¡Hola, jefe! Hey Chieftain, long time no see—wait, why are you a pile of bones?

Don't panic. The gates to the Land of the Dead have probably swung open again, and the dead are back in town!

And it's not just you. The Barbarian camps across the rainforest have all turned into ridiculous walking skeletons too.

But honestly, who cares? If we're all in the same boat, we might as well dance.

It's your trusty Maggie here. Welcome to Soulmask's very first festival-themed DLC—Bone Bash!

The update is scheduled for October 22, and it comes in three parts: a brand-new free festival storyline, a paid festival-themed DLC, and newly opened themed Official Servers.

Since Shifting Sands, we've been pushing ourselves to tackle different ancient cultures. But with Día de Muertos just around the corner, we wanted to look back—and dig a little deeper into the culture that inspired Soulmask in the first place. So we chose Día de Muertos, the most vibrant traditional festival of the Americas, as the theme of this celebration: Death is not the end. Being forgotten is.

Of course, as our first festival DLC, we want every Chieftain to be part of it. So let's start with the festival storyline. It's not complicated. In short: you suddenly died.

"Still alive? Still breathing? Still able to see? Okay, okay…"—Awareness X

Yes. When you log back in after the update, you'll find yourself as a walking skeleton—like you've died exactly once.

Awareness X will tell you that to get your body back, you'll need to head deep into a Barbarian camp in the rainforest (or the River Delta, if you're playing in Shifting Sands) and pay your respects at the Marigold Altar there. Alternatively, you could just go die properly once—a person can't die twice, right?

These Barbarian camps all sit in starter areas, so you'll get there quickly. But perhaps under the Altar's influence, they've become a true Land of the Dead: marigolds everywhere, towering painted skulls, and Barbarians reduced to bare bones yet still hard at work—all telling you the same thing. The festival of the dead has arrived.

Once you've paid your respects at the Altar of the Dead, you'll permanently unlock this darkly comic skeleton look. While you're at it, dress your whole tribe up as the dead—those 24/7 work shifts finally make a lot more sense…

But if you want to properly celebrate Día de Muertos, the Bone Bash DLC is the heart of this festival.

For a festival rooted in the Americas, we wanted a building material that carries the region's traditional character—so here comes the brand-new Carved Stone building set. Always wanted a proper Aztec pyramid? Now you can build exactly that in your own territory.

From the Marigold Altar that summons your ancestors to dance after revival, to flower beds that spread into a sea of marigolds, to war drums that get your Tribesmen partying—we've prepared 43 Día de Muertos-themed decorations of all shapes and sizes, more than enough to build your very own Land of the Dead.

Nobody turns down more outfits—not even the dead. We've prepared several skeleton skins, plus an adorable Día de Muertos Black Panther saddle. You can also give each type of Tribesman a different little headpiece, so you can still tell who's who—and boss them around accurately—once they're all bones.

Yes, "Masks" will always be our thing. We've prepared a Mask for Bone Bash too—but don't get the wrong idea. This one is not built for combat.

Homecoming Revelry is a purely recreational Mask. Its main job is to pull everyone around you into the Día de Muertos celebration, anytime, anywhere. Every so often, a new Tribesman drawn in by the festivities will come to join your tribe—none of them are powerhouses, but one more dance partner is always welcome. Its Mimicry Mode opens a portal made of flowers that teleports your Tribesmen out in the wild back home to join the party.

Please note: Homecoming Revelry's abilities provide no combat or stat advantages whatsoever. It exists for one reason only—to bring joy to you and your friends!

We know what you're thinking. Festival or not, we're not slowing down on improving Soulmask itself. So here's a quick progress report.

On controller support: Controllers have been a long-standing concern for many players. Since this has been an ongoing optimization effort, we've been hesitant to make firm promises. This time, though, we've given controller play a major overhaul: a brand-new radial menu and UI adjustments will deliver a fresh experience for controller players, scheduled to launch alongside Bone Bash. As a substantial change, it may still have rough edges—we'll keep adjusting based on your feedback.

On the tutorial: For veterans this may not be life-or-death, but we're unanimous on one thing—Soulmask's onboarding is very, very important. In the upcoming version, we've once again reworked the new player tutorial from the ground up: guidance on deploying Tribesmen as followers, and on assigning and using Assignments, are the focus of this round of improvements.

On Tribesman AI: If you spend time in our community, you'll know we've recently been collecting videos and save files of Tribesman AI issues. Yes, we genuinely need your help, Chieftains—the more cases you send us, the more precisely we can rework Tribesman behavior. I believe this won't take long.

What we've covered today is only the "basics" of what's coming during Día de Muertos. The truth is, we've put together a "massive" community festival for Bone Bash—ready to clock in at the 24/7 Factory of the Dead?

Over the next few days, we'll gradually reveal everything we've prepared for this celebration. The goal is simple: make sure every Chieftain has a great time during the festival of the dead.

This is Maggie, and we'll be back soon with more on Bone Bash. Stay tuned!