Despite the disappointing launch of Refreshed Supply, I have been keeping an eye out for updates while I make sure I don't set my expectations too high.

Days after the launch, a public beta branch exclusive to Steam users (who participated in the Steam beta client) was introduced. I suppose this is to help test out the state of the game before the hotfix becomes official. This allowed testing of fixes and providing feedback if needed. In this article, I will be showing off what has been fixed since the first Hotfix and the upcoming Hotfix #2 that is currently accessible to the beta branch and set to release in January 2026.

In the first hotfix, improvements to the full 3D aim were made and the classic cutscenes were added as a toggle option. The latter is weird to me because I asked about this somedays before the launch but was told by the netcode engineer that it was unlikely with the reasoning being the use of Smacker Video and licensing things. Of course this led to another reason being lossy compression when I suggested converting them to a different format.

Come to realize, the quality of the cutscenes can be retained after all.

The cutscenes (especially with the original Fresh Supply) came off lossy sure, but due to how Smacker Video playback is handled, you can hardly notice it. (The Blood CD at release contained AVI versions of the cutscenes)

So instead of trying to work around with the Smacker Format situation, it could be as simple as recording the cutscenes being played on the original in 1080p and retain the quality with a tiny bit of basic editing. I imagine this is proven because this exists. So the answer to the unlikeliness of having toggleable classic cutscenes is strange (and nonsensical) to me.

Because of this simple replacement mod, we now have a toggle for the original cutscenes. Gotta love workarounds to prove some points.

Sounds got a bit of improvement by disabling the low-pass filter by default which caused sounds to be muffled along with other minor fixes to the game logic and rendering. Additionally, an option was added for emulating classic 2D audio panning.

Initially, my optimism was still low by the time the first hotfix came out but In the upcoming Hotfix 2, there appears to be some potential improvement coming in the multiplayer department. (The main reason why I pre-purchased this remaster at all.)

If you care about achievement hunting, the triggering of the "Chosen-In-Regress" achievements has been fixed. For context, you had to kill three Beasts at Post Mortem's final level in under three minutes.

At launch, finishing off your opponents was near-impossible despite the code being there and appears to be a carry over from Fresh Supply. It has now be restored in the beta branch albeit with some quirks. In the original game, if you tapped the Use key without getting hit (or stomped on) you can revive yourself with only 1 health. Additionally and I assume due to how the physics and collision were changed, you can't push a player upwards in it's finishing state. This works by crouching while aiming up before pressing the Use key which pushes the player upwards.

Both of these things I've mentioned haven't been restored yet but it's a good first step for improvement. Once these two things are restored, I should be smooth sailing for this feature.

Obviously the Guns Akimbo bug, I've mentioned previously has been fixed and thankfully so. Anyway I will list some stuff that still need to be looked at along with some suggestions.

What need's fixed?
* The dynamite meter is still visible when dead in multiplayer (can be replicated by getting killed while charging one)
* The Teams scoreboard on top is still misaligned in 16:9 resolutions (worse in 4:3 resolutions)
* The Bloodbath Scoreboard needs some improvement (a bind to show the full list of players)
* The ping in public lobbies not always showing.
* There is some lag, dips and microstutters after playing for awhile. I assume it must be something weird with the Kex Engine.
* Restore Cooperative View.
* Fix the Bloodbath announcer, where killing a player says something but doesn't but getting yourself killed makes the announcer say something.
* Restore announcer quotes at the start of the match. Ex : "Let the Bloodbath Begin!", "The festival of blood continues.", etc.
* Maybe more that I haven't thought about at the time of writing this.

Some suggestions
* I think colored player names would be beneficial to those who grew used to playing the multiplayer through NotBlood (As an accessibility option)
* Add in hitscan-only autoaim to make projectile weapons like the Napalm Launcher more-reliable to use.
* The refactored netcode could use some improvements regarding latency compensation.
* Just like in NotBlood (a toggle), have it so when you kill somebody in Bloodbath, you get a big text somewhere in the center that tells you who you killed.
* Extending player colors would be nice as well. This was experimented with in NotBlood before.
* Actual Dedicated Server support. This is doable as a "semi-dedicated" server but this limits up to 7 actual players due to the server host portraying as a dummy player. (Not guaranteed because of the 8 player limit, but if it's doable then that's cool!)
* Spectating in multiplayer. It's was somewhat implemented in NotBlood but relies on Co-op View and can be triggered when dead. (Name yourself spectator, kills you instantly on start with no respawning) I think having an actual spectator would be great to have, even if the dedicated server support doesn't happen. (But as always, not guaranteed)
* Transferring user maps on-load would certainly help alot with custom content on the multiplayer side since they are tiny files. However this falls on the "not guaranteed" side and I imagine this being PC-only due to concerns over the Map Format and if there are potential security concerns. (I imagine being limited to using stock textures but most of the usermaps I play don't need custom textures anyway)

That's about it for now for this insight! I will keep you up to date if anything comes out.