I hope you all had a good holiday season. Let's hope this year will be better than the last.
Here's a small patch for 1.2 focusing on recent player feedback. It's fixing a few bugs and balancing issues. It's nothing major. Unless some major crash or bug pops up, this will likely one of the last "hotfix" for the Rebirth update, next patches will add proper content (on top of the usual fixes and tweaks).
Expect a full devlog in a few days.
1.2.3 Changelog
Balance: During the Main Story, "experienced" trait progression is reset in between acts, so new players don't get overwhelmed by 30+ settlers crying about the lack of a proper bedroom
Balance: Reduced the ratio of pandemonium infected recruits (15%->10% in Rare, 30%->20% in Common, 95%->90% in Everyone difficulty settings)
Balance: Enforced limits to the amount of boss level hordes being active on the map at the same time (only one of each kind, max), also made them to spawn later
Balance: The Swarm faction event can no longer spawn super close to the player base (also slightly reduced the amount of creatures inside on spawn)
Balance: Hordes won't spawn too close to the player base (unless it's intended)
Balance: 3rd degree burns, if left untreated for 4 to 5 days, will heal on their own but leave permanent scars decreasing morale and some stats
UI: In "Misc Orders", added two buttons to 'turn off' and 'turn on' all the selected production buildings
UI: When an expedition gets killed, a new, prettier, info panel is shown, displaying the reason why it happened + a log of last messages
UI: When someone turns hostile due to mental breakdown, auto pause/center camera (if set in settings), there's also an alert sound, and the message is written in red
UI: When someone under mental breakdown starts a fire, there's a new alert sound, and the message is written in red
Fixed: It was technically possible to spawn in a 1x1 island in some specific scenarios (including Act1) preventing you from being able to play the game properly
Fixed: Impossible to attack walls/windows/clutter when defending a map location
Fixed: A crash with travel events, more specifically, the zombie horde travel event had a 33% chance to cause a crash when the player fails the event
Fixed: One of the "animal food" recipes was missing in the electric kitchen
Fixed: Pandemonium infection wouldn't spread through brawls as the standard fist/punch attack wasn't properly replaced by the infected variant
Fixed: Multiple minor issues with world map spawners (bandit hideout for instance) when they are conquered by a horde
Update 1.2.1 & 1.2.2
Hi,
This is a small patch to fix the issues found in 1.2, most of which are related to the Arakan playable faction archetype. There's no need to reset your progress or anything like that.
The main visible change, beside a few minor graphical improvements, is the new bone carving station. As the name implies, all bone-related recipes (mainly a thing for cannibals and mutants) have been moved there. It means that the bone armor is now available right from the start, possibly making the very early game a bit easier for those factions.
1.2.2 Changelog
Fixed: Possible crash in "Scenario->Custom->Equipment" menu if one of the items provided in the scenario doesn't exist (outdated mod issue)
Fixed: If a survivor is being "summoned" by the pharmacy while their inventory is completely full, they would get stuck in place
Fixed: Similar issue with doctors not having the room in their inventory to grab some bandages, for efficiency's sake, inventory weight check is disabled while treating a patient
Fixed: It was somehow possible to break stairs and the associated logic by building a farm over them, causing one part to disappear, and confusing the hell out of the survivors below
1.2.1 Changelog
Balance: Crafting recipes unlocked by the bone working tech (cannibals and mutants) moved to the new bone carving station
Balance: All other bone based ammo, tools, and weapons have been moved to this new station (for consistency sake)
Balance: Added exploration tech to base technologies known by Arakans
Balance: People are more careful after getting wounded at work, meaning that they are not likely to get wounded again for a bit
Balance: Underground raids have been moved to the surface as their likelihood of getting to be an hindrance to the base is practically zero otherwise
Graphics: Replaced the expedition military jeep's sprite (found in military bases) by something looking a lot better
Graphics: Replaced the expedition motorcycle's sprite by a new one
Graphics: New headgear sprites (military helmet, metal helmet, and the various caps)
Graphics: Replaced body armor sprites (military, mercenary and metal armor)
Modding: The Arakans' ability to make pets out of typically non-adoptable critters is now data driven instead of being hardcoded
Fixed: Both the new questline and one of the unique survivors you can recruit while exploring the world map had their effective cost doubled
Fixed: Arakans' spiders would forget who had adopted them after reloading a save, alongside a bunch of fun stuff in the same genre
Fixed: Babies made by arakan-adopted spiders would spawn as wild
Fixed: Similar issues if a NPC changes its AI module midgame (pretty sure it was only a thing with some modded mutagens)
Fixed: Missing "downloaded a mod" achievement check when starting a new game, meaning that the achievement would only trigger when downloading a mod from the game's UI
Fixed: The pharmacy's logic code wasn't handling a few cases where the jobs wouldn't be distributed properly
Fixed: Clicking the button "adopt" on a friendly wild spider would causes the butcher or neuter checkbox to be accidentally checked
Fixed: Warning/Failsafe when using Windows 10 K or KN was yeeted at some point, not informing people with those exotic versions to go download the media pack
Fixed: The "Select All Units" button was not legible enough
Fixed: Prisoners coming back from an expedition were keeping their weapons/armors
Update 1.2.1
Hi,
This is a small patch to fix the issues found in 1.2, most of which are related to the Arakan playable faction archetype. There's no need to reset your progress or anything like that.
The main visible change, beside a few minor graphical improvements, is the new bone carving station. As the name implies, all bone-related recipes (mainly a thing for cannibals and mutants) have been moved there. It means that the bone armor is now available right from the start, possibly making the very early game a bit easier for those factions.
Full Changelog
Balance: Crafting recipes unlocked by the bone working tech (cannibals and mutants) moved to the new bone carving station
Balance: All other bone based ammo, tools, and weapons have been moved to this new station (for consistency sake)
Balance: Added exploration tech to base technologies known by Arakans
Balance: People are more careful after getting wounded at work, meaning that they are not likely to get wounded again for a bit
Balance: Underground raids have been moved to the surface as their likelihood of getting to be an hindrance to the base is practically zero otherwise
Graphics: Replaced the expedition military jeep's sprite (found in military bases) by something looking a lot better
Graphics: Replaced the expedition motorcycle's sprite by a new one
Graphics: New headgear sprites (military helmet, metal helmet, and the various caps)
Graphics: Replaced body armor sprites (military, mercenary and metal armor)
Modding: The Arakans' ability to make pets out of typically non-adoptable critters is now data driven instead of being hardcoded
Fixed: Both the new questline and one of the unique survivors you can recruit while exploring the world map had their effective cost doubled
Fixed: Arakans' spiders would forget who had adopted them after reloading a save, alongside a bunch of fun stuff in the same genre
Fixed: Babies made by arakan-adopted spiders would spawn as wild
Fixed: Similar issues if a NPC changes its AI module midgame (pretty sure it was only a thing with some modded mutagens)
Fixed: Missing "downloaded a mod" achievement check when starting a new game, meaning that the achievement would only trigger when downloading a mod from the game's UI
Fixed: The pharmacy's logic code wasn't handling a few cases where the jobs wouldn't be distributed properly
Fixed: Clicking the button "adopt" on a friendly wild spider would causes the butcher or neuter checkbox to be accidentally checked
Fixed: Warning/Failsafe when using Windows 10 K or KN was yeeted at some point, not informing people with those exotic versions to go download the media pack
Fixed: The "Select All Units" button was not legible enough
Fixed: Prisoners coming back from an expedition were keeping their weapons/armors
After The Collapse 1.2.0: Rebirth Update
Hi!
Here's a very massive update for After The Collapse, hence the skip in the usual version numbering system. It covers multiple new systems, new quests, a slicker UI, heavily improved graphics, new critters, and a ton of fixes and balance changes. As usual, the full change-log is at the bottom of this post. I will also cover the reasons why there has been no update in a year at the end of this article. The important bit is that updates will start rolling out again at a regular pace.
Visual and Audio
This will be the first thing you'll notice when launching the game. All background images, static cut-scenes, portraits, and illustrations during events and quests have been redesigned or replaced by much higher-quality assets sharing a similar art style. That's about 200 new or replaced images in total. Additionally, all main story cut-scenes have voice-over narration and dialogs, in English only, though (there's no plan to add more languages).
The visual improvements are not just limited to the "non-game" parts. As you can see in the screenshots below, all the different wall types, including the mountains and caverns, have been redesigned using a top-down 3D perspective. It really should have been done sooner as it makes the game look a lot better.
A very common complaint regarding the user interface is that it is oversized. As such, the font is now a bit smaller (which incidentally fixes an issue with the text being slightly distorted), and all menus, panels, and elements (like check-boxes and such) have been resized, if not fully redesigned. Even the menu at the bottom of the screen uses much less space. There's a side effect, though: scaling down the UI in the settings will make the text much harder to read.
There are still a few menus and screens I need to review and possibly redo, but they're in the minority. The next stop will likely be the over-world map, which really needs a facelift. I might also do something about the survivors themselves, replacing them by something better looking/animated, not 100% sure yet.
Fishing!
This is a new way to feed your base, which can be used as a replacement or as a complement to farming. It does not require any particular technology and is available right from the start of the game, assuming there is water nearby, of course.
You build fishing docks next to the water; they function similarly to a crafting station. You can either fish with bait or without, with the former being a lot more time-efficient than the latter. You can build fish bait at the camp fire. There are 2 recipes: the first one requires nothing (the survivor is "looking for worms") but takes a while; the second one uses plants and is much faster. All those activities use the new "fishing" skill. Fish are considered a food ingredient that can be used in the kitchen to make cooked fish or fish'n'chips (with potatoes). Both of those meals are very filling and give a pretty decent buff.
Compared to farming, fishing is more labor-intensive, as you need to make bait and have multiple docks with workers constantly busy fishing. Depending on the map, it also might be riskier, as you might need to fish relatively far away from the security of your walls. That said, it's immune to bad weather, the food you produce is of much higher quality (especially in the early game), leading to happier survivors, and it's easier to predict and monitor food availability.
Early game food production was one of the very few systems for which there was one thing, and one thing only, you could do. You'd make 30 tiles worth of farm in every game, probably even the very first thing you'd even place on the map. It always bugged me, but I never really had the time to add more ways to do it until now. It's also the first game system in a long line that I'm going to alter and make more meaty.
New Critters
On top of the new giant crab variant (a tanky melee focused ice/electric crab, more common in humid/cold biomes), entirely new creatures join the roster.
Giant ants come in 2 variants (soldier and worker). They aren't very tanky but come in large groups. As with the real ones, there's nothing much to gain from fighting them beside the satisfaction of not being eaten alive by a swarm of insects, which is as good a reason as any. I didn't get the time to expand on the concept much yet, but I'll be adding their own dedicated underground biome and unique world map battle map and systems in the next update. I'm pretty excited with what I'm going to do with them in the future.
Caterpillar-like critters now spawn in the underground layers. They are extremely weak, but can be pastured (they drop eggs). They reproduce quickly and are a decent source of silk and animal meat. There's only one variant, but more will come soon.
Finally, in the annoying, but rare and exploitable, spawner category, I added the mutated carnivorous plant and its poisonous spore minions.
Unique Survivors
Those are survivors you can recruit during extremely rare events and world map mini-quests. Right now, there are 10 of them, but you'll see a lot less than that during the course of a game. They come with a custom portrait, bio, and equipment and have really good stats, traits, and skills. They are generally very costly to recruit.
Right now, they aren't integrated as well into the game progression as I'd like. It'll be ironed out in future updates, and I might even give some of them their own dedicated recruitment quest-lines.
New Short Quest-line
I added a new short questline, Wandering Stranger. It is not available in story mode, but it should work in all other scenarios. It triggers when an expedition is traveling the world map during the midgame (it's gated by having radio researched). You do not have to accept it immediately; if you tell the wandering stranger 'No', the event will pop up again.
I won't go into much more detail. It's lore heavy but not particularly complicated and includes some unique rewards you can't find anywhere else.
New Wound System
If you've played After The Collapse for more than a few hours, you probably noticed that outside of combat, survivors would never get wounded. Even in combat, it was rare and limited to a very small selection. This was partly due to the implementation; each time I added a new injury, I would also have to edit every single weapon file accordingly. It was not a scalable system, and it made weapon modding more difficult than it should be. Plus, there was no way to make some wounds more rare than others. Well, those are things of the past.
Now, while working, your survivors will get wounded pretty frequently, actually. The less efficient a survivor is at a task, the more likely they are to get wounded. The nature of said wound depends on the task: hauling may cause back pain, while someone working at the smelter may get first-degree burns. Rare exceptions aside, those wounds are quite superficial and will heal on their own. They will impact the survivors' morale and stats/skills temporarily, though. This can be disabled in the difficulty settings, but I would strongly advise against it.
Regarding combat, instead of tying injuries to each weapon individually (which is still possible), the game ties those outcomes to the damage type and the weapon category. For instance, all standard rifles (ranged, piercing) share the same pool of injuries the game can pick from, while all shotguns (ranged, impact) use a different pool to pick from. In practice, this does not change the likelihood of being wounded when hit; it just increases the number of possible outcomes.
New Playable Faction Archetype
The Arakans (from Act 1 of story mode) are now playable in the other scenarios. They haven't been fully tested and are probably quite challenging to play. They have the same tech limitations as the mutants, barring you from using the late-game stuff. They are mentally unstable cannibals (mental breakdowns are slightly more common) and cannot recruit people normally. You can't even recruit while exploring world map buildings. Yeah, that's a lot of negatives, but there are a few upsides.
First, you can place giant spider nests on the map. They act exactly like the occasional spider nests you'd find on the map, except they're friendly, and you can adopt the spiders. They can use said spiders as pets, which is not possible when playing other archetypes. They start with the ability to launch expeditions and the ability to craft bone weapons and armor. They also have access to two unique technologies. The first one gives you increased mastery over spiders, allowing you to build nests for each sub-species of giant spider. The second technology is an early-game and low-cost replacement for the slave collar; it's to be installed in a vehicle and will allow you to capture survivors.
The general idea for this archetype is to use prisoners as a work force and recruitment pool (and possibly as a food source) while you rely on the spiders to protect your base. I would recommend starting with four more survivors than normal if you decide to play with this faction; it'll compensate for the lack of the initial recruitment event.
User Interface
The UI hasn't only been downsized; it's been improved as well! The most obvious improvement is the minimap, which uses little icons to show survivors, traders, critters, and even fire. Don't ask me why it wasn't implemented like two years ago; I don't know either.
All the world map menus (location, expedition, horde) got a makeover. They use less screen space while displaying more information. The combat strength of a given horde or expedition is clearly indicated on the menu via the sword and shield icons, giving you a clear, visible indication of how a(n automated) battle is likely to go down without having to dig through several menus.
Logged messages are generally more nicely written, especially when it comes to injuries, sicknesses, and deaths, avoiding unnecessary repetition of the same information. Speaking of death, instead of getting the associated settings menu when clicking on an occupied tomb, you'll get a short eulogy for the departed instead.
The list goes on. It's still the same UI, and things are handled the same; it just feels nicer overall.
Game Balance
The first thing regular or returning players will notice is that the smelters need workers now. This may slow down the pace at which the early game is played, as you'll need more manpower to do the same amount of stuff as before. The late-game electric furnace is still automated.
With the slower pace and the higher need to prioritize medicine over rushing to pipe weapons, I decided to increase the damage output and range of crossbows. It's not a big boost, but it's enough to make crossbows viable against early-game threats.
Many, many traits and professions have been added or altered. Some of the very good or very bad ones are also more rare (not everyone gets to be a genius, not every soldier survived the war, and so on). Speaking of traits, they can influence the invisible "mental stability" meter of each survivor alongside a variety of other factors. I'm a bit torn on keeping this value invisible, but it's way too easy to cheese when it's not.
Regarding the environment itself, plants spread a bit slower, fires die down during the rain at a much faster pace, while acid rain and blood rain are shorter but may damage the sanity of whoever is outside when the calculations are done.
Modding
As usual, everything is data-oriented; in text files, even the questlines are 100% data-driven. A lot of existing systems have been improved in this particular update, but it stays compatible with any mod that was already (fully) compatible with 1.0.
A Few Words
So, yeah... I've been away for a bit. Well, a year...
While it's true I was severely burned out after the 1.0.1 release, burnouts don't last a whole year (it did last a few months, though). I'm not going to share my private life publicly because it's not really who I am. I'll just say that a lot of stuff happened, mostly of the bad kind, and it took me a while to recover from said stuff. I want to apologize for this brutal and unannounced lack of update, it's against everything I normally stand for as a developer. I get it if you're mad at me, but there isn't much I can do about it now.
The important bit is that I'm back, and there shouldn't be any more interruptions in the future. The pacing of said updates won't be as hectic as in the pre-1.0 era. I'd like to take the time needed to implement the new features properly.
First things first, the world map need to be made more pretty to look at, because the more content and quests I add, the more it takes the center-stage, and the current visuals are starting to really clash with the rest of the game. I might try a node based system instead of a free roam one, it might make world exploration more engaging. Weather effects and transitions (or lack thereof) need a refresher too.
Beside that, I'd like to add the ability for mixed damage types: like modifying a rifle with some macguffin artifact to add fire damage on top of its piercing damage. Retractable walls could also be a fun addition to play with (connect a bunch of walls to a lever, push lever to toggle the walls on / off). Neutral critters and visitors would also help in making the local map feel more alive. Finally I'd like to review how fires interact with plants, the fact that they leave absolutely nothing behind is bugging me. Oh, and ants.. lots and lots of ants.
Anyway, that's all for now. I Hope you'll have a good time with this update!
Cheers!
Full Changelog
AI: When in a lounge or study room, survivors will benefit from the effects of seats with special effects (like the sofa)
AI: When placing tiles, survivors will try to pickup enough building material to place several in a row whenever possible
AI: Creatures (outside of combat) should be a bit more chill and not constantly move around
Balance: Reduced "Logistics" research time by 20%, slightly increased vehicle research time
Balance: Some very good and very bad traits/jobs are now less common than others
Balance: Reduced the max amount of initial hostiles on maps (mostly visible at High and Very High danger level)
Balance: The basic smelter requires a worker instead of being automated (the late game one is still automated)
Balance: Acid/Blood rain weather patterns are a bit shorter, blood rain will cause sanity damage
Balance: Flamethrower range reduced by 1 across the board (pipe version 5->4, modern version 6->5)
Balance: Standardized and extended the types of wounds people can receive from being hit by weapons
Balance: Increased bow and crossbow damage to make them a bit more viable in early game so players don't feel the need to always rush pipe weapons
Balance: Reduced Exoskeleton Helmet (all variants) ranged damage bonus from 10 to 5
Balance: Initial good events when starting a game no longer count toward good/bad event balancing (reduces likelihood of having multiple bad events in a row once the protection goes off)
Balance: Wild plants and trees grow and reproduce more slowly
Balance: Replaced "Laceration" wound by "Bad Cuts" in the Very Bad Day scenario, to reduce the likelihood of instant game over
Balance: Being exhausted, starving, or dehydrated (basically any deadly need at max value) decreases mental stability
Balance: Underground giant mushrooms propagate in much less dense clusters
Balance: Tweaked a few items' weight to make exploring mines less cumbersome
Balance: Wild vegetation shouldn't expand to completely separated regions anymore (underground giant mushrooms no longer invade empty parts of the cavern)
Balance: Fires die down much faster when it starts raining
Balance: Reduced spawn rate of buildings overrun by the infected by 33%
Balance: Chatting with friend/foe has a less extreme influence on morale, and multiple tweaks to the system (some discussions have more long lasting effects than others)
Content: Fishing! Added fishing dock to catch some fishes, the Fishing skill itself, a bait recipe to campfire, and 2 recipes to cook your fishes
Content: Added fishing rod to skill-boosting items you can build (or loot)
Content: Playable Arakan faction archetype, mastery over spider kind, cannot recruit people normally, must take prisoners and possibly convert them, 2 unique tech to research
Content: A fairly long expedition event chain 'Wandering Stranger' with unique rewards (not available in the main story, radio tech required)
Content: Added unique survivors, with custom equipment and boosted stats, who can be recruited very rarely during standard recruitment events
Content: Added a few events (both local and travel events) to recruit those unique survivors
Content: Workers have a small chance to get themselves hurt when working, depending on skill and activity (can be disabled in settings)
Content: Improved combat related wound system
Content: Abominations from act 3 are integrated in the other scenarios
Content: Many new survivor traits, professions, and a lot of new wound types
Content: Added surgical kit to medical stations, used to remove lodged bullets and shrapnel wounds
Content: Added ice crabs to the fauna, tanky and melee focused, available for taming too
Content: New monster type: Giant black ants (2 variants: worker and soldier), not particularly dangerous, but tend to show up in large groups
Content: New underground only critter: Giant caterpillars (can be pastured and used for silk production, eggs can be found by killing them or through traders)
Content: Added wood wall to basic carpentry tech, useful on maps with little access to stones
Content: New enemy spawner, mutated carnivorous plant and it's poisonous spore-like minions (appears the same way as other spawners, by razing nature)
Content: The giga crab joins the ranks of the boss-type critters, it's not meant to be a fair fight, and only appears as a horde in the late game
Content: When a farm is selected, you can see a progress bar below each individual plant to show how much they are grown (the bar is yellow when in progress and green when ready)
Graphics: Most cutscenes, events, and mission-related images have been redesigned in HD with a coherent-ish art style (150 pictures, took quite a while)
Graphics: Some of the lower quality textures and assets have been replaced
Graphics: Added new legible icons to the minimap to show fires, survivors and critters
Graphics: Replaced all existing wall types by ones with a fake 3D perspective
Graphics: Mountains and cavern walls got a similar treatment
Graphics: Tweaked main scenario's intro sequence (arrival at bunker) and replace invading zombies by their fully animated variant
Graphics: Added some event-specific artwork to replace the generic ones (like corridors are actual corridors, and not the tunnel picture)
Graphics: New farm tiles, looking distinct from the rest of the terrain
Graphics: Much better sleep animation and positioning
Graphics: New venomous spider sprites and animations (no longer just a recolor)
Modding: Ability to blacklist specific travel events in scenarios (Scenario.Events.BlackListTravelID)
Modding: Added ability for travel events to make sure that at least someone survive no matter the event's effects.
Modding: Point of interests can be preloaded with specific mobs instead of faction dependant ones (see qradio_bunker)
Modding: Added "ReplacePOI" to TravelEvent effect list (see new event chain, ValueString is POI ID, ValueFaction is optional faction ID)
Modding: Travel event options can check for a second condition (global variable check, see qradio_stage3_storage)
Modding: Added global event to replace a point of interest (see the qradio questline ending)
Modding: Traits can be set as "Rare" (true/false, default false) to reduce how likely they are to spawn by 66%
Modding: Similary, hordes can be set as "Rare" (true/false, default false) to reduce how likely they are to spawn on the world map by 66%
Modding: New or existing wound-type traits can be associated to activities/skills in the new wounds_work folder (add new files instead of editing base ones)
Modding: In the same spirit weapon types and damaged types are linked to wounds in the wounds_weapon folder
Modding: Unique survivors can be added to the pool by adding "UniqueNPC: true" (alongside a few optional params) and to a new NPC file (see npc/unique_*)
Modding: Added DailyMentalBreakChange, MentalBreakModifierGain, MentalBreakModifierLoss settings to traits
Modding: Added EventUniqueRecruit to the event types, used to recruit either a random unique NPC or a specific one.
Modding: Added "InitialStorage" and "AddToInventory" to faction archetype file (see the new arakan archetype)
ProcGen: In the world map, deadly biomes are less common and have patches of non deadly biomes instead of being big blobs
ProcGen: Mountains on the surface can properly touch the sides of the map
ProcGen: More distinct biome fauna
Sound: Added voiced dialogs for all main story cutscenes (english only)
UI: Rooms with enemies inside are more clearly indicated with a much brighter red color
UI: General UI cleaning pass, making the user interface look a bit less like an oversized toy
UI: The font used in the menus is more compact (side effect: screen resolutions below 900p are difficult to read, I'm looking into new options for potato computers)
UI: Scaled down many UI elements to improve legibility (drop-down lists, checkboxes, health bars and such)
UI: Added info to factory screen, warning when there's no compatible adjacent depot for queued orders
UI: Job management menu more legible (less yellow text everywhere)
UI: In the world map, the "point of interest" menu, and its sub-panels, have been redesigned to look less barebone
UI: In the world map, the "horde" and "expedition" menus have been altered in a similar fashion
UI: Many lists and menus have been resized, standardized, and made more compact
UI: Survivors' stats and job sub-panels are a lot more compact
UI: In the "Add a recipe" submenu for crafting station, items in the list can be double clicked to be added quickly
UI: Expedition widget is now available in combat mode
UI: Added a "Mass Trade" button to the diplomacy tab, allows you to request traders from all factions simul
UI: Bottom menu downsized and reskinned
UI: The short text/lore cutscenes can be skipped with [ESC]
UI: Replaced some of the "Settler got trait: X" by nicer messages
UI: Occupied individual tombs have a new menu showing an epitaph + details about whoever is buried there
UI: Camera automatically centers on a survivor if they turn into a zombie if "center/pause game if survivor is hurt" is checked
UI: Expeditions are automatically named after the vehicle being used
Fixed: Farms could drop the "plant seed" job on rare occasions
Fixed: Small blocking issue in the "build roof" job
Fixed: Some typos and weird looking sentences have been corrected/rewritten
Fixed: Map generation had a small chance to cause scorpion or spider dens to appear during the intro cutscene
Fixed: Some bits of text, in a few menus, were displayed with a very slight distortion
Fixed: Mouse-wheel scrolling in some menus, when the list is barely longer than the menu itself, would be very slow
Fixed: An issue where placing or deleting a build location, walls especially, wouldn't always update the pathing map correctly
Fixed: Right clicking a tile with items on the ground would incorrectly state that a survivor would get the items when those are set not to be
Fixed: Tooltips would appear incorrectly sized for a few frames (partial fix)
Fixed: Misc building related issues
Fixed: When manually defending a production center against a raid, hostiles would not try to break the doors
Fixed: Message "we're done exploring X (0.0132023154kg space left)" sent after an expedition finishes wasn't formated properly
Fixed: When using "Automated Battle" on a map location tied to an event, it wouldn't automatically launch the event
Fixed: Text dump events (triggered in a few specific questlines) couldn't display its optional banner image properly
Fixed: It was technically possible to trigger the same interactive event menu twice
Fixed: Misleading message spam when an illness is spreading
Fixed: Sickness timer was reset each time one is transmitted, even to someone already having it, causing epidemics to stay for way too long
Fixed: Tutorial characters (bob, clara and such) couldn't be butchered properly or use their fists in combat
Fixed: The event used to spawn hordes on the world map would display an incorrect alert
Fixed: People sleeping too far away from their bed
Fixed: Weapon info panel was giving erroneous stats when it comes to their chance to apply wounds
Fixed: Cannibal faction archetype wouldn't automatically set the faction setting to allow eating human meat
Fixed: The faction summary tab wasn't checking if the private bedrooms were completed or not
Fixed: Dead critters being rendered on top of live ones
Fixed: Probably a bunch more, didn't keep track of everything
1.0.1 Balance & UI Update
Hello!
Here's the 1.0.1 update. Namely, the version which probably should have been released initially, but well, hindsight is always 20/20.
On top of the usual improvements, tweaks and fixes, there are 2 main arcs for this update: a proper balance pass at the story mode while fixing its remaining problems, and the much requested job management tools.
Enjoy!
Story Mode
The main change in this story-line is that there's a soft cap to the maximum amount of people you can control. This includes expeditions and workers at production center. The cap increases in each act. It's 25 people in the first act, 50 in act 2, 75 in act 3 and 150 in act 4. This is unique to story mode, the other scenarios and sandbox modes are still uncapped, obviously.
The rational for this change is pretty simple, it's to make this mode more difficult for veterans (limiting their ability to grind the whole world-map before moving to the next chapter) without complicating things for newcomers.
Additionally, you'll start the first act with an additional soldier-type settler, pushing your initial population to 8 survivors and giving you more than enough firepower to deal with literally anything the game can throw at you in the first few in-game weeks.
There are many more tweaks and fixes to the story stuff. Most will only apply when you switch to the next act (that's kind of a structural issue with the quest system) or start again.
Job Priority Menu
As shown in the previous devlog, I reworked the job priority menu to include the list of currently queued jobs. There's not much to add, the menu is self explanatory enough.
Job Manager
Here's the new job manager. It should be a lot more useful than its previous iteration. It's also much easier to read. I might still modify the UI further, because it's nowhere near as compact as I'd like it to be, but that will have to do for now.
So, you can select which jobs you want it to handle, while before it was kind of a all-or-nothing affair.
You can also tell it to make some of the entries "exclusive". Meaning that the people selected for a particular skill will only have this skill enabled. This is basically for the "Science" field. Enable it, set it to keep only the one best survivor, and check it to be exclusive. This way, your scientist will do science, and science only.
If you check the "Maintain Settings Automatically" checkbox, settings will be automatically reapplied each time you get a new survivor, or one dies, leaves, come back from an expedition, and so on. Basically, it does what it says on the box :)
But what if you want to set manual job settings on one (or multiple) of your survivors? Well you can do that too now!
See that check box at the bottom of the survivor's job menu? This is its purpose. Check it, and the job manager will completely ignore this survivor.
I can't stress this enough, though. There's no magic combination of jobs settings that will beat a base designed with proper depot and factory placement. Nine times out of ten, outside of farmers, scientists and medics, you'll just make things worse.
Notable Stuff
I decreased the trade value of things like poison and tree seeds, as those were practically free money printing machines. I also halved the silk/poison production rate of tamed spiders/scorpions.
I also added a new booze with limited anti-sickness properties (I know, I know). It has a decent trade value, and can be made for relatively cheap with alcohol and poison (why not).
There's a lot more in the following changelog, which I encourage regulars to look at.
Full Changelog
Artificial Intelligence
Survivors usually look for a nearby job before looking at the global list, now they'll only pick the nearby job if there's nothing else tagged as more urgent in the list. This should fix issues where you set a whole building to be razed, but a doctor is urgently needed elsewhere. They should pickup the urgent job instead of queuing more nearby demolition ones. At least that's the idea and it's assume you use global job priorities.
Balance
In Story Mode, each Act has a maximal amount of population you can manage (25, 50, 75, and 150, respectively)
In Act 1 of story mode, heavily reduced the total quantity of loot which can be found in military bases and police stations
In Act 1 of story mode, removed special underground biomes from the world map
In Story mode's first 2 acts (and outside of Act 1's ending), back-to-back events will no longer occur
Added a second soldier type survivor to act 1's start to put it on par with a standard game start
Halved production speed of poison and web from spiders and scorpions (from once every 12h to once a day)
Slightly decreased reproduction rate of tamed giant spiders
Heavily reduced buying/selling price of poison and tree sprouts
Some of the least used/rare food (cooked meal, MRE) provide slight anti-sickness benefits on consumption
Added "plot armor" to mutant horde's HQ in act 2 to prevent players from skipping the whole mission
Added "plot armor" to most friendly factions' HQ in story mode to prevent players from getting soft-locked
Increased rarity of spec ops armor, military armor, and some advanced rifles (both damaged and working variants)
Game Content
Added an alcoholic beverage which can be made from alcohol and poison, decent trade value, some health benefits
Job Manager overhaul, easier to use, more functionalities and can detect people leaving/joining/dying to reapply your settings on its own when set to auto.
Fog/cloud texture size increased. It's also "stuck" to the map instead of using parallax scrolling as it was visually annoying when zoomed out.
User Interface
Game will look for installed mods before starting a Story Mode game and warn you
Study Zones can be "paused" so you can tell students/teachers to go do something else without having to clear the list
Fully reworked Job Manager menu and functions. You can also set individuals to be ignored by said Job Manager by using a check box in their individual job sub-menu
Redesigned Job Priority menu with additional job queue information
Added total population counter to your faction's summary which includes expeditions and people working at the production centers
Added tooltips to Settle Info Menu (when selecting a location for your base) to explain the various terms like decay, water access, danger and so on
You no longer have to press the surrender button when defeated during a manual expedition battle
Modding
Scenarios can set a maximum quantity of survivors the player is allowed to manage
Ratio of special underground biomes can be altered (see act 1 map)
Ability for a consumable to have a need modifier that the AI will not detect but still function. Like a food which slightly lessen sickness but you don't want to be used JUST to reduce sickness because it'd imply using way too many units. (see drink_devil, meal_mre, and meal_cooked)
Bug Fixes
Farm could spam plant-seed jobs uncontrollably (regression bug from 1.0.0.4's AI improvement)
Clicking on a log entry about a map battle you've left would try to teleport your camera to a target who doesn't exist anymore (often leading to a crash)
Multiple event related issues in story mode (won't fix itself in whatever act you're in)
People currently in an expedition wouldn't be included when relocating your base
In sandbox mode, moving the base somewhere else could duplicate survivors if you customized your starting list
Selection from the Population menu was unreliable (the menu can no longer be dragged around as it was partially the reason why)
Issue where a stair could be blocked by a 2x2 (or larger) furniture during map generation
The previous fix to the minor "copy/paste recipe" bug wasn't taking single item factories (like water collectors) into account
Act 4 would normally finish when a specific item you've just produced is put into a container, it'll now be finished as soon as it's produced to avoid confusion.
Hordes would not spawn any loot when defeated in automated combat
Some issues with loot distribution when defeating grown hordes (then which have been on the map for a long time)
Defensive battles would not use the proper gear for your workers
Devlog: general news, 1.0 status, and next updates
Hi there!
After those first few hectic weeks, I think it would be a good time to take a breather with an article summarizing how everything went, my future plans, and so on and so forth. We didn't have a proper devlog in months, after all.
I first want to welcome all the new players! I know the initial 1.0 release was a bit rough (especially in story mode), and I'm very sorry about that. Still, most of the major bugs got fixed quickly thanks to everyone's prompt and detailed feedback.
1.0 Release Status
All things considered, 1.0 was a relatively solid release. It had 3 major "Day 1" bugs which tripped people over in a way I'd rather have avoided. All were literal typos in the code base. It's not bad code, it was just a case of coding fatigue after the last few months. They were all caught and quickly dispatched.
It doesn't mean that 1.0 ain't without faults. We wouldn't be at the 4th hot-patch otherwise, but considering it was the largest content update I published in quite a while (if ever), well, it's not all that bad. Act 1 and 2 in story mode could probably have been a tad nicer to newcomers, and many issues could have been avoided with a couple more weeks of testing. But overall, and given the circumstances, it was fine.
I'll get to the commercial side of things later, for those who care about it. But, let's move to more important topics first.
Game Content
ATC has a plenty of content to go around, and I'm pretty sure that some sub-systems are still unknown to most new players (did you know that you can breed your cattle/pets for specific traits? traits are inheritable). Still, many of the active community members burnt through content a LOT faster than I could have ever imagined.
It's a double edged sword. Watching people unlock exoskeleton production, rocking those armors even in story mode barely a week after release was awesome. It's also a tad scary from my perspective. It's forcing my hand into focusing the next big content update into adding more late game quests and world map content. Which, don't get me wrong, I'll be more than happy to provide. It's just that, now, I have a much better understanding of what MMO developers have to go through :D
1.0.1 Update
So, this will be the next update and it should arrive in a few days to a week, depending on reports. This is nothing major, obviously.
it'll include a reworked job manager in the faction menu. This one should be a lot more functional than the previous iteration. As usual, like ALL job management features, this is purely optional. If you build a base correctly, with input/output depots next to your crafting stations and rooms placed in an effective fashion, you can definitely do without.
The much more crucial job priority menu is also being reworked to include a list of all jobs being queued, updated in real time. As such, you'll be able to see how changing the priority of a particular task is going to influence the queue.
After discussing it with people on the forums, and noticing a trend in the save-games I received, each chapter in story mode will get a soft population cap. As much as it's fascinating to see someone make a base with 200+ survivors before the end of the first act, it's going to ruin their experience and the overall balance in the following chapters. Limits will still be fairly generous.
Scenarios and sandbox mode, obviously, will stay untouched in that regard.
It'll also include a bunch of QoL requests from the community (automatically getting traders from friendly factions for instance) and balance changes.
Mods
I'm going through a process of manually validating already published mods. Mods that I know to be compatible with 1.0 are tagged as "1.0 (Verified)". This doesn't mean that said mod doesn't have internal bugs, it just means that it's not overwriting 1.0 files with outdated versions.
Mods without this tag may still be compatible with 1.0, it's just that I haven't tested them yet.
Mods tagged as "Deprecated" are, either plain incompatible with 1.0, or are downgrading vanilla features back to the stone age. Don't use deprecated mods.
And to new potential modders, I'll be more than happy to answer any question you have, and help you go through your first release. The best place for that is on the discord channel.
Burnt Out
People who've followed me for a while (or those who read my posts in general), already know this. After several months of crunch time to get 1.0 out of the door while dealing with family related issues in parallel, I am completely burnt out.
If I was going to count, 90% of the bugs I fixed post 1.0 are due to typos and rogue lines of code left behind after a bad copy/paste. While bugs are bound to happen in every new major releases, there's normally a proper reason for most of them to exist beside pure exhaustion.
So, I give myself another month (until the end of October) to deal with the remaining obvious bugs, deal with the 1.0.1 update and possible follow-up patches. After that, I'll take one to two months off. I'll still be around on the forums and discord most of the time, but I won't process requests or bug reports unless I deem them absolutely critical.
I am fully aware that newcomers might see this as a bad sign. Stories about game developers going on "vacations" just after release and not coming back are all too common. But after over 6 years running this company, not even mentioning my modding days, and sustaining my first game way after it's was viable to do so, I hope I earned at least enough credits to be trusted on that front. Heck, if you don't believe me, feel free to ask what other people think on the forum ;)
Then what?
When I said that 1.0 wasn't the end of the road, I wasn't lying. Next step is 1.1, and then 1.2, and so on and so forth until 2.0 (hopefully).
There are a few areas I'd like to explore. And that's entirely parallel to the whole "make procedural generation, UI, and AI better", those go without saying.
First one is regarding the late game and map exploration content. If I learned something from writing story mode, it's how powerful the quest system can be. I'd love to add a series of well hidden bunkers. Some might unlock a high-tech gadget, some might unleash a plague or a new faction, others would just deliver a bit of lore. All tied to chains of events and text-based quests.
Secondly, I dislike the current mercenary system used to defend your outposts. The overall concept ain't bad per say. It's just way too basic at the moment. An ideal system would replace that "buy button" by a list of mercenaries, the more factions you're friendly with, the more different layouts. And you'd be able to pick mercenaries with specific loadouts, said loadout would impact on the buying price.
I'd also like to work with the faction archetype system. If you played the game beyond story mode, you already know how radically different it is to plays mutants compared to those puny humans. It's an area I'd love to develop more. It's also a very good candidate for DLC content later down the line as faction archetypes can come with their own custom quest-line.
There's also the base building aspect. I could (and should) add a bunch of decorations, furniture, and additional buildings. While it's true that we have pretty much all that's really required, there's very little decorative and mood related fluff for people to make pretty looking bases. And one shouldn't underestimate the appeal of a good screenshot.
Overall, and that's a running thing with ATC, the game's code-base has a ton of fairly intricate systems, but I barely scratched the surface of what they can do, and I'd love to spend some time digging deeper.
At least that's for my immediate thoughts. I'm not longer duty bound to a massive list of promises I made years ago. Last thing I want to do right now, is to bound myself to another list instead of going with what I actually want to work on. When I have a proper plan for 1.1, you'll know.
In any case, there are a ton of things to look forward to and I hope you'll stick around :)
So, how the release went?
Overall, it went well enough. ATC is not in any danger of being dropped due to a lack of money or interest anytime soon. And, like with my previous game, I'll publish a proper post-mortem when I feel the time is right. Now is way too early to do so. I can share a couple things, though.
Sales for this first crucial month are half of my "noice!" estimate but are way above my "sad face" estimate. It's comparable to my first game's release, and it'll likely beat it over the next month. It is sorta surprising to me because, contrary to that first game, ATC has been selling copies for 4 years (and at a much cheaper price) before 1.0 was released. So, hey. Not bad :)
Public feedback has been great. I was certain the reviews would get a nose dive into mixed territory due to being shown to a much more "general" audience, but overall, even if the score took a slight hit, we're still at a very positive rating at the moment of this writing. And after my first game's bugfest, you have no idea how happy I am about this.
The one thing I'm actually surprised by are the wish-lists. In 3 weeks I nearly doubled my pre-1.0 amount. I expected the number to fall, not to grow. I assume it has something to do with the fact that I refused to go below $10 on release. No regrets there, and it basically means that I have a security cushion of potential sales if things get rough financially in the future.
ATC got pretty much no coverage in any major publication despite trying to ping them. It's not a surprise in the slightest, and a few yt/twitch channels covered me anyway. I'm not going to complain about it, I did the bare minimum when it come to advertisement.
--
Well, I guess that's all for now.
1.0.1 coming soon, with the final batch of bug fixes accompanied by a few new features :)
Cheers!
Update 1.0.0.4 (Hot-Patch 4)
Hi people!
Here's the 4th bug fixing patch for the 1.0 release. As usual, it's fixing most of the reported issues and includes a few user requests. A larger update will follow soon, unless enough bug reports pile up to justify another hot-patch.
I will post an article about the 1.0 release, my future plans and everything else in a few days.
People who are in the middle of a game, especially in Story Mode, should pay close attention to this changelog as, when loading your game, some of your production centers might be automatically abandoned and you might want to know why.
Cheers.
Artificial Intelligence
Farmers will no longer try to plant seeds in an outdoor farm if the current weather is damaging the plants (blood rains, acid rains and cold waves), they will continue to care for the rest of the farm, though.
I added a toggle in the Faction menu to globally prevent or allow survivors to extinguish fires on their own (user request; use at your own risks)
User Interface
In the production center tab of the faction menu, locations are now sorted alphabetically, and added an indicator to highlight places which are currently under attack.
Bug Fixes
Gold Ingots could not be sold to traders. This was silently fixed a few days ago.
A crash when someone is trying to get food, but have a full inventory and can't access any valid depot. They'd normally drop some stuff on the ground, but it could cause a crash instead. This was patched immediately after the bug was reported.
In defensive battles on the world map, it wasn't possible to "[ctrl] + right click" on items to attack them in order to clear a path in an uncooperative building.
The intro sequence in Story Mode would count toward some of the achievements' progress. I didn't reset the achievements, though. If you got them for free, well, good on you :)
The main menu's button to change layer was not updated when events or other menus would move the camera to a different layer.
Going back to the main menu from a story mode save, and then directly launching a new story mode campaign could have negative consequences for the new game, effectively making that second game unplayable. We're getting in super situational bug territory here, but a bug's a bug.
Faction screen wouldn't grey out the button to recall survivors from production centers like the normal menu does when it's under attack
Minor UI glitch which could prevent the "do you want to defend this production menu" from appearing when multiple locations are attacked simultaneously
An issue where one of your production centers would defeat an invader but all the workers would die, only leaving mercenaries. Putting the location is a state where you couldn't evacuate it, but it would still produce resources. They will now properly be abandoned, and you'll be warned when it happens.
Another issue could cause a production center to lose its workers when targeted by another faction's raiding party. Yes, before the actual attack, and yes, it was a nasty one.
Update 1.0.0.3 (Hot-Patch 3)
Hi there!
Here's a new hot-patch, fixing the majority of the reported issues. There are still a couple problems that I'm actively investigating. Those will be subject of a follow-up patch before the end of the week.
Feedback and suggestions are taken into account and will be subject of their own minor update very soon, but right now, I'm mostly focusing on fixing issues.
Thank you for your understanding :)
Balance
The options to prevent survivors from gathering dead bodies and dropped loot are now the default ones when starting a new game. Made it so to prevent suicidal runs.
Slightly tuned down abomination raid's strength in act 3 and 4 (It's still meant to kill an undefended base).
Content
You can finish exploring production centers that you own, no need to abandon/reclaim them anymore. Yes, you can still find recruits there, I know it doesn't make a LOT of sense, but it's better than the alternative.
Bug Fixes
Survivors could incorrectly think that the "pandemonium toxin" item would cure them, leading to all sorts of fun
Problem with specific items tied to Act 4 dropping before you're supposed to get them (game will fix itself in act 4 if the problem is present in your save)
Results of certain events could be re-rolled when leaving the interactive event menu at a specific time (camping scientist stealing all your monies is the big one)
Tentative fix for the rain weather slowing down the game on specific computers/systems
On its first run, the game would detect some 4K/ultrawide displays incorrectly, causing a variety of issues. Detection and scaling should be better now. I can't guarantee it's fool-proof but tweaking graphical settings yourself will work anyway.
Extremely situational crash which I'm not going to try to translate in plain words.
Issue when transitioning from Act 1 to Act 2, causing random events to happen too often with good/bad selection being disabled
Stability issue when browsing workshop mods from the game's interface
In the ingame mod manager, deprecated mods were hidden when browsing the subscribed ones, preventing you from unsubbing directly from the game
Minor issue with the command to copy of factory's queue (changes to the copy would impact the original until game is saved/reloaded)
German sheperd's death animation was incorrectly using the pitbull's one
Disassembling a garage wouldn't give back the vehicle's equipment
Update 1.0.0.1 (Hot-Patch 1)
Hi there!
Here's the obligatory hot-patch for 1.0. Normally I would have waited until the week-end to have time to make sure I was just fixing bugs, not adding more, but the changes were pretty straightforward.
I'm aware of a few other issues, but those will take a bit more time to investigate.
Thank you :)
Balance
The ability for a military raid event to spawn was pushed back (grace period extended, increased minimum population). And it was removed completely from Act 1 of Story Mode (assuming you're not already in act 1)
In Act 1, some map locations will spawn with no mobs at all to make things easier for new players.
User Interface
Hidden "Updgrade To" button if the necessary tech is blacklisted to avoid confusion in story mode.
Clarified the weapons/armor equip menu by replacing depot name by item category with ammo type when relevant
Added performance options to disable rain soundscape in the audio settings (it will also reduce the amount of rain drops), only use if necessary.
Tutorial
Accidentally building a stone/metal container instead of a wooden one will still work in the related stages.
Altered water production part to clarify what you're supposed to do
Bug Fixes
Your money could go into the negative (still investigating the reason why it happened in the first place)
Issue in Act 3 where it wasn't possible to access the bottom layer of the robotic research lab due to pathing issue
The "Army Remnants" raider faction was not always included, causing raids of soldier to be counted as fauna and preventing them to spawn in the world map.
Typo in the intro sequence (oops)
After The Collapse 1.0
Welcome!
After several years of heavy development, After The Collapse is finally out of Early Access! While this doesn't mean the development is going the stop anytime soon, it's still a very important milestone.
I would like to thank everyone who bought the game early and everyone who contributed in any way, no matter if it's feedback, bug reports, mods, coding advices or general support. Without you, I wouldn't be here. You have no idea how grateful I am.
in my last devlog I said that story mode would be the "one and only" big feature included in 1.0 compared to 0.9.8. Well, I was wrong. I implemented a lot of nice features I'm going to detail in this post.
This will be followed by a chapter mentioning my immediate plans following 1.0 and the inevitable hot-patches ːsteamhappyː
Story Mode
This is the major new feature in this release. Story Mode is designed both for new players and those who'd like to have a more directed experience. In this mode, you go through an intro sequence establishing the lore, followed by a reworked (and optional) tutorial touching on most of the basic aspects of managing a base. It will then expand in a four chapters long story about you and the other factions.
This story follows a group of survivors who are fresh out of their bunker and who have to adapt to a strange post-apocalyptic world. It includes four world maps, a couple new factions, new mobs, multiple quests, and unique map locations to visit and conquer. As the story progresses, the more advanced gameplay options are explained as the need arises. As such, this mode is a good way for new players to familiarize themselves with the mechanics by following clear goals.
But this mode is not for new players only. It's hard for me to go into details without getting into spoiler territory, but I really hope the more experienced players will enjoy the second to last acts. I don't pretend to be a good writer or storyteller but I'm pretty happy with the different missions and obstacles put in your way. I also left space for future improvements (both mechanically and story-wise).
Faction Archetypes
Many of you requested this feature after I released the "Rise of the Mutants" scenario. Back then, I wasn't entirely sure it was possible. Well, I was wrong. It's even likely to be expanded upon in future major updates.
Simply put, you're no longer forced to play as a boring bunch of technologically minded humans. There's a whole new framework allowing me to define completely new archetypes with their own tech tree, events, maps, quests, and such.
In practice, in all sandbox modes and many scenarios, you get to choose between 3 completely different archetypes to play with. They determine the kind of survivors you'll recruit and capture, your access to technologies, the type of random events you'll encounter, and so on:
Humans: The default faction you're already used to. Access to all techs, flimsy but talented humans. Some might start with a basic gun, some might start with nothing.
Mutants: Big, green, mean and punch super hard. Limited tech tree, but immediate access to taming and expeditions. They are prone to infighting but don't get depressed. They are pretty fun to play.
Cannibals: Same as humans but all your recruits will be cannibals, you have access to decent early game bone weapons and to all techs. They are, overall, less skilled than the other humans and spawn with very bad gear.
The whole thing is, like most of everything else, moddable. From a technical standpoint, adding in new archetypes, with completely new tech trees, event selection and playable characters is pretty simple.
Combat: Control Group
Until now, it was a pain to locate and activate only a select few people (preferably holding the best guns) when you were under attack. Sure, patrol zones help a lot, but it's not always an optimal solution. So, I added a "control group" hotkey. If you're not used to the term, it allows you to save a group of people you want to use in combat mode and call them into action with the press of a single hotkey.
In practice, you select the people you want to act as your "emergency defense force" and press [ctrl]+[hotkey] to save this group (or shift+hotkey to add whomever you have selected to the group). And yes, you can add/remove from the control group directly from the population menu.
Once set up, whenever you need soldiers without disturbing the whole base, all you need to do is to press the hotkey. It'll switch them to combat mode, ready to obey your orders. As usual, I updated the Encyclopedia to reflect the new feature.
Combat: AI and Balance Pass
I fixed a few problematic behaviors. One which was particularly annoying when moving many people at once. They wouldn't stay in a tight pack on arrival to their destination, making it a pain to move more than a few soldiers through a building or sewers. Another issue was that people would try to "find cover" when shooting at something which can't fight back. They don't do that anymore: shooting down doors or windows will no longer waste ammunition and disrupt your group's positioning.
To a more controversial take now. I halved weapon damage across the board, it's implemented through a global Damage Modifier option in the settings file (so you can revert this change, or customize it to your liking).
The reasoning is as follows. As the game progressively got new weapon classes and as the average bullet-speed changed from glacially-slow to lightning-fast, combat became incredibly deadly. Initial placement and cover became the only things that really mattered.
This change slows down things so you can occasionally save a badly hurt soldier by repositioning them. Also, it's putting a lot more pressure on your modern ammo production which, until now (when you knew what you were doing) was pretty much never an issue. It's also justifying the existence of melee weapons as backup options.
Of course, the global damage alone wouldn't be enough. Some weapons' damage output has been tweaked/increased. Boss monsters got their bonus health heavily reduced. Advanced melee weapons like the "electric axe" or the "chainsaw" have been added. Some mobs, like the scorpions and crabs, got an armor covering both the head and the body (so they can no longer get one-shot by someone with a half-decent military skill).
Quests and Content
As announced previously, it's no longer possible to research the robot building tech directly. Figuring out how to build giant sentient robots seemed a bit out of the realm of possibilities for a band of survivors in a post-apocalyptic world. Instead, you'll acquire the tech through a random event that can trigger once you satisfy various requirements. It'll be expensive and require you to go through a deadly bunker that will appear on the world map once you accept the quest.
I also tweaked some of the existing "mini-quests" you get while moving your expeditions around. Exploring the random loot building can now have negative consequences instead of just being a freebie.
Story mode includes a lot of new buildings to explore through the quest system, some of which will likely be incorporated (with tweaks) into the standard game in the future. In the same spirit, later stages of the main story contain a few monsters you won't find the standard game. They will be incorporated in future updates.
I also added the option to manually defend your production centers when they are under attack. It works basically the same as a standard map battle (except this time you're the one inside the building). It's optional and can be set to always be automated in the gameplay settings if you don't like getting interrupted by popups.
Map Generation
I improved map generation too. In maps where buildings are not bordering a road, said buildings are placed more intelligently. They won't be placed over a river or blocked by a mountain range. As a result, villages in complex biomes look a lot better. It takes a few more seconds to generate the map, but it's definitely worth it. I also added a couple more building types, and tweaked a few formulas, the usual.
I think we're in a good place with those changes. City block generation is still a bit lacking, but I don't think it's a massive issue. I will likely continue to tweak and improve the various map/building generators for a very long time, it's the kind of code I would write for fun anyway.
User Interface
New helpful articles are featured in the in-game encyclopedia, many context/help menus are more informative and have been updated to make sure they are up to date with 1.0. The weapon info panel show a lot more information.
A lot more things have been added to make all things "gel together" but listing every item would be a bit boring, you can refer to the full changelog for the whole list.
Misc. Improvements, Bug Fixing and Optimizations
Well, I'm not going to list every single bug-fix in 1.0 here, you can refer to the changelog. I'll address a few issues that were present in 0.9.8 (and before)
- The annoying short freezes that would happen sometimes and which would be "fixed" by reloading a save have been fixed. It was a pain to pin-point the root of the issue, but it has been eradicated. On top of that, the overall economy-related code has been entirely rewritten, leading to better performances in larger and older bases. Contrary to the previous iteration, it's also thread-safe, eradicating one the last ways the game could crash.
- An issue with underground and indoor farming was causing plants to (very slowly) degrade when your camera wasn't looking at the layer the farm was in. It was tied to more global issues related to the way I handled light sources. Game will also tell you when plants are dying so you can check what's up.
- The world map was incorrectly handling location ownership, leading to locations flipping back to an incorrect faction after loading a save. This has been fixed. In practice, the late game "mutated horrors" (renamed to The Swarm) perform much better, AI expeditions and enemy hordes are much better at their doing their respective jobs.
- Complete French Translation. It's no secret the French language was left a bit behind during Early Access. ATC contains a lot of text (enough to fill a large book), most of which went through several revisions. As such, keeping the translation up to date was just not cost-efficient. This is corrected. Everything has been translated properly. I can't promise that there won't be any oddities or the occasional overflowing text in some menus, but the game is perfectly playable and understandable in French.
What Now And What Next?
Well, I'll stay around for a couple weeks to handle what I assume will be a deluge of bug reports and complaints regarding years old systems I didn't explain fully, forgot about, or assumed easy to guess. I'll publish the inevitable weekly hot-patches accordingly. I'll also try to add Steam Cards. The game has already been verified by Steam, so it's just a matter of motivation. Then, I will take some time off. This year has been quite eventful, both online and offline, and I really could use some.
After all that, I will get back to coding. I have no todo-list to offer right now. For once, I'll be able to code it on the fly instead of going through a checklist, and that's generally where I shine. The rest will depend on how well received is the game. A graphical and audio makeover ain't out of the question, but that's for much later. Just know that more free content updates will follow. I have the habit of working on my projects long after their 1.0 release, ATC won't be an exception.
Mod & Save Compatibility
ATC 1.0 save-games are NOT compatible with previous versions. It's intentional. I assume that the next few weeks are going to be very busy already. Handling incredibly specific problems tied to a save-game which might be dating from versions as old as 0.8.3 is just not an option.
Mods working with 0.9.8 should still work here as I made no breaking changes to the modding system, just improvements and additions.
However, I heavily suggest to disable all mods when playing Story Mode (texture / graphic ones are safe), especially anything altering the world map (new locations, loot, factions).
A Few Words
So (potential bugs aside) 1.0 is pretty much what I wanted ATC to become. Of course, there's still room for improvement, plenty of it. But the overall formula of feeding your late game base through world map exploration and domination is working pretty well. Especially as it can be expanded upon by adding new world map quests, secret bunkers, or other late game events.
To any newcomer who read through all this, I sincerely hope you will like the game and give it a fair chance. And, If not, no hard feelings, that's what refunds are for. I can't please everyone and that's okay too. :)
Full Changelog
Artificial Intelligence
Combat AI no longer tries to find cover when attacking something that can't fight back
Large group of combat-mode survivors move in tight packs when given a move command, making navigation and combat a LOT easier
Survivors properly recognize which seat is in use, meaning that undersized dining rooms will make people unhappy
Pets (the combat friendly ones) are more reactive to their owner being attacked, targeted or killed
Survivors will check if there's any doctor beside themselves before going to the hospital and whine about the lack of doctor if there's none
Settlers will no longer ALWAYS pick the nearest break room (75% of time instead), this will help them use all the facilities in a multi layer base
Improved AI and navigation of world map hordes and AI factions' expeditions
Enemy raiders will no longer try to clear infested buildings for you and generally try to ignore the hostile fauna (no more "free" map clearing)
Survivors are much better at using all the dining rooms if there are multiple (using the nearest first if seats are available)
Survivors handle tiles with a LOT of content to pickup more efficiently (multiple people can work on the task)
Water supply job for farms will automatically set itself to high priority if the farm ran out of water completely
Ability for AI faction with high aggression to send overkill-sized raids when targeting production centers (only if hey have the manpower)
New Content
Story mode, a story with 4 chapters spanning several maps with unique missions, monsters and mechanics, teaching you every system you should be made aware of
The mutant faction archetype can be selected in the sandbox modes (surface dweller, bunker inc, custom map)
A more 'fleshed out' cannibal faction archetype has been added (on top of the standard humans and mutants)
Optional defensive combat when your production center are attacked (can be set to always auto in game settings)
Melee weapon tree expanded to add new and fun melee weapons (chainsaw, superheated blade, electrified weapons)
New factions to meet in story mode, older factions being fleshed out
The ambulance vehicle (in expeditions) provides passive healing on the move
Added "Field Medicine" item, can be put on an expedition vehicle, give passive healing no matter if moving or not
Manufacturing Bench can produce armor pieces (it's a lot more expensive than breaking down armors, but more practical)
The "mutated horrors" special end game threat has been renamed as the "Swarm" and associated units/buildings have been renamed accordingly
The "Swarm" fields more unit types, including a deadly bloater who'll release a bunch of poisonous swarmlings on death
Multi layer building can be explored in world map's combat maps (seen in act 3)
The whole Robotic tree has been moved out of the standard tech tree. It can be acquired through the event/quest system (after Manufacturing).
Several new world map quests/dungeons will pop up as the game progresses (mostly in story mode)
Added 4 achievements for completing each part of the main story
Game Balance
Reordered some of the technologies and associated unlocks
The construction of exoskeletons relies on the rare lootable tech coupled with manufacturing (instead of robotics)
Removed wooden water well (ugly looking & too quickly outclassed to be relevant), moved normal water well to carpentry
Bone weaponry is under the Bone Tools technology which is available to both mutants and (human) cannibals now
Reduced traders' buying prices (at least for most of them)
Metal smelting recipe at basic smelter produces twice the metal and require a bit less than twice the resources and time to reduce job spam
Halved fire environmental damage + tweaks (having a group wiped in seconds because someone caught fire was a tad too much)
Better placement of initial spawn, vehicle won't be planted in a wall or a mountain and should leave room for survivors to move around
Reworked some numbers to make automated combat in world map more on par with manual combat (still a work in progress)
The ammo crafting station can craft the artisanal ammo, like the artisanal weapon bench, to facilitate base organization
The amphibious combat vehicle can carry 8 people instead of 6
The lack of constructed tiles will decrease the value of a room (this is relevant to private bedrooms and break rooms)
Tweaked prices of a few items
Added weights to map exploration loot tables (factories more likely to give actual resources, fuel stations give more fuel and so on, modern weaponry is a lot more rare)
Armor of many animals and end-game mutated horrors apply to both their head and their body
Critical damage decreased from 100% to 50% additional damage, lowered chance on ranged weapons, especially rapid firing ones
It's no longer possible to evacuate or reinforce an outpost while it's under attack (was too easy to exploit)
Added DamageMultiplier to game settings file. This is a 'incoming damage multiplier' which is applied to everyone. It dictates the pace of battles.
Halved all damages using the above multiplier, causing a much needed increase in ammo consumption while making the actual fights more engaging
Slightly tweaked many weapon and armor values
Reduced the health bonus many mobs get to compensate for the lesser damage output and armor related changes
Many crafting recipes have been tweaked either in components or execution speed
Slightly reorganized mobs' weaponry (melee spiders have a bite attack instead of using "claws" and so on)
The "Can Attack incapacitated enemies" is the default setting when starting the game to reduce confusion
Force attacking (ctrl+right click) an incapacitated enemy will set their invincibility timer to zero so ammo don't get wasted
People with 0 perception would be unable to see anything farther than 1 tile, which gameplay-wise, led to problems (increased to 5).
Slightly improved the gear mercenaries (defenders of production centers) can spawn with
In progress constructions can no longer be used as "perfect" cover (in other words, they can be shot and destroyed)
Game Engine
Heavily reduced CPU cost of "combat mode activated" survivors under your control (no more slowdowns at 50+ fighters in your combat group)
Restructured all the economic/logic system, saving tons of CPU cycles in the process, and nullifying the risk of threads colliding
Final code optimization pass, slightly better overall performances. Also removed unused and duplicate data/asset files.
Better code for combat map scene generation, allowing basic "go there" missions instead of just "kill all things" (used in story mode)
Overall better handling of lights, especially when a light source is moved to a different layer
Graphics and Sound
Upgraded a few item textures
New textures for the basic smelter, armor forge, and tweaks to a couple other buildings
Wild plants and trees no longer spawn perfectly aligned to the grid, leading to a more natural look
Some headgears (exo and specops helmets, construction hat) will emit a cone of light in front of whoever is wearing them
Additional sound effects and variations for grunts, weapon fire and reload, item building, object razing
Modding
Support for custom playable faction archetypes (like humans and mutants here), see "data/playableraces/*"
It's possible to prevent a faction archetype from receiving free recruits, or exploring for recruits/prisoners by keeping related fields empty
All relevant game data can be fully translated (support for travel events, cutscenes, laws, scenarios and encyclopedia articles)
Travel events and hordes can be gated with the same parameters as normal events (including difficulty and mature tags)
Added "TechBlacklist" field to travel/normal events and hordes, will prevent them from happening if said tech is researched
Melee weapons can use ammunition properly now
Expedition vehicles and items can provide passive healing while moving (on top of when resting), see ambulance and field medicine
Travel events can open the diplo screen with either a specific faction or the one owning the current tile
Travel events skill/stat testing can check a previously set variable instead of using a set number (see main_radiotower_battle and _battle2)
Local trader visits's event files can set a min/max inventory count with "MinProducts" and "MaxProducts" fields
Added "Weight" field to loot tables, make item(s) in this filter more likely to be picked (like weight = 2 is the same as having 2 times the same filter)
Added system in map files to force the player to spawn in a specified location (see main_act2 map)
Added "ForceCanAttackWalls" (true/false) setting to raid event settings, will override the player's difficulty setting
Added "DeathSpawn", "DeathSpawnChange", "DeathSpawnCount" fields to NPC, allow to spawn other NPC on death, see mother_spider
Map POIs can be set to force manual combat, which is useful for the "go here" type ones
Researching technologies can set global variables (see main_robot_data)
Added "IgnorePOI" to faction def files (string list), used to prevent a faction from targeting specific POI
Added "LightSource" and "LightSourceColor" to all items which can be equipped, adds cone of light to wearer (see specops helmet)
Procedural Generation
Village type maps no longer spawn buildings over water and mountains, leading to much better looking results
Better spacing of cities in world map generation (and more reliable at spawning the correct number)
A few more building and room types
User Interface
You can now define a set group of people you can put in combat mode with the press of a button, useful in small fights and clearing building
You can zoom out further (only really useful in gigantic maps, and yes it might be a tad laggy at max zoom out on busy map)
If there's nothing left to research, the research screen will show a message explaining that some techs can only be found through exploration
Scenario menu's faction tab altered to take the new playable races into account
Weapon encyclopedia/info panel displays a lot more information about the weapon's properties
Encyclopedia's weapon comparison table can be sorted by any of the categories
Innate equipment (animal claws, turrets' weapon and such) can be filtered out in the encyclopedia's comparison tables
Flamer ammo renamed to fuel capsule (as it's used by the chainsaw too)
Reworked some tooltips, added contextual help screens and warnings (like plants dying of poor health)
Complete French translation (there's a few oddities left but it's an enormous improvement compared to previous versions)
Updated the "Combat UI" encyclopedia page with information about the new control group hotkey
Added article about "Relocating your base" to the encyclopedia, explaining all the associated systems
You can now (re)load a game while in a manual battle
The Filter button/widget is no longer hidden in combat mode
Most interactive events after conquering a POI are automatically triggered so you don't have to attack and then press explore (which was a bit awkward)
In interactive events/quests the % chance of success and/or conditions are shown as tooltips instead of taking a lot of space in the menu
In the menu associated with map locations, the items being produced can be clicked to open their respective encyclopedia/info panel
All interactive events/quests properly pause the game
Right clicking the upgrade button will show the the upgrade's info/encyclopedia page
Bugs Fixed
Redesign of the Military Base's main building was too big to spawn (regression bug 0.9.8)
Issue evaluating how long a base survived in the game over screen (regression bug 0.9.8)
People wouldn't drop their melee weapon on death (regression bug 0.9.8)
Underground farm plants could lose health when the camera is not underground (regression bug 0.9.?)
Minor issue that was preventing eating/drinking sound effects from playing correctly (regression bug 0.8.5.3)
Weird game freezes in specific conditions (tied to people taking breaks in lounges and using classrooms)
Potential crash when attacking a horde with an expedition and clicking the attack button just the moment either of them move to another tile
Extremely rare crash tied to pathing (not sure it could happen outside of debug mode tbh)
Non crashing exception in attack script
Micro freezes and other rare crashes caused by the economic layer
It was possible to put the game's UI in a non functional state by clicking some of the elements while the pause menu is up
Game log wasn't cleared during defensive/offensive manual combat map, allowing the player to break game logic by clicking on it
Melee weapons using ammunition were non functional (there was no such weapon in base game until now, though)
Wrong sound effect being played when a door is destroyed
When loading a save where a trader was exiting the map, it could cause them to go back to trade zone and disappear
Multiple minor issues with the way interactive objects are claimed and unclaimed
The result of AI vs AI map location takeovers wouldn't be properly registered when saving/loading a game
Missing feedback message when a horde fails to attack one of your outposts
Typo in attack script which could cause ranged attackers to freeze at a door under some conditions
A couple issues with pastures & butchers which couldn't always recognize that whoever is working for them died
Relocating a base would reset the date causing issues with events and game logic
Relocating a base could reset pet ownership
Minor inconsistencies depending on how you toggle combat mode
The "Escaped Prisoners" event could trigger on factions not intended to work with said event
More grammatical and spelling errors (so many of them. I'm sure there are plenty more left, be sure to notify me)
Genetic Horrors' map spawners would incorrectly spawn zombie aligned hordes
In Population menu, sorting by skill wouldn't place people who can't use a particular skill at the bottom
Issue when a Technology is dropped on the floor (result of expeditions) alongside other items, it would prevent the settlers from storing the tile's content
During manual battles, time would (partly) continue to pass on the world map (hordes would move and so on.)
Small metal spikes were using the wooden version of the sprite
Some autosaves not displaying a screenshot in the save/load menu (different bug from "not taking the screenshot at all" which is still a thing)
Cosmetic issue where you could still click the attack button in the expedition menu while your attack is already under way
Small issue with the way civilians try to get to the safe zone in combat mode
Some oddities with pathing when adding/deleting building orders (generally with walls)
If a map location has no loot table and no associated quest the explore button was not greyed out (only relevant to modders)
In some very specific situations, AI factions would ignore undefended production centers they normally could take.
Some map events' loot could drop items that are not meant to be accessible normally
Bug/Exploit where you could repeat a stage in a quest/travel event by closing the menu at the right moment
Rare issue where a dead mob would still run the fighting script for one update cycle, potentially causing an error
If someone was supposed to water the farm but got taken away to occupy a production center, the farm wouldn't be able to get water until save is reloaded
Very large path-blocking factories/interactive objects would cause issues with pathing (it wasn't really an issue until a specific building was added in this version)
Problem with factories in very low resource situations
Using the copy command/hotkey on an occupied tomb would create a tomb that is also occupied
