Changelog

All notable changes to The Syndicate are recorded here. Newest version on top.

0.9.1 — 2026-08-06 — Performance hotfix

Purely performance — no gameplay or balance changes.

Fixed

• Large-city stutter from supply/grocery deliveries. While a courier case sat in the world, the game hitched (~1-second frames) for as long as the case existed — and it got worse the bigger the city. Cause: the case was being located by a full linear scan of every interactable in the city each tick; on a large map that single scan took ~1 second. It now uses the game's O(1) id lookup. (Small cities never showed it, which is why it slipped through internal testing on a compact map.)
• The same O(city)-scan pattern, removed from three other hot paths that could hitch on large cities: the crime-scene occupant check while you're standing inside a scene, address lookups during the evidence-heist and home-vacate windows, and the fixer lookup that runs repeatedly on load / during onboarding. All now use the game's scoped or O(1) lookups.

0.9.0 — 2026-08-05 — First public beta

The first public release. The Syndicate turns Shadows of Doubt into a career-hitman sandbox: a fixer moves you into the city, you take contracts, put targets down, and try to walk away from the exact investigation your own kills create.

Contracts & progression

• Underworld reputation career across four ranks — Recruit, Associate, Operative, Lieutenant — with one-time promotion rewards (the False Face mask at Level 1, the Second Skin gloves at Level 2, the contract board at Level 3).
• Auto-assigned contracts by v-mail at Levels 0–2; a browsable job board (up to 3 concurrent) at Level 3.
• Target selection scored on Wealth / Security / Exposure, with Full / Partial / Cold info leads — Partial/Cold hand you a clue trail guaranteed to resolve to one citizen.
• Escrow payout: money and standing clear only after a kill's heat settles; you collect on the pinboard. No reputation for a job you get identified on.
• Optional contract objectives: Clean Kill, Deadline, Photo of the Body, Poison Kill, Forge an Accident (overdose or fall), No Violence, Dispose at Sea.
• Hit Tokens, spent on the game's native social-credit stat.
• Onboarding flow with a Dispatcher check-in gate and one-shot tutorial toasts.

Killing

• Six working firearms with ammo, magazines, reloading, shotgun spread, headshots, and gunshot alarm.
• Reusable poison syringe (silent or delayed kill), single-use overdose vial (staged overdose), sedative for a clean no-marks KO, and forge-a-fall by dragging/heaving a downed body off a height.
• Melee with a cripple-on-hit slow. Enforcers and landlords are protected (KO only) to keep the city's finite pools intact.

The investigation & consequences

• Live crime scenes fed by witnesses, security cameras (with a darkness/stealth gate), and a fingerprint/forensics system with a public-place gate.
• Warrant + enforcer manhunt, home raid with murder-weapon seizure and cruncher-exposure penalties, caught-carrying confiscation, and a fine ledger.
• The False Face mask blocks identification (never forensics) and carries its own masked-persona notoriety with a "slip" that merges your masked spree onto your real identity.
• Residual-heat meter with a "Loose Ends" evidence-heist offer, and a mole email that reports what nearly caught you.

Tools, apps & UI

• Syndicate, Supplies, and Groceries cruncher apps (courier delivery, level-gated gear, global price multipliers).
• Anonymous Tip Line and the Dispatcher phone line (pause/resume, pull work early).
• Custom newspaper front pages for your kills, manhunts, and staged accidents.
• A top-of-screen HUD cluster (level, open crime scenes, mask, heat) plus a WANTED banner.
• The Fingerprint Remover tool and an in-room "your prints here" cue overlay.

Notes

• The public build ships with debug tooling disabled and keeps citizen names and home addresses out of the log ([Debug] Enabled = false).
• Nearly every number is a config knob in Kropath.TheSyndicate.cfg.
• Beta: expect bugs and balance changes. Best played on a new sandbox save with procedural murders off, and back up any save you care about.