[ver.0.1-demo] 01/05/2023[h2]Comment:[/h2]

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  Hello everyone!
  This isthe largest update so far since the game has been made public and italso converts the demo into what can be considered a featurecomplete build of the first level of the game.
  
  It took awhile but I can now start mainly focusing on the development of thesecond level and the likely commercial release upon itscompletion.
  
  Alongside the new gameplay features, thisupdate also includes tons of code-refactoring improvements to ensurethe production of future content moving forward becomes moreefficient, since this is a solo-project, workflow enhancements willalways take top priority.
  
  Below are the list of changesthis patch brings!
  
  

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  The entire saving and loadingof data has been overhauled:
  
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    The loading of sub-areasinside the main level is now multi-threaded which highly reducesthe chance of stuttering issues occurring when new areas arerequired to load.
    
    
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    Saving is now alsomulti-threaded.
    
    
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    Upon dying, the level is nolonger required to be reloaded from scratch to ensure gameplaystability:
    
    The game screen will now fade out; the playerwill respawn and gameplay will resume seamlessly, this improvementalso means that the changes in the world like enemy wounds, corpsesand blood stains will remain during the entire play session.
    
    
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  The Nightmare puzzledifficulty has now been added to the demo, completing the set of allpossible 12 combat and puzzle difficulty variations intended to bein the game.
  
  
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  The close combat system hasbeen added to the game with two new weapons you can find in the mainlevel.
  
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    Its a very rudimentarysystem that consists of light and heavy attacks, and blocking withthe weapon equipped.
    
    
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    All three actions consumelarge amounts of stamina in varying degrees, and deplete thedurability of the weapon per interaction (meaning you wont losedurability if you hit the air)
    
    
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    The durability of an item canbe viewed on the inventory screen.
    
    
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  The enemy poise system hasbeen reworked:
  
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    Staggering an enemy beforewas only possible through headshots (chance based criticalattacks), it now works using a threshold value that once depletedwill trigger the stagger animation, you can deplete it with allmanner of attacks but the bias is in favor of critical and heavyattacks.
    
    
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  Added the ability to consumeregenerative items in real-time without accessing the inventoryscreen; an icon on the bottom-right of the hud will appear whenselecting different consumables
  (make sure to hold theconsumable button to activate the healing action.)
  
  
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  Added a post-process visualeffect to better indicate when the player gains new lives or losesthem upon death.
  
  
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  The game now pauses properlywhen the Steam overlay is called.
  
  
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  The game will now pause if itdetects a controller has been disconnected.
  
  

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  AI improvements:
  
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    An AI director thatcoordinates all the active AI in the game has been implemented.
    
    
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    Enemies are now able toperceive each other and react in different ways depending on thecontext:
    
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      Enemies will now betterspread out across the map since they always take into account theposition and movement goals of other enemies that they are awareof.
      
      
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      The AI is now able to reactto the awareness level of other perceived AI, meaning that theywill enter a hostile state if they see another hostile AI, orenter search mode if they see or hear another AI in search state.
      
      
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      Enemies will now coordinateto better surround the player instead of blindly all moving on theshortest path towards the player.
      
      
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    The AI is no longer allowedto roam too close to choke points like doors that the player mustto go through to exit certain areas, in most cases they alsorepresent blind spots where the player is made unfairly vulnerablebecause of the design of the camera system.
    
    
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    The vision and hearing rangesof enemies have been reduced to compensate for their improved AI.
    
    
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  The player no longer has towait for UI menus to finish fading in or out to receive backcontrol, this was mainly an issue with the inventory UI, but otherinterfaces were affected by this as well.
  
  
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  Replaced the handgun modelwith another one of higher fidelity.
  
  
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  Added new scene assets.
  
  

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  Fixed a rare bug where enemiesattacking you with both arms would trigger an unintended double hit.
  
  

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  The entire input system of thegame has been migrated to an improved Unreal Engine 5implementation, keybinding customization will be temporarilydisabled until the transition is fully implemented.
  
  

[ver.0.0.65c-demo] 24/10/2023[h2]Comment:[/h2]

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  Extra round of polishing forthe demo!
  
  

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  URL Launch buttons have beenadded to the main menu for accessing the games steam store,joining the games discord server or opening the X/Twitter gamesprofile.
  
  

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  Fixed an issue with theloading screen not having proper text scaling below 1080p.
  
  
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  Fixed an issue with itemsgetting visually stretched when examined outside of 16:9 screenratios.
  
  
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  Fixed a bug where the wrongsfx would play when picking up stackable items with a fullinventory.
  
  
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  Improved the playercharacters texture maps.
  
  

[ver.0.0.65b-demo] 17/10/2023[h2]Comment:[/h2]

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  This patch is focused onimproving the stability of the game & adding quality of lifeimprovements rather than introducing new features.
  
  
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  The project has been migratedfrom Unreal Engine 4 to UE5 (version 5.2.1 to be specific), thiscaused tons of bugs that needed to be fixed but I believe I managedto hunt all of them.
  
  

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  Graphic Presets have beenadded to the settings menu.
  
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    All the configurationsettings are now exposed inside a .ini file instead of a binarythat the user cannot customize if needed.
    
    

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  Improved the rotationanimations when items are being examined.
  
  

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  Fixed an issue where theinventory drop down menu would linger after pressing the SaveGame button.
  
  
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  Fixed a visual animationglitch caused by releasing the aim button while performingweapon related actions.
  
  
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  Fixed a bug on switching theauto exposure setting on & off multiple times that would causethe brightness setting to be incorrect.
  
  

[ver.0.0.65-demo] 28/09/2023

[h2]Comment:[/h2]
- This patch is almost all about animations!:

. The entire animations system for the main character has been reworked from the ground-up, until now everything relied on raw animation data, that meant that I had to manually create all the variations for every set of animation state.

. For example: For sprinting I needed to have 6 total different animations, 3 for each health state (healthy, injured, critical) plus another 3 almost identical ones when the player was holding a handgun.

. You can imagine that this system would scale terribly bad over time as more systems, weapons and actions get added to the game.

. For that reason the entire animation workflow has been reworked from 0 into a new system that relies on layering animations on top of one-another with control over every section of the characters body.

. Going back to the previous example: now I only need only 1 sprinting animation instead of 6 and the 3 health states and all possible weapon handling variations get layered on top independently of other sub-animation systems.

. This change was necessary to account for the new character mechanics being introduced in this patch plus the two new melee weapons to be added in the next one, the sooner workflow optimizations are implemented the greater the gains!



- The bug fix and crash fix sections of the patch notes have been moved closer to the bottom since I barely had to use this sections (I dont think there has been a single crash issue so far) **knocking on wood**

- All things said, below are the patch notes, I hope youll enjoy these new changes and look forward to the next Halloween patch!

[h2]New Features:[/h2]
- Added an option in the gameplay settings section to swap the gamepad glyphs between XInput and DualShock4.

- Added the Quick turn / turn 180 degrees action, keyboard & mouse users have an extra dedicated mappable input for this, gamepad users can trigger the action by pressing the sprint button while moving backwards.

- Stamina system added to the game:

. The system is divided between two resources stamina & max stamina, one dependent on the other.

. Actions like quick turn, shooting, sprinting or in the next patch attacking or blocking with melee weapons will drain this hidden stamina stat, this resource will always rapidly replenish whenever the player is idle but it cannot surpass the maximum stamina

. The maximum stamina pool decreases slowly over time but it can be replenished with healing items and by resting in some of the safe areas in the game (lower combat difficulty modes only)

You always retain 60% of the total maximum stamina you start with, no matter what you do.

. The current effects of running out of stamina are slower movement speeds and a reduction in your chance to land a critical head-shot with firearms, it will likely include in the future slower quick turn speeds, lower damage & speed of melee attacks and possibly a penalty to damage blocking.

. The goal of this system is to allow for players to plan ahead with short bursts of continuous actions, whether it may be ambushing or evading enemies, the game favors the prepared and those who do not underestimate their perilous circumstances.



- The Stamina Solution healing item can now also be used on its own without the need to combine it with another item.

- A new healing item has been added to the game that combines and improves the effects of its base solutions.

- The new animation layering system now allows for players to get visual feedback on the health state of the player while aiming with weapons.

- Acceleration leaning implemented into the game, the player will now dynamically lean in the direction of movement, resulting in better visual locomotion fluidity, this has no bearing on gameplay, but it does improve the presentation of the game.


[h2]Adjustments:[/h2]
- With the goal of maintaining balance with the new stamina system, the base acceleration rate of enemies have been slightly reduced across all combat difficulties.


[h2]Bug Fixes:[/h2]
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[h2]Crash Fixes:[/h2]
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[h2]Known Issues:[/h2]
- There's a small issue with the game not recognizing input bindings that affects users who have previously launched the game with previous versions, there's two ways to solve this:

. Navigate inside the game with the mouse to the settings ''controls' sections and press the 'Restore Defaults' button, this will overwrite the old configs.

. Delete the old input.ini file at:
. Windows: %USERPROFILE%/AppData/Local/BalkWaters/Saved/Config/WindowsNoEditor/input.ini
. Linux: ~/.config/Epic/BalkWaters/Saved/Config/LinuxNoEditor/input.ini

. I'll address this as soon as possible with a hotfix update.

[ver.0.0.6-demo] 30/08/2023

[h2]Comment:[/h2]
- This new patch is focused on difficulty balancing and UI ease of use:

. Ive been experimenting with improving the game interfaces for Steam Deck users and any players looking to play the game with smaller screen resolutions, this patch includes scaling improvements for all the UI interfaces, font changes and other general enhancements like background blur effects on the pause menu, etc.

[h2]New Features:[/h2]
- Added an interaction visual effect to improve player feedback when examining items, the item will now display a blue glow when it is being inspected from the right angle.

[h2]Crash Fixes:[/h2]
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[h2]Bug Fixes:[/h2]
- Fixed a bug that allowed players to save the game in unintended locations (previous patch bug)

- Placed angle limits on some cameras to stop them from going out of focus.

- Improved the LOD distance configuration to some assets that were switching to their optimized shader configuration at too close of a distance.

[h2]Adjustments:[/h2]
- Renamed all difficulty modes to better represent how difficult they are to complete on average.

. Novice has been renamed to normal

. normal hard

. hard nightmare

. hardcore king of shades

- Added new extra close-up camera shots that showcase some of the items most players are having trouble finding or the current camera is just too far away to properly discern them from the background.

- Modified the textures for the windows in the main level to obfuscate to an extent what the player can see on the other side.

- Added an extra ammunition stack that can be found on the map for normal & hard combat difficulties, this is a temporary work-around until melee weapons are implemented and added into the game.

[h2]Known Issues:[/h2]
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[ver.0.0.5-demo] 18/08/2023

Comment:

- I hope youve enjoyed what the demo brings thus far!

Ive been working on a patch to solve some of the minor grievances Ive seen players have with the game so far, below you will find the patch notes organized based on category.

- All new demo related versions moving forward will end with -demo at the end of the version number.

New Features:

Crash Fixes:

Bug Fixes:

- Fixed an issue where UI sounds would not execute when navigating the difficulty selection screen.

- Fixed an issue that caused navigation UI sounds to overlap with other UI sounds sometimes.

- Removed the combine button from the ammo inventory slots as it currently serves no purpose since the ammo automatically stacks with each other and it led to some players thinking they could reload weapons with using this method.

- For consistency between all key items, the discard button has been removed while the item remains of use for the player; once its use has been fulfilled the discard button will appear and a small icon will show up to notify the player of this change.

- Fixed two typos in the Spanish localization.

- Enabled the ability to modify the resolution while in Full-screen mode.

- The Main Menu button in the pause screen now requires user input confirmation.

Adjustments:

- If a certain criteria has been met, the player will now spawn in a different location upon death in novice and normal combat difficulties.

- To improve player feedback one of the puzzle objects in the game now displays a text message declaring if the player is not yet ready to engage with the puzzle.

- Douglas will now look at many more objects of interest which the player can interact with.

- Improved the conditions for the spawning of one of the enemies in the main level.

- Added extra loading screen tips.

- Changed the interaction button description for one of the items from Use to Save game, saving the game has too small a role in this demo to bother the players with figuring out the items purpose in the game.

Known Issues:

- For some players in the windows version of the game the main menu background video doesnt play correctly, usually the issue fixes itself the next time the player loads the main menu.

Ill be looking into this issue as soon as I can.

The first release of the demo for "THE KING IN THE SHADES" is now available for everyone to play!

Once I am satisfied with the state of the demo and ready to move on to the next level and the comercial release of the game, the demo will likely be removed after a period of 1 week to a month.

Until then I will keep updating it with new content, any feedback I can receive will be more than welcomed!

Be sure to play it while it's available and have fun!

Signing: sp1r1t_d1tch