Spacelords becomes one of the very first games to include full cross-play, unifying all Spacelords players around the world regardless of the game system of their choice. This measure will also ensure a more optimal matchmaking system and shorter queuing times between games for the growing Spacelords’ community.

“Implementing full cross-play is a really complex endeavor for any developer,” commented Enric Álvarez, Game Director. “For a small independent team like MercurySteam, the effort we put behind enabling this feature speaks volumes of our commitment to offer our fantastic community as many options to play Spacelords with total freedom as possible.”

See you on the Broken Planet!

The Team-up or Die update is now available, so here are all the changes and bug fixes included in this update.


NEW COMMUNICATION SYSTEM

Team play is extremely important in Spacelords and players need better communication tools than they have now. At the same time, Spacelords is committed to be a cross-platform, language-barrier free, harassment-proof game. This is why we've implemented a new, deeper and more flexible communication system.


INITIATIVES

- Communication messages have been renamed as Initiatives. They are written in a more literal way to better represent what players are going to do next.

- There will be two types of initiatives: generic ones ("I'm going for ammo") and mission-specific ("I'm going to defend the Protector").

- When a player chooses an initiative, an icon of his/her character will appear under that initiative in his/her teammates respective panels.


TEAM LEADER

A new team leader figure has been implemented. At the beginning of the match one of the players will be selected by the system to be the leader. This player can either accept or decline the leadership. If they decline, the leadership will pass to another player.

- Leaders will have the option to send orders to their team, these orders can be accepted by any other member of the team.

- Each order can only be accepted by one player, and each player can only have one order accepted at the same time.

- At the end of the match, non-leaders can "thumbs-up" the leader to congratulate them. The leader will gain Status* for each "thumb-up" received.

The initiative and order flow will show up to all Raiders in their interfaces, so everyone will know what objectives and tasks are their teammates doing.

*Status Coins players obtain when leveling up and in the Adventure have been reduced. Instead, leaders will receive more Status at the end of the match when they receive the teammates' approval.



SPACELORDS TRIAL

Recruiting a new Spacelord is one of the most important decisions players will have to make in their time in Spacelords. We want players to have all the necessary information when deciding which Spacelord they will recruit next. Now that the player has all the necessary tools, we've given up on feeding the decision for them with pricing and level requirements, groups of four Spacelords each will share the same level requirement and price instead.



TRIAL SYSTEM

We've implemented a character trial system. Players will now be able to play for a limited time with any Raider that is available for recruitment. When the trial period expires, players can choose another -or the same- Raider to start a new trial.

- Trials have no cost.

- Spacelords on trial will have their default weapons and Cards equipped.

- Spacelords on trial cannot be modified: Blueprints cannot be built, cards cannot be drawn.

- Blueprints you acquire for a Spacelord in trial will be usable when the character is recruited.



CHARACTER GROUPS

- Group 1 (level 4 // 25000 gold each): Hans, Kuzmann, Shae, H.I.V.E.

- Group 2 (level 18 // 90000 gold each): Mikah, Ginebra, Doldren, Rak.

- Group 3 (level 33 // 180000 gold each): Ayana, Loaht, Iune, Schneider.

- Valeria and Aneska will remain ungrouped, but they have decreased their level requirements to 44 and 48, respectively.



LAST CHANCE PHASE

Most matches last for 15 minutes or less. Win or lose, this is a healthy behaviour for any mission. A small number of matches, however, get stuck in a situation where neither side can win or lose. These matches have a considerable number of survive phases. Some of these can be rememberable epic victories, but more often than not, they feel drawn-out and exhausting. These relatively small number of matches were skewing mission balance too much. Too many adjustments had to be made around this problem to make sure the occurrence was kept low, which impacted our ability to focus the balance on the enjoyment of the majority.

We've implemented the "Last Chance" phase: a new stage where the match will end as a defeat if the Raiders lose all their lives.

- Matches are now limited to two Survive Phases.

- After the second Survive, the match will enter in the "Last Chance" Phase.

- During the Last Chance phase, Raiders will keep respawning and losing lives. When the Raiders lose their last life, the game will be over.

- Decreased Raiders' lives from 16/16/16/... to 16/12/8 when playing against an Antagonist.

- Decreased Raiders' lives from 10/10/10/... to 16/12/8 when not playing against an Antagonist.

- Mission difficulty has been re-adjusted accordingly.



GAMEPLAY


WOUNDED STATE

The wounded state has been reviewed to be more forgiving:

- It takes 2.5 seconds without receiving damage to recover from wounded (from 5.5 seconds).

- Character control is increased overall (faster turns, shorter animations when entering wounded).

- The amount of health with players recover from wounded has been decreased to 25% of the character's total health pool (from 50%).



ANTAGONIST SPAWN ZONES

Antagonist spawn zones have been enlarged in Hanging by a Thread, In Shock, Destroyer of Worlds, A Fistful of Sand, Short-Fused and The Enemy Within.



AMMO DROPS

- Ammo drops are now only pickable by human players, AI enemies/allies just walk through by them without being able to pick them.



WEAPONS


HAREC

- Decreased Easter Egg's mine damage (-15%)


LOAHT

- Decreased Popcorns' damage (-20%)

- Popcorns' grenades no longer do push.

- Decreased Bubble Gum's damage (-10%)


VALERIA

- Removed Earthing's recoil.


KONSTANTIN

- All Gatlings now shoot some bullets while gaining speed.

- Now O.Shtorm bullets pierce enemies.

- Now the bullets from each Hornet HH3's shooting mode have different types of bounce.



ANESKA

- Invicta projectiles can now be detonated through enemies.



CARDS

HADES DIVISON

- Decreased Integrity's damage reduction from 30% to 20%

- Increased Integrity's duration from 2s to 6s

- Increased Hard's damage reduction from 30% to 35%

- Decreased Hard's duration from 4s to 3s



BUG FIXING

- Fixed a bug where DLC "Starter Pack" was not giving some Blueprints properly (missing Blueprints will be returned to those users who already bought the DLC).

- Fixed a bug where sometimes Antagonists respawned under the ground.

- Fixed a bug where Aequilibrium events were not registering properly.

- Fixed several bugs were some bullet trails' position were not appearing correctly.

PlayStation Plus

PS Plus subscribers will receive 80000 Gold for Spacelords every month.

The Spacelords Identity update is finally spreading to all the platforms and regions! The changes on this update are very extensive. These patch notes will only cover them superficially. Make sure to log-in and check them out.



NEW ADVENTURE SCORING

 With the new Adventure score system, players will now gain rewards at the end of each month. With this we want to heavily increase access to gold and weapons for everyone.

 - Rewards are based on the total sum of the best scores you get on each mission as a Raider and as an Antagonist throughout the whole month.

  - Up to 310,000 Gold, 9 Common Blueprints, 6 Rare blueprints, 12 XP Boosts and 5600 Status

 - Regular income at the end of each mission has not been modified.


NEW CURRENCY: STATUS

 Veterans will now distinguish themselves from other players with the new Status system:

 - Players with levels from 120 to 200 will gain Status periodically.

 - XP gained after level 200 will not increase the level but will yield much bigger Status gains.

 - Very high scores in the new Adventure give out Status as well.

 - Players whose level was beyond 200 after the patch will be instantly awarded Status currency when they first log in.

  - They will receive 5 Status per level beyond 201.

 - New Status icons show along the player's name in the HUD while in-game.

  - There's a new Status level at 120/140/160/180/200.

 Status is a currency that can be used in the in-game shop to purchase exclusive fungible cosmetics.



NEW SPACELORDS STORE

 The in-game store has been completely remade!

 - New cosmetic items types:

  - Weapon skins

  - Melee weapons

  - Emotes

 - New "pack" system offers discounts for buying in bulk:

  - All packs have a 10% discount by default

   - Some packs will temporarily increase its discount to 20% or 40%.

   - These temporal discounts will rotate every 24h (20%) and 7 days (40%)

  - Some packs are only available during short time-spans and will feature a 30% discount

   - We will announce in our social networks when one of these packs appears!

  - If you already own some items contained in a pack, these will be discounted for you.



INDIVIDUAL SCORE & PLAYER OF THE GAME

 Spacelords is a team-based game but we want to properly reward players who stand out from the rest of the team.

 - Each Raiders will have an extra score based on their individual performance.

 - The player with the best performance will be highlighted at the end of the match.

  - This player's Weapon and Card setup will be visible to everyone on the rewards screen. Emotes will show up to the rest of the team in the rewards screen.


ALEPH AND AMMO DROPABLES

 Enemies now drop their ammo and Aleph on the ground when they die by melee attacks. These items can be collected by any player or AI on the map.


NEW ANTAGONIST SPAWN SYSTEM

 We've reworked the Antagonist respawn system, so they can better plan their evil strategies.

  - Antagonists now will have free movement while in the respawn camera mode.

  - Respawn points are now big respawn zones. Antagonists can respawn in any place inside these zones.


WELCOME PAGE

 A new panel in the Main Menu which works as a quick access to the most relevant information: news, shop discounts and your current Adventure progress. You won't miss anything!


INFO PANEL

 We've improved the in-game mission information for the players.

  - The mission-objective text box has been replaced with a whole new panel with better and clearer information.

  - Raider and Antagonist MMR will be shown there along with the AI's current difficulty level. We hope this will help our players to better understand the relationship between mission difficulty and MMR.



SOCIAL NETWORKS

 All of our social networks are now just one click away. Don't miss any of Spacelords' news and get some XP boost as a gift when you visit them for the first time.



NEW DLC: STARTER PACK

 There's a new DLC in the different platform's stores available.

  - 2500 Mercury Points.

  - 8 XP Boosts (x1.5).

  - 25,000 Gold.

  - 4 Blueprints: Vinc "Eager" 23-1 for Alicia, Pepper Pot for Lycus, Ferox Impetus for Harec & O. Tolchok E10 for Konstantin.



SURVIVAL PHASE SKIP REMOVED

 The ability to use gold to trigger Cortez to immediately show up with Aleph during survival phases has been removed.


SURRENDER SYSTEM

 Surrender is a valid option to leave a match the team doesn't want to continue playing on, but it may not be as clear and accessible as it should for the newcomers. We have improved the system to be more understandable for the players when voting a surrender option.


PERFORMANCE

 - The game now uses less system and video memory on all platforms.

 - New 3D rendering option on settings (only on PC).


LOADING SCREENS

 - Added a bunch of new and cool images to the load screens.


CANCELABLE EMOTES

 - Emotes and dances animations can now be cancelled by performing any action.


MISSION BALANCE

 HANGING BY A THREAD

  - Decreased gunship's health points in low MMR matches (-25%)


 SHORT FUSE

  - Decreased the extractor's health points in low MMR matches when not playing against an antagonist (-25%)

  - Decreased the amount of Aleph charges needed to overload the extractors in low MMR matches (-25%)


 NO RESERVATIONS

  - Decreased the speed at which the charge bar of the barge diminishes in low MMR matches when playing against an antagonist (-14%)


 A LOW BLOW

  - Decreased all of the barriers' health points in low MMR matches (-30%)


 DOUBLE AGENT

  - Decreased engineer spawn rate in low MMR matches when playing against an antagonist (-22%)



CHARACTER BALANCE

 KONSTANTIN

  - O.Tsiklon UV9 now stops shooting when charging the missile.


 MIKAH

  - Granny increases its damage as well as its firing rate when reloading with enough charge for the duration of the next clip.


 RAK

  - Decreased Rak's Pishachas damage (-10%)

  - Decreased Rak's Pishachas healing (-10%)

  - Greatly decreased Nilben Launcher's damage (-20%)


 HAREC

  - Ignis Fugit now only gets critical bullets with headshots.


 LYCUS

  - Increased Shit happens' damage (+10%)

  - Decreased Pepper Pot's small-spread damage (-10%)

  - Increased Peppers Pot's small-spread damage in long-distance shots (16+ meters).

  - Increased Pepper Pot's big-spread damage (+5%)

  - Decreased Pepper Pot's medium-spread damage (-10%)


 VALERIA

  - Whip has been reworked: The quantum projectile won't react to Valeria's shots if she's not nearby.

  - Slightly increased Whip's quantum projectile spark damage (+5%)

  - Greatly decreased Whip's quantum projectile speed (-30%)

  - Earthing has been reworked: The quantum projectile launches three explosions in a row after being shot.

  - Greatly decreased Earthing's quantum projectile damage (-20%).

  - Slightly decreased Shakura's quantum projectiles damage (-5%)


 HANS

  - Tarasque F-750 has been reworked: Its falling projectiles now fall in a 90º angle (the boomerang effect has been removed).

  - Added a new firing profile for Tarasque F-750: The player can now choose between short and long-distance behaviour for its falling projectiles.

  - Increased Ansgar "Warm" MM1's damage (+5%)

  - Increased Heaven's Bane K8's last projectile damage (+10%)

  - Decreased Heaven's Bane K8's three first projectiles damage (-10%)

  - Decreased Heaven's Bane K8's three first projectiles explosion radius (-10%)

  - Increased Heaven's Bane K8's reload time (+10%)


 SCHNEIDER

  - Decreased all of Schneider's drone's health points (-30%)


 DOLDREN

  - Increased JK-5's damage (+5%)

  - Increased JK-5's clip by 5 bullets.

  - Increased KLT-13, JK-5 and Bloody Mary's located damage exponents (+0.1). This translates into a higher damage difference between a headshot and a foot shot.


 ANESKA

  - Now Aneska's weapons do more damage when she is near her Mech.

  - All of the Mech's grenade's areas now stay active until another one is launched.

  - Reworked Invicta's grenade states: There are only two states for this grenade now.

  - Greatly decreased Invicta's grenade damage (-20%)

  - Greatly decreased Ionizer's grenade damage (-20%)



PROGRESSION BALANCE

 - XP Boost can't be used before level 4.

 - All character cards can be drawn at level 11.

 - Decreased the level requirement to shuffle character cards from 26 to 19.

 - Changed the level requirement to unlock a new set of character cards from 26/33/50/72/105/158/200 to 19/30/50/73/103/143/193.

 - All faction cards can be drawn at level 3.

 - Changed the level requirement to unlock a new set of faction cards from 10/28/38/63/92/143/180 to 15/26/37/63/93/133/183

 - Increased the level requirement to recruit Hans from 3 to 4.

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Shae from 16 to 12

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit HIVE from 23 to 17

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Mikah from 30 to 22

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Ginebra from 36 to 26

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Doldren from 41 to 30

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Rak from 48 to 39

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Ayana from 52 to 44

 - Increased the level requirement to recruit Loath from 44 to 48

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Iune from 55 to 52

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Valeria from 57 to 55

 - Decreased the level requirement to recruit Schneider from 59 to 58

 - Decreased forge level requirements from 87/98/108/118/129/140/151/163/175/187/199 to 86/96/106/116/126/136/146/156/166/176/186


NEW SKINS AND SKIN PRICES

  - New Tribal Hunter skin for Rak

  - New Lady Hasselti skin for Ayana

  - New Space Tourist skin for Valeria

  - New The Scourge of Phobos skin for Aneska

  - Decreased Ginebra's Slave Unit skin price from 4500 to 3500 Mercury Points

  - Decreased Loaht's Grendel skin price from 3000 to 2500 Mercury Points


BUGFIXES

 - Fixed an exploit in Short-Fused where the tank on the hill could be destroyed by a canister placed in the lower zone.

 - Fixed a bug where the damage sound was being played when a player was healed.

 - Fixed a bug where the communication menu could not appear after a host renegotiation.

 - Fixed a bug where Cortez brothers continue dancing even if an enemy was attacking them.

 - Fixed a bug where the grunts could not show their Aleph trace through walls.

 - Fixed several issues with Kuzmann's AI when Shae is being electrocuted.

 - Fixed a bug where Shae's voice was playing while playing with Ayana.


KNOWN ISSUES

 - On PS4, some skins can be bought as part of a pack but not individually, this will be fixed in the next patch: Harec's Red Death, Alicia's Reborn, Lycus' Prussian Mercenary and Konstantin's Rusty Pilgrim.

 - Releasing Sa-Dhu's pressure while using the card Strain in melee can prevent the weapon from firing again until Shae dies.

MercurySteam reveals today the first images of Sööma, a brand-new playable character for Spacelords interpreted by Dutch actress and model Stefanie Joosten. This new character will be available in Q2 2019.

Working in conjunction with MercurySteam’s artists and animators, Joosten has lent her image and voice talents to play the role of Sööma, a member of the Umbra Wardogs faction, born in the Cydonia region, on distant Mars, as part of a seclusive cult devoted to helping those who suffer pain and oppression.



"Sööma is a really interesting character to play with,” said Stefanie Joosten. “She can absorb the damage suffered by her allies, but that power comes with a price for her to pay. It is really exciting seeing my character coming to life, and can’t wait for Sööma to be released!”

You can watch her teaser trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqlYOIOr4l8

ANESKA

Reborn from her ashes, the Scourge of Phobos joins the Raiders!

- Aneska can now be recruited by players with 61+ level.


KNOWN ISSUES

We've identified a long-standing bug that caused some entities to bypass some game-mode damage multipliers. Those entities were dealing less damage than expected in training mode and when playing as a Raider against an Antagonist as well.

The affected entities are:

- Schneider's drone.
- Iune's converted grunt.
- Rak Mayura's Pishachas.
- Valeria's Einstein-Rosen bridge.
- And with this new patch, also Aneska's Mech.

Note that this hasn't been affecting game balance. The game has always been balanced around that bug, however, we had less control over damage input and output than we thought. When this bug is fixed, all numbers will be adjusted accordingly and we'll be able to more correctly adjust these abilities' power levels.

This is fixed in our internal version but is not published along with this patch yet. A patch will follow soon featuring these adjustments.



HUD

In Spacdelords, we've structured player advancement in terms of levels. Players gain levels fairly quickly, specially at the beginning, gaining close to one level per match for the first 10-15 levels. Most of those level-ups, however, don't provide much direct player power. Spacelords is a shooter and ultimately, a game of skill. Power imbalance is only actually meaningful at around 20-30 level differences.

This contrasts heavily with how level differences convey power in most other videogames. A PVP battle with a 20 level difference on most MMO or ARPG games is not a fair contest at all. Veteran players know Spacelords well and adjust their expectations accordingly. New players, however, have previous knowledge from other games and have negative reactions when they see these differences.

Spacelords also structures players into Tiers. Tiers are a much better indicator of power difference. If a Tier 6 is playing against a Tier 5, it looks like there's some power difference. When a Tier 6 faces a Tier 4, the power difference is clearly bigger. Clearly put, tiers better represent power differences between players than levels do.


- Players now show their Tier Rank in matches instead of their level.


Some players have achieved levels far beyond the level 100 required for Tier 1. This is a great accomplishment and we want to properly reward that in terms of prestige towards other players. We are very concerned that with this change we're removing the only feature that shows everyone how hard those players have worked. Our next update will feature a new system that will properly reward these players with much more that just a level show-off, however, in the meantime, we appreciate your patience and understanding.

DIFFICULTY

There are many aspects to match difficulty, enemy health, damage, AI behavior and sheer amount of on-screen enemies. We've tuned how we apply difficulty increases to make sure that difficulty is felt as an interesting, challenging change (more enemies, more intelligent) rather than straight power upgrades (damage and resistance upgrades, commonly known as bullet-sponge enemies).

- All game difficulties has been adjusted. Simply put, this should feel like more but less powerful enemies.



ANTAGONIST

Playing as a Raider or as the Antagonist should be a matter of personal preference. Playing as a Raider is a cooperative, very tactical experience. Playing as the Antagonist is stressful and a massive check of skill. This decision should not be about how to maximize your gold income.

- Greatly increased the defeat score range for the Antagonist. Antagonists can now get higher scores when losing if they performed well.

MATCHMAKING AND MMR

As the MMR system stood, Raiders and Antagonists were experiencing the same amount of MMR change after each match. There's a few problems with that; It creates MMR inflation and it doesn't properly reflect the skill check that each player has gone through.

- Antagonists experience much bigger (x4) MMR changes after each match than Raiders do. This cancels out overall MMR gains to keep inflation on check and also distinguishes playing as the Antagonist as the big skill check it is.
- Raiders playing against an Antagonist experience smaller MMR changes than they did before this patch. Of all matchups, this is the one with the most uncertainty. The system can draw less accurate conclusions from it.
- Raiders not facing an Antagonist will experience bigger MMR changes than they did before this patch. Of all matchups, this is the most accurate one (AI difficulties are very consistent) and the skill check is quite accurate, if only a bit dissolved across four players.


AEQUILIBRIUM

Aequilibrium was balanced around (public, non-guild) Tiers, where the number of players oscilates between 20 and 30. Guilds brought new private and smaller groups, which were being excessively affected by Aequilibrium drift.

- Increased Aequilibrium drift starting time from 2 to 4 hours.
- Increased Aequilibrium drift speed increments after 6/18/48 hours to 12/36/96 hours. 



WEAPON & MISSION BALANCE

The gameplay team has been very focused on Aneska lately. We're only using this patch to attack a few of the more outstanding issues.


 WEAPONS

- Decreased Ignis Fugit's damage by 10%.
- Decrased Nilben Launcher's damage by 10%.
- Decreased Shy's infection and bullet damage by 10%.
- Decreased O. Tsiklon UV9's damage by 5%.
- Decreased Hornet HH3's damage by 5%.


 SHORT FUSE

- Difficulty no longer affects Wardog Slicer's health points.


BUG FIXES

- Fixed a rare bug where the game was not starting some matches.
- Fixed a bug caused by the Beholders' attack that could crash the game.
- Fixed a bug where the game could crash when using Rak Mayura's ability right before winning a mission.
- Fixed a bug where Harec could become invulnerable when using Firmness card.
- Fixed a bug where HIVE's Shy was unintendedly piercing through shields.
- Fixed several bugs related to projectile generation.
- Fixed a few behavior issues affecting Guardians in A Breath of Hope.
- Fixed a bug where extraction missions were not ending properly if there was any Cortez brother on the game.
- Fixed several bugs related to Chat.
- Fixed a bug where the Squad invite system was not working properly.

KNOWN ISSUES

Aneska's rare weapon's name is "Solaris" in-game and "Invicta" on the store, this latter is the intended name and will be changed in the next update.

Hans is the kind of guy fond of sharing war stories. For him, there’s nothing like the old times, and some of his grumpy witticism might sound odd to the newer generations, but that doesn’t mean he’s wrong. “Back in the day, if you couldn’t solve a situation with Napalm, it was because you weren’t using enough Napalm”, he always says when remembering the Terraforming Wars on Mars, where Hans earned the nickname “Vulcano” thanks to using his Tarasque F-750 -a weapon able to fire Napalm munitions, ideal for covering an attack or a retreat with a wall of fire. Armed with the F-750, Hans single-handedly managed to stall the Humblebee clan’s offensive, becoming one of the heroes of the war.

Hans' new weapon, the "Tarasque" F-750, is now available in Spacelords: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QSeHpaFDfo

Spacelords Roadmap’s first major update, SpaceGuilds, is around the corner. These last days we have revealed some of the adjustements and new features coming to the game, like the Radar or the Cortez Brothers, but there’s a lot more to come! In a new episode of Inside Spacelords, Community Manager Karen Hernández explains all the changes, including the arrival of the awaited Guilds.

Check it out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuPof73O2-k

As a Free to Play game, Spacelords welcomes lots of new players who try the game for the first time every day. Most players are curious about Spacelords unique features and gameplay, but inevitably there are some who decide it is not a game for them, and quit the match. That’s perfectly fine -you can’t please everybody- but the rest of the team will be left in a disadvantage, having to face the invading factions and maybe even an Antagonist with an understrength squad.

It may be also the case that players lose their connection to the game, and while they try to reconnect their teammates would struggle to achieve the mission’s objectives. Well, no more. The Cortez family comes to the rescue!

When the SpaceGuilds update goes live, if a player disconnects from a game one of Cortez’s brothers will teleport into the fray, taking the player’s place. Far from being mere AIs, the Cortez bros are quite capable allies, able to hold their ground against the toughest enemies. Moreover, when they are killed, their demise won’t detract from the Raiders’ lives pool. Of course, if the missing players reconnect to the game, they will rejoin the fight and Cortez’s brothers will teleport back to the Beluga.



We reckon this is a useful (and fun!) new feature that will help solving a recurrent but unavoidable problem. We hope you enjoy it and look forward hearing what you think of it in the Spacelords Official Forum, Twitter and Facebook.

See you on the Broke… Wait, what? Didn’t you know Cortez had brothers? Didn’t we mention that before? And what are those rumours saying that Dr. Kuzmann was seen leaving Cortez’s dormitory with his toothbrush in a medical sample container?