This month I'm experimenting with a more rapid update schedule, so you can expect about 1 of these per week.
We've just hit 400 reviews on Steam (yipee!) Thank you to everyone who took the time to leave a review. Just 100 more and we may have a shot at that delicious Overwhelmingly Positive rating. As always, be sure to join the discord if you have anything to request or report.
Here are the changes.
New Stuffs
Added cow.
Ending a sprint will now rotate your gun to the angle it was at when you began the sprint.
Added some "pity chiplets" the player receives for completing main line missions 3 and 6. These will appear in a package by your desk, and should help round out progression for agents who are very bad at finding them.
Began overhauling some of the audio setup. Eventually this will further reduce load times. For now there should no longer be frame drops when initially slowing down time on potato computers. Changes also allowed me to implement a global audio fadeout when changing scenes.
Modified AI behavior so that they take a brief pause after reaching a location they want to investigate. This makes it easier to lure enemies into a trap!
You can now stop Freyja's pathfinding by using the stop command. This will prevent soft lock situations when freyja gets stuck and can't pathfind to places.
Toilets, landmines, and other computers are now named based off a static tracker instead of a random value. Previously there were rare cases where two computers had the same name. TLDR. These computers will now be named things like "toilet_0, toilet_1" instead of "toilet_0451"
Removed some sussy words from the in game dictionary.
Tune in next week for some overdue changes to guns, a new common enemy type, and some updates to the infiltrator class.
0.8 Hotfix
Hello Agents (◕‿◕✿)
Just a few little fixes to 0.8, details below.
Changes
Fixed a bug that allowed you to aggro a nurse and kill Starbucc, possibly breaking the questline without a cheat code to repair it.
Abilities from the knight class should not all be compatible with the light mech. These mostly only effected the right handed melee weapon but should now effect both as intended.
Fixed an issue with swapping between melee and ranged weapons with the light mech
Fixed an issue that made the aim guide invisible if weapons were sufficiently accurate
Fixed a bug with warpicks that gave them negative damage.
Fixed a bug that allowed you to both kill and rescue a character in the new sidequest leading to some strange scenes.
Fixed a visual bug with the divine mandate skill preventing the effect from triggering properly.
S T A C K H U N T E R
Helloooo Agents (✿◕‿◕)
Been a while.
Today I bring you DDS version 0.8! This comes with the finale to the stackhunter sidequest, new missions, new toys to play with, and lots of new story content.
This update is brought to you with some excellent art from Emett! They’re always a pleasure to work with. Go check out their work and commission something from them here: https://twitter.com/KSteakay
A special thank you to everyone who left a positive review since the last update. I’ll include some development details after the changelog for anyone interested. As always, be sure to join the discord if you have any bugs to report or suggestions to make.
New Stuff
Completed Stackhunter Sidequest. This comes with a new mission, and tons of story content.
Added Frejya
Added Shark Attack!
Overhauled much of the player gun code. Many gun abilities now apply to the player’s gun(s) instead of their character model.
Changed how player accuracy sight works. This can now appear on multiple guns at once.
Mounted guns can now be instructed to continuously fire.
Introduced a new stat rolling algorithm. If you’ve seen my video on this, you might have spotted an error in how I was creating random distributions. This error occasionally generated guns that were suckier than they should be. The new stat rolling algorithm should not have this issue.
Added an ez hack panel for Freyja if you have that option enabled.
Fixed and Adjustments
Silence ability extended from 4.33 seconds to 15 seconds in duration. No longer a John Cage reference but feels much more usable.
Toll booths now deal damage equal to mission level. These things are a much bigger issue later into the game.
Fixed many typos.
Removed some naughty words from the game dictionary.
Fixed a bizarre bug that prevented the background shaders in the PGD from spawning if the player picked up a particular chiplet earlier in the game.
The network graph is now open automatically in the tutorial. Too many players were missing the message on how to open it and ended up playing the entire game without a mini map LOL
Fixed a bug with the Become Succ perk that caused it to not apply the perk downside. Somehow this perk is always broken idk why.
Non lethal melee weapons have a 1.5 second stun floor, so they’re all guaranteed to do at least something.
Enemy patrol radius reduced from 30 meters to 15 meters. When enemies hear something and go to investigate, they’ll mill about the area in this radius. This makes distracting enemies a more viable strategy.
Increased speed of blackout animation
Fixed several bugs associated with hacking grenades through walls, and after they exploded.
Added a new fade shader to many trees and torii gates in the game.
Sewer level now specifies that you need to spike the target computer.
Fixed a bug causing bows to override the sound of the next melee weapon you picked up.
You can now backtrack through options with ctrl+tab since shift+tab opens steam overlay
Known Issues
All abilities are meant to work with Freyja, but there are lots of weird bugs I couldn't get around to fixing. The idea is Freyja should compliment your build rather than erase it. It'll take a few updates before everything is working properly.
Deluge has some bugs, this mode is getting a small rework down the line anyway so I'm just ignoring them for now.
There are LOTS of dumb story flags in this update. I tested almost all of them but there are a few permutations that might be a little broken if you played the 0.7.9999 preview update on Itch. Testing everything switching between versions of the game was just too much work, but this shouldn't be a problem for most of you.
Some players reported issues with the new gun aim sight. I was never able to recreate this on my end but I think I found the problem and fixed it.
Freyja's ez hack window is kinda ugly. Made the thing last night in like an hour, will probably get a fresh coat of paint down the road.
Development Update The 0.8 Update has been in the works for a looong time. There is a lot more I wanted to add, including an entire alternate route. Those things might appear in a post 1.0 update I’m calling “DDS: Consequences,” along with other cut features. After treading water on this side quest for so long, I wanted to release it and get back on track for 1.0 release. I’m happy with the state of it. All the best (and worst) ideas ultimately made it in.
I’m aware development has slowed down a bit and want to address the reasons why. A few months ago I graduated from grad school and landed a great job. I’m still working on DDS just about every day, but it took a few months for me to figure out my work-life balance. Some of the Stackhunter sidequest was extremely difficult to implement and that put a damper on things too. Thank you all for your patience while I got this done. ٩(◕‿◕)۶
There are only a few things left to do before we reach 1.0. This includes:
An alt-route to the main quest (3 new missions)
Roguelike mode
Possibly 2 more standalone missions (might get booted to post 1.0)
I’ll be taking the rest of December off to play around with my next project, and I’ll get a hotfix out to fix 0.8 bugs if need be. I’m planning on spending January working on fixing annoying issues, adding some new enemy types, visual improvements, new abilities, fun stuff like that. February we'll start charging through the rest of the 1.0 requirements.
Gonna move back to a weekly update schedule after this month, so expect more regular content drops! Releasing in big chunks is more efficient, but I get kinda anxious when DDS goes without an update for too long >.<
Happy holidays! Thank you all again for keeping up with DDS and supporting the project.
0.7.5 Update
Howdy Agents! (◕‿◕✿)
Most of my dev time is focused on story and mission stuff for the final stackhunter update, so I don't have *too* much to share with you today. It's been a while since our last update though, so I wanted to deliver a few goodies.
Thank you to everyone who left a review this month! As always, be sure to join the discord! for updates and cute pictures of frogs.
The Notes
added the ability to toggle vsync from the options menu
optimized elements of the player's hud for a minor performance increase
added several new skeleton and grenade sprites
fixed an issue in the Bellagamba Grid mission where two neighboring computers had the same name
autocomplete backtracking is now done by holding control and pressing tab. Shift tab opened up the Steam overlay and no one liked that
enemies can now aim pick weapons properly
modified some code involving the initialization of melee weapons which should improve load times
fixed some dialogue typos
smoke grenades now generate with double duration
I was hoping I would have more time to dev once I finished up my degree and started my new job, but in reality I've had much less :< The current plan is to start staying up to 2:00am like I used to. October is just around the corner which will mark the 1 year anniversary of DDS! I'd like to finish Stackhunter by the end next month, which should leave a pretty straight shot to releasing 1.0. I'll be adding ~3 additional missions to serve as an alt-route to the main story, and the long awaited roguelike mode! DDS will receive some additional content past this, but only things I didn't originally imagine in the 1.0 release. It's been an amazing experience getting to this point and sharing DDS with all of you, and I hope these final content updates are worth the wait!
Some recent news regarding Unity's clown carnival revenue model has many devs seriously bummed out :< This recent decision (along with many others) feels deeply misguided at best, and many developers big and small are taking this opportunity to jump ship. I love working with Unity in large part because of the community and their support, but decisions like these put Unity's greatest asset at risk. I will not be porting DDS to Godot or anything as it would be a nightmarish amount of work, and because these changes shouldn't effect me personally. But I'll definitely be turning my eye towards Godot for my next major project.
Stackhunter Part 2
Hello Agents (✿◕‿◕)
This update is brought to you with some lovely art from Emett! Please go check out their twitter and commission some art from them.
I overworked myself again. Oopsie! But I'm here with the 0.7.4 update which includes 2 new missions for the Stackhunter side quest (1 per route) and a comfy story scene with your client. I haven't had as much time to test this build so there might be some bugs lurking around. Be sure to join the discord! so you can help report them and see pictures of cool frogs!
In addition to the new content there are a few other notes:
Adjusted the player line of sight shader, the effect should be a little more subtle now.
Fixed some spelling mistakes.
That's actually it the rest of my time was spent on story stuff -_-
Thank you all for keeping up with Deadeye Deepfake Simulacrum. Gonna take a little time off this month to focus on bug fixing and finishing a new enemy type I'm working on before wrapping up the Stackhunter sidequest with its third and final installment!
0.7.3 Hotfix
Heya Agents (✿◕‿◕)
Here with a little hotfix to correct some bugs and adjust some things introduced in the last update.
Shortened the description of some new abilities so text doesn't go off screen
Defensive twirl skill will now end with your weapon aimed in the same direction it started.
Fixed a bug causing time dilation to get locked when pausing the game with slug active.
The seducer perk now correctly applies the seduced status effect. This perk was also buffed so the effect triggers 40% of the time instead of 25%.
0.7.3 Update
Hellooooo Agents (✿◕‿◕)
Here with another monthly update for y'all. I am extremely close to having two more missions done buuuut I'm not quite happy with them and I'm in the process of moving rn. I've decided to release the 0.7.3 update now and then put those new missions up once I've moved in and had the time to polish them.
This new update still comes with a ton of stuff though! Check down below for a list of specifics. Thank you so much to all of you who picked up a copy of DDS during the Steam sale. And a special super thank u so much with a cherry on top to everyone who left a review! We've blasted past 300 and are on our way to 500!
Every non-secret class got a new perk. Many of these will allow you to spice up your playstyle in crazy impactful ways.
Gunmeister - Defensive Twirl - reloads are longer but you gain massive damage resistance while you do. Special thanks to Grace from the discord for suggesting this idea!
Acrobat - Red Light Green Light - Move faster but stop when attacking.
Medic - Flesh Pact - Damage is increased but damage is shared with hostile units in line of sight distance.
Technician - Dedicated Hardware - Cameras and Turrets are free to hack and command, but other hops cost double.
Chronomancer - Double Time - Doubles the cast time of your abilities.
Esper - Psychic Shield - Damage is first dealt to your Ego.
Hacker - Going Mobile - While your laptop is open, your character moves in the direction of your cursor.
Empath - Obedience - Allies lose the ability to move on their own.
Infiltrator - Blindsight - Reduce your view distance by 25%, along with all enemies.
Knight - True Warrior - Lethal weapons put targets to sleep instead.
Necromancer - There and Back - Death is not the end!
New Abilities
Gunmeister - Self-Defense - Each source of damage is negated at the price of a bullet from your magazine. Very proud of the effect for this though it does render over menus for some reason. I'll fix that eventually.
Empath - Spank - Your next melee swing converts enemies to your side.
Empath - Friends with Benefits - Consume your most recent friend, gaining all their resources.
Infiltrator - Peek - Create a small vision circle around your cursor.
Big Changes
Slug Rework. Slug now drains at a rate proportional to time dilation. 5 seconds of slug means you can slow time for 5 seconds of real world time. To compensate for this nerf, all skeletons can have 5x as much slug as before! This change was made to make Chronomancer cheese builds more interesting. Don't worry! They haven't been nerfed into the ground. Chronomancer stuff is still totally busted, you just need to be a little more strategic with your resources in the early game, and build your character around it in the late game. The Slug Guzzler perk was also buffed to drain slug 200% faster rather than 800% faster.
New Lighting effects for player line of sight! Your vision now has a subtle glow towards the edges. I always wanted it to look like this but only now got the shader working properly. This should make overlapping sight lines a little clearer, and add a bit of visual flair to the look of DDS. I'll probably add an option to turn this off later if you don't like it though!
The Empath Become Succ perk has been reworked (again) to make it more in line with the spirit of the original. Empath abilities now have half cost and double charges, at the cost of the opposite being true for all other abilities.
You can now press left shift + tab to cycle back through auto complete suggestions. Thank you zenbu for requesting this in the discord!
The Jester class now awards 8 random abilities and 4 random perks, up from 7 an d 3.
Added some additional tutorialization stuff here and there after watching some confused streamers take a crack at DDS.
Added a bunch of new skeleton and grenade sprites.
Bug Fixes
AI no longer breaks when a hacking action is interrupted by the death of a target.
Fixed some performance issues with security cameras. These things were doing way more work than they needed to so you might notice some performance improvements in a handful of levels.
enemies no longer shatter glass if their melee weapon intersects with it in an inactive state
removed the vacuum cleaner from the house call mission. This thing had a habit of breaking windows and sending all the enemies in the house into patrol mode.
lots of other minor tweaks and fixes I'm too lazy to list out
That's all for now! I should have 2 new missions for you soon so keep a lookout for those in the next week or two.
0.72 Hotfix
Fixed a rare issue where one of the final missions would count as completed if the player died. That's all!
Stackhunter Part I - 3 New Missions!
A mysterious treasure hunter arrives…
Hello Agents (✿◕‿◕)
Today I bring you part 1 of the Stackhunter side quest! In order to hold myself to reasonable deadlines, I’m gonna release this in three parts with parts II and III arriving in July and August.
Help your new client locate a mysterious treasure hidden in the depths of the corporate complex. Part I will kick off the story with three new missions and an introduction to Starbucc, a cold, calculating fortune seeker with many secrets, and a little bit of a tsundere side (O///O).
This side quest will appear automatically after completing the Malicious Emails mission half way through the main story. You’ll have to choose between two missions for each playthrough. If you wanna jump straight to the action or experience all three without starting a fresh save, you can use the following codes in your terminal.
go_to_scene_ PrismTaster
go_to_scene_ BathhouseGen
go_to_scene_ PrismSwamp
If you’re working from a completed save, I recommend turning on the “scale enemies with shop” option in the gameplay options. This will increase the difficulty to match your character.
Outside the new mechanics which I will not spoil here, there are a few bug fixes and changes to go over. Here are da notes.
3 New Missions! But you knew that already.
Added 14 new Grenade Sprites, doubling the total number. This is a long overdue chore to give nades some much needed visual variety. I'll be sprinkling more of these in over the next couple updates.
Added a handful of new skeleton sprites.
Fixed a bug causing enemies to shatter class when it connected with their weapon, even when the blade was not live
Fixed a bug with operator computers causing them to crash your terminal if you attempted to connect to an invalid machine.
Thank you all so much for playing DDS! I’m excited to finally show off some of these new missions. They’ve been very hard to develop but I think you’ll enjoy them. See you all next month with 2 more!
(Btw, could like 2 of u leave a review?👉👈 We’re really close to hitting that 300 milestone!)
0.7.1 Update
Hey Agents (✿◕‿◕)
Here with a quick update for you. Still hard at work on the next sidequest. I'll have some missions to share in the open beta next month. Be sure to join the discord if you want access to them! As always, a special thanks to everyone who checked out the game or left a review!
This update features some huge bug fixes, balance changes, and a quality of life improvement several of you have suggested. Check out da notes down below.
Da Notes
Fixed the Concierge's Pleasure Fortress Mission in the Duvet sidequest. This mission was TOTALLY broken and let you just walk to the finish line and skip the whole thing. Big oversight on my part, should be back to working now.
You can now rebind they autocomplete button!
Fixed lots of visual weirdness in Duvet's apartment
Buffed the Technician Deep Pockets ability to provide 3 grenade refills instead of 2. I've heard a lot of talk on the discord of grenades being underpowered. I personally rely on them heavily while playing but that might just be me!
Necromancer perk severance buffed, the downside of this ability now reduces your ego by a factor of 3 instead of 4.
Chronomancer perk Endless Cycle buffed to reduce maximum slug by 75% instead of 90%
Fixed an offset title in the gameplay options menu
Chronomancer's Instant Rewind ability now rewinds you 5 seconds instead of 10. This just makes it a little easier to use and you can also run a cheese build by combining it with Necromancer's The Slip ability. Not that chrono-necro-mancer-wancers needed additional cheese but whatever.
The Shower Daemon will no longer appear if you have another visitor. There was an edge case before where you could end up in a sticky situation but get locked into dialogue and die.
Some other small bug fixes involving niche ai behavior, UI stuff, and notifications in the apartment
