Closed Alpha 0.9 Update

Written By Nikolas Zorko

Hey Survivors,

Today our Closed Alpha Update 0.9 goes out to our backers. This update hits a few big milestones for the development of Dead Matter, and you can learn more about them by reading our previous blog. Today’s monthly blog will go over the changelog for 0.9.


As of 11:30 AM (MST) on August 29th, 2022, Closed Alpha Update 0.9 will be available for all Closed Alpha backers. Please ensure you have deselected any branches in the betas menu and allow Steam to update the game.

Before You Test 0.9

Before we get into the changelog, we want to stress several points that will make your testing more effective.

One

First off, we want to encourage you to use our crash reporter. Every time Dead Matter crashes, a crash reporter will automatically pop up after the game closes, please submit the crash report.This information is essential to our programmers. Furthermore, you should fill out the crash description with as much detail as possible. By filling out the crash description, you make our programmers very happy.

Two

WIP UI For Closed Alpha 0.9

WIP UI For Closed Alpha 0.9

If you have any feedback, please use the in-game Submit Feedback button for feedback and bug reports. You can find this button by pressing escape while in-game and clicking the “Submit Feedback '' button. Please fill out the form that pops up and click the Include Feedback box to automatically share a screenshot with the team. Then press OK to send your feedback directly to our team. This bug reporter is the best method for getting your feedback, and we prefer it here over any other bug report location.


Three

For this update, there will be temporary QI-Games-run multiplayer servers around the launch of 0.9. These servers are labelled QI Community #01-03 0.9. Additional servers will be community-run and managed. The QI Games multiplayer server will only be available for a limited time after the release of 0.9. We have created an updated set of instructions for server setup, which will be available here and in our Discord server on the #serversetup channel.


Four

For this update, we recommend that every player use the high preset regardless of your hardware configuration. We are in the midst of optimising our other preset options and therefore there will be significant visual bugs on the lower visual presets. Please ensure you change your game’s settings to high during your playtesting of 0.9.


Five

Lastly, we want to share some of the new control bindings. Please double check your control bindings after you update to 0.9 to make sure that these new controls do not conflict with your current configuration. If they do, please rebind the controls or manually delete your game settings entirely to get the new default controls. Here is the new list of controls:

  • Press L-Shift while aiming down sights to use Focus. Focus counteracts weapon sway but depletes your stamina.

  • Press Z to go into the prone position.

Changelog:

Features and Improvements

Engine Upgrades

  • Implemented “World Partition”

  • Replaced previous lighting system and implemented “Lumen”

  • Transitioned from texture streaming to virtual texture streaming for a majority of assets in the game

Multiplayer

  • When a player logs off or disconnects from a multiplayer server their player stays in-game sleeping for a limited amount of time

  • Moved online subsystem for greater compatibility with future platforms

  • Player stats save after you log off

  • Added a Linux based server

Gameplay

  • Unarmed combat implementation

    • You will need to bind the Free Hands action in your game settings to a key of your choice. Then you will be able to start throwing punches.

  • Added eagle eye perk, which lets you spot items in-game easier

  • Added weapon sway and focus

  • After weeks of physical therapy, your player characters can now go prone.

  • Reworked status effects system; damage can now be applied to limbs and other conditions can be applied to the player character

Locations

Seebe

  • Deployed procedural foliage in Seebe

  • Elk Flats Campground gameplay touch-ups

  • Seebe Dam visual touch-ups

  • Added Rafter Six ranch

  • Added Camp Chief Hector

  • Added Go-Kart/Skate Park/Gas Station

Dead Man’s Flats

  • Deployed procedural foliage in Dead Man’s Flats

  • Landscape, gameplay, and loot touch-ups

  • Dusty’s Gas Station touch-ups

  • Fable Mountain Resort touch-ups

Exshaw

  • Deployed procedural foliage in Exshaw

  • Retouched Community Campground

  • Added Heart Creek Bunker

  • Added Graymont Plant

  • Added Concrete Plant

  • Added Quarry

  • Added Baymag Plant

Other Locations

  • Trans-Canada Highway landscape, gameplay, and loot touch-ups

Items And Inventory

  • Canned food can be opened by smashing, prying, or using a can opener

  • Switched to caret arrows in inventory menus for improved UI experience

  • After a brief sabbatical, the loot reveal system was reimplemented into the game

Art And Animation

  • Retro-Reflective material cleanup

  • Added unarmed combat animations

Audio

  • Move firearm sounds from Unreal audio to Wwise

  • Reimplemented audio for projectile weapons, melee weapons, containers, footsteps, and ambient sounds

Bug Fixes

  • Fixed animation overlap for the Lee Enfield bolt action rifle

  • Fixed weapons spawning system so they spawn with a full magazine attached 

  • Fixed issue where weapons rendered outside of player’s hands from 3rd person perspective

  • Fixed grid inventory system from incorrectly assuming the size of the player’s free inventory space

  • Fixed issue with items despawning when you left game session

  • SVD sniper rifle missing audio

  • Fixed bug preventing players from rotating items

  • Fixed issue with duplicate shadows of 1st person arms

  • Fixed an issue where players who disconnected and reconnected before their character left the world could lose their inventory or become unable to respawn

  • Fixed issue where perks and occupation are not being applied to the player character

  • Fixed issue where leaning does not move the weapons or viewmodel arms, only the camera

  • Fixed bug causing some inventory sounds from working

  • Fixed bug where inventory would not update properly when equipping or equipping clothing

  • Fixed bug where using the r key for interactions caused players to reload weapons as well

  • Fixed a potential exploit that could allow item duplication

  • Fixed bug where medical items could crash client’s game on multiplayer

  • Fixed bug for emission materials on billboards

  • Fixed bug where audio plays duplicates when opening containers

  • Fixed bug where character items disappeared when reloading into a server

Known Issues:

  • The auto-run feature is referenced in keybindings but not yet available in this release

  • You may experience missing or problems with textures on low and medium settings, therefore we recommend that you playtest on the high settings preset only.

  • Various audio placeholders that may or may not sound like a bouncing basketball

Conclusion:

Happy testing, everyone!

We will be paying close attention to bug reports and crashes this week, so get your bug reports sent in as soon as possible. We will be monitoring our server for game-blocking bugs. You can expect a hotfix to address any serious problems we encounter.

Thank you for participating in or following our Closed Alpha. Your feedback helps us more than you could ever imagine.

Alright, have some fun in Dead Matter this week.

Cheers,

Anton

Oh, we will be back at the end of September with another development update to give you a peak into 0.10.



Nikolas Zorko
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September Development Update
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0.9 Closed Alpha Update Announcement