[previewyoutube=29MO-l9FWt8;full][/previewyoutube] In Cyber Knights, the New Boston dome is the ever-present setting. It is more than 10 miles wide in diameter and at its peak stands over 1 mile tall. This massive structure rests on super-foundations and the ceiling arch is supported by the large buildings, the nearly mile-wide "towers". Layer upon layer of metal and concrete make the dome, slice upon slice of street, hab-sector or industrial zones stacked upon each other. Below ground, out in the Wards, high in the towers, escaping off of rooftops - it is your playground, your heist targets, the home of your enemies, friends and safehouse. It needs to have the right vibe. And so we're excited to roll out a major milestone off the roadmap with the VIBE update, the all-new lighting engine!
Technically outside of the official Q1 end by a few days, but we're going to notch this one where it stood. And with the lighting engine roadmap items struck down, we can at last finish up Mac support. Onwards to the truly big beasties of Q2 - safehouse base building and blueprint crafting!

New Lighting Engine & Post Processing

The new lighting engine includes a new post processing color grading system that is helping to push the right vibe for our dark future cyberpunk setting - dark, shadowed, gritty but still vivid. We hope you'll jump into a heist and check out the new look because every scene, mission and corner of the game has been improved. This is a huge update with innumerable changes, so there are sure to be follow-on fixes that tweak certain areas, lights, objects that stick out as odd or that need roughness or metalness changes. If you do see anything weird just hit F10 to send us a report; well be making ongoing adjustments as always. Throughout Early Access, we're working on many, many different projects. Visual and animation improvements is a big area for these, so even with the lighting engine improvements we're continuing to push in other areas that will improve the game's visuals.

HUD Bar Spacebar Issue Fixed

With the last update there was an issue where using some of the buttons in the HUD bar - specifically items or advantages - could result in the focus getting stuck up there. Then the next time you tried to move with spacebar, you'd actually be pushing one of those buttons or ending your turn. Bad! Fixed now.

Photo Mode Improvement

To make photo mode better, we've hidden the last few UI elements that were hanging around on screen when it was enabled. This includes the blue circle around character's feet which was the most annoying.

Camera No Longer Sticking

In some cases if you chose to skip all during a scripted scene, the camera would just jam right where it was when you skipped instead of cutting ahead to the character or enemy who is about to take their turn. This is now fixed and we've made some minor improvements to the camera position before the black curtain rises at the start of a level to make sure the camera is always focusing on the right character with them in an unobstructed view.

v1.5.1 - 4/2/2024

- Upgraded all levels and scenes to new lighting engine (lighting is more diffuse, more indirect contribution, better ambient occlusion) - Upgraded all levels and scenes with new post processing (ACES color grading for shadowed, grittier, vibrant world) - Fixed issue with photomode (default "P") where character selection UI stayed visible - Fixed bug where using items or Leverages could leave selection in button bar and trying to move might end turn or be ignored - Fixed odd white square appearing in the character hover (now is corrected to be >| icon indicating they are in the next turn) - Fixed issue with camera getting stuck in odd positions after skipping scripted scene