Introduction, Tutorial, and Player Onboarding
Upon release, we heard a lot of feedback about the need to assist new players in understanding the game's mechanics and systems. The original onboarding was not very informative, leading players to face a heap of mechanics without explanations. It's time to fix these mistakes!
We completely reworked the starting sequence and added a narrative mission that provides more context to what's happening in the Solar System. During the tutorial, you can both acquire useful items and explore game mechanics without the threat of encountering tough guys with circular saws. And if you prefer a more challenging start, you can easily skip this mission!
Along with this mission, we are introducing a system of narrative missions similar to a prologue. In the future, with each major update, we will continue to expand this system.
New Mechanics and Improvements to Existing Ones
We've significantly reworked crafting! The interface, a bunch of new recipes, and yes, we've eliminated many exploits. We've also added a new crafting station: a stove for preparing simple food from available materials.
The mechanic of item decay over time has been introduced, primarily affecting raw food products and quasimorphic artifacts. For example, spoiled meat can be processed into antibiotics. So get ready to transform human flesh into pills.
Many old items now have useful properties. For instance, duct tape can now repair weapons and armor by 10 units without losing maximum durability. And you can pour a bottle of water on yourself to extinguish a fire.
A mechanic of puddles has been added, resulting from the destruction of containers with acid and water, as well as the use of a toxic sprayer.
A grenade launcher has been introduced, which can be loaded with any grenades. Do you remember that heart can used as a grenade? In the real world, your heart can be broken, but in Quasimorph, you can break someone's skull with a heart!
Also, we are expanding the set of tools available to you: now mines will be at your disposal!
Finally, we've reworked the mechanic of fire and character burning, aiming to make it fairer and more readable. Combined with the new method of extinguishing yourself with water, you now have a much better chance of surviving encounters with flamethrowers.
Interface Improvements and Quality of Life (QoL)
Let's start with the main one: yes-yes, inventory sorting! And you can also delete items in the inventory of Magnum. But that's not all.
Many interfaces in the space part of the game have been reworked:
- Color codes for stations have been made more understandable.
- It is now possible to change the operative in the mission window without closing the mission window.
- The interface for displaying reputation with corporations has been changed.
In mission mode, some crucial improvements have been made:
- The character will not stop when moving through closed doors.
- Additional damage indication from any source has been added, with the player character flashing, making it easier to notice the presence of a wound or if you are standing in an acid puddle.
- Crafting at the workbench has been redesigned similar to crafting on the ship-base.
- Grenade throwing animation has been redesigned.
Global Parameters and Balance
It was amusing to observe how actively you abused the barter system, produced a massive number of items, exchanged them for faction items, and then discovered that faction strengths had grown to unimaginable values.
We tried to shift the gameplay focus towards mission completion. Now, the most useful items can be obtained more frequently through missions, and bartering will provide more consumables, ammunition, and medical supplies. Additionally, we attempted to cover the most obvious and straightforward corporate barter paths to avoid players endlessly accumulating resources.
Apologies to those who wanted to turn Magnum PMC into a pharmaceutical company specializing in morphine production!
Demon pacts have also been fixed and rebalanced, as some were not working or were functioning incorrectly. The ally summoning should now work correctly, and we've reduced the penalties for using pacts, allowing you to use them more frequently.
Content
And of course:
- Over 20 new items added.
- Active weapon display in hand fixed: now it will be easier to distinguish a flamethrower-wielding enemy from one with a shotgun.
- New armor set added.
- Quasimorphic weapons added (you may have noticed them on the exchange lists before, but now you can use them!)
- Unique rooms added to Moon missions.
- Many old room presets reworked and improved.
- New fully destructible objects added.
