Update 4: Aug 5, 2024

In this major update, the biggest element is changing from Unreal Engine 5.3 to 5.4, which broke a few things but brings substantial performance improvements.

Starting with general update notes first:

Gameplay

• Flame Torch starting fuel increased from 120 to 225
  
• Fixed fuel counter to properly show ammo amount for Fire Extinguisher
  

Art

• New Crimson Drive Core & Crimson Core Dock 3d assets & visual updates to the Crimson Drive room
  
• Added more decals and signage to various assets
  
• Fixed buggy “goop splatter” decal from exploding eggs to no longer stretch way up the walls/doorway when eggs explode
  
• Various other small tweaks and improvements
  

Stability & General Bugs

• The lobby has been temporarily disabled, as the 5.4 engine update broke them. For now, host players will load directly into the POD and will see a message prompting them to wait for all other joining players before starting a mission
  
• As a result, players will be sent back to the main menu after ending a mission. We are currently working on a fix for this to bring lobbies back asap
  
• Added missing drop weapon (“Drop Current Tool”) button to key binding list in options
  

Performance

Unreal has been updated from version 5.3 to 5.4, which should bring upwards of 1.5 - 1.8x performance improvements.

With that and the previous video setting tweaks from the last update, we now have some recommended settings changes based on desired performance/your hardware and everyone should be seeing better frame rates across almost all hardware levels.

Notes On Performance & Settings

Screen resolution is the single greatest component to framerate in the game, as a large amount of Lumen costs revolve around it. By default, the game will run in “Windowed Full Screen” mode, which will use your existing desktop resolution.

A 4k screen vs a 1440p screen will literally have upwards of ½ the performance of the lower resolution screen setup. The best way to fix this is with the use of the “3D Resolution” video setting, which is a built in form of upscaling similar to DLSS.

All performance metrics assume the player is Host (Client players will see higher performance than Host players). Numbers are collected by me personally from several playthroughs, so your mileage may vary.

So far testing has shown that performance improvements are even better for lower resolution screens and hardware (eg - we had one tester on a GTX 1060 now hitting consistent 20-35fps on HIGH settings with 50% 3d Resolution, that was previously seeing 5-15fps on LOW settings!)

Max Visuals

All Settings on Epic, 100% 3d Resolution.
This will give you the maximum visual quality, at the lowest framerates.

Expect approximately 20-35fps (~30 median) on an RTX 3080ti GPU @ 4k Resolution.

High Visual Quality

All settings on Epic, except for Reflections and Effects, set to “High.”
70% 3D Resolution.

Expect approximately 33-48 (~42 median) FPS on an RTX 3080ti GPU @ 4k Resolution.

Balanced Visuals & Performance

All settings on Epic, except for Reflections and Effects, set to “High.”
50% 3D Resolution.

Expect approximately 40-55 FPS (~48 median) on an RTX 3080ti GPU @ 4k Resolution.

Performance Priority

All settings on Medium.
70% 3D Resolution.

Expect approximately 45-62 FPS (~53 median) on an RTX 3080ti GPU @ 4k Resolution.

Maximum Performance

All settings on Low. (NOTE: This will disable Lumen lighting ENTIRELY, resulting in a significantly darker visual appearance)
50% 3D Resolution.

Expect approximately 62-80 FPS (~75 median) on an RTX 3080ti GPU @ 4k Resolution.

Upcoming

Upcoming changes will need to continue to focus on some stability and and functionality improvements as we continue to rebuild from a few of the things that Unreal 5.4 broke, as well as continue to improve the overall functionality of the game. After that, then we can get back to the fun stuff -- improving the gameplay!

The next upcoming targets include"

• Getting lobbies back online for a better join/start mission experience
  
• Eliminating more bugs from level generation that occasionally lead to failed hallway generation at level load
  
• Private vs Public server options