Great news for hobby statisticians: We’ve got our annual “Year in Review” statistics ready! Sorry it’s a bit late this year, someone spilled juice on the office calculator so we had to do it all by hand.
Management is very pleased with some critical figures: Overall employee deaths have decreased this year, for example. Fall damage is still the leading killer among DRG employees, but this year recorded cases dropped to an acceptable 32 million. Nice work!
As usual, any figures relating to workplace safety violations and employee complaints have been omitted, as Management deemed these numbers to be statistically insignificant.
Please enjoy the full statistics below, and know that the Deep Rock Galactic Corporation appreciates your contributions to this record year.
Rock and Stone!
With Love, -The Ghost Ship Crew
The 2025 Lunar Festival is live!
Hello Miners,
The Lunar Festival 2025 is here! You can boot up Deep Rock Galactic right this absolute minute and dig into it. We’ve got the full event details in the preview post, but in a nutshell, here’s what’s coming:
Brand new snake hats
Brand new old hats
Double XP for those who dare
Firecrackers and festivities aboard the Space Rig
Slither on in and snake it up! This year’s Lunar Festival runs until Thursday, February 13th at 13:00 CET.
Oh, and in other news: the Closed Alpha playtest for GUNTOUCHABLES is live now! It’s a co-op doomsday shooter coming out via Ghost Ship Publishing.
If you’d like to give that a go, you can learn more right here: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2543510/view/501689772772687893?l=english
Sending an enormous hug to all of you!
With love, -The Ghost Ship Crew
Lunar Festival 2025 Preview
Hello Miners,
According to the lunar calendar, a new year is nearly upon us! If you ask Management, though, you should quit worrying about what the moon is doing, and focus on your own work in the mines.
However, as tradition dictates, it’s nearly time for another Lunar Festival in Deep Rock Galactic! We’re just about ready to get the Year of the Snake off to a slithering start.
This year’s Lunar Festival goes live on Thursday, January 30th at 13:00 CET, and it’ll run until February 13th.
Let’s take a look at what’s in store:
There’s a snake on my head!
To motivate our workforce during these celebrations, Management has seen fit to commission yet another piece of festive headgear. Starting next week, all employees will have the opportunity to earn The Serpentine Special – simply complete the Lunar Festival 2025 assignment, and you’ll unlock this slithery specimen for all classes.
Snag the hats from previous Lunar Festivals
During an asbestos recycling operation on one of our orbital storage facilities, we stumbled across an old cache of hats from previous Lunar Festival events. While interplanetary hazmat protocols dictate we incinerate these hats, Management has generously decided to offer them up to our employees instead!
To collect all these old hats in one fell swoop, just complete the Last Year's Blessings assignment and we’ll add them all to your inventory. And if you notice any chest pains while wearing these hats, keep it to yourself.
Snakes in a Cave
It started as a route transport job for Longbeard Freight. But a shipment of rare venomous snakes got loose from the cargo hold and attacked the pilot, tragically causing the vessel to crash on Hoxxes with a loss of all crew and passengers.
Even more tragic, though, is that the doomed freighter was also carrying a load of antique Golden Serpent statues that Management had ordered. Now these statues are scattered through the caves of Hoxxes – and to make matters worse, our insurance policy doesn’t cover snake-based accidents.
We need your help. Dig up and deposit a Golden Serpent statue during your mission, and Management will reward your whole team with a Double Performance Point Bonus. Everyone wins.
Firecrackers are back on the menu
We’ve got the Space Rig looking dazzling with festive banners, lovely paper lanterns, and a fresh shipment of Space Persimmons. And much to the chagrin of Management, complementary firecrackers will make a return during the Festival.
Management initially decided to stop with the firecrackers due to employees’ reckless conduct last year. However, a large shipment of mining explosives turned out to be too unstable to use in subsurface operations, so we decided to turn lemons into lemonade. Try not to use them near the windows.
Join the GUNTOUCHABLES Closed Alpha playtest
Oh, on another note – GUNTOUCHABLES, which is coming out via Ghost Ship Publishing, is holding a Closed Alpha Playtest next week. If you’re interested, we’d like to invite you to sign up! You can do so on their Steam store page.
That’s all for now! Let us know in the comments if you think Steeve would wear one pair of jeans with 8 legs, or four pairs of regular jeans.
With love, -The Ghost Ship Crew
Yuletide 2024 is live!
Hello Miners,
The headline says it all: the Yuletide seasonal event is now live in Deep Rock Galactic! Grab them pickaxes and hop down in the mines to show those Glyphids the true meaning of Yuletide.
You can read all the event details in the preview post – but in a nutshell, Yuletide is all about:
Cool hats
Shooting elves
Working hard
We’re running this event until January 7th at 13:00 CET, so you’ve got a nice bit of time to collect all your Yuletide goodies.
The Ghost Ship gang is going AFK for the holidays, so we'd just like to wish everyone a very happy Yuletide season. Hope you get lots of time to share with friends and family, give or get some cool gifts, maybe eat a tasty treat or two. Don't forget to make time to play DRG, too.
Thanks for yet another fun year together in the mines -- we'll see you in 2025. All the best until then.
Rock and Stone to the bone!
With much cozy holiday love, - The Ghost Ship Crew
PATCH NOTES - S05.07
Hello Miners,
Althought the patch was last week, naughty elf's made this post disappear, it is now here! This patch adds a few seasonal events, fixes a number of bugs and we updated the DRG universe tab to also include the Merch Store and Mug Kickstarter.
With Love, The Ghost Ship Crew
--- PATCH NOTES —
- Fixed Scout Grappling Hook Occasionally Fails to Pull the Scout ( https://app.betahub.io/projects/pr-5632787018/issues/13 ) - Fixed Crawlers using too many particles when walking - Fixed that terrain could block the players from connecting nodes to the power station in Industrial Sabotage - Fixed selecting the incorrect previously equipped item when pipeline building - Fixed Gunner shield frequently fails to provide buffs to players ( https://app.betahub.io/projects/pr-5632787018/issues/57 ) - Fixed a bunch of typo’s - Fixed Crash when approaching Core Stone retrieval pod, with some objects ( https://app.betahub.io/projects/pr-5632787018/issues/134 )
Yuletide 2024 preview
Hello Miners,
The holidays are nearly here!
We mean that in a figurative sense, of course. Management would like to clarify that the term "holiday" should not be in any way associated with paid time off. Here at Deep Rock Galactic, we like to think of holidays as a sort of special flavor that motivates our employees to work even harder. And it's almost time for the year's coziest, most motivating holiday: Yuletide!
The Yuletide 2024 seasonal event starts on Thursday, December 19th at 13:00 CET. It'll run until January 7th 2025, which is a little longer than standard seasonal events, so you’ve got some extra time to gather up all your Yuletide goodies.
Let’s give the present a little shake and guess what’s inside.
Your yearly Yuletide gift from Management
It’s been a terrific year for the company, so we’ve decided to give each and every employee your own special Yuletide gift. At long last, we’ve invested in better equipment! We’ve requisitioned some advanced, highly functional safety gear for all of you: the Gift Wrapped hat!
This sturdy cardboard helmet should protect you from the consequences of at least one workplace accident. That’s a huge improvement in the company safety record, statistically speaking.
Of course, a gift is best when you can appreciate its worth. That’s why you’ve got to work for it! You can unlock the Gift Wrapped helmet via the Yearly Performance Bonus assignment, which will also grant you extra Performance Points, crafting resources, credits and a couple infused Matrix Cores. Don’t say we never did anything for you!
Open season on Yuletide Elves
It seems that we’re dealing with another seasonal infestation of Yuletide Elves. If left to run wild through the caves of Hoxxes, they’re liable to get caught and ground up in our mining equipment, and that’d have an unacceptable consequence for our productivity. To prevent that, we’re tasking you with a simple solution: Bag ‘em and tag ‘em.
Shoot the Elves on sight, deposit the body in the M.U.L.E., and Management will grant you (and your team) a Double Mission Performance Point Bonus.
Collect all the hats of Yuletide past
Just like always, you’ll be able to snag the whole run of old Yuletide hats, all in one fell swoop. They’re a bit dusty, but if you’re willing to sweat for ‘em, they’re yours.
Complete the Fashion of Yuletide Past assignment to unlock all the Yuletide cosmetics from past years’ celebrations.
A few extra goodies under the tree
But wait, there’s more! Complete the Yuletide Elf Hunt assignment, and you’ll unlock the following:
Pickaxe set: ‘Chillaxe’
Bosco framework: ‘Yuletide Special’
Elf suit armor + headwear*
This assignment will only appear for you if you haven’t already completed it and collected the rewards a previous year.
*Last year, Management documented a significant number of friendly fire incidents connected to wearing this elf costume. We reiterate once again that all injuries sustained while wearing this outfit are the employee’s individual responsibility.
Deck the Halls With Balls of Gunk Seed
To complete the Yuletide experience, Management has once again decorated the Space Rig for the holidays. Your break time is still unpaid, but now it’s much more festive! You can look forward to holiday garlands, delicate ornaments, cheery Yuletide music, colorful lights, and all the rest! We plugged the holiday lights into the same outlet we use for the life support systems in the Med Bay, so don’t go fiddling with it.
Management would like to underline that these decorations are provided on the assumption that all employees will respect the No Snowball Throwing policy while aboard the Space Rig. You’re here to work, not to feel Yuletide joy.
Yuletide 2024 begins on Thursday, December 19th at 13:00 CET and it’ll run until Tuesday, January 7th at 13:00 CET.
Bundle up, Miners! With love, -The Ghost Ship Crew
On the Horizon Recap: November 2024
Broadcast starts at the 6:03 timestamp
Hello Miners,
In case you missed our big ‘On the Horizon’ dev livestream last Thursday, we’ve got a whole lot of news to share! You can watch the whole thing right up above, but we’ve also got the highlights down below.
The tippy-top highlights
If you’ve just got two minutes, here’s what you should know:
Deep Rock Galactic merch is finally here! We teamed up with Heroic Replicas to open the official DRG merch webshop – and, in collaboration with Scorched Steel Industry, we’ll soon be releasing official Abyss Bar beer mugs via Kickstarter.
The first Rogue Core teaser trailer is out. We also went into Unreal Engine to showcase some of the enemies and weapons, and discussed a lot of details about the state of gameplay. Click here to watch the teaser, or scroll down for the full segment and more details.
Rogue Core's Closed Alpha is slated for Q2 2025, and an Early Access release at the end of 2025. For more updates on the game’s development (and potential Closed Alpha access), follow Rogue Core on Steam.
Deep Rock Galactic Season 06 will have to wait until Rogue Core is out in Early Access. We’re tackling one big project at a time, so we’re holding off on planning or developing anything to do with Season 06 while we’re going full steam ahead on Rogue Core.
Ghost Ship Publishing has announced a new title: Guntouchables. Developed by the Danish studio GameSwing, we’re psyched to help bring another fun co-op shooter into the world. See the reveal trailer here.
Below, we've got an updated roadmap (covering all of Ghost Ship Games and Publishing) for you. Then we'll go through the broadcast segment by segment, to sum up the most important bits.
Take a tour of Ghost Ship Games' new office
After our big move in August, we’ve now gotten (mostly) settled in the new digs! Here’s Aaron to give you an engaging and educational six-minute tour of our new workspace.
Deep Rock Galactic merch is finally here!
Finally, the days of “DRG has no merch” are over. Thanks to our friend Dave at Heroic Replicas, the official Deep Rock Galactic merch webshop is live!
You can check out the webshop right this red-hot minute. It’s got loads of cool stuff, such as:
T-shirts for all four classes (duh, gotta have t-shirts)
Ceramic Loot Bug piggy banks (buggy banks?)
A dedicated light-up RGB mechanical keyboard that’s literally just the ‘V’ button so you can Rock and Stone more easily
And much more!
Pro tip: Use coupon code 'COUPONCODE' for a free sticker pack on any orders over $40
Everything listed here is up for pre-order now, shipping in early 2025. And it’s worth highlighting that this selection is only Phase One of the merch project – we’ll have more cool releases landing in the shop in the coming months. Stay tuned!
But that’s not all! Through a collaboration with Scorched Steel Industry, we’re happy to announce that your most asked-after merch item is finally a reality. Soon, your beverage of choice will find a spectacular new home in the official Abyss Bar beer mugs.
Scorched Steel is funding this project via Kickstarter, and the launch date for their campaign is just around the corner. If you’d like to back it and grab one (or a few) of these mugs for yourself, click here to be notified when the Kickstarter campaign goes live.
Rogue Core: New teaser trailer and gameplay details
The first glimpses of Rogue Core are here! If you haven’t already seen it, check out the new Pre-Alpha Teaser Trailer above, or by clicking right here.
We spent the majority of On the Horizon discussing all sorts of Rogue Core details, from gameplay to enemy design to release timeline. We did a writeup of all of that, but it was so big that it became its own article – so if you’re keen for more Rogue Core, you can read all about it right here.
Right now, we’re aiming for a Rogue Core Closed Alpha in Q2 2025, and an Early Access release at the end of the year (Q4 2025).
As always, we touched base with all the developers releasing games via Ghost Ship Publishing to hear where they’re at. If you’d like more details on each title, the Ghost Ship Publishing segment starts at the 18:12 timestamp. Otherwise, here are three bullet points from each:
Guntouchables (GameSwing)
Say hello to the newest title to get picked up by Ghost Ship Publishing! In this co-op roguelike arcade shooter, four doomsday preppers blast their way through the disaster they’ve all been waiting for.
You can watch the Guntouchables release trailer here. GameSwing, the developers, describe the game as “Nuclear Throne meets Left 4 Dead.” Teamwork, fast feet and firepower reign supreme.
Guntouchables will be releasing to Early Access on Steam in Q1 2025.
The SpellRogue team has been busy putting out five big updates in the 10 months since they released to Early Access. Loads more spells, QoL tweaks, enemies and difficulty modifiers have been added since launch.
Next major milestone for SpellRogue is adding a fourth playable character: the Wind Wizard. They’re still refining and balancing how that new dice caster will play.
For now, the team’s plan is to release SpellRogue 1.0 around March 2025.
This historically-accurate game about medieval dinosaur wars is currently experimenting with how they’ll balance gameplay between action and strategy. The team calls the genre “hack ‘n strat.”
Ability to ride dinosaurs confirmed. Other recent focuses include advanced base building and resource management, and an expanded selection of dinosaurs.
Dinolords is aiming to make their Early Access launch on Steam in Q3 2025.
When we called them up during the stream, the Funday Team was in London to represent DRG: Survivor at the Golden Joystick Awards. They didn’t end up taking home the W, but we’re proud of them all the same. <3
It had been a while since we’d heard from Bitfire – and they came with a brand new trailer to show off! You can watch the new teaser trailer here.
The team’s been focused recently on building out a unique arsenal for each of the game’s four character classes, and dialing in procedural generation for the levels. Take a look at the gnarly fire effects for the flamethrower in the trailer.
DarkSwarm’s Early Access release date is still TBA.
And that's the show! Hope you saw something you liked in there. As always, sending our best to all of you, and a big ol' Rock and Stone.
With love, -The Ghost Ship Crew
‘On the Horizon’ is coming back! Here’s the livestream agenda
Hello Miners,
On the Horizon is coming back – and that means news on all things Ghost Ship.
Next week, we’re broadcasting another On the Horizon, our big dev livestream where we take a deep dive into what we’re up to, checking in on our own games as well as Ghost Ship Publishing titles. For this one, the headliner is Rogue Core news — but we’ve also got a lot of other goodies on the agenda. Did somebody say Deep Rock Galactic merch?
On the Horizon goes live on Thursday, November 21st at 14:00 CET (UTC+1). You’ll be able to tune in via Youtube (where the premiere is already live) as well as on Twitch. A recording of the whole thing will be available after, too.
Here’s what’s on the docket for the stream! Do keep in mind that all these timestamps might vary a bit.
14:00 CET - Welcome!
Søren Lundgaard (CEO) and Mikkel Martin Pedersen (Game Director) say hi and get things started. Since this is our first big broadcast from our new office, we’ll also have Aaron Hathaway (Marketing Manager) give you a tour of the new digs.
14:10 CET - Dev talks with Ghost Ship Publishing
Søren and Alex Skronski (Head of Publishing) call up all the developers of the different Ghost Ship Publishing titles for an update of where they’re at. This means news on DRG: Survivor, SpellRogue, DarkSwarm and Dinolords. There may be some more special news here, too.
14:45 CET - Deep Rock Galactic merch reveal & showcase
The days of “DRG has no merch” are over. At long last, we’re finally doing it: a full run of Deep Rock Galactic merch, soon available for preorders worldwide. Aaron and Alex (Head of Marketing) will introduce the project, showcase a selection of goodies, and launch the webshop live on stream.
15:00 CET - The state of Rogue Core
Mikkel takes the stage again for a big update on how Rogue Core’s coming along. We’ll talk about where we’re at in production, share screenshots and footage from the game, and discuss different aspects of the game’s design, art and lore. We’ll save time for a little Q&A afterwards.
We hope you’ll join us for the live broadcast next week on Thursday, November 21st. Again, you’ll find the stream on our Youtube and Twitch channels.
Talk soon!
With love, -The Ghost Ship Crew
Ghost Ship Games is making our... Esports debut?
Athletes spend a lifetime training for a moment like this.
Years of practice. Endless hours of honing kiting skills, tightening fast-twitch reflexes, building a master’s touch for baiting a Dreadnought into a supply pod.
All this, to get to the place where champions are forged: the Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor - Ultimate Challenge Invitationals.
What is the Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor - Ultimate Challenge Invitationals?
Put simply, it’s the absolute pinnacle of sporting competition. Presented by the Ghost Ship Sports Network in cooperation with the Interplanetary Dwarven Athletics Association (IDAA), the Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor - Ultimate Challenge Invitationals are a live broadcast Esports event, pitting players head-to-head for the highest score in Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor.
Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor, as you may know, is the rogue-like auto-shooter spinoff of the original Deep Rock Galactic. It’s one dwarf, solo, against the infinite alien hordes of Hoxxes. Developed by Funday Games and published by Ghost Ship Publishing, the game just released their big Update 04, which introduces a new biome, a scoring system, and a whole hosts of ramped-up mutators and lethal challenges.
To mark the occasion, we’re making it the center of this groundbreaking esports event: the Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor - Ultimate Challenge Invitationals. We’ll be broadcasting live from the Ghost Ship Games HQ in Copenhagen, with live play-by-play commentary from our extremely qualified sports journalists and splitscreen coverage of all the action as it unfolds in this head-to-head single elimination tournament.
Expect adrenaline. Expect groundbreaking sports journalism. Expect nothing short of the greatest, most professionally-produced sports experience in recorded history: the Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor - Ultimate Challenge Invitationals.
Is this a joke? No. Sort of. We’ve lost track. But we are sure of one thing: We’re going live on Monday, November 4th at 17:00 CET.
Who’s competing in the Invitationals?
For this year’s Invitationals, we’ve brought in eight content creators, all of them well-versed in Deep Rock Galactic and DRG: Survivor. On Monday, November 4th, they’ll be competing head to head in our single elimination tournament, to make it to the finals and claim the title of World Heavyweight Champion.
This year’s competitors are:
Idlecub
Javarak Gaming
ThisTofu
Explorian (fka DRG Historian)
Sniss
Rexalicious
TBA
TBA
These eight contestants will be assigned via random matchup for the Invitational’s four qualifier rounds. In each round, competitors will be playing head-to-head in a pre-seeded match on Hazard 5 difficulty. The player with the highest score will advance to the next stage of the tournament bracket, and eventually on to the finals – but only one can be the true champion.
What’s at stake?
Nothing short of the most coveted trophy in sports history: the DRG: Survivor World Heavyweight Champion title belt.
Handcrafted with authentic Glyphid leather and gold plating harvested directly from Hoxxes, the championship title is a symbol of dwarven fortitude, strength, and enduring spirit. It’s graced the waists of many proud miners – and this year, at the Ultimate Challenge Invitationals, it’s going home with one of the eight competitors.
How do I tune into the Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor - Ultimate Challenge Invitationals?
Great question.
When the event begins on Monday, November 4th at 17:00 CET, you can watch the Invitationals on Ghost Ship Game’s Twitch or Youtube page. The event premiere is already live on Youtube, in case you want to be there the split second the action kicks off.
We hope you have a lovely weekend, and we’ll see you at the Invitationals.
With Love, - The Ghost Ship Crew
Hoxxes Halloween 2024 is now live!
Hello Miners,
It's the spooky season.
Sharpen your pickaxes, check your weapons, and put on your most absorbent underwear: Hoxxes Halloween is here, and all its ghastly horrors are now running rampant in the caves.
Unlock the new Creeper Wolf Mask and show the bugs who's the real apex predator
Collect all previous Halloween cosmetics via the Last Year's Horrors assignment
Shoot the screaming skulls in the caves and deposit them for a double mission performance point bonus
Enjoy the Halloween decorations aboard the Space Rig and under absolutely no circumstances ask yourself why Management has so much money for candles but still hasn't invested in better equipment
It's all live right this minute! Hoxxes Halloween runs until November 7th at 13:00 CET -- so make sure to get the goods before then.
Have fun, and remember: Employees caught discussing paranormal happenings on company property may be subject to disciplinary exorcisms.
