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Update notes via Steam News

Dare you enter the Spider Islands? Three new regions unlocked in the latest Major Update!


Ahoy Captains!

We've unlocked three regions for you to explore in our latest Major Update, alongside a load of other cool new stuff.

Check out this video of the latest additions to see them in action:

YouTube™ Video: Abandon Ship: Major Update 05: The Spider Islands

Views: 3,362

Explore three new regions in the latest Major Update for Abandon Ship: - The Spider Islands. Fight off giant arachnids as they drop onto your vessel.

Before we delve into The Spider Islands, some important house-keeping: In order to gain access to the new content, your existing saves will not work in the latest version - Don't worry though, you can get a head-start by using one of the multiple quick-starts, the latter two have the option to customise your ship and crew so you can approximate where you were before.

If you are mid-playthrough on the previous version and wish to continue it, then you may switch over to this older version of the game via the Beta Branches system:

  • Go to your Steam Library

  • Right-click on Abandon Ship and select "Properties"

  • Go to the tab marked "Betas"

  • In the drop-down box, select the one called "0.5.11395 – Shattered Empire Version"

Wait for the game to finish updating, you should see the branch name listed after the game name.
If you’re up-to-date on the Beta Branch (i.e you already have the items listed below) then your saves will be unaffected.

Here's what we've added...

3 New Regions

The regions we’ve unlocked are:

  • Spider Islands

  • Cannibal’s Lurk

  • Peril’s Cauldron

Head south to gain access to them, and they're unlocked once you defeat the Kraken - the second and third Quick-Starts commence with these areas accessible.

Ports are few and far between in these areas, so only enter them with a well-supplied ship with a full crew!

All of the new maps contain a wealth of unique events and islands to discover. We won’t spoil everything, but here are some examples of what you can expect…

Spider Islands

Stemming from Mother’s Grasp, Arachnids of all shapes and sizes have gradually spread out, taking over the entire region. Tales of treasure and the availability of rich silk draw people to the region, despite the danger it poses.

Blanket web permeates the skies, obscuring visibility, while thick strands connect the islands together.

If you’re forced into combat in this region, the disturbance draws the attention of the larger spiders. These periodically drop down onto both ships and attack. While individually weak, they can overwhelm weakened stragglers and the red spiders explode into a pool of acid, so be sure to stay on top of any infestations.

The strong winds of the Wild Sea, and poisonous gasses of the Forsaken Sea stop the spiders from expanding beyond their region. The Silk Keys had none of this protection however, and it fell to Aldous Spiderbane to stop their encroachment, pushing them back to near extinction. Unfortunately he was unable to complete his task, and in the years since the spiders reclaimed the territory they lost. You can visit Aldous and undertake a special quest for him in the Silk Keys, which lie in the Shattered Empire region.


-- Visit the Silk Keys to find out about the statue we teased in the last Major Update --

We’ve added a handful of new weapons in this update, none are available in ports and can only be obtained by completing quests. If you want to get your hands on the Spider Egg Launcher, you’ll have to go looking for it somewhere in the region.

Also, beware of strange vessels with spider iconography that can be found in the area. The crew only utter the words “Mother knows best” and are seemingly ignored by the arachnids.

Cannibal’s Lurk

The second of our new regions has a different kind of infestation: Cannibals.

These natives wear imposing masks designed to intimidate their prey, and will paddle out to battling ships, boarding both at the start of combat. If you can dispatch them quickly, you may gain some advantage over an enemy still distracted by them.

While it’s easy to assume the locals are savages, the settlers drawn to the region are not blameless, drawn by misguided rumours of cities of gold. One event in the bottom of the area sees you responsible for determining the fate of both factions.

In this region you’ll once again team up with Sigismund, the explorer you encountered in the Howling Seas. He’ll reveal what was at the centre of the imposing mass of Ice before joining him on another one of his adventures.

Peril’s Cauldron

Our third region contains a broad selection of maps to explore.

Head to the Sea of Serpents and explore the Writhing Atoll. Strange people who live in harmony with the snakes patrol the area in custom vessels. They are capricious, just as likely to attack unprovoked as provide you with a gift.

It is in this region that you have a chance to gain the Snake Venom Gun.

One of the other maps in the region may contain an island familiar to those who have braved the Haunted Seas. It is here that you’ll obtain the Ghost Mortar:

This weapon was previously only found on Ghost Ships. Now, should you complete the associated quest you can unlock it and use it against your foes.

There is of course a whole lot more to discover in these regions, and if you want to discuss what you’ve found, how you resolved some of these quests, need help finding everything, jump on the forums or our Discord.

Ship Visual Blueprints

The community have often asked if they’ll ever have the chance to take control of the cool-looking ships available to the other factions, and now you can!

The Visual Blueprints system is available from the Ship Management menu in the Journal, and once you’ve acquired a Blueprint you can swap over to it as long as you own the same class vessel.

You have to earn the Blueprint however, and you can only do so by capturing it intact. Your blueprints are not tied to a save game, so once you’ve unlocked a blueprint you’ve unlocked it in any of your games.

We intend to add many more Ship variants for each class before full release, and in this update we’ve added two more to find (we’ve given hints on where to find them in the region descriptions above)

Ship Weapon Layouts

Accompanying the Visual Blueprints is another ship-based system, and this one allows you to select a different weapon layout.

By choosing a Strike, Bombard or Heavy Bombard you can choose to forgo your cannon batteries and replace them with more Swivel Guns or Mortars. The Heavy Bombard can gain even more Mortars by losing the Swivel Guns on the ship.

This opens up a wealth of new customisation options with your ship and weapons, and there can be some potent combinations. It takes a while (and sufficient booty) to find everything you want, but it’s fun trying different setups and testing their effectiveness.

Of course, anything you can do, the enemy can do too – so be prepared to be on the receiving end to some of these deadly combo’s.

You can swap Weapon Layouts at any time in the Ship Management section of the Journal.

AI Ramming and Boarding

The AI will now ram and board you. Some ships will be more aggressive in this than others, but even defensive-minded ships may decide a quick “ram-and-run” may be an efficient way to stop you once you chase them down.

This, combined with the Weapon Layout changes mean that existing players should be on their toes when engaging in combat, as there are many new ways the AI can hurt you.

Anti-Ram Upgrade

To help you keep ramming AI ships at bay, we’ve created the Anti-Ram.

This one-shot-per-battle-per-side upgrade can be equipped into the side-slot on your ship (the same space Gargoyles and Harpoons go) and, once an enemy attempts a ram on you, the button will light up. Pressing this in time will fire out the Anti-Ram, which is stuffed with explosives. Upon impact, it will halt the ramming vessel, inflicting damage on it. This will allow you to either move out of range, or attempt a counter-ram.

We’re also conscious that ramming is something some players do frequently, and wanted to give the AI something to counter that with. If they have it of course, but it’ll give Rammer-Spammers pause before going in for the kill :)

Coastal Defences

Coastal Defences are like Sea Forts, but are land-based. You’ll find these scattered throughout the world, and they’ll open fire on you if you’re at Wanted Level 1 or above. If you engage in battle in range of a hostile Coastal Defence, it’ll bombard you in combat, too.

We plan on doing a lot more with Coastal Defences in a future update, so consider this their opening salvo.

Surrender

Sometimes in battle the AI may now plead for mercy, which you may choose to accept, or fight to the bitter end. Likewise, if you’re at deaths door, the AI may offer clemency if you’re prepared to give up some of your hard earned loot.

Massive Optimisations

We’ve done a huge amount of work optimising the game, so those players with Integrated graphics can now run the game much faster with the correct settings.

If you previously weren’t experiencing high enough framerates, we advise checking them again. You can switch via the in-game settings menu and see the difference, so it’s simple to achieve the right visual quality and framerate sweet-spot.

If you’d been running the game on Low quality previously, you may wish to see how the game runs on Medium settings with this update.

On our test machine with an Intel HD630, combat (which is the most-intensive part of the game) is running at a steady 30fps at 1920x1080. Lowering the resolution gives a hefty speed boost, too.

Patch Notes

If all that wasn't enough, we've done a load of bug fixes, quality-of-life improvements and polish, too! Head to this post for the full details:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/551860/discussions/9/1642038659010595314/


-- Take on a mission with The Syndicate when you visit the port in No Yonder --

Our last update was huge, and this one is even bigger - we can't wait to show you what we have planned for the next one, too!

If you find any issues, please report them on the forums, and if you like it, let us know by leaving a review :)

Thanks for the support.

The Abandon Ship Crew.

PS - Thanks to all our Beta Branch testers, your feedback was invaluable.

Major Update 05: The Spider Islands (Version Number "Early Access 0.5.12154 ")

We have released a Major Update, called "The Spider Islands".

This pulls together all of the new content and systems we had released in the Beta Branch since our previous Major Update.

Important!

Before we look at the latest changes, some important house-keeping: in order to play the new content, you will need to start a new game. The latter two Quick-Starts have the world unlocked for you to explore, along with port screens to allow you to customise your ship and crew.

If you wish to resume your playthrough from a previous build, then you may switch over to this older version of the game via the Beta Branches system:

  1. Go to your Steam Library

  2. Right-click on Abandon Ship and select "Properties"

  3. Go to the tab marked "Betas"

  4. In the drop-down box, select the one called "0.5.11395 – Shattered Empire Version"

  5. Wait for the game to finish updating, you should see the branch name listed after the game name.

If you’re up-to-date on the Beta Branch (i.e you already have the items listed below) then your saves will be unaffected.

The Spider Islands

You can read a post that describes all of the main new features here:

[

Abandon Ship Announcement    May 29, 2019

Major Update Released: The Spider Islands 

Ahoy Captains! We've unlocked three regions for you to explore in our latest Major Update, alongside a load of other cool new stuff.

](https://steamcommunity.com/games/551860/announcements/detail/1608261029763621814)

This includes the following major changes:* Spider Islands New Region Unlocked

  • Cannibal’s Lurk New Region Unlocked

  • Peril’s Cauldron New Region Unlocked

  • New weapon: Spider Egg Launcher

  • New weapon: Snake Venom Gun

  • New weapon: Ghost Mortar

  • Ship Weapon Layout System

  • Ship Visual Blueprint System

  • Coastal Defences

  • Massive optimisations on systems running on “Medium” and “Low” quality settings.

There have been a lot of other fixes and improvements, and the list below covers everything else:

Loading and Disk Usage Optimisations

  • Improved boot-up time, so the game reaches the main menu faster.

  • Font glyphs are now cached over time at the start of the game to avoid a hang on minimum spec machines when getting to the Prisoner Unlock screen (because the italics font hasn't been built yet).

  • Auto saves no longer occur when entering ports, exiting bridges or entering whirlpools. These were unnecessary given autosaves happen either just before, or the player wouldn't lose any progress. On minimum spec machines, this reduces slight hitches that could occur.

Bugs

  • Fixed the Statue Island Map from being discovered from the start of the game.

  • Resolved an issue if a “wait for port” node was waiting for a sub-graph to complete and the player quits and reloads, which could prevent the quest from completing.

  • Fixed instances where it was possible for icebergs to hit the player ship from the front, even if they were equipped with an icebreaker.

  • Howling Sea gates that led to the Cold Sea were being unbarred too early.

  • Set up casual difficulty to have 2 Golden Shipwrecks in different maps (it used to always put two in one map).

  • Rearranging of ship components in the Journal is no longer allowed in the Sea Arena. This caused a bug where the ship would sail off the screen, and the player had to exit to main menu to fix it.

  • Fixed new move and move-and-interact Ship Exploration commands not occurring when trying to move to the node already being moved to. This fixes instances where clicking on ports and gates would send the ship to those points, but not interact with them.

  • Fixed AI sometimes getting stuck trying to heal at a sickbay table.

  • Paused monologue that plays when you defeat the Kraken, stopping instances whereby the weather could be heard behind the monologue.

  • Kraken Grab Stab tentacles no longer flinch, stopping the unsightly clipping when using a mortar on the Kraken as it is going under the ship for a Hull Grab.

  • The disable wait ambush modifier could break, meaning that you could be ambushed while waiting in instances where you shouldn’t be ambushed.

Miscellaneous Polish and Improvements

  • World Map now has icons to show if the port is discounted or unavailable.

  • Fog and Poison Fog icons will now appear on the world map.

  • Disabled ambush while waiting in the Ice Sheet, Kraken Sea and Devourer maps.

  • The guarding ships in the Plague Map were using the Ghost icon, they now have their own icon.

  • Added Cave Islands to all other biomes.

  • If a Trade Route's port is disabled (fire, cult controlled) the trade route is now "disabled" and goes black.

  • "Level up" floating message now appears above the overhead crew icon. Previously it only appeared in the crew icons in the bottom-left.

  • Keyboard shortcuts are now shown on relevant tooltips.

  • Added a Discard box in the Ship Management screen.

  • Added bespoke audio for the recent ship sinking variations.

  • Tweaked the name placement on the original unique islands to make them more aesthetically pleasing.

  • Added an "Are you sure?" prompt if you're buying a new ship and have left stuff behind on the old one (some players mentioned they forgot, then lost all their stuff).

  • Player Crew no longer cheer when the enemy flees.

  • When completing the Active Quest, another Quest is now made Active.

  • Whirlpools are no longer interactable if they have no destination (players would attempt to enter the whirlpool in the Duskvale map).

  • Added Ghost controlled exploration Sea Fort tooltip.

  • Changing scene now instantly closes the Action Tutorial UI if currently open and completed.

  • Can now swap crew icon order in the Journal.

  • Entering port at night made the ship appear too dark in the port menus, so have added a Light to the Render Player Ship prefab, that only gets switched on in specific instances.

  • All Character commands now display an Order Confirmation UI - this gives better feedback when giving your crew orders, as there were instances where you would click and not receive any UI confirmation.

  • Character mouse cursor boarding icons implemented, helping to reinforce when you can board and when you can’t.

  • Implemented "Character Gained" popup UI that appears above the crew discs in the bottom-left.

  • Characters can now be given an attack command against surprise or torpedo dive Boarding characters. This means you can click on boarding Haliphron and Cannibals when they're climbing over the ship rail.

  • Keyboard shortcut: Left-Right arrow keys now select crew

  • Kraken Battle Tutorial - helm is now circled if not manned during Flee Kraken Tutorial

  • Added latest Newsletter names. Removed those people who have either unsubscribed, or the emails have had a hard bounce.

Balancing

  • Tidal Waves now remove Acid.

  • Haliphron no longer take damage from Acid.

  • Swivel Guns can now be used against the kraken.

  • Weapon price balancing: Made the Suppression Gun slightly cheaper, others more expensive (Web Snare, Tackler, Spider Egg Launcher, Sniper, Ship Smasher, Hull Destroyer, Lightning Gun, Hull Crack & Fire Clusterbombs, Barshot, Berserk Dart & Acid Bomb)

  • Upgrade price balancing - Heavy Spikes and Armour are more expensive, as is the Automatic Water Pumps. Diving Bell and Flaming Gargoyles are cheaper.

  • Weapon Damage Balancing: Acid Bomb causes marginally less damage. Berserk Dart and Web Snare don't last as long. Suppression gun now lasts slightly longer.

  • As we tutorialise coastal defences in the opening map, there is now a hull repair flotsam placed along the route to the bottom gate, to offset any damage from the coastal defence that might have been incurred.

  • Adjusted minor difficulty so that no matter what level you are and which ship class you have, you'll always have a chance of getting the smallest ships. Otherwise if the player had a Man O War, they could only get something as small as a Brig. This means there should be a chance of getting a smaller ship to easily trash.

  • Ships are now generated with absolute values, thus minimising instances where suddenly higher enemy vessels appeared in very specific circumstances. This could happen if the player leapt up a large amount of ship classes just before they changed map, such as having a Brig but saving up enough money to go straight to the Man O War.

  • Adjusted Castaway quest so there is a lower chance of negative morale outcomes occurring.

  • Removed a map from Region 12 so the area flows better.

  • Some of the "Fleeing Before Battle" events had outcomes that described a "smaller" ship, the other a "larger" one. These outcomes will no longer trigger it the player has the Cutter or Man O War respectively.

We’re making fantastic progress with only four regions left to unlock. Our journey through Early Access has at least one other Major Update before we move to version 1.0, and you can read about what we’re planning here:

Latest Dev-Team Focus

For the longer term plans, visit this sub-forum:

Early Access Roadmaps

Thank-you for your support and feedback, it is greatly appreciated. If you haven’t tagged the game or left a review, please do so – it helps us massively.

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