Update 35 - Welcome to the Summer of Versus!

June 27, 2023

Play as the Aliens in Versus Mode

Versus is a life-and-death PVP struggle between the Survivor and Alien teams. The rules are simple, Survivors need to reach the end of each map and the Aliens just have to stop them. After each round, the teams switch sides.

Scoring is based on each Survivor team’s progress through the level. Nothing else matters. Getting a perfect grab or gooping the player running ahead won’t score you any additional points, but it will net you bragging rights.

Take Control of Alien Specials

There are currently five different alien specials in the game, with more in the works.

  • Grabber - The grabber’s primary attack can incapacitate a single player, but doing so leaves them open to attack by the other survivors. The Grabber’s secondary fire is a quick melee swipe.

  • Gooper - The Gooper is a triple-threat, it’s primary attack is a long-range, area denial goo bomb able to slow the entire survivor team. A direct hit on a single Survivor incapacitates that player for additional chaos. But the Gooper’s secondary is it’s secret weapon. Get up close and start the happy dance to spawn multiple goo balls and do massive area damage.

  • Brute - With a massive lunge for its primary attack and a hard-hitting punch as the secondary, the Brute can do massive damage to the Survivors. Press and hold primary attack to see the landing zone, but know that anyone between you and your target will get knocked away.

  • Spawner - The Spawner builds an army of turrets to harass and annoy your enemies. To spawn a group of three turrets, put your crosshair on a Survivor (you don’t need line of sight, you can spawn turrets through walls) and left click. Note: We’ll add a secondary attack to the Spawner in a future update.

  • Flasher - The Flasher is a one-two punch of problems for the Survivors. Its primary attack is a quick punch with a short cooldown. The secondary attack summons nearby common aliens, keeping them from aggroing and attacking nearby Survivors until you release your attack. And the Flasher’s Survivor-blinding light is in full effect in Versus.

  • We’ll have more specials coming soon. We have more specials in the pipeline now, including [redacted], more Gooper variants, and much much more…

Tuned for Different Team Sizes

We’ve tuned Versus to play well with different team sizes, the default public versus games are playing great in 2v2, 3v3, and 4v4 modes. Or you can set up a private game and play however you’d like.

  • If you just want to take time to learn to play the Aliens, load up a private game and turn AI humans and AI Aliens off, set the spawn rate to Instant, and fire it up. (You’ll want to open the console using the ~ key and use the console command wingame on your turn as the Survivors though). We’ll automate this process for Xbox players in an upcoming patch.

  • We’ve included private mode settings for 1v1 as well, but it’s not quite where we’d like it to be yet. If you have ideas for the 1v1 mode, we’d love to hear them in the Discord.

This Is Just the Beginning of the Summer of Versus

This is just the start for The Anacrusis’s Versus mode! We know there’s a lot of work left to do on Versus, but we wanted to get this out as soon as it was fun so we could start collecting feedback from the players. Here’s what we have in the pipeline before the game hits 1.0 status this fall:

  • Team selection

  • Dances and taunts for the Aliens

  • More playable Aliens

  • Scoring changes that will let teams that fall behind early have a chance at mounting a comeback

  • Better communication tools for both teams, including team chat, a team comms wheel, pre- and post-match chat, and more

Join the Discord to share your feedback and check the Roadmap on Trello to find out what’s coming next!

Episode 4 Updates

We’ve been hard at work on Episode 4, integrating changes based on feedback from the changes in Update 32. We’ve completed the art and polish pass on the first two levels of Episode 4, and done a significant redesign on the Episode 4 Finale. Additionally, we’ve optimized performance throughout the episode.

Performance Fixes

This update includes significant performance improvements that should improve perf on all systems, especially those with lower-spec CPUs.

  • Optimized AI system to reduce framerate sag during large hordes

  • Reduced the impact of the Flasher effect, especially during large hordes

  • Steam Deck users should see significant performance improvements as well

Added Mixed Input Controls

We’ve added the ability for PC players to use multiple input types simultaneously in The Anacrusis. For example, you can use the gamepad for movement and a mouse (or mouse-like device, like a controller gyroscope) for aiming simultaneously. Steam Deck, PS4/PS5, and Switch Pro Controller users using the Steam Controller setup menus.

This should work with any input devices that mimic gamepads, mice, keyboards, etc. Please let us know how this works, especially if you have problems with hardware that you’d expect to work but didn’t.

To enable Mixed Input mode, go to the Settings / Gameplay menu, then flip the toggle for Enable Mixed Input in the Accessibilty section. For this release, the glyphs that indicate button presses will behave unpredictably when you’re in mixed input mode, but we’ll address that in a future update.

Bug Fixes

  • Created and fixed a bazillion bugs we discovered while building Versus mode

  • Adjusted the navmesh in most episodes to reduce pathing errors

  • Fixed areas where bots and aliens would get confused in Episode 4

  • Fixed areas where alien common would get stuck in spawns, which created quiet periods where there shouldn’t be quiet periods

  • Fixed some cases where player bots wouldn’t save players from grabs or goops

  • Updated the German localization based on feedback from German players. Danke schön!