Dev Log 14: Low-Tech / High-Tech Rifles

Hi guys,

The humble bolt-action rifle and the mighty plasma rifle differ in power, availability and reliability, but both have their place in Underrail.

The low-tech option that is the bolt-action rifle is cheap, both in base parts and mods, it requires reasonably low mechanical skill to craft and maintain and its basic ammo is relatively cheap and plentiful. It does moderate amount of damage in early game (of course, keep in mind that damage of a firearm is going to heavily depend on the ammo) and it will never jam.

The game will also feature some some late-game anti-materiel models that will pack quite a punch, so investing in bolt-action rifle feats will be useful in late game as well.

The downside, of course, is that it's turn-bolt operated and requires a separate action to reload after every attack, so the rate-of-fire, and hence the overall damage over time, is rather low.

Plasma Rifle, on the other hand, is a formidable late game weapon. It has a powerful energy attack that melts through most enemies with ease. Only the most heavily armored robots or those targets sporting an equally high-end energy shield can shrug off such an attack.

In a way, it is not as different from bolt-action rifle in the way it operates - it fires a single powerful blast and then has to cooldown for a period (during which the character can perform other actions) so it has a low rate of fire. The power and the cooldown are determined by the number of capacitors used in its creation as well as general quality of components.

It's heavy, expensive, hard to create and maintain, its components are rare and expensive, and it can malfunction if not maintained properly or if damaged by elements.

On paper it is a far superior weapon to the simple bolt-action rifle, but overall, it's hard say. It will depend on the time, place, and, of course, the target.

The comparison of these two weapons should give you a good idea about how I plan to approach balancing different armaments in Infusion. The power is not everything at all stages of the game. The cost, availability, reliability, skill requirements, the way weapon operates and more - it all plays into how good a weapon is.

That's it for now. We're very close to releasing that new gameplay video. It's going to be a short trailer of various things we have in the game at this stage. In the meantime, be sure to follow me on X, where I post smaller tidbits of development regularly.

Cheers.