Ys IX 1.1.3 - Nobody Expects the Surprise Performance Patch

Hi everyone,

I bet you didn't expect an Ys IX performance patch!

Some background: while working on the upcoming release of Trails from Zero, and specifically looking to keep it at a solid 60 FPS on all maps on the Nintendo Switch, I implemented an optimization which I thought might also be helpful for Ys IX.

So I ported it over, and depending on the hardware and in-game scenario, some testers saw improvements of 25% in CPU limited scenarios. As such, it seems worth releasing publicly. I've also updated the performance chart from the original release with this new version.

Note that this improvement requires Direct3D feature level 11_1. If you are using some very old hardware or operating system version which does not support this, the game will automatically fall back to the previous rendering path.

We also included a few other minor changes in this update. Here are the full patch notes:

- Improved CPU-bound performance. The degree to which you will notice this depends on the specific in-game scene, settings, and your hardware GPU/CPU balance.
- Adjust the refresh rate selection algorithm to more reliably pick the available refresh-rate closest to the one desired.
- The game executables are now signed. This should hopefully reduce the antivirus false positives that sometimes pop up for some players.
- Fixed the English item description of the Holy Sword's Hilt accessory to correctly reflect its capabilities.

While we do not expect this patch to introduce any regressions, with the great variety of hardware and software configurations available on PC this is not always guaranteed in all circumstances.

- Peter "Durante" Thoman, CTO, PH3

Update 1.0.42

In this update we address some bugs players have encountered.

- Fixed couple of scene bugs
- Fixed an issue where in some cases The Janitor might spawn a wrong item after player has used the item slot

Hotfix #3 for Update #6 and DLC

A second hotfix for update #6 as well as the Can Touch This DLC is now available addressing the following issues:

Base Game

- Fixes the spawning position of painting splashes.
- Fixes subsurface scattering artefacts.
- Fixes an issue that causes hair to glow in the dark.
- Adds scrolling to the warehouse menu when products don't fit into the UI screen.

Can Touch This DLC

- Fixes several cases of “Unbound” on the Hammer Tool and Air Brush Tool. You might need to reset keybindings to restore default key settings, depending on how you set up your keybindings.
- Adds an ability to cancel the placement of the Cash Register after picking it up by pressing RMB. This will cancel the placement and return the cash register to its previous spot.
- Improves collision in several spots for better decorations / shelves placement.
- Fixes the unpaintable roof section.

If you have any issues with an update, hot fix or DLC, please contact us on our Discord or send us an e-mail to support@drago-entertainment.com with the bug description.

It helps us a lot if you include your save file folder or a link to a video if you were recording/streaming with the problem occurred.

Save files are located at %LOCALAPPDATA%/GSS2/Saved/SaveGames -> if you .zip the entire folder and send it to us or make a link to it available, we will be able to check your specific case and help directly with the issues.

Online Matchmaking Update for Overcooked! 2

Hey there, Chef Pals!

Thank you for your patience while we have been investigating some connection and matchmaking issues you have been experiencing recently with Overcooked! 2.

Following our previous update where we released this on the beta branch, we are now releasing the online matchmaking update on the main branch!

Patch Notes:

The game will now look to match players based on local geographic regions, matching those with similar latency to improve the overall online experience.

As always, please report to our customer support here if you encounter any issues with the game or with this update: help@team17support.com

New Features

• New auto aim setting that can be accessed in the Gameplay options.
• Player now has a brief death animation before showing the Game Over screen.
• Trying to shoot with a weapon that has no ammo will automatically switch to a different weapon. This can be turned off in the Gameplay options.
• Weapons with no ammo can no longer be selected.
• Each weapon on the Skill Tree has an icon showing what kind of ammunition it uses.
• Level selection now remembers campaign progress even when saves are deleted.
• Hallways and doors where levels end are now marked.
• Added separate autosave and quicksave slots for Priest and Journalist characters.
• Level progress tracker was added to the pause menu.

General Balancing

• Experience requirements are lowered for each new skill point acquired. At the end of the adventure players can now receive 14 points instead of 11 assuming no experience upgrades were taken.
• Adjusted experience upgrades to be more effective.

Enemies

• Ancient Portal - decreased health.
• Entity of Torment - decreased flying speed.
• Boss 4 - fixed occasional game crashes.
• Secret Lab - fixed navigation of some Liquidators.

Weapons

• Worm Nest - explosive worms now steer towards the closest enemy on its path.
• Worm Nest - fixed projectile exploding in situations where it shouldn't like climbing stairs from a sharp angle.
• Worm Nest - fixed projectile getting stuck in level geometry without exploding.
• Worm Nest - shooting and reloading sprites are no longer blurred.
• Thunderonomicon - upgrade no longer increases damage dealt.
• Whale's Bane - fixed weaker projectiles not penetrating enemies.
• Whale's Bane - fixed weaker projectiles disappearing near doors.
• Des Goules - fixed energy beam not following the crosshair when looking around at high speeds.

Skills

• Aspergillum - increased range.
• Aspergillum - more forgiving stun hitbox.
• Necronomicon - fixed time not pausing when the player was reading story elements.
• Medallion - increased duration.
• Herbs - increased player damage resistance while active.
• Flashlight - increased light distance for all upgrades.
• Camera - stunning enemies is now more reliable.
• Camera - enemies standing behind other enemies are now affected by stun.
• Camera - slightly increased range.
• Camera - fixed bright light affecting fog in certain levels.
• Cigarettes - slight balancing tweaks.
• Flashlight - fixed flickering when moving.

Levels

• Boss 3 - changes made to increase readability of the intended path between phases.
• Sewers - acid now raises at the same speed as the player on low framerates.
• City of Ancients - made light skills more effective in dark areas.
• City of Ancients (Endless) - fixed invisible enemies.
• Mines - now it is easier to jump off from minecarts.

General Tweaks and Fixes

• Aim sensitivity can now be set to higher values.
• Aim sensitivity can now be set to more precise values.
• Endless Mode - fixed a bug where less enemies spawn in later waves.
• Localization - Polish language adjustments while playing as Journalist.
• Door tip widget is now correctly aligned to the texture.
• Removed decimal numbers in character level progress bar in skill tree.
• Fixed the Continue button in some cases prioritizing autosaves over quicksaves or normal saves even if they were older.
• Fixed enemy health bar not touching the top of the screen then HUD is hidden.
• Fixed skip options hiding and music stopping when the player pauses during the credits.
• Fixed player being able to delete invisible save slots.

Raji: An Ancient Epic Enhanced Edition - Now LIVE!

It is with great excitement from our side that we can announce that Raji: An Ancient Epic's ENHANCED EDITION update is here!

What can you find in this update?

- Improved the health gained and lost feedback for Raji and enemies
- Improved enemies executions (animations) and health orb spawning
- Improved hit impact effects
- Improvements to combat VFX
- Tightened up many animations for Raji and enemies
- Removed dodge animations from heavy attack combos to make them more responsive
- Improved combat pacing
- Added variations for all enemy types, with fresh new visuals, attacks and abilities
- Behavior overhaul and new abilities added for the Chieftain and Mahabalasura bosses
- Behavior overhaul and new attacks added for the Mahabalasura boss
- Added a camera zoom feature using mouse wheel or Gamepad right analog stick
- Added a comprehensive main menu
- Added ability to disable tutorials
- Added new game modes
- Added the option of revisiting locations from previously cleared levels
- A̶d̶d̶e̶d̶ ̶s̶u̶b̶t̶i̶t̶l̶e̶s̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶s̶i̶x̶ ̶I̶n̶d̶i̶a̶n̶ ̶r̶e̶g̶i̶o̶n̶a̶l̶ ̶l̶a̶n̶g̶u̶a̶g̶e̶s̶ (coming in a future patch)
- Complete SFX overhaul
- New background music added to the Fort and Desert level
- Hindi voiceovers added
- Added Ray-traced Shadows, Ambient Occlusion, Reflections and Global Illumination
- Added Nvidia DLSS and AMD FSR (1.0) upscaling options
- Many bugs fixed

Important

As we mentioned here, we encountered some issues with the subtitles for the various Indian regional languages. As such, the subtitles had to be removed for the launch day. However, we are working to fix the problems and will add them to the game in a (near) future patch.

PATCH 1.0.7 - Bugfixes

Bugfixes

- Added Monthly Mode seeds for the next few months
- Fixed bug which caused loading to fail in very rare random occasions
- Added safety precautions for partially corrupted save data, related to spawning of water train stations
- Fixed typos in French, German, Italian, Russian

5.013 Many Various
(Released May 26th, 2022)

* Fixed a nuclear warhead typo.
** Thanks to Dismiss for reporting.

* Fixed a small typo in Asteroid Mining Powerplant's description.
** Thanks to Друг for reporting.

* Added the Spymaster and the Outgard Spies to the Spy Network galaxy filter mode.
** Thanks to Dismiss for reporting.

* Rewrote hover text for "Disable music" in debug menu.

* Fixed one typo in AIP hover tooltip.
** Thanks to Pybro for reporting.

* Fix a bug where Minor-Faction allied Svikari might fail to join their allies.
** Thanks to Dismiss for reporting

* The AI Reserves now are explicitly disabled once the imperial spire is active
* Also make the imperial fleet less likely to get stuck on planets by needing to kill a command station they aren't allowed to shoot.
** Thanks to Mike for reporting

* The alert for a Dark Spire Locus spawning now only tells you the planet name if you are watching the planet. This matches with the notification behaviour
** Thanks to Lampshade for reporting

* Every 60 seconds the galaxy will try to relink itself; there were some reports of the zenith miners disconnecting the galaxy
** Thanks to Lampshade for reporting.

* Stop having reverse tractoring prevent traversing wormholes.
** Requested by zeus. Thanks to Tom Prince for implementing!

* Make the Spire Frigates provided by spire cities in expert mode have slower speed.
** This was already true of those provided by Frigate Neural Nets, and of all other spire ships. Note that this will only impact newly built cities in existing games.
** Thanks to Tom Prince for implementing!

* Relax some settings on harder campaigns, so harder settings can be picked.
** Thanks to Tom Prince for implementing!

* Fixing exception that occurred within hack response of an outguard beacon, if that beacon was on a planet never owned by the ai.
** Removed comment from copy-pasted code that is incorrect.
** Thanks to Dismiss for fixing!

* Make the bottom right selection window show entity tooltips for modular ships.
** This also makes selecting and deselecting them work as expected (selecting or deselecting by line, rather than by type).
** Thanks to Tom Prince for implementing!

* Entity Type Drawing Bag changes:
** Fixed a bug in the EntityTypeDrawingBag wwhere it potentially didn't not draw certain things correctly under certain circumstances.
** ETDBs can now also accept a weight_list in XML, which (by default) is 100 for each item inside. This will affect the items in the primary list, and allows each ETDB entry to be weighted differently if necessary. This multiplies through with potential sub-items:
** The new XML tags is_in_random_pick_mode (bool, default is false) and random_pick_count (integer, default 0, only gets used when in random pick mode). Random Pick Mode alters the ETDB from working off its internal list one index at a time to randomly picking X indices (can pick the same twice or more).
*** I.e. an ETDB draws with a random pick count of 200 out of a list of 2 items, the first, weighted at 150, being a single unit by name (named "A"), and the second, weighted at 50, being a tag that 2 units in the game have (named "B" and "C"): There will be a 75% chance to choose A, and 12.5% chance for either B or C. Thus on average it will end up with 150 A, 25 B and 25 C.
** Thanks to SirLimbo for adding!

* Unit encyclopedia now supports search by 'Tech' eg, 'core' would show ships benefited by core
** Thanks to Dismiss for implementing!

* Show the total strength of ships in the sidebar tooltips, rather than the strength of a random stack.
** Thanks to Tom Prince for fixing!

* Take into account "AIP never reduces below" when calculating remaining AIP.
** Thanks to Tom Prince for fixing!

* Make `PlanetFaction.SwitchToFaction` use the right planetary fleet, when switching between faction for non-centerpieces.
** I think this is the underlying bug that was triggering #26327. This might also be somehow related to #26000, which I was trying to debug when I discovered this, but I could not reproduce that bug.
** Also, when both "Deep Logging On Object Histories" and "Show debug data in unit tooltips" are on, show that object history information in the tooltip.
** Thanks to Tom Prince for fixing!

Facciola007 Mods

* Several new mods by this new mod author!
** New fleet starting names mod, for more new fleet name options.
** Ark Starting Fleets mod that gives more options for starting out, and then a + version that is for using DLCs.
** Golem Starting Fleets mod that gives more options for starting out, and then a + version that is for using DLCs.

DZ Sidekick Mod

* DZ Sidekick now creates some economic and military at game start in svikari mode
** Otherwise a sidekick player might just sit there for 10 minutes until they have their first ships

* Add some defensive code to the game lobby for a DZ Sidekick related exception; this has proven hard to recreate
** Thanks to SilverLight for the report