Dev Diary – October 2020

[The Gentleman Bastard]

OMG Darkwalker sounds amazing!!!! I hope that if its popular enough theyll just make it a new Challenge. But seeing as they havnt done so with 4DON I dont see that happening. Still excited tho!!! Gunna have to play on my X1 and Switch to unlock Endless Night in Custom (Awesome add-on btw). All in all, shaping up to be a damn fine update!

[Screenshot Pilgrim]

Perhaps a deep plunge into cabin fever.  The dark walker in the solitary mind...    

Get outside!  

[oplli]

Wow, i am very impressed this looks soo great. i am happy to see a new variant for the haloween events and this one sounds INCREDIBLE! with a lot of action. i am really happy to see that we will have a new region. it is not the one i thaught it will be next but i am always very enthusiastic to hear about new regions. And please take your time to release episode four i am shure it will be great. take care in those hard times  !

[Ragnawagna]

I wounder how the event work if get chased by the entity do we have unlimited stamina or no exhaustion if its nearby. it will be bongers if somthing like that help to make it a good challenge.

[MarrowStone]

4 hours ago, Ragnawagna said:

I wounder how the event work if get chased by the entity do we have unlimited stamina or no exhaustion if its nearby. it will be bongers if somthing like that help to make it a good challenge.

Im guessing it probably moves quite slow. If it can follow you indoors then it probably walks indoors. I hope... 

[Wintermute_TLD]

On 10/15/2020 at 9:55 PM, Admin said:

Hello everyone,

With the Switch launch behind us, I wanted to update you on our activities around THE LONG DARK for the remainder of this year.

NEW EVENT: ESCAPE THE DARKWALKER (October 29th - November 12th)

This year’s Halloween event, ESCAPE THE DARKWALKER, is different from what we’ve done in the past. In broad strokes:

• In an endless night, you are stalked by an invisible, malevolent entity bent on your destruction. Keep your distance from the entity for as long as you can. Once it closes in on you, you die. The only objective is to survive for as many real-time minutes as you can.
• You can’t hurt the Darkwalker, but you can slow it down. Using special spray paint Glyphs, you can temporarily dispel or attract the entity.
• You can play in any region of the world, but you can only stay in a region for 30 real-time minutes (Note: all timings are being tuned based on playtesting and may change before the event goes live) before toxic fog will appear. When the fog appears, you’ll have 5 real-time minutes to escape the region before you die. Once the fog takes hold, the region is impassible. A lot of your strategy will come down to where you travel and how far ahead you can plan your movements through the world.
• Since you can’t see the entity, you’ll have to count on what you can HEAR to stay alive. Listen for the entity’s cries, its footsteps, and how the spooky music builds as it approaches your location.

You can run but you cannot hide! Walls won’t keep the Darkwalker out. So your success depends on the route you take through the world, and how you manage your sparse GLYPH resources.

Why did we decide to switch up the traditional FOUR DAYS OF NIGHT formula?  We took on your feedback about the last few iterations of our annual Four Days of Night Halloween event. One of the consistent things we heard was a sadness around missing the timed event for various reasons, or the fact that it was hard to get all the badges without playing every single day (I mean, we *want* people playing The Long Dark every day, but sometimes life gets in the way!).

We also wanted to freshen things up this year and do something different that would perhaps embrace a bit of a stronger “horror” vibe than we normally would in the game. Halloween is a fun holiday and this gives us the opportunity to play around with ideas that might not make as much sense in core gameplay, but can provide a lot of suspenseful enjoyment for our players!

ESCAPE THE DARKWALKER runs from October 29th to November 12th. Participating in the event earns you some special unlocks, including a new Custom Mode unlock: Endless Night.

DECEMBER SURVIVAL UPDATE

We’re working on a new update to Survival mode, for a planned December release. This update will include a variety of UI improvements, some tuning changes, and two new gear items, but the highlight will be a new region: ASH CANYON. We’ll release more details as we get closer to the update, but this piece of concept art might give you some ideas.

EPISODE FOUR

The team’s been working hard on Episode Four, and as I outlined in my last developer diary, we have delayed the episode until 2021 due to COVID. Look for an update on episode progress some time in January.

HOLIDAY SHUTDOWN

Just an early reminder that the whole Hinterland team takes an extended holiday between Christmas and New Year. We’ll share the dates closer to the holiday. During this period, support and test resources will be limited, so we appreciate your patience as it will take a little longer to respond to any reports you send through the Support Portal.

We’re looking forward to seeing what you think about ESCAPE THE DARKWALKER. Get ready, and have fun with it.

- Raphael

New event sounds great! does fire do anything against the Darkwalker?

[DarKube]

The rocks of the Ash Canyon really looks like the ones in HRV, I think the new region will be near HRV. That would force me to explore the Valley 😄!

[Sherri]

On 10/16/2020 at 12:09 PM, Valuable Hunting Knife said:

Ash wood is also used to make baseball bats apparently... 'here boy, good doggy, over here!'  *Thwack*

Oh man I would love a melee weapon we can use on animals without engaging in a struggle.

[Gun Tech.]

ATDS where the reward at the end is "you died." ? 

[turtle777]

Ok, I’m trying to connect the dots:

 

- Ep. 4 features a prison (see Aug Dev. Diary)

- New region Ash Canyon

 

Does this mean the prison will be in the Ash Canyon region ?

Alternatively, the Prison could be a small add. region ?!?!

Or, the prison will be put into an existing region (even more ????)

-t

[piddy3825]

22 hours ago, Gun Tech. said:

ATDS where the reward at the end is "you died." ? 

no offense, but what does ATDS stand for?  not familiar with that acronym...   I looked it up and these were some of the responses.  
Automated Telephone Dialing System?  American Theater n' Drama Society?  Automatic Tunnel Drive System?  
I'm pretty sure it's not what you were saying, right?

[Arcx]

30 minutes ago, piddy3825 said:

no offense, but what does ATDS stand for?  not familiar with that acronym...   I looked it up and these were some of the responses.  
Automated Telephone Dialing System?  American Theater n' Drama Society?  Automatic Tunnel Drive System?  
I'm pretty sure it's not what you were saying, right?

"As the dead sleep" - it's a challenge made by Hinterland, which is pretty hard because you get no health regeneration except for emergency stims and it's pretty much Interloper-settings. You have to visit graves all over Great Bear to complete the challenge.

Edited October 19, 2020 by Arcx

[piddy3825]

2 hours ago, Arcx said:

"As the dead sleep" - 

you could just said it was an acronym for that, but thanks anyway for explaining

[hozz1235]

7 hours ago, turtle777 said:

Ok, I’m trying to connect the dots:

 

- Ep. 4 features a prison (see Aug Dev. Diary)

- New region Ash Canyon

 

Does this mean the prison will be in the Ash Canyon region ?

Alternatively, the Prison could be a small add. region ?!?!

Or, the prison will be put into an existing region (even more ????)

-t

It would make sense that the new region would support Ep4.  But then again, they repurposed PV for Ep3 so anything could happen!  I'm still betting on option 1 though.

[michaelyork777]

Imagine if the DarkWalker can cut-off transition points like Ravine Area either way, or Dam Environs/Winding River,  or Cinder Hills, Could be a Bad Time.

Endless Nights sounds great, I hope the temps scale for indoors, Deadman on that would be BRUTAL

[devamadhu]

Distancing to escape an invisible entity for which there is no known cure?

Protective tools in limited supply?

Avoidance of a deadly mist that renders enclosed areas unusable?

I'VE NEVER BEEN MORE READY

[Glflegolas]

Well, looks like my stalker survival series will have a new region to explore soon -- and have no fear, viewers, I will go to Ash Canyon almost as soon as it's released!

Story Mode Speculation:

I personally think that Blackrock Federal Penitentiary will not be located in Ash Canyon, rather, it'll be located somewhere north of Desolation Point, probably somewhere on the Trans Island Railway Line. That would make sense since Astrid enters Coastal Highway at the end of Episode 3, and I would expect most of Episode 4 to go something like this:

• Astrid enters Coastal Highway
• She finds someone in the Quonset Garage
• This someone asks her to get something from Desolation Point
• After a few quests in Coastal Highway, Astrid goes through the eastern rail tunnel in Coastal Highway to get to Perseverance Mills (a new region)

For Episode 5, I would expect that Hobbs has captured Will and is holding him prisoner at Blackrock in Perseverance Mills. This episode will either mainly revolve around a) Will trying to figure out how to break out of the jail and find a way to avoid capture, or b) Astrid has to somehow defeat Hobbs in order to free Will, or c) some combination of all of the above.

Where I think the regions will be located:

Official in-game map:

A map made by the developers just before Episode 1 and 2 were released:

[dbmurph22]

I agree with your speculation on both Ash Canyon and Perseverance.  That early map looks legit and Ash out of PV would balance the overall regions and there's an opening near Three Strikes for it.

Might check out your vids - sounds great.  I would suggest maybe spoilering some of your post.  Or maybe keeping the Ash Canyon bits, but moving the Story Mode elements and Perseverance Mills material to the story mode area with a spoiler warning in the title.   Don't want to be "that guy" but just trying to help.

[Glflegolas]

Well, Timberwolf Mountain is facing the wrong way, but other than that, the second map is OK.

It is also possible that you'll be able to enter Ash Canyon from the northeastern end of Mountain Town, near the end of the road.

I can't spoiler the post anymore - sorry! Maybe the mods can help?

[dbmurph22]

I was gonna say you could copy, delete and then repost with spoiler but I don't even see how you can post with a spoiler tag at all.  I guess you could do that if you wanted to copy, delete, and then break it up and repost the Ash Canyon parts here and the Wintermute parts in the Wintermute subforum.  I'll leave it up to you, though - made my suggestion, and will be on my way.  Thanks for the kind response.

I think you could be right about the Mountain Town/Spruce Bridge connect to the new Ash Canyon.  If you think about overall layout this does quite a bit and adds a lot of extra flexibility since it reduces the Mystery Lake bottleneck when crossing the map to either the east or the west.  Exciting times.

 

 

[TheShortBright]

im having nightmares of the darkwalker already lol

this is gonna be like the blackout club but its the whiteout solo with and invisible creepy guy after your life

[Jimmy]

15 hours ago, Glflegolas said:

Well, Timberwolf Mountain is facing the wrong way, but other than that, the second map is OK.

It is also possible that you'll be able to enter Ash Canyon from the northeastern end of Mountain Town, near the end of the road.

I can't spoiler the post anymore - sorry! Maybe the mods can help?

I'd predict Ash Valley being between Broken Railroad and Hushed River Valley.

From the appearance of the teaser art, the cliff coloration bears resemblance to HRV. The signs of logging mean it would logically be connected to the Great Bear railroad for transport, so I'm guessing the connection to Ash Valley will be either across the Broken Bridge at the end of the Broken Railroad or through the lower ravine below it.

We might possibly see a connection to Hushed River Valley through here too, giving two separate 'stub' maps an additional exit. This would be an interesting choice that allows for routing a large loop across the western side of the map. For an Interloper, this would give the option of hitting HRV for the mackinaw jacket and a hammer from the Signal Fire, then forging at the Maintenance Shed (unless the exit to Ash Valley is at the bottom of the ravine). A tempting alternative to Spence's, depending on Ash Valley's danger levels, shelter locations and resources.

I can't agree with your placement for Ash Valley on your map because I predict that's where we'll see Blackrock Penitentiary. The Crashed Prison Transport Bus in Mountain Town points towards this area of the map, so we can assume this is road is linked to the prison.

[Glflegolas]

10 minutes ago, Jimmy said:

I'd predict Ash Valley being between Broken Railroad and Hushed River Valley.

From the appearance of the teaser art, the cliff coloration bears resemblance to HRV. The signs of logging mean it would logically be connected to the Great Bear railroad for transport, so I'm guessing the connection to Ash Valley will be either across the Broken Bridge at the end of the Broken Railroad or through the lower ravine below it.

We might possibly see a connection to Hushed River Valley through here too, giving two separate 'stub' maps an additional exit. This would be an interesting choice that allows for routing a large loop across the western side of the map. For an Interloper, this would give the option of hitting HRV for the mackinaw jacket and a hammer from the Signal Fire, then forging at the Maintenance Shed (unless the exit to Ash Valley is at the bottom of the ravine). A tempting alternative to Spence's, depending on Ash Valley's danger levels, shelter locations and resources.

I can't agree with your placement for Ash Valley on your map because I predict that's where we'll see Blackrock Penitentiary. The Crashed Prison Transport Bus in Mountain Town points towards this area of the map, so we can assume this is road is linked to the prison.

Locating Ash Valley between Broken Railroad and the Hushed River Valley would be welcome, and not entirely illogical either. I think your placement is another strong possibility.

On the other hand, I don't agree with your placement of Perseverance Mills. Why? [WARNING: MINOR SPOILERS!]

• Astrid crawls through the tunnel at the Crashed Prison Transport bus and is found by Molly near Long Curve in Pleasant Valley. Many of the convicts, along with a prison guard, ended up in Pleasant Valley too. Therefore, it is almost certain that Mountain Town and Pleasant Valley were once connected by road.
• Perseverance Mills seems like it would be a rather large town, and so the railway would almost certainly lead to it.

[TheShortBright]

so this would mean that there is a limit to how long you can survive in the escape the Darkwalker mode, right?

not counting the transition areas if you stayed in every area for the max time (30 minutes + the extra 5 toxic fog minutes) then you can only survive for a maximum of just under 385 minutes each run. I would really like to see areas slowly become accessible again as it would allow for players to play for longer and not feel cheated (even though I think that 385 minutes is MORE than enough there will always be some people who  want to survive infinitely).

so here is my suggestion: after 5 areas become inaccessible the the area that became foggy first becomes normal again, that way player can be even MORE strategic, as to carefully choose which areas to go to and help create a path to follow as they avoid the Darkwalker. i mean, this doesn't HAVE to be in the game, but it would be nice to be able to know that your time isn't numbered.

if any devs or people who work at hinterland read this then thanks for making the long dark, it really shaped me as a person and i L O V E  it

Edited October 21, 2020 by TheShortBright
misspelling

[oplli]

7 minutes ago, TheShortBright said:

after 5 areas become inaccessible the the area that became foggy first becomes normal again, that way player can be even MORE strategic, as to carefully choose which areas to go to and help create a path to follow as they avoid the Darkwalker. i mean, this doesn't HAVE to be in the game, but it would be nice to be able to know that your time isn't numbered.

This Would be SOOO great!