Pred Report VI | Predecessor

Pred Report VI

2024年3月19日

Summary

Greetings Champions!

With so much excitement surrounding Predecessor this month it’s easy to forget that it’s been a while since the last Pred Report!

One of our core principles as a company is to champion community transparency, so today we’re keen to continue that value answering yet more of your burning questions, providing exciting insights into upcoming projects, and just generally summing up where we’re at as a company.

Let’s do this!

PRED Talk

Kicking things off it’s important we reshare our recent PRED Talk video, in which Robbie announced a plethora of exciting new features and sneak peaks coming soon to Predecessor.

He also revealed our official Open Beta launch date (March 28th) and our highly anticipated launch date onto Xbox (also March 28th). Talk about hype!

Quickfire Questions

Will players need to do anything during the transition to Open Beta?

Nope! For anyone with the game already the transition to Open Beta will feel like just another game update. There's no new special game key to redeem, no new SKU ( that means product!) to download from a store - just a regular ol' game update!

Will console players get Early Access bundles?

At the time of our Open Beta launch this won’t be possible, but we’re exploring ways for new players to catch up quickly to their PC counterparts. We’ll share more on this when we’ve made a final decision on a path forwards.

Will console players have a way to get the rewards from previous Early Access seasons?

We understand that there are many players on PlayStation who missed out on Early Access Season 1 and 2 rewards, and there will be more players coming in from Xbox who will have also missed out on the recent Early Access Season 3 rewards.

Why did Amber launch with so few uses?

We envision Amber as a multi-purpose soft currency. We have plans to make it more useful for more things beyond Hero Acquisition, but in order to roll it out quickly and without too many variables that could go wrong, we elected to limit it on launch to just this one use.

Which Xbox consoles will be supported?

At the launch of Open Beta and our initially rollout on Xbox, only Xbox Series S/X will be supported.

What regions will be supported on Xbox?

At the time of launch, we’ll be making Predecessor available globally on Xbox Series X/S consoles ( some exclusions may apply).

Which regions can take part in the Predecessor Open Beta?
Steam Global*
Epic Global*
PlayStation NA, SA, EMEA
Xbox Global*

*Some exclusions may apply.

When can we expect more server regions?

We know there’s requests for more servers and supported regions. We’re constantly reviewing this and should we find that the player base in a region is large enough that we can safely split matchmaking without harming the matchmaking experience of other regions, we will immediately roll out new servers in those regions.

When will the new lighting changes launch?

We’re pleased to confirm that the first of many visual improvements coming to Predecessor will arrive in V0.16 on March 28th.

When will the new Undertow skins launch?

These will be coming later this year, during the summertime.

When will Ranked Mode launch?

Like the Undertow skinline we’re aiming to launch Ranked Mode in Summer after a couple of months of Open Beta. We’ll share a specific release date a little closer to the time.

Will Ranked Mode feature detailed, viewable statistics?

Ranked mode will launch in a fairly feature-limited state. Our intention is to get it out at the right time and then build up new features and offerings based on community feedback and data gathered from how the gamemode is interacted with.

When will account linking launch?

Account linking was blocked by our migration to an entirely rebuilt and custom backend codebase. Now that this is released, we’re able to proceed with work on this and other systems that were held up. We don’t have a firm date for this feature just yet, but we’re hard at work on delivering it as soon as we’re able to.

After Open Beta launches, will the update cadence change?

The eagle-eyed among you have probably spotted that our Open Beta launch takes place on March 28th, which is a Thursday (as opposed to our usual update day of Tuesday) and falls outside of our usual 3-week update cadence.

With the backend changes and UI improvements out the way, will content speed up?

We’ve discussed in the past how we’ve had to prioritise important infrastructure work in place of content or skins. While we don’t intend to release patches more frequently, we’re pleased to share that we do hope you’ll notice an overall uptick in game development.

When will the prices of skins be adjusted?

As promised in a previous blog, we’re revising our skin prices following community feedback.

When will Yin/Aurora/GRIM.exe/ Wukong/Boris/Zinx/Terra come to the game?

All of the remaining Paragon Heroes are in the pipeline and will be added in future content updates. We won’t spoil who’s coming and when, so keep an eye out for announcements in the lead up to content releases to see who’s coming up.

Marketing Predecessor

It’s no big secret that we’ve focused our efforts on development for the past few years, with less of an eye on marketing our game.

Our goal has always been to make the best game we possibly could. We’re confident that having a well balanced game that looks slick and plays great will serve us better in the long term, as opposed to promoting a less-polished version of the game too soon which may lead to a short-term surge in new players, but could also lead to those new players dropping off due to an unenjoyable experience.

With that said however we are now at the point where we’ve started greasing the big marketing machine we’ve been quietly building.

We hope you find it as exciting as we do!

Where’s Early Access Season 4?

We do not intend to have any further seasons during Early Access. Instead our next season will take place shortly after our full launch later in the year.

As exciting as that may initially seem, it doesn’t mean that we’re in a position to launch out of Early Access anytime too soon. We’ve still got a lot to do before we get to that milestone.

Ranked Mode

Did you miss the reveal of our work in progress Ranked Mode images?

Ranked Mode will launch later this year with support for Solo/Duo queueing only. Like all major features released during our Early Access, Ranked Mode will release with room for growth and improvement, allowing us to develop this gamemode alongside your feedback and suggestions.

Matchmaking Improvements

We’re really pleased with how much better matches have been with our first implementation of our new system.

Expect more matchmaking improvements as time goes on and look out for that aforementioned deep dive blog coming in the next couple of weeks!

Community Roundup

We’re not the only ones around here doing awesome things! Check out some of the amazing stuff our community is making!

My name is Crunch

Check out this adorable fanart of Crunch by skyycha! He looks absolutely chuffed to bits, probably because he got to punch someone.

I like to punch

Sticking with the theme, kirama—k also had a crack at some Crunch fanart and we’re blown away by the combo of contrast and line work!

Rose Thorn Countess

Here’s some stunning Countess skin fanart by Diin126, who’s imagined her as a prickly rose thorn assassin!

Angsty Argus

We had to include at least one piece of artwork of our most recent Hero, Argus, and how could we pass up this incredible art by Alsassa? We can really feel the determination in his eyes - great work!

The Nations League Tournament

Exciting news, patriotic competitors! Lilleby and ForTheCore have announced The Nations League, an exciting new tournament coming soon!
When: March 30th - 31st
Where: The ForTheCore Twitch Channel

Competing Nations (so far!):

Registrations are closed, but you can still get involved!

That’s all for now, Champions!
What do you think? Excited for March 28th? Join our Discord and let us know if you’re jumping in on Xbox when it launches!

← Previous PRED Talk (Spring 2024)
Next → Early Access Patch V0.16