Dagger Directive - Dev Blog: April 2025

Apr 29, 2025

Hi everyone! Last month I went over some of the new weapons and announced that co-op is getting added. This month brings more weapons and I’ll go into some more details on what’s changing with multiplayer.

Weapons

FGM-148 Javelin with its two fire modes (Top Attack and Direct Attack) and ability to lock on to a variety of targets will make quick work of enemy vehicles.

XM29 OICW Provides a combination of a 20mm programmable grenade launcher with a 5.56mm assault rifle. This was an experimental weapon so we took some liberties with its implementation in the game.

Multiplayer Updates

As the work to add co-op continued we’ve had to adapt some current systems and add some new ones to get the game working smoothly with multiplayer.

Changes to existing systems:

• You will have a separate character to use in multiplayer.
• Loadouts are now shared between all of your characters. This makes it easier to jump from single player characters to multiplayer. The preset loadouts can now be deleted to make room for more customized ones.
• All missions will be unlocked by default in multiplayer. If you want to play the missions in order you can, but we didn’t want to restrict players just because they haven’t unlocked a mission yet.
• Hardcore mode will only be available in singleplayer to keep the player data more organized.
• Saving and loading mid mission is restricted to single player. There are just too many variables that can affect smoothly loading and saving in the middle of a multiplayer mission.

Additions:

• Reviving dead players has been added as a way to keep the pace up and make the game fun for everyone, even if a player is taken out early.
• While having everyone join on the ship, prepare equipment, and deploy on a mission is the ideal flow, we know that won’t work every time. We’ve added the ability to join mid mission. To get joining players started quickly they’ll parachute in near the existing team. Weapon selection can still be made from the loadout screen on the way down to the ground.
• The ship now has a locker where you can customize your character's uniform, appearance, and patches.
• Friendly fire became a bit of an issue during playtesting over the last couple of weeks so we’ve added a Friendly Fire warning to the UI. It can be seen in the gif below.
• Communication is very important for a game like this. We’ve added voice and text chat along with a map pinging system to help get information back and forth within your team.

Night Changes

Night missions complicate friendly identification. A few new features and items have gone in to make night missions easier with teammates.

• Chemlights, both visible and IR, have been added to help mark areas or targets.
• The patches on the players' uniforms now give off an infrared glow to make them easier to see at night.
• IR Strobes are attached to players helmets to make them much easier to see even at longer distances.

Next month we’ll cover the lower level multiplayer systems and the multiplayer UI in more detail in addition to the new weapons of course!