Hey all!

Stories from the Outbreak 1.0 has been released, marking its full release after almost a year in Early Access.

This update brings massive improvements to the games narrative systems conversations have been reworked, events now have long-lasting consequences, other humans can be fought, all writing has been improved and the total written content has been doubled. This is, of course, accompanied by various gameplay improvements, fixes, new art, and more the full changelog has been appended to this announcement.

Well be monitoring player feedback and releasing patches with bug fixes and other small improvements, but were also planning at least one more content update in the future, plus console releases, and, potentially, modding support. You can read about our plans more in the previous instalment of Dev Notes.

If you want to support our studio and the games continued development, please consider leaving a Steam review! Each review really helps us.

Thank you for this adventure were looking forward to our next stories together,

The Coldwild games team

Full changelog:

* Human enemies (arriving in 3 flavours)
* 41 new events, as well as additions and improvements to existing events
* 5 new trinkets
* Conversations and emotions have now been entirely reworked
* STR and SKL have been combined into a single stat: PWR
* Added an in-game encyclopedia containing information on enemies, trinkets, characters and more
* Stat checks now have an accompanying animation
* Steam achievements
* Remaining backstories and epilogues (Anna, Dmitry, Inese, and Katerina)
* Many new backgrounds and event images
* Improvements to most written content in the game, including backstories, story fragments, conversations, and more
* Further improvements to the game's ending
* Many status effect icons have been recolored or otherwise changed
* Various visual improvements and polish
* (bugfix) In certain situations combat encounter pool could be emptied resulting in combat that has no enemies
* (bugfix) Fix incorrect damage estimate indicator after using regular attack on an enemy which is already targeted by delayed attack
* (bugfix) Fix autosave happening less frequently than intentended
Balancing:
* Enemies have generally been buffed to balance various new advantages to the player (more details below)
* Stat prices now scale twice as fast, but the scaling is now unique for each stat
* Training now also gives inspiration points upon completion
* Lowered training duration by 1 (doesn't affect maximum or minimum training time)
* Training progress is now updated after completing a node instead of entering it
* Eating fully at a safehouse now heals 50% instead of 40%
* Starving at a safehouse now damages 40% instead of 20%, but is no longer lethal
* Particularly difficult enemy encounters can now be found in some events in the third map (e.g. The Wager)
* Prevented poison-heavy or protection-heavy enemy encounters from appearing in first map's hard nodes
* Immunity no longer lowered by friendly damage, and now only affects damage from enemies
* Renew can no longer be applied to inanimate objects (barricades in the Necklace of teeth challenge)
* Toxic reprisal posion amount 3 -> 2
* Elegant strikes damage bonus PWR -> 6
* Interruption - speedup next ability by 20, insted of making it instant
* Antidote poison removal 4 -> 5
* Seize hope heal amount 3 -> 4
* Debilitate tick amount 10 -> 8
* Dare PWR gain 2 -> 3
* Condemn max amount 30 -> 20
* Traffic cone delay amount 10 -> 7
* Bottle opener rarity Common -> Uncommon
* Rare coin rarity Rare -> Uncommon
* Zombie's heart challenge now decreases poison at a slower rate
Enemies:
* Swarming infected PWR 4 -> 5
* Swarming infected Virulent bite base cooldown 50 -> 45
* Warden Shield base cooldown 30 -> 25
* Warden Forceful slam base cooldown 33 -> 30
* Bloated PWR 3 -> 4
* Bloated Delay the inevitable base cooldown 20 -> 25
* King Demolition focus gain 1 -> 2
* King Battering ram focus gain 1 -> 2
* Frenetic Wild shred base damage PWR-2 -> PWR-1
* Frenetic Lacerate flesh focus gain 0 -> 1
* Aberrant Ichor spit base cooldown 40 -> 35
* Anomaly Mystify base cooldown 35 -> 30
* Parasite PWR 4 -> 3
* Parasite Latch on base cooldown 30 -> 33
* Ghoul Reap focus gain 1 -> 2
* Mutantmother initial Fumes amount 3 -> 2
* Mutantmother Spread spores base cooldown 35 -> 40
* Mutantmother Invite delay amount 25 -> 15
* Legion Out for blood base damage PWR -> 2*PWR
* Final boss aggressive strategy abilities now happen in a different order
* Worthless Worship protection amount 30 -> 20
* Worthless Worship now removes 4 bleed and 1 poison
Anna:
* Base TGH 6 -> 5
Jnis:
* Base INT 5 -> 4
* Recover base cooldown 18 -> 20
* Recuperate base cooldown 23 -> 25
* Safeguard base cooldown 20 -> 22
* Wild shout protection amount 7 -> 6
Katerina:
* Headshot base cooldown 20 -> 23
* Mind blown base cooldown 20 -> 23
* Precision shot base coolldown 25 -> 28
Dmitry:
* Deranged bashes base cooldown 45 -> 40
* Take cover, Recollect, and Look after are now half as strong
* Take cover base cooldown 50 -> 30
* Take cover focus cost 3 -> 2
* Recollect base cooldown 50 -> 35
* Recollect focus cost 4 -> 2
* Look after base cooldown 40 -> 25
* Look after focus cost 3 -> 2
Dzintars:
* Base TGH 4 -> 5
* Base AGI 3 -> 4
* Exsanguinate friendly bleed removal 1 -> 2
Inese:
* Advantageous timing and its upgrades base cooldown 25 -> 22
* Battlefield manoeuvres health loss if Inese is preparing an ability 15 -> 20
* Decapitation and its upgrades base cooldown 70 -> 80
* Overwhelm bleed amount 2 -> 3
Zigmrs:
* Base AGI 6 -> 5
* Base INT 7 -> 8
* Base AMR 3 -> 2
* Prolegomenon and its upgrades base cooldown 20 -> 23
Viktorija:
* Base AGI 6 -> 5
* Base PWR 4 -> 3
* The best defence base cooldown 20 -> 16
Maksim:
* Base PWR 3 -> 2
* Base INT 7 -> 6
* Base AMR 5 -> 4
* Designated now increases outgoing damage by 75%
* Hone base cooldown 55 -> 40
* Hone amount 2 -> 1
Samanta:
* Base AGI 6 -> 4
* Momentum and its upgrades base cooldown 25 -> 27
* Push onwards and its upgrades base cooldown 25 -> 30
* All out protection amount 45 -> 40
* All out exhaustion amount 13 -> 12
Sprdtis:
* Base TGH 7 -> 8
* Esprit de corps base cooldown 25 -> 35
* Overloading neurons base cooldown 55 -> 50
* Fighter's impulse base cooldown 40 -> 35
* Providence base cooldown 25 -> 20
Elza:
* Base INT 4 -> 5
* Strike back amount 20 -> 25
Bete:
* Base INT 7 -> 5
* Butcher and its upgrades now give half as much vulnerable