Llorona madness / Panic at the mortuary

We’re proud to finally show you our latest update, with new content, revisited mechanics, and overall improvements that better the horror experience. We’ve been fixing a bunch of things and incorporating new ideas given to us by you, our hunters. We thank you dearly for being with us on this journey, your support is turning SO BELOW into something greater than we envisioned. Thanks.

New content:

The Bach Funeral Parlor.

• Our newest map is a creepy mortuary facility, infested with recent paranormal phenomena. This map can be played with any entity (except for the Nun, which is unique to the Church). This is our first attempt at a map that’s just been abandoned, and its medium-to-small size make it perfect for solo contracts and speedruns.

New radar system.

• The new radar system allows the hunters to detect special objects, enemies, and other hunters in their surroundings. The device is divided into two parts: the portable antenna, and the radar monitor at the base. The idea es to team up with other hunters and coordinate through radio. The hunters can choose on the monitor who to track. Communication is key.

Reworks, fixes and improvements:

Llorona madness.

This time we bring you a new revisited version of one of our most popular entities: La Llorona. For a long time, we felt that the Llorona entity was somewhat underdeveloped. That’s why we not only changed the models of the whole family, but we implemented a transformation function that reflects the state of the entities (roaming, hunting, searching, etc.), making it a little easier to navigate the maps safely. This in time inspired us to revisit her behavior and that of her children. Now the children can call upon their mother when disturbed by the hunters, as well as transforming and being able to damage the hunters if the perturbations go too far. The whole Llorona experience has been significantly improved. Now their behavior make for a very dynamic set of encounters.

Voice chat improvements.

Proximity chat and radio communications are essential to immersion in SO BELOW, and the previous implementation of the radios was—put slightly—a nightmare. Finally, after many hours of troubleshooting, we are proud to announce that the in-game voice chat is now stable and fun to use. This means we have a consistent proximity chat experience and the corresponding sound effects on radio and while dead. Please, go ahead and give it a try, for there could still be some bugs left to be found.

Player camera improvements

The hunters can now enjoy a much better camera experience with smooth transitions and improved hand object positions. This means that tools such as hand cameras are much more comfortable (and practical) to use. Additionally, we’ve decided to completely get rid of the immersive mode (headbob), for it caused many more problems than its worth.

Quality-of-life improvements.

Sprinting doors: Now the hunters can rush through a haunted location by sprinting towards doors, providing a much more agile experience. This, however, causes a lot of noise and can prompt entities to investigate the area. Escaping entities is now an important factor. And, on that same note…

General entity behavior improvements

The general haunting behavior of most entities has been improved by binding the entity speed to the distance relative to the hunter. This means that, in principle, the hunters can outrun most of the entities by sprinting gracefully across the map. This does not apply to teleporting entities, such as the shadow. Additionally, the entities now forget the player position after some time, allowing the possibility to hide (remember that crouching is your friend).

Revisited hunting objects.

We are constantly thinking about new ways to improve the hunting experience, and that’s why we’ve brought back the Geiger Counter and the Glowing Sticks with new functionalities.

• New glowstick system. The glowstick item has been revamped to offer 8 individual glowsticks in one pouch, meaning hunters can now easily mark their path through mazes or leave some sort of indicator anywhere they want. - New Geiger counter. The Geiger counter is back, and this time it offers a mor comprehensive experience. The device can detect entities and haunted objects, but it also detects overall paranormal activity, meaning that when there is an ongoing attack, its reading will go through the roof. - Defibrillator rework . The defibrillator got a new look and feel, as well as an important overhaul: it now has more charges. Now hunters can revive the player multiple times (3 times per defibrillator)

Revisited maps.

We went through all the maps in scrutiny looking for missing mechanics or weird situations. All maps were improved in systems and decorations to some degree, meaning a more consistent experience and a refreshing look (especially in older maps, like the orphanage). Some changes include: - Additional tool spawn rate increased. This was done in order to have more crucifixes and other tools available while exploring. - More audio elements and cues. Some maps lacked a few audio cues and tricks, such as haunted areas having a different reverb to evoke a haunted feeling. - Revisited decorations and lore consistency. Many paintings, symbols and other decorations within the maps were updated to fit the overarching cult narrative.

Game audio improvements

The game atmosphere is very important to us, so we added more subtle sounds and a few game sound mechanics that noticeably improve the game feeling and immersion. These things include new physical sounds, new ghost sounds, improvements to the footstep system, and more. Also, both the Nachtgeist and the Llorona sound sets were improved as a part of the Llorona madness overhaul. Additionally, thanks to your help, we fixed some character voice lines that were mixed.

Additional Bug fixes

We are always reading and learning about new bugs, and thanks to that we’ve fixed and improved a lot of small things here and there (thanks to everyone reporting on our discord server). A couple honorable mentions are:

• Doors clipping randomly. Has it happened to you? A very annoying bug where the doors clipped between positions. This caused open doors to appear closed and vice versa. - Objects changing state after changing object selection on inventory. Meaning that sometimes certain consumable objects (like crosses, defibrillators, etc.) could be “reset” by this bug.

And that’s all we have for now, dear hunters. We will focus the following weeks on performance improvements and also finishing a new map (spoiler alert: our first forest map). As always, we thank you for your continued support and, especially, for your feedback. Although we are a very small team, with all your help, this now feels more like a big and loyal community. Thank you very much everyone.