Underworld Ascendant

Performance Improvements and New or Updated FeaturesMajor improvements to frame rate and load times.Lighting pass across the game to help players see deeper into the darkest corners of the Abyss.Added Saurian Mage allies that have been captured by Typhon’s minions. Once you free these allies, they will aid you in battle against nearby undead. Added the Outcast character Fane, an ally who, once freed, becomes a vendor selling adventuring provisions wherever Hapurkala sets up camp. Added Talking Skulls (Bart and Bertha) to the Midnight Forum in Marcaul.Increased the equipment that drops in the earliest part of the game and added several new types of gear.Loot from chests is now placed more intelligently in the chest’s interior, to reduce unintended collisions.Added a new, more appropriately-sized model representing smaller equipment items like helmets and boots.Added confirmation text when Quick-Saving, including a notification if the player is in a situation where saving is not permitted.You can now start climbing ropes and chains from swimming contact, not just jumping. Also, contact with water won’t break you out a rope climb.Blast arrows no longer detonate without being fired (like, for example, when they’re sitting in a chest).Rune formulas branded on wands with the Focus Mastery skill are now preserved around player respawn.Added Goggles of Night-vision as a new item of headgear.Added variation of scale colors to Saurians (rather than all defaulting to green).Updated Aelita\'s vendor tables to offer a greater selection of gear usable with the Ceremonial Garb skill.Updated the sfx that plays upon completing a quest.Improved performance when things are on fire.

Update 2 Build NotesThe Stygian Abyss renovatedThe world is now a series of interconnected levels, accessible through The Grand Staircase. Updated quest flow now focuses on important narrative quests that highlight both new and refined story and content, while allowing the player to freely explore the environment and optional side-quests.As a result of this major change, we highly recommend that you start a new game to experience it. That said, if you want to start from where you left off, your old save games will still work and you will start at a roughly similar place in the new story progression.Player experience improvements highlightsUpdated enemy patrol paths and lighting pass in all levels to enhance tactical stealth gameplay, and enemy population overhaul/refinements on all main quests.New and streamlined story elements along main critical path, with supplemental story elements moved to explorable space.The Vault of Nyx, the final level encounter, gameplay and clarity improvements.Meta Game updatesThe Doom Counter has been refined to better ramp the type and difficulty of creatures that appear, and now allows players to complete the game without having to set it back more than once in an average playthrough. Save Game SystemPlayers can now use F5 to quick save and F9 to quick load said quick save.Players are now asked for confirmation if they are about to overwrite an existing save.Clarity pass on the text in the Save menu to improve usability. Also a load game panel clarity pass. It will also now show difficulty of each save game.AIUpdated enemy patrol paths and AI behavior models to improve their reaction to player actionsEnemies will no longer do more than one in-combat emote in a row, which makes them much more aggressive.Enemies will flee less often than before.Animuses now alert all nearby undead when they are being attacked.