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The Solus Project – New & Free Huge Expansion Released

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Grip Digital and Teotl Studios have announced the release of a huge, new and completely free piece of content “The Highpoint Expansion” for The Solus Project. In “The Highpoint Expansion” the player will explore the new and very vertical Highpoint island, along with its accompanying massive cave level.

As the press release reads, tons of new content is added in this free expansion, with over three hours worth of additional story and gameplay including a new cave look, acid lakes, dozens of strange flying orbs, a monstrous creature, and, last but not least, a massive windmill.

“The plot thickens as the player ventures ever deeper into the world of The Solus Project and begins to understand even more of what has happened on the planet.”

Alongside the new content a large new patch is included fixing known bugs and balancing dozens of existing features.

Here is the changelog for this new patch:

MAJOR

  • Episode 3 content added
  • Save game format was tweaked to be more flexible for the future! Backwards compatibility was built in but may still lead to unforeseen consequences. Please back up your save games and let us know if you hit any unexpected issues!
  • Force feedback support added.
  • Balancing: Text scrolls slower + speed can be set via ini file. Flashlight upgrades give 15% now. Major fix for hypothermia being incorrectly calculated in average temperature environments. While sleeping your body temperature changes less.
  • Smoke monster also attacks other sources of heat now. You can hide yourself with cold items. Can now recraft the frame device found in the second large cave level.
  • Ladder behaviour changed.
  • When climbing ladders you now go down with forward if looking down
  • Cannot strafe on ladders anymore to lessen risk falling off

Core

  • Changes to Xbox controller layout
  • Game now supports force feedback for Xbox controller
  • Audio now uses 64 channels instead of 32. This fixes all forms of audio noise and restarts but may impose higher demands on PC. Please keep an eye out for any problems here.
  • PDA Story text reading slower
  • PDA story text read speed can also be manually set via game.ini
    Communication tower parts now correctly saved and loaded on levels other than Crossroads.
  • Swords can also open cans of food now
  • Smoke Monster now also attacks heat crystals, and can now no longer see the player if the player holds a cold emitting item. Upon attacking a heat device it also allows for the heat device to be emptied and return to its shell state thereby allowing you to craft a different kind of device next time around.
  • Glitched torch problem fixes where lighting one torch with another could result in unusable torches in some scenarios.
  • Ocean reflections now a lot faster to render, and due to that ocean reflection sharpness increased
  • Game has better check for when you are outdoors, resulting in less stoppage of rain in places where it doesn’t make sense
  • Sky One disappears in a cloud of smoke now.
  • Flamethrower ignites items you hold better
  • All items are less likely to fall through the ground now. May impact performance.

Balancing

  • Buffs go down 60% slower
  • Can fall 15% further without taking damage (fall damage currently starts at 3 meter 80).
  • Weather now mostly ignores Slow Day Night cycle setting. Weather changes 50% slower in Slow Day/Night but does still change unlike before.
  • Battery upgrades flashlight extended from 10 to 15% per upgrade.
  • Flashlight loses power slower if difficulty is easy or if slow day and night is enabled
  • Can jump 10% higher and accelerate slightly faster when walking
  • Warmth crystals in the levels give off a bit more heat.
  • While sleeping temperature stays more stable
  • Serious calculation error fixed in hypothermia recovery rates when in medium warm environments

UI

  • Xbox and PC news in main menu now split up
  • Support for Russian, German, French, and Spanish has been extended further but is not yet final.
  • Credits updated.

Levels

  • Landing floating meshes and holes fixed
  • Flashpoint Cave 1 hole fixed
  • Flashpoint Cave 1 warning about fire extended to also include heat + moved to earlier in the level for increased awareness
  • Flashpoint Cave 2 green fire now also heats you and ignites torches
  • Return journey at the end of Episode 2 now more clearly guided and more visually pleasing
  • Flashpoint multiple holes fixed
  • Flashpoint weather change 20% faster
  • Flashpoint sharks swimming through the islands fixed
  • Crossroads incorrect North/South orientation sky fixed

VR

  • In VR PDA is a bit more angled to make reading a bit easier
    VR runs on Oculus 0.8 still and it will be another week to 3 weeks about before this is resolved. Also Vive crashes may occur. Same time frame for a fix for that.
The Solus Project The Highpoint Expansion