Miscreated #HO | ¿Más zombis? ¡No, mutantes!

Miscreated Patch 25 SVOGI and SFP!
This is a massive update to the game and almost every file in the game has changed as a result. It will require a full download from Steam - approximately 7GB in size.

We've also added SVOGI to the game which improves the look of the game dramatically.

We've spent a lot of time working on this release and we hope you guys enjoy it. We do plan on doing a few hotfixes within the next few days, but we didn't want to hold back the update anymore.

SVOGI (Sparse Voxel Octree Global Illumination)

This system allows us to dramatically change the lighting in the game to a more accurate representation of how light behaves in real life. Interiors of buildings will be darker than the outside world as they should be and color bounces off of objects and shows up on nearby objects. In general the lighting of the entire game looks immensely better.

Miscreated is the first game, in any game engine, to use SVOGI in production. It has been attempted by other companies but was removed because it didn't perform well enough. Fortunately for us they have incredibly smart people at Crytek that were able to implement it and now we get to pass that on to you!

The system works by voxelizing the entire world. A voxel in this context is essentially just a very basic representation of each object. Think Minecraft: the basic shape is there but it lacks any detail. This is done to the entire world. Once everything is voxelized lighting calculations can be performed on this very simple version of the scene. Then using the simplified voxel version the global illumination is calculated and then rendered into the scene.

So what does this mean for you the player? It means scenes will pop out at you a lot more. The interiors of houses will all be properly lit, not bright interiors. Everything looks better and potential performance impact is minimal, if any at all.

We love the new feature and we think it really adds a lot of depth to every scene and makes looting houses and exploring the world that much more immersive.

Animation System

We also switched the way we do our animations from a traditional first-person/third-person system to a Simulated First Person system.

To clarify, this doesn't mean we're removing first person or third person camera views from the game. To understand exactly what this means lets first explore how traditional game camera systems work.

Traditionally you have a first person view and a third person view. The first person view is a special view where the only thing you see on screen is your weapon and your arms. This needs an entirely separate animation rig and separate first person animations. The first person animation rig is just the arms up to the shoulder.

A third person view is what every other player in the world sees when they look at your character. So it has the full skeleton the full character and every part moves and is animated. This also needs a custom set of animations.

So what are we doing that's different?

We are taking this first person view and just throwing it away. However, we are reusing the third person view system and using it to simulate a first person view.

So what does this mean for development? Why would we do this?

With a traditional camera system it means everything needs two sets of animations done and both of those sets need to match or it looks weird. It also requires two sets of clothing - one for the first person arms rig and another for the third person character. With a simulated first person view using the third person rig/character we only need to create one set of animations and clothing that can be used for the third person and the simulated first person (again just a third person view zoomed in to where the player's eyes would be locate at)
So now we can create animations two times faster because we have only half of the work to do as before.

Freelook
If you run the game in windowed mode there's a bug in the CryEngine SDK where the game will lose focus when the default freelook key, the left Alt key, is released. If you run in windowed mode and use freelook it's recommended you rebind the key to something else for now. If you use fullscreen mode, then left Alt will continue to work fine.

Changing graphics settings while in game (in the server) crashes the game. We will hotfix this asap.

Game
• Fixed "Virtual Function" crash when exiting the game
• Reduced the likelihood of the game staying running in the task manager after exiting
• Fixed crash when picking up items or swapping items in inventory
• Adjust lighting for SVOGI more - also made interiors a little brighter
• Reduced frequency of stalls/freezes while playing
• Increased grass render distance
• Potential fix for servers getting stuck and not being able to join them (getting sent back to server browser screen)
• Added settings which can be used to force a server to be locked to an exact time
• Removed all fog weather patterns for now - will be added back in later when the fog flickering is fixed
• Fixed crash from turning off the flashlight/torch or dropping it on the ground
• Altered Crytek recommended setting that should help reduce stuttering/freezing while playing
• Rendering engine updated to use the amazing SVOGI system from Crytek
• Texture flickering greatly reduced if not totally removed on most things
• Better texture compression - uses less VRAM and more efficiently streams to the GPU
• Less stutters while playing caused by textures being loaded
• Some forest assets are a lot more optimized now
• Player oxygen system added - player will now start drowning when the oxygen meter runs out
• Smaller install size - 10GB down to 7GB
• Stars are much brighter at night
• Lots and lots of general clean-up and improvements with the entire game

Textures
• Adjusted the color of the tree LOD textures to blend much better

Models
• Adjusted the stairs in some of the houses so it's smoother going up them

Vehicles
• Moved the exit positions for the ATV closer to itself
• Horns and lights are synchronized to all players

Animations
• Many more animations updated because of the new SFP mode
• Fixed camera clipping through the ceiling when jumping in some buildings and structures
• Adjusted flashlight animations to work better
• Adjusted animations so the player's feet don't slide as much when moving
• Rifle melee animations updated
• New SFP-based (Simulated First Person) animation system (still WIP)
• Almost every player animation in the game has been updated for SFP
• First person/third person shadows always match now
• Tactical weapon mode - raise/lower weapon
• DOF added to weapons when aiming
• Aiming system improved due to new SFP mode

Items
• Light from the flashlight and torch is no longer obscured by their own model (was causing odd behaving shadows)
• Adjusted physics proxies on ranged weapons so they don't bounce around when dropped

Networking
• Much more efficient network layer (processing is about 10x faster than before)
• More efficient entity priority system
• Client joins server slightly faster - "Joining Server..." phase
• Client loads the world map faster - "Loading World.."
• Server synchronizes data to clients faster - "Synchronizing World..." phase

UI
• Added Oxygen meter display to the stats bar
• Modified the temperature meter display to show the player's temperature in Celsius

AI
• Much more efficient AI pathfinding system

Anti-cheat
• EAC updated to latest version

Sounds
• Weapon shot reverb sounds working