Welcome loyal players and wishlisters, the ones who make it all possible! Cmon in and let's talk Jungle.

BTR-80

Soviet Era Armored Personnel Carrier

In our initial jungle devlog, some of you suggested this behemoth! Here it is in it's retro Soviet glory. We also made a slight modification to add some anti-aircraft missiles to the rear, to make it's attack a bit more spicy.

It also carries 10 NPCs that can disembark when it reaches a destination or when its health drops below 25%.

Weak Point System

Aka The Red Butt

We have added a weak point to the back of the BTR unit, that rewards you for landing direct or near-direct hits. This adds more depth to the combat, and rewards you for landing direct or near-direct hits on the rear of the BTR.

Death to the Circle Strafe Meta

I have hated that a lot of action games have basically one movement pattern that can be repeated over and over for any situation: the circle strafe. Just hold down the shoot button and move in circles.

BTR-80 Weak Point

We decided to experiment by putting a weak point on the back of the BTR-80 enemy. We're experimenting with 2 approaches to showing this to the player: a red pulsing area on the rear, and a large red exhaust port that's actually part of the BTR. Which do you prefer?

When you hit the weak point, you do 2x the damage. The unit is armored and has a lot of health, so this is crucial to taking it down.

Known affectionately in our discord as "the red butt"

Another variation we're experimenting with- a red exhaust port.

What Counts As a Hit

In order to do damage to the weak point, hit it with a gun or missile in that small area. The guns and missiles have 2 zones of damage: one is a very small zone that counts as a direct hit, the other is full splash damage that is reduced with distance. Splash damage does not count on the weak point- it has to be hit more closely.

Hitmarker Adjustment

In order to show the player where they're hitting, we updated the UI hitmarker to show a different color for the 3 types of hits: hit on an unarmored unit, hit on armor, and weak point hit.

Audio Feedback

We're still playing with this, but we've created new sounds that alert the player to what they're hitting. The armor hit is more of a ricochet / metal impact sound, and weak point hit is distinctly different.

I Want Your Feedback

What's your first impression of this new damage model? What other ways do you want to see more depth in the combat? This will first be released with Chapter 2 and we will iterate it with your feedback through all of early access.

Jungle Mission Teasers

We are knee-deep in the Chapter 2 campaign at this point, and it is really coming together. I don't to give away any spoilers so I'll just post some generic teaser screenshots below.

Your future home-base. Still a work in progress.

Coastal real estate, open-air hangar, bring your own helicopters

Defending against a beachhead attack

Dusk in the jungle

The Huey feels right at home here...

Poll: Your Top 3 Missions and Why

Respond in the comments: What were your top 3 missions and why did you like them? This will help us prioritize as we build out the rest of Chapter 2 and plan Chapter 3.

Mission Names

Heyday Mayday (nostalgic first mission)
An Odd Tool for Odd Jobs (doing tasks for Tommy to get the littlebird)
Scrapyard Scrap (kill enemies with the rope, defend Tommy's junkyard)
A Crude Rescue (oil field mission, destroy fuel buildings and rescue hostages)
A West Texas Road Trip (first convoy mission)
Into the Canyon (canyon / jet escape)
Tail Risk (destroy the bases, capture helipads)
The Long Way Home (Second convoy mission)
Battle of Big Rocks (defend your local town, tank intro)
Data Harvesting (radar turrets, steal servers, jet appearance)
No Such Thing as a Free Launch (attack the spaceport)
Crawler Mauler (final boss fight against Klein, prevent rocket from launching)

If you want to discuss this in more detail, join our discord: discord.com/invite/XmMTqEjpQg

Thank You!

As always, thanks for making this game possible. We really appreciate all your feedback and support. The jungle is coming along and I think you're going to love it.

-Colin "cfinger" and the Cleared Hot team