Hei Outlanders,
This year has been quite a ride and we would like to thank each and everyone of you who stuck with us through thick and thin. Today, we'd like to take the opportunity to recap everything that happened in Vigor in 2021 and share with you the steady progress we've made during the past year. The whole team is incredibly proud of everything we managed to add-/-tweak-/-fix-/rebalance. So sit tight, pour yourself your favorite drink, grab a Christmas snack, sit back and enjoy!
Before we jump straight into the details, you can see in the picture below a more general look at what happened in Vigor in 2021. We released 4 Seasons starting with Season 7: Mercenaries, followed by Season 8: Trappers, then Season 9: Stalkers and finally Vigor Chronicles: Vengeance marked a completely new chapter for the game. We also released 4 Legacy Seasons. The first Legacy season: Preppers came out with update 8.1, followed by Legacy season 2: Hunters in update 9.1 and then surprise surprise, we decided to release two Legacy seasons during Chronicles: Vengeance. The first one released was Legacy season 4: Warlords by popular demand from our community, followed by Legacy season 3: Rivals a few weeks later.
All righty then, now that we got that out of the way, let's jump into the details. Our road begins in February 2021 with the release of Season 7: Mercenaries. We introduced three new weapons into the mix, the B93 Raffica, the M60E3 and La Chiave. We also implemented a fun little mechanic in Encounters - openable and lockable exits! Last but not least, the Mercenaries brought with them anti-camping mortar strikes, however they were removed the following season as they were influencing gameplay in a way we didn’t intend. Speaking of the following season, Season 8: Trappers came out in April and with it came two new packs - the Hunter Pack and the Prey Pack. We also added a brand new weapon into the game - the PH M82! We made sure that every encounter had two Loot Events at all times and we did an XP rebalancing - primarily, the XPs for Resource and Military crates was significantly lowered, and the XPs for actions in Encounters was reworked to now award double the amount on average. The last thing we tweaked in this season were the Shootout rewards. We thought it would be best to rebalance the rewards based on leaderboard position.
During the middle of Season 8: Trappers, we released our 8.1 Update which included a brand new feature - Legacy seasons! These are past seasons that are no longer active and offer a great way for players from new platforms like PlayStation and the Nintendo Switch to get cosmetics and the Battle Pass from previous seasons that were only available on Xbox. But even Xbox players who played the first seasons and weren't able to complete the Battle Pass will have the chance to do it when we roll out each Legacy season. Besides the Legacy season, we introduced the "Thank You Charity Pack" with all proceeds going to Brno University Hospital to help them fight the spread of Covid-19. We finally added the Dev and Partner titles but most importantly, we made some changes related to consumables, mainly the rarities of consumables and the stack amount that someone can bring with them into an Encounter.
In August, we released one of our most anticipated and jam-packed updates in terms of features, Season 9: Stalkers. We finally added something that our community had been requesting for a long time - grenades! Because they are special issue rarity, players can now carry two frag grenades with them in an Encounter and use them to force out other players who might be hiding inside a house or other advantageous area. Besides the grenades, another big feature that was added in Season 9: Stalkers were improvements for new gen. consoles. Players on the Xbox Series S|X and PS5 are now able to enjoy Vigor in 60 fps! We also added a new weapon, the A74-KSU, we gave the Elimination mode some love: we turned off team killing, we added new loadouts and did a rework on the rewards. Last but not least, we added Czech localization to the game so our players in the Czech Republic can play Vigor in their native language!
With update 9.1, which was released in September, we did a revamp of the Cosmetic Store with lots of interesting weapon skins and outfits neatly sorted and the Featured Store where players can now discover exclusive items and new deals. We released Legacy season 2: Hunters and added an Elimination exclusive outfit "Junker (Dead Shot)". Finally, update 9.1 saw the return of the Outlander Pack following feedback from our community on what premium pack from the past was the best.
In November, we released probably our most ambitious update this year with Vigor Chronicles: Vengeance. We finally added lore into the game in the form of 10 cassettes that players can collect from the free tier of the Battle Pass and listen to the story of Adam, a former soldier who wants revenge and is out for blood, in their Shelter. We also released a new Shootout map, called Kjerstin, which is great for some close combat thrills. A new map is another thing that our community has been craving for a long time and we're so happy to finally bring it to you. Don't worry though, Kjerstin will be released as a full Encounter map in the coming updates. In Vigor Chronicles: Vengeance we introduced a new weapon as well, the glorious special issue assault rifle L85A1 and a brand new set of grenades in the form of the M84 flash grenade that allows you to blind your enemies to take that lethal shot or give you the necessary time to make your escape out of a tight situation. In contrast to the M67 frag grenade, this one is military grade which means you can bring up to 3 of them into an Encounter. In addition, we released a new premium pack that lets you dress like a member of the Danish Frogmen Corps. It's our "Vigor: Path To Vengeance" pack, one of our most menacing-looking outfits we've ever released, and it's currently available in our Crowns Store! Right now, as you're reading this blog, it's on sale so make sure to head over to the store once you're done and grab one before the sale ends!
And that brings us to the last update of this year, update 10.1 aka our Christmas update which saw the Shelter and most maps decorated with Christmas ornaments as well as Santa coming back into the Outlands to provide the airdrops instead of the airplane. One cool new feature we added for this update was snowballs in Elimination mode! You can throw them the same way you throw grenades and you'll be able to find them as a loadout item. Be careful though. It's all fun and games, but if you get hit with a snowball, that's an instant kill.
This year we've added some fireworks to the game which you can use in the Outlands to celebrate the holidays or just confuse your opponents. Either way, make sure to give them a try in the Encounters as they truly are a magnificent sight to behold. These fireworks were given to all players for free on first login after update 10.1 went live. On top of that, you can claim even more of them by completing challenges. Speaking of challenges, our challenge system is getting a makeover and we've taken the first step of implementing these changes with update 10.1. We know that the current challenge system might be a bit outdated, which is why we want to introduce some new challenges, and the XP gained from them will reflect the difficulty of each challenge better. You’ll find them in a new tab for challenges, so they'll be easily accessible. Our team also worked hard on a number of optimizations in the game, specifically:
- Network optimizations leading to less bandwidth consumption for shooting (reduced by 45%), aiming (reduced by 75%), radiation (reduced by 95%) and character's state
- Framerate optimizations for the Shelter, Mortar Strikes, and impact particles caused by bullets
And for the last feature of the last update of the year, it's something that our team worked hard on. It's a rework on some electronic mechanics that we dubbed "Electronic warfare". Cool right? So what does Electronic warfare include?
Well, simply put:
- The Disruptive Tower and Portable Jammers activated or placed by you or your teammates (friendly players) no longer jams the Signals Detector for you or your teammates, but hides you from everyone who isn't friendly
- Icon when being friendly jammed is now blue (instead of red)
- Friendly transmitters can still be jammed by friendly jammers
- Signals Detector detects friendly players and transmitters with a blue icon
- Portable Signals Detector does not detect friendly players, and marks friendly transmitters with a blue icon
Before we end this blog, we wanted to share with you some interesting data.
- The cassette "I'm Adam" was replayed 25,027 times.
- Median kill distance of the Contact Bomb: 11.9m
- Average distance travelled on Sagbruk: 105,806m
- Maximum achievable average movement speed: 420cm/s
- Longest kill distance by a weapon besides booby trap and contact bomb: SVU at 558.6 meters
That pretty much sums up all of our updates for 2021. As a parting gift, here's a sneak peek on what you can expect in the next year. As our producer, Phil Hilal, said in our last stream of the year: "We want to focus on the first-time experience for Vigor players. We know it's a bit rough and we would like to have a look and improve it and make it more accessible even for first time users". There it is folks! We're focusing on the onboarding experience in the beginning of the new year so stay tuned to get more info as we work on that and as we announce details about what we'll be working on after that!
And now, slowly but surely, we've reached the end of the year and this blog. Once again, we would like to thank all of you guys for being a part of our community, for pushing us to constantly improve and deliver a better gaming experience. Without you, there wouldn't be Vigor. Thanks for sticking with us for these past 2 and a half years through thick and thin. We want to wish everyone happy holidays, to spend time with your loved ones and here's to a new year full of new opportunities, adventures and hope for a better and Covid-free world. Stay healthy and safe out there and as always,
See you in the Outlands in 2022!