0.2.21 "The Co-op Update"

0.2.21 "The Co-op Update"
Patch Notes

NEW SOLO / CO-OPERATIVE GAME MODE: STORY MISSIONS
- There is now a new Co-operative Story Mode. You can play it Solo, or with up to 5 other friends. (6 players total.)
- As of this update there will be one mission available, "Wharfage."  As a Company Cleanup Crew, explore a frosty and abandoned Company Shipment Processing facility on the planet Mavi. Assess the damage, and who knows, maybe you'll get to shoot something!
- We are interested in doing a whole slew of continuing story missions in the future.
- In the Story Mode lobby, The Hivemind is an entity responsible for directing the flow of combat. The Hivemind will dynamically change the combat environment to keep you on your toes, or give you a breather when you need it. The Hivemind will also make the enemies more difficult and more numerous if there are more players in the game.
- On top of this difficulty balancing, there are 3 overall difficulty levels the host can choose from by accessing the Match Settings screen. The difficulty levels are as follows:
1) Normal - This is the default way to play the Story Mode, especially if you're mostly in it for the story itself. This mode is mostly recommended for beginners who want to enjoy the environment, story, and have a nice, cozy experience.
2) Hard - This mode is a good bit harder, but any veteran (or particularly bold) FPS players should feel right at home here. It's a tough life, for those who choose it, and for those who like a challenge.
3) Space Madness - For the truly mad. There is no initial safe zone, there is no downtime, and The Hivemind will not let up. Ever. Good luck! Absolutely not recommended on your first playthrough.
- In Story mode, players are assigned a job by The Company. These jobs are Security, Medic, Engineer, Miner, Human Resources, and Janitor. These jobs give each Spaceman different starting items (though always at least a handgun), and later on, this is planned to also give each Spaceman different perks. (Right now there are NO PERKS in Story mode.) If you're playing Story mode by yourself, the Security job will always be selected to give the Spaceman the best fighting chance.
- To Revive allies in Story mode, living Spacemen will need to locate Cloning Tanks and interact with them -- when they are available. Cloning Tanks will not become available if you have already passed them prior to an ally being killed off.
- Health Stations can only be used once in Story mode, afterwhich they go offline and can no longer be used. Plan carefully!
- Health Stations are dynamically activated by The Hivemind (AI director) in Story mode, and will not always be unlocked on a given playthrough.
- You can no longer shove your allies in Co-op or Survival modes.
- In Story mode, there are explosive barrels found in various locations, which can be damaged and will then explode after a brief moment. They apply "co-op explosive" damage, which means Spacemen players will receive far less damage from these explosions than hostile aliens might.
- In Co-op and Survival mode, teammates health can now be seen when close by, even without a health syringe in your hand.
- In Co-op and Survival mode, friendly damage is now reduced to 25% on Normal difficulty, 50% on Hard difficulty, and 75% on Space Madness difficulty. (Survival is always treated as Normal difficulty.)
- In Co-op mode, Shove cooldown is half as long as normal, allowing Spacemen to shove to their hearts' content!
- The "Start a Game" button has been split into "Solo / Co-op" and "PvP" to better illustrate the available modes of play at a glance. (Shapeshifter is found under PvP, Survival and Story mode are found under Solo / Co-op.)


GENERAL IMPROVEMENTS:
- Christmas is now automatically supported in the game. All Christmas related props will be active for the entire month of December, every year.
- New first person Shotgun walking animation.
- The clock countdown noise no longer play in the background after the game has ended.
- The Shuttle scan sequence will no longer progress in the background after the game has ended.
- There is now a first-person muzzle flash light when firing weapons, which will now illuminate dark areas when you fire most weapons.
- All instances where the player's camera is controlled (turning to face shover when shoved, turning to face parasite when it jumps on you, turning to face Health Station when activated, etc.) now interpolate over time instead of being instant, to better help the player understand which direction they turned and to cause far less confusion when these events occur.
- To better help players understand what's going on at any given time, some emotes are now accompanied by context-sensitive text chat. For example, Greetings emote will now say "Hello!" or if you're looking at someone, "Hello, Blue!" Heal emote will be accompanied by "I need to heal." or if you're low on health, "NEED TO HEAL NOW!" Suspicious emote will now be accompanied by "I'm suspicious..." or if you're looking at someone, "I'm suspicious of Blue..." And other emotes have other text messages accompanying them. Have fun (and beware) of this addition to emotes!
- The Spaceman Customization menu now has a button that selects between having your Spaceman stand idle or run on the treadmill.
- Improved lighting and visibility in the Customization Menu and Lobby.
- The Spaceman Customization menu has been reorganized slightly in preparation for more customization options.
- Unarmed/Punching now has proper third person animations and some new animations in general.
- There are new first and third person animations for swingin a Stun Baton.
- With the mouse, you can now ALWAYS rotate the camera around the character when directly spectating other players.
- The main menu has received various improvements, now has a Social section, and the larger gray titles are now smaller font and blue, to better fit the theme.
- The Shuttle interior spectator camera now shows the spectator outlines on all Spacemen.
- Physical hit reactions (when a spaceman is shot by a gun) are now way more responsive and can stack, instead of temporarily locking out other hit reactions after the first.
- The 1 and 2 number keys are now bound to switch weapon as well as the default Q key.
- Spacemen can no longer use items, shoot, punch, switch weapons, or interact with things for 0.3 seconds while switching weapons.
- There is now a button prompt on the Spaceman ghost HUD for the F1 player list and SHIFT to view map.
- The Ready button in the lobby now changes to green if you are ready. If all players are ready, the host Start Game button will also turn green.
- Security bots should no longer show up in the Co-op or Survival lobbies.
- When any sound files in the "Dialog" category of sounds is being played, other game audio is now reduced. (Audio Ducking)
- There is now a third-person animation when a Spaceman is using the Health Station.
- The Research Sample has received updated artwork for the egg inside its container.
- Lobby: The camera has been raised to give player's a better view of their Spaceman customization.


MONSTER IMPROVEMENTS:
- Potential fix for Monster sometimes dodging when they did not intend to.
- Monster now has a proper burrow animation.
- Monster burrow dirt particles are now much more obvious and larger.
- Monster Corpse Eating now has first and third person animations.
- There is a new cutscene when the Monster steals the Rescue Shuttle. [KNOWN ISSUE: Camera weirdness during this event. We'll get to it!]
- The Monster's Parasite Egg now has brand new artwork and animations.
- The prompt for eating a corpse has been changed to say "Consume Corpse" instead of "Consume Body"
- The prompt for eating a corpse now warns the Monster that the corpse "smells kinda funny" if the corpse has the Antibodies perk, which will block Monster health regen if eaten.
- Fixed: Burrowed monster items no longer show shadows on the ground, giving away the monster's position. [KNOWN ISSUE: First person weapons no longer cast shadows. We figured this was an okay trade-off in the meantime.]


ITEMS:
- All loot items have a brand appearance when sitting in the world and have a pulsing green glow to better indicate their existence.
- NEW GEAR ITEM: Sentry Turret. This turret will shoot at aliens or any non-human lifeforms. Turrets can shoot roughly 180 degrees in the direction they are placed. While they're not very smart, they pack a big punch if you're an alien who wanders too close to field of fire, delivering a deadly 4-round burst. Sentry Turrets can be destroyed by the usual means and can not be moved once placed, so place them wisely! (3 key by default)
- Shapeshifter Mode: Sentry Turrets spawn up to 2 times per round in this mode.
- Survival Mode: Sentry Turrets will be unlocked from Weapon Canisters up to 3 times in this mode.
- NEW GEAR ITEM: Tripmine. This item is a one-time use deployable. Simply face a wall and press 3 in order to deploy it against a wall, floor, ceiling, or other surface. It will arm after a moment and then detonate if a Monster (in Monster Form) or other alien walks in the path of the beam. They will also detonate when damaged.
- Tripmines come in stacks of 3. This count is displayed by the name of the Tripmine item, on the HUD.
- The Welder now deals a small amount of damage to Spacemen and some other objects, such as Acid Bombs (not recommended.)
- The Assault Rifle, Railgun, and Handgun now have a different tracer effect.
- Fixed: Sometimes when shooting into the sky (or other void) tracers would be sent in a wrong direction.
- Bullet Tracer feedback for Assault Rifle, Handgun, and Sniper Rifle are now clientside and therefore instantly responsive.
- For Spacemen holding a Radio gear item, other active Radios will now show up on the overhead map.
- Items should no longer stretch, grow, or shrink when a character picks them up.
- The Suitcase Nuke item now fits better in the Power Item Canister.
- The Railgun now penetrates and can hit up to 5 targets total, if they are within 30 meters of the last penetrated target. Penetrating rounds deal full damage.
- Weapon HUD reticles are now red when the current weapon is overheated.
- The Health Syringe and Welder now have on-screen hint text for left and right mouse button.
- The generic heat venting sound has been improved and changes some between weapons.
- Flamethrower damage to Spacemen is now 2, down from 4 (per interval of damage from the direct flame.) This is done both to nerf the Flamethrower in Shapeshifter, and make it more useful in Survival and Co-op, without burning all of your mates alive.
- NEW EXPERIMENTAL WEAPON: The LMG. This weapon fires almost twice as fast as the Assault Rifle. It deals very low damage to Spacemen, mid-range damage to aliens, and very high damage to the environment and other non-living targets. The longer the LMG fires, the more accurate it becomes (to a limit.) Art, balance, and sounds are an untextured work in progress and not final whatsoever. This weapon spawns from regular item spawns, up to 1 time per map, in any game mode. Be the first to grab it! Feedback welcome!


PERK CHANGES:
- When a Spaceman activates Chocolate Milk, there is now a drinking animation.
- Having the Action Hero Perk in your first loadout, now, alongside the Action Hero backpack, shows an Assault Rifle in your Spaceman's hand, instead of a handgun.
- The Monster's Patient perk now has the added benefit of refilling your Shapeshifter DISGUISE energy after using a Health Station. This will now theoretically allow a Patient Monster to stay in Human form for the entire round, if they so choose.


OPTIMIZATION:
- The Monster now has proper LOD models resulting in vastly improved performance at a distance.
- The Default Helmet has a new and improved appearance, as well as a vastly lower impact on performance.
- Fixed: The "tapdancing" bug is fixed. Landing sounds can no longer play multiple times in rapid succession.
- Optimized local flashlight performance for improved framerate.
- A bunch of helmets have had their LODs improved to look less blocky in the Lobby and Customization screen. (In other words; some of the worst offending helmets no longer should look blocky up close, while still saving on those sweet, sweet frames.)


SURVIVAL MODE:
- Survival Mode: Crumerian Insect Drones now swarm during rounds. They are minor nuisance and do not count towards the wave count and can persist after the Wave is cleared. Kill them whenever you see them... or at least when you have time.
- Power Weapon Canisters that have unlocked now show on the overhead map in Survival mode.
- NEW SURVIVAL MAP: U.F.O. Fight in the dark and cramped corridors of a U.F.O. blasting through hyperspace! Just watch out for unwanted hitchikers.
- Survival: Improved survival perk icons for Heat Sink, Healthy, and Hustle.


MAP UPDATES:
- Abduction: Fixed issue where Spacemen can sometimes fall through some parts of the UFO when crouching and uncrouching.
- Duress: Added multiple new hallways connecting areas previously blocked off from one another.
-- Station 7 now connects directly to The Lab.
-- Processing Room now connects directly to Station 3.
-- Removed left side of the Cafeteria counter to allow walk-through directly to the Kitchen.
-- Station 1 now connects directly to Station 2.
- Duress: Fixed collision on a ramp near Station 5.
- Spaceburbia: There is now a tombstone by Red's House.
- The Spacemen Tutorial has received major improvements both in terms of feedback and how long it takes to complete things. The Spokesman was told to tone it down a bit, and now talks quite a bit less, and allows you to progress much quicker through your objectives.
- Spacemen Tutorial: Fixed graphical glitch that caused a line across the screen.
- Added additional "Company Training Documentation" panels to the Spaceman tutorial.
- Spaceman Tutorial: Added improved "light on" sound effect in the EME room.
- Echo: The benches throughout the level has received new artwork.
- Space Bar: Received various art improvements throughout.
- Recruitment: If the Monster has Chitin perk they can no longer be eartag tracked on the monitor in the Monitoring Room.
- Recruitment: Fixed graphical glitch that caused a line across the screen.
- Recruitment: Opened up a one-way pathway (dropdown) between the lower area and upper area by Glass Halls. This will allow quicker traversal through the center of the map, especially when oxygen is low.
- Claustrophobia, Outpost: Added some music to the arcade machine
- Claustrophobia, Outpost: Added some additional ambient noises
- Grand Hall: Added some additional ambient noises
- Monster Tutorial: Added some additional ambient noises
- Architects: Added some additional ambient noises