0.4.14.0 has landed. This update is hot off the press with a new HUD design, extra building options and a brand new wetness and mud simulation system. Older systems have received some love as well, such as the foliage system, which no longer suffers from a performance hit while harvesting. We’ve tackled as many bug fixes and feature requests as we can for this update - so grab a warm beverage and take a look at what’s new below.


Developer Comment:
It would be advisable to start a fresh game as some mechanics, craftables and items may be bugged or not be available if using out of date game save files.

UI Update

As part of the new UI overhaul, this update features a redesign of the HUD and several other important UI elements. The new HUD is designed to provide a more streamlined user experience as well as a significant performance improvement over its predecessor.

• Buffs and debuffs are now displayed in there own list making it easier to see what is active
• New notification system with updated visuals
• New debuff displayed for being overburdened / encumbered
• Added kill notifications to all kills
• Added new vital icons on the player HUD for hygiene, sickness, temperature, noise, visibility and carry weight. Tweaks to data will be made over the next few updates.
• HUD status effect icon rework to show important effects that may be influencing the character.
• The weapon HUD is now in the bottom right and has been simplified.
• Vehicle HUD has been updated. The display has been simplified, not showing speed anymore, only fuel and damage.
• Updated respawn system for player. Players can now choose the location of their respawn.
• Updated visuals for respawn screen with new visuals for UI currently being worked on.
• Updated visuals for set spawn point popup on world beds with new visuals for UI currently being worked on.
• Death screen now shows respawn locations which are on cooldown and how long until they become active.

Runtime Vertex Updating (Wet and Muddy Effects)

• Added runtime character vertex painting. This system will visibly show when a character gets wet from a water source or muddy from wet mud. Characters can wash mud off and dry near a fire.
• Players will automatically dry over time but this will take a lot longer compared with standing at a fire.
• Being wet now affects body temperature. The more wet you are the colder the character will get.
• Added wetness de-buff that affects player body temperature if over 30% of the body is wet.
• Added mud slick location, a muddy path that crosses a river near the Slaughtered Lamb.
• Added wet mud deformation system that we will also use on snow in future.

Building System

• Added new metal and stone building parts which can be set from a new menu inside the building part radial menu
• If a building part is not built, its material type can be set in advance on the frame.
• You can upgrade the building material of a part which is already built for a cost.
• Garage doors now open and close together. No need to open and close each door.
• Tidied wall interaction menu. Several wall options are now contained within a 'Wall Properties' sub-menu.
• Some building part menu icons have been updated.
• Updated wooded rope railing building part meshes
• Updated building support column meshes
• Player buildings can now have two additional layers of height.
• The building system will remember which building material type you placed last and will apply this building material to all building parts upgraded thereafter.
• Updated building system placement. Players can now put down rooms without having to have an adjacent room. Placement now aligns to a grid while in the building zone.

Optimisations

• New harvesting system which eliminates spikes when harvesting foliage.
• Disabled mesh distance fields to try and reduce tile loading lag
• Modified tile LODs to try and eradicate lag when loading tiles in and out
• Optimised spawn camp campfires which caused additional costs on the GPU.
• Removal of legacy assets still being referenced in the packaged version of the game.
• Memory improvement for spawning and changing building support columns
• Various improvements to building part resource handling
• Improved calculations responsible for player body temperature affecting CPU performance
• Minor performance improvement for building resources display
• Rebuilt the streaming distances on world tiles to reduce lag stuttering
• Rebuilt outdated landscape LODs
• Reduced some of the operations involved in determining what interactable object the player is looking at
• Improved shadow properties on a type of grass.

Added

• Burned NPCs now visually change to show that their are burned out
• NPCs on fire who strike a target (including the player) with a melee attack will now set their target on fire for one second.
• NPCs can no longer be looted if burned out
• Added heavy armour helmet that has a chance of appearing in supply drops and red and black class weapon safes.
• ‘Locksley "Archery" volume four magazine’ has been added that will unlock the compound bow (which is now locked by default). This bow can be crafted at a workbench.
• Added recipe blueprint "Boating for Numpties" enabling the player to craft boat oars. Expect at least two more volumes of this book in the future.
• Added new security cards for locked safes. They can be sold not purchased.
• Added new Inflatable Decoy which can temporarily confuse infected. Pops when destroyed, briefly knocking infected back. Inflatable decoy can be found in domestic loot containers and in houses around the world. They can be sold and purchased by traders.
• Added new blood decals which spawn from projectile impacts with NPCs.
• Added pools of blood which will now collect under dead NPCs
• Added Recurve bow, which is crafted at the workbench and unlocked with ‘Archery "Locksley" Issue 5’ magazine.
• Added resource "Low Form Carbon Fiber" as a resource and crafting recipe.
• Added wet mud footstep effects and sounds.
• Added new effects on player footsteps instead of just always having dust effects.
• Added new Marauder Heights location, with more development of the area to come.
• Added new WIP locations around Nadir Peeks Mountain.
• Added new radio telescope array location.
• Added commercial airline crash site, more to come around the area.
• Added new collection of crafting blueprint magazines "Hunting and Adventurer". Issue #1 unlocks the tanning rack.
• Added chance of blueprint magazines being available at traders data tables in world loot.
• New road blockades from downed trees and debris.

Updated

• Updated road behind Tammerlane, Hanouten and Swanfield Supermarket.
• Camera repositioned to be more central as the camera zooms out
• Updated the visuals of houses around Hanouten.
• Campfire grills can now take one lean meat. Hobo Stoves can now take two lean meat
• Boat Oars can now be crafted at a workbench when unlocked
• If a trader will not purchase any more of an item, it will say NONE.
• All weapon safes found around the world now have a puzzle attached (find the numbers) and will auto generate loot depending on safe level.
• Weapon safe puzzles are now split up into five categories each containing high quality loot depending on the category: basic, yellow, green, red and black.
All weapon safes apart from "Basic" will require a security key as well as an eight digit code to open.
• Improved collision on security card assets making them easier to interact with.
• Legacy signs added back to the world for towns
• Updates to Marbough with additional areas, increased infected and more security gates.
• Train track road and path crossings are now crossable via wooden ramps.
• Updated missing foliage from safe-zone tutorial area and missing trees.
• Supply drops will now drop weapon blueprint magazines for ammo and archery.
• Holding sprint button before moving now launches player straight in to sprinting
• Sprinting and moving from crouch now exits crouch and launches in to sprinting
• Characters can now sprint as normal in safe zones
• Crouching now exits sprinting and player cannot start sprinting while crouched
• Lighting now updates every frame, but we have allowed player to control this via the settings menu.
• Starter motor now recycles to scrap metal, electronics and mechanical parts.
• Alternator now scraps to scrap metal, mechanical parts and copper wire.
• Foliage no longer blocks the camera
• Crafted leather backpack can now be crafted at a workbench
• Updated location discovery notification having no text
• Trader multi-purchase will now display the amount they will purchase from the amount stack and if none/0 then no display will be available.
• Additional items added to interable toolboxes
• There is now a very short cooldown between throwing grenades and aiming to throw the next grenade.
Holding the aim button will cause the next grenade to be prepared as soon as it becomes available.
• Grenade projectiles now spawn directly in the player's hand, instead of slightly offset in front of the player
• The grenade throw indicator now changes colour to show the player when they are unable to throw
• Thrown projectiles can now rotate as they travel through the air, which looks more visually accurate.
• Thrown projectiles now leave the player's hand in the correct orientation
• The grenade menu can now be closed by pressing the grenade button again
• The grenade menu can now be closed by right-clicking
• The grenade menu now only shows the throwables currently available to you.
• Rebalanced all grenade/throwable ranges in line with new distance calculations
• Animation preparing to throw grenade is now much faster
• Adjusted launching angle for grenades so that the player does not have to keep looking upwards to throw the grenade further
• Updated functionality of radial menu system to include space for more iconography and menu data to update when hovering over items.
• Compound and Recurve bow are available from traders who trade weapons.
• Replace stone bridge at Old Slaughtered Lamb location with a wooden bridge.
• Removed Slaughtered Lamb building.
• Updated roads and cliffs around dam location
• Adjusted torque, RPM and speed of farm truck as a new base for vehicles going forward (still some tweaks to come).
• Removed shore foam from lake water materials
• Swapped out all bush variants with a more performant version that also looks a little better in the world
• Research table menu can now be closed with right-click, in line with other radial menus in the game.
• Research table 'TOGGLE THE RESEARCH STATUS' option now only displays warning text if there is something preventing research from starting.
• Shortcut display has been removed until design has been finalised.
• Replaced wooden bridge near water wheel in Hanouten
• Setup up Bruce and Meiline to buy and sell books.
• Bushes resized slightly around the world.
• Various text improvements in George Paisley's dialogue.
• Slightly increased the range which players can interact with ladders
• New bushes and shrubs on the new foliage system using the camera fade system.
• Essential items such as ID cards will now always spawn on the bodies of NPCs, even when burned out from fire.
• Coffee Machines will no longer allow you to interact with them until the last poured drink is taken. This makes it easier to take the drink.

Fixes

• Fixed traders having the incorrect IDs setup for books causing none of them being able to be sold to a trader apart from bibles.
• Fixed not being able to craft the Monster Hunter face mask.
• Fixed emissive value on racing board time values and text
• Fixed no more than one item of harvested foliage respawning at a time
• Fixed being able to loot and store items in the kart track road/track
• Fixed left/right movement on horses not working
• Fixed NPCs on fire often not showing their flames effect until the moment of their death
• Fixed the window getting cut off on item details panel
• Fixed Marbough spelling updated on map
• Fixed an interaction with horse's troughs to tether the horse if the player has already untethered the horse by mounting it.
• Fixed hole in map near Nadir Farm.
• Fixed burned NPCs respawning with burned material textures
• Fixed animation issue when an infected burns to death while also grappling the player. The grappling sequence now aborts when this happens.
• Fixed sometimes being able to continually add food to a cooking station even though there is not enough space to take more food.
• Fixed adding sausage meat to a grill adding lean meat instead
• Fixed not being able to add lean meat to any cooking station
• Fixed items placed on Hobo Stoves not appearing after loading a saved game.
• Fixed crouching speed not updating when the character is affected by something which should slow them down, such as being overburdened
• Fixed 'The Rare Plants' book appearing in the inventory with the title 'None' and disappearing after saving and loading the game.
• Fixed blueprint fragments disappearing after saving and loading.
• Fixed feathers not disappearing from birds nests when harvested
• Fixed issue where traders will display minus values in the "ALL" display of the trader menu.
• Fixed destroyed house at farm having twice the geometry it should.
• Fixed trader purchase amounts being incorrect.
• Fixed notifications not counting up on when additional items.
• Fixed landscape deformation at Crossbridges
• Fixed issue where under certain circumstances, infected would not have the burned out effect when they should
• Fix for burned out infected being found standing up, but also seemingly dead.
• Fixed floating trees near bear waterfall
• Tentative fix for the on off state of the light in Boathouse not saving.
• Fixed the landscape deformation at the burger bar in Cross Bridges
• Fixed floating light fixture at the train storage
• Fixed position of the second set of safe codes at the Bleaksly farm being positioned through the door
• Fixed recipe notifications showing no title text
• Fixed lockpick fail notification showing no title text
• Fixed rare bug where an NPC's behaviour could lock up after losing access to their combat target
• Fixed issue where the player would move slower when walking left compared with moving right
• Fixed circumstances where projectiles could collide with the player who threw them as the item is being throw
• Fixed ladder at demolition site.
• Fixed shortcuts display hiding when opening the inventory.
• Fixed issue where the grenade radial menu could get stuck while other radial menus, such as the building menu, should be visible.
• Fixed mis-matched icons on building menu on walls
• Fixed incorrect text on player building column options
• Fixed landmark entry for Hanouten shore boat house showing as a blank entry.
• Fixed misplaced trash decal at Valhalla
• Fixed floating water tower at Train storage
• Fixed Recurve Bow not being able to be repaired.
• Fixed collision on steps at dam buildings causing the player to get hooked up on them.
• Fixed using 'Free Build' mode causing resource calculations for building parts to not be correct after turning Free Build off.
• Fixed being able to pick up permanent chemical workbenches in the world on new games.
• Fixed issues with building resources not displaying correctly.
• Fixed building resources not being recorded correctly, causing building parts to appear unbuilt after saving and reloading.
• Fixed placing new building blocks causing parts from adjacent blocks to become unbuilt.
• Fixed Archery 5 Blueprint not being recyclable.
• Fixed being able to research a new blueprint on the research table before taking the last one, which would override the waiting blueprint.
• Fixed flashing research table icon not appearing after saving and loading.
• Fixed issue where parts of player built roofs could have the wrong texture.
• Fixed icon for bug repellant
• Fixed issue where placing new rooms in a building could cause some adjacent parts to lose their resources if those parts had been assigned a building material other than wood.
• Fixed issues where camera would erratically push in and out when standing in a partially built area of a player building.
• Fixed inaccurate vehicle projectile collision.
• Fixed unusual camera movement when walking backwards and pressing shift to sprint.
• Fixed indoor buff activating and deactivating sporadically while still inside a player made structure.
• Tentative fix for indoor buff having a chance of getting stuff on screen.
• Fixed XP notification counting up to thousands and staying on screen.
• Fixed foliage effects spawning when a player moves through a bush or long grass.
• Fixed water effects not spawning.
• Fixed foliage and other natural resources not disappearing when harvested.
• Fixed not being able to loot arrows from dead NPCs if the arrow hits their body after it has already been looted.
• Fixed difficulties with interactable objects not highlighting for interaction even though the player is looking directly at the object.
• Fixed interaction icons on foliage and natural resources often flickering.
• Fixed floating fences around Marburgh gas station
• Fixed helmets disabling flashlights and preventing them from being used
• Fixed swapping flashlights with NVGs equipped allowing flashlights to be used on top of NVGs
• Fixed odd vertex data showing on Sophia game and menu model, Maia Crass and Margret Tilly
• Fixed camera zooming inside the player when approaching the safezone gates in Driftwood mode before talking to Ken.
• Fixed several instances of foliage clipping or floating
• Fixed big floating tree on road to safezone from nearby church
• Tentative fix for players receiving XP from items in player owned storage.
• Fixed Margarete Tilly still having god bless you
• Fixed Neville Roberts and Daisy Simpson having vertex issues