Well, we could not of launched at a more awkward time, the lead developer was moving house that weekend, not due back on project for a whole week. So that saw our fortnightly patch get delayed till the following week (7th June 2019).
But unfortunatly, some of the big changes we have been making are still unfinished and we required an extra week to finish making the changes and testing improvements.
So as well as a plethora of improvements and fixes to player cameras and other mechanics, we hope by releasing our 0.2.7.+a patch on Friday 14th June 2019 we should see some great performance improvements and no more motion sickness :P
WHAT HAS BEEN THE FOCUS FOR THIS PATCH?
0.2.7.+ has had a main focus of world performance, seeing where we can make improvements. The first thing we looked at improving was what was causing the most drain, the sky system (day/night cycle) and heavy complex shaders (materials).
With the aim to make improvements on visual style as well as improve the overall performance, we have totally rebuilt our landscape shader from the ground up, to place in everything we have learnt from development over the years at the same time as cutting out all the demanding instruction count and functionality.
Also making huge changes to foliage density and draw count, using grass meshs spairingly and improving textures to assist in the reduction. This hopefully will not make much difference to the look but will improve performance.
As well as a huge overhaul on the landscape shaders, the next big thing to tackle was water shaders. Due to water having high reflection and transparency, it will always be a drain on GPU if you want it to look good. So again, we wanted to look for a solution that would make our water shader look similar if not better at the same time as improving it's effect on the GPU.
We accomplished this with removing screenspace reflections with our own solution. The water interaction has also been improved, by adding in character wading animations, object water ripples and a new improved underwater visual system, with alot more features to come.
Due to the ocean and lakes also being as explorable as the rest of Eden-Nadir, wrecks will start to show up along the shores and in the depths of both oceans and lakes over the coming patches, ready for ou to explore.
The next thing we looked at was how to improve the complexaty of our sky system. The sky system controls an awfull lot of mechanics as well as talking to our season manager, AI systems, weather manager, loot spawners & world harvest manager, controling when things can respawn and so on.
And again due to the nature of skyboxs with layered clouds and so on, we needed a more performance friendly solution. So as we owned an indie licence for Simul's TrueSKY (used by Ark: Survival Eveolved & DayZ) we thought this would be our solution.
As you can see from the image, it looks stunning, but at its current state, does not fully support DirectX 12 and can cause some large performance hits on large landscapes with opacity masks in place (holes in the landscape for basements and caves).
So we have had to stick with our original sky system for now until DX12 support comes in, but our system is now ready just to turn TrueSKY on.
WHATS COMING UP SOON
For more details on whats to come you can always visit our websites road map. But for a quick overview, here is what our focus will be over the next few months:
Performance
AI Version 3.0
Additional protagonists
4 player coop
Exclusive DLC Apparel redemption
THINGS TO REMEMBER BEFORE PURCHASING JOE
As we have stated from day one of our unlisted launch on Steam, JoE is heaverly in development by two developers and a single 3D artists. We know it is very performance demanding and many bugs coming out of the woodwork, please make sure to read the following statement from our Steam store page before your purchase, as always all your support is appreciated.
BEFORE YOU PURCHASE: AN IMPORTANT MESSAGE FROM THE DEV TEAM
In the spirit of our ethos of transparency and integrity we want you to know that our game is at ALPHA stage in EARLY ACCESS and will therefore contain many bugs and have performance issues on low to mid-end machines. We’re really proud of how it plays so far (it’s a lot of fun!) but if your rig DOES NOT meet the RECOMMENDED spec then the game may not perform well and as much as we appreciate your support we would suggest that you wait until later in development before you invest your money. We don’t want you buying something that’s going to disappoint you.
Please also be aware that multiplayer is not yet implemented. This is under development and planned for Q4 2019.
We’re on Early Access on Steam (rather earlier than you may have expected)! In short, don’t panic - nothing has really changed. Development is forging ahead as before but we’ve had to make an adjustment regarding Early Access.
In order to stay in line with Steam’s policies regarding selling the game though our website at the same time as the Steam store, we have entered Early Access in private mode earlier than initially planned.
In terms of development and patches, nothing has changed.
It was our original intention to enter Early Access at the same time as introducing multiplayer to the game. We’ve had to change this now that we have entered Early Access sooner, but will be releasing multiplayer at the same time as originally planned.
Apologies for any initial trouble with the Steam page or download. The issue is sorted now and you can purchase the game from the Steam page.
*MINI-PATCH* Public Alpha v.0.2.6.3a Patch Notes
Public Alpha v.0.2.6.3a - MINI-PATCH
Fixed notifications not stacking properly. Notifications now stack to a maximum of five on screen notifications. New notifications will remove first slot before adding a new one.
Various improvements on notifications system. Works more smoothly and fixed several errors.
Fixed Don’s Hardware shop. Player’s can not enter before the doors are unlocked by quest objective.
Fixed holes in Hanouten safezone wall.
Added new harvestable sticks. Sticks are now scattered around the map. Pick them up to use them in crafting.
Fixed damage volumes on barricade barbed wire from blocking projectiles.
Adjusted position of Mistress truck and surrounding landscape.
Fixed items not spawning in the back of the Mistress truck.
Added loot containers (crates of boxes) in the back of Mistress truck.
Repositioned O2 gauge above warning icons.
Repositioned weapon and radio frequency HUD elements.
Improved visibility of ‘Location Discovery’ notification.
Added building menu keybinding to KBAG (Key Bindings At A Glance).
Added switching fire mode keybinding to KBAG.
Added Temperature display option in game settings menu. Toggle between Fahrenheit and Celsius.
Added vocal audio to birds.
Fixed campfire upgrades not appearing.
Fixed campfire not working properly after placing, destroying and replacing it.
Fixed inventory auto-manage logic to prevent items being lost.
Fixed campfire ignite/extinguish button appearing incorrectly after destroying and rebuilding campfire.
Equipped items no longer contribute to carry weight.
Increased base carry weight from 10KG to 15KG.
Fixed movement animation speed when moving slowly because of being overburdened.
Added death music.
Increased stamina regeneration speed (when walking and stationary).
Fixed picking up ammunition via the Vicinity tool not removing the ammunition box from the world.
*HOTFIX* Public Alpha v.0.2.4.2a
Private Alpha v.0.2.6.2a - HOTFIX
Completed optimisation of Decontamination Zone with LODs and mesh optimisation.
Adjusted loot spawns in safezone towers which were not spawning loot.
Adjusted smoke particle transparency on generators emitting smoke.
Changed body bags in Decon-zone with body piles.
Fixed missing textures on dirt piles in roadworks scenes.
Fixed missing textures on TV Screens in Decon-Zones.
Fixed missing textures on whiteboard in Decon-Zones
Fixed media not displaying on Game Hints.
Added truck with bodies Decon-zone.
Fixed crouching not being affected by movement limitations (i.e. weight, shallow water, etc).
Fixed shallow water not causing player to be affected by other movement limitations.
Fixed inventory camera moving above player’s head when opening inventory while crouched.
Fixed weight of items not being registered.
Fixed temperature spiking at an uncontrollably fast rate after picking up items.
The accompanying Developers Digest will be available this coming Monday 20th May
Player
Added new vital: Temperature. Keep your Temperature within safe limits and take action to correct your temperature if it gets too high or too low.
A high body temperature (above 99F) will cause you lose Hydration at an accelerated rate. A very high temperature will cause you to lose Wellbeing and will eventually kill you.
A low body temperature (below 97F) will cause you to lose Hunger at an accelerated rate. A very low temperature will also cause you to lose Wellbeing and eventually kill you.
Standing or swimming in bodies of water causes temperature to decline. Swimming causes temperature to decay faster than wading in shallow water.
The Campfire is now a source of heat which affects character’s Temperature.
Clothing items now affect Temperature.
World Ambient Temperature is affected by seasons, weather and time of day.
ST-RV watch shows current Body Temperature and Ambient Temperature.
ST-RV watch now displays current date and time.
Added new status warning icons to HUD. Player is now warned by a opaque icon if Temperature being significantly affected and a pulsing “!” if it is entering dangerous levels. Additional icons for broken bones, blood loss, smell, visibility and sound have been added, although functionality will be added for these in a future patch.
Added new player carry weight dynamic. All items have an weight cost. If you become overburdened, you will start moving slower, until eventually you are unable to carry any more and halt movement altogether.
Added new functionality to backpacks and clothes. These items can increase your maximum carry weight.
Redesigned campfire interaction. New design fixes various issues found in the last patch. Adding items to the campfire is now handled in the inventory UI.
Campfire upgrades are now applied within the campfire. You no longer need to carry campfire apparatus with you in your inventory. Click the ‘Upgrade’ button to select which type of upgrade you want to apply at the cost of some basic resources.
New functional campfire upgrades. Choose between the Grill, Spit and Tripod upgrades. Grill will only cook meat. Spit can cook less meat, but also hold a cooking pot. Tripod can only hold a cooking pot. You must have an upgrade to add items to the fire.
New (work in progress) campfire interaction animations.
New Cooking Pot mechanics. Stand or swim in a body of water, select an empty Cooking Pot or Metal Bucket in your inventory, then click on the ‘Fill’ button. This will give you a pot of Dirty Water. Purify the water by placing the pot on to the campfire until it boils and becomes Clean Water.
Added drinkable Cooking Pots and Buckets of clean water. Instantly replenishes hydration to full.
Added button to Campfire UI when interacting to ignite and extinguish it.
Fixed issue where player could be pulled through walls when using the campfire. Character now sits down at the closest point on the campfire.
New Campfire camera position and updated visuals.
Removed legacy campfire upgrades from loot spawns.
Added new notification UI display when objectives are complete.
Fixed Vicinity inventory section not showing after loading a save-game.
Fixed various issues associated with switching camera while in ADS/Over-shoulder view.
Fixed issue where items being added to a full inventory would disappear.
Fixed issue when spending resources from the inventory could result in additional resources being added.
Fixed issue with backpack showing in waist slot on startup.
Removed player depth of field continuously updating depending on players focal point.
Added Experimental feature - Objects near to the camera will blur when player zooms with [RMB] (Right Mouse Button).
User Interface
Updated Quest objective UI display with new design.
Updated Game tip UI display with new design (partially complete).
Story/Quests
Updated how quest system handles allowing player into to buildings and areas depending on your current objective.
Updated how the quest system handles quest items.
Game
Fixed certain loot spawns producing cat boxes.
Created new functionality to check if player has purchased DLC (currently only available for Steam).
Updated save data. Players will need to start a fresh game because information in the save system has been updated.
AI
Fixed circumstance causing headless Wanderers.
Environment
Added four new types of Fern, highly optimised SpeedTree assets.
Added new textures for landscape grass, forest floor and road gravel.
Added five new types of Sugar Maple tree, including saplings.
Added Club Moss Shrubs randomly around the world.
Added new River/pond weed to river beds.
Added new Popup Decontamination / Quarantine Zone along roads. This area is highly compromised by infected but has some enticing rewards if you are willing to take the risk (expect lots of noise and obstacles).
Added new road work locations. These may play an important role in gameplay later on.
Replaced all roads with new damaged road meshes and materials.
Replaced old Scots Pine tree assets with new optimised versions.
Continued adjustments to lighting for shadows, all foliage and sub surfacing setups.
Fixed ‘snakey’ branches on Oak trees.
Fixed the boat like shape in some of the Oak trees.
Optimised 3000+ textures for texture streaming and memory performance.
Added new ‘Vicinity’ section to inventory. Open the inventory [Tab] and loose items near your feet will appear in the Vicinity section. You can drag these items individually in to your inventory or click ‘Take All’.
Added new strafing animations.
Added new animations for turning on the spot.
Added new crouching animations, allowing character to move backwards and crouch at the same time.
Camera no longer moves down with character when bending down to pick up items off the ground.
Improved pickup animation blending.
Add new Stamina vital. Stamina is drained when you do physically demanding activities and recharges when you rest for a moment. Your maximum stamina is controlled by how much energy you have. If you have 50% Energy your maximum stamina cap will be at 50%.
Fixed low energy preventing the character from moving entirely.
Vitals decay is no longer linked to day length. Changing the night-length modifier in ‘Settings’ will no longer change the rate which your vitals will decay.
Slightly reduced base energy decay.
Added new breathing audio affected by your Stamina. You can tell if you are on low
Stamina as your breathing becomes stronger.
Added Stamina statistic to ST-RV watch.
Vitals no longer continue to decay after death.
Fixed maximum vital values resetting properly after death.
Camera now shifts when opening the inventory to place the character in center of viewing area.
Vitals now display while player has their inventory open.
Key-Bindings at A Glance (KBAG) hidden from HUD while the inventory is open.
Adjusted screen position of KBAG.
Fixed Sherif Sen starting to talk to the player after respawning from death even if their radio is muted.
Added new ‘Death Camera’. Regret all your decisions with the updated visuals.
Fixed rare circumstance causing player’s movement to be greatly reduced unexpectedly.
Replaced various movement animations with new female motion capture ones.
Disabled weight display until upcoming fix.
Disabled temperature display until upcoming fix.
Fixed bug causing player to get stuck in the air when reloading and vaulting at the same time.
Building
Added new small buildable storage containers, available from the ‘Manufacturing’ tab in the building menu "B". Items can be safely stored and retrieved later.
Added new large buildable storage containers, available from the ‘Manufacturing’ tab in the building menu "B". Items can be safely stored and retrieved later.
Added new shelvable storage, available from the ‘Manufacturing’ tab in the building menu "B". Items can be safely stored and retrieved later.
Game
Added additional standard information to Mantis bug reports made in-game [F1] to include the version number and save status.
Updated save file. We have made lots of updates to the the save states, so you will be asked start a fresh game to be sure that your game is running properly. Sorry!
Fixed ‘Nettles’ and ‘Radio’ items appearing as a white cat boxes after being dropped.
AI
Fixed occasional bug causing Wanderers to continue facial movements after death.
Fixed occasional bug causing Wanderers to have improper collisions after death.
Environment
Complete lighting overhaul . Reworked to improve atmosphere for different times of day with distinct colourations. Adjustments to specular and ambient depth on world assets. Night time is now significantly darker to emphasise street lighting and the player’s flashlight. Improved night time lighting to simulate moonlight with blue hues. Time of day affects volumetric lighting and fog. Enabled auto exposure to allow camera to adjust to light and dark situations. Overall lighting quality has been improved with the intention of making visuals look less flat without harming performance.
Updated rain visuals.
Added a new crash site area with ambulances and bodies. (These will become world narratives in the future. You will be able to work out what happened and find out more about the island).
Added new police tape with physics. They are affected by the wind and if the player moves through it.
Added new dead grass type.
Added new dynamic housing layouts. Housing interior, exterior, barricades and door arrangements are randomly chosen. Additional variants to be added with each future patch to make each house unique.
Added new breakable windows in to houses. Shoot them to smash the glass.
Added new breakable glass to doors.
Added new random door variants.
Adjust LODs (Level Of Details) on foliage to improve transitions as camera gets closer.
Fixed issue with streetlights and adjust time of day they turn on and off.
Fixed issue with fog not rendering over transparent shaders.
Replaced placeholder tunnel with new model.
Replace grass assets with new realistic assets using subsurface scattering.
Replaced basement houses with new WIP dynamic versions.
Removed ladder from Safezone water tower until asset has been amended.
Adjusted detritus items on Hanouten starting beach.
Fixed collision issues in Hanouten Liquor store.
Audio
Added new sound effect to cars. When raining you can now hear raindrops hitting the vehicle.
Added real-life recording of Colt 1911 ACP .45 Pistol fire SFX. Mixed down for multiple pistols.
Added real-life recording of Winchester fire sound SFX. Mixed down for multiple rifles.
Added real-life recording of Heckler & Koch HK416 fire SFX. Mixed down for multiple rifles.
AVAILABLE IN THE STEAM STORE VERY SOON!
*HOTFIX* Public Alpha v.0.2.4.3a Patch Notes
*HOTFIX* - Version 0.2.4.3a
Adjusted natural Energy degeneration over time to decay over the course of one day.
Heavily reduced Energy cost modifier when doing physically exerting activities (e.g. jogging, sprinting, swimming, etc).
Added new variety of high energy chocolate bars.
Added new energy drink.
Added beer drink.
Energy cost from jogging now separate from walking.
*HOTFIX* Public Alpha v.0.2.4.2a Patch Notes
*HOTFIX* - Version 0.2.4.2a
Player
Fixed consumable items not restoring health.
Fixed certain consumable items from not being removed from the inventory when used.
Fixed notification issue when using consumable items.
Fixed issue when building menu was not correctly displaying required resources.
Fixed weapon and ammunition HUD icon not disappearing when opening the building menu.
Added Wire item to crafting menu. Costs 1 Scrap Metal for 10 Wire.
Player building system now displays actual icons of resources required.
Removed starting resources & equipment.
Game
Disabled physics when harvesting (i.e. cutting down trees) until lag spike issue is fixed.
All resources can be harvested without depleting until lag spike issue is fixed.
Environment
Added new harvestable mushrooms across the landscape.
Adjusted the size of seagulls.
Adjusted the size of (enormous) pigeons.
Added new Pigeon fly zones over "Brook Haven" and "Tilley's Garden Centre".
Restructured and rebalanced Vitals system. Hunger, Hydration and Energy all degenerate faster as you do more vigorous activity such as running and swimming.
Regenation boosts from consumables now stack together.
Removed “You are full” limit when consuming items. You can now keep consuming even after your vitals are full and get the benefit of the regeneration.
If your energy goes to zero, your Hunger and Hydration will start to plummet.
If either your Hydration or Hunger goes to zero, your Energy will plummet and you will start to lose Wellness.
Added Wellness vital. It will degenerate if you do not keep up your other vitals. Your Wellness is your maximum health limit. Low Wellness will also increase the rate that your other vitals decay.
New visuals for Adrenaline Mode. As your Energy gets closer to zero, you will enter Adrenaline mode where your view will start desaturate and get darker at the edges.
Removed camera shake from Adrenaline Mode.
Improved visual effects for Focus Mode.
Focus Mode and Free Look are now separate. Hold [Alt] to look around in Free Look. Then right-click [RMB] to enter Focus Mode which will highlight items.
Weapons
Fixed projectile collision on roadblocks.
Performance improvements for projectiles.
Game
Begun process of baking materials to into grouped 4k resolution to reduce texture streaming memory for performance.
Fixed loot spawns with guns and ammunition not working properly where items would either appear or disappear on the next visit.
AI
Partial fix for navigation issue causing Wanderers not to move until the player aggravates them.
Various minor Wanderer performance optimisations.
Environment
New road visuals implemented.
Added additional trucks outside pharmacy in Hanouten.
Fixed various gaps between roads and landscape.
Adjusted Hanout pharmacy position forward to fix gap between the building and walkway.
Removed dirt decal outside Hanouten pharmacy.
New metal textures added to procedural ladders.
Added new area "Brook Haven". A large new industrial complex outside Hanounten.
Added new abandoned factory monument.
Significantly reduced culling distance of all trees for performance.
Added lilly pads to ponds and lakes.
Added new SUVs.
Added roof racks to SUVs that contain lootable luggage.
Added new boat model which Amy spawns on. This boat will be drivable later in development.
Improved Focus Mode Camera. Camera no longer rotates at a steep angle and resetting the camera when releasing [Alt] is much smoother.
Fixed player camera angle from glitching when moving the camera into a vertical position.
Reimplemented slight offset to camera so that Amy is not always stood directly in front of the camera.
Fixed camera shake continuing to run if character if forced to stop moving due to opening their inventory.
Player’s hair will no longer interfere with the camera when in first person views.
Focus Mode can now be used in first person modes without locking the camera.
Fixed a second scalp of hair appearing at Amy’s feet after using a campfire.
Fixed various issues caused by crouching when moving in or out of water.
Fixed splitting stacks in inventory resulting in item duplication.
Fixed water bottles being gained or lost when auto-managing inventory.
Fixed inventory reacting like [Shift] is held down if inventory is opened while player is running.
Fixed issue where a white box would appear on the HUD when getting on ladders or getting in water with a weapon equipped.
Fixed energy degeneration never happening after energy has reached zero for the first time.
Increased number of Wooden Planks received by crafting them from Logs.
Weapons
Slightly reduced jamming chance for AK.
Weapons now spawn with some compatible ammunition next to them.
Game
Removed nudity and censorship options.
Updated loot spawn tables to improve the way items spawn together.
AI
New visual style for Wanderers. Wanderers now have new bodies and can appear as males or females.
Wanderers now have different body sizes. All Wanderers can now appear with a regular or heavier physique.
Added variety of new Wanderer clothing, including randomised civilian clothes and uniform outfits.
Shooting Wanderers wearing helmets in the head will cause their helmet to fly off before they can be headshot.
Added new running animations for Wanderers.
Significantly increased number of Wanderers which now spawn in Hanouten - be careful out there.
Fixed situation causing Wanderers to spawn in the ground.
Adjusted movement speed for Wanderers to reduce sliding during animations.
Fixed deer occasionally moving without their legs animating.
Building
Fixed building parts only needing one of each required resource to build.
Building bar resource values now update properly when placing building items.
Halved cost of all building parts.
Environment
Fixed missing textures on Hanouten church doors.
Campfires and Sleeping Bags are no longer blocked when trying to build them in towns like building parts are.
Added new "Tilley's Garden Centre" to the world.
Added new derelict industrial buildings location to the world.
Added ST-RV Display (V) keybinding reminder to KBAG (Key Bindings at a Glance).
Loot spawns will now be appropriate for their location. For example, ‘Domestic’ items are can be found in houses, ‘Medical’ items can be found in the Pharmercy, etc.
New minable rock visuals (replacing the dino poop looking ones).
New broken pier / jetties added to lakes and rivers.
New derelict boats added to boat repairs in Hanouten.
Loot spawns added to beach hut roofs (use ladders at back to gain access).
Loots spawns added to top of scaffolding.
Additional optimisations to overall world assets.
Added homemade roadblocks around Hanouten, reducing ease of navigation around town.
