Scorched Acres is the first content update for Hopoo Games smash hit Risk of Rain 2. It has just gone live on Steam at 8 am PDT today, so is available to download and play right now. It introduces a lot of new content for the game, including a new playable area, a new boss, a new survivor called Rex, and lots of new items as well.

The New Survivor, Rex

Rex is the new Survivor, and he is a part plant and part robot. He is also substantially bigger than the other Survivors. His kit makes for an exciting playstyle between balancing your self-healing and spending your health to output damage. You can find a full breakdown of his abilities below.

  • Passive: Abilities apply WEAKEN, a debuff which reduces enemy armor, movement speed, and damage.
  • Primary Fire: Fires three syringes in quick succession. The third syringe applies WEAKEN and heals REX.
  • Secondary Fire: REX sacrifices its own health to launch a seedpod mortar. Aims at a distant location and lands after a brief delay for huge damage.
  • Mobility: Launches REX backward and shoves all nearby enemies away and applies WEAKEN to them.
  • Ultimate: REX sacrifices its own health to fire a flower that PULLS all nearby enemies and ROOTS them.

The Scorched Acres update also includes the following new content.

New Boss – The Grovetender:

The Grovetender is a hook-throwing caretaker of wisps found only in its home of Scorched Acres. The Grovetender will fire a giant barrage of seeking wisps that detonate on contact and occasionally fire a burst of hooks from its masks that pulls in any survivor it hits. And yes, there is a new song to welcome in this terrifying new boss.

New Stage – Scorched Acres:

Scorched Acres takes place at sunset in a mysterious installation in the woods, filled with smog from the surrounding nearby fires. As the new alternate third stage to the snow map Rallypoint Delta, Scorched Acres houses a new monster called the Clay Templar and the new boss, the Grovetender.

New Enemy Affix – Malachite:

Malachite enemies can now spawn in later difficulties as high-tier elites. Malachite enemies possess several unique abilities, such as temporarily disabling player healing.

New Items, Equipment, Drones, and More:

An arsenal of new items and equipment is now at players’ disposal. This includes two new drones, the Equipment Drone and the Incinerator Drone; Category Chests; six new items, such as the Old Guillotine and the Little Disciple; and three new types of equipment such as the Spinel Tonic.

Community Suggested Changes:

Quality-of-life improvements suggested by the community have been implemented. This includes the HUD now displaying the current stage count and flashing health bars when the player reaches a critical health state.

There is, of course, much more to be discovered in-game, but the only way to experience it all is to download the update, which is available on Steam right now, and get stuck into another run.