There's a new build on Steam for Windows and Linux! This build includes graphical changes, gameplay changes and some general work on stability.

Forest and Beach Level Updates

There have been changes to the sky and sun/moon light in general, but specifically in the forest and beach areas the lighting and overall visual style has been overhauled.

Reflections

The game now uses screen space reflections throughout, meaning that reflections look much crisper and update in real-time.

Pick-Up Physics Improvements

Previously, when picking up an object, it would be teleported, rather than moved using the physics engine.

This update brings physical simulation to held objects, so they interact with the world and other physics objects in a more robust manner. A side-effect of this is that they feel a little springier when held.

Flushable Toilets

Some (unfortunately not all!) toilets in Estranged are now flushable. This was a requested feature. I'm not kidding!

Other Changes

• Adds -lowendmachine command line switch to force blocking on load (instead of background streaming of levels)
  
• Adds a small loading indicator to the HUD to show when level streaming is happening
  
• Replaces current loading screens with a spinner
  
• Adds a splash screen on startup to replace the splash screen in the menu
  
• Switches to the deferred shading pipeline - this allows more graphical features (like screen space reflections), but will perform worse on lower end hardware
  

As I've been saying for a while, I'm working on the final content for Act II, so updates may slow down while that happens. If you'd like to provide feedback, join the community at https://discord.gg/estranged !

Alan