Like a mighty eagle, the update #24 (aka 1.1.0) has just landed! And the bird brings you many sweet new treats.
It's kinda two-fold: there's the free content update part focused on building your new home, and the Underworld DLC that expands the game with a brand new open world map and all sorts of new recipes, features, skills, and whatnot.
Let's go through some of the new stuff! I'll try to separate which ones are part of the free update and which require the Underworld DLC.
Update Highlights
Tabula Rasa - The Builder's Isle
A new mini island has mysteriously appeared north of the Evac Site on the main island. There you will find a new quest that will walk you through the new build features. That's also your very own space where you can start building whatever you want. Your home. Your base. Whatever you want to call it.
As you complete the phases of the new quest, you'll unlock more and more new stuff to build: new walls, doors, furniture, and decorations. You'll be able to create your own hut/base/cabin/house/mansion from whatever pieces there's available. We'll be adding some more stuff to build in future free updates as well. Also if you bought the Underworld DLC, you'll unlock some special new buildables otherwise not available.
A well deserved rest.
The build limit has been greatly increased, so you'll able to place a lot more objects in the base game, and even more with the stuff you find in the DLC. We'll probably be increasing the limit in the future updates as well.
Home Portal
The Home Portal is a reward for completing the new construction related quest. Once invented, it allows you to create a quick portal that will take you to Tabula Rasa -- and back. Currently (as in 1.1.0.30) it only works on the main island, but we're hoping to make it work anywhere you may roam. (Except tombs maybe.)
Build Mode Usability Improvements
New hotkey for accessing the Build mode has been added. By default it's bound to B on the keyboard, but you can change it as you wish. It brings up the Build mode, so you don't have to spend your active inventory slot for Builder's Kit anymore.
Building your home is a delicate process. Sometimes you do make mistakes and place objects in ugly positions and unwanted angles. Destroying stuff should be familiar to you by now, but occasionally you need a tool finer than a sledgehammer. So we've added another usability improvement for deleting objects you no longer love. While in Builder's Kit mode, just hold down ALT on keyboard (LB on gamepads), and click away to delete (and refund) the ill-fated objects.
We'll also keep our ears open if you have any ideas how to improve things. (One thing we're thinking about is how to move the protagonist out of the way when you want to build something in that spot. We haven't yet decided how to do it, but we've got our thinking helmets on.)
Greener Grass
Farming used to be something you do outdoors only, but glad that's over now! You'll now be able to start farming indoors by constructing Planters. You can even build an elegant greenhouse made of glass around your to-be-vegetables, or maybe just have a garden in your living room. You do you!
Don't mind the skeleton. It was but a minor work mishap.
Seed Bag is also getting a fancier new version. It's waiting for you to find it deep below sea level in the Underworld DLC. Enhanced Seed Bag is what we call it. Single plant action with that bad boy plants 9 seeds at once (in a 3x3 grid)! It can also be upgraded to speed up the planting action, and be used to grow new Mana Plants. Prepare to harvest some nice little mana berries!
New Tools (aka Weapons)
There's a new tool meant for smashing in town, and it's called the Wrench. It sits in the Invent tree behind the Baseball Bat, and could be new blunt tool of choice. Give it a go!
The Underworld DLC also expands the selection of craftables with things like Sawed-Off Double Barrel Shotgun and a Crossbow, but those you have to find and earn first.
Fast Travel Between Campfires
In the Underworld you can travel freely between all the campfires you've lit. After completing a certain quest there, you'll also be able to take that knowledge to the main island. Fast Travel has never been so convenient and safe!
The Call of the Underworld
Obviously a big part of this new update is the Underworld DLC. I'm not going to spoil much of it here though. Once you purchase it, provided you've gotten yourself out of the first area (Capernaum), a new Quest will popup up and show you the way to the world under. Safe trips!
- Underworld DLC. - Builder's Isle added to the main island north of the evac site. - New building related inventions and objects, unlocked after Builder's Isle progression. - Added "Wrench" as a tool to fill the gap between Baseball Bat and Sledgehammer. - Built object names are now shown in the map. - Added quick key access for Builder's Kit. - Now remembering your previously selected buildable between sesssions. - Delete function for "Builder's Kit". - All headgear besides gas mask are now upgradable. - Showing the map sector (like K23) in big map for the cursor location. - UI navigation now works with any bound movement keys.
CHANGED
- Large metal objects now drop additional scrap metal when destroyed. - Changed around "Combat" side of the invention tree to accommodate Wrench and shuffled some trinkets around. - Buffed the build limit modifier on all "Builder's Kit" upgrade levels and on food recipes giving build limit. - Quests now visible in build mode. - Fisher skill now gives better fishing speed bonuses early on and rewards more XP for fishing. - Tweaks to temperatures in areas with extreme temperatures. - Nerfed items and food recipes giving enemy aggro range decrease so that maximum cap is now at most 70% - Buffed the "Riot Shield" damage, shield hp and knockback distance.
FIXED
- Rare crash related to entering the pause menu. - Destroyed built objects are now instantly updated in the big map. - Usual open world glitch & terrain fixes. - The survivor does not fall through built structures anymore when throwing knives. - Fixed showing of negative numbers for item uses, now capped at 0. - Inner "Fortress" doors van now be destroyed only after outer doors have been opened. - Link tower achievement had incorrect number of link towers associated with it.
Up Next
Next we're going to bring this update to all the platforms out there, and then start working on the next update. In reality this work is somewhat simultaneous, but just don't expect the next update to come out before this one is available everywhere.
The work on the next big secret DLC after this one is already well under way. However, I don't dare estimate when it'll see the light of day. It's going to be different than this one, but it'll also feature a new big open world map.
Join us for a developer launch stream to celebrate the "Underworld" DLC release!
Announcing DYSMANTLE: Underworld DLC 💎
We're happy to announce that we're on the final development stretch of a shiny new DYSMANTLE DLC called Underworld! We were hoping to get this out before the summer vacations, but unfortunately things simply aren't yet ready for release. The current estimated Steam release date is some time at the end of August, so we're close!
The DLC will feature a new open world map called the Underworld. Note that this is not an Undercrown related thing, this will go way deeper -- and beyond. The story will shed some more light onto the mysterious event happening on the island, and almost all the existing game features are expanded in some way: there will be new quests, recipes, skills, monsters, weapons, outfit, headgear, fish, plant to farm, buildables, and so on. For those who survive the Underworld main quest, there will be a sweet and useful reward: among other earthly rewards, you will be able to fast travel between Campfires.
All this will arrive with the upcoming 1.1.0 update #24 which will also contain some free playable content. The focus will be on giving you more tools to build stuff like platforms, walls, furniture, etc. We're expanding the main island a bit to give you some more room for your building activities and to add some Quests related to it. But more on that later!
You can find out more about the Underworld (and perhaps wishlist it?) at it's Steam page here:
The next step for the team is to once more recharge our batteries with the traditional Finnish 4-5 week summer vacation. This long break makes it up a bit for having to live in a cold and dark country like Finland. This might not be the best time to make that statement though as it's midsummer (Juhannus), which means that the sun basically doesn't go down AT ALL. It's surreally bright during the night time. Also it's almost 32° Celcius (~90°F) outside right now, so... not exactly cold. But it can get -32° during winter!
Anyway, have a great summer everyone! (Missing the office AC already.)
💎
Update #23: Touch-ups
Version 1.0.4: Touch-ups
This is a minor update with many smaller tweaks and balancing updates. The next update (1.1.0) will be a big one!
Change List
ADDED
- "Dentured Fangs" and "Berserker Charm" can be upgraded. They were also rebalanced. - New spit attack pattern for the "Puker". - Traditional Chinese localizations. - Performance improvements.
CHANGED
- UI tweaks (mostly for touch interfaces). - Text size tweaks. - Language menu sorts languages by language code (always shows reference language first). - Language menu sets cursor focus over current language. - Buffed the "Leaper" enemy damage on all attacks a bit as the enemy was underperforming compared to specs. - Buffed trinket effects for "Shock Absorber" and "Rabbit's Foot". - Plant beds can now be destroyed with a shovel. - The survivor now respawns at the home shelter if he dies consecutively three times in a very short period of time. - The collection now shows zero for materials that the player does not carry or have in the storage. - It is now possible to walk through a dead co-op player. - Invention notification now makes a sound. - Hunting rifle now has modifiers for all upg levels (conceptually a high crit dmg & chance weapon). - Added fishing xp buff modifier to "Tackle" an fixed some faulty modifiers. - Invent screen has less empty space around the grid. - Faster material pick up (more materials picked up at once). - Russian now uses the sama font as other languages.
FIXED
- Quest text locations show up properly in all stages. - Not possible to destroy "Fortress" entrance doors through the main gate any more. - Localisation fixes. - Fixed an issue with the "Ark" level 2 door not opening when it should. - "Riot Shield" HP now shown correctly after quick swap. - Materials do not disappear anymore when starting a co-op game when saving is not possible. - "Arcade is dead" cabinet can now be searched only once. - Fixes to faulty positioning of co-op player spawns. - Usual open world glitch & actor fixes. - Campfire achievements now uses the correct amount of campfires. - Radio achievement now takes into account radios in shelters. - Fixed discrepancies between some texts and voiceovers not matching. - Fixed slider value changing with gamepads and keyboard. - Fixed Crowbar missing most of its upgrade effects. - Timed crate gold medal had wrong amount of crates found required (51, is now 52). - Fixed main quest getting stuck by not acknowledging all the found fuel cells.
Update #22: Survivor's Log 📓
Boom! Another patch has just dropped!
Do note that, even with the boom and all, this is mostly a maintenance/fix update. However, there is a couple of new quality-of-life features included.
One of the new things added is something that has been requested pretty much since the first early access versions. There can be lots of things happening at once if you run around in the wide open world. You may not always have the time to read the texts thoroughly while being eaten alive at the same time. So now, if you notice you missed some text, you can go to the new Text Log screen and go through the lines again. The screen includes pretty much all the texts you see in the game world (all the protagonist "thoughts", read bulletin boards, notifications, etc).
The text is visible for the duration of the game session only, so after you save & exit, all that text is lost like tears in the rain. (In other words, the save state doesn't contain these texts.)
Another requested feature has been a quick menu for swapping your active items. After unlocking all four tool slots, it can be a chore to cycle through them all by pressing the switch item button repeatedly. So now long pressing the button pauses the game and opens up a menu like this:
I hope this will reduce the unnecessary swapping cycle. (This will be also be the primary way to swap items in the upcoming mobile version.)
As usual, full list of changes can be found below.
CHANGE LOG
ADDED
- Added Survivor's Log screen with texts you've encountered during this game session. - Quick Swap Active Items menu (Hold down item swap button). - Performance optimizations. - Camera distance slider. - Caribou can be tamed.
CHANGED
- UI tweaks. - Wood pile drops more wood. - Storage Box Upgrade available sooner (level 8 after crafting the Sleeping Bag). - Builder's Kit requires Fabric instead of Iron. - Breaking foliage, tableware or farmables don't cause freeze frame effect. - Allowing using gamepad DPAD for navigating CarriedMaterials screen. - Smelters and Sawmill can now use carried materials. - Lowered smelter & sawmill build costs, to further encourage building multiples of them. - Lowered amounts needed to refine most materials, but increased the time to complete. - Roughly doubled the amount of "fuel" provided by refining building fuel sources. - New HP and Level icons. - Red-blue color blind friendly player colors in color blind mode. - Increased map cursor speed and tweaked its sensitivity when using a gamepad.
FIXED
- Localization fixes. - Crash related to loading new areas. - In case player did not get a fuel cell drop from killing the bosses, installing fuel cells should still be possible if bosses are dead. - Fixed an issue with the "Volcanic Trail" quest where the player did not light up the campfire at Vulcan. - Usual open world glitch and issue fixes. - Changed the tomb "Shining passageway" a bit so the player can't get stuck. - Added POI markings to a couple of quests that were missing them. - Fixed Smelter and Sawmill HUD font scale and icon colors. - Campfire menu Inventory button opens the inventory for the correct co-op player. - Crash when loading a save with too many times fished (over 6k fishes). - Fixed a sequence skip in "Last Stand". - Fixed fishing in certain spots. - Aiming now stops correctly, when the player changes equipped tool. - Improvements to "run toggle". - Material slots no longer overlap with the map. - Hiding fabricator recipes in Invent screen. - UI scale fixes. - Showing unlocked recipes properly in collection (doesn't happen automatically for old saves). - Throwables now hit targets more reliably. - Destroyed wall caps do not block melee attack anymore. - Camera z near/far fixes.
Up Next
I know it's the same story as before, but we're still working on releasing the game on other platforms. At the same time, part of the team is designing and implementing the new content for 1) the next bigger free content update, and 2) the upcoming DLCs. We're pretty much on schedule. Still not sure if we're going to do yet another smaller patch before the next bigger patch, but we'll see.
As for the next content update, here's a little work-in-progress sneak peek:
You may be able to figure out what's that all about! But I do want to make it clear that it will take some time before this will be available. The best estimate at the moment is 2022/Q2.
Stay tuned!
📓
Update #21: Italian Update 🍝🍕
After hanging around in beta for quite some time, the Italian localization is now available for everyone!
(Also not sure if I should to apologize for (deliciously) reducing Italian to 🍝🍕. But forget Michelangelo, Galileo, Leonardo, and folks -- pizza is where it's at! Especially 🍍🍕 #teampineapple.)
Anyway, this patch is a smaller maintenance & fix patch with the usual bunch of improvement and tweaks. The performance (as in frames per second) should be up to 30% better as we've been optimizing the game and the engine for lower-end hardware. For other changes, see the full change list below.
CHANGE LOG
ADDED
- Italian localizations. - Performance optimizations. - Option for player indicator circles to tell co-op players apart more easily. - Green dot indicator for gear you can afford to upgrade.
CHANGED
- UI tweaks. - Allowing using larger windowed resolutions but hiding the window title bar and using thinner frames in those cases. - Decal tweaks and sharper sources graphics. - Player no longer receiving damage during cutscenes (prevents you from dying to poison puddle while you can't move). - Launchpad tunnel doors are now always open if the player has finished the game.
FIXED
- Localization fixes. - Player death position set properly for both of the players (using position for whoever dies the last). - Acquiring map happens right after you leave the first link tower even if there are notifications queued. - Showing built structures like turrets in the map before loading the actor type assets. - Fixed quest items in "Hot Head" not returning to destructible when they should. - Walking animation does not get stuck anymore during "Warm up the engine" main quest phase. - Saving now works correctly when exiting the game while sitting on the campfire. - Clicking special tool icon now correctly changes the special tool instead of the primary weapon. - Mouse and gamepad controls now use the same minimum and maximum camera tilt values. - Usual open world fixes to visual glitches and some objects.
Up Next
We're still working on releasing the game on pretty much all the meaningful platforms out there. The new content will be available after everyone gets the 1.0 version, so it may still take some time. The estimate for the first content update is still Q1 (this year).
We may or may not release another fix update before that. Basically it depends on if we're able to fix enough of those smaller things you've reported. There are lots of minor bug reports waiting, but we simply don't have the resources to fix every single one of them. For example we know that if you enter a tomb with all the slots filled with materials you can't drop (such as fuel cells or mana stuff), you're not able to pick up the tomb reward nor leave the tomb. You're stuck, so you have no choice than to restart the tomb, go and store your materials, and do the tomb again. Ideally there'd be a more elegant solution to this, but as this doesn't get you permanently stuck, it's fine for now.
Happy new year and buon appetito!
🍝🍕
Update #20: Hot 🌶️ Fixes!
First of all: thank you everyone for the successful DYSMANTLE full launch! If you're reading this, you probably had something to do with it! Yay!
The transition from Early Access to Full Version went better than we anticipated. Nothing blew up! (Unless you ask macOS users who had some terrible crash issues for a couple of days, but all that is fixed now. Apologies.) The game is selling pretty well, which is a nice bonus for a small indie studio like us. It also means that it makes sense for us to continue developing the game longer. It's good for everyone!
So, the first hot fix update is here. This one is pretty straightforward reaction to all the feedback and bug reports you have sent. Keep those coming! There are also a couple of smaller new things such as the options icons, but mostly this is about fixing stuff like localizations, quest phases, and audio issues.
This is the Update #20 with build number 1.0.1.x. Wonder what happened to Updates #18 and #19? They didn't have a fancy Steam announcement like this, but #18 was the Release Candidate version and #19 the Launch Version 1.0.0. So we aren't as bad at counting as people are saying. We're just bad at spelling our game names properly. But that's fyne.
Anyway, without further stalling, here's the change log...
CHANGE LOG
ADDED
- Option screen tab icons. - More resolutions visible in resolution selector (Windows and macOS).
CHANGED
- UI tweaks. - Both players now sleep when sleeping at the campfire. - Changes to numerous object parameters, such as hp, dmg threshold and drops. - Buffed katana "DMG to monsters" parameter. - Initial Bandage invent cost raised a bit. - Increased Lumberjack damage vs trees. - Removed main quest Crown phase where you needed to visit the Collapsed Road to continue. - Changed Crown Station Tomb puzzle to a simpler one. - Slight Tomb Guard damage reduction. - Adjusted the 'Displaced' quest. - Stage sounds are suppressed while playing myth tablets.
FIXED
- Localizations (still some strings waiting for translation). - Audio crash (macOS). - Fixed material magnet and retweaked modifier. - Numerous open world fixes to graphical glitches. - Slight optimisation to open world. - The quest "Displaced" now only rewards xp upon completion. - The main quest now correctly progresses to the "link relay" phase after scanning for relays. - Monsters are able to traverse through opened drawbridges now. - Power attack effects should not appear anymore during normal attacks. - Player can now press the run button down while exiting the camp fire screen. - Fixed saving game for Windows user names with special characters. - Audio system falls back from XAudio2 to DirectSound if early initializations fail. - Fixed a bug that sometimes caused wandering enemies to get stuck on obstacles. - "Archaeological Expedition" quest phase fixes if the player has skipped portions of it by mistake. - Releasing a combined running/dodge button while running and changing weapon at the same time does not start dodge rolling anymore. - Potential fix for a bug where player's falling animation keeps playing forever. - Material slots cannot hold negative amounts anymore.
Up Next
We're working on three DYSMANTLE related things at the moment: 1) fixing stuff, 2) creating new content, and 2) bringing the game to other platforms. We're optimizing our engine for some of the performantionally (it's a word) challenged platforms, and all that will eventually benefit Steam users as well.
All this will keep us busy for at least the rest of 2021, so you can start expecting new stuff in 2022 Q1. We'll likely release more of these minor patches before that though. We're hoping to add Italian localizations before Xmas too.
Hot DYSMANTLING everyone!
🌶️
DYSMANTLE - The Most Relaxing Sit Back Post-Apocalypse!
So, it seems we have this thing called Steam Awards. We actually had some trouble categorizing the game. Here are the categories and our thoughts.
"Game of the Year" was maybe too brave for us. We think DYSMANTLE is great - but is it the best of all throughout the whole year?
"VR Game of the Year" - This wouldn't fly.
"Labor of Love" sounded good - however DYSMANTLE has been out for only a week as a full version and the description mentioned "been out for a while"
"Better With Friends" - well I guess we could have gone with "Better With a Friend Sharing the Same Screen". To be frank, there might be truer multiplayer games out there.
"Outstanding Visual Style" was something we thought for a while - DYSMANTLE has a distinct style and it is well executed. So this was an option. However, then we thought that a lot of games want to be this one and some of them are quite stylish.
"Most Innovative Gameplay" - well, we've played games like Baba Is You so we really couldn't choose this.
"Best Game You Suck At" - that would imply the game maybe has a steep, but rewarding learning curve. We think DYSMANTLE isn't that - it's quite easy to get into and not too stressful.
"Best Soundtrack" - well, we do have some music. But no, some games have a dozen and more good tracks.
"Outstanding Story-Rich Game" - we do have a story and it's quite interesting actually. But then again we thought there are games which actually focus on gripping storytelling so we skipped this.
"Sit Back and Relax"- Hey, you can actually do this with DYSMANTLE, especially if you compare it to other post-apocalyptic starvation-fueled wasteland warrior games. So we have a winner: DYSMANTLE is probably the most relaxing post-apocalyptic survival game!
So, that's our category of choice "Sit Back and Relax" - with the most relaxing post-apocalyptic open world survival game!
And that's our choice - you can obviously choose differently. In any case, have fun in DYSMANTLE!
1.0 Out Now
Today you can play DYSMANTLE as the 1.0 version. The game is now complete with all the planned features, content, localizations so far. So, you can complete the game completely and even continue playing after that. We're so happy to reach this point and we hope you'll enjoy playing DYSMANTLE!
That said, we'll still have more to come, so stay tuned for future updates - and maybe even a few surprises!
But for now, go for launch!
Change List
Localizations
The 1.0 adds localization support for these languages:
English
Simplified Chinese
Russian
German
French
Spanish (Spain)
Japanese
Korean
Turkish
Portuguese (Brazil)
There are also some very minor fixes which you can view in the in-game change log.
Developer Launch Live Stream
Tomorrow is the day - the launch day. To celebrate we'll host a developer launch stream. Two brave DYSMANTLE developers will play the game until exhaustion. Well maybe not exhaustion, let's say that until a suitable ending.
