The Early Access version of The Desolation, a blockchain co-op looter shooter by Stratosphere Games, has received a new update bringing a couple new features, improvements and bug fixes ahead of the release of the limited free-to-play demo for the Steam Next Fest.

What’s New in This Update?

This update introduces your very own spaceship acting as your home from which you change equipment and embark on various missions. After you do the tutorial, which has a new ending, you will be taken to the new spaceship, which you will now see whenever you open up the game. You can adjust your loadout by heading to the armory section, while selecting missions is done through the world map, after which you can use the drop pod to start the mission and open the game lobby, with the lobby updated to support multiple players while allowing you to see what suits, weapons and Ultimates your teammates have equipped.

Speaking of the world map, the developers have improved it by turning it into a 3D globe with selectable regions, each of which are split into multiple territories. Only Europe can be selected at the beginning of the game.

Aside from the new ship, the studio has also launched the first MMR Suit called Destroyer that is set to “expand your possibilities to tackle our new seasonal leaderboards.” You get this suit by simply updating the game, gaining access to 5 new Active Skills and 1 Ultimate Skill alongside a new movement ability. The new movement ability that this suit brings is called Rocket Jump, which pushes nearby enemies away once you use it to launch yourself into the air, but also when making a strong landing. The Ultimate Skill included with this suit is Thermonuclear Strike, which lets you fire a rocket that causes a huge thermonuclear explosion dealing 2000 damage, with extra damage applied from its long afterburn. Among the new Active Skills is Armored Core, which buffs you with 2000 Armor that lasts for 10 seconds. Another new Active Skill is Thermal Blockade, which lets you spawn a barrier that damages all enemies that go through it, with a future update set to update the skill to make it block incoming projectiles.

While this suit’s shields aren’t as good as the ones on other suits, it does come with lots of health and the ability to use heavy machine guns as a special weapon. You can also use the same weapons that the Fortress can use.

Improvements to enemies have also been made, making it so that the Charged Neonate creates a thermal damage area upon death, while the Shieldbearer’s visual design have been updated to be more in line with the designs of other Shade enemies. It’s easier to differentiate between regular and elite enemies now, as elite enemies now come with a new glowing “Elite Material.” That being said, it’s also simpler to tell which enemy is an elite or boss now, as bosses now come with a larger “boss health bar” while elite enemies don’t have this bar at all now.

More details on everything included in this update can be found in the official patch notes. Because of the new spaceship and MMR suit, and to make the new leaderboard seasons fair for everyone, the developers have had to reset all accounts, so everyone’s in-game progress and in-game items have been wiped out, while NFTs of course continue to remain. Speaking of NFTs, while leaderboards only give out in-game items for now, the team is aware of the community’s desire to earn NFTs from leaderboards, and have teased in the patch notes that players can look forward to earning them in various upcoming community events.

How to Play

The Desolation is currently available in a closed Early Access phase for players who bought the Founder’s Pack in November last year or won it in a giveaway. Each Founder Pack contained a certain type of limited Access Pass that lets you jump into the game after downloading it on PC from the game’s official website, with participants also set to get a mobile version in August this year.

You can however look forward to playing the Web3 title this month during the Steam Next Fest, when the studio will launch a free-to-play demo on Valve’s platform. This demo will be playable for a limited time though, from June 10th to June 17th. You can add it to your wishlist to get notified, and you may want to do it through the game’s quest dashboard to earn points that you’ll be able to turn into tokens in the future. Using the quest dashboard requires connecting your Twitter/X account.

After the demo, you’ll likely have to wait till September this year, as that is when the game is set to launch in open beta, according to the updated roadmap found in the new whitepaper that was published last month. The game will officially release in January 2025 as a free-to-play title, allowing players to earn tokens that allow for skins, suits and gear to be minted into tradable NFTs.