Site-02 Transmissions #9 | SCP-127 and Visible Armour

Hello Site-02!

With most of the features for 14.1 being wrapped up and readied for launch, we’ve prepared another Site-02 Transmission to show you the major and minor additions coming in 14.1. We are also planning a beta towards the beginning of April, which you’ll hear more about soon. But for now, let's dive in.

SCP-127

Game Design

The idea of adding SCP-127 to the game was considered for years. It was first pitched by Game Design in 2020, during the development of the 11.0 ‘Parabellum’ update.



Being a simple Series 1 SCP, it was a perfect fit for an SCP shooter, and well-suited for the update that would overhaul the weapons and animations. However, the difficulty in designing SCP-127 was making its design both interesting and rewarding. It was intended to be “the S-tier of SMGs,” with its high fire rate and damage counteracted by the inability to reload the weapon.

Early drafts by Game Design were not satisfactory, due to the weapon’s sole gimmick being the regenerating ammo. This caused the anomalous ammo to be more of a hindrance than an upgrade, as the user had to wait for ammo to regenerate, leaving them exposed and unable to fight back, a unique problem no other firearm in the game suffers from.

Unfortunately, 11.0 had finished development by the time the document had been finished and a satisfactory concept was made, and attention had to be turned to more important projects, causing work on SCP-127 to be paused. It was not until 14.0 that development decided to revisit SCP-127, and it was decided that SCP-127 would become the primary focus of 14.1.

To solve some of the initial issues with a non-reloadable gun, it was decided that SCP-127 would grant 15 bullets upon a kill, allowing the user to get multiple kills in quick succession without needing to worry as much about the limited ammo. SCP-127 also grants the user Hume Shield, the same artificial armour given to SCPs which, unlike the artificial health (AHP) given by adrenaline, absorbs all damage and does not decay while the weapon is equipped. If lost, it regenerates after a short while, but starts decaying the second SCP-127 is no longer being held.



To further incentivise keeping SCP-127 instead of swapping it out with another firearm, SCP-127 has a tiering system where, depending on the amount of kills and damage the gun deals in the hands of the same user, it receives an increase in its damage, fire rate, penetration, and ammo regeneration. This makes extended use of SCP-127 a gamble, as the potential to snowball into a hyper-effective killing machine is countered by the initial vulnerability and the possibility of losing it all if the user were to die.

Art

In contrast to SCP-127s design document, the development of the model and animations were considerably quicker and smoother.

The actual SCP-127 model was created by Murmur, the same artist behind the FR-MG-0 and the Experimental Weapon Locker, who based the design on the Heckler & Koch MP5K. The internal biology is based on the original artwork, with the barrel and ejection port visibly showing the fleshy internals.



The animations for SCP-127 were made by Mikel. Due to the weapon’s non-reloadable nature, it has a significantly smaller set of animations compared to other weapons. Replacing the standard loading and unloading animation of other guns, SCP-127 features the satisfying ‘HK slap’ in its unique loading animation, while its inspect animation shows the weapon’s chamber in all its visceral detail. The weapon's sling loop was given physics, allowing it to swing in whatever direction the player looks, similarly to the Lantern item’s physics.



Sharp-eyed SCP fans may have noticed that despite the article featuring SCP-127 as a MP5K PDW, the model chosen in-game was based on the MP5K. This is because during development, the SCP Wiki article was modified — SCP-127 was originally labelled as a MP5K, with the image of a MP5K SCP-127 displayed on the article. However, due to copyright issues, the image was taken down and replaced with a normal MP5, yet the text of the article still erroneously referred to SCP-127 as a MP5K. Our model was based on the text of the article, not the image, and it wasn’t until the model was complete that the text in the article was changed to reflect the new image.


SCP-127’s image used on the modern wiki page. https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-127

Audio

The creation of the audio assets for SCP-127 also went smoothly. The gunshot sounds were designed to sound unique enough to clearly convey that it was not an ordinary gun, while also being clearly identifiable as gunfire, which was accomplished by layering in audio of a sound designer spitting alongside audio of a 9mm gunshot. The handling audio was also intended to sound unnatural and painful, which was accomplished by mixing various meaty and metallic sounds, combined with breathing noises during weapon inspection, to impart the idea of a living weapon.



Narrative Design

“I know it's a weapon designed to kill things, but it's just not hostile or cruel. If anything, it almost seems… tired. Like all it really wants is for someone to take it out of that tank and give it a reason to exist.

I dont think it’s bloodthirsty. I think it’s just lonely.”
- Alyssa Warwick, Senior Researcher, Site-02

Being one of the first sentient SCPs that most players will not be running in fear from (at least when it’s on your side) gave an interesting challenge to the narrative design team. How is it possible to convey a sense of its personality and story to the players in a diegetic manner that doesn’t force players to go out of their way to find it? In other words, how can we make the lore of the item come to the player?



While not the main priority, it was a possibility which intrigued the team, and with the possibilities of a living item being endless, we found a way! We’ll let you discover it on your own, but we will say that we’ve found a way for the player to hear comments on the history of SCP-127 before it was transferred to Site-02, all entirely in-game.

Third-Person Armour Models

A feature previously planned for 14.0 that was cut due to time constraints, we’re excited to finally bring visible armour on human player characters!

PurpleGoop, the artist behind these armour models, went through several different iterations before landing on designs everyone was confident in. It was important to us that the pieces of armour not only look good, but are also presented in a way that makes sense within the game’s setting.

The first problem that the team ran into was how exactly armour would be represented on each class. SCP: Secret Laboratory features two very distinct groups of player models: the ‘civilians’ (D-Class Personnel, Scientists, Facility Guards), and ‘militants’ (Chaos Insurgency, Nine-Tailed Fox). While it would have been an easy task to equip the civilians with armour, it was not as easy of a task for the militants, as their models have built-in armour and would be much more difficult to modify.

The team was butting their heads together trying to figure out a solution to present armour which made sense visually for ALL classes, while also maintaining consistency in appearance. We quickly realised that it was not possible for a few reasons. Primarily, the NTF and CI models have vastly different body armour designs, and blurring the line between the two with similar-looking armour models would go against our design principle of keeping the two teams visually distinct.


Early sketch of armour designs

Another issue was that if we were to base the armour designs off of the Nine-Tailed Fox or Chaos Insurgency, civilians who find armour in the early game will appear like military combatants, which we believe would look neither aesthetically pleasing nor fitting.

It was a tough choice, but at the end of the day, the team decided to give armour a unique ‘facility’ look for the civilian classes. Armours, when worn by civilian players, will appear as protective gear that one would generally expect to find inside of an SCP facility. Light Armour would appear as the Facility Guards’ day-to-day vest, suited for low-level security detail. Combat Armour would appear as riot gear, which Facility Guards would equip during more violent assignments such as D-Class riots or when transporting SCPs. Heavy Armour would appear as Armed Mobile Task Force gear, found in the armouries of Foundation facilities.

Concept art of Combat Armour.

“Combat Armour is where things get tricky because on the one hand, it spawns in the facility, but also on MTF/CI. I would argue that Combat should not be represented with military gear, because it won't even look like what the CI/MTF wear, and will create all sorts of inconsistent weirdness. Should we make medium look more like what heavy security guards would wear, then at least it’s justified by the fact that they spawn in on-site armouries.

Most of the time, civilians will be wearing medium armour, either from TC01 or looted. And police riot gear is sleek and slim enough to keep them looking kinda still like civilians instead of bulked-up bomb defusal units, keeping their distinct silhouettes. It's better for a civ to loot an MTF/CI and get armour that looks like it came from the facility, rather than looting armour that looks completely different to anything anyone else is wearing.”
x3j50, Lead Narrative Designer

Heavy Armour

Heavy Armour was an exciting task to work on. Designing the Nine-Tailed Fox’s Heavy Armour proved a lot more challenging than the Chaos Insurgency’s counterpart..

The Chaos Insurgency’s Heavy Armour variant, now quickly becoming a fan-favourite, had the simple creative process of a designer saying “Use the Altyn helmet. That one looks really cool,” and the rest of the team responding with a standing ovation to that idea.



The gasmask got in the way, so it had to be removed.

The Nine-Tailed Fox’s gear, however, was much more involved. We wanted a design that complemented our MTF’s strange, alien, and occult design.

The first design concept was way too strange, alien, and occult, so we lugubriously decided against it.


“This probably ain’t gonna fly” -PurpleGoop

After some iterations, PurpleGoop settled for a more realistic and practical design for the armour that was appropriate and accurate to the lore of the Foundation’s new, questionably-sourced Mobile Task Force gear. Sometimes, all you need to protect yourself against a dangerous anomaly is some good old kevlar and some guts.



Below are work-in-progress screenshots of the high-poly model, before optimisations.



Here are some renders of the Nine-Tailed Fox and Chaos Insurgent in their heavy gear to conclude this section of the devlog, provided by our talented 3D artist Sol.





Miscellaneous
This post is starting to get too long, so let’s quick-fire some features that you can expect to see in 14.1!

New Keycard System



14.1 will slightly rework keycard functionalities. Rather than the original system which often confused new players, we have opted for a simple, three-clearance system, separating access levels to three distinct groups: Containment, Security, and Administration. Have we mentioned that they’re also fully customisable through the admin panel? Have fun, server owners.



In addition to this, the update will feature the Surface Access Pass, a keycard which is exclusively capable of opening surface gates. These will be found around the map, so keep an eye out!

Pocket Dimension Visual Overhaul



The Pocket Dimension is being given a well-needed facelift! While still functioning identically, SCP-106’s personal hellscape has been decorated with luxuriant, muddy greenery, the impression of rotting wood soaked with gangrenous humours, and a dense fog blanketing the endless suffering of attempting to guess the correct exit.

New Containment Signs



This one is a minor change, but it’s a long time coming. We’ve finally decided to swap out the SCP containment signs found at containment chambers with our own original design, replacing the old Containment Breach design. This design features magnetic, numbered squares, which containment personnel can interchange whenever an SCP object must be relocated or swapped out for a different one.

SCP-3114 Reimplementation



14.0 broke SCP-3114 due to its disguise mechanic not supporting the new human models, and due to time constraints, it was not able to be completed in time. We have been able to fully reimplement 3114 in 14.1, with it being accessible through the RA once more.

SCP Opt-Out



A great quality-of-life feature coming in 14.1 is the SCP Opt-Out setting. We recognise that not all players want to play as a bloodthirsty anomaly, and some prefer the gameplay of a human fighting against the odds. The SCP Opt-Out setting allows you to do exactly what it says on the can.

More Lore Interactibles

For all you lore detectives out there, update 14.1 will include a handful of new discoverable lore pieces, some easier to find, and some hidden away in the darkest depths of the facility.



We won’t be spoiling anything here, but we hope that you have fun discovering more about the story and world of SCP: Secret Laboratory.

Conclusion
Update 14.1 is an absolutely impressive feat from our development team (at least, we at PR think so!), and we’re greatly anticipating its release. We’ve still got a little more to do before the team can confidently ship it to the public, though.

The upcoming Patreon Beta on the 5th of April will hopefully give us enough time to polish the update to perfection, as well as provide us with valuable feedback to make 14.1 the best we can!

We thank you for reading this entry of Site-02 Transmissions, and for your continuous support towards SCP: Secret Laboratory’s development.

Stay tuned, and until next time, see you in the dark.


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