"In FEBRUARY?!" - I hear you cry - "But that's January's basement!"

And right you are! However our love to you all knows no bounds, no limit, and so we crawled out of the winter holidays, past the seasonal sludge that is Late Winter, and did our gosh darn best!


[h2]TL;DR:[/h2]
[h3]I'm not reading all that just tell me what's up[/h3]

New Features:
Holo-Brooches
Steam Deck
Polish Subtitles

And of course tons of improvements:
Gameplay
NPCs
Shaders & Renderers
Tiny Tweaks here and there

Those of you up for a deep dive, let's go!!!!
Those of you who aren't, you're dismissed, have a wonderful weekend




[h2] NEW FEATURES[/h2]

[h3] HOLO-BROOCHES[/h3]

Heading to the Museum will now prompt a message that tells you that a Holo-Brooch has been unlocked! Once unlocked, you can start collecting!!

Holo-Brooches are items Foster gets to equip as part of his outfit!
Previously only being a small aspect of the game, we've come up with a cute and elaborate way to make them more fun:

• More:
  Before, the Holo-Brooch came in 3 standout designs;
  Joey, Citadel, and Spankles. If you think those were cool, just wait to see how many there are now!
  
  
• New Design:
  While they previously had a more muted appearance, we got our very talented UI dev Simon to give them a vivid spruce up;
  New art, new shaders and "you can actually tell what they are" - wise words from the dev team.
  
  
• MINOS:
  When entering MINOS terminals, you can now find a new tab that lets you keep track of your discovered Holo-Brooches.
  
  
• Where?? How???
  Silly you'd ask! It's an adventure game!!! Explore, be weird with it. Live a little. Try out items where they don't belong. Have a snoop where you shouldn't. Click on things. Be a tiny bit unhinged, as a treat!
  

• Skipping
  Some of you smarty pants were switching control inputs while the intro was playing, and it glitched out to be unskippable!!!! I mean.. we fixed it but damn, kids these days, no chill. (Just kidding we love you)
  
  
• Tabbing out
  Tabbing out during the intro also made the sound go out of sync with the animation. Sometimes the subtitles would even go missing. But no more!
  

• Multi-tasking
  Foster used to have to stop everything he's doing just to pull the Hacker out?? Super useless. Walk and talk buddy, it's not rocket surgery!
  
  
• Going Viral
  Big, BIG End-Game Spoiler, but very funny; So to line up character interaction with animation, we make Foster approach things from a specific angle or direction. You click on it, and he'll position himself in a way that we have the animation for. Makes sense, looks good, what could possibly go wrong???
  Now, were you to approach the globe from a opposite direction because you entered the scene on the wrong side of the room for some insane reason (looking at you Speedrunners) Foster would cross the room to go to his animation trigger spot, walk straight through the Virus, and DIE. We now told Foster to never ever touch the virus. You really gotta spell things out, huh.
  

• Woop Woop that's the sound of the Police
  Spoilers ahead: In Recycling there is a puzzle where you need to crush your crowbar into a machine and if you do this a Security Droid should come to investigate. However, when saving and reloading in a particular way the Security Droid would just take the beeline for your ass, walls didn't exist to him, he was just coming for you. Terrifying. Also not true anymore.
  
  
• Hint States
  Some Speedrunners would start being out of sync with the Hint States because things were done in such an overly efficient way, that we didn't account for (like using prior play-through knowledge and doing things ahead of time). We're onto you. I think we fixed it!...
  
  
• Cube Puzzle Camera Bug
  A little spoilery: When you were on one Cube in the Cube puzzle, and held your joystick down to the bottom left, the camera would keep moving down, the time you'd move to the next cube you'd be just moved along horizontally, but the vertical (which you were in the - on, all the way down) became your new 0 and you were stuck seeing nothing during one of the most important scenes in the whole game. Devastating..
  

• Double Joey all the way across the sky
  I'll tell you a little secret. Every player model has a stunt double for the cutscenes. They're not the same.. And when one of them doesn't make like a and you end up with two of them! - This also happened to Orana in Graham's Apartment! Thank you for reporting, this should now be fixed!
  
  
• Joey clipping into Foster
  When Joey is in his shell, flying he's a much taller than we accounted for. We now accounted for it.
  
  
• Rogue Joey Hat
  Just floating around. Wild. We caught it though!
  
  
• "Improved Joey Shell Initialisation"
  Better Joey. Strong Joey. Hunk Joey. Shiny Joey.
  

• Reginald Poetry Reading
  Got a few complaints that the turnout was bad. There are now more NPCs at the recital. Happy, Reg?
  
  
• Gang Gang
  Bullies. They sometimes pushed players into a soft-lock by pushing the player off the NavMesh! Super mean. We gave them a talking to.
  
  
• NPC Triplets
  SORRY! We realised that the rate of NPC twins and triplets was unrealistic and not immersive. Less of that. Hopefully.
  

• Quick Textures
  So when you load up a game the engine is trying to load up textures as quickly as possible by looking up what's in memory first before refining it later. This is why sometimes things look a little blocky before they become clearer as the game is finished loading up. Your game is basically "streaming" in the high quality textures by looking them up once needed. But from now on textures that are always needed, like Foster, will just exist with a high-end texture, no need to "stream" - that end result will just look like he's always his most handsome self.
  
  
• Well lit NPCs
  So to save you all a lot of memory it's good manners to "bake" lighting into a level rather than calculate it in run-time. It's also good manners to always update it when you move or change anything in that level so it doesn't look wrong. I don't know like making NPCS IMPOSSIBLY BRIGHT IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT?? They look way less radio-active now.
  
  
• Aspiration Gala Black Screen
  We fixed some Race Conditions on Aspiration Gala. Race Conditions are the order a program is told to load things in. When you enter a level there are a ton of things that need to happen at once and it will determine a hierarchy based on factors like your device, and your technical constrains. Sometimes these race conditions get loaded in the wrong order, which is 1. hard to identify, and 2. hard to pin down as it can be due to a plethora of reasons. But ladies and gentlemen, (and those betwixed) we got 'em.
  
  
• Less expensive stink
  So, turns out the stink lines on the truck are hella expensive on the frame-rate.. We made it stink less for you. We did the same for mist in a few other places. Things tend to stink, and mist less. I think that's a fair way to summarize this.
  
  
• Desert Sun now casting more elaborate Shadows
  Like for Telephone poles, and... rocks. Worth the 3080, wasn't it
  

• Game Saves
  We added a visual distinction to game saves and autosaves!
  
  
• Loading Spoilers
  If you moved the camera too quickly maps and things would load up in an order that could spoil some of the game (if for example something was hidden behind a wall) - We made note of these areas and we now play our cards closer to the chest.
  
  
• Performance upgrade: Hacking & Pausing
  Okay this one sounds a little boring but it's a huge quality of life update! When you used to Pause or pull out the Hacker the game continued existing in the background. It now doesn't. It's GONE. It makes everything more responsive, more stable, AND it's a blessing on the battery
  
  
• What a Drag
  When multiple game controllers were connected, dragging and dropping would sometimes go a bit bonkers. No more bonk.
  
  
• Better collisions
  More solid Furniture. 10/10 would stub your toe!
  
  
• Deserters
  You think it's funny running into the desert, out of bounds??? Well you're right, and now it won't glitch you out so much.
  
  
• Revolution Splashscreen
  Now uses the updated logo! Very snazzy.
  
  
• Switching between languages
  Switching languages willy nilly should NEVER MAKE THE GAME CRASH!!! And it doesn't...
  
  
• Subtitles
  Sometimes the game got confused about where to put a subtitle; the speech bubble or bottom text. And then it did both
  
  
• Tweaked layout in places
  Some stuff is now smaller, or bigger, or more consistent
  
  
• Pause Menu
  A completely redone Help Screen UI for clearer, more useful information when using a controller.
  
  

Official Merch is now available!
Currently only available in the UK!

It's finally here, our official merch!

We're starting off with a smaller range of things until we get more confident in how things work, and with the help of your feedback will improve our services over time

GET YOUR HOLIDAY JUMPERS NOW
As in yesterday, as in actually as soon as you can if you want it in time for the 25th! We tried to launch this last week to give you all more time, but it's been A Week and we hope you understand.
These very special, limited edition Holiday Jumpers are made on demand, once you place your order, before they get shipped out to you, so please plan at the very least 9 days for them to arrive.

Our Holiday Collection is available to order until end of January 2021 and features 2 Holiday Jumpers in:
Merry George Green: https://revolution.co.uk/merch/holiday-jumper-george
Jolly Nico red: https://revolution.co.uk/merch/holiday-jumper-nico
and we designed them with a focus on winter, not *just* the holidays to let you get away with wearing them for more than just the festive months!




THE CLASSIC LINE
A line of t-shirts focusing on the iconic box art from beloved Revolution Software games! Available in pitch black, and some even feature prints reminiscent of the original, and slightly distressed look of the official box art of Broken Swords first ever physical release. We hope it sparks some memories..



WHY ONLY IN THE UK???
Because there is a lot of legal stuff to sort out selling to the EU right now, and it's all constantly changing. Currently we can only get it set up to ship and charge within the UK, and trying to figure this out was part of our delay in launching this, but we decided it's best to launch it now, and continue to try and see how things develop, then delay any further!
We hope you understand.

WHAT WE'RE STILL WORKING ON
More merch, once we know what sells and what doesn't
Cooler packaging
Super special limited edition runs??? MAYBE???
Reappearance of some old faves???
Making sure everything runs smoothly, this is a brand new way to do merch for us and it will come with a learning curve!

PLEASE READ OUR SHOP POLICY
We made sure it's short, easy to understand, and very readable.
We're a little strict with refunds & exchanges, and we want to be super transparent about it before you purchase: https://revolution.co.uk/terms-of-service-and-policies

WE HOPE YOU'LL LIKE IT
This has been in the works for a long time, and we really hope you'll love everything on our merch store! If you have any questions you can email us at merch@revolution.co.uk or chat with us on here
Thank you for always supporting us, and being so kind about everything we do. We push ourselves very hard, but seeing how happy it makes you all makes it so worth it. We hope you know how much we appreciate each and every one of you. Lots of love from all of us at Revolution

FIRST THINGS FIRST
Before we get started on the Patch & Update notes, we wanted to remind you that it's now less than 24h that you get to grab Beyond A Steel Sky for -40% on Steam
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1146310/Beyond_a_Steel_Sky/


[h2]SORRY THE OLD GAME CAN'T COME TO THE PHONE RIGHT NOW. WHY? OH, CAUSE SHE'S DEAD![/h2]
We've moved to a new Unreal Engine version, and oh my god it's been so much work, but we're so happy with the result, and we hope you'll be too...


[h2]MOVING TO UNREAL ENGINE 4.26[/h2]
Unreal Engine 4.24? Don't know her. We're all about that 4.26 now!
It comes with everything Epic engineers put into the update, and trust us, you do not wanna see that list. Instead we're highlighting the bangers:

• [h3]IMPROVED PERFORMANCE[/h3]
  
  
• [h3]IMPROVED STABILITY[/h3]
  
  
• [h3]REDUCED MEMORY USAGE[/h3]
  

• [h3]CONTROLLERS[/h3]
  Controllers used to have some erratic behaviour. Especially inside the terminals.
  Fun Fact: Using a controller often just means that the mouse cursor isn't gone, but hidden from view. That meant that on certain screens, things would already be highlighted, even if they didn't seem to be highlighted with your controller. This could make the controller feel like it was selecting items arbitrarily, which it wasn't - it was just interacting on what the invisible mouse was selecting. There was a particular occurrence in Reflections where you couldn't select certain chairs for no sensible reason. Using the controller is now much sleeker!
  
  
  
• [h3]ONBOARDING EXPERIENCE[/h3]
  Starting out playing the game is now much easier, smoother, and more intuitive! Time to turn your nan into a fan!
  
  
  
• [h3]TYPOS IN CREDITS[/h3]
  Pobodys Nerfect
  
  
  
• [h3]WAIT WHICH GAMESAVE WAS IT?[/h3]
  Well guess no more! They come with timestamps now!!! Technology is incredible.
  

HAPPY NEW YEAR - WE HAVE GREAT NEWS

• 40% OFF Beyond A Steel Sky, as a treat
  
• Developer Commentary Update
  
• Dave Lowe has new music and a documentary
  

• Charles Cecil:
  As Creative Director, Charles used his experience of over thirty years to manage the project as a whole, covering every aspect of the games development from big-picture story writing and complex puzzle designs, to the shape and size of the Mini-Knackwurst sausage.
  
  
• Kevin Beimers:
  Kevin was involved in Beyond a Steel Sky since before the first line of code was written; Alongside a quirky disposition, Kevin brought decades of writing and design experience to the team, giving life to the characters of Union City with outlandish jokes and unique personalities.
  
  
• Ross:
  After starting his career at Revolution, Ross returned after years of AAA development experience to lead the overall game and level design on Beyond A Steel Sky - this included heavy involvement in the narrative and puzzles throughout the game. You can thank Ross for ensuring no puzzle came close to the trauma of Broken Sword 1s Goat.
  
  
• Nina:
  As Lead Scripter, Nina was responsible for the implementation of Beyond a Steel Sky - a huge undertaking for the studios first project in the Unreal Engine; When she wasnt writing heaps of killer code, shed be playing her part in the narrative and puzzle design of the game.
  
  
• Luke:
  Luke was one of the level designers and overall fix-it gurus on Beyond A Steel Sky, leading the charge on the Desert, Reflections, and Land Train Office sections. His greatest battle, however, came in the form of a giant magnetic crane and its sidekick - 4YR.
  
  
• Em:
  Em was one of the leading animators on the game. Specializing in motion capture and facial animation, Em was able to bring life to the ridiculous character dialogue through expressive gestures - its all in the eyebrows.
  
  
• Dave Gibbons:
  The man who needs no introduction, Dave Gibbons brings a lifetime of pop culture illustration experience to the Art design - from the characters and costumes of our post-modern citizens, to the shine-polished architecture of Joeys new regime. His proudest addition, however, is the conception of the Mini-K sausage, inspired by a bacon sandwich he once tasted in the 90s.
  
  
• Noirin:
  The unsung hero of Beyond a Steel Sky, Noirin keeps the studio aloft as COO of Revolution Games. Using decades of experience with major corporations and publishers, Noirin juggles both the internal and external elements of production.
  
  
• Alistair:
  Working with Pitstop Studios, Alistair composed the soundtrack for Beyond A Steel Sky, combining traditional orchestral elements with more contemporary sounds, and in doing so sought to achieve a tone that brought nostalgia to our traditional audience whilst inspiring new-comers to the sci-fi adventure genre.
  
  
• Matthew:
  As well as his responsibilities for the design and implementation of Beyond a Steel Sky, Matthew managed the games dialogue, from writing branching dialogue trees and edgy one-liners, to the casting and voice recording of the English release. Between these roles, Matthew just about had enough time to check his hair.
  

• Touch devices will now get a small animated tutorial, fresh from scatch!!
  
• Improved how to tell when you can use something from increased range! Fun!
  
• Tutorial text improvements in text, but also in MINOS! We went all out.
  

HAPPY HALLOWEEN


And oh boy do we have treats for you! Let's get right to it:


[h2]TRADING CARDS[/h2]
You asked and we delivered: Trading Cards are now live!
To give them something truly special and personal, they are largely made up of never-before-seen concept art. Our characters have gone through a lot of iterations through the design phase so you might even find some inconsistencies. All part of the charm (we hope!).


[h2]EMOTICONS[/h2]
We couldn't give you Trading Cards and not include emoticons.
No literally, that's how the system is set up!
We went through a few drafts and hope we ended up with a variety of emoticons that are both fun, and give you loads of opportunity to use them in conversations. And YES there is a clown, but that's all we're gonna say! Happy hunting!


[h2]25% OFF[/h2]
This is the biggest discount we've had so far, but we felt like it's autumn, and with the year we've all been having you deserve it! You might wanna pick it up now if you're thinking of gifting it to a friend for the holidays cause we're not sure we can match this one so quickly again!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1146310/Beyond_a_Steel_Sky/

And now, for our shortest Patch Notes ever (yes this is a lowkey brag! Please be happy for us!).


SEE YOU LATER, ELEVATOR
This one was devious because it was one of those bugs that occurred when you saved and reloaded the Aspiration Gala after the technician had gone up in the elevator.
The elevator then reloaded being on the bottom of the level, wide open and really inviting.. but entering it would do absolutely nothing. It really felt like a blocker, but surprisingly it was even more misleading..

Let's backtrack:
The game essentially relies on hint states, kind of like a stage setting in a theatre!
Hint Stage 6 for example means "elevator down".
But the Elevator itself didn't understand it was supposed to be down. While it was set to be downstairs it did not know what script to reference, because it was literally off-script.
Like a time traveller, or a really bad play with that one kid who never knows what's going on so they made them a tree and they still somehow managed to bomb? That.

The elevator now remembers what part of the game we're all on, and will no longer try and distract you prematurely!


FALLOUT BOY
Someone, not naming ANY names, kept pushing the boundaries - quite literally..
A little secret about gamedev is that if the player can't reach it, it's probably not real.
It takes a LOT of memory to load in objects, and they are not actually necessary to display things! We talked about NavMesh in previous patch notes, which to briefly recap is exactly what it sounds like: a mesh to navigate on. This is used for railroading NPCs, making things have physical boundaries, etc.

Now, when we make these boundaries to keep you OUT of parts of the game, it's because we don't want you to see!!! Cause there is very little we actually waste physical memory on. It's all a sham! Beyond where you can walk is nothing but illusions!!!

But some of you keep finding ways through and we keep patching them up. Probably till forever!
So for now we again, improved meshes, which is fancy for You can now bump into stuff better - Enjoy!


WENDELL'S MOUSTACHE
Wendell is a simple guy, but he does take pride in his moustache.
I lied. Wendell has been nothing but trouble. First he walked around blocking everyone. Then he wouldn't stay in his chair, and now he's fully derailing the camera to zoom into his moustache.
God damnit Wendell.

Actually to be fair this time it wasn't quite him, it was his umbrella. When you, the player, would approach Wendell from a specific angle, the umbrella would block the camera, putting it into a tight spot. The camera was using Foster's and Wendell's location to try and find the best angle and tried to make an executive call. Boom: A fullscreened moustache closeup.

We found a super elegant solution to this though: A scripted approach!
So now when you, the player, try to start a conversation from an angle like this, Foster will take a few steps to align himself in front of Wendell. Don't worry it's still his good side.


BIRDEMIC
City Walls now has more bird. We will not elaborate. But youre still welcome.


REGINALD CONSPIRACY
When Reginald comes out of his little room you were able to examine him, and the game would be talking about him like he was a MINOS terminal. For no reason at all. It now refers to him as a person again. Which he is. Yup.


4YR U SO QUIET
When 4YR gets..... too far for you to reach in a cutscene, it was impossible to understand what he was saying! He even got the little speech bubbles with the dots in them for when youre too far away to hear an NPCs dialogue. Not very accessible.

You can now hear relevant lines loudly enough, but don't worry - the game will still allow you to walk away if you get tired of his moaning.


CUTSCENES IMPROVED
You transition into them better. Whenever you get to a point to trigger a cutscene it will now slow you down ahead of that, almost stepping into it if you will (and you will).
It looks so smooth and we're all geeking out over it!

MENU REVAMP
We tried something new and exciting.
It's more segmented, cleaner, and features different cards.
Were super happy with it and hope you are too!


There are some more tiny adjustments and fixes, but whats a puzzle game without a little mystery..

This patch really showed us how far we've come in a short time, thanks to all of you.
So many of you are in steady communication with us, and it's honestly heartwarming how positive and supportive this community has been.

Let's not sugar-coat it. This year has been a lot, but you all make us wanna finish strong.

For those of you who want to, feel invited to join our Discord: discord.gg/revolutionsoftware
We are on there all the time, and on Fridays we even play games together with our Community.
We'd love to see more of you there!

All the best from the whole team at Revolution

HAPPY ASPRIATION DAY

We're proud to make Patch #3 Beyond A Steel Sky's biggest content update yet!

• Achievements
  
• French Voiceover
  
• German Voiceover
  
• 20% OFF: Return of the Launch Sale!
  

• -10% Discount
  
• a "Complete The Set" Option
  
• Original Soundtrack of Beyond A Steel Sky
  
• FREE Comics!!!
  

• Bug Fixes & Improvements
  

• Beyond A Steel Sky
  Shocking, right?
  
• The Original Soundtrack
  For the first time ever on Steam!
  
• FREE Beneath A Steel Sky & Beyond A Steel Sky comics
  High resolution PDFs illustrated by Dave Gibbons! Absolutely Free. Our treat because we love you!
  
• A "Complete the Set" option
  Already paid for some of this stuff without the Bundle? Upgrading to the bundle will get you the exact same saving as buying it whole! Pretty neat!
  
• -10%
  Oh yeah and the entire thing is 10% OFF (if you buy it this week, that's on top of the -20% discount on Beyond A Steel Sky, so that's a damn good offer!)
  

WHAT WE FIXED:

[h2]GAMEPLAY[/h2]

[h2]H4CK 4LL 7H3 7H1N95[/h2]
Ever messed around in Piazza and had a robot run off with your precious data? Well no more! You can now reset MINOS circuits in Piazza. No more lurking at the vending machine to get your data back!


[h2]WAIT HOW DO YOU KNOW ALL THAT?[/h2]
Foster knew too much. He now knows less.


[h2]HINT LOGIC IN APARTMENTS[/h2]
The engine now has a better understanding of what the player is thinking


[h2]HUNTING FOR CLUES IN APARTMENTS[/h2]
..or as its referred to internally: "Loz's Crazy Palace of Code"
We realized the puzzle was a little strict, and the game now lets you discover things in more than just one order.


[h2]WHAT COSTUME SHALL THE POOR BOY WEAR[/h2]
At some point during the game, Foster would just wear something completely different for no apparent reason. Unless of course someone had put a space at the end of the costume name the engine tried to reference. That would then lead to weird referencing issues. That would have been embarrassing :)



[h2]TECHNICAL[/h2]

[h2]THE MINOS PUZZLE THAT LEFT YOU BAMBOOZLED & STUCK[/h2]
Do not untag this unless you know exactly what bug we're talking about here:

[h3]Why did this happen:[/h3]
The infamous Puzzle in MINOS where you divide by 0? YEAH TURNS OUT YOU CAN'T BE USING THE ACTUAL NUMBER 0 CAUSE IT MESSES WITH TRYING TO LOAD GAMESAVES!
It didn't save the number 0 because it assumed 0 changes had been made to the Plinth. "The number hasn't changed" That meant whenever you loaded the game, you loaded the starting state instead of what it should have been. It's a little more complicated than that but if you actually want to know more, we can host an entire stream on this, that's how elaborate it was.. TL;DR: GG. We played ourselves.

[h3]How we fixed it:[/h3]
Huge shoutout to your fellow gamers over on Steam who shared their gamesaves with us, and walked us through what went wrong. Due to it being a loading issue that got you stuck we had to save the game in a very specific condition, in order to experience the loop people were stuck in.
We ended up deciding to set the base stat to 99
Unfortunately we could not change this in existing gamesaves without risking people without this issue getting strange results, so we have to ask you to reload from your last gamesave.


[h2]CAMERA IMPROVEMENTS[/h2]
When standing too close to walls or objects with your back, the camera could sometimes go inside a character model, or even yeet itself into the next room over, which in turn dulled the audio like you were eavesdropping on your own game! - Well no more!!!
Cameras now understand that they are better than walls, and can, in fact, overrule them.


[h2]RUNNING UP THAT RECYCLING CENTRE[/h2]
When walking to a very specific spot in Recycling Centre, you could wiggle into a spot that would make you fall through the world, resulting in many being able to walk around the city floor! One of the cooler bugs.

[h3]Why did this happen:[/h3]
Just collision bounds issues, you wouldnt understand..
What you visually see in games doesnt necessarily exist as a solid object. The job of telling you which objects are solid, and what gives you resistance, and by how much, is down to a completely separate system.
A lot of these resistance meshes keep a simple geometry (think hitbox). But yeah. In a shocking plot twist nothing is real in Unreal Engine. Does just what it says on the tin.
Anyway, a small gap did not have enough resistance and it meant you could shimmy down where you should absolutely not!!!


[h2]LITTERING[/h2]
Really, Foster?

[h3]Why did this happen:[/h3]
Its not Fosters fault really. While bin animations were standardised, the height of bins across Union City was not.

[h3]Additionally:[/h3]
When you interact with an object that has a specific animation attached to it, for example the Spankles vending machine, what is really happening is that you the Player, are travelling on a NavMesh:
Imagine the map being covered in green blankets that AI can travel on and when you, the Player approach a location to interact with an object, it has an animation attached to it (like the Spankles vending machine). Now Imagine that NavMesh is not lining up correctly - that would lead to all kinds of nonsense.

[h3]In conclusion:[/h3]
Foster is blaming his terrible aim on incorrect bin heights, and standing too far off to be able to make the shot.. okay.



[h2]NPCS[/h2]

[h2]EMBER[/h2]
This was a very rare occurrence, but for some players Ember would be impossible to interact with.

[h3]Why did this happen:[/h3]
This was due to the indicator; the little white circle.
Unreal Engine knows when you, the Player, are looking at for example Ember, and will make the indicator appear, thanks to a timer.
Now imagine someone was constantly resetting that timer because they told Unreal Engine that something moved when it was not looking.

Basically Ember was convinced she had to approach a particular spot that didnt necessarily exist. She couldnt cope with that failure and kept resetting.

Never being in one place long enough for you to look at her, and for the indicator to appear, Unreal Engine translated this to: no actions available..

It's like when you ask your dad for something he knows mum said no to. Well, we overruled them both.


[h2]YOU CANT GET THE STAFF THESE DAYS[/h2]
The Apartment Cleaning robot was having trouble with a couple of things, including with how much water was currently in it.
This alone is forgivable, but it made life really hard for poor Raquel.


[h2]THE FOSTER LEAN[/h2]
A little similar to the NavMesh issue, when Foster would approach an object, like a door, we would tell your character model to get "in position to THIS LOCATION " to start this animation.
We set the approach location where Z is 0, but because it was relative to another in-engine approach arrow that was slightly moved, and set Z to (for example) -30, basically instructing Foster to limbo through the door.
Foster is an obedient boy.


[h2]2 SLOW 4YR GUNS[/h2]
Foster is not a vehicle and is not allowed to enter Union City without one.
When stepping into the entrance area 2 very helpful lasers will inform him to move his meaty butt out of the entrance zone in 10 seconds or less; or else.

While 4YR is a valued employee bot, and is welcome to shuttle through this zone.

BUT: If Foster interacts with 4YR while lasers are pointing at him counting down from 10, the countdown doesnt just stop until you two are done talking!
In fact Foster would be mercilessly taken out with a dramatic death scene.

Except, after dying hed just get back to chatting up 4YR?!
We put an end to this nonsense!


[h2]4YRIDE INTO THE SUN[/h2]
In a horrific oversight, some of you figured out how to ride 4YR like a steed.

[h3]Why did this happen:[/h3]
Step up is enabled by default and we forgot to switch it off on the battery
So while you can not step up on 4YR in general, you could totally do it while the battery was slotted in his back.
Lead to some truly amazing gifs though..


[h2]LET GRETA REST[/h2]
You used to be able to catch another conversation with Greta the Hologram, just when she was about to fade out, making her invisible!
We made sure she can shut herself off in peace now.


[h2]PANIC! AT THE MUSEUM[/h2]
In the Museum the father & daughter duo were completely different AI to the generic museum NPCs, and therefore had the intelligence to avoid running into eachother, but did not have the faintest clue to walk AROUND these other, alien NPCs.
No more traffic jams!


[h2]DIVA ALONSO[/h2]
Basically there is a scene where Alonso should be leaving the Museum dramatically!
But if you, the Player, left before him, Alonso would just stay there and pout, because you ruined his exit.
It took a while but he should no longer throw a tantrum over the theft of his dramatic exit.


[h2]MUSEUM INFO BOT[/h2]
The overbearing little guy used to be able to corner Foster, and make it unable for him to leave. We sorted that out.



[h2]ART[/h2]

ORANAS SKIRT: Much more comfortable now that it doesnt clip into her.

ADS: The Advertisements around you now tie in with world building better.



[h2]ANIMATION[/h2]

CHAIRS & DESKS: We had to re-explain to some NPCs how sitting works.

JIMMY: Used to be shy about talking in cutscenes. Gave him a little confidence boost.

CUTSCENES: Scrubbed, and now very polished!

FOSTERS DEATH STARE:
This one was interesting: It only happened after Foster changed into another outfit.
No head or face animation would work anymore, except for lip sync which runs on a completely different system.
We figured out that this was due to the blueprint of the animation being referenced by the outfit. So if Fosters old outfit was gone this code wouldnt replace the reference it was looking for until you either entered a transition scene, or reloaded manually.
Foster now uses b e s p o k e live references



[h2]UI[/h2]

HACKING ON GAMEPAD NOW MUCH SMOOTHER: weeeeeeeee

QDOS LOGIC: clearer flow of how Foster learns information

BONSAI: Displays as it should



[h2]AUDIO[/h2]

NO MORE SELF INTERRUPTING:
Sometimes a computer would take longer to load in and start dialogue lines, and that would mess with the timings as those delays were not accounted for, resulting in NPCs interrupting themselves when speaking. We now make sure that the audio finishes before the next one can queue.



[h2]PERFORMANCE[/h2]

GAMEPAD CONTROLS: smoother, better, faster, less awkward

OPTIMIZED CITY SHADERS & GEOMETRY: shiny & pointy

OPTIMIZED TEXTURE COMPRESSION: smaller & snappier

GLOBAL MEMORY REDUCTIONS: less means more

LEVEL TRANSITIONS: more loading, less crashing



A BIG THANK YOU:

We can not overstate how grateful we are to have such an understanding community in these uncertain times. Shipping a game during a global pandemic comes with unique challenges that affect us as a studio, a team, and also simply human beings.

While there is lots more to do, we believe that this 2nd Steam Patch puts the finishing touches on the game we would have liked to have shipped with.

We dearly hope that this will give everyone the experience they deserve to have when playing Beyond A Steel Sky.

Thank you all for your patience, and for rooting for us.


AND AS ALWAYS: JOIN OUR DISCORD:
discord.gg/revolutionsoftware

No.. really! Were there all the time!
We help with puzzles, troubleshoot obscure system errors with you, and generally like to feel closer with people who play our games.

Were so grateful to have such a strong, vocal, and passionate community around our games, and we know we can not ever say it enough, but we deeply appreciate every single person who has reached out and been in touch with us.


HAPPY WEEKEND FROM US AT REVOLUTION

[h2]Announcing this here again: The Crosspromotion event didn't show it to everyone we wanted this to see[/h2]
This game is a huge part of our history, and indeed Adventure Game history.
When Charles Cecil & Dave Gibbons work together great things happen..

[h2]A cult classic that took AMIGA by storm in 1994[/h2]
15 whole disks it took then.. Feels like yesterday and forever ago all at once.
Very proud of the innovative Virtual Theatre system, Beneath a Steel Sky is a gripping cyberpunk science fiction point and click adventure game. Art directed by award-winning comic book artist Dave Gibbons (Watchmen). It's widely considered as one of the best point and click adventures ever written.

[h2]Now on Steam[/h2]
For the first time ever Beneath A Steel Sky is now on Steam, thanks to the warm reception to the 26 years in the making sequel Beyond A Steel Sky, which we released here first.

Beyond A Steel Sky can be enjoyed on its own, but if you want to travel back in time with us, and maybe find some hidden origins of choices we made when world building the Union City you know and love, then we invite you on a journey, back where it all started...

Beneath A Steel Sky:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1368340/Beneath_a_Steel_Sky/
After being brutally abducted from his village in the wasteland, his village obliterated, and his kinfolk butchered, Robert Foster escapes a helicopter crash and finds himself alone save for the circuit board of his best friend, Joey, the AI he built as a child. Foster soon resurrects Joey and together they find themselves in Union City, where oppressed citizens live and work in soaring tower blocks, under the strict control of a brutal, fascist, AI dictatorship whilst the corrupt, covetous and rich live below, shielded from the choking pollution.

In the melting pot of Union City, a not so impossible future, mankinds worse nightmares are waiting to emerge from beneath the steel sky. It's Man against Man. Man against Machine. Man against Time.

Strangers in a strange land, Foster and Joey must survive long enough to discover the sinister truth behind his abduction - why they specifically came for him - and defeat the evil before its too late. Its a terrifying threat that only you can liberate Maybe.

AND YES - THIS IS THE VERSION WITH VOICE ACTING IN IT!

[h2]Charles Cecil & Dave Gibbons rejoice over Beneath A Steel Sky on Steam[/h2]
In case you missed it, we announced this heading to Steam just a few hours before on a live stream. If you've never seen Charles and Dave interact this is going to be a treat. But tread lightly: When people spend this much time world-building they tend to forget what is and isn't a spoiler ;)
[previewyoutube=Vam18423Xto;leftthumb][/previewyoutube]

[h2]Thank you all so much[/h2]
It's rare and wonderful for us to be so close to all of you. The amount of love you are showing Beyond A Steel Sky has been incomprehensibly meaningful to us as developers, and people.
Because of all the love you have shown us, we were able to bring this game to Steam, and therefore, a whole new generation of gamers. And we're on the edge of our seats to hear what you think.

And to those of you familiar; we are so grateful to see you all playing this game, on a whole new platform. After all of those years it still means so much to you.

[h2]You're always welcome on Discord[/h2]
As developers who have not always had the luxury to be this close to our community, we are not taking this for granted. Thanks to the digitisation of storefronts we are now so much more able to hear from you directly, and we try to always make time to have a little natter / chinwag / hangout session:
discord.gg/revolutionsoftware

[h2]AND YES! STEAM LETS YOU LEAVE REVIEWS NOW[/h2]
For the first couple of hours the platform would not count hour played, and would therefore not let people leave reviews. This has now been fixed! - No update needed!
We hope that you can make up for lost time, queue up the game, and let us know how you find it!

Lots of love from the whole team at Revolution

This game is a huge part of our history, and indeed Adventure Game history.
When Charles Cecil & Dave Gibbons work together great things happen..

[h2]A cult classic that took AMIGA by storm in 1994[/h2]
15 whole disks it took then.. Feels like yesterday and forever ago all at once.
Very proud of the innovative Virtual Theatre system, Beneath a Steel Sky is a gripping cyberpunk science fiction point and click adventure game. Art directed by award-winning comic book artist Dave Gibbons (Watchmen). It's widely considered as one of the best point and click adventures ever written.

[h2]Now on Steam[/h2]
For the first time ever Beneath A Steel Sky is now on Steam, thanks to the warm reception to the 26 years in the making sequel Beyond A Steel Sky, which we released here first.

Beyond A Steel Sky can be enjoyed on its own, but if you want to travel back in time with us, and maybe find some hidden origins of choices we made when world building the Union City you know and love, then we invite you on a journey, back where it all started...

Beneath A Steel Sky:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1368340/Beneath_a_Steel_Sky

After being brutally abducted from his village in the wasteland, his village obliterated, and his kinfolk butchered, Robert Foster escapes a helicopter crash and finds himself alone save for the circuit board of his best friend, Joey, the AI he built as a child. Foster soon resurrects Joey and together they find themselves in Union City, where oppressed citizens live and work in soaring tower blocks, under the strict control of a brutal, fascist, AI dictatorship whilst the corrupt, covetous and rich live below, shielded from the choking pollution.

In the melting pot of Union City, a not so impossible future, mankinds worse nightmares are waiting to emerge from beneath the steel sky. It's Man against Man. Man against Machine. Man against Time.

Strangers in a strange land, Foster and Joey must survive long enough to discover the sinister truth behind his abduction - why they specifically came for him - and defeat the evil before its too late. Its a terrifying threat that only you can liberate Maybe.

[h2]Charles Cecil & Dave Gibbons rejoice over Beneath A Steel Sky on Steam[/h2]
In case you missed it, we announced this heading to Steam just a few hours before on a live stream. If you've never seen Charles and Dave interact this is going to be a treat. But tread lightly: When people spend this much time world-building they tend to forget what is and isn't a spoiler ;)
[previewyoutube=Vam18423Xto;leftthumb][/previewyoutube]

[h2]Thank you all so much[/h2]
It's rare and wonderful for us to be so close to all of you. The amount of love you are showing Beyond A Steel Sky has been incomprehensibly meaningful to us as developers, and people.
Because of all the love you have shown us, we were able to bring this game to Steam, and therefore, a whole new generation of gamers. And we're on the edge of our seats to hear what you think.

And to those of you familiar; we are so grateful to see you all playing this game, on a whole new platform. After all of those years it still means so much to you.

[h2]You're always welcome on Discord[/h2]
As developers who have not always had the luxury to be this close to our community, we are not taking this for granted. Thanks to the digitisation of storefronts we are now so much more able to hear from you directly, and we try to always make time to have a little natter / chinwag / hangout session:
discord.gg/revolutionsoftware

WHAT WE FIXED:

[h2]4YR - U BEING SO DIFFICULT[/h2]
Right in the beginning of the game 4YR used to get stuck and there was no way to get around this. This has now been fixed, including in existing gamesaves - so no need to start over!


[h3]Why did this happen:[/h3]
Every character has a floor angle they can travel on, and 4YRs was set to 0.
When 4YR experienced anything more than 0 he got anxious and told Unreal Engine that he was, in fact, currently falling.
And Unreal Engine was very understanding and worried about him and chose to wait and wait and wait.. And wait..
UE4: are you-
4YR: nope still falling
Unreal:...
4YR: .

We added a little more angle and now he understands what the floor is again.

[h3]Also:[/h3]
We also noticed that you could offer 4YR something from your inventory while he was (spoiler) hanging in the air and it would set him FLYING. Distracting 4YR like this is very rude since hes clearly busy, so now this option has been removed!!
Shoutout to Luke from the Scripting Team who tracked this down and found an elegant solution


[h2]CAMERA BUG: CUT STRAIGHT TO TRASH[/h2]
In an extremely tense and story-plot heavy scene the camera suddenly changed over to show absolute nonsense, including a door, and a literal pile of rubbish. Horrifying.


[h3]Why did this happen:[/h3]
The entire array of Dialogue participants was empty, so when the camera tried to "look at" for example Foster it couldn't find him!! Camera went to 0,0,0... TRASH!


[h3]Why was this so hard to fix:[/h3]
This was an extremely hard bug to reproduce, even when 6 different people spent several hours on it.

Lead Scripter Nina only found the bug because so many people came to Discord and shared their gamesaves with us;
"It's such a rare bug, but thanks to the save game provided, I was able to discover what it was, and it's just so satisfying SMASHING bugs and I get all excited about the fact that it's going to make a real difference to people out there. I can't wait for them to be able to continue their playthrough all the way to the end!!!"


[h2]TRANSITION SCENES[/h2]
This should fix a lot of the issues some of you have reported about crashing just before level transitions. Hopefully this is a huge boost to some of you who are trying to play this game without access to one of those impressive streamer battlestations :P

[h2]LINUX GANG[/h2]
Well keep it short and sweet cause we know you value efficiency

[h3]USES CORRECT GPU NOW[/h3]
Gone are the times when NVIDIA cards where overwritten by Intel

[h3]OPTIONAL OPENGL 4.3 RENDERING[/h3]
Its nice to have options

[h3]YOU ALSO GET IMPROVED TRANSITIONS AND CUTSCENES[/h3]
And that should resolve the crashes some of you have experienced

Joost (who is so integral to Revolution, he doesnt have a coherent title) and his old friend from his ScummVM days, TMM have teamed up and brought you these fixes thanks to the thorough feedback weve received from all of you!


[h2].... AND MORE[/h2]
[h3]OCULUS VR HEADSET[/h3]
Users can now boot the game, but its not intended to be played with VR in mind

[h3]FIREWALL OBJECT INVISIBLE[/h3]
When graphics were set to Low Detail there was an interactive object missing, but we put it back

[h3]A PATCH CLASSIC[/h3]
Further optimisation and stability improvements


WHATS NEXT:

[h2]Grahams Apartment: [/h2]
A very rare conflict will result in getting stuck on a puzzle without solutions to get unstuck. We can not stress how rare this bug really is, but due to the difficulty of the actual puzzle, there are a lot of false reports on it and were trying to close in on what is actually happening here, and how it might be conflicting with other potential reports.
And for that we would love for you to help us with! Are you stuck in Grahams Apartment?
Hop over to discord.gg/revolutionsoftware and lets talk about what you are experiencing.

[h2]Achievements: [/h2]
They're coming, and are currently being tested to make sure they're all firing correctly

A GENERAL INVITE TO DISCORD:
discord.gg/revolutionsoftware

Many of you are very aware how much time and effort we have put into working on improving this game with your help. Were incredibly active over there and it helps us a lot to be this close to you.

Were so grateful to have such a strong, vocal, and passionate community around our games, and we know we can not ever say it enough, but we deeply appreciate every single person who has reached out and been in touch with us.

COVID has thrown a real spanner into our personal and professional lives, as it probably has for all of you too. A lot of us are used to being a lot more collaborative in our task flow, and its just hard when our equipment, testing gear, and team are not all together in one space.

There is lots to do still, but doing it together makes this all a lot quicker.

All the best from us at Revolution

Beyond A Steel Sky is launching today with a 20% release day discount, and to make things even more special, weve teamed up with Steam to secure an extra 10% discount on top for Broken Sword fans!





This means anyone who has Broken Sword 5 in their Steam library will see Beyond A Steel Sky launching with a 30% discount for the entire first week!

Making Beyond A Steel Sky has been a true labour of love.
Everyone who knows about Revolution Software, and Charles Cecil & Dave Gibbons, know that this game has been a long time in the making.

This exclusive Steam offer reflects how grateful we are to those of you who have been with us through all these years.


Thank you for everyone who has wishlisted so far, and all of those wishlisting today still - It has helped more than you could ever possibly imagine.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1146310/Beyond_a_Steel_Sky

We can not overstate how special it is to have such a dedicated community that has followed us across the games we make this passionately. You are so full of creativity, passion, and curiosity, and we couldnt be more humbled by all of you, so we hope that this shows just how much you mean to us.

All the best from all of us at Revolution

Firstly, Happy New Year one and all!

2019 was a fantastic year for Revolution, and we're unbelievably excited to bring on 2020. It won't be long until we have a lot more launch information for Beyond a Steel Sky - where it'll be available and when it'll be released, and we're absolutely thrilled you'll be able to enjoy it soon. What better way to approach Revolution's 30th Birthday!
The Studio is now kicking into final gear as we approach the finishing line. There are still a few things to wrap up and decide upon, but we cannot wait for you all to share the journey with us to launch.

In Charles' Christmas Message this year we also hinted at a new project that we hope to talk more about towards the end of 2020, so it's never been a better time to keep an eye on what we're doing going forward. For now, however, we wish you all the best for the New Year and hope your 2020 will be full of great adventures!

[previewyoutube=6jX1xdvm_qw;full][/previewyoutube]

Be sure to check in on our Social Channels: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and on our Discord Channel for extra updates, screenshots, videos, and information on everything Beyond a Steel Sky and more - we wouldn't want you to miss out!

Hello Everyone!

Beyond a Steel Sky is well and truly on it's way, and the team here are working like crazy to deliver the best game we possibly can.
With everything we're trying to fit in to the game, and a well as keeping quality high, development is beginning to take a little longer than initially scheduled.
There's no need to worry, and this isn't a bad thing at all! Some of you may have spotted on our initial announcement press release that Beyond a Steel Sky would be coming out in 2019. We can now confirm that it will be releasing a few months later in 2020.



We still can't say exactly what the date will be yet, and we'll have updates for you on that in the new year.
You can head over to our website for a more detailed update.

There's also a PC Gamer article sharing the information, as well as some more lovely Beyond a Steel Sky goodness, which we strongly recommend checking out when you get the chance!

Be Vigilant everyone!

Hello everyone!

At EGX London last week we had our first hands on demo for Beyond a Steel Sky available for you all to play. We had such a blast, and the feedback couldn't have been better - a shame it all had to come to an end!
For those of you who came along to play, we really hope enjoyed it! For those of you who couldn't make it, there'll be other opportunities soon!

Amongst all the fun and excitement, Charles Cecil (the Director of Beyond a Steel Sky and co-founder of Revolution Software) also gave a talk about Redefining the Rules of Adventure Writing. Covering all of our games (Lure of the Temptress, Beneath a Steel Sky, the Broken Swords series) and our current work in Beyond a Steel Sky.
How better to learn about what goes into a classic Revolution Adventure game!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9igYz1lzv8

As always, if you want to keep up to date with the latest developments for Beyond a Steel Sky, then follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Discord - and adding the game to your wishlist doesn't hurt either!

Be Vigilant!

Hello everyone

Were unbelievably excited to have our Beyond a Steel Sky Steam page go live at last - it feels so real!

Weve been working tirelessly for what feels like aeons to bring you the very latest in Revolution Adventures. Beyond a Steel Sky is the long awaited sequel to 1994s Beneath a Steel Sky which, if you dont know already, is currently free on GOG and a Remastered edition can be found on the Apple Store. Thats right, Robert Foster is back!

Please add Beyond a Steel Sky to your Steam Wishlist. Itll help us and, more importantly, itll help you! Youll be able to find any and all updates and development stories here, but dont be afraid to find us on Twitter, Facebook, and on our shiny new Discord so youll never miss a beat. Did you see IGNs Exclusive First Look at Beyond a Steel Sky? No? Check it out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKS8sQnrPiA
Be Vigilant!