Job Contracts

This update took a little extra time to clean up old code but that also fixed a lot of bugs along the way. This is also the 2nd update on our Dev Roadmap to Launch!

Job Boards

Random world events have been reworked into job boards where hackers can accept contracts. These events bring higher level enemy types (mantas, snails, bats, bufferfish) into the low level areas as timed challenges. [Turret spawns coming in a future patch.]

By giving them defined routes, we can combo different enemy types with terrain that suits them. This allows for themed fun, like making deliveries to a nearby shop, intercepting data payloads sneaking through volcano tunnels, or tagging graffiti.

Deliveries give item rewards for completing the routes before the package degrades. The waypoints have been spaced so that there's multiple routes, allowing for more creativity and item usage to improve your time.

Payloads can be allied or hostile, spawning both attackers and defenders. [Heal.bat integration coming in a future patch.] Unlike the previous versions, payloads navigate to the destination without you and move at a faster speed. You'll have to keep up and keep the waves of attackers away. Allied payloads can be healed too, making those items more useful. I hope to add fast and flying payload types in addition to the armored crab payload.

Expect more of these events to be integrated into the inbox missions soon to spice up the story. Plus the return of world events, but in response to your actions in each sector.

Hacker Factions

It was difficult to represent all the factions for hackers, corporations, and eccentrics through only the inbox mission system. Too much text! Thanks to the job boards and their graphics and scripted events, there's room for more characters.

The endgame will challenge you to organize groups with different goals and cultures according to their common interests. Plus, you might be able to call in favors to make the final missions easier.

panic()

Artists, poets, and idealists resisting the conformity of product cycles.

DIYcrypt

Hobbyists and pirates who jailbreak and recycle corporate devices past their expiration dates.

X_X

Masked anarchists interested in amusement and profit.

The Knights of Ishkar

They want to protect Finality, just in case it's a next-gen AI studying humanity and waiting to hatch.

Machiavelli's Pizza

They're really passionate about pizza delivery and don't like their rival restaurant using AI for takeout orders.

Future patches will add job boards for The Word, Ol' Glitchy's Bait Shop, and a few other factions.

Graffiti

This is the first of several graffiti drops but I added a few graffiti paintings from artists Lea Kieser and Ben Nicholas. Lea painted two panic() hackers that will appear in the main story. Ben added some graffiti of soldiers to the Wasteland's broken battlefield. We'll have more graffiti art coming in future patches, including from Dom2D!

Boerner's Hot Merch

Speaking of lore, the volcano's secret shop has been upgraded in honor of one of the Supermesh's first hackers who popularized volcano runs. A custom fire-themed shop inventory will land in a future patch.

Fixes

Maybe this patch was the fixes we made along the way. Check the full patch notes below but highlights include mouseover text fixes for all loot pickups, fixes for waypoints that just wouldn't go away, and fixes for the unusable hacker caches and recycle bins.

Have a good weekend, hackers!

0.9.225 - Job Contracts (2/22/26)

• Added new HUD indicators for delivery and payload events, along with the ability to spawn attackers and defenders in response to your progress. [More spawn improvements coming in future patches.]

• Added 5 job boards through the volcano with delivery and payload contracts.

• Introduced DIYcrypt, panic(), and X_X as factions in addition to the Knights of Ishkar and Machiavelli's Pizza.

• Replaced several mission events with defend and delivery segments.

• Mission defense events now prompt you to get to the area before the hack starts.

• Replaced the volcano secret shop.

• Improved chat messages to list all your rewards with more color and less text.

• Added several new graffiti arts (thanks to Ben Nicholas and Lea Kieser)

• Added HUD prompts for proxy hack modifiers and boss fight events. [Boss fight redesign and balance coming in future patch]

• Improved the Portcullis color scheme.

• Added a panic() room.

• Fixed mouseover descriptions for many pickups.

• Fixed hacker caches and recycle bins that were unusable.

• Fixed waypoints not being removed after missions.

• Fixed dropping items from the inventory.

• Fixed boss fight HUD texts.

• Improved text readability and added more server and item colors to text notifications.

• Made enemies teleport less frequently in combat.

• Fixed server and waypoint indicators in Einar's throne room.

• Fixed waypoints to volcano summit and throne room.

• Fixed waypoints through the firewall tunnel.

• Fixed bugs with chat placement and font sizing.

Plus I probably forgot a couple dozen late night bugfixes that got left out of the notes...

Now I can sleep for the first time in 4 months.

• Nonadecimal & superdupergc