This is a pretty small patch to fix a few crashes and work on translations. It does however have a fix for that annoying issue where you go into a building and open your inventory and your character immediately leaves the building because they've got a task to perform. No more reflexively pressing pause immediately after entering a building!
Here's the full changelist:
Stop characters from exiting a building immediately after you made them enter it (when they have a role)
Added debug tool for translators to print out all the speeches and how they would appear using different combinations of speaker and listener names
Updated Chinese and Korean translations
Fix for exploit where you could tell what's in a building by clicking Enter on it in command mode
Fix for crash when hovering over maps in character creation menu in mods
Various crash fixes
What's this publicbeta thing?
v127 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
New patch in publicbeta (v126) - the "Mining Rights" update
One thing I've been feeling in my playthroughs is there isn't a lot of strategy to the mining system - you generally just plonk down a mine in your base and you've got everything you need. This patch aims to make it more interesting by making the mineral deposits much more scarce and having a lot of them owned by friendly NPC settlements. You have a dialog option to buy (or sometimes acquire by force) rights to use their mines.
There are still patches of mineral deposits in the world outside of NPCs bases, so look out for the rocks with ore in them. You can also use the geological maps to find them. However, the world map and geological map items always felt overpowered to me as well, so I've split them into 4 quadrants - you need to collect 4 maps with different quadrants to see the whole world. (This only applies to the Large map size though btw).
In case it's a bit too scarce now, there are sliders in the world creation screen to make ore more common. Also btw this system only applies to newly started games, old savegames will continue to use their old geological map.
Here's the full changelist:
Made rich mineral deposits much more scarce and often owned by an NPC settlement - added mines to the settlements, and dialogue to negotiate mining rights
Various crafting tweaks - get less wood from trees, less minerals from 'poor' mines, can make arrows from steel as well as flint, iron ore and steel weigh less
Tweaks to the envy formula to make it slightly less likely NPCs will start fighting purely over gifts. Also when you give people gifts they will comment if others are getting jealous.
When feuding, characters will say the things they're angry about
Your community members will warn you as a group of raiders or zombies is approaching
Split world maps and geological maps into 4 quadrants, so you have to collect all 4 to see the whole area (on the Large map size only)
Fix for chef not fetching rabbits from traps if they're far away
Fix for being able to pour stew out of other community's pots without them detecting that you are stealing from them
Fix for characters sometimes getting into a loop of continually exchanging items with each other
Fix for characters sometimes getting into a loop of continually jumping over a tree stump
What's this publicbeta thing?
v126 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
New patch in publicbeta (v124)
This is primarily a quick patch to fix some bugs people have reported, but it also adds one sort-of new feature - the number of fences you can queue up while building has been increased to 32 (it used to be 8). It also makes them passable while under construction, i.e. you can walk through them, so you can't use it as an exploit, which was the original reason the limit was so low.
Ultimately the goal is to be able to queue up different types of buildings, so you could queue up some fencing and a gate and a shack or suchlike in one go and then leave them to it - this is just a stepping stone to that.
Here's the change list:
Fix to make it possible for modders to add bows
Increased maximum number of fences builders can queue up, made props under construction only become obstacles when resources start being used in them
Fix for community buildings being deleted after a dead community is re-occupied, and then that community also dies
Fix for rabbits and zombies saying 'hey!' when you throw a snowball at them
Fix for crash after using a mod with a story that contain the same asset bundle
Updated Chinese translation
EDIT - I've released another quick patch with a few more things, after someone reported a crash. So it's now v125:
Fix for zombies jittering sometimes when a pack of them is attacking you in online multiplayer
Updated Korean translation
Crash fix
What's this publicbeta thing?
v125 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
New patch in publicbeta (v123) - The Jealousy Update
It's patch day! This patch is mainly all about jealousy. You can flirt with more than one person (and they'll get angry with each other), you can dump the person you started a relationship with. When you give gifts to some people, others will wonder why they didn't get any. When you give out green passes among your community members, they'll try and take them from each other. Hopefully it should all help create a bit more drama!
There's also the usual sort of bug fixes and such. I realized there was a pretty major one that stopped you from progressing to the next romance stage with certain personality types, which therefore would have locked off the new endgame stuff for a lot of people - that's fixed.
I've also made it easier to cook human meat - you can just do it over a fire now instead of needing to put it in stew with some vegetables. That should help in the earlier stages when you're often short of food... though of course, most of your community members won't be happy about it!
Here's the full change list:
You can flirt with multiple people at once, and they won't appreciate it
You can now dump people
Giving gifts to a person will often cause resentment among others who haven't gotten any, particularly if they didn't much like that person
Your community members will get angry with you if they haven't gotten a green pass yet, and may steal them from each other
Fix for snowman quest (and others) not failing properly, also explained more how to scoop snow
Drinking game quest ignores any drink policy you might have set
Resume All Roles button on Community Page
Disable bleeding from feuds to make them less deadly
Made F8 debug menus translatable
Made human meat cookable on a spit
Fix for characters sometimes thinking they can't go to a nearby river to get a drink
Fix for role icons not appearing on all icons on character switching bar
Fix for relationships not being possible with some personality types
Fix for out of sync error when trying to trade with someone, if you have a different language set from another co-op player
What's this publicbeta thing?
v123 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
New patch (v122)
I've put another patch out in publicbeta, this one's mostly me updating translations and just catching up with some bug reports that people sent me over the last few months while I was deep in the sandbox progression work:
Updated Korean and Chinese translations
Fix for NPC getting stuck in a loop telling someone to leave their community
Possible fix for gunpowder crafters filling up their inventory with containers of curry etc
Changed default limit of wandering groups on Medium maps to 4 instead of 2
Make it harder to kite looters away from their base and then assassinate them when they are shaking you down
Better handling when a mod or story fails to load a dll
Fix for crash if you kill some fake FEMA teams
Fix for crash if mods have a dependency loop
Rare crash fixes
What's this publicbeta thing?
v122 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
New patch in publicbeta (v120) with performance improvements for online co-op
This week I've been working on optimizations for online co-op. This was a particular problem when you had built up your base and there were a lot of characters around.
To get a bit technical, there were two main problems. Firstly the prediction code for nearby characters was a major bottleneck (which doesn't exist in single player). Secondly the fog of war calculations were causing framerate spikes, because unlike in single-player I was performing them on the main thread (for reasons relating to the need for determinism in multiplayer). In both cases the solution is I've offloaded them to different threads. PCs with 8 cores should benefit most from this, but I would guess most people have at least 4 physical cores, but 8 virtual cores with hyperthreading, so will probably be okay.
Anyway that was the most glaring performance problem, but I am of course aware there are other optimization needs besides this. Multiplayer will still be a little worse than single player, and even in single player it doesn't always run at a solid 60 fps on my reasonably high end PC. So I will come back to this again. (I think the main culprit is the renderer.)
Here's the changelist:
Optimizations, mainly for online co-op when a large number of characters are nearby
Fix for being able to activate Dark Past quest twice for the same person
EDIT - I've released another patch, v121, which mostly just fixes an error message introduced in v120.
What's this publicbeta thing?
v120 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
New patch in publicbeta - Sandbox Mode Long Term Progression!
Yes, it's a patch! For the last few months I've been working on something to try and give Sandbox Mode a better sense of long term progression. I've always felt - and I've seen comments saying the same - that Sandbox Mode starts well (though it can be tough for newbies, but that's a subject for another time) but once you've gotten to the stage of building a base and growing your community it's a bit perfunctory. You're just given a quest to take over the area, and that's it. That's what this update is trying to address.
Instead of just a quest to take over the area, you'll see a quest to get to know the members of your community and "ask them what's up". Asking the right community member (i.e. right age/gender for you, and with a good opinion of you) "what's up?" will trigger a bit of flirty dialog, doing this a few times will lead to some quests and - if you don't give them the brush off - eventually the start of a relationship. Following this thread will lead to bunch of missions that ultimately end in a new way to complete Sandbox Mode. The quests involved have some variation depending on personalities, the time of year, and RNG. Not everyone can be trusted.
In order to test the new stuff I also did a full playthrough, fixing up bugs and various annoyances as I went. That's partly why it took so long. I have to say, having played it through, that I don't think I'm "finished" with Sandbox Mode yet. These new quests give it a structure that was badly needed, but it still needs to be filled in a lot more. Plus there's a lot of Quality of Life improvements still needed, and I'm not happy with all of the gameplay.
Upcoming patches in the near future will be smaller and focused on the above, and shouldn't take nearly as long as this one just did. Later, when I'm working fully on Story Mode, I guess there might be some long patch-droughts. Don't worry though, I've been working on Survivalist since 2009, it might take a while but I'm not about to disappear.
Note that this patch is in the publicbeta branch for now, and probably will be for a long time! Also in order to get any of the above to trigger, you should start a new game in Sandbox Mode, don't use old saves.
What's this publicbeta thing?
v117 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
Here's my changelist (warning, this is a bit more SPOLIER-y than the above):
Rewrote how roaming hordes etc works to be driven by scripts and show which ones are currently active on the map screen
Flirting, starting relationships with people in your community, triggered by asking them What's Up (if they like you enough, and are the right age, gender etc)
If you get into a relationship with someone they will trigger a mission to contact FEMA and try to get a green pass into one of their bases, doing this questline is a new way to complete Sandbox mode
Snowball fights and snowmen (can be part of the flirting questline)
Feeding rabbits (can be part of the flirting questline)
Raiders with pipe bombs
A bunch of combat AI fixes
Some balancing tweaks like making helmets reduce your sight while caps increase it more, being able to craft backpacks, not all zombies dropping loot, making some quests rarer
Being able to pause/resume roles from the community screen
Fix for chefs getting stuck and not cooking stuff sometimes
Allow builders and crafters to go further when looking for resources (since you can limit them by setting a zone)
Fix for pickaxe sounds not being played when mining inside the mine
Forget places marked as inaccessible when setting movement zone or gate policy
Added Hungarian! Updated Japanese and Spanish.
Stop wandering groups from always spawning close to each other on maps with few roads
Fix for error message when trying to play a mod if it depends on a mod that hasn't been downloaded
Fix for miners sometimes getting stuck not going into the mine anymore
Added & and | to speech formulas (for use by translators)
Use new Unity input system for gamepads, in the hopes it fixes a bug where triggers didn't work on some XBox gamepads
Crash fixes
EDIT - released a new patch with some quick fixes (v118):
Insulation display fix
Crash fixes
EDIT - and another one (v119):
Fix for crash when triggering a tripwire after exiting a building
Fix for crash when crouching and needing to get a drink
Moving v115 to the main branch
I'm moving all the most recent work from the publicbeta branch into the main branch! Here's a recap of the major changes which are now in the game for everyone:
When you start a new game, you can view, download and play any of the community-made Stories from the Steam Workshop:
I've split community content into two types: Stories and Mods. Stories are complete playable maps (whether procedurally generated or hand-made), while Mods are smaller bits of add-on content. You can only play one Story at a time, but can select multiple Mods. There have been quite a few useful ones made already!
I've made it possible to create mods that introduce new weapon models, new clothing models, and even new code! I made couple of example mods - the trilby hat and the revolver - with guides here and here explaining how to do that.
I also made a big internal change - Stories or Mods can now be dependent on each other, so you don't have to make a copy of Sandbox to make one small change to it, you can just make it a dependency.
Moving on from mods, I've also added the much-requested Ultrawide Screen Support.
And to fix a common source of confusion I've revamped the Equipment Policy Dialog so you can choose exactly which actions are allowed - for example, if you want people to plant corn but not eat it, you can now do that:
New patch in public beta (v115)
New patch out! This fixes a few things in the last patch, and adds support for Ultrawide screens - if you have anything wider than 16:9 the game should now stretch to fit it instead of showing black bars on the edges. The main menus are still 16:9, but the inventory screens will stretch (which conveniently means you can show more items on-screen at once).
I don't actually have an Ultrawide monitor myself, so although I've tested it by stretching my Unity window I haven't tested it in real world conditions - please let me know if it's not working.
Here's the full change list:
Ultrawide Screen Support
Some fixes for the equipment policy dialog
Fix for dead communities on fixed maps not being taken over by wandering groups - ability to edit community base rect in debug menu
Updated all translations
Make sure props aren't drawn when they're really far away (optimisation)
Crash fixes
EDIT - It was v114 but I borked it so I did another quick patch, it's now v115:
Added difficulty settings on debug menu
Fix for crash when you throw a piece of meat or carrot
It's staying in publicbeta for now - I'm still not moving it to the main branch sadly as some people reported a rare crash when joining online co-op games a few weeks ago and I still haven't tracked it down, do let me know if you get it.
What's this publicbeta thing?
v115 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
New patch in publicbeta (v113)
There's a new patch in publicbeta, the main noticeable change is I've improved the equipment policy dialog so you can choose what people are allowed to use an item for - for example you could say they can plant maize or cook with it but they can't eat it raw:
I wanted to move the previous publicbeta patch to the main branch, but a couple of people reported a crash when joining multiplayer games and after spending some time on it I still haven't been able to track it down, so I've just added some logging and it'll have to stay in publicbeta a bit longer unfortunately. (Please email me at survivalist.game@gmail.com if you do get that crash by the way! :) )
Here's the full changelist:
New options on Equipment Policy Dialog
Allow editing equipment policy by hovering over ingredients in crafting amount dialog
Added listener and thirdperson functions for translations
Error message if you try to use a Mod which has a dependency on a different Story to the one you have selected
Fix for screenshots sometimes not loading in savegames menu");
Crash fixes, logging, and possible fix for corrupt terrain data
What's this publicbeta thing?
v113 will be in the "publicbeta" branch for a while, before pushing it to the main game. If you want to try the latest features as they come out (and help test them!) it's a good idea to start using this branch. But keep in mind:
Because it's the bleeding edge it could be less stable
If you want to be able to play online co-op with someone you'll need to be on the same version as them
If you go back from the "publicbeta" branch to the main branch you may not be able to load savegames created on "publicbeta".
To use publicbeta, just right-click on Survivalist: Invisible Strain in your Steam library and go to Properties, then Betas and in the drop-down select "publicbeta".
