Published , by TJ Denzer
Published , by TJ Denzer
The COVID-19 coronavirus may have disrupted most of the game industry, but folks big and small are still moving forward. Hinterland Games in particular has put in several large efforts on their survival game, The Long Dark, in the wake of the pandemic and just released a dev diary speaking to upcoming content for the game, despite work from home limitations.
Hinterland Games' latest developer diary was dropped on April 30, 2020. CEO, Founder, and Creative Director Raphael van Lierop took the opportunity to share a wealth of content players can expect in the future of The Long Dark. In the immediate future (Lierop says this May), players can expect an update to Survival mode navigation, including enhancing the in-game map. Of course, hardcore survivalists will be able to toggle off these features as well. Autowalk is also coming to the game as an accessibility feature in the mid-May update, as requested heavily by the community.
After the mid-May Survival Update, Lierop had plenty to say about Episode Four of the game’s Story Mode. Admitting that it has been slowed by limitations presented by the developer’s current work-from-home measures, Lierop still claims Episodes Four and Five are in the works to bring twists to the story that should bring a satisfying conclusion while also leaving some questions open for future installments to answer. Because the lockdown makes story sequences and dialogue and performance recordings difficult, Lierop says the new chapters will take longer than expected to launch, but players can still expect The Long Dark: Episode Four in 2020. Be sure to check out what we thought of Episode 3: Crossroads Elegy.
One of the other major things the diary speaks to is mod tools and support, which Lierop claims are still being developed for the game. In fact, a specific team has been put together at Hinterland to build the system, taking into consideration what kind of modifications and user-created content the game can support and how the studio will go about developing the technology that will cradle this effort. Lierop says players can expect to hear more on mod support in the future as the new team focuses on the highly-requested feature.
As we await the May update and further content, be sure to follow all of our coverage of Hinterland Games and The Long Dark, including their recent efforts to raise money for COVID-19 relief efforts alongside the World Health Organization (WHO).