No, we're not dead at all. And neither does Long Drive.

We did not expect that it would be easy to rewrite the main parts of the game, but even so, it is much more difficult than we expected. Genesz is sweating blood and fighting to get the update ready for you as soon as possible, but he won't release it half-finished. We don't know how long it will be until it is ready, but once it is ready, we hope to be able to say that it was worth the wait.

The landscape generation is the most difficult part of the whole process, we have to prepare it first so that we can adjust to it and place the possible new buildings and possible settlements.
Some new mechanics are also expected, and if we don't end up dying until then, maybe a more functioning multiplayer will be ready.

In the meantime, please be patient, the game will continue to receive updates, unless Genesz starts making kitty videos.

Thank you for being so many of us and waiting for the update.


Genesz, Gab, Gus, Doc

But, if you are bored, you can follow Gus on his Youtube channel, if you are missing the good old Chat 'till you Die vibes!
He just started the channel a few days ago, don't expect anything fancy, or you get your armpit kicked!

We are still working on the game base codes. Its's a very hard work because anything you change in the game's old code could break everything else.
It is a very meticulous job to track down all the bugs and therefore it is a rather slow process since Genesz is the only one who coding.
We are working on a lot of new things, but the main direction is still the renovation of the game's new terrain generation and the optimization of the game, which is not easy due to the above.
Please be patient, this is a small project of a few people.
As soon as the update becomes available, you will be the first to know about it.
Keep up :)

• Bikes driving got much better, they spin less likely and should be less jumpy,
  and their keyboard steering speed decreases less at higher speeds
  
• Removed not being able to drink or pour from heavy containers
  
• Fixed being able to attach baskets and such to air if they have other attachables in them
  
• Pallets do not physics lock new things while picked up
  to make it easier to move them around without grabbing random things
  but already locked things will stay on it
  
• Fixed attachables loading to the hitch when the should be somewhere else on the car
  
• Adjusted fridge collider very slightly
  
• Raised Car02 and Car02k's suspension
  (couldn't stiffen it :( that made it roll over)
  
• Increased the car hauler's rear wheels sideways friction to spin a bit less likely
  (that too rolled over with even more friction)
  
• Since the new menu, you can have old saves from before the menu with the same name as a save after it, This is because some invisible character got added to the name of the save Which I removed now, so now everything is back to normal
  (except that you now can have same named saves from before and after this update)

Enjoy :D

We are here again with some news, new stuff, and many interesting things!
CHANGES/FIXES/Things added since the last post:

• Added spirit water bubble level tool instrument thingy ( YES! )
  
• Added new Trophy! (And they should spawn now)
  
• Fixed being able to attach things to the thin air, if looking at buildings or the terrain
  
• Fixed the bus locking its own wheels again! :@
  
• Collider size of locked wheels now update with different wheels
  
• Fixed not being able to attach trailers to the big vehicle
  
• Added "Reduced Debris" option the the misc tab in the settings
  (If enabled, breakable things fall into less pieces and those disappear too)
  
• Poles are now tilted, and most of the road side buildings are now connected to them.
  (This will gain importance in the future)
  
• Fixed some attachables getting frozen in air on loading!
  
• Changed baskets and such things attaching again, they should now attach with their closest point to the closest point on the sufrace that you are looking at, and not exactly to the point you are looking at.
  (Hope you understand! Because we don't)
  
• Fixed not being able to attach trailers (broke with the previous fix)
  
• Fixed licence plate and other attachables not loading correctly when attached to the slots of the bike seats
  
• Attaching baskets and a few attachable things now should be easier, because they no longer use their center, but their closest point for attaching
  
• Bike's steering with keyboard is now slower on higher speeds, this should make the controls of the bikes a lot better!
  (And they should bounce slightly less)
  
• Fixed player preview not visible in player tab
  
• Fixed the bus locking its own wheels ( :@ )
  
• Adjusted trailer center of mass to make it a bit more stable (not the car transporter, but the small one!)
  
• Pallet is now attachable and has physics lock zone! (This is very interesting and unlocks amazing new upportunities!)
  
• Rail-part-chunk-something is now attachable
  
• Fixed some errors from the bug reports sections (Steam and Discord)
  
• Added some things to make older mods work!
  
• Removed VR from the main branch
  (It is now in the betas called vrtest, it also has multiplayer)
  
• Fixed bike's seats color not saving
  
• Fixed the new vehicle's tank pouring angle
  
• Fixed coffin, bed and rear seats now spawning

• Few vehicles now have removable fuel tanks
  (when loading older saves those vehicles will not have a tank)
  
• Fuel cans, oil cans and such can be installed as tanks
  
• Car interior lights now turn on when the doors are opened
  they have 3 states:
  
  1. only on when doors are open
     
  2. always on
     
  3. always off
• Physics lock triggers now lock vehicle's wheels if its handbrake is on, so transporting them is more stable
  
• Added deferred rendering path setting
  (this may run a bit better, than forward, which was the default)
  
• Distant terrain setting now disables the Distant Terrain Camera when it's disabled
  (should gain more performance when disabled, than before this update)
  
• Added cloud shadow setting (it can now be disabled)
  
• Added Sky Objects setting which affects, clouds, stars and airplanes in the sky
  (and also disables the Sky Camera when it's disabled)

• Added new vehicle
  
• Added new vehicle
  
• Added new vehicle
  
• Added new vehicle variations
  
• Added Stereoscopic 3D options (Anaglyph, SBS, Depth)
  
• Added metal detector
  
• Stuff can be dug up from underground with the shovel
  
• Added stuff spawning in boxes
  
• Added ramp
  
• Added coffin
  
• Added VR Look around (Only Headset, no motion controllers yet)
  
• Toilets can now be installed instead of the rear seats for kombi cars
  
• Added new radio stuff and the halloween themed commercials only play on halloween

• Fixed not being able to put Car08's right mirror in inventory
  
• Fixed a bug with attachables and physics lock
  
• Fixed saving on bike
  
• Fixed paintings sometimes not being random
  
• Fixed compass needle not rotating around
  
• Fixed invisible ghost siphon hoses remaining when leaving behind a siphon hose, same with ragdolls
  
• Fixed 360° Camera being small if on an other monitor

• Changed some mirror stuff a bit
  
• Succesfully moved to new Unity version (from 2019.2.21f1 to 2021.3.15f1)
  (And finally to 2021.3.18f1, but not on purpose)
  
• Did something to the old heathaze, so its not glowing
  
• Sun defender's text changed from "Continue" to use "Adjust"
  
• Sun is blinding again when you drive west around sunset
  
• Adjusted plexiglass, now those are blinding too
  
• The friendly human npcs added in the scary update no longer spawn in peaceful mode
  
• From now on the Broom can be put in inventory
  
• whiter wall in starting house

As always this update is both delayed and rushed, it seems like that is the only way to do it.
So thank you for the patience!

After the previous update back in november the plan was to bring back the christmass and winter stuff from v20191227winter, fix a few things and start working fully on multiplayer again.
There wasn't enough progress made to be done before christmass, so this update was in the works instead.

Now after the unavoidable hotfixes will be out, the plan would be to work on multiplayer.
But that is not so simple. Syncing a few things is not that hard, but the game under the hood is like an overcomplicated rusty pipe system made of badly written moldy spaghetti code living in a dark basement with slimy angry looking spider creatures crawling on everything. And hissing at me.

In the past few years I have gained a lot of experience, now I should be able to do much better.
So a lot of the main scripts need to be rewritten, like the:

• terrain generation
  
• building generation
  
• save-load system
  
• item manager

If these don't work properly (and they don't) the multiplayer will not either.
And it is not efficient to implement new features to them, or other systems depending on them either.

Playing with older versions which have the previous terrain generation now almost make me sick.
They didn't made me sick back then, because they felt great then, but they weren't.
And the current one feels not too bad now, but I want to have a very good one, and be very sick of this one, when that comes out.

I don't like to talk about plans like this, because they never work, something always crosses them out, and the game should do the talking anyway by it's improvements, and not me. If I'm talking, then I'm not working.
But it is good to see the community on the discord server[discord.gg] already sharing their experience with this update and the activity on other places.
I would interact more with you, but "sadly" there are so many of you and I'm a man of a few words, aren't I?
You know that if you saw the previous live streams. Speaking of those, there should be one sometime about this update on the TLD youtube channel, I'm sure it will be posted on the TLD facebook page[www.facebook.com], if you are afraid you miss it.

Have fun with this update!
Hopefully the next one won't take much longer as the average updates took this far.


v2022.11.11:

• Fixed lag when loading older saves?

v2022.11.10:

• Added inventory icons for:
  
  • book
    
  • crate debrish
• New pole cable (eats a bit less performance (at least from the cpu))
  
• Few other smaller script and model optimizations

v2022.11.09:

• Fixed a few lag spikes and a small continous something
  
• Fixed food shooting
  
• Fixed no physics on stuff after an error (hopefully)
  
• Books can now be stored in inventory (no icon yet)

First of all: Sorry for the delay, we are hard at work. The patch should be out any day now, so be prepared to regurarly check the Youtube channel, Facebook page, Steam, and all that!
Many things happened, but most importantly: Our Grandmother's old Trabant has been a bit renovated, she got her old shine back, and lots of her parts were upgraded, changed, etc.
Our Hungarian players and viewers know, that all of us had grown up in this car. It is in our family since 1987.

Without this car, there would be no Long Drive. Without this car, our life would be pretty different. And yes, this is the same car that appears in the Jalopy in real life video! Oh, and in The Long Drive in real life video also!
Thank you Grandma, for the memories, you will live on in this car, we will take care of it for as long as we can!

This is a video in Hungarian language, but still if some of you are interested, you can watch it, so I thought I post it here. Take care guys, we are working on the patch as fast as we can!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xtHCsRYClg

Fresh News:
https://www.facebook.com/thelongdrivegame

• Added new big building
  
• Added new friendly npc
  (mainly for halloween, but it will stay)
  
• Added new flashlight, chair, misc stuff
  
• Added decoration ai (bat)
  
• Fixed truck doors openable even when dismounted
  
• Fixed beer bottle bottom gib model uv
  
• Fixed rabbit blinding or deafening with headshot
  
• Fixed car camera recender winding up
  
• Fixed a building which should only spawn far from the road not spawning anywhere
  
• Rabbits no longer insta kill (but still fast)
  
• A few doors in the starting house can be opened wider
  
  Changed road side building generation:
  
• Fixed road side buildings not loading at the same place
  
• Poles may still move a bit
  
• Buildings should repeating less
  
• (Loading saves from previous versions still works,
  but the same buildings will not be there near the road)

• Added new beer bottle material
  
• Added 2 new door glass materials at the start house
  
• Fixed the bus's RPM gauge not working
  
• Fixed a few things missing from a few vehicles
  (like gear sticks, and the leafsprings of the truck)
  
• Fixed the new car's trunk (or frunk) physics lock trigger
  not reaching small things around the middle

• Fixed weapons not working without steam
  
• Fixed the start car not being saved if it is the new one
  
• Fixed not being able to move until pause/unpause at start

Happy Halloween! ːsteamhappyː

Ver.20220925c

• Added new car
  
• Added new engine for the first car
  
• Added new music to neon synth radio
  
• Added power pole cable
  
• Added Shotguns
  
• Added bulging eyes when zooming
  
• Added physics lock setting in misc tab
  
• Added female character
  
• Added thumbleweed
  
• Added window roll down feature
  
• Picked up stuff now rotates using physics
  
• New ammo box for the gun
  
• Crates are breakable

• Breakable stuff ignores the mass of the thing it collided with,
  so they are easier to transport
  
• Bunny ragdols very slightly more stable
  (Disabled self collision)
  
• Fixed unused stuff spawning
  (like square headlights next to round headlight car variant)
  
• Smoothed bulging eyeballs when zooming
  
• Fixed Screenshot keys not rebinding

• Things in trunk are getting locked only if it is closed
  
• Parts which fall off after collision won't have
  their physics locked until picked up

• Shoot, melee weapon damage eachother
  
• Bike driveable by client
  
• Synced burp, fart sounds
  
• Synced firearm shot sound, flash

1. right click the game in your steam library
   
2. select Properties...
   
3. select BETAS tab
   
4. from the dropdown menu select multiplayer_test

(You don't need to enter any beta access code.)

• Random ragdol spawn button [F8]
  
• Depth vision [End]
  
• Suicide, revive [F9]

We are working on so much new stuff, you will see them in the next few months hopefully.
Prepare for hotfixes! ;)

Misc and Fixed:

• Changed "Lobbies" button label to "Multiplayer"
  ( because we can imagine a few people sitting at home wondering what a lobbie is,
  while searching for multiplayer, this should avoid any confusion now )
  
• Added Shotgun ( not yet fully done, but you can use it now )
  
• Picked up stuff now rotates using physics
  
• Crates are breakable
  
• Breakable stuff ignores the mass of the thing it collided with,
  so they are easier to transport
  
• Multiplayer button only visible if the game is started through steam
  
• Bunny ragdols very slightly more stable
  (Disabled self collision)

• Synced Ammo
  
• Synced sponge and wire brush being broken
  
• Synced push
  
• Synced weapon state and a few sounds
  
• Synced spray can color
  
• Synced door open/close sounds
  
• Synced client breaking things
  
• Removed ~300m physics distance limit from host
  ( You can now go VERY far away from eachother! )

1. right click the game in your steam library
   
2. select Properties...
   
3. select BETAS tab
   
4. from the dropdown menu select multiplayer_test

(You don't need to enter any beta access code.)

• Added power pole cables
  
• Added colliders to other players
  
• Added physics lock setting in misc tab
  - In multiplayer the server's setting is used
  - Things in trunk are getting locked only if it is closed
  - Parts which fall off after collision won't have their physics locked until picked up

• Synced physics locked items position and rotation
  
• Synced Food

• Fixed unused stuff spawning
  (like square headlights next to round headlight car variant)
  
• Fixed players flying here from far away, when standing up from a seat
  
• Fixed players being twisted
  (now they should be only as twisted as in single player)
  
• Items disappearing (or being unsynced) should be less frequent

• More stable join
  (less car falling apart)
  
• Smoothed bulging eyeballs when zooming
  
• Smoothed picked up items sync a bit more

• Added bulging eyes when zooming

• Synced car variants a bit more
  
• Synced license plates texts
  
• Synced radio devices
  
• Synced radio channels
  
• Fixed everyone teleporting when someone joins
  
• Smoothed picked up items sync a bit
  
• Can steal items from other players

• Added "DevBacon" checkbox to the developer menu
  
• which turns on beacons above buildings, so it is easier to find them
  
• maybe Fixed Car04, Car06P, Bus02 not being driveable
  (because of some seat list having more elements than it really has)
  
• Synced car variants a bit
  
• Fixed players's clothes colors a bit more

We know there are more lot of bugs and problems, working on it and other much more new stuff

ːsteamhappyː



Thank you for playing and for the feedback and patience. Have fun and don't you EVER get sand in those Steel Pants of yours!
ːsteamhappyː