Poached : Hunt The Hunter v0.8.7

**The purpose of this update is to address as much testing feedback as possible, as well as improving game stability and A.I. performance. Creating a solid foundation for upcoming new content including new missions, new radio stations and vehicle customization that will be available in v0.8.8

This update includes 70+ crucial game changes, as well as 12 fixes to the controller support features that apply to players using controllers. The game is still optimized for Keyboard/Mouse input but controller support mode is activated whenever a gamepad is connected, and will also serve as the input method for the upcoming console PS/XBOX releases next year.

The game demo has also been updated for this release to reflect the games latest state. More to follow soon. As always, thank you everybody for the continued support, feedback and bug reporting. Happy hunting!**

1. 4 new Steam Achievements to unlock.
2. A brand new mobile home upgrade that can be purchased for your caravan, this gives you all the modern amenities of a real home and costs R130,000. If you have completed the game and want to take your stay on the reserve to the next level, then saving up for this purchase is a great incentive to keep playing. The mobile home can also be customized out the box with different curtains, tiles, fittings, surfaces for free at any time. [Only unlocked after the final campaign mission!]
3. Improved enemy cover finding and flanking capabilities by manually placing best cover spots by hand in every battle as opposed to allowing only a deterministic algorithm. The deterministic algorithm is still used in scenarios that might spawn random battles, but any battles in a specific location now uses finely tuned hand placed cover spots. The current location of all cover hints will need to be tested and fine-tuned over the next few updates with some patch updates to this one but a much more solid foundation is now in place to work with.
4. As a result of previous point, improved cover finder lookup memory - as well as scene loading time.
5. Fixed issue with all "Press Any Key To Continue" scenarios to not function properly with the keyboard if the player Alt+Tabs the game at any point, caused by the Alt key being locked into polling upon game window re-focus.
6. Tutorial tooltips have been enhanced to be more educational. They now provide clear distinctions between hunting and poaching, explain the conditions under which certain animals like zebras and goats can be legally hunted, and emphasize the importance of conservation and following hunting regulations.
7. Optional screen-space reflections & chromatic aberration are now off by default for new installations.
8. Added more grass detail to outskirts of terrain focusing on making the outskirts look a bit more beautiful for vehicle exploration.
9. Improved the on-screen holding position appearance of the shotgun as well as sprinting animation orientation and finger-on-trigger position.
10. Fixed an issue causing insane crazy shadow flickering when the player steps underneath the awning of the shebeen building staring out at the map in certain missions.
11. Introduction scene now has subtitles like the rest of the game, and will also adhere to current subtitle settings.
12. Increased collision timing accuracy of rhino stampedes and ability to destroy your vehicle if angered.
13. Fixed all remaining cactus colliders that were missing from the map, particularly near outskirts.
14. Slight improvements to enemy reaction times and movement procedures as well as animations, particularly when turning corners while running.
15. Ostrich racing waypoints now have animated flags to mark the location instead of only using waypoints.
16. Fixed issue which allowed ostrich racing to be cheated via simply walking to each checkpoint before jumping into the ostrich and officially starting the race. Also fixed some other small ostrich racing minor issues.
17. Increased variety of different eye colors between enemies for slightly increased realism.
18. Added new slot machine minigame to shebeen.
19. Added some new furniture to shebeen and fixed some missing colliders on existing furniture.
20. Added some new décor to shebeen.
21. Improved shebeen lighting slightly.
22. New introduction scene visual look & feel update.
23. Slightly improved sniper rifle weapon rendering material.
24. Slightly improved FAL/FN on-screen alignment appearance, sprint height and left thumb holding position.
25. Fixed a bug that caused the scores leaderboard to not load a second time if you view the scores, exit the leaderboard back to the main menu and then try to view the scores again in a single main menu session.
26. Fixed all missing "Hover" states in main options/graphics/control menus, including all sliders and buttons.
27. Improved the "Hover" state audio when navigating menus to sound less annoying/high pitched/clicky.
28. Fixed an error causing the stock market status to not save in-between dealings if player doesn't always interact with the PC each time they enter the caravan.
29. Made the stock market more profitable overall and also increased the risk factor.
30. Fixed "Hold Any Key To Skip" function for introduction sequence to also include mouse clicks.
31. Removed secret snail entrance to "Noise Complaint" secret level. Level can now only be accessed through certain actions after completing the game.
32. Fixed issue with bakkie still having a 1 sided glass mesh on the inside of the cab after the window glass has been destroyed.
33. Vastly improved the quality of the broken glass shards created by shooting the windows of the vehicle as well as fixed some collision issues relating to the shards which could even cause the vehicle to go flying.
34. Increased the size of the zone responsible for triggering an asynchronous spawning of gazelles to prevent the player from seeing gazelle pop into view prematurely.
35. Reduced the amount of gazelles found in the Delta Zone for increased realism.
36. The insert coin interaction when playing the "Piet Of The Jungle" arcade game now requires an actual payment of 1 coin to play.
37. Fixed issue allowing weapon wheel to be brought up during crafting of items such as tents or campfires.
38. Fixed issues with the pool table found inside the shebeen that could cause balls to disappear randomly sometimes when hitting the edge of the table too hard, and also added internal rules to track the amount of balls sunk with a win condition if the black ball is sunk last after sinking all other balls first.
39. Fixed issue causing a weird unfunctional pause to occur if weapon wheel button is attempted while piloting a drone.
40. Improved the physical appearance of reflection materials in the warehouse interior Mission 6.
41. Improved flashlight lighting balance in Mission 6 warehouse interior.
42. Increased font size of on screen indicator for switching between radio and notepad for clearer visibility.
43. U.I. now has simple onscreen indicator for when flashlight or lantern is equipped.
44. If a player wanders in the dark for a while without equipping any form of light, such as a lantern or flashlight, the game will suggest that the player turn on a light. This suggestion will occur only once per session when the inventory is opened, and only if the player has not already activated a light source. If the player prefers to move in the shadows, the message can be safely ignored.
45. Fixed an issue that caused the camera's Y-axis to adjust unexpectedly upon the player's first movement input. The camera now loads in the correct state initially.
46. Fixed some more weird waypoint issues causing leftover stragglers in Mission 2 to conglomerate around a weird position if not found during the second "Open Field" enemy wave.
47. Game now includes a first-time disclaimer upon first launching, letting players know that their scores will be submitted to the leaderboard, allowing players to opt-out before even starting a new game, with the knowledge they can reactivate the score submission at any time if they change their mind.
48. Improved appearance of weapon wheel pause menu by adding a radial blur behind the wheel when paused.
49. Added a new exit sign to shooting range to make it clearer to players how they may exit the range if they don't wish to exit via the main menu.
50. When selecting characters upon starting a new game, you can now see their stats when you hover over them for a more informed decision.
51. Fixed issue where looting enemies while moving would halt movement input.
52. Fixed an LOD issue with a rock near the shebeen that would cause it to physically rotate its orientation at different distances.
53. Improved vehicle dynamic navmesh obstacle to help prevent animals and enemies from walking into it as frequently.
54. Saved games now remember if the vehicle radio was turned on or off.
55. Radio station audio is now streamed from disk instead of loaded into memory. This allows the voice & audio team to create theoretically infinite amounts of radio stations without affecting performance. Also, games memory consumption overall will be improved slightly.
56. Fixed potential stretching issues in loading screens when using aspect ratios other than 16:9.
57. Daisy seeds can now be purchased from online shopping for camp gardening aesthetic purposes. Each planted seedling takes a 24 "game hour" cycle to grow from seedling to full plant.
58. New modern drones to replace the attack B.I.R.D. scouts in mission 7 & 8 as it's less confusing for the player. The game will still have drones disguised as birds that the player can pilot, but the exploding rewired drones are now more recognizable as drones.
59. Decreased the amount of exploding drones in Mission 8 to lessen potential player frustration. The amount of drones will remain the same as before however if playing on the "Hard" difficulty setting.
60. Pressing spacebar during navigation of the personal computer inside the caravan no longer exits the system. The system can now only be exited by pressing escape or by selecting the on-screen exit button within the system, or using them start/select buttons on gamepad.
61. Fixed some issues with stealth foliage near Mission 1 Wave 1 enemy hideout disappearing at distances of 75 meters.
62. Decreased volume of "Mission Complete" explosion sound. [Potentially heart-attack causing.]
63. Fixed a critical issue that could cause asynchronous detail loading zones in the outskirts of the terrain to double spawn items if the player drives into the zone with a vehicle instead of walking.
64. Fixed scale of elephant in Zone F near the fishing zone to be more realistic.
65. Optimized loading screen memory footprint during gameplay.
66. Fixed small issue that might sometimes cause commands to not be recognized in the online stock market if player exits and re-enters the app using the PC.
67. Fixed issue causing a disembodied enemy conversation loop if the player loads a save game inside the camp during a battle in the Mission 1/Wave 2 poacher encounter.
68. Improved quality of the bed model used inside the caravan for sleeping in-between missions.
69. Fixed a critical edge case issue that would cause certain game triggers to not work properly if atmospheric fog is disabled via the options menu.
70. Improved character #4 arm material.
71. Improved poacher camo beret rendering quality.
72. Experimental feature can now disable head bobbing by using a cheatcode in the main menu. [Available through discord.]
73. Numerous code refactoring operations for best performance as well as project maintenance, and also a few things I don't want to mention for sake of spoilers.

V0.8.7 Controller-Support Update Notes

[These only apply when using a controller, otherwise the game functions as before with the Keyboard/Mouse setup]
74. Controller-support stability improvements.
75. Shops and crafting tables menus can now be exited by pressing "B" instead of only back or select.
76. When using a controller, the pause menu can now be toggled on and off using the menu/start button itself, as well as being able to close the menu with the back button as before.
77. Fixed some issues with buttons not always auto selecting when buying from shop with controller.
78. Changed action terms in the game to be input-device agnostic. I.E. instead of saying "Hold R Mouse for notepad" or "Hold Left Trigger for notepad" a universal language such as "Hold Aim for notepad" will be used. Currently only includes hold labels for swapping weapons, switching notepad & crafting as the majority of actions in the game are performed through minimalistic U.I.
79. Input rebinding for controller now lets players know to press "A" when on an action button to rebind the action.
80. Fixed an issue that caused player control bindings being bound to the playerprefs settings, causing player bindings to be reset every time a major update is made. This also includes a system to migrate previous bindings to the new system to that this update does not lose current bindings.
81. Changed audio-based controller vibration to not be triggered by radio transmissions.
82. Mini arcade game "Piet Of The Jungle" found inside shebeen can now be exited with back/select, or B instead of only being able to exit with the controller menu button.
83. Text in crafting menu and other modal windows now adjusts its content when a controller is connected for more context specific instructions.
84. Fixed issue that could cause the mouse cursor to never appear in the shop menu when a controller is connected.
[b]85. All options menus can now be exited with the "B" button instead of having to navigate all the way down to the back button.

V0.8.8 Future updates to look forward to!

• A new music radio station featuring top S.A. bands.

• A new bakkie garage for customizing your vehicle as well as upgrading its performance.

• More achievements to discover.

• New bonus missions to complete for xp, points, money as well as further achievements.

• Bakkie racing as well as new racing tracks for Ostrich racing.

• Race courses such as bakkie or ostrich racing will soon all have their own separate leaderboards, allowing users across the globe to compete for the best times on each individual race.

• Further improvements to enemy A.I. and cover finding.

• Game fixes, optimizations and much more!

Please report all bugs to the Discord or the Discussions forum on Steam.