"Terminal" - it is all about control!

Commanders, report in for your 11th major update briefing! Your technicians & scientists achieved some major breakthroughs with your clone control terminals:

The data interfaces for your clones and equipment underwent a major revision and provide more insights into the default stats and synergetic effects. Advancements in cloning technology reduced the amount of variables you have to consider during battles and in turn you get additional options to enhance your Mercs in battle. A new module even allows you to automate various controls for your Commander clone, remap your inputs, and adjust a few more graphical interfaces.

With this new Terminal, your chances against M.E.G.A. Corp.'s robot horde should be better than ever!

Continue reading for the details, but first:

⚠️ SAVEGAME NOTICE ⚠️

Savegame Reset: OPTIONAL, NO ACTIONS NEEDED

This update primarily adjusts interfaces and underlying systems without any major changes of progression or unlock conditions. You can continue playing with your existing savegame.

If you are updating from a version prior to 0.10, we will display the warning to ask you about resetting your savegame! In this case, a savegame reset is recommended - but not necessary - to see all of the new content that was introduced with 0.10 "Strike Squad".

If you choose to reset your savegame, you will start fresh and a backup of your last savegame is automatically created in your local game folder. You can find a guide on how to restore savegames from older game versions here: How to access & restore savegame backups (Steam Forums)

Now, on to the details of update 0.11.0 "Terminal":

Improved Level-ups & Stat Synergies

Until now, you were only able to upgrade your Commander's stats with regular "in-battle" level-ups.

Now you can also upgrade your Mercs (again) - but attention: these generic level-ups don't replace the Merc Specializations you can choose between stages in your operation!

You still need to collect Skill Points from Supply Drops or Elite enemies, or fight for the Survivor Bonus. The drop rate for Skill Points was slightly increased to help you reach these Elite Skills more confidently over the course of an operation.

The Commander level cap increases from 90 to 150 and the initial XP curve is a bit less steep to help with early battle adjustments. Various level-up upgrades were adjusted to work within the new level cap.

We continue working on the overall balancing and progression and you will likely encounter some edge cases, e.g. when excluding too many upgrades from the rotation.

The underlying system for "base attributes" - Combat, Technology, Tactics, Resilience, Devastation & Luck - changed to a simpler, more transparent system, removing the "class" categories for Mercs & Weapons.. This also shows in the UI, although it is still being worked on and will receive more polishing.

The Base Attributes directly influence a certain set of other stats, sometimes depending on the specific type - especially for weapons. Technology scales the damage output for Beam weapons, but Launchers scale with Devastation which also impacts AoE for all weapons.

Adjusted Traits, Gear, Rooms & Weapons

As part of the squad-building adjustments, most things in the game received some more or less significant changes. Generally it makes sense to check the stat modifiers again to understand how certain things interact now.

Traits & Rooms received the biggest changes. They have a much more notable impact on the Base Attributes and should allow you to try some new Trait combinations to work towards more focused squad-builds, especially when combining certain weapon and damage types.

Gear is also more closely connected to Base Attributes and received some unique properties, similar to Commander Weapons which will get more interesting upgrades in a future update.

Generally, we tried to reduce negative trade-offs in various areas or turn them into something that you can use to your advantage in your squad-build. For example, Mercs & Weapons may now receive a damage bonus depending on either increased or decreased Commander view range.

Balancing & Progression Adjustments

While we are working on a larger balancing pass at the moment for the next update, focusing mainly on enemies and progression, we're already releasing a few adjustments with this update. The difficulty curve and progression grind increased a bit too much with the last update (0.10) and we need to gather more data and insights around the new squad-build system to make better decisions and adjustments.

But the Rooms and Room upgrades should be a bit more affordable now, especially in the beginning. You still need a good amount of Blood Diamonds, but the building component requirements were mostly reduced and some drop rates increased.

Mercs you "rescue" on a mission are now also immediately recruited to your roster. But the Mercs from "recruiting" missions still want their share of Blood Diamonds before they join your outfit.

We started work on the "Complications" during an operation to change them from being flat-out curses to more interesting random events that can be both a boon and a curse for your strategy. This change will go into full effect with an upcoming patch update for 0.11 quite soon.

Input Remapping & New Settings

As we're approaching a v1.0 launch, more convenience features coming to the game. This update brings some additional settings & options, specifically a basic menu to remap your inputs.

Please note that the game still recognizes your primary input device automatically, so you need to use the device to remap the inputs for it. If you want to change inputs, e.g. for the coop-player(s), exit the settings menu and switch to the device you want to configure after you're done with the other one.

Auto-Aim & Auto-Fire Options

Due to popular demand from the community, we finally implemented options to toggle auto-fire and auto-aim in the Settings for all Commander Weapons.

While auto-aim is a simple on/off toggle, auto-aim gives you different aiming options to select from.

Attention: The game is still built and designed around active twin-stick shooting.

These options are turned OFF by default.

Some weapons my not be as effective as others when using auto-fire or auto-aim since they are meant for active use in certain situations and to control your squad. Use these options at your own discretion.

UI & HUD Improvements

Like every major update, 0.11 "Terminal" also comes with multiple audio-visual improvements and better UI & HUD elements. Aside from general refinements and fixes for glitches the most notable change is the introduction of "root nodes" for the upgrade & specialization trees. You can inspect the base stats of any Merc & Weapon both during battle and in the bunker.

The menus for building and upgrading your Rooms and the mission UI have also received some improvements, alongside various ingame VFX.

We are also working on showing a better overview of your Commander, Weapon, and Merc stats during and at the end of an operation. This is still very much WIP, but we're getting there. In addition, we're working on a much nicer look for the bunker, but this is not quite done yet, so stay tuned for a 0.11 patch update soon.

Reminder: Couch Coop

A highlight in update 0.10 "Strike Squad" was the hotseat couch coop mode for up to 4 players!

It's as easy as it can get to enjoy some operations with your friends. Just pick your main input device for the Commander, e.g. your mouse & keyboard, and hand any additional controllers to your friends.

As soon as you start an operator and got your first Merc, any player can just press start to join the action and control any Merc. You, the Commander, still control the action and decide the direction and which objectives to capture. The Mercs are able to move around freely on screen, dash into the enemies, and directly control the twin-stick action with the chosen Merc's weapon.

The game and coop mode are supporting all common controllers. And - drum-roll - you can play even with friends online via Steam Remote Play Together. The best thing: only the host, i.e. the Commander, needs to buy the game.

But we appreciate if you support us by buying or gifting the game to your friends ❤️

We would like to hear more from your experiences with the co-op mode!

All Improvements, Fixes, Adjustments & Details

As always, here's the full list of changes in 0.11:

• Added generic upgrades for all Mercs.

• Increased Commander level cap to 150 and flattened initial XP curve.

• Enabled "exclude" by default with 2 uses at start.

• Removed "classes" and added base attribute upgrades to Rooms.

• Adjusted Traits, Gear, Weapons, Mercs, and Commander stats to work more reliably with derived bonuses from the base attributes.

• Added auto-aim & auto-fire options to Settings.

• Added input remapping to Settings.

• Added options for contrast & brightness and time scaling to Settings.

• Mercs from "rescue" missions unlock immediately and don't require spending BD.

• Removed the camera animations interrupting gameplay when stage rewards and extraction point objectives spawn.

• Added a security prompt to confirm "excluding" upgrades from the rotation.

• Adjusted the "Build Room" menu to work more conveniently.

• Fixed an issue with your Commander Weapon not working after being revived.

• Fixed the UI/HUD toggle option being active in regular builds. You were able to toggle that by accident, especially on controllers.

• Fixed a crash that could happen when multiple "Charger" enemies were dashing at you.

• Fixed stats from Base Attributes not showing up in the upgrade UI.

• Fixed an issue that allowed you to build the same room multiple times.

• Improved the readability of UI on Steam Deck.

• Reduced amount of bloom and noise from post-processing.

• Fixed various enemy modifiers not applying correctly to the enemies.

• Added a better system to handle multiple boss/miniboss HP bars in the HUD.

• Adjusted map selection to a strict left-to-right navigation along the unlock progression.

• Adjusted the layout and visual appearance of the Clone Bay menu.

• Fixed various animations to play more reliably.

• Adjusted UI elements to reduce flickering lines across many resolutions.

• Improved the overall look of the HUD and matched it more closely to the rest of the UI.

• Fixed an issue with the Dash bar not working correctly in HUD.

• Fixed your navigation jumping to the top in the Bunker when returning from a Room.

• Fixed various animations not playing in the radio dialogue popups.

• Fixed an issue with your HP bar not showing certain damage impacts & status effects.

• Added missing icons to skill & upgrade tree nodes.

• Fixed various instances of missing or misleading translations & texts.

• Improved & fixed various camera transitions around objectives & bosses.

• Improved the Objective indicators in HUD and added labels to them.

• Fixed an error with Hail's attack not spinning correctly.

• Hail now prioritizes groups of enemies instead of the Commander with her default attack.

• Improved how enemy projectiles interact with obstacles to provide more cover.

• Improved the performance for building Rooms in the Bunker and showing Skill & Upgrade Trees.

• Increased Speedy Drone miniboss HP to be a more reasonable challenge.

• Increased the HP for Charger miniboss variants to a more reasonable level.

• Fixed the collision for Buttload and Trigger Truck minibosses.

• Improved the visuals and behavior of the Fire Speedy Bros minibosses.

• Improved the visual indicators for various enemy attacks that charge up.

• Fixed an issue with some popup buttons not reacting properly to mouse input.

• Commander takes a small knockback hit when bumping enemies with the Riot Shield.

• Gear procs are now already working at "common" rarity, with improvements at higher rarity levels.

• The Barrage at the end of a stage is easier to evade initially and you get a more reliable warning.

• Fixed an issue with wrong amounts of loot being shown at the end of a stage/operation.

• Adjusted and reduced the modifiers for Maps & Operations.

• Fixed a potential crash when selecting upgrades.

• Fixed a potential issue that could prevent you from starting a run.

• Fixed an issue with tags not showing up correctly in Armory & Depot.

• Fixed an issue with Commander XP not resetting correctly after aborting an operation.

• Fixed the "Veni, Vidi, Captum" achievement so it can be completed again.

• Fixed requirements for "Elite Commander" award & achievement.

• Fixed an issue with your selection cursor going off-center in the Genome Lab and Stage Overview.

• Fixed an issue with Merc weapons not working correctly after certain upgrades.

• Fixed various potential issues with missions not unlocking correctly.

• Fixed the stats containers for Weapons in the Pause Menu not reacting to controller input.

• Input should register correctly and work immediately after the stage intro animation played.

• Input hints at the start of a stage should deactivate when "show hints" is toggled off in Settings.

• PlayStation and Xbox controllers should show the correct icons in UI.

• Removed the sentry enemies from the stage reward Supply Drop.

Known Issues

We listen to your feedback and are currently working on fixes and adjustments for these isees:

• Conduits radio message appears too far in the center of the HUD (hotfix coming).

• The loot economy and progression are not well-balanced at the moment, we are already making progress on that.

• The difficulty ramp between the "tutorial" map and the GLXY Standard Operation (1st "real" map) is quite high and needs adjustment. We're working on a major pass for the enemies & maps.

• Some stats are not showing up as intended in all menus.

• The Commander Stats overview at the end of an operation is not showing after you die.

• The Commander Stats in Clone Bay and during an Operation still shows a few duplicate stats and some weapon & synergy bonus stats are missing.

What's Next?

"Terminal" is major Early Access update #11 for Survivor Mercs.

As we are approaching the v1.0 release, we will release more smaller updates now. So please "Follow" the game to be notified when the news drop. Our plans for these upcoming updates include:

⏩ doubling-down on the new Map & Operations structure to provide even more varied runs, new Objectives, and less randomness while squad-building

⏩ further refinements for UI & HUD to improve action readability and immersion

⏩ deeper gameplay and improved replayability by refining squad-builds & synergies and expanding the number of challenges and procedural generators for the maps & operations

⏩ better performance while improving enemy & Merc AI behavior

⏩ settings for input mapping and other accessibility options. And, of course, we will continue to work on more content along with these features.

Commanders, we are truly grateful for all your feedback and input during Early Access.

Please don't forget that the game is still under development. All your feedback helps us make a better game and iron out some of the remaining rough edges, imbalance, and bugs!

Please, help us grow the community with a positive review and get involved in the development by participating in our community projects, and sharing your feedback, insights, and ideas on our Discord server (or the game's Steam forums).

Let's continue making a great game, together ❤

Lock, load, and loot, Commanders!