Orderrrrr up! Makeship has graced us this Black Friday with a DOUBLE GLOWY MADNESS MERCH DROP! We've got the absolutely adorable zombie chef Gil Glow-in-the-Dark Plushie, AND duo enamel pin set of yet another adorable Glowy Gil, and Nevada's hottest zombie DJ, Tricky! (who does not glow.)

As always they SHIP WORLDWIDE for one low, flat rate. And if you order RIGHT NOW, you get a sweet little Black Friday discount. Not sure how long that lasts (It's a Makeship event, not ours) so you may wanna jump on quick.

Speaking of jumping on quick, these fellers are only available until DECEMBER 15TH. So, don't delay!


Also, the lads at Turtle Pals Tapes still have a few Vinyl OST box sets left. Just a hair over only THIRTY remain at the time of writing. If you're interested, ACT NOW!

mpn_engi Beta [2.10.e] mpn_engi
[You can access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]

[h3]FIXED[/h3]
Some Creber clone bodies wouldn't despawn when leaving one room for another. Note: if you were experiencing weapons missing when returning from a mission, please let us know in the bug reports if it's still happening after this update. Thanks!
[h3]TWEAKED[/h3]
While holding a ranged weapon, and with the appropriate skill, you can now block bullets with your off-hand melee weapon.
Creber clones will teleport back to you during Contract missions if they end up too far off screen.

mpn_engi Beta [2.10.d] Update mpn_engi
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

FIXED
The Heist stage wouldn't complete if you tried leaving as a Creber clone.
Dead Creber Clones would come back to life when moving between some street areas in Contract missions.
Creber Clones were retiring themselves when you used the train car ladders in Fast Track.
Hirelings were resurrecting between rooms.
Creber clone count indicator wasn't updating between waves.

You folks have been loving those Sanford & Deimos plushies so much that Makeship have chosen to EXTEND the campaign for another WEEK AND A HALF!!! These little chuckleheads are now available for purchase until AUGUST 19TH!

They still ship WORLDWIDE for a low, flat rate, and are made with the same care and quality that Makeship is known for. Don't delay, get yours today!!!

Makeship are back with a hot new plushie drop! But this time, there's not just one, but TWO OF THEM. Who else, of course, but the best-darned two-dude wrecking crew in all of Nevada Sanford and Deimos!!!

They're made of the same high quality stuff that Makeship is known for, and just as well, they're ready to deploy anywhere in the world with flat-rate WORLDWIDE SHIPPING.

To sweeten the deal even further, buying both chuckleheads gets you 10% off the pair of them! Just add them both to your cart, and the discount will automatically apply. But don't Delay! They're only available until AUGUST 9th.



Secure your very own Sanford, Deimos or BOTH today! Just uh... Don't leave Deimos alone with your phone. Whatever he does, we're not responsible.

Coming soon, courtesy of our pals over at Makeship, the official Sanford and Deimos plushies! They'll be available for purchase on July 18th, (Don't worry, we'll send out another reminder,) but in the meantime we've got a giveaway! You could win a set of these adorable scamps ABSOLUTELY FREE! All you have to do is follow Makeship and Project Nexus on Twitter and retweet this Tweet! Giveaway ends July 17th at 2PM EST.

Thanks for helping spread the word, and we'll see you again on launch day!

Beta Patch v1.09.c

mpn_engi Beta [2.09.c] mpn_engi
[You can access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]

[h2]FIXED[/h2]

• Cyber Bandit Brutes (or anyone equipped with a Dissonant Cannon) were no longer using the warning-reticle to aim at you. They'll now use the standard sniper aim reticle to give you time to react.
  
• Certain debris and particle effects (as seen when you defeat the S-3LF Eater, for example), were abruptly despawning rather than fading out or shrinking slowly.
  

• Some particle effects were displaying as black squares on the sides of the Pit Stop stage area.
  
• Typo in the S-3LF Eater clues ("magnitize" -> "magnetized")
  

Happy Monday folks! The release build is now caught up with all beta updates, primarily the following:

[h2]FIXED[/h2]
Nexus Core Drones (during the Murder Time bossfight) weren't properly initializing, causing issues that could make fighting them impossible.
You'll no longer have an empty Tac-Bar sticking to you when completing Arena, before imprinting.
DoT effects now wiped when going to imprint your Arena character.
Further precautions added to Slaughter Time to prevent enemies from ending up in unreachable areas.

[h3]Update v1.08.b[/h3]

[h2]FIXED[/h2]
Weapons with an arc-spread were firing in a straight line, such as the Magiturge De-Rez spellbook.
Random NPCs could brag about defeating the S-3LF Eater if they snuck in the last hit.
Flak Gun description typo.

[h3]v1.08.a[/h3]

(NOTE: We had a little version confusion on the last patch - it read v1.08.c when it should have been 1.07.c. We're now officially in the 1.08's now, though!)

[h2]ADDED:[/h2]

• M.12 "Flak Gun", a flame-spouting shotgun with DoT effect, now available at the Blackmarket!
  

• DoTs somehow got disabled in the last update. They should be back to causing havoc again.
  

[h2]S-3LF Eater Release Patch (v1.07.b)[/h2]

[h2]FIXED[/h2]

• Using the book in the Bandit Shrine will now continue your quest - for those who have already read the book, go back and use it again and you should advance as normal!
  

We're here with update 1.07.a on the public branch, which includes a BUNCH of new content for you!



[h2]FEATURED[/h2]
Legacy of the S-3LF Eater: a new Story Campaign update! Investigate the origins of the Cyber Bandits and their enigmatic creator, Dr. Gonne, while evading the pursuit of a relentless nightmare. Rumor has it that the doctor's laboratory below the Science Tower has recently opened up again...
New Steam Achievements!
Steam Trading Cards for Project Nexus are now available, including craftable badges, profile backgrounds, and emojis.

[h2]ADDED[/h2]
Holographic floor projectors added to the Arena Sleepwalker Tutorial for the VR Buddies to spawn from, and to Murder Time for the Cyber Bandits.
New scythe weapon, and a heckin sweet new haircut available!
Particle effect added when sleeping in the Arena HQ Loft.
Medical Cabinets added to the Story overworld sectors.
Church and Jorge congratulate each other for knocking you down (if they're near each other).

[h2]FIXED[/h2]
Dual wielding two firearms when picking up a two-handed melee weapon would cause you to drop one firearm as well as the melee weapon. Now you'll take the melee weapon and drop the two firearms.
Fixed how the game displays quest objectives in the top left of the screen. Mostly backend changes to streamline and improve it.
Crit kills with fire damage would cause the target to burn to a husk instantly. The game was checking if they had stopped thrashing before ending the effect, but crit'd enemies die instantly and don't thrash, so the burning process got skipped.
A niche bug where de/buffs attached to your Corpus could apply/stack after that corpus was broken. This wouldn't affect existing gameplay, but future updates utilizing corpus would have broken the whole buff system.
Corpus was displayed in backwards order in your profile/inventory screen. You wouldn't normally see this because all current Arena origins use only a single corpus type, but it was painfully visible with custom modder origins.
Poorly repeating textures in the Vampire Shrine and Science Tower Courtyard areas made the floor look bad.
The 12.7x99mm ammo was named incorrectly in the code using an invalid ASCII character, which led to problems for modders.
Enemies firing explosive weapons (such as the N51 Mortar) weren't properly firing at the reticle on the ground.
Asylum Patients would refuse to "wake up" and fight if they spawned in unaware.
Player's squadmates could leave the room in the Story overworld, which made swapping to them impossible.
Since early pre-Alpha days, we've grappled with a Unity glitch where some weapons would knock over physics objects across the screen (often with EXTREME force) when aiming them around. In theory, we've found a low-cost fix for this.
Doc won't pick up the HQ phone anymore when he's clearly standing right next to you.

[h2]TWEAKED[/h2]
Snoop-able popup messages should rest better in frame, especially on smaller and lower resolution screens.
Reformatted the menu for selecting an Arena character's origin. On top of displaying the information in a more even and sensible way, it also allows custom origins designed by modders to appear in the list without blocking the description text.
Improved AI pathing around Commercial District ramps.
Charge-up and heavy attacks do slightly less knockback across the board (to compensate for the huge boost they got last update).
N51 Officers now have an off-brand custom mask to make them more unique.




Remember, send those bug reports to the game's Discord, and we'll get right to work mpn_engi

[h3]mpn_agentWelp...we went and did it.mpn_agent[/h3]

We've released Steam Trading Cards, Profile Backgrounds, mpn_engiEmojismpn_soldat, and Badges for Project Nexus, featuring artwork from some of the most talented artists Newgrounds has to offer.

If you wanna splash your Steam profile with some stellar new drip, then you know how this goes: collect those cards, craft those badges, and start customizing your Steam experience with that Nexus swag.

[h2]mpn_hank *COMING UP NEXT*mpn_hank [/h2]
New achievements, and the long-awaited S-3LF Eater update!

We're private-testing fourteen new achievements for Project Nexus over the weekend, and will hopefully have those available for all players by next week! You may have noticed the new achievements showing up on the game's Steam page - we'll let you guys know the moment they're live.

We're also on the final round of closed testing on the Legacy of the S-3LF Eater free content update, which will include a ton of fixes and some cool new additions to the game!


See you VERY SOON GUYS!

The release build has been caught up with all updates from the beta branch! The Halloween ghosts are also now finally at rest - thanks for killing them for us!

In January we're releasing the next content update for the Story Campaign: a neat little romp around the overworld while being pursued by a relentless nightmare: the S-3LF Eater! Learn a little about the enigmatic Cyber Bandits, their creator Doctor Gonne, and the origins of Project Kobold that preceded them. If you like lore, this is the update for you. If not, you've got a big bad villain to beat up. Hopefully something for everyone!

Stay tuned!

While we deck the halls and continue to work on the next BEEFY update for the game, we've partnered with Turtle Pals Tapes to create this kickass Vinyl LP Box Set of the ENTIRE MADNESS: Project Nexus soundtrack!



Each LP is housed in high quality jackets featuring the art of HeadSquash, AokiCyber, LEIXO DOMO, GlitchArtTV, and DVillefort. All 5 jackets are stored in a hard walled slipcase with art by Krinkels. Each box set comes with a booklet featuring liner notes, development images, and other pieces of MADNESS: PROJECT NEXUS related art.

There is currently no set cutoff date for pre-orders. Manufacturing is set to begin in late January, however, pre-orders will continue after production begins. This post will be updated as more information becomes available.

GET YOURS TODAY!!!

Just a couple lil changes today while we continue to work on the next free DLC for Project Nexus...more on that later!

For now, we made these couple of tweaks:

FIXED
Grand Steward's Clockworker defenders were apparently on strike, and would sometimes attack their boss.
Tremendous update to the location checker used by teleporting and spawning enemies. It's cleaner and should prevent a ton of issues with enemies ending up places they don't belong.

ADDED
Small update for the Not Enough Madness mod team to more easily adjust the scale size of weapons.

[previewyoutube=P2isL-Pw1yI;full][/previewyoutube]

It's finally here! The full Cinematic Trailer for Project Nexus!

If you want to support our ability to do projects like this in the future, go follow our boys at Skel Studio on Twitter and Patreon.

We've got something really special for you folks today. Skel Studio as well as Krinkels himself will be in Hollywood CA on November 28th premiering the MADNESS: Project Nexus Cinematic Story Trailer and YOU'RE INVITED!

You may remember Skel Studio as the mad bastards behind Mutt and Chopps, the Project Nexus Release Trailer, or the Project Nexus Madness Day Trailer. Now they're ready to unleash their newest project upon the world.

GET TICKETS NOW!!!


If you can't make it, don't fret! We've still got an opportunity for some premiere swag for ya. If you like and retweet This Tweet, as well as follow Skel Studio and Project Nexus on Twitter, you can bag yourself one of 5 movie posters signed by Krinkels! More details on the Twitter Page.

We hope to see you there! Let's make this once in a lifetime event a wild one!

You guys absolutely killed it with the Tricky plush. So much so that we're right back with round 2, featuring HANK!

Once again lovingly rendered by the masters over at Makeship, Hank is here to adorably seethe wherever you decide to plonk him down. And, he'll be able to get to anywhere in the world, with flat-rate WORLDWIDE SHIPPING.

Don't Delay! He's only gonna be hanging around until NOVEMBER 25th.

Grab yours today!


Art by Vix

Feliz Dia de los Muertos, amigos of Madness!

We've got a little spooky update LIVE on Project Nexus waiting for you violent little ghouls. Can you exhume the secret Bloodsucker nest buried deep beneath the city? What is the meaning of this new, vile curse? And where are all these GHOSTS coming from?!!

[previewyoutube=8EyCBxsIF5U;full][/previewyoutube]


You guys have absolutely been killing it with these plushie orders. So much so that Makeship has chosen to EXTEND THE CAMPAIGN BY ONE EXTRA WEEK!!! Don't miss out on this incredible second chance to secure your clown!

This will not affect the timeline of the original ship date. He is still estimated to SHIP WORLDWIDE on Jan 7th!

Don't delay! Get yours before they're gone!

Full Release [1.05.d]

The release build is now available with these changes:

FIXED
The new 12.7mm Eraser rifle had its buttstock attachment point too far inside the model. Made attachments look goofy.
Eraser rifle now set to breach like a shotgun during reloads.
Jorge's Sludgethrower was causing enemies to burn on death. Gameplay was unaffected.
Heavy / Pistol Cryo weapons were disappearing from inventory after purchase.

The release build is now available with all previous Beta fixes/updates, along with these changes:

ADDED
New firearms! Introducing the ND-2000 and NM46 (plus shock variant) smgs, AN74b and Eraser rifles, and the Model 23 Surplus pistol. Plus, a new line of Cryo-Gun weapons and an Acid Blaster at the Arena Blackmarket vendor!
Threw some holiday lights up in the Crackpot boss room to give the whole place just a friendlier vibe

FIXED
Hair was still showing through some background characters' hats, and in some cases, wasn't showing at all when it should (such as when wearing a radio headset or a headband).
A ramp ledge in the Base Jumping stage was allowing enemies to leap off the ramp and stand up on top of some scenery, where shooting them was very difficult.
The end credits for Story Campaign had a MERC Sniper whose hat loved to change color randomly.
A "do not teleport here" area blocker in the Crackpot boss room would make characters look like they're floating.

TWEAKED
Retiring a controller now only takes Right+Left Bumpers to be down when pressing Start. The Back button was getting intercepted by Steam during remote play, which prevents players from quitting.
You can also retire a joystick/controller by clicking on it in the Pause menu.

We've got something real special for you today, folks! We've teamed up with Makeship to deliver you lot an incredibly adorable plushie of your favorite zombie psycho clown.

Made from a soft, high-quality fabric, this little guy will look perfect perched up on any desk, table, shelf, or lazy susan. His mask is fully removable as well, incase you prefer those pearly whites on display. He also ships worldwide, so nowhere is safe!


He's not gonna be around forever though, you have until OCTOBER 13TH to secure your clown! Once the campaign's up, he's gone. Forever laughing into the abyss. But who knows... If this campaign's real successful, we just might see some other members of the cast get hit with the Makeship magic.


ORDER YOURS TODAY!!!

A big merger update coming your way, folks!

We're putting everything from the many Beta updates since the Magiturge release into the public build. Here are some of the highlights:



[h2]**Beta [2.06.d]**[/h2]
ADDED
Holding ALT while making a purchase will auto-equip that item, if possible.
The "Hold Shift" and "Hold Alt" indicators in the inventory now change colors to indicate what you're holding.
In Fast Track's fourth car, Half-Mags and Mags can each climb up top to chase you.
Arena Hirelings will warn you that they were unable to level up due to level cap when arriving back at the HQ. They'll also display a lock icon over their level when examined.
FIXED
Mashing the Swap Weapons button (TAB) when leaving an Arena stage would wipe out your purchased weapons for any junk weapons you're carrying. Great way to sneak a crappy wrench out of a stage, in exchange for that nice $4,000 SMG you bought. This should now be fixed.
A few cutscene, mission, and skill description typos.
Looking up the Arena HQ ramp that leads from the Hub room to the Helipad, you can see a bare wall at the top. This has been replaced with a better effect.
Removed a spawn point in Foundry that could allow some opponents to linger off screen where they could shoot you without recourse.
More protection added to the ramps in the second train car of Fast Track, to keep Mag executions from trapping you in the geometry underneath them.
Bandit headgear had a large collider that made them look like they're floating off the floor when knocked off of someone.
Being over-encumbered wouldn't recalculate your downgraded dodge or sprint correctly. Also did some work streamlining the calculation process on the back end.
The Gambler wasn't walking away in Contract 3.
Some background characters weren't disabling their body-smock when wearing an outfit (such as the ravers in Contract 3).
Leaping Zeds couldn't be countered with the appropriate skill.
Orderlies weren't grappling properly at the end of their dash attack.
TWEAKED
Magiturge wands are now available all at the same time, rather than starting only with Plastic and unlocking one-at-a-time as you advance through stages. To balance this, wand addons will instead be unlocked over time (the way gems already do).
Nerfed AAHW Half-Mag health. They still hit just as hard.
Clarified the descriptions of the Wizard Staff melee weapons (it wasn't apparent that their real power comes from charging them up).
When buying from the Arena Quartermaster, you can now swap between hirelings in order to compare their weapon and armor stats to the items you're buying them.
Added a few more Wildlander and Poltergeist enemies to the later waves of Haunting at Nevada House. Poltergeists are also a little faster.
Demoniac Demonstrator units use a deadlier skillset when dual wielding.
New descriptors for the waves of some Arena stage, such as Fast Track being called "Car 4" instead of "Room 4", etc.
Cultists will get through the windows in Haunting of Nevada House a lot more quickly.
Being over-encumbered can downgrade your Tac-Bar up to two times rather than only once.
Tiny nudge to grenades when they impact the floor, to keep them from "physics-ing" through the floor in some areas.
Dissonant Robots can be thrown when countered during their charge (with the appropriate skill).


[h2]**Beta [2.06.g]**[/h2]
ADDED
The Agent Origin's new origin skill allows their pistols to stunlock enemies and ignore even more Tac-Bar within their sweet spot (once you've got the skill). We're also giving 'em the AAHW voice set.
FIXED
The enemy indicator that appears over off-screen opponents at the end of waves will get wiped when you bribe them as the Mercenary origin.
Despite being the worst driver in Nevada, Doc can no longer kill you at the end of Fickle Friends by accident.
Trying to play Sleeper Labs with four players would break the stage select screen.
TWEAKED
The Patient Origin's imaginary friend got a tweak. We won't ruin the surprise. Also, the Patient is invincible at the moment the friend is summoned.
The Infinite Ammo powerup now applies to melee durability as well.
Significant weighting multiplier (currently x5) applied to Acrobatics XP earned in Arena. This should help casual acro gain for most players.



[h2]**Beta [2.06.h]**[/h2]
FIXED
Disquieted Mask found yet another sneaky way to be unequipped. That's been cleaned up, *again*



[h2]**Beta [2.06.i]**[/h2]
Tiny update today with a bunch of typo fixes.
By this weekend, we SHOULD have all beta fixes merged into the release build!



[h2]**Beta [2.06.m]**[/h2]
FIXED
Updated the controller system to be compatible with Steam's controller settings (again).
Bunch of typos fixed.
TWEAKED
When given the prompt to allow a controller to take control of Player 1, pressing Start or A on your controller will confirm YES, and pressing B counts as NO. The previous button system was confusing.


[h2]**Beta [2.06.n]**[/h2]
FIXED
Small update to how background characters handle outfit pieces that should and should not remove the part they belong to (such as gloves removing the hand objects, but *not* for fingerless gloves, etc.)

Beta [2.06.g]
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

[h2]ADDED[/h2]
The Agent Origin's new origin skill allows their pistols to stunlock enemies and ignore even more Tac-Bar within their sweet spot (once you've got the skill). We're also giving 'em the AAHW voice set.

[h2]FIXED[/h2]
The enemy indicator that appears over off-screen opponents at the end of waves will get wiped when you bribe them as the Mercenary origin.
Despite being the worst driver in Nevada, Doc can no longer kill you at the end of Fickle Friends by accident.
Trying to play Sleeper Labs with four players would break the stage select screen.

[h2]TWEAKED[/h2]
The Patient Origin's imaginary friend got a tweak. We won't ruin the surprise. Also, the Patient is invincible at the moment the friend is summoned.
The Infinite Ammo powerup now applies to melee durability as well.
Significant weighting multiplier (currently x5) applied to Acrobatics XP earned in Arena. This should help casual acro gain for most players.

Beta [2.06.d]
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

[h2]ADDED[/h2]
Holding ALT while making a purchase will auto-equip that item, if possible.
The "Hold Shift" and "Hold Alt" indicators in the inventory now change colors to indicate what you're holding.
In Fast Track's fourth car, Half-Mags and Mags can each climb up top to chase you.
Arena Hirelings will warn you that they were unable to level up due to level cap when arriving back at the HQ. They'll also display a lock icon over their level when examined.

[h2]FIXED[/h2]
Mashing the Swap Weapons button (TAB) when leaving an Arena stage would wipe out your purchased weapons for any junk weapons you're carrying. Great way to sneak a crappy wrench out of a stage, in exchange for that nice $4,000 SMG you bought. This should now be fixed.
A few cutscene, mission, and skill description typos.
Looking up the Arena HQ ramp that leads from the Hub room to the Helipad, you can see a bare wall at the top. This has been replaced with a better effect.
Removed a spawn point in Foundry that could allow some opponents to linger off screen where they could shoot you without recourse.
More protection added to the ramps in the second train car of Fast Track, to keep Mag executions from trapping you in the geometry underneath them.
Bandit headgear had a large collider that made them look like they're floating off the floor when knocked off of someone.
Being over-encumbered wouldn't recalculate your downgraded dodge or sprint correctly. Also did some work streamlining the calculation process on the back end.
The Gambler wasn't walking away in Contract 3.
Some background characters weren't disabling their body-smock when wearing an outfit (such as the ravers in Contract 3).
Leaping Zeds couldn't be countered with the appropriate skill.
Orderlies weren't grappling properly at the end of their dash attack.

[h2]TWEAKED[/h2]
Magiturge wands are now available all at the same time, rather than starting only with Plastic and unlocking one-at-a-time as you advance through stages. To balance this, wand addons will instead be unlocked over time (the way gems already do).
Nerfed AAHW Half-Mag health. They still hit just as hard.
Clarified the descriptions of the Wizard Staff melee weapons (it wasn't apparent that their real power comes from charging them up).
When buying from the Arena Quartermaster, you can now swap between hirelings in order to compare their weapon and armor stats to the items you're buying them.
Added a few more Wildlander and Poltergeist enemies to the later waves of Haunting at Nevada House. Poltergeists are also a little faster.
Demoniac Demonstrator units use a deadlier skillset when dual wielding.
New descriptors for the waves of some Arena stage, such as Fast Track being called "Car 4" instead of "Room 4", etc.
Cultists will get through the windows in Haunting of Nevada House a lot more quickly.
Being over-encumbered can downgrade your Tac-Bar up to two times rather than only once.
Tiny nudge to grenades when they impact the floor, to keep them from "physics-ing" through the floor in some areas.
Dissonant Robots can be thrown when countered during their charge (with the appropriate skill).

Full Release [1.05.a] Update is Here!

The release build is now available with all previous Beta fixes/updates, including the following:

[h2]New Arena Origin: The Magiturge![/h2]

Experience the canonical "end" of the Arena Combat story with the strangest addition to the Origin lineup to date. The Magiturge is an otherworldly weaver of arcane gifts and the artificer of unique spellcasting wands, which they construct from within their pocket-dimensional tower. Achieve three imprints to unlock this Origin, and go on to learn the final secrets of Nevada with arcane elements thundering from your very fingertips!

There will be more content in the coming months, as always: new weapons, new origins, and who knows what else. But for the time being, we hope you enjoy the free summer update!

Beta [2.05.v]
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

[h2]ADDED[/h2]
The Story Campaign stage select screen now features little background images just like (most) Arena stages, courtesy of DarkSignal.

[h2]FIXED[/h2]
Water ripples were looping rather than playing once. They also weren't despawning, which hogged memory.
Throwing rocks were able to disarm like the Madarang.

[h2]TWEAK[/h2]
Disabled burning SFX on the fire DoT.

Holy cow, do we have a ton of updates for players opting into the public beta branch! In preparation for the Magiturge Origin Update going live later this week, we're finally bringing three months of fixes out of private testing and over to the public.

Let's get down to it, shall we?



Beta [2.05.u]
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

[h2]FEATURED[/h2]
Hair is now automatically assigned to its own wearable slot, and is purchased from Skinner in the Arena Medbay. It's still mutually exclusive with your hat, but removing your helmet will always reveal that beautiful hairdo (or polished dome) underneath.

[h2]ADDED[/h2]
Game will allow the user to confirm that they wish to overwrite a supposed corrupt save with a valid cloud save, rather than doing it automatically. This will help players to know why their save file suddenly backtracked progress.
A couple new color swatches for the Colorizer.
New shoulder-mounted radio accessory, available at the Quartermaster.
A few new hairstyles.
New Fenching weapons: Sai, HandLance, and Stiletto. Fencing quick attacks are now faster, too!
Brand new voices for Doc, Nexus Support, and N51 Mortar.
Cute little gasp when a character resurfaces from drowning.
After Imprinting, a checkmark will appear over every Origin you've already played.

[h2]FIXED[/h2]
Controllers are working again!
The grenades carried by a single Nexus Agent in the Arena Facility could be picked up, when that should not be possible.
Crashing in an Arena stage would cause you to start in HQ with your hirelings still in a squad with you.
The Shock Longsword's broken version still swung with an electric looking arc effect.
Using a joystick/Xbox controller, your character once again moves slowly or quickly depending on how hard you tilt the control stick.
Having an Attribute lower than 1 (through stacking outfit penalties) would screw up all kinds of things, depending on the stat.
Visual bug when zip dashing when using a transition object (ladders, etc.) where you could end up through a wall for a moment.
Smoothing is now being properly applied to transitions between animations when entering/exiting certain kinds of interactives, seen in places such as the Sleepwalker Bed and your loft cot.
Harmacist guns/syringes and some other random weapons that cannot be picked up would not despawn between waves, or ever.
Restarting at the very end of Arena before Imprinting would spawn you in as Hank.
It was possible for weapons to stop spawning on the Story Campaign final boss's second phase. The root cause of this issue may have been creating problems elsewhere in the game, such as NPCs failing to find valid weapons to use.
The Colorizer would misrepresent the current texture set of an item if you had never changed it before.
You can no longer counter a furious G03LM and throw him across the room.
Arena Kills once again count for your achievement progress for all successful waves of a stage, not just the last one.
You were able to counter charging enemies (such as MERC Zerkers) without having the Charging Counter skill. Your perfectly timed blocks will still prevent you from getting knocked around, of course, even without the skill.
Some players didn't have their Arena wave-end screen pop up after victory or loss. This, strangely, was caused by their operating system not allowing them to alter their own save files. While this fix will repair the wave-end error, it won't stop players from losing all game progress so long as their computer doesn't let them update their save file. This, sadly, is out of our hands.
Corpses being phased out of existence could glitch out visually if you paused the game during their decay.
The Controls tab of the Options menu wouldn't display the number of connected Joysticks until you'd first clicked the Keys tab.
Your character will no longer fail to load their outfit models in Arena when leaving on the helicopter for a mission.

[h2]TWEAKED[/h2]
The Electric Dozer shotgun definitely needed some nerfing. We're trying a few things to clean it up: wider arc to its spread, shorter distance before its shot vanishes, slowing down the shots slightly, and raising the tier before it's available for purchase. I mean c'mon, this thing was triple-S tier.
Cleaned up how your attributes and encumbrance update and apply their bonuses, as appropriate, when altered.
Disabled backface culling on transparent hair in the Inventory menu, so certain styles look better up close.
Beards are colorizable.
Hirelings will have access to your current Origin's color swatches.
Added a one-time warning to Hard Sell where the game recommends bringing hirelings with you.
Dr. Christoff's unique charge-up attacks will not affect teammates whatsoever. His first level telekinetic lift also got slightly buffed.
You cannot be killed in the Playground in such a way where it renders your character unplayable.
The places your Arena hirelings lean and sit can now be used by you as well. Also, your loft bedroom seat and couch can be used.
Madarangs tweaked to be more useful and disarm opponents far more often.
Framerate maxed out at 120. This game wasn't designed or tested for framerates higher than this, and errors do sometimes occur. Note that enabling Vsync will ignore this limit, so user beware.
Dome Bandages are now a hairstyle rather than a hat, and can be colorized.
Weapon stat windows indicate if the weapon or its ammo will apply Explosive or DoT damage, as well as any debuffs it may cause. This will disambiguate weapons such as grenades, which used to only show the tiny damage they inflict on impact.
Weapons and Armor you or hirelings cannot wield will be showed greyed out in your inventory, such as masks and glasses when your Disquieted mask is occupying that slot.
A couple of unarmed skills have been reordered so that Charging Counter could be moved down to Tier 2 instead of Tier 3. It's a really good skill to nab early on, and didn't make sense to withold it until the end of the game.
N51 Commando loses their Tac-Bar, but the N51 Assassin gains one.
Put some corner cover points in a few areas of Arena's Fast Track stage.
Broken melee weapons will now only give you a hilt if you have the Improvised Weapons skill. For weapons that break into other perfectly usable weapons (such as brooms becoming stakes), nothing has been changed.

[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

As you can see from the version number, our fabulous beta testers have been behind the scenes helping M:PN update with a bunch of quality-of-life fixes!

Namely, Cloud Saves! If you've had issues with save files corrupting, we're hoping that this will help resolve all of your issues forever. Back up your saves and then switch to the M:PN Beta Branch on Steam to give cloud saving a whirl.


FEATURED
Cloud Saves! Make sure you're logged into Steam and have Cloud Saves enabled.
FIXED
Squadmates will help shoot at Apothic Gestalt (Phase 2) again, as well as approach other boss units they were avoiding in melee.
Corpses were falling through the terrain in the Science Tower Courtyard.
Thrown weapons will no longer embed in physics objects (which would cause them to freak out).
You could soft lock yourself by backtracking in one room of Arena Contract 4, "Mandatus".
A weapon thrown with the Lawnmower skill could drop multiple copies of its broken version if it hit multiple enemies on the same frame it broke.
Display for Encumbrance and Tac-Bar update appropriately after buying new Skills.
Empty-handed NPCs would hunt around for weapons to use, but if they picked up a throwable, would continue looking for weapons. This gets them stuck in a loop if all that's left are throwables.
Heavy Weapons won't give you bonus mags for Ranged Core skills anymore, as mentioned in the skill descriptions.
Catch Thrown skill works again, and NPCs (including your squadmates) will properly use the skill if they've got it.
An archiving issue was stopping hirelings from advancing in level or appearing in the HQ.
Nexus Blade's audio wasn't muting during the pause menu.
Small text glitch when firing hirelings from the HQ. Their name would sometimes not appear in the window prompt.
Arena Siege attackers will now give up on their obstacle targets (windows, car piles, etc.) once they've been wiped out.
There was a small window where you could safely quit an Arena stage on completion, but before XP and Cash were assigned to you. You're now locked out of leaving during the stage-end breakdown.
TWEAKED
Additional checkpoints added to Climb and Chasms in the Story Campaign, to make these otherwise long stages more bearable when you die.
Tons of small bonuses added to all kinds of gear at the Arena quartermaster.
Nerfed damage to squadmates from explosions and hazards.
Weapons affected by Shuriken Arc skill only suffer reduced damage if they pull enemies back to you. This de-nerfs the boomerang, throwing disc, etc.
Altered the visual look and size of weapon/armor stats displayed in the inventory for better legibility.
Half-Mag outfit and glasses were showing up way too soon at the Quartermaster.
Consolidated a bunch of hood wearables to trim out a bunch of obsolete and redundant gear at the Quartermaster.
One fewer wave at Slaughter Time's last checkpoint.
Removed "Plummet" skill from a bunch of enemies. They will no longer be invincible while falling, in case they get stuck in geometry and need to be killed.
Some throwables (mostly non-explosives) can be looted from bodies.
Murder Room invisible ceiling raised to make room for Cyber Brutes leaping around.
A bunch of gear has been given a variety of stat bonuses in the Arena.
Thrown weapons without a visual object (Nexus Bolts, etc.) have been given a default icon outline in the game UI. Others still (Rocks, etc.) have been given new icons entirely.
When failing to pick up a throwable because the one you're carrying cannot be dropped, the game will notify you.
N51 Mortar can't be knocked down anymore (least of all by themselves).
N-60 requires two hands to wield regardless of a character's stats.
The Character Select screen had a Beta Branch warning that needed rewording.

A couple of small fixes today:

-Thrown melee weapons were sustaining a lot more durability damage than intended. This has been corrected.
-The Ghi, Headband, and Pugilist Outfit have had their Unarmed Speed bonuses standardized, so their stats are easier to read.
-Small text placement issue in the Colorizer.

All Versions:
New Post-Holiday Update! Check out our new mission, "The Heist", in Arena Combat now! (Available to those Nevada warriors who have made it past Contract 3)


------------

Current Patch Includes:

ADDED
The Heist: Stick up Nevada Central's must lucrative target in a brand new Arena stage!
Your Arena money is now represented by a stack of cash in your Loft. You can now behold your monetary progress as it grows.
Your purchased Color Swatches will carry over with you after imprinting, as well as the Swatches of any Origins you imprint *after this update*! You'll still need to unlock the Colorizer again in order to apply them, of course.
Plus, a couple new Swatches at the Fence.
FIXED
Sweep attacks have a better, rounded sweep area to account for low FPS.
Most revolver cylinders were rotating an incorrect direction when reloading.
"Coinbearer" spawns in the Arena Infinite Waves were not spawning properly, and sometimes not at all.
Characters that teleport when they lose a corpus (Apparitions, Crackpot, etc.) will do it properly if they're ragdolled.
Some gate obstructions have been tweaked to block off their areas faster (such as on each level of the elevator in the split-room battle in Climb). This should stop squadmates from leaving before they're supposed to.
Changes to the Slaughter Time murder fan to prevent it from drifting away from its start position over long periods of time.
Stop Sign can be thrown.
Charge-up attacks on some heavier weapons were not letting you leap forward.
TWEAKED
Various firearm stats have been balanced.
Some wepons are HEAVY. They will slow you down while held or stowed on your back - this scale changes based on your Endurance and your size. They're also much cheaper to purchase.
Blackmarket markup has been scaled down the more expensive a weapon already is.





The previous Beta versions have been merged into the Release Build:

Beta [2.02.b]
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

FIXED
The Story Campaign stage selector shortcut (aka stage selection map) was allowing you to bypass events that need to occur before accessing certain stages (such as blowing up the door to the Sheriff's stage, or encountering the Outskirts snipers before entering Power Play).

------------

Beta [2.02.d]
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

ADDED
Stage Select screens show which difficulties you've beaten the selected stage on, and World Maps will indicate stages beaten on Madness difficulty.
FIXED
In Chasms, players were sometimes getting stuck in the "water room" when the door at the end of the hall won't open. This was the result of a larger issue that never cropped up except in some very few rooms.
The scale of weapons in the Massive Origin's hands should be correct now. This applies to your character in the world, as well as in the inventory menu.
Record of your cash earned in Arena for each stage wasn't displaying in the correct format.
Weapons destroyed after a throw will drop their broken version now, so long as that version doesn't decay on the floor (such as crappy broken hilts).
Melee weapons thrown with the Lawnmower skill will properly lose durability.
You and your squad are now properly invincible before, between, and after completing waves. This should prevent accidental deaths and other workplace accidents.
You can crit hit opponents during your charge-up swings again.
TWEAKED
Cleanup to the Playground back room to make it prettier.
Weapon rebalance: range decreases for pistols, shotguns, and other very short weapons.
Weapon rebalance: magazine penalty tweak, so that larger mags carry greater penalties for size/recoil/recovery.
Weapon rebalance: BR7 and FNC slightly nerfed to make them fit as low-mid tier rifles.
Shock Sword and Axe moved from the Quartermaster to the Blackmarket (just like the Dozer Model E).
In the post-game interactive outro for Arena, your name will be shown correctly instead of as "Player".

NOTE v.2.02.c was released only to the private Beta branch for closed testing. It contained some of the above updates.

We know it's a long shot, but we're terribly proud of the unparalleled work done by both Cheshyre and Locknar on our game. The heavy hitting dubstep, the ambient electronica, the body-shaking drum'n'bass, the head-banging metal...we could not be more grateful for the love and labor they both poured into this game's OST. Project Nexus would be a barren, soulless experience without the life their music lends to it.

That's why we're shooting for the Best Soundtrack award on Steam this year!

The soundtrack is available on Spotify for those who haven't picked it up on Steam yet, in case you want a reminder of what exactly we're asking you to vote on:
Locknar's half of the OST
Cheshyre's half of the OST
Some of our favorite tracks are Blood Soon, Child of Swamp Zombie, Enter the Nexus, Waltzer White, and AAHW. What're yours?

Thanks for mobilizing with us, oh dear friends-of-Madness. Let's find out if we can bring Hank and the gang out of Nevada and into the world stage with our very first award. And thank you for making this a wonderful launch year <3 <3

-Swain & Krinkels

All Versions:
New Halloween Update! Play as An Offering, a new spooky Origin for M:PN's Arena Combat mode.


Merged Beta updates into Full Release:
__

Beta [2.01.r]

ADDED
Hand-to-hand hit indicator added to Brute class enemies who are prone to tantrums, to let you know how many hits you've landed to piss them off.
New audio for the Light, Heavy, and S200 MERC rifles. Janky, dirty, and perfect!
MERC Battle Rifle has a proper ran-out-of-ammo ping! sound.

FIXED
Changing the direction you are facing while enacting a full dodge would pick the wrong animation for the move.

TWEAKED
Updated the icon for the Distracted buff that Brutes receive after a tantrum.

TESTING
Added a small pause after clicking an icon in your inventory menu before allowing you to buy, sell, or equip. This could screw a few things up for your character if you were too quick to click.

Beta [2.01.r]
[You can access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

ADDED
Hand-to-hand hit indicator added to Brute class enemies who are prone to tantrums, to let you know how many hits you've landed to piss them off.
New audio for the Light, Heavy, and S200 MERC rifles. Janky, dirty, and perfect!
MERC Battle Rifle has a proper ran-out-of-ammo ping! sound.

FIXED
Changing the direction you are facing while enacting a full dodge would pick the wrong animation for the move.

TWEAKED
Updated the icon for the Distracted buff that Brutes receive after a tantrum.

TESTING
Added a small pause after clicking an icon in your inventory menu before allowing you to buy, sell, or equip. This could screw a few things up for your character if you were too quick to click.

We're merging the existing Beta fixes into the public build! As always, merging builds may yield unexpected glitches. We appreciate all bug reports to help us resolve those problems. Thanks everyone!

Here's what's changing:



From Beta [2.01.o]

ADDED
Option to enable/disable indicator circles beneath the feet of you and your squadmates. Note that player indicators will always be active during multiplayer.
Indicator to let you know when a Story Campaign wave of enemies is infinite (meaning, the goal of the room is not to kill everyone who enteres).
Phonebooths have been converted into a world map for Story Campaign. You can now access any available stage by using these booths, located in multiple places across all sectors.
The MERC Light and Heavy rifles both given a total makeover (the previous incarnations still exist as "Retro" versions).

FIXED
Some players reported having no success with button mashing challenges (sword locks, grapples, etc.) due to framerate. A change was made that should even out the challenge for those players.
Spectral characters could glitch out of the stage if they teleported while a character had a hook weapon in them. Yanking the hook back was preventing them from returning.
Disquieted origin should no longer be allowed to pass through barriers when teleporting into a melee attack.
Garage doors in a specific room of Deep Storage weren't visibly opening.
Slaughter Time kill fans should no longer drift out of place over long periods of time.
Your crowd of adoring fans would disappear after going into the Slaughter Time infinite checkpoints.
Hive Slugs were spawning way outside of Hive's body, thanks to an issue with how ragdoll is calculated. We removed their ragdoll on spawn to resolve the issue.
Some light sources would negate the appearance of color swatches being applied to your characters and outfits.
The pilot won't keep having the same conversation with you after returning from the Nowhere.
The Massive was too shy to dance in Club Advent.
A couple of tweaks to calculating Acheievments that should cause some of them to show up under all the right conditions again (specifically the Arena achievements).
TWEAKED
To make things easier for hand-to-hand fighters, Cultists and other siege attackers may no longer swing at anything other than their siege target. This protection also comes with an additional change: no attacker can strike an opponent through a solid surface with melee or unarmed. This will require a lot of scrutiny for error, so make sure to log all bugs (especially being unable to hit your target when you should) in the service-depot!
Christoff (and everyone else, really) now holds the [Q] key to pick up keycards, C4, etc. just like picking up weapons, rather than holding the [E] key.
After beating Arena Contract 3 and unlocking the Fence, you will now be able to bring up to FIVE squadmates with you on missions instead of the current max of three.
A few staircases in the Facility stage needed aim blockers to prevent your cursor from slipping between the stairs and aiming where you did not intend.
The N911, NS19, NK33, and Bizon given a mild damage reduction of one point.
Advanced Block/Guard Mobility skill costs halved.
Hirelings won't gain the trait that makes them want to throw weapons unless Acrobatics is their primary skill group. Hirelings who currently have this trait will not lose it, however.
MERC Cap given an option to tilt it in the Colorizer.

**Beta [2.01.o]**
[You can access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]

ADDED
Option to enable/disable indicator circles beneath the feet of you and your squadmates. Note that player indicators will always be active during multiplayer.
Indicator to let you know when a Story Campaign wave of enemies is infinite (meaning, the goal of the room is not to kill everyone who enteres).
Phonebooths have been converted into a world map for Story Campaign. You can now access any available stage by using these booths, located in multiple places across all sectors.
The MERC Light and Heavy rifles both given a total makeover (the previous incarnations still exist as "Retro" versions).

FIXED
Some players reported having no success with button mashing challenges (sword locks, grapples, etc.) due to framerate. A change was made that should even out the challenge for those players.
Spectral characters could glitch out of the stage if they teleported while a character had a hook weapon in them. Yanking the hook back was preventing them from returning.
Disquieted origin should no longer be allowed to pass through barriers when teleporting into a melee attack.
Garage doors in a specific room of Deep Storage weren't visibly opening.
Slaughter Time kill fans should no longer drift out of place over long periods of time.
Your crowd of adoring fans would disappear after going into the Slaughter Time infinite checkpoints.
Hive Slugs were spawning way outside of Hive's body, thanks to an issue with how ragdoll is calculated. We removed their ragdoll on spawn to resolve the issue.
Some light sources would negate the appearance of color swatches being applied to your characters and outfits.
The pilot won't keep having the same conversation with you after returning from the Nowhere.
The Massive was too shy to dance in Club Advent.
A couple of tweaks to calculating Achievements that should cause some of them to show up under all the right conditions again (specifically the Arena achievements).
TWEAKED
To make things easier for hand-to-hand fighters, Cultists and other siege attackers may no longer swing at anything other than their siege target. This protection also comes with an additional change: no attacker can strike an opponent through a solid surface with melee or unarmed. This will require a lot of scrutiny for error, so make sure to log all bugs (especially being unable to hit your target when you should) in the #service-depot!
Christoff (and everyone else, really) now holds the [Q] key to pick up keycards, C4, etc. just like picking up weapons, rather than holding the [E] key.
After beating Arena Contract 3 and unlocking the Fence, you will now be able to bring up to FIVE squadmates with you on missions instead of the current max of three.
A few staircases in the Facility stage needed aim blockers to prevent your cursor from slipping between the stairs and aiming where you did not intend.
The N911, NS19, NK33, and Bizon given a mild damage reduction of one point.
Advanced Block/Guard Mobility skill costs halved.
Hirelings won't gain the trait that makes them want to throw weapons unless Acrobatics is their primary skill group. Hirelings who currently have this trait will not lose it, however.
MERC Cap given an option to tilt it in the Colorizer.

The Full Release of M:PN has been merged with all patches from the Beta Branch:

**Beta [2.01.j]**
[Access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]

ADDED
-Integrity check added to file saving. Your old data will not be overwritten if the new data your game is trying to save looks to be corrupted. If you notice any career rollbacks taking place, then it's because you're one of the extremely rare players who may experience their careers being rendered unreadable, but the integrity check prevented the corrupted save from overwriting the old one. If, after this update, you *still* end up with an unreadable career, it may be something more critical, like an OS issue. Either way, we're not done attending to this bug and have alternative fixes we want to test before implementing.

FIXED
-[MAYBE?] If you or an opponent were struck just as you sync'd into an animation with them (Executes, Grapples, and Sword Locks namely), then one character could be released from the animation while the other stays in it to completion (or forever, if it's a loop), even after death. We've added a safety that should prevent this, but we'll need bug reports if it continues.
-Crackpot could teleport to some absurd locations. We're slowly closing off his access to those.
-You would retain your throwable slot weapon when ending your Arena game, before Imprinting.
-Thrown weapons will pass through allies again, and your lawnmower skill will work with larger weapons (such as the Dragon Slayer) again.
-The grapple range for enemies to find a target was terribly low.
-Chainsaw executes (and some others) won't leave bodies hanging in the air anymore.

TWEAKED
-The bridge lock in Last Leg receives a quest marker after using the terminal (if the lock has not been destroyed) to help players figure out what to do.
-The same bridge lock also responds to damage from Dissonance weapons, in case the player opted to bring in the Christoff loadout.
-And while we're here fixing the bridge lock, we've included an infinite-grenade pickup briefcase in addition to the grenade refill box, on the off chance you managed to lose your grenades.
-Some sync'd animations wouldn't move characters close together quickly enough. We're tweaking the numbers to see if we can get the feel we want without breaking anything.

HOTFIX
-Stake weapons given to you by breaking your broom or baseball bat could go into negative durability.




**Beta [2.01.k]**
[Access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]

FIXED
-Body splitting deaths could prevent room progress.

HOTFIX
-[MAYBE?] Characters should no longer get stuck in their grapple animations despite being dead.
-Achievements for beating Story Campaign and finishing all Arena Wave Stages (also on Madness) has been restructured and *should* work. Please let us know if they're still not applying for you.



**Beta [2.01.l]**
[Access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]
**Status:** *Released*

FIXED
Exiting a door during a cutscene might have caused your character to run back into the door with an unbreakable pathfind order.
Corrections to light-blockers in the Haunting stage may have fixed some spawn issues with wave enemies.
Buggy spawner in Fast Track now spits folks out just fine.

TWEAKED
A few more bumpers added to locations where players and squadmates could get stuck in the geometry.
Tossed in some zones to guarantee the ghost minions in the final Story battle can never wander outside the play area.

After what was almost eight years of development on this game, I can't believe I'm writing about our first week post-release.

It's been a whirlwind, guys. It's outrageous to wake up every morning, check Steam, and see that thousands of you are playing the game at once. For years, the player base has been limited to the few original Kickstarter and crowdfunding backers who'd found us early on. Many of you have only just discovered MADNESS: Project Nexus through Steam's marketing, Newgrounds, or our live action trailer. Others have sat patiently for years, awaiting the day that we finally found the nerve to say "Okay, I think this game is done."

Leading up to launch, we were working the most obscene hours we'd ever known. At the beginning of September, we thought we'd make the workload light: 10-hour days, 5-hour weekends. A week in, and that wasn't going to cut it. We kicked things up to 12-hour days, 8-hour weekends. Still not enough. With launch day approaching rapidly, we pushed it to 16-hours a day for 11 straight days, and to handle the post-launch bug reports, we kept that same schedule for a week more after that.

But that's what it takes. To make this project pristine, to keep our promises: that's the cost. Jumping from 50 beta testers to thousands upon thousands of live players means otherwise unknown issues suddenly pop out from the shadows. We haven't stopped addressing and fixing these issues, and after nearly eight years of working on this game, we hope you'll trust that we don't intend to.

Thank you to the Testing Corps beta tester team for helping us crack bugs since day one, but especially now, when time is of the essence. This project could not exist without you.

Thank you to those that found us and backed our little concept of a project back in 2014, or pre-ordered the game without ever being sure that it could be made. We hope your wait was worth it.

Thank you to the Madness fan community, as well as to gamers giving this world their very first try. We hope you'll stick around a while.

Thank you for believing in this game. Thank you for giving us a chance.

-Swain, 1/2 of Team Madness

Beta [2.01.k]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

FIXED
-Body splitting deaths could prevent room progress
-Stake weapons given to you by breaking your broom or baseball bat could go into negative durability.

**Beta [2.01.j]**
[Access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]

ADDED
-Integrity check added to file saving. Your old data will not be overwritten if the new data your game is trying to save looks to be corrupted. If you notice any career rollbacks taking place, then it's because you're one of the extremely rare players who may experience their careers being rendered unreadable, but the integrity check prevented the corrupted save from overwriting the old one. If, after this update, you *still* end up with an unreadable career, it may be something more critical, like an OS issue. Either way, we're not done attending to this bug and have alternative fixes we want to test before implementing.

FIXED
-[MAYBE?] If you or an opponent were struck just as you sync'd into an animation with them (Executes, Grapples, and Sword Locks namely), then one character could be released from the animation while the other stays in it to completion (or forever, if it's a loop), even after death. We've added a safety that should prevent this, but we'll need bug reports if it continues.
-Crackpot could teleport to some absurd locations. We're slowly closing off his access to those.
-You would retain your throwable slot weapon when ending your Arena game, before Imprinting.
-Thrown weapons will pass through allies again, and your lawnmower skill will work with larger weapons (such as the Dragon Slayer) again.
-The grapple range for enemies to find a target was terribly low.
-Chainsaw executes (and some others) won't leave bodies hanging in the air anymore.

TWEAKED
-The bridge lock in Last Leg receives a quest marker after using the terminal (if the lock has not been destroyed) to help players figure out what to do.
-The same bridge lock also responds to damage from Dissonance weapons, in case the player opted to bring in the Christoff loadout.
-And while we're here fixing the bridge lock, we've included an infinite-grenade pickup briefcase in addition to the grenade refill box, on the off chance you managed to lose your grenades.
-Some sync'd animations wouldn't move characters close together quickly enough. We're tweaking the numbers to see if we can get the feel we want without breaking anything.[i][/i]

Here's what's new:

FIXED
-A single door in the Training Mission was preventing players from proceeding past one of the later rooms.
-A few spots characters could have been stuck have been given bumpers.
-Some invisible bumpers were allowing themselves to be rendered.

We're merging the existing Beta fixes into the public build! As always, merging builds may yield unexpected glitches. We appreciate all bug reports to help us resolve those problems. Thanks everyone!

Here's what's changing:



Beta [2.01.b]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

ADDED
-Safeguards against file corruption if you should crash while your game is saving.

FIXED
-(Maybe?) Turkish players were unable to advance past the Inner City stage. Converting a piece of text from upper to lower case would fail 100% of the time for these players specifically, but no one else, and prevented them from completing the stage.
-Sheriff doesn't teleport to his start position in his first confrontation.
-Demoniac eyes were the wrong color.
-Swamp Zed spawning was broken in Haunting.

TWEAKED
-Zed Brutes (G03LM Mk.Zed) have their armor removed. Because they don't have a takedown prompt, it's unfair to make their bodies invincible.

TESTING
-There is a soft lock at the fan in Flood Control that can sometimes happen. We've included a few safeguards to stop it, but until we can nail down what's causing it, we can't be sure it's fixed.
-It's rare but possible for a character to get caught in an infinite falling loop while using very specific spawn points. We've added safeguards that we hope will prevent this from occurring.



Beta [2.01.c]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

FIXED
-Blood pools had been switched off.
-Was possible to create duplicate saves when creating a character.

TWEAKED
-Safeties added to prevent Players from killing themselves if they haven't already figured out that Turrets in Seeking Asylum are lethal.


Beta [2.01.d]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

FIXED
-Wonky physics on rope chains decorations.

TWEAKED
-Safeguards added to prevent players from getting past the Flood Control giant fan and the Seeking Asylum glass barriers.
-Some adjustments to the Orders system to prevent characters following others off of cliffs.



Beta [2.01.e]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

FIXED
-Bossman wouldn't let you hire folks into your empire if you skipped his dialog with the Quartermaster after rescuing the Pilot.



Beta [2.01.f]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

FIXED
-Hidden door to the Sewer in Flood Control was moved from the Fan Room to someplace else. You couldn't return to the room that took you there, but that's been fixed.

TWEAKED
-Improved mask applied to Crackpot in the Chasms bossfight.
-Climb is a little less grindy in its more tedious parts, and has more guns. The destruction puzzles are also more obvious.
-Footlockers and pegboard "lockers" didn't default to having extra magazines for their weapon drops, but we decided they should.


Beta [2.01.g]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

FIXED
-[MAYBE] MERC Zerkers, Mag Agents, and other enemies with an angry charge could get stuck in place and behave as if stunned despite standing idle.
-Final Story mission wasn't recording your victory. This prevents beating it again on Madness difficulty, accessing loadouts, or getting your achievement.
-Some of the toggle gates in the Sleepwalker Labs wouldn't give you access when up.

TWEAKED
-Added a few more colors to the Employer swatch in Arena.
-More guns brought in by Zeds during Beat the Streets.

**Beta [2.01b]**
[Access this build from the ``releasebeta`` Branch on Steam]
**Status:** *Released*

ADDED
-Safeguards against file corruption if you should crash while your game is saving.

FIXED
-(Maybe?) Turkish players were unable to advance past the Inner City stage. Converting a piece of text from upper to lower case would fail 100% of the time for these players specifically, but no one else, and prevented them from completing the stage.
-Sheriff doesn't teleport to his start position in his first confrontation.
-Demoniac eyes were the wrong color.
-Swamp Zed spawning was broken in Haunting.

TWEAKED
-Zed Brutes (G03LM Mk.Zed) have their armor removed. Because they don't have a takedown prompt, it's unfair to make their bodies invincible.


TESTING
-There is a soft lock at the fan in Flood Control that can sometimes happen. We've included a few safeguards to stop it, but until we can nail down what's causing it, we can't be sure it's fixed.
-It's rare but possible for a character to get caught in an infinite falling loop while using very specific spawn points. We've added safeguards that we hope will prevent this from occurring.


UP NEXT
-A couple of achievements are having trouble registering. For the ones involving waves completed or kills, don't worry - your progress isn't being ignored. You should get those achievements right away once they're fixed.

[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

FIXED
-Execution distance has been drastically reduced for enemies. It was unfair.
-It was possible to get Ghoul to slam outside the edge of the stage, making it vanish from the fight.
-(Maybe?) Some very few players had issues progressing through the third Contract mission. They were experiencing a unique error with the vampire burn death. I've made some attempts to stop that from occurring.
-Destroying the electrical box in the third Residential stage before the cutscene hint ended would soft lock the exit door.
-The writing for the first level of Ranged Dual Wield was misleading and cryptic. We cleaned it up, and also raised the maximum allowed weapon size for dual wielding at that level.
-(Maybe?) On the rare chance an enemy gets caught under the floor of the haunted house stage, we've added a zone that should kill them off so no one gets stuck.
-Bossman should appear in the correct spot behind his counter when required, and will sell you Hirelings again.
-N51 Commandos place bombs on the doors of Hard Sell again. Prepare for a treat, those of you new to the game.

TWEAKED
-Vampires cannot auto-kill you when they bite you.
-Once you begin your weapon pick-up animation, if you're interrupted by any state change, the item will go directly into your hands. Fair is fair!
-Game modes identify themselves as Solo or Solo + Co-Op on the main menu now.
-Second story Flashback tweaked to make it clear you do NOT proceed by going through the gate where the car emerges.
-Health cabinets added to first Church & Jorge fight.
-Playground: You can use the terminals if your hands are bound.

TESTING:
-A few players are getting stuck at the final door of Inner City. We've added fixes that clean up other stages and hope that applies here too. If not, there are now debugs in the Beta Branch that will help us determine exactly what is happening for these few players.

We've been working 16 hours a day since launch to get these updates to you as quickly as possible, so bear with us while we clean up the issues being discovered by a previously unimaginable number of new players! (THANK YOU for the bug reports! They are an endless help to us)

This update merges all fixes being tested in the Beta Branch:

[Beta 2.0.a]
Status: Released
ADDED: Option to disable the dream cam effect in Sleeperwalker and Christoff Cutscenes.
TWEAK: Nerfed MERC Zerkers
TWEAK: Small aim-block shelf added to Jorge's ledge in C&J's first fight that is only on when you're up top. Helps keep you from aiming down below unintended.
TWEAK: Teleporter added to Playground so you can move back and forth as a large unit.
TWEAK: Honk Zeds have a flashbang effect on explode rather than a grenade effect.
TWEAK: Crackpot laughs a lot less when casting magic.
TWEAK: Crackpot guarded by two Prophets, not two Graveseekers.
TWEAK: Reduced the grind of Flood Control and Chasms significantly, and threw in a couple of narrations between Sanford and Deimos to cut up the monotony.
TWEAK: Inched the Grab/SwordLock grapple toward being slightly in favor in the player.
FIXED: Interactive mode Throwables and Shields now usable, and you can restart your game properly


Beta [2.0.b]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

ADDED
Posters teaching how to press CTRL to swap between squadmates added to all Industrial stages.

TWEAKED
Fences won't block your gun from passing through them when aiming and firing.
More magazines for locker guns in Tough difficulty. If Melee weapons aren't penalized by difficulty, neither should firearms be.
Residential stage Inner City given a checkpoint before the boss swarm.
A little flavor added to the Pause menu.
Hint added to the electric box room in The Scenic Route (sewers).
Being ragdolled will prevent enemies from attacking you. Does not apply when you put yourself into ragdoll.
Two of the Tutorial rooms adjusted to be more understandable, and another room to be impossible to lock yourself in.

FIXED
Potential softlock in Sheriff fight if an enemy ends up in the wrong area.
Potential softlock in Beat the Streets outdoor area.
Spiked gates have a raised blocker to stop characters getting knocked behind them.
In very rare cases, certain help indicators wouldn't show.
(Maybe?): Trying to fix the door at the end of the first residential stage, Inner City. This is a difficult bug to reproduce, so we're trying something new here.
(Maybe?): Trying to fix the soft lock at the water room near the end of Chasms (Mining stage 2).
Ally could get stuck in the first Story Flashback cutscene.
Could backtrack from the end of Asylum stage and lock yourself out of the final room.
Bodies won't decay through the floor anymore, which will stop them being visible if they die on a floor above a room.
Zombie G03LMs could spawn with a helmet and be impossible to kill without explosives.
A bunch of other potential softlocks.

FUTURE PRIORITIES
Controller Support. This game is recommended Mouse + Keyboard, but local Co-op depends on having your controller work with the game. Right now the game only supports Xbox and compatible contollers and game pads, but we're working to figure out the current compatibility issues. This, along with the current soft locks, are our top priority.



Beta [2.0.d]
[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]
Status: Released

FIXED
-Execution distance has been drastically reduced for enemies. It was unfair.
-It was possible to get Ghoul to slam outside the edge of the stage, making it vanish from the fight.
-(Maybe?) Some very few players had issues progressing through the third Contract mission. They were experiencing a unique error with the vampire burn death. I've made some attempts to stop that from occurring.
-Destroying the electrical box in the third Residential stage before the cutscene hint ended would soft lock the exit door.
-The writing for the first level of Ranged Dual Wield was misleading and cryptic. We cleaned it up, and also raised the maximum allowed weapon size for dual wielding at that level.
-(Maybe?) On the rare chance an enemy gets caught under the floor of the haunted house stage, we've added a zone that should kill them off so no one gets stuck.
-Bossman should appear in the correct spot behind his counter when required, and will sell you Hirelings again.
-N51 Commandos place bombs on the doors of Hard Sell again. Prepare for a treat, those of you new to the game.

TWEAKED
-Vampires cannot auto-kill you when they bite you.
-Once you begin your weapon pick-up animation, if you're interrupted by any state change, the item will go directly into your hands. Fair is fair!
-Game modes identify themselves as Solo or Solo + Co-Op on the main menu now.
-Second story Flashback tweaked to make it clear you do NOT proceed by going through the gate where the car emerges.
-Health cabinets added to first Church & Jorge fight.
-Playground: You can use the terminals if your hands are bound.

TESTING:
-A few players are getting stuck at the final door of Inner City. We've added fixes that clean up other stages and hope that applies here too. If not, there are now debugs in the Beta Branch that will help us determine exactly what is happening for these few players.

[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

FIXED
Execution distance has been drastically reduced for enemies. It was unfair.

TWEAKED
Once you begin your weapon pick-up animation, if you're interrupted by any state change, the item will go directly into your hands. Fair is fair!
Game modes identify themselves as Solo or Solo + Co-Op on the main menu now.

Hey, gamers! While we continue looking at issues some players are having with controllers in M:PN, we wanted to share a quick fix that could resolve the problem.

THIS IS NOT GUARANTEED to solve your issue, but it's a good place to start:



Head to your game's settings and make certain that your Xbox controller is not disabled like in the image above. You want your controller status ENABLED.

Currently the game only supports the use of Xbox and compatible controllers. We'll be including PS4 support next, as soon as we're certain that Xbox controllers are running smoothly.

Also, current the game only provides multiplayer co-op in the Story Campaign. We have ambitions to allow other players to control your hirelings in Arena, but for now, you're restricted to the single game mode.

In the meantime, we're putting in the hours to resolve our top priorities right now: making sure your controller works as advertised, and to eliminate the soft locks that sometimes prevent progress. We went from a large beta tester team to a HUGE player base overnight, and bugs no one had ever heard of before are now being reported. We are attending to all of them, and will not let off until we've destroyed them all!

[Access this build from the releasebeta Branch on Steam]

ADDED
Posters teaching how to press CTRL to swap between squadmates added to all Industrial stages.

TWEAKED
Fences won't block your gun from passing through them when aiming and firing.
More magazines for locker guns in Tough difficulty. If Melee weapons aren't penalized by difficulty, neither should firearms be.
Residential stage Inner City given a checkpoint before the boss swarm.
A little flavor added to the Pause menu.
Hint added to the electric box room in The Scenic Route (sewers).
Being ragdolled will prevent enemies from attacking you. Does not apply when you put yourself into ragdoll.
Two of the Tutorial rooms adjusted to be more understandable, and another room to be impossible to lock yourself in.

FIXED
Potential softlock in Sheriff fight if an enemy ends up in the wrong area.
Potential softlock in Beat the Streets outdoor area.
Spiked gates have a raised blocker to stop characters getting knocked behind them.
In very rare cases, certain help indicators wouldn't show.
(Maybe?): Trying to fix the door at the end of the first residential stage, Inner City. This is a difficult bug to reproduce, so we're trying something new here.
(Maybe?): Trying to fix the soft lock at the water room near the end of Chasms (Mining stage 2).
Ally could get stuck in the first Story Flashback cutscene.
Could backtrack from the end of Asylum stage and lock yourself out of the final room.
Bodies won't decay through the floor anymore, which will stop them being visible if they die on a floor above a room.
Zombie G03LMs could spawn with a helmet and be impossible to kill without explosives.
A bunch of other potential softlocks.

FUTURE PRIORITIES
Controller Support. This game is recommended Mouse + Keyboard, but local Co-op depends on having your controller work with the game. Right now the game only supports Xbox and compatible contollers and game pads, but we're working to figure out the current compatibility issues. This, along with the current soft locks, are our top priority.

Starting from now, we're going to be posting our immediate, quick and dirty fixes to the new Beta branch of the game! Once they have been tested and are considered stable, they will be pushed to the main branch of the game.

To access the beta branch, right-click on the game in your library, go to properties. Once in the properties menu, go to 'betas' tab. Then, go to the branch selection and select the 'releasebeta'


Anyways, on to the regularly scheduled patch notes!

ADDED: Option to disable the dream cam effect in Sleeperwalker and Christoff Cutscenes.
TWEAK: Nerfed MERC Zerkers
TWEAK: Small aim-block shelf added to Jorge's ledge in C&J's first fight that is only on when you're up top. Helps keep you from aiming down below unintended.
TWEAK: Teleporter added to Playground so you can move back and forth as a large unit.
TWEAK: Honk Zeds have a flashbang effect on explode rather than a grenade effect.
TWEAK: Crackpot laughs a lot less when casting magic.
TWEAK: Crackpot guarded by two Prophets, not two Graveseekers.
TWEAK: Reduced the grind of Flood Control and Chasms significantly, and threw in a couple of narrations between Sanford and Deimos to cut up the monotony.
TWEAK: Inched the Grab/SwordLock grapple toward being slightly in favor in the player.
FIXED: Interactive mode Throwables and Shields now usable, and you can restart your game properly.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/488860/MADNESS_Project_Nexus/

Just do what comes natural.

ADDED: Voices volume slider.
TWEAK: SFX added to Face Picker and Fence stores.
TWEAK: Squadmates will avoid running into dinner bells. This may conflict with how they pathfind, but that seemed like the better alternative.
TWEAK: Better Acro XP the lower your Acrobatics core skill.
TWEAK: Squadmates will abandon a target the moment they're dead. No more wasted bullets.
TWEAK: A few changes to Gil to make him easier.
TWEAK: Wider range of mid-tier weapons will persist in Arena.
TWEAK: Story squadmates are very inclined to evade grapples. They'll nearly always do it unless stunlocked.
FIXED: Sheriff stage starter ACTUALLY fixed this time.
FIXED: Sometimes, out-of-bounds zones would exclude certain enemies forever (such as when entering into the area via a door). An added safeguard should prevent this type of soft lock in the future.
FIXED: Phobos ghosts agro again.
FIXED: Hiring/Firing a recruit that was just called in but doesn't exist on the map will now properly remove that recruit from the pool.
FIXED: You can quit out of the Truck Chase stage without the game sending you back to the Story Campaign intro cutscene.
FIXED: Squadmates will do a better job avoiding and staying out of Dinner Bell alarms.
FIXED: Slaughter Time audience could become unaffected by volume settings.

NOTE: The mute button for voices doesn't work, it'll be in the next build.

TWEAK: Large-vs-Small executes follow the same rules for killing opponents as any other execute, and have been made more gorey to celebrate.
TWEAK: Four years later, the beam for your headlamp goes off along with the spotlight by pressing F.
FIXED: Locked ladder at beginning of Tutorial.
FIXED: Opening some lockers (such as the Warchest), your hand would not follow the opening door or lid.
FIXED: Sleepwalker Bed started you off on wave -1.
FIXED: Small fixes to the Tricky fight, and made the stage easier to see what's happening.
FIXED: Sheriff wouldn't leap the second sandbag.
FIXED: (Maybe?) Levels of alertness were being applied strangely. It was only really showing in Turrets, but this may resolve other issues with characters not going agro when they should.
FIXED: Turrets weren't reloading when out of ammo, and
FIXED: Knockback from heavy and sweep attacks were sending folks the wrong way.
FIXED: Tricky and Christoff weren't coming with you into the Overworld after defeating them in their respective stages.
FIXED: Mag Bandit's light post would turn on when dropped.
FIXED: You shouldn't be trapped out of the stage in the Church/Jorge Mining Sector fight anymore.
FIXED: Flare Pistol is no longer obscenely heavy. Some ammo types (not magazines) were increasing the weight of their respective firearms.
FIXED: Blackguard's sweep attacks will hit again.
FIXED: Camo pants, and some gloves, were lowering their price for having good buffs rather than raising it.

IMPORTANT: We set each of the three pre-rendered videos (Gibbing Tree logo, MPN title card, and New Story career intro) each to different settings. Please let us know which ones DO and DO NOT work for you! Some players have been having issues, so we're trying a spread of ideas.

ADDED: The final demonstration snippets on the main menu are in! At a glance, players will have a better grasp of what each mode is.
TWEAK: Acrobatic squadmates will be more likely to dodge out of the way of enemy grapple attacks just in time.
TWEAK: Your squadmates are less prone to being combo'd by opponents.
TWEAK: G03LM tantrum grab will still result in a Distracted (back-grab) condition even if they manage to grab an enemy.
TWEAK: Sheriff Boots have the spurs toggleable on/off from Colorizer.
TWEAK: G03LM Mk1 slightly less tanky, but not by much.
TWEAK: Imaginary Friend is more aggressive, and gets a big damage buff to its fists based on your level. They'll get extremely beefy fast.
TWEAK: Squadmates will run back to you if they are too far and without orders. Combat used to prevent this.
TWEAK: Updated how units find a location to spawn into the world or teleport. Be on the lookout for this causing issues, even though it's been fine in testing (like that EVER matters)
TWEAK: Better pacing with how HQ shops respond to you with voices.
TWEAK: The old eye gouge execute got a facelift (lol?)
FIXED: Brute was blocked from entering Pit Stop through the wrecked car.
FIXED: Under the right circumstances, Coin Holders in Slaughter Time could prevent the next squad of enemies from spawning.
FIXED: Turrets wouldn't vanish after death.
FIXED: Sometimes, large enemies might screw up the way a character is targeted by A.I.. Don't ask.
FIXED: Firing your weapon could prevent you from blocking for some time afterwards.
FIXED: Sweet Tony wakes up properly.
FIXED: Allies not able to incap properly.
FIXED: NPCs should no longer go hunting for weapons when they have an order already.
FIXED: Vampires outside Club Advent no longer run down the stairs after jumping in.

ADDED: Pre-rendered introduction added to new Story Campaign games!
ADDED: Tricky in the Load Screen
TWEAK: Since Jeb has a busted sword by default, we made his original loadout available after beating Commercial District 2: Sleeper Labs.
TWEAK: Binary Sword moved to purchase at Fence, and the Stop Sign is now available there as well.
TWEAK: Asylum Patient faces brightened up to make them more distinguishable vs Grunts.
TWEAK: A little clean-up on the flashback cutscenes with Christoff. Also, once you're in there, you HAVE to finish it to proceed.
FIXED: Pathing in Murder Room.
FIXED: Enemies that spawn into overworld sectors will have their default equipment if not given anything else.
FIXED: Dead squadmates (or yourself) come back to life when leaving any stage.
FIXED: Skip Stage button won't wipe your equipment out anymore

DISABLED: Steam Achievements until we can develop those further.
ADDED: SFX sweetener when a room goes unlocked after clearing it, to remind you it's time to move on.
TWEAK: Binary Sword now breaks into a smaller version of itself, before then breaking into a hilt. Jeb now starts with that broken version by default, but can be assigned the full Binary Sword on replays as a loadout.
FIXED: Story characters should reset stats to normal if playing them in a stage. This ought to fix the post-credits cutscene issue with Jeb losing telekinesis.
FIXED: Smoothed out transition between emote animations. Interrupting one emote for another would often cut awkwardly and immediately into the next animation.
FIXED: Damage Tick wouldn't show for the attack that killed your target.
FIXED: Commanding squadmates to pick up weapons won't result in them trying and failing anymore.
FIXED: Units will swap out of weapons they've depleted.

AI UPDATE:
-More aggro the more enemies targeting them
-Finds a spot to attack from that is opposite where melee attackers are coming from
-Can push through crowds if they HAVE to move through them
-Smarter dodge (always snap first if it's a combat dodge)
-Dodge out of crowds when surrounded by melee attackers
-No more walking (instead of running) in combat when melee threats are near
-Can juke enemies by making enemies attack sooner than they want to.
-Will dodge away from exploding barrels

ADDED: An additional cutscene to play after you've beaten the game and watched the credtis. You can also reach it by accessing the Credits through Mystery Dude's cave paintings.
ADDED: Introductory rooms for Hard Sell, Haunting of Nevada House, and Slaughter Time.
ADDED: New voice sets for Hank, Hofnarr, Pilot, Quartermaster, VendeVice, Toughs, and Orderlies!
TWEAK: Gudgeon Swarmers in Slaughter Time will now punch you relentlessly. We made their fists weaker, but expect to get ganged up on a LOT.
TWEAK: Experiment's claws were nerfed. Same bonus damage, but some hidden bonuses were removed.
TWEAK: Brute takedown animation tweaked so weapons will end up falling through the ground much less often.
TWEAK: Nexus Core flags altered to look les Third-Reich-y. Like, we get it. They're the bad guys.
FIXED: Experiment's Scary Origin skill should work again.
FIXED: Infiltration missions did not allow you to proceed when finishing an Infinite Checkpoint.
KNOWN ISSUE: There is a sound that won't turn off after experiencing the post-credits cutscene. Only restarting the game will resolve it (thanks a ton FMOD, you were such a great investment)
THIS ISSUE HAS NOW BEEN FIXED

It's that time of year once again folks! Time for more badass Madness 'toons, games, music and art over on today (and every day, frankly.) So git'cher butt on over to the submission page and CONSUME THE MADNESS!


Banner by KitsuneYuki476

We'll see you all again in ONE WEEK for the release of the game!

ADDED: Arena has a new system for its Infinite Waves, which are now broken into Checkpoints. Completing all waves in a checkpoint resets the wave, but the enemies will be Imprinted to be more difficult each time. Please help us test this new feature!
FIXED: Hazards were bouncing you wildly far away.

ADDED: Tutorial now also teaches Charge-up Attacks
TWEAK: Cleaner access to the Flashback Cutscenes in Story Campaign when viewing Mystery Dude's cave art.
FIXED: Directional sound uses the correct speakers when the camera changes direction (it used to only be based on position)
FIXED: The final Flashback Cutscene started you indoors. Now it starts outside, with a little tasty reference to Madness Combat.

ADDED: The Massive can yank the helmet off of dizzied G03LMs now, rather than being too big to do it.
TWEAK: Arena hirelings will do a better job avoiding Murder Room pits before they fall.
TWEAK: Several safeties instituted to keep career saves from being nuked if something goes wrong during the save.
FIXED: The Massive can operate the stairs in all Contract Missions
FIXED: Leaving the Mag Bandit fight would cause Hank to float in the air forever.

ADDED: New Tutorial game for beginners to learn the ropes (Controller commands version coming soon).
ADDED: New playable Story Cutscenes added between all sectors. They only play once, but can be accessed again by viewing the Mystery Dude's work in the Outskirts gas station.
TWEAK: Press RETURN during the load screen to start the next scene immediately after the load is complete.
TWEAK: Stats adjustments to a bunch of armor in Arena.

ADDED: New official Gibbing Tree logo and intro.
ADDED: Bandages Skin added to the Skin Picker. Go be Madness Combat 4 Hank! (He wasn't that good though)
TWEAK: Bribed Enemies and Troopers will exit the Foundry at the end of the round via some new ladders.
FIXED: Some errors with Gestalt in the Climb stage.
FIXED: Small changes to how enemies path when first entering a room.


The demo has also been updated To be on the current build of the game. There is no new content, but all the bugfixes, balance changes and improvements over the past several months.

It's finally here. After over 7 years of anticipation. After 7+ years of eye-straining, sanity-draining, bank balance-straining work. Through crowdfunding campaigns, cross-country moves, life changes, code-rewrites, engine updates, part time jobs and a freakin' worldwide plague, the end of our wild journey is almost here.

And it has a date.


[previewyoutube=bqoQhjvkTqw;full][/previewyoutube]


SEPTEMBER 29TH.


We've been waiting so long to finally get this thing into you folks' hands, and we know you sure as heck have been waiting for us to give it to you. In just two and a half weeks the wait will finally be over. Whether you backed us all the way back in 2014, are one of our Funky new friends, or hopped on this crazy train somewhere in between, we're all eternally grateful that you've continued to stick with us through to the end.

We don't plan on letting you down. See you all on the 29th.

ADDED: Background images for Arena stages (seen in the Stage Select menu), courtesy of DarkSignal
ADDED: Arena inventory screen: Hold SHIFT to scroll faster through the list, or HOME/END to pop straight to the top or bottom.
TWEAK: DoTs cannot kill a character locked into a synch animation (Execute, Grapple, Blade Lock, etc.)
TWEAK: Cleanup on how NPCs initialize their orders when the player enters their room.
TWEAK: Hank's Hardened Goggles weren't reflecting white like his standard goggles.
FIXED: Enemies on a path would sometimes run right past, ignoring you.
FIXED: Specters and some other enemies were teleporting to their same position without going anywhere.
FIXED: The zed body that Gil starts off chopping up was glitched.
FIXED: The icons for buffs you'd collected weren't removing, despite going transparent.
FIXED: Combo meter wasn't displaying.

TWEAK: Your combo timer will be extended while in a synch'd animation with another character, while in a melee/charge-up state, or while dodging. Each of these actions increases the timer by varying amounts.
FIXED: Some other stuff the last updates broke lol

ADDED: Melee and Unarmed now ignore a flat percentage of an enemy's armor value. This percentage increases as your Lethality and Force subattributes grow, respectively.
TWEAK: Option menu audio sliders now snap to whole numbers. No one needs a decimal worth of volume change.
TWEAK: Your hirelings will attempt to evade the weapon boxes (and thus their explosions) spawned into Slaughter Time.
TWEAK: Changes to how NPCs decide to dodge obstacles and sniper fire. They were also sometimes dodging when they shouldn't.
TWEAK: Small changes to Disquieted teleport so you don't end up in ridiulous places.
TWEAK: Squadmates who die in the Sleepwalker mission won't end up in the medbay.
FIXED: Contract 4 would crash after load.
FIXED: Slaughter Time floors weren't allowing the Disquieted teleport to work.
FIXED: Music would turn off after adjusting its volume.
FIXED: Hirelings who died on a mission but received enough XP on a previous wave to level up, will now do so.
FIXED: Assigning weapons to a character who doesn't appear in a stage with you would cause the item to vanish forever.

ADDED: Our beloved Dr. Crackpot has his own voice set!
FIXED: G03LMs will stun after five hits again. This comes with another streamline to the code.
FIXED: Contract 3 had an odd crash that should be good now.

ADDED: Couple new swatches.
TWEAK: Industrial Sector touched up with more MERC branding.
TWEAK: Bandit gear will all now colorize.
TWEAK: More adjustments to the pathfinding system.
FIXED: The shipping container floors of Fast Track (Car #2) were preventing the Disquieted from teleporting.
FIXED: The no-shooting-while-hit-by-melee tweak was causing enemies not to shoot whatsoever until struck at least once.

ADDED: New shape for the Disquieted mask, in case you need a version that fits with hoods.
ADDED: Zeds now have their own takedown animation versus Brute-sized opponents.
TWEAK: Pathfinding tweaked to allow characters to nudge each other out of the way a little more freely. We hope this doesn't create issues, but keep your finger over the bug report button just in case.
TWEAK: Some Takedowns would launch enemies further the bigger they are. The game will now adjust your and their animation speeds to stop this from happening.
TWEAK: Non-bot NPCs that are struck by melee will not shoot their firearms until after a brief timer has passed.
FIXED: We're cleaning up old, obsolete pieces of clothing. The Disquieted origin was using one of them.
FIXED: Small issue with Hireling gear reappearing in the inventory after it was supposed to be destroyed.
FIXED: Thrown melee/ranged weapons weren't benefitting from the damage powerup.
FIXED: Face Picker wasn't properly updating your default face until you left the scene.

TWEAK: New rifle ammo types added to workbench, others modified.
TWEAK: The Massive origin has a new defensive takedown when they're targeted by enemies, which should stop them from taking painful hits from Orderlies, Patients, Zeds, and other grabby opponents.
TWEAK: Enabling/disabling of the HUD has been generally cleaned up.
TWEAK: More precautions to prevent enemies from attacking you while you're in a finisher attack.
TWEAK: Moving Target Acrobatics skill now has Tactical Novice as a prerequisite.
TWEAK: As a general rule, a character cannot be stunlocked by an attacker that is some degree smaller than them. Many enemies already had hard rules regulating whether or not they can be stunlocked, but this will help cover the Massive's gradual growth.
TWEAK: The Foundry has been made easier: MERC Gunners only spawn as a boss unit on the final waves of the second and third checkpoint, and the Captains are moved to Infinite Waves only.
FIXED: The Massive origin could leap into outer space under the right circumstances. They could also leap outside the boundaries of the stage, and would take damage when landing.
FIXED: Small issue when calculating damage dealt by H2H bonuses.

ADDED: Smiley texture for Disquieted Mask.
TWEAK: We're testing giving the Massive the AAHW Half-Mag's charge-up punch, as well as a "Hulk Leap", mostly to get around the stage more quickly, but also because it's cool. Use your charge-up attack to unleash both.
TWEAK: Big Weapons skill was priced over where it ought to have been.
TWEAK: Revolvers had ludicrous armor piercing.
FIXED: Disquieted Mask was terribly expensive to colorize due to an antiquated pricing convention.
FIXED: Disquieted was teleporting into ramps during melee attacks.
FIXED: Disquieted Free Execute skill wasn't working.
FIXED: Music no longer cuts out after transitioning between scenes.

FEATURE: Contract 4, the final stage of Arena Combat, is now available once you've beaten the Nexus Facility stage, and along with that, Arena's "New Game +" Imprint system. EXPECT BUGS, TESTERS.
TWEAK: Load Screen doesn't dump you into the next scene until you've pressed RETURN.
TWEAK: BUffer period when narrations occur so you don't accidentally skip the dialog by pressing Return right as new dialog appears.
TWEAK: The big Sector/HQ graphic that displays up top when you go to a new overworld area will no longer play until all cutscenes are complete.
TWEAK: Removed the weapons from the hands of your squad when departing the helipad. It looked goofy. Just store your weapons for takeoff, ya goons.
FIXED: Finished repairs to the audio system used by the Minigun, Flamethrower, and Sludge Hose.
FIXED: The description for the Throw Big acrobatic skill was outdated.
FIXED: Blunt Throw skill had an absurd price for its tier level.
FIXED: Stragglers would pass THROUGH lifts in some instances. They would also attempt to walk to inconvenient points to stand.
FIXED: Small single-frame animation glitch on menu characters.
FIXED: Non-Automatic Rate-of-Fire bonus was applying to automatics.

TWEAK: You and your squad are invincible during Takedowns that you initiate.
TWEAK: Changed some stage prerequisites in Arena. It's not as linear, but you need the same stages complete to unlock each Contract.
TWEAK: Lowered the number of waves per checkpoint in Murder Time.
FIXED: A tiny issue caused all sorts of start locations to freeze the characters using them.
FIXED: Minigun was having issues with its continuous fire audio. While this should be fixed now, other problems may crop up (such as moving between rooms firing off its idle sound). If anything hardcore breaks tho, bug report it!

ADDED: G03LMs have a different tantrum animation than other Brutes.
-ADDED: Click to get rid of a tooltip.
-ADDED: Goyle's got a proper recording crew for his show.
-TWEAK: Huge melee weapons (the ones with reeeeeally heavy swings) will always either knock back or ragdoll opponents.
-TWEAK: Ragdoll Executes no longer available to basic NPCs.
-TWEAK: Aim reticle recoil visual (the red circle) no longer gets so outrageously big.
-TWEAK: Significantly increased the frequency and max number of weapon boxes that spawn in Slaughter Time
-TWEAK: We're giving upper level enemies the Deadeye skill, in order to balance against Tac Master a bit. This will let them break corpus with grazing shots.
-TWEAK: Some effects on the final boss of the Story Campaign were adjusted to only be seen when they're facing certain directions. This should make it easier to tell which way they're facing, due to transparency.
-FIXED: Pathing and collision issues in Murder Room ought to be resolved.
-FIXED: Camera issues when traveling between scenes.
-FIXED: UI Notifications would glitch out their formatting if more than one played in a row.
-FIXED: Medical Cabinets inside vans were missing in Contract 3.
-FIXED: Since changing the stage order in Arena, some things were firing off before they were supposed to.
-FIXED: Small error in cutscene camera direction when trying to focus on certain characters.
-FIXED: The trapped explosion-door at the start of Residential 2 was firing off twice.
-FIXED: The broken hilts of some melee weapons could have a range FIFTY TIMES farther than any other, thanks to a typo.
-FIXED: A variety of things could cause characters to either become stuck in an emote, or cause an emote to be interrupted prematurely. We've revised the system that controls when these things happen.
-FIXED: More Depth of Field issues have been dealt with.

ADDED: Indicators on the Pilot/Bus map for Arena stages you've beaten.
-ADDED: Your corpus now display your healing process.
-TWEAK: Outskirts snipers firing on you before Stage 2 "Power Play" will now go on forever until you've disabled the spotlights. This replaces an old, unstable system.
-TWEAK: The end cutscene of Outskirts Stage 3 "Road to Nexus City" better displays the Mag Bandit destroying the gate.
-TWEAK: Slight boost to Hireling XP gain.
-TWEAK: Skill description font sized down.
-TWEAK: Game is more clear about when you've beaten a stage in Arena via the end-wave breakdown.
-TWEAK: Most Arena stages must now be played in a set order. Colors have been added to indicate stages that are unplayable, already completed, or next on your list.
-TWEAK: Modified some dialog in Arena (mostly between the Player and Doc) to account for how we want certain plot points revealed, and to remove red herring info that doesn't help to push the plot.
-TWEAK: Cleaned up the Options menu, removed obsolete key bindings, and added a tab for Keyboard/Controller instructions.
-FIXED: Healing your Corpus used to speed up when dealing damage to enemies. After the healing system revamp/cleanup, this feature was removed. We've put it back in, and a visualization for this process up top.
-FIXED: The trail on your target reticle would sometimes load in terribly huge.
-FIXED: Enemies that vanish on death (Robots, etc.) were vanishing with their held weapons. These should now drop before they vanish.
-FIXED: Animated textures (punch plates, etc.) were messing up if that character was involved in a cutscene.
-FIXED: Open vans in Contract 3 had no collision.
-FIXED: Squadmates weren't animating in Stage Menu screens.

We should have Contract 4 done by the end of the week. The final stage still needed more testing, but we wanted to get these bugfixes out now!

NOTE: Since we changed the order that stages are played in Arena, you may find some missions not appearing where you remember them being (namely Contracts),

Go check out the helipad and make sure you've completed all missions there. Any green stage markers mean you haven't completed them yet, as far as the game is now concerned.

Tweak: Hard Sell units will take cover in their back rooms.
-Tweak: Water splashes were too loud. SHHHHH
-Fixed: Small color error on goggles/glasses.
-Fixed: Story Campaign enemies performing an animation were speaking their wake-up chatter when they ought not do it.

*NOTE: We accidentally skipped 1.37.c and released as 1.37.d last night, so we're just advancing to 1.37.e today

Tweak: Continuing your combo or landing a crit depended on tapping and releasing LMB (because of how Charge-Up power attacks work). Now, it'll only look at pressing LMB. Should work for controllers too, but needs further testing.
Tweak: Cleaned up the "sniper aim" area marker.
Tweak: NPCs will generally wanna get out of the way of the Mortar's grenade range before he fires.
Tweak: Escaping an Orderly's grapple requires Space Bar to get out, not Attack.
Fixed: Haunted House was inverting the frequency of Demoniac Cultist attacks based on difficulty. Thus, they rarely appeared on Madness difficulty, and spawned too often on Tourist.
Fixed: N51 Mortar was sneaking in a grenade launcher attack without the "sniper aim" area marker. I cannot recreate it, so I added what might work as a fix.
Fixed: Stepping in blood puddles would paint your body instead of your feet.
Fixed: Melee weapons, or weapons without mods of any kind, had trouble spawning into the Blackmarket when appropriate.
Fixed: Cyber Bandits got a small graphics tweak to their goggle glow.

Editor's note: Whoopsie! Totally forgot to hit 'publish' on this sucker. Thanks to user BFR2005 for pointing this out!

Tweak: The influence ammo capacity has on the price of Arena firearms has been drastically reduced. The Minigun should sit at around $1 million now instead of $4.2 million. We'll keep playing with these values until it feels right.
-Tweak: Standard G03LM units use the same rear takedown for both Melee and Unarmed if the attack wouldn't kill them, just like they used to.
-Fixed: Default loadouts for some enemies weren't being equipped correctly.
-Fixed: Some Story Campaign units were interrupting their plot animations to wander around.
-Fixed: Timer wasn't displaying when it should have (it was still working though).
-Fixed: Graveseekers and Prophets in the Mining 2 minecart chase weren't spawning with their default weapons.
-Fixed: Theoretically, we've removed what may have caused enemies to dodge away from your H2H Finisher.
-Fixed: Updating the version of your game would reset some of your saved options/preferences. But not this update

Feature: Murder Room is back in Arena. Not all trap features are in and live, but so far we like the new layout.
-Added: New combat emotes for Nexus Core and N51.
-Added: Grenade launching weapons will force NPCs to utilize a modified form of the "sniper aim" which broadcasts where they're gonna carpet bomb. Squadmates and Bot-mind units will continue to fire normally.
-Added: New Cyber Bandit gear at the Quartermaster and Skin Picker.
-Tweak: N51 "Wall of Death" will move a tad more quickly. Still not allowing them to sprint.
-Tweak: Enemies attack more slowly in Tourist mode, and more quickly on Tough + Madness.
-Tweak: AAHW Soldats had access to the Sweet Spot skill, which allowed them to potentially shoot through your Tac-Bar if you were in their ideal range. That's been removed.
-Tweak: Attack warnings in Arena Siege stages could all play at once, making it far too loud.
-Tweak: For some reason, we never let the earpiece headset be available for purchase at the Quartermaster. It is now.
-Fixed: Grapples were causing the camera to zoom in even when the player isn't involved.
-Fixed: Unfinished progress bars would remain on screen for interactives after they were disabled.
-Fixed: Enemies bribed by the Mercenary Origin will cancel their current orders. N51 Recons were still trying to disable their Siege target after being converted. TRAITORS.
-Fixed: Too many units interacting with the Siege objective in Hard Sell could cause you to lose the stage before the Artifact was exposed.

We're almost there, guys. Next up: CONTRACT 4, and the END OF ARENA

Feature: Third and final Siege stage added to Arena, and along with it, the N51 faction make their presence known. They're sturdier than the Nexus Core, but more conservative in their attacks.
-Tweak: The health of Turrets is unaffected by Madness difficulty. In addition, the size of a unit reduces the effect Madness difficulty has on their health.

Added: Incapped squadmates will have a little marker to show where they are if they're off screen.
-Added: The last few enemies in a wave will also have markers, so you can track them down. No more hide-and-seek. NOTE We need our testers to help us find where enemies are hiding in Facility when the last few units won't enter.
-Tweak: Damage bonuses for gloves were WAY too high. I mean, come on. The Punkers boosting your damage to the same as the Dragon Slayer? Gimme a break.
-Tweak: To compensate for unarmed damage being nerfed, your Force, Lethality, and Critical sub-attributes will further increase your Unarmed, Melee, and H2H Critical damage respectively.
-Tweak: Slowed the Foundry stage conveyor belts down to half their current speed.
-Tweak: Shields take damage while blocking. They absorb all damage, so it's fair they should degrade. Blocking with melee weapons is unaffected.
-Tweak: The Chameleon augmentation was deducting Tac-Damage from incoming hits incorrectly.
-Fixed: Hank was using the wrong block animation while unarmed.
-Fixed: Narrations won't cause your head to bob if it would stop you from blocking, weapon swapping, Tac-dodging, etc.
-Fixed: One of the quick attacks for dual wield wasn't swooshing correctly.
-Fixed: Oil splats in Industrial Sector were obscuring weapons dropped underneath them.

Added: The Fence carries a bunch of new augmentations.
-Tweak: Streamlined the calculations for Trauma (damage) recovery.
-Tweak: Engineers and Soldats won't leap away from your melee attacks anymore.
-Tweak: Slowed down G03LM units.
-Tweak: Lowered the frequency of blood splattering on you. It was getting out of hand.
-Fixed: Starting in the wrong room of the Facility.
-Fixed: All of the Fence's items should be available right away, regardless of Arena progress.

Added: Odiums have their own unique attacks added in. They'll be a lot less brutal, too.
-Tweak: Nexus Soldats have two instead of three corpus, but now they're a bit faster than they were before.
-Tweak: Punching Bag toy wasn't really responding to impacts.
-Tweak: Small adjustments to how some enemies spawn in Facility to keep them from getting stuck out of view.
-Fixed: Zeds looked goofy when holding a gun, and it could screw up attack positioning and likelihood.
-Fixed: Some bonuses from armor weren't being added or removed correctly.
-Fixed: Could get stuck in Mag Bandit's second fight if knocked out of the stage.
-Minor: Dead squadmates would show as healed after the end of any checkpoint in Arena.

Tweak: Facility stage has better blockers to prevent Soldats from appearing in areas where they shouldn't.
-Fixed: Camera will properly zoom in at times when it should have.
-Fixed: Squadmates couldn't be commanded to use an Interactive object (computer terminals, etc) if they were already standing on it.
-Fixed: Some fall-to-death areas weren't applying damage or corpus loss correctly.
-Fixed: Story Campaign's unlockable MERC Uniform was referencing a broken object, and wouldn't work.
-Fixed: Nexus Core units like to stick to their leader, but would insist on doing this when assigned to guard a point.
-Fixed: Squadmates swap weapons again when they run out of ammo.

Features: The Facility is back in the Arena, and with it, the Nexus Core. Good luck - if you thought Slaughter Time was difficult, then you're gonna need.
-Added: Nexus Soldats and other stealthy enemies may spawn by dropping directly in behind you. LOOK OUT.
-Tweak: Cultists in the Haunted House stage no longer count for your kills, and spawn on a different timer than the main waves you need to defeat.
-Tweak: All throwable and big-projectile weapons will now pass through fences. The fact that they couldn't was stopping crossbows, daggers, etc. from passing through the Haunted House windows.
-Tweak: Slight speed increase for low level characters.
-Fixed: Some fall-to-death areas weren't applying damage or corpus loss correctly.
-Fixed: Story Campaign's unlockable MERC Uniform was referencing a broken object, and wouldn't work.

Featured: New Arena stage, filled with new badguys to beat up!
-Added: Slashing Stun action added to Critical sub-attribute. This gives slashing weapons a small chance to cause Dizzy debuffs on enemy (nowhere near blunt/unarmed ability).
-Added: New Slayer Knife at the Quartermaster, and three versions with elemental variations at the Blackmarket.
-Tweak: Characters with a net positive resistance to an elemental type (Burn, Dissonance, Shock, etc.) cannot be affected by DoT's of that type. Example: Robots resist Dissonance, so Dissonance DoT's won't stick to them.
-Tweak: Explosions do reduced damage to the Player squad in general. In addition, team damage from explosions is way down for Player squad (though it's much less for the player themselves).
-Tweak: Gas Pumps in Pit Stop now heal between Waves (amount based on difficulty), but they have a little less overall health.
-Tweak: Improvements to how the squad command system interprets your clicks.
-Tweak: Quartermaster is back to stocking only weapons within your Tier range.
-Tweak: The Pain voice for characters will happen a little more often, and under different circumstances than before. We're checking to see if these voices get over-played (especially for Player squadmates)
-Tweak: Visuals for losing and especially healing Tac-Bar improved to be cleaner and more readable.
-Tweak: Adjusted AI's desire to throw grenades. Should be fairer for all sides, but requires testing.
-Tweak: Hirelings won't abandon their Hold-Position post to chase enemies they can't see.
-Tweak: Zeds can be stunlocked by H2H.
-Tweak: The Pilot's now has a crew on the Helipad.
-Fixed: Pausing the game could cause characters to screw up their calculations and break them (which could lock enemies out of reach). This particular error is now fixed FOREVER.
-Fixed: RoButlers weren't displaying all the correct textures.
-Fixed: Shield bash was benefiting from Light Swing skill.
-Fixed: Gil wasn't grabbing targets correctly after the Execution system revamp.
-Fixed: Explosive barrels were messed up.
-Fixed: Characters using an interactive object in a stage would continue using it after death.
-Fixed: Powerup Bonuses were staying applied when leaving scenes.
-Fixed: Some firearms had ludicrous magazine counts.
-Fixed: Bonus Magazines from outfits weren't applying.
-Fixed: Countering a leaping/charging enemy wasn't causing you to properly counter and throw them.
-Fixed: Rear executes versus Brute-class enemies weren't doing the "no-kill" version (this was a visual bug only - they would still stand up after).
-Fixed: Damage Ticker wasn't showing bonus damage being applied (as per Experiment's fire weakness).
-Fixed: Church/Jorge weren't spawning into their third bossfight.
-Fixed: Lag spike in the boss room of Flood Control, AGAIN.
-Fixed: Sticking to interactive objects (such as valves) after finishing using them.
-Fixed: Powerups weren't despawning when they were supposed to.(edited)

*NOTE: The new stage will need LOTS of testing! EXPECT BUGS.
NEXT UP: The return of The Facility

Feature: We rewrote the Bonus system from scrap. This will affect the buffs your Origin gives you, as well as wearables like gloves. If you notice the bonuses suddenly not working, let us know!
-Added: The Fence now sells you augments. These powerful stat boosters occupy a unique slot on your body.
-Tweak: Agent Shades use the "cat-eye" reflection property differently than other glowy goggles, for testing.
-Tweak: Medical Cabinets added to Contract 3.
-Tweak: Cleaned up the body asset for Spectral skin.
-Fixed: Grade B Troopers in Arena were set to a low level, which screwed up their hiring price and made them behave stupider than usual.
-Fixed: The new Alternate Parts system (which allows players to pick new heads and skins for their Arena characters) was screwing up some characters like Gestalt who have their own alternate parts already.

Added: Swatch Inverter added to Colorizer/Skin Picker. Once you've bought a two-tone swatch, you can swap which color goes onto which part of your gear/body. This feature needs testing, so please go nuts and report bugs!
-Added: More swatches.
-Tweak: Precision Shooter skill now also lets you instantly drain enemy Tac-Bars when they're in your Sweet Spot, rather than wait for the bar to drain.
-Tweak: Small bonus to Cash/XP for playing stages on higher difficulties.
-Tweak: Lowered cost to skip checkpoints.
-Tweak: No summoning Troopers into the Sleepwalker Tutorial stage. You can still bring in your Hirelings, though.
-Fixed: Skin changes weren't showing up on your character or Hirelings as they take the helicopter to/from missions.
-Fixed: Tier 0 gear was uncolorizable because there was no cost to tint them, and the game didn't know what to do with that.

Added: More skins to Skin Picker.
-Tweak: Difficulty affects how expensive it is to skip Arena checkpoints in a stage.
-Fixed: Buying up Checkpoints in an Arena stage and then backing out of the menu would reset your difficulty to the last difficulty you'd played.

Feature: Arena Contract 3: Club Advent
Feature: Boon Tokens, earned by completing Arena stages on higher difficulties and by hunting special
enemies during infinite waves. You'll spend them at the Fence and the Skin Picker, both accessed after Contract 3.
Feature: You can now hire and summon Status Quo minions during missions. The upgrade terminal is located in the Dormatory. This feature is available after Contract 2 (so, most of you have it already).
Feature: Skin Picker enabled in the new HQ Loft (unlocked after Contract 3), allowing you to modify your and your hirelings' appearances...for a price. Keep track of this space for other goodies over time!
Added: FNF reference. Are we popular yet?
Added: Testing a new reflecive effect on the "glass" surfaces of outfit pieces (Shades, Goggles, etc.). Not everything will shine the same way. Still a work in progress, especially on glasses (where it tends to be too obvious)
Added: Your selected stage difficulty is locked in for every Arena stage you play. Changing difficulties will reset you to Wave 0 on that stage.
Tweak: Playground now uses the new Skin Picker system when you morph into different units. This will fix alternate parts (zombie heads, etc.) that stayed with you when you swapped back to a normal unit.
Tweak: Colorizer can be used to adjust the gear on your Hirelings now.
Tweak: AAHW Half Mags will fire off the charge-up animation before doing their insane punch attack, and it will be less accurate if you're moving.
Tweak: Waves won't spawn units into a room if too many from that wave are still alive, but now waves will count ALL members of their faction when deciding to spawn, regardless of how they got there. This will need testing, especially in the Story Campaign!
Tweak: Better AI if they have the ThrowOften behavior. They'll only toss guns when they're outta ammo now. Also, helped AI know the difference between having the ShurrikenThrow skill and the ThrowOften behavior. Sanford should stop throwing guns now.
Tweak: Colorizer scales prices based on the tier of the item being colorized.
Tweak: Melee and unarmed strikes only regenerate Tac-Bar on crits, but they'll recharge more of it. Thrown melee weapons will also now recharge Tac-Bar as well.
Tweak: Leap-attack units (Abominations, etc.) will now deal hit damage if they fail their grapple due to a target's size or being occupied in another grapple or execute.
Fixed: Heatseeking "thrown" weapons (Church's Shock Bolt, Crackpot's Magic Bolt) weren't finding a target to lock onto.
Fixed: Punch Ablation + Enervation skills weren't happening at the right time.
Fixed: A small amount of your Unarmed XP was being counted as Melee, sometimes.
Fixed: Minor error where enemies with infinite ammo would try to draw from a personal stockpile of ammo that didn't exist, which would break their ability to reload. Shouldn't ever come up naturally in the game, but could be provoked in Playground.
Fixed: AAHW Mags and Gil were not executing their target when grabbing behind themselves.
Fixed: Removed a few tester characters from the Playground spawn menu.
Fixed: You could screw up the final scene of the Outskirts Truck Chase by leaping off the back just before cutting to the boulder scene.
Fixed: No more Hank with white gloves. This should stop Arena characters from losing all future texture and mesh alterations bought at the Colorizer, too.
Fixed: The "I'm talking" radar effect over characters' heads could become permanent under the right conditions. Those conditions should be resolved.
Fixed: Swapping between certain scenes could cause your music to restart the current track from scratch. Now it continues where it left off. This change may cause musical errors - keep an eye out for us please!
Fixed: Light Swing skill was applying to pistol whips.



NOTE: This is a big update with some fixes to MAJOR core engine details!
This means (say it with me now): THERE WILL BE BUGS!

Added: For testing, we threw in the AAHW Half-Mag into Fast Track (Final Checkpoint). He'll be undergoing observation, so send us your thoughts!
Tweak: Experiment Origin does standard Unarmed executes again.
Fixed: AAHW Mag bosses in Arena should spawn with their big guns now.
Fixed: Mags will spawn properly into the first train car of Fast Track, when appropriate.

Added: New Loud/Quiet loops for (some) Arena stage music. Tracks will start off in a quiet state, and advance to loud when you start the stage.
Tweak: Registered weapons will decay just like any other in the Arena.
Fixed: Sweet spot was visible when starting a stage, even if your targeting reticle was not.
Fixed: Narration squiggles weren't properly deleting themselves.

Added: Saved games sorted by Last Played.
Tweak: Arena Battle stages will calm down on the number of enemies they spawn at once. Except for Slaughter Time, of course.
Tweak: (Story) Fallen teammates will receive a little shove forward when they climb back into a stage after falling off a ledge while incapacitated. This should stop them falling backwards off the ledge they just recovered from.
Tweak: Those little blips over a character talking in a cutscene will now disappear the moment someone else starts talking.
Tweak: Upped the spawn frequency of weapon drops in Slaughter Time.
Fixed: Dead teammates being returned to a stage will no longer stand there idle, unable to be saved.
Fixed: Water was considering too many physics objects. Significantly reduced which objects water will interact with, which should help tremendously with lag spikes in the Mining Sector.
Fixed: Rare bug where using a Takedown on someone just as they leave a door could cause you and them to fly out of the stage.
Fixed: Bodies wouldn't decay at certain times during Slaughter Time stage (or any stage really, but mostly that one).

Added: Brand new back-end system to Executions/Takedowns! You won't notice much new on your end, but it's running faster than ever, and opens the door to tons of new options. For example: try using broken hilts on Mags, or execute a dizzy enemy as Jeb!
Tweak: No more locking swords with a melee opponent if you, the player, are in a finisher.
Fixed: Slaughter Time's murder fanblades would disorient after a long enough time. I blame floating point variables.
Fixed: Positioning & Footwork were affecting each other's categories and not their own.
Fixed: Cutscenes could cause a character's in-world textures to look wrong.
Fixed: Armor Filter and Eyebrows outfit pieces will stop disappearing after you buy them. You'll still need to buy them one more time, though
Fixed: Light Punch/Swing skills weren't apply the speed bonus to your attacks.

Added: New Damage Ticker tracks your destructive power! Enable it in the Options Menu.
Tweak: Weapons with small magazines (shotguns, etc) have their bonus mags properly multiplied by your Core Ranged skill and appropriate Extra Mag traits (it's no longer just a bonus measly single additional shot per).
Tweak: Outfit pieces now give different kinds of magazine bonuses. Check your gear to see if it applies.
Tweak: A little indicator to let you know when you have so many mags that more won't display.
Tweak: Starter gear in the Warchest is now just a few set weapons to give all skill groups a chance to train.
Tweak: Weapons that break and become other legit, non-handle weapons will cost more at the Quartermaster.
Fixed: Error in menus when trying to display a character who is wielding and glowy weapon (shock baton, etc.)
Fixed: A couple places where glowy light effects weren't doing what they need to.
Fixed: Scrying Goggles and a couple other outfit pieces are optimized and looking sharp.
Fixed; Agent origin properly calculating encumbrance again.
Fixed: Your starting Arena Origin gear will no longer vanish from your inventory when unequipped. Existing characters are unaffected :frowning:
Fixed: Cannot unequip gear that is reducing your encumbrance, if doing so would take you over cap.
Fixed: Heavy ranged weapons no longer upgreade their magazine count based on Core Ranged (as it was always meant to be).

Added: Glow effects added to a ton of goggles and other outfit pieces. Plus they're colorizable!
-Tweak: Glow effects for weapons appear correctly in the Inventory/Store.
-Tweak: The quartermaster only sells you classic grey outfit pieces. If you want them colorized, you're gonna hafta pay for it, pal.
-Tweak: Extending weapons (batons, Nexus blade, etc.) or weapons with wield animations will stay out/animated when you throw them. They also fit on the hip/back based on their retracted size.

Added: Laugh track for Slaughter Time complete
Added: Invulnerability Powerup drop for Arena
Tweak: Hand-to-hand Finishers can now only happen when you have one (or fewer) dudes swarming you. They were always meant to be "cool endings" to combat, so now that's a thing. As a result, we've also tweaked the Power Finisher skill to apply to any unarmed kill.
Tweak: Disabling your UI Hud doesn't force the cutscene bars to appear anymore.
Tweak: Taser Pistol and Flare Pistol cleaned up and available for purchase at Quartermaster
Fixed: DoT deaths to elemental effects (fire, etc.) will provoke the proper death animations.
Fixed: The game no longer resets your difficulty to Tourist (aka Easy) if you don't reselect your difficulty every time you play a stage (even though it shows the difficulty you picked last time).
Fixed: Sometimes you'd attack in slow motion if interrupted while doing a melee finisher.

Fixed: An optimization in the last update caused Sweet Spots to seemingly disappear.
Fixed: Elves could crash your game. Merry Friggin Christmas.
Tweak: Upped damage on Slaughter Time weapons.

Fixed: April Fools!
Added: The new Slaughter Time is now cleaned up. Go achieve glory!
Added: Enemy Slaughter Time weapons kill you in a lovely way.

Feature: Brand new HIGH DEF character models!
Feature: The new Slaughter Time Arena Stage is in! It replaces Murder Room for now (it may be back soon).
Added: Hit registration flash when you or your enemy are hit. Game feels much more arcade-y with this on, and we like it. This can be enabled/disabled from the Optons menu.
Added: Electrocution and Burning deaths.
Added: Stun Gun & Flare Gun weapons, for dealing low-tier shock and burn damage.
Tweak: Improvements to how NPCs upgrade their alert status by witnessing an ally who is also alert.

Added: New gloves! They're like fingerless, but with fingers.
-Added: MERC Power Saw weapon.
-Tweak: Weapon themes for Arena Waves has been instituted! Factions will only pick from weapons appropriate to them, regardless of tier, unless they have no others available.
-Fixed: Enemies should no longer approach you if you're locked into a cutscene.
-Fixed: Reassembling your squad (as per some Story cutscenes) could cause all sorts of problems if not done correctly. Should be more reliable now.

Tweak: Certain weapons won't blade-lock you with enemies. Chains, broken hilts, that sorta thing.
-Tweak: Improvements to GPU Instancing on blood splats (aka, fewer draw calls and thus better GPU performance)
-Fixed: Gore wasn't working for firearms.
-Fixed: Turrets were waking each other up repeatedly in Sleeper Labs because they were noticing the other turrets were awake, over and over.
-Demo: Bossfight music should be back in!

Hey there friends! In the very wee hours of the morning today, Swain pushed an update to the demo! In the update you'll find all sorts of bug fixes and improvements, as well as all the tweaks, changes and quality of life improvements we've been pushing to the main game over the past several months (which you can read in the lovely patch notes we've been putting out.)

To download the demo, head on over to the store page and look for the 'Download PC Demo' button on the top of the information sidebar on the right side of the page.




As always, any and all feedback and bug reports are very much appreciated. Other than that, have fun and keep on truckin'!

Added: Deimos joins the loading screen.
-Added: Two new T-shirt/Pants outfits, and some fixes to others.
-Added: Be careful, Church & Jorge don't like being knocked down.
-Fixed: 8th wave of Fast Track on the final checkpoint (aka Infinite) was inaccessible.
-Fixed: Bike chain SFX are back.
-Fixed: Broken glass on some Science Tower enemy rapel spawners fixed.
-Fixed: No more frozen characters who die, fall off of platforms, and return again.
-Fixed: Having a melee combo already triggered when getting hit would force you into a Charge-Up (Power) Attack when you recovered.
-Fixed: Fingerless gloves weren't supposed to be colorizable (yet). Maybe you'll stop seeing them reset now?
-Fixed: Upped the collision detection on powerups so they don't fall through the floor.

Added: Fast Track (the train stage) has been updated with a new car, a flashy front engine, and an updated existing car. CHOO CHOO.
-Added: Jorge has his voice lines! He and Church will also more reliably charge into one another when trying to get you.
-Tweak: Arena enemies won't randomly spawn with shields.
-Fixed: Spawning enemies into the Gas Station resolved.

Feature: Heavy attacks operate as sweep attacks now. Damage bonus has been reduced, but now your heavies can smash multiple opponents (albeit with reduced damage). Mega large weapons are unaffected.
-Tweak: Follow Through skill changed. Slashing weapons deal full damage to all enemies hit with your heavy swing. Gave this skill to the Story protagonists.
-Fixed: Enemies that are supposed to have infinite ammo should actually have it again.
-Fixed: Some dumb stuff with shurikens that I did. Also, their looping audio will properly end when they stop flying.
-Test: Falling damage negated if you just entered ragdoll. Should prevent losing corpus if an enemy's hit knocks you down, only for the floor to kill you.

Tweak: Sword Locks require you to mash ATTACK again, while evading Zeds etc. still requires DODGE.
-Tweak: Gloved weapons can now affect your damage type with unarmed.
-Tweak: Crossbows bolts fly through slain enemies more reliably than most other projectile types.
-Tweak: Better animation for de-masking and de-helmeting enemies (Sleepwalkers, Riot Guards, MERC Laborers)
-Tweak: Ranged-weapon NPCs in cover will prioritize being the attacker as if their target was at their ideal range.
-Fixed: Stunning Fist skill works again (did you notice it wasn't?)
-Fixed: Tooltips should place correctly on all aspect rations and resolutions. They've also beeen added to the Character Creation screen.

Howdy there folks! After a little over a month of closed testing, we're ready to open up the official Project Nexus Discord server to the world! This is a server exclusively for and about Project Nexus. If it's has anything to do with the game, we've got it. Come on down and chat about the game, share or view fan creations about the game, download mods for the game, catch Swain and Krinkles on a stream developing the game, or just join up and get (optional) pings for updates about the game!

For all your Project Nexus needs, join us at: https://discord.gg/BegDfepgkZ . Hope to see you there!

Featured: Pit Stop for Arena Combat has been reworked to provide a more siege-like experience. Expect bugs: we need your reports!
-Added: Crossbow SFX
-Tweak: Put nails on the wooden board melee weapon so please SHADDAP ABOUT IT NOW THX
-Tweak: Madness Difficulty only available when you beat a stage on Tough.
-Tweak: Lots of gear has been made colorizable.
-Tweak: Nexus Core units received improvements to their uniforms.
-Tweak: Riot Guards got further armor improvements (at least they would say so)
-Tweak: Mild armor calculation change.
-Tweak: Abomination screams should no longer burst eardrums.
-Tweak: Laborer no longer has an invincible head. Instead, his helmet gives him a second chance at living (hopefully he'll make better decisions).
-Tweak: Robots not invincible from the front anymore. Instead, they don't stun unless struck from behind.

Added: New Arena Powerups: Speed, Triple Damage, and Infinite Ammo
-Tweak: Dodge-y enemies have a time buffer before they may dodge again.
-Tweak: Player squadmates will now dodge and take cover sometimes, even if it's not in their personality.
-Fixed: Staggered Gunners (etc) die as expected when they take enough damage.
-Test: If Enginieers don't take cover often, or if your Squadmates dodge/take cover too often, let me know!

Added: New death animations!
-Added: New melee executions!
-Added: Longer stuns for victims hit by a Critical melee or unarmed strike.
-Added: Exit wound blood spray for Firearm kills.
-Added: While bracing your aim with most automatic weapons, if you tap the trigger VERY quickly, you'll fire a single shot rather than the full burst fire.
-Added: Visuals for "Priority Skills" to help new players decide what's important to buy next.
-Tweak: Lots of gear can now be Colorized.
-Tweak: Rate of Fire and ammo updates.
-Fixed: Hirelings no longer buy skills they aren't qualified to have.

Tweak: Management of audio channels improved on weapons.
-Fixed: Blackguard can be killed again.
-Fixed: Escalators in Science Tower Stage 1: Base Jumping no longer glitch out.
-Fixed: Some more cover objects that let you leap them out of a stage are now fixed.
-Fixed: A few blockers added in (like the final room of Arena's Contract 2)
-Fixed: NPCs leap over cover again like they used to.
-Fixed: Robot Rack spawners functioning.
-Fixed: Indicator for successful unarmed block vs opponent's unarmed no longer registered as a red-squiggle.

Tweak: Hirelings will want to find new weapons on the ground more often than before.
-Tweak: Striking an opponent targetting a gas pump will draw their attention away from it.
-Tweak: Contract 2 ("The Goods") is tougher than before. Characters able to pass the final checkpoints of Foundry and Pit Stop had too easy a time. We might ramp this back after doing a major balance overhaul [SOON].
-Tweak: Hireling XP not affected by your bonuses/penalties.
-Tweak: Certain skills are a priority for your Hirelings to purchase, such as Tactical Novice. They stiil need to buy the required Prerequesites and Core skills on their own, but once available, will buy priority skills immediately.
-Fixed: Handlebar mustache mesh was missing.
-Fixed: Updates to the Options system were screwing up some people's HUD.
-Fixed: Swamp zeds could "Perfect Block" you...?
-Fixed: Critical Hit indicator was backwards.-Fixed: Cars weren't properly randomizing in Contract stages.

Added: Tooltips further cleaned up, and added to Stage Start menus as well. If they're annoying you, disable them in the Options.
-Added: Version checker for game options, so we don't have to reset your options with every new addition.
-Tweak: MERC Gunner bosses spawn with the proper weapon, and dual wielded.
-Fixed: All tiers of weapons/gear can now be purchased from the Quartermaster once you've finished the highest tier stage available. Note that as we release new stages, you'll be locked out again until you beat those stages.
-Fixed: Unarmed core skills weren't updating your corpus correctly for the Noob and the Patient origins.

Added: Tooltips are back in the Inventory/Stats menu. This is PHASE ONE of their reintroduction. They won't format correctly on all resolutions, but we're getting them out there now to at least help disambiguate the Attributes and what they do.

Tweak: Price rounding to clean up the Quartermaster and Hire Recruits screens.
-Tweak: More mags for guns with low ammo count (but not the M79, you sadist)
-Fixed: Footprints should now stick to raising/lowering platforms.
-Fixed? It SEEMS like explosive ammo is remembered on modded guns now. I didn't fix anything but I can't reproduce?

Fixed: Longer cutscene narrations weren't showing correctly due to engine resources.
-Fixed: Blackguard fight should work again.
-Fixed: Entering a door after a room with Turrets would freeze you in the doorway of the next room (Mostly Commercial Sector)
-Fixed: Skip Stage option should no longer lock you out of playing.

Added: Sheriff's got voices now too!
-Tweak: The way enemies approach you and choose to attack you in close quarters has been tweaked to feel more balanced. They will attack in waves and then hang out and defend in waves, giving combat a push-and-pull feel. Not all enemies will do this (Zeds, Brutes, etc.), but enough that you should notice the difference. This is a work in progress and will require more input from beta testers.
-Fixed: Charge-up attacks should no longer randomly fire off.
-Fixed: Won't get stuck in place trying to leap over cover anymore.

Added: Sanford, Deimos, Christsoff, Gil, and Abominations all have original voice sets. Jorge and G03LMs coming soon. None for Hank though. Ninja go SHHHHHH.
-Added: Difficulty bar for Arena Combat (just like Story Campaign). You can disable Stun-lock and play in Baby Mode if that is the kind of "gamer" you think you are.
-Tweak: Madness Difficulty makes weapons do obscene damage to you -and- your opponents. It's basically a "Golden Gun" mode. Don't get shot!
-Tweak: Block Breaker and Big Weapons skills improved. They also swapped places on the skill tree.
-Fixed: Characters losing corpus properly again.
-Fixed: Origin starter gear begins registered, same as anything bought from Quartermaster.

Added: New animations for unskilled characters swinging gigantic weapons.
-Tweak: Made the gym look like a gym.
-Tweak: Standardized all stun animations, so there's no more randomness to how long you're stunlocked.
-Tweak: Staggered characters don't glitch out when attacked, and their Dizzy icon doesn't flash persistently.
-Fixed: More interactive levers fixed in Story Mode (mostly in Mining Sector)
-Fixed: Blocking damage reduction calculation was bonkers.
-Fixed: Conduits were breaking the game when they blew people up.
-Fixed: Soldats could survive falling down the pit in The Murder Room

Howdy! As you may have noticed we've been doing a lot of hotfixes lately. Well, this time around we've got PATCH NOTES! Here's what's been shakin' and movin' in the beta in the past week.

2/4/21 [1.30.a]
Arena: Train Infiltration stage had trouble bringing in teammates. Fixed!


2/4/21 [1.30.b]
Large Power Lever interactives lost functionality across all stages (Power Play, Climb, etc.). These should be working again in most places, but we need bug reports to help us find the missing ones!


2/4/21 [1.30.c]
-Feature: Laborer helmets can be knocked off...but can you figure out how?
-Fixed: Character images in narrations/cutscenes displays the proper dude.
-Added: Limiter broken for characters dying - they can no longer all cry out at once.
-Added: Murder Room is now playable from Pilot's missions
-Fixed: Weapon shader using secondary lights


2/5/21 [1.30.d]
-Fixed: Large enemies hurt their allies again when appropriate (Mag Bandit throwing junk, Brute tantrums, etc.)
-Tweak: Mag Bandit Sewer Miniboss now spawns weapons on ground pound.
-Fixed: Mag Agents spawn correctly into Fast Track Arena stage.
-Fixed: Equipped weapons weren't returning to Warchest after resetting your gear when returning to Arena HQ.
-Fixed: Civilians are invincible now, FOR SURE.
-Fixed: Minor pathing issues when being assigned a new path.
-Fixed: Pathing to objects on desks would take you on a weird path.
Silent Update Additions
-Fixed: Later waves in the Foundry Arena stage caused your aim to pass through conveyors down to the lower floor.
-Fixed: Empty/Broken weapons could be re-equipped from Warchest between Arena waves.


2/7/21 [1.30.e]
-Added: Explosive rounds now have their own, new explosion effect.
-Added: You can now block melee attacks with unarmed without the appropriate skill. You'll still take full damage, but you won't go into Stun-lock. Same goes for breaking out of it.
-Tweak: Breaking out of Stun-lock by spending Tac-Bar (Press Space) has a much more forgiving timing window. That's what spending Tac-Bar gets you.
-Tweak: VR Training Buddies can no longer Stun-lock you.
-Tweak: You may light attack by default again. Your Light Swing/Punch skills replaced with altenates that let your first light attack in a combo connect VERY FAST.
-Tweak: Broken hilts, screwdrivers, and scalpels can break now.
-Fixed: Sold weapons vanish from the warchest and the floor.
-Fixed: Weapons, armor, and gun mods need to be unlocked by progressing through stages. The entire MASSIVE stockpile of gear will no longer be available out of the gate.
-Fixed: Sleepwalkers whose bodies are split in half will stay down.
-Fixed: Negative armor piercing now factors in. It acts as a small multiplier to the target's armor.
-Fixed: Doc is tired of you killing him in the HQ.
-Fixed: Slime doesn't drop on Swamp Zed dismemberment.
-Fixed: Special Strike uses correct animations. Everyone was using Deimos's new quick kick.
Hotfix Update
-Fixed: Scrolling through the Quartermaster/Blackmarket was obscenely laggy


2/8/21 [1.30.f]
-Added: After you beat the Story Campaign, you have a new shortcut to skip the final stage and go right to the bossfight.
-Added: Post-game, you can return to the top of the Science Tower for some sweet gear.
-Tweak: The final checkpoint of Arena stages no longer uses "Madness Difficulty" rules, such as opponents not flashing red before attacking.
-Tweak: Better interpretation of the Player's intended dodge direction.
-Tweak: Tusk throwable weapon now swings like a very heavy weapon.
-Fixed: Doors between sectors no longer begin unlocked.
-Fixed: Beating the Story Campaign no longer traps you on the balcony before the final mission.
-Fixed: Larger enemies weren't holding weapons correctly.
-Fixed: A hireling's armor no longer counts against their Medbay revival cost.
-Fixed: Can no longer bypass locked-out skills using crafty menu manipulation.
-Fixed: Spamming Snap Dodge and Kick properly cancels into a full dodge.

Our testers have just been given access to the latest version of the Madness: Project Nexus Closed Beta (v1.13.a), which means we're now counting down toward only a couple of checkpoints before full release of the game!

The new update includes a ton of balancing fixes and cleanup for Story Campaign, but primarily focuses on the new Arena Combat game mode. Arena was completely gutted and rebuilt from the ground up, and as it stands is mostly complete and only lacks the inclusion of four more stages, which are already nearly done. Barring setbacks, expect that update to reach closed beta in two weeks. After that, we move onto final cleanup before releasing the game to the public.

In addition to cleaning up endless bugs, tightening up CPU/GPU performance, and balancing gameplay, the final cleanup portion of development is also going to include a number of features we've put off until the very end:

* A tutorial stage that teaches basic to advance combat moves.
* Short, playable cutscenes between Story Campaign sectors that explore the history of Project Nexus.
* Multiplayer for Arena mode.
* Introductory video for Story Campaign
* Arena Hireling personalities and base interactions
* Face Picker for Arena Combat
* Story Campaign squadmate swapper
* Make The Playground (aka Interactive Mode) playable

I'm positive there are more, but these are the big ones. We hope to have all of this content in before March, leaving us a solid month of focused testing before we reassess and determine where we are on a final release date. There are other things to be done outside of game development (such as advertising and promotional content) that won't be discussed in this post, which will further occupy us. We're hopeful for this timeline though, and hope to hit you guys with a new set of release notes in two weeks!

-Swain

We whipped up a brief little survey to gather some more feedback and data regarding you guys' experience with the Demo. It only takes about a minute or two to fill out and we'd love to hear what you all think (as well as continue to hear from you all on Twitter, Steam and the Forums!)


TAKE THE SURVEY!



Thank you to everyone who has given us feedback so far as well as the rest of the OVER 15,000 OF YOU who've checked out the demo in the past 12 days! We appreciate all of it sincerely, and hope to deliver the best possible version of this game to you guys as soon as possible.

In the interest of Whetting all you lads and lasses' appetites, we present to you the official demo for Project Nexus! (Just in time for the Autumn Festival!)

The demo contains the first two levels of the Industrial Sector for Story mode, pitting you as Sanford and Deimos in their quest to have a little chat with the Sheriff (seriously, they just wanna talk.) So get yer negotiatin' boots on and go engage in some good old fashioned Nevadan DIPLOMACY!

The Demo is live right now over on the store page of the game. Scroll down to the info sidebar on the right side of the store page and click 'Download PC Demo' to download the PC demo!

We'll be back soon with more info on the Arena update for our beta holders as well as release updates for the rest of you fine folks. Until then enjoy the demo and keep on truckin!

It's that time of year again, folks! Time to celebrate those little gray rascals who refuse to mind their own business.

To help celebrate we have, of course, our usual roundup of killer 'toons, killer tunes, killer art and killer games for you all to feast your collective senses on. You can find all that juicy goodness over on the Madness Day page on Newgrounds.

https://www.newgrounds.com/collection/madnessday2020

As for Project Nexus, we're still trucking along with the arena rework. Expect to see a beta for the new and fully revamped arena very, very soon. This sucker's been completely retooled with new systems, new progression, new locales, new baddies and more.

Have yourself a lovely Madness Day, and stay tuned for more news in the very near future.

Hey there folks! Today we've shipped a major update to the game that also marks a major landmark in development.

Story Mode is complete!

At long last, we're done with story mode. Every single stage is complete and fully playable. There are still bugs (and we'd love to hear about them!) but the entirety of Story mode is complete and in the current build of the game.

Combat Overhaul

The other main thing Swain's been slaving away at for the past several months is a general combat overhaul. Hundreds of little tweaks and changes have been made to the core gameplay to make it alot more refined and a lot snappier. Unfortunately at the moment, none of these changes have been tested in Arena Mode. Things WILL be broken! Playground mode (formerly Interactive mode) is also currently broken, but will be addressed in a hotfix in the coming days.



What's Left?

So, where does all this leave us for release? Well, we have two main things left to do before we're ready to unleash this thing to the public: a slight Arena revamp and a final bugfix pass. As well as adapting arena to the new combat engine, we wanna take another pass at the core gameplay. Our plan was always to go back and touch up arena mode after we were done with the Story and that's exactly where we're at right now. We've had a few ideas kicking around on how to spice up the main gameplay loop of Arena Mode as well as there still being a few small features that are still currently missing or unfinished from the mode in general (weapon modding, anyone?) We promise this wont take NEARLY as long as finishing up Story Mode. In fact, Swain says he wants to try and get this revamp done and ready for testing in one month.

Of course, these plans along with today's update will result in a lot of BUGS. Bugs that will need time to hunt and fix before launch. If you have access to the beta, be sure to report any bugs you find to the Steam discussions and we'll squash 'em ASAP. The more you guys find on your own, the less time we need to spend finding them ourselves and we greatly appreciate it.



Finally, once Arena's been touched up and all the bugs have been fixed... Thats it! We'll be all set to finally launch this thing to the public! It's been a hell of a ride for everyone and a hell of a long road, But we truly are at the end here. All the main content of the game is DONE and all we have left are some tune-ups under the hood and some little details to the paint job; we're almost there. Thank you to everyone who's stuck with us on this long and wild journey. Through thick and thin, through delays and silence, you all have continued believed in us and we don't plan on letting you guys down. From the bottom of all our hearts, thank you.

Just a little bit further.

Hey there kids! Today we've got an appetizer for you hungry lot while our main dish finishes cooking up: The game's soundtrack!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1260510/MADNESS_Project_Nexus_Soundtrack

Now I said 'appetizer' in the opener, but this could really be a main course all its own: 33 original tasty tracks from DubChef Devin 'Locknar' Martin and an ADDITIONAL 23 MORE ORIGINAL TRACKS from Madness OG (chef status questionable) Sean 'Cheshyre' Hodges combining for a total of over THREE AND A HALF HOURS of ear-buttering, soul-jolting, mind-melting BANGERS.

You can pick up the soundtrack Right here on Steam! Alternatively, the soundtrack is available to stream through Spotify for both Locknar and Cheshyre's halves respectively and is also available on several other platforms which are listed on our post over on the Project Nexus website.

So go on and show our audio boys (and your ears, frankly) some love while we continue to wrap up this dang ol' game into the prettiest, sturdiest, sleekest and Ultraviolentiest little package we can. We sincerely appreciate all of you sticking with us throughout these years and we hope to finally get you guys' hands on the complete experience as soon as we can, but for now, enjoy the tunes and keep on truckin!


FOR THOSE ALREADY ENTITLED TO A COPY:
For those who backed us on either Kickstarter or PayPal at the appropriate tier, you will receive your key via email as soon as we can get them and send them out. Cheers!