicates that the object is usable, used on objects like Flux Nodes and Beam Redirectors that the player can interact with
Yellow Notifiers: Loot - Indicates that the object can be opened or broken for a chance at loot
Green Notifiers: Travel/Healing - Indicates that the object is used for travel or boosting, and occasionally for healing objects like Swampspore Clusters and Nanomed Consoles
Red Notifiers: Destructible - Indicates that the object is destructible, used on explosive traps as well as barriers that require a grenade to destroy
Purple Notifiers: Secret - Indicates that the object is a secret or bonus loot area, giving a hint if a criteria needs to be met to unlock the secret
Blue Notifiers: Story - Indicates that the object is a collectible Memento or Log, able to be read and added to your Index when collected.
New Damage Numbers System: Damage numbers now appear over the health bar of all enemies, changing color for Critical Hits. Damage Numbers can be toggled off in the options.
Added Cursor Color Picker and Transparency slider to Options
Updated Crosshair textures to be more readable and noticeable when re-colored
Added Map Reveal to the start of each level, revealing all map waypoints at once and displaying a message to remind the player to check the map
Items
Passive Pickup: Scorched Choker and Golden Scorched Choker - Converted from Passive, grants the player health regeneration when out of combat but limits health to 50
Passive Pickup: Ammo Synthesizer - Converted from Passive, grants the player a 75% chance to regenerate ammo when an enemy is killed
Passive Pickup: Bio-Extractor - Converted from Passive, heals the player for 3 health each time an enemy is killed
Passive Pickup: Mesmer - Converted from Passive, freezes the enemy over your crosshair
Music
Added new Level 3 Combat Music
Balance
Player minimum Health and Stamina increased from 25 to 50.
Player acceleration values tweaked to make movement more responsive
Lowered increasing stress drop percents for Volatile and Fortified DNA when in large fights to prevent Level 4 and 5 fights dropping too much DNA.
Pickup: Nanomed Patch - Changed to a healing Pickup. Heals 50 each use, with 3 charges.
Pickup: Wild Feast - Replaced health regen passive with 3 charge heal that fully restores health and stamina
Pickup: Tesla Injector - Updated Stamina Regeneration script to prevent floating dodge mutations from being infinitely usable. Stamina no longer stays full constantly, but will drain and after a 1 second delay will regenerate at 2x speed.
Pickup: Flydrop Core - Reduced Stamina Regen delay from -4 seconds to -2.5
Increased accuracy on a handful of One Handed and Rifle weapons
Adjusted damage spreads of many weapon projectiles to make damage dealt a bit more random and also balance weapon damage output based on recent testing.
Removed unique Critical Hit damage multiplier on a few weapons. Now all weapons have a base 2x critical hit damage multiplier.
Weapon: Laser Engine - Increased Damage per Second from 6 to 16, reduced ammo drain rate, reduced magazine size to 60, increased reload time
Weapon: Flamethrower - Increased Flame range and speed, reduced ammo regeneration delay, decreased fire rate and magazine size by 20
Weapon: Tesla SFG - Increased damage of Tesla SFG Ball explosion greatly, reduced damage dealt when colliding with ball before explosion
Weapon: Pyro SMG - Increased range of pyro smg projectiles
Weapon: Double Tap (LMG Variant) - Reduced fire rate
Mutation: Feral Heels - Increased jump speed, reduced distance of leap. This should make the mutation more useful in combat and prevent it from accidentally flinging the player off of the level as often.
Mutation: Gaseous Sack - Increased Stamina drain per second while floating
Mutation: Leeching Tentacle - Reduced lifesteal to 10% on melee
Mutation: Draining Maw - Reduced lifesteal to 10% on crit
Trap: Mining Laser - Reduced damage per second to 10 from 120. The laser will still be a large threat and will burn away health quickly, but won't instantly kill if jumped into with full health.
Enemy: Solus Warden - Decreased health of Armor Shells, and increased base enemy health. Hatchlings will be released earlier from the Warden now, and the health bar will appear once the Armor Shells are broken for the majority of its overall health.
Misc
Updated Tips displayed on the loading screen with 50+ new tips.
Optimized level 5 map collision to prevent navmesh from generating larger than necessary and reducing performance
Optimized Grenade Warning floating icon
Added static batching to many static level assets, giving a minor performance boost over dynamic batching that they previously used
Added Splash triggers to water, lava, and acid in all levels that trigger the Drop Drone and play a splash particle when the player lands in them
Fixes
Fixed Mining Spider boss Satellite Strike lasers disappearing when they travel over the elevator platform
Fixed Tritoraptor Matriarch leaping into the elevator shaft if the player was on top of the elevator platform
Attempted fix for Hivemind wieners getting stuck and never unburrowing
Fixed a handful of pickup items being usable infinite times
Fixed 3D Printers not ignoring armor when removing health on use
Fixed 3D Printer and DNA Printer having a few old Passive items that were converted to Pickups spawning
Fixed cavern teleporters on a few levels transporting the player underneath the floor when at low FPS
Fixed Level 5 Playtest End memento not appearing when the bottom of the elevator is reached
Fixed Level 5 Core holo barrier around the Beacon Locator being able to reflect and duplicate projectiles infinitely, sometimes causing a huge performance drain
Fixed a handful of errors in the Tutorial after recent updates
Miscellaneous level fixes and tweaks
Beacon 2.5 - Pathfinder
Beacon patch 2.5 is released adding new Level 5 Landmark zones, UI improvements, and an overhaul to Pickup items! Patch 2.5 will be our last major content patch in Early Access. Over the next few months we’ll release a few small patches with more UI improvements and quality of life fixes, but our main focus will now be on finishing the game for release later this year. We’ll let everyone know when we have more information on the launch ready to share!
One of the biggest changes this update is the overhaul to Pickup items, updating every pickup in the game to be more powerful and meaningful to your run instead of being trash that litters the ground after fights. All buff pickups have been updated to Passive Pickups, providing a buff to the player permanently as long as the item is held. All attack and utility pickups have been updated as well, adding more charges and buffing the power of the pickup if necessary. Coming across multiple pickups now will force you to make a choice over which to carry depending on if you want more attack power or want to hold onto a Passive buff for a few fights.
The final set of Tinkered Weapon Variants are also included in this patch, bringing the total weapon count up to 100 now. The new variants are a mix of old and recently added weapons, with 8 of them requiring Research levels to unlock.
A new set of UI improvements has been added in this update as well, including the Ammo Wheel and new Weather Hologram Notifiers. The Ammo Wheel appears when a weapon is being fired, showing you directly near the player how much of your magazine is left without having to glance to the corner of the screen. The new Weather Hologram Notifiers appear for all Stormcell events, giving a much clearer preview of the impact area and danger level.
Beacon is also on sale for 25% off from January 23rd to the 27th for the Lunar New Year Sale!
Patch 2.51 should be released in a few weeks, and will include more UI updates along with a new Notifier system that will better inform the player which objects are interactable and give hints at how to complete secret areas. Check out the full patch notes for Patch 2.5 below.
Pathfinder
UI
HUD Ammo Wheel - Added a segmented wheel that appears around your player and depletes as your ammunition is used. The wheel is segmented based on your equipped weapon's magazine size.
Weather Notifiers - Added new hologram weather notifiers that appear on the floor when a Stormcell is incoming, warning the player of the impact zone of the Stormcell.
Added new Tab Screen animations when tab screen is open or the tab is switched
Adjusted spacing of the corner HUD elements, giving more space from the edges of the screen
Swapped the position of the ammo counter and weapon icon on the bottom right HUD element
Added Faction names to beginning of Faction Bonus tooltips
New Tinkered Weapon Variants
Sonic Shotgun Variant "Tidal Wave"
RotBlaster Variant "Siamese Twins"
LMG Variant "Double Tap"
Energy Blaster Variant "Sparky"
Energy Rifle Variant "Spray N' Pray"
Laser Refractor Variant "Refactored Refractor"
Bone Bouncer Variant "Far Flung"
Bonesling Variant "Osteoblast"
Laser Carbine Variant "Last Word"
Remote Crossbow Variant "Quiverer"
Stygian Hunter Variant "Hellhound"
Stygian Hammer Variant "Stonewall"
Misc.
Luck Stat Update - Replaced Luck's previous functionality with new Jackpot system. Every crate you open has a chance of being a jackpot, forcing 2 extra items to drop. Your chance to get a jackpot raises and lowers based on your Luck stat.
Reduced Fog of War reveal radius slightly
Updated all items to have consistent icon scaling and glows
Added new ambient particles to Swamspore Lights, Succulent Fruit Trees, and other objects to better draw attention to them
Pickups Overhaul
Pickups: Passive Pickups - Converted all Buff Pickup items into new Passive Pickups, granting the player a buff permanently while the item is held. If the Pickup is dropped or swapped the buff is removed. Specific changes and converted items listed below.
Pickups: Attacks and Utility - Altered many utility and attack pickups to have more charges and be more powerful, but reduced drop rates. Pickups are meant more now to be a choice of attack to hold onto for a few fights instead of items you spammed to swap after they began littering the floor. Specific changes listed below.
Passive Pickup: Focus Injector - Grants +100 Accuracy and +25% reload speed while held
Passive Pickup: Adrenaline Injector - Grants +100 Speed while held
Passive Pickup: Steroid Injector - Grants +100 Resistance while held
Passive Pickup: Flydrop Core - Removes Stamina recharge delay while held
Passive Pickup: Palier Stem - Grants +30 All Stats while held
Passive Pickup: Matriarch's Egg - Gives +100 Stamina, +100 Speed, -100 Accuracy while held
Passive Pickup: Wild Feast - Gives +1 Health Regen while held
Passive Pickup: Tesla Injector - Gives Infinite Stamina while held
Passive Pickup: Wrist Monitor - Converted from Passive, gives +100 Stamina while held
Passive Pickup: Pyro Vest - Converted from Passive, gives +100 Flame Armor while held
Passive Pickup: Tesla Vest - Converted from Passive, gives +100 Tesla Armor while held
Passive Pickup: Hive Nectar - Gives +300 Resistance, -100 Speed while held
Passive Pickup: Illuminated Sporeling - Gives +100 Critical Hit while held
Passive Pickup: Soured Veins - Gives +300 Speed and -300 Stamina while held
Passive Pickup: Celestial Clover - Converted from Passive, gives +300 Luck while held
Pickup: Tritoraptor Egg - Replaced with a 5 charge healing item, restoring 10 Health and 50 Stamina each use
Pickup: Crab Legs - Increased heal from 10 to 20, increased Stamina replenish from 50 to 100, and increased charges from 3 to 5.
Pickup: Flare - Increased charges from 5 to 10
Pickup: Proximity Mines - Increased charges from 5 to 10, increased Mine explode damage
Pickup: Repentant Daggers - Increased charges from 5 to 10, added ambient and impact sounds to the dagger
Pickup: Quill Spears - Increased charges from 5 to 10, added ambient and impact sounds to the spear
Pickup: Bonerangs - Increased charges from 5 to 10, increased bone impact damage
Pickup: Magrail Meteors - Increased charges from 1 to 3, added reticule to show where your meteor will impact
Pickup: Mega Satellite Strike - Increased charges from 1 to 3, improved reticule telegraphing, reduced damage slightly
Pickup: Hatchling Halo - Increased charges from 1 to 3
Pickup: Mega Swarm - Increased charges from 1 to 3
Pickup: Mega-Barrage - Increased charges from 1 to 3
Pickup: Tesla Drone - Increased charges from 1 to 3
Pickup: Remote Hack - Increased charges from 1 to 3
Pickup: Nanomed Trauma Patch - Increased from 1 charge to 3, increased permanent heal from 25 to 50 (Now heals 100 immediately and 50 fades away)
Pickup: Emergency Override - Increased charges from 1 to 3
Pickup: Slomo - Increased charges from 1 to 3
Pickup: Starborn Flare - Increased charges from 1 to 5, Increased radius of flare debuff effect, updated particles
Pickup: Rotbladders - Increased charges from 1 to 5, added pop sound when boost is activated
Pickup: Reactive Shield - Increased charges from 1 to 5
Pickup: Telemite Serum - Increased charges from 1 to 5
Pickup: Inverter - Increased duration from 8 seconds to 20 seconds
Balance
Start Crates - Greatly increased the chance that the 2 crates in the start crash site will drop a 1 handed weapon if spawned
DNA - Updated the statistics ranges of all DNA types, reducing negative stat bonuses overall to make early game genomes less punishing and to compensate for the new Mutation stat bonuses
Mutations: Stat bonuses - Added and updated many of the stat bonuses on mutations, theming them more specifically to the enemy set they originate from and adding more negative stat bonuses to attempt at balancing the power of late game builds. New slot stat bonuses are detailed below, with a few exceptions on mutations like Rejected Arm.
Mutations: Head Slots - Head slots now provide +40 of their subfaction's positive stat bonus
Mutations: Chest Slots - Chest slots now provide +40 and -80 of their subfaction's stat bonuses
Mutations: Arms, Legs, and Tail Slots - Now provide -40 of their subfaction's negative stat bonus
Mutation: Palier Back - Increased Stamina replenish chance when damaged from 10% to 20%
Mutation: Bracing Scales - Decreased Damage Ignore chance when damaged from 25% to 20%
Mutation: Reactive Shell - Reduced damage required to trigger the Quill Spray
Mutation: Rejected Arm - Increased Speed from +40 to +80, increased Accuracy from -15 to -40
Mutation: Feelers - Added +40 Accuracy bonus
Mutation: Pyro Cannon - Changed Pyro Cannon from flame ball projectile to a flame cannon projectile, making it impossible to harm yourself with the projectile
Enemy: Excavation Eye and Drone - Reduced speed of beam, increased noise on beam aim
Weapon: Plasma Pistol and Roadrunner (Variant) - Increased Accuracy
Grenade: Tesla - Increased speed/range of Tesla grenade throw
Levels
Level 5 Hydro Core Added - Raise or lower the water level in the Hydro Core to reach new areas and direct the beam into the power core.
Level 5 Excavation Core Added - Explore the excavation core and disable the laser engines to guide your beams to the power core.
Updated Level 5 exit, adding a new Beacon Locator locked on the elevator platform until the beam puzzle in the landmark is completed.
Many various level fixes and tweaks
Mementos
New Ship Memento: Soda Case
New Uncharted Memento: Mirage Sample
New Onyx Memento: Harmonic Rod
Music
New Level 2 Combat music added
Fixes
Fixed Save File Break caused by the Energetic Tail mutation
Fixed a handful of items and weapons from recent patches missing from the resources list, causing them to not load from Continue saves
Fixed Tesla and Pyro hologram head mutations missing from the mutation drop list after recent update to those mutations
Fixed Highlight Shader not working in the last few builds
Fixed Pickups still showing the uses counter for Passive and one time use pickups if one with charges was previously held
Updated the settings on all item icon textures to reduce texture memory usage
Updated the settings on many particle sprites and other textures to reduce texture memory usage
Fixed Level 3 Hydro Reactor Prism variant flux nodes not activating the Reactor
Fixed Beam Redirector lasers on level 5 not being low enough to damage the player when walked through
Fixed a handful of memento titles being too long
Fixed basalt stacks being pulled by conveyors not being blow-upable
Fixed tesla debuff stunning enemies forever in some cases
Fixed Blood Altar waypoint not being marked as found after use
Fixed awkward weather transition when entering Level 5 landmark zones
Fixed Left Mouse and Right Mouse inputs not displaying correctly on the HUD. Now shows "LM" and "RM"
Fixed two spelling errors on the Tutorial intro screen
Fixed player getting stuck in a falling loop if a trigger_push is jumped into with a launch mutation
Fixed Chilpodrae being able to launch Chilopod enemies, causing them to become undamageable
Fixed Tritoraptor Queen sometimes leaping at the player after they have been flung off of the level, causing to it stay below the arena until it can leap up again
Fixed Spider Droid bosses health bars being activated before the player reaches the boss platform
Beacon 2.4 - Breaking Point
Beacon patch 2.4 has arrived adding new Act 1 bosses, DNA features, and dozens of level edits and balance tweaks that bring the game one step closer to completion.
Some of the most important additions in this patch are the new DNA features, including Faction Bonuses and Recycling. Faction Bonuses give you a passive buff for each pair of DNA from the same faction, adding a new layer to how you choose to alter your genome. Recycling allows you to convert 3 random pieces of DNA into a DNA Mod, giving you more chances to alter your Genome slots and also something to do with extra DNA once your Research is maxed out.
We’ve also been testing the Dynamic Crosshair for a while now and after a full accuracy pass on every weapon in the game it’s now being added as the default crosshair. The new lines that appear indicate the outer angles of your current weapons accuracy spread and are updated dynamically as your Accuracy stat changes. For example, if you activate a Focus Injector you’ll now be able to see how much your accuracy has improved and what your chance to miss an enemy is based on your distance away. If you try out the new Dynamic Crosshair and still prefer the old direct line, there’s a new option to toggle it back.
Thanks for everyone's patience as we worked on finalizing and testing patch 2.4 the last couple months! With this patch levels 1-4 are nearing their final forms for the initial release of the game. Level 5 will be getting a bit more content in 2.5 and then Level 6 will come with the initial release of the game next year! Check out the full patch notes for 2.4 below if you want all the details on what’s been added.
Breaking Point
New Bosses
New Native Boss: Tritoraptor Matriarch - Face off against the Tritoraptor's largest and deadliest form, able to leap over the arena to repeatedly perform a Tailspin that will knock you off of the edge if not careful. Once below half health, the Matriarch can activate her cloak and will sneak around the arena to lay rapid growing Tritoraptor Eggs.
New Prism Boss: Tesla Mega Spider - Fight the Tesla variant of the MK-X Spider Droid, firing explosive Tesla SFG rounds from its head and summoning repeated Tesla Strikes for each transmitter deployed.
New Prism Boss: Pyro Mega Spider - Fight the Pyro variant of the MK-X Spider Droid, firing clustering Flame Ball projectiles from its head and summoning a large Flame Hologram Field that covers a large chunk of the arena for each transmitter deployed
New Solus Boss: Quilled Hivemind Brain - Fight the Quill variant of the Hivemind Brain, firing out multiple barrages of giant Quill Spears in a 360 degree radius of the arena when agitated.
New Solus Boss: Illuminated Hivemind Brain (Coming in 2.41) - Fight the Light variant of the Hivemind Brain, releasing a massive Light Wave along with some Globule Clusters when agitated.
Prism Boss: Excavation Mega Spider
Increased max health by 200 and increased the max damage allowed per stage to 400, allowing the spider to be killed in 3 stages now.
Increased health of stomach prong required to disable boss
Increased health of transmitters
Increased speed of laser sweep
Set spawn lifts to disable completely once the boss is killed
Set all enemies in the arena to be killed by an Emergency Override wave when the boss dies
Added new particles and updated outdated ones
Fixed missing floor materials
Fixed Spider Boss prong holes not matching the bosses prong position
Enabled elevator at exit platform that allows the player to return up top
Solus Boss: Acidic Hivemind
Improved readability of the red flash when the Hivemind Brain is taking damage
Updated Wiener and Tail models and set up Wieners to explode when killed
Added chance for health or a pickup to drop on wiener kill
Increased wiener health
Scaled up Tails and increased their attack range
Reduced tail slam damage
Set Wieners and Tails to burrow permanently when the Hivemind Brain is killed
Updated exit drop to allow the player to fly back up using a Wiener Cannon
Fixed Hivemind Brain sometimes overlapping attacks when entering its second stage
Fixes to wieners being damageable or attacking at times when they shouldn’t
Uncharted Boss: Flauros Aphelion
Decreased cooldown on Flame Wave attack
Greatly decreased cooldown on Bloat Summon attack
Increased Bloat health
Reduced health pickup drop rate on Bloats
Added Reflect to Bone Shields
Fixed Aphelion sometimes not teleporting to the center before casting Flame Barrage
Fixed Aphelion not rotating while casting Flame Barrage central attack
Fixed Bloats not exploding when they float into a Bone Shrine
Updated boss light bridge entrance disable sequences
New Enemies
Solus: Acid Wiener - Separated from the Hivemind, the Wiener survives on its own in a large chitin form found in Solus dominated territory.
Solus: Quill Wiener - A solo Quill Wiener, after unburrowing it sprays a barrage of quill projectiles over an area around the player.
DNA Reconstitution Process
New Function: Recycle - Added Recycle function that allows you to trade 3 random pieces of DNA in your inventory for a random DNA mod. This will help make finding mods easier if you were unlucky with looting them as well as give players who have passed the research cap something else to do with bonus DNA found in runs.
New Function: Faction Bonuses - Added Faction Bonuses that are applied when 2 pieces of the same faction are slotted in your genome. With each 2 matching pieces added a stack of the faction's buff is granted.
Faction Bonus: Prism - +50% Accuracy
Faction Bonus: Solus - +50% Critical Hit Damage
Faction Bonus: Native - +50% Stamina Regen
Faction Bonus: Uncharted - +5% Item Drop Rate
Mutation Life Cap - Set Mutation Life cap to 10 to prevent extremely high mutation lives
UI
DNA Icons on the Reconstitute Screen now show the faction's icon instead of a letter
Added Weather Type name to Map Screen, with temperature and stormcell icon
Added Darken HUD Corners Option, enabling a dark gradient over the left and right HUD indicators to make more clear to read against bright backgrounds
Added new aim assisting Dynamic Crosshair that more accurately displays the accuracy of your current weapon. Dynamic Crosshair is now the standard aiming option and an option has been added to change back to the old direct line.
Misc.
Added GibManager to limit max number of gibs spawnable. When the limit is reached, previous gibs from the list are deleted.
Added DNA pickup particle effect
Mementos
Added Bestiary Logs for all Uncharted and Native faction enemies
Added more memento spaws in Act 2 Landmark levels
Levels
Added Level 2 Volta Cargo Pod Landmark - Explore the crashed Cargo pod of a rival Corp. Search for power boxes to disable holo-barriers left active in the pod and boost your way to bonus loot.
Added Level 4 Volta Life Support Pod - Explore a crashed Life Support pod from a rival Corp, with Medbay and Aquaponics sections. Search for power boxes to release the O2 pod in the center and gain access to bonus loot.
Added Act 1 Shipwrecked Spire and Megaspire Telemite Maw pocket worlds - Jumping into a Telemite Maw now has a chance to bring you to a Shipwrecked Spire, offering a piece of bonus loot or access to a 3D Printer
Added Act 2 Native Irradiated Rotspire loot zone - Explore the rotspire and find out how to release the Bonespikes to gain access to the loot
Added Level 4 Shipwreck Cap Tiles, giving Ship loot if you venture to the edges of the level and can clear debris blocking the entrance.
Added new secret variants to the Level 3 Containment and Shipping Reactor landmark levels
Updated a handful of Act 1 Cap, Middle, and Trap tiles with improved layouts and more randomized loot spawns.
Updated Level 2 Untamed Sanctuary - Merged main Untamed Sanctuary zone with main level tile, allowing the main terrain to show up on the Map screen and increasing performance
Updated a few Level 4 Intro tiles with improved terrain and new blockade randomizers
Updated Level 4 Shipping Headquarters - Improved level intro terrain and fortress forms, updated shipping container detailing, updated left fortress removing side vertical conveyors and adding a new bridge to the upper exit, added new central platform variants, updated and added new secret variants
Updated Level 4 Hydro Headquarters - Widened fortress forms, widened all pipe forms to make easier to traverse, added new pipe detail forms to fortress spires, updated and added new secret variants
Updated Level 4 Mining Headquarters - Removed lower left secret terrain, adjusted right entrance terrain, widened middle fortress platforms, updated and added new secret variants
Updated Level 4 Solus Mega Hive - Updated entrance terrain with zip lines, added new wiener enemy spawn variants to the previously empty holes in the chitin forms
Balance
Updated small and large crate (Stockpile) loot spawns. Small crates now drop 2 items max and large crates 3 items, increasing by 1 for each stack of the Uncharted bonus
Updated enemy loot spawns. Small enemies now drop max 1 item, medium enemies 2, and large enemies 3
Enemies: Reduced max threat range on most enemies to prevent following the player too far and increased alert ranges
Player - Increased default Stamina Recharge delay from 4 to 5 seconds
Player - Adjusted Speed curve values, increasing the max speed and adjusting the animation speeds to feel more natural with the new curve
Enemy: Icosatron - Added 75% chance for Icosatron to overload when near low health, exploding in a large radius after 4 seconds if not killed. Also increased roll speed slightly
Enemy: Karnak - Updated loot method to allow damaging the Karnak with any weapon instead of only a well placed explosive
Enemy: Tesla Droid MK2 - Increased radius of Tesla Grenade explosion to match the player's grenade radius
Enemy: Containment Droid - Increased radius of Fragment Grenade explosion to match the player's grenade radius
Enemy: Solus Ward and Wardling - Reduced scuttle speed by about half.
Added chance for Rotspore Nectar health pickups to drop from native enemies
Weapons: Overall accuracy balance pass has been done after the addition of the Prism Faction Bonus and new accuracy line crosshair. Most weapons have lower overall accuracy, with heavy weapons and shotguns generally having the widest spreads.
Weapon: LMG - Reduced bullet damage slightly
Weapon: Sniper - Reduced initial sway and speed of laser when aiming, making it easier to fire quick shots with if timed right
Weapon: Explosive Crossbow - Increased base damage of explosive bolt, increased hitbox size of bolt bullet, reduced speed of explosive bolt.
Weapon: Sonic Shotgun - Reduced Accuracy lower spread to make Focus Injectors more useful paired with it
Weapon: Starborn Sniper - Reduced base shot damage
Weapon: Starborn Shotgun and Fractal Death (Variant) - Reduced base damage of bullet, increased hitbox size of bullets
Weapon: Flamethrower - Increased max range of flames shot out
Auxiliary: Quill Bladder - Increased amount of bursts able to be charged and increased amount of quills shot per burst.
Auxiliary: Laser Port - Increased laser damage per second and damage radius of laser
Auxiliary: Concussive Missile - Increased damage and radius of the explosion
Pickup: Repentant Dagger - Spread out damage range of daggers and increased lifesteal to 50% of damage dealt
Grenade: Fragment - Increased range slightly and spread out damage min/max
Grenade: Nematode - Reduced detonate time and increased damage slightly.
Passive: Hacking Drone - Set Hacking drone to not hack if there's only one droid nearby.
Passive: Tesla Drone - Increased duration of summoned drone to 60 seconds
Passive: Laser Sight MK1 and MK2 - Lowered accuracy gain from Accuracy passives to make acquiring the Prism Faction Bonus more desirable. MK1 is now +25 Accuracy and MK2 +50
Mutation: Illuminated Antenna - Reduced time required standing still to activate Accuracy bonus
Mutation: Tesla Boltfeet - Increased dodge duration and cooldown of dodge, and shortened dodge slightly to match base dodge distance. Also reduced stamina cost slightly.
Mutation: Springy Claws - Decreased dodge duration and cooldown of dodge, and lengthened dodge slightly to match base dodge distance.
Raised Base DNA drop chance on Small enemies slightly
DNA Mod - Pickup Duration - Changed to +5 Seconds Duration
DNA Mod - Stamina Recharge - Changed from increased Stamina Regen to -1 Second Stamina Recharge Delay
NanoMed Console - Increased heal per second to reduce time spent at the console
Weather: Tesla Strike - Added new randomized Tesla Ring trap that can be left behind randomly after a lightning strike, stunning the player if entered. Lowered tesla strike initial damage.
Weather: Sporefall - Updated sporefall to be a larger mound of spores that falls and bursts, instead of slow falling spore pickups
Fixes
Fixed level 3 exit fog being black
Fixed a few enemies not showing up in their Bestiary log preview
Fixed Flashlight appearing on clone bay opening
Fixed Flashlight casting a shadow of your own weapon often
Fixed a few DNA Skill Mod stats not correctly granting the stats when spawned in game
Fixed DNA not spawning in challenge runs still
Fixed Laser Sight MK1 and MK2 items not correctly granting stats
Fixed Chilopodrae enemy bounce/reflect staying active after charging
Fixed Bonespike Auxiliary item not spawning from Bone Caches
Fixed Transmitter Arm mutation melee using normal melee attack on top of the Prism enemy hack ability
Fixed a few incorrect memento names and model previews
Fixed Prism Transmitter Arm mutation hacking all enemies, not just Prism
Fixed Flauros enemy animations not looping
Fixed DNA Caches accidentally merging, causing less to spawn than intended in many DNA Cache loot spawns
Fixed Telemite Mini Maw triggering the player drop drone if jumped into from a high height
Fixed Solus boss loot spawn rewarding Prism DNA
Fixed ship power boxes being difficult to hit sometimes
Fixed Mining Droids walking screenshake having no distance clamp
Fixed Steam Vent traps not pushing player
Fixed many arena intro stinger sounds not playing
Fixed seams on many fortresses and forest terrains showing
Fixed enemy health bars disappearing when over certain weather fog types
Fixed Rain and Storm weather rain particles not spawning in a big enough area when the camera is zoomed out far
Many miscellaneous level fixes
Beacon 2.32
Beacon patch 2.32 is released, including new Level 3 Shipwrecked Reactor variants and a performance boost!
Levels
Added new Shipwrecked Reactor variants to all level 3 landmarks
Updated Level 3 Landmark and Cap tiles to have improved terrain and updated detailing
Updated Level 3 Solus Variants to remove shipwrecks and have more Solus themed traps/loot randomizers
Added new Nanomed Console and 3D Printer loot spawns to Level 3 Landmarks
Miscellaneous level fixes
Misc
Updated Steam API implementation to allow building with IL2CPP, giving an estimated 20-30% performance increase
Updated Pocket World generation to remove unused pocket worlds after loading. This should increase overall performance when a Telemite Maw spawns.
Balance
Solus Colonies - Increased drop rate of Nectar health pickups when colonies are destroyed and reduced hatchling spawn rate to make items spawning more likely
Grenade: Tesla - Increased explode range and adjusted throw speed
Grenade: Pyro - Increased base explosion damage
Fixes
Fixed UI error over Weapon HUD caused by a change last update
Adjusted Conveyor Mega Booster animation to help prevent it jamming the player while launching
Beacon Patch 2.31
Beacon patch 2.31 is released, making some balance tweaks to armor and debuffs as well as fixing the Continue item loading bug!
Balance
Armor: Reduced base player armor value and balanced item/mutation armor items to make maximum armor attainable 80
Difficulty Settings: Tweaked player damage taken values to be balanced around new armor values. Will generally mean you take slightly more damage, and armor items will provide more benefit when found.
Debuffs: Increased duration of many debuffs to 10 seconds, including all flame and acid damage types. This should make Resistance a bit more desirable to pick up and give it more room to affect the duration of pickups when tweaked.
Weapon: Energy Blaster - Increased accuracy
Misc
Added glow highlights to many crates and a few other mechanics such as ziplines
Widened collapsing basalt bridges and succulent trunk bridges to make easier to walk over
Minor updates and fixes to the new Tutorial
Updated Level 2 End/Level 3 Start zone
Added new weather types to the Main Menu weather randomizer
Fixes
Fixed items not being loaded correctly on Continue and Weekly Runs
Fixed lower waterfalls and tiny basalt spires from registering as a drop drone position, which should prevent getting stuck if fallen off of the main level onto one
Fixed conveyor boosters occasionally not boosting the player the full way
Fixed enemies being afraid to enter the Ouroboros Armory pod (Navmesh was broken)
Fixed start level ship pod rendering incorrectly in some fog types
Fixed Uncharted crates dropping bonus health injectors
Fixed level 2 shipwreck intro booster flinging player into the void
Fixed Bio-Extractor being un-pickupable from Ship Caches and fixed model being skewed
Fixed a handful of challenge settings using Tesla and Pyro hologram mutations having missing mutations on their spawn lists
Fixed Flauros weather fog sphere having no material applied
Fixed a few passive items having too small of pickup triggers, making them impossible to pick up from the new Ship Cache crates
Fixed level 5 edges of the level having unnecessary fall triggers that would reset the player when floating
Fixed landmine trigger blocking shots when dormant in the ground
Fixed Steam Vent wall trap from hurting/pushing player while inactive