AI War 2
Beta 3.773 The Turbo
This one is a bit unexpected in its content. There's a few bugfixes and QoL improvements, but then mostly I focused in majorly on both sim performance and framerate for the game, and got some pretty magical results.
Overall there were some places where in a giant galaxy from user deadzone with a ton of ships and factions, I had like 60% sim speed at best. I now have 100% sim speed on that, with some very occasional dips that I haven't yet located.
That particular save also was extremely choppy, and was giving me a framerate that was maybe in the 40s, but extremely jerky because the frame times were so uneven. I've done a ton of work on that, and I'm now seeing closer to 60-70 fps, with some dips still on that as well, but with it largely being smooth instead of jerky.
I get so used to playing midsize games, or the early game, or just whatever saves people are sending in, that I don't usually see these performance hotspots unless someone happens to give me a save that has it. If you've got such a savegame, then please feel free to either pop it on our bugtracker or send it to me on discord.
The changes to make this work so much better were nontrivial, so there are likely going to be some cross-threading bugs resulting from this. That will keep us on the beta branch slightly longer, but honestly it just depends on testing results.
I have a big backlog of correspondence as well as bugtracker tickets to look at since being out for the holiday, and I promise I'm not ignoring any of that -- I just wanted to really focus on this thing today, since it's the sort of thing that both is really important as well as leads to potential new bugs. Having this in sooner than later, and then dealing with the existing reports, should let me double up on dealing with those reports plus new ones.
So how is performance now? I'm getting pretty diminishing returns on the one savegame that was a big problem for me so far. All the other saves I have were already fine. Do you have any saves that still are problematic in the new version? If so, send them on over!
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.772 Refinements And Polish
Okay, I really need to stop predicting what my next day is going to be like. I was planning on finishing up the bugfixes for multiplayer today, but instead I had to spend a bunch of time on the phone with Intuit (uggggh), and then there were a rash of other issues that affect both single player and multiplayer, so I worked on those, instead. We really are getting close on the beta being back to the stable branch, but there's still just a bit too many things going on for me to be ready to pull the trigger yet.
There's an interesting poorly-performing mid-game save that deadone77 provided, and before we come out of beta I want to see if I can't get that running smoothly. I suspect it already runs better than the stable branch would have with that scenario, but now with all the beta improvements I can actually see which parts are slower and I think I can deal with that. I suspect that if I can get that solved, then that will be a major performance boon for games in general in that sort of state, which will be great for all of the more active factions.
Anyway, so there's still some random bugs, there's that performance thing I want to get dealt with, and there's the MP bugs that I still need to work with. As far as getting out of beta goes, that's the full list of what I'm aware of. Tomorrow is Christmas Eve, so I'm going to be signing off for a few days to spend time with my family. I hope that you and yours are having a great holiday season if you celebrate anything around this time, and if the next holiday for you is New Years, I'll be seeing you well before then.
That's the other big reason I don't want to go out of beta right now: doing that right before a holiday where I'm not around and a number of new people are likely to show up seems unwise. I'll be back on the 27th or so.
Thanks so much to everyone who has been working so hard on testing, and discussing, and tweaking and fixing things!
Enjoy!
Beta 3.771 Expert Mode And Civilian Industries
Thanks to Tom, this one has a version of expert mode that is very close to feature-complete. Balance feedback is still needed from more folks on it, and I have some more ui work to do on the top resource bar, and there are some more optional features planned for expert mode, but the really core stuff is all there from Strategic Sage's point of view, which is super exciting! He and I had been plotting these features since May, so that was quite the wait, and I thank him for his patience and ongoing advice on it. Tom has really made expert mode happen way faster than I would have been able to, which is a huge boon, I'm really grateful.
In other news, I've reviewed all the mods since we're nearing the end of this beta period, and marked the ones that are not ready yet as being disabled, and let the various authors know for those who did no already know. On that note....
Civilian Industries has been something that took a ton of work to convert over, but StarKelp came in and smashed the last of the issues with that, and it's now back in working order for the first time since entering the beta period! That's quite exciting since this is one of the most popular mods, particular for newer players.
I've been working primarily on multiplayer, getting the bugs in that ironed out so that the beta branch will be as-good-or-better than the current stable branch for multiplayer. I'm not quite to that point yet, and I would not call the multiplayer playable on the beta branch just yet, but I think perhaps tomorrow it will be. There's a few other last-minute bugs that I see have been reported for single player as well, so I'll knock those out before we get off the beta branch in general.
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.770 Bug Roasting
Not quite off the beta branch yet, but I'm hoping that either tomorrow or the next day will see that. There were some severe regressions and some other major issues that just got missed in the last build, but those are all cleared up now and I'm currently not aware of any major bugs in the single player game for the base game and the first two DLCs.
If there's more I'm missing, please continue to let me know!
Multiplayer remains offline in the beta branch, but I aim to get that sorted out tomorrow. I had been hoping to get that all done today, but the vast majority of my day got taken up by the other bugs on the roster. For multiplayer, the main thing that I have to get working again is the initial handshake and the way that deserialization buffers work; during the refactor, I changed that back in July, and I recall thinking "oh yeah, I'll have to check and make sure that all does right when I get to testing multiplayer." At the time, I thought that was going to be August!
Still, as extra-long as this giant beta period has been, the game is exceptionally polished from it. The extra throughput that we have made a severe memory leak I introduced a couple of days ago something that almost flew under the radar. That's maybe a strange flex, but in the past, or indeed in most programs, a memory like that would have been paired with far more substantial general program slowdown. (I've thoroughly checked this for other leaks, and beyond that one boneheaded one from the 17th, we're good).
I've done a couple of major system refactors in my past work, twice on really large business systems spanning a bunch of servers, and a few times on games for Arcen (including the original migration from my hand-coded engine over to have Keith and I piggyback Unity back in 2010), and this has by far been the largest. The entire AI War 2 project has in general been a time of pushing technical boundaries in order to open up new gameplay and modding and performance abilities, and that has been a challenge to balance along with the regular schedule for the game, but I'm really glad to where the technology has (very nearly) arrived at now.
When we first set out to work on AI War 2, neither Keith nor I had ambitions for nearly such complex factions, AI that would process so much data, or support for mods of such complexity. But that's how the game and its community have evolved, and the modern version of the game really handles all of it very well.
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.769 Neinzul Custodians And Total Conversions
Let's start with a question: aside from multiplayer, if you're in the beta branch, are you seeing anything that would prevent us from merging back with the main branch? Because I've finished all the todo items off my list for single-player. I have another day or day and a half of multiplayer work and fixes to do, plus whatever bug reports people make in that timeframe, but other than that we're head back for the stable branch for the first time since mid-July, good grief!
But seriously, if I'm missing something please let me know!
This version has a lot of bugfixes, and yet more total conversion support. The first total conversion mod for AI War 2, called "Classic Fusion," seems to be nearing a releasable state. It's essentially recreating most of the original AI War (AI War Classic) in the AI War 2 engine, with the AI War 2 factions, and with other specific tweaks to kind of merge the two games and meet in the middle. I got my first taste of booting it up today, and just going into the build menu -- which looks like AI War 2, of course -- made me immediately have this intense wave of nostalgia as I saw all the AIWC ships and structures, reborn in a new fashion. This is something Puffin has been working on for years now, and it's quite a feat.
Tom has also added more refinements for fuel in expert mode, which seems quite welcome! That mechanic has seen a lot of discussion on discord, and I'm glad that it's getting balance and attention. In the short run I've been focusing my efforts on getting us out of beta, but even after that there's a long list of other items I plan to work on for expert mode, DLC3, DLC1 late additions, and some other general base game additions.
Speaking of DLC3, StarKelp has been working hard on the Neinzul Custodians, which is basically the Roaming Enclaves. The Neinzul Wild Hives, another DLC3 faction, also got some updates and some new planet-wide ship mechanics to go with them. This game went from being "oh, poor Neinzul, they get no representation and it's all spire and zenith" to "wow, we have five substantial Neinzul factions in the third DLC." I am pleased with this development, and the further expansion of the lore and civilization of this race. Out of the three main alien species in the AI War universe, they've always been the least-explored. Nice to be reversing that!
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.768 Ironman And Doomsday
This one has a lot in it! First of all, lots of bugfixes and performance improvements, getting us closer to being out of the beta branch. Hopefully next week, knock on wood!
Perhaps even more exciting, this one adds some new features to the base game and to DLC1:
The "ironman mode" (where you can't savescum) was previously part of DLC3 for testing, but is now part of the main game and ready for use by anyone.
In DLC1, there is now an optional "Doomsday Mode" you can turn on, which causes the galaxy to progressively collapse around you as you play. You can make it more or less intense. Thanks to Puffin for coming up with the cool idea, and to Badger for implementing it!
Expert mode has also seen a lot of balance updates, thanks to vigorous discussion on discord, advice from Strategic Sage in particular, and thanks to Tom for implementing the changes. Fuel should be more interesting and challenging now, is the short of it, and there's also some options for trying out a few different balance variants of it.
Tadrinth has added yet another cool AI type for DLC3, which is the "Speedster" this time. This one uses fast ships in waves, has speed magnifiers on all planets, and has special speed booster guardians in the warden fleet.
Also in DLC3, the necromancer, templars, and elderlings have gotten a whole heap of updates to make them more balanced and fun. Lots of cool additions from Zeus in particular, and also a lot of balance adjustments from Badger based on discord feedback.
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.767 Elderling Sanity
We're suddenly VERY close to being able to come back out of the beta branch! Our remaining todo items for that milestone are here: https://bugtracker.arcengames.com/view.php?id=25884 If you know of any bugs that are important to have fixed before we get off the beta branch, then please do let us know! Comment on the bugtracker issue of note to bump it to the top, for instance (you can use your steam login if you want).
When it comes to coming out of the beta branch, that's a major milestone because we've been on the beta branch since July, good grief. Literally six months as of... today, actually. I'm hoping to be out of beta mid next week, but it depends on what people mention in the meantime. Out of beta won't mean that Expert mode or the new DLC1 and DLC3 items are all done, but it will mean that folks can play the most-stable version of multiplayer yet, as well as just generally having all the awesome improvements from the last six months.
Speaking of awesome improvements, there's a lot going on with DLC3 features and factions still, too.
Tadrinth has added a super intense new Panopticon AI type, which comes complete with a bunch of new unique AI Eyes just for it.
Badger has been rebalancing and expanding the Neinzul Elderlings, which now have a sanity meter and can basically go insane in certain circumstances (overcrowding). Elderlings are a really terrifying enemy in general, but they're also a really dynamic and interesting ally when you choose to set them up that way. The maddening of Elderlings works a little bit differently when they are neutral or antagonistic to you compared to when they are your allies, but both are very exciting and help give even more of a lovecraftian feel to this DLC.
StarKelp has been working on the Neinzul Wild Hives, making them drastically more fast-acting and violent, like an infection.
I've been focused on bugfixes, and other blockers for coming out of beta. Hovering over icons in the planet view now works properly again (was a recent regression), the intel sidebar no longer jumps all around like an insane elderling, and tutorials are now fully functional again. Plus other smaller items!
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.766 The Red Harvest
This one has a bunch of necromancer and templar and sapper improvements for those testing DLC3, plus many other balance items.
For those on the beta branch for pre-DLC3 stuff, this has a number of significant bugfixes, most notably around reloading the xml for switching what your enabled mods and/or expansions are. This is the first time that has worked since the start of the Great Refactor, and it's a relief to have that done because it was the single most complicated thing on my todo list prior to us being able to get back off the beta branch.
This build also improves raiders and raid starships a bit, and adds some exciting new foes when you're playing a fallen spire game in DLC1.
Yesterday I spent most of the day organizing items on our bugtracker so that everything is in one place and I can see what is needed to finish out the beta period, the DLC3 test period, expert mdoe, and the complete edition in general. That helps a lot!
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.765 Easier Upgrades And Necromancer Surge
This one feels fairly game-changing just because of one QOL feature in it, which is that you can upgrade your fleets (and see more details about them) right from the techs tab. Various folks had requested that over the years, and having that in now is really awesome. You can still use the upgrade on the fleet details popout as well, but now you can basically do it whichever way is more convenient.
DLC3 is getting a ton of refinement in this build for our testers to enjoy, and the necromancer is really coming together. Metal and energy (and thus also fuel) are no longer things that necromancer needs to worry about; it's all hacking, science, essence, and hexes. The necromancer is definitely feeling increasingly great to play, and it's definitely a simpler (but potentially brutal) mode, which was the idea.
There are a fair number of bugfixes in this build as well, including some of the more prominent ones that were annoying people in the prior build. Mainly thanks to Badger and Tom for those fixes.
There's lots going on, and a lot of the new and revised factions and features are really hitting a point where they are being close to being feature complete. Quite exciting!
More to come soon.
Enjoy!
Beta 3.763 Necromancer Reanimation And Refinement
This one has a number of bugfixes, and a number of extensions for player types and map generation. It also has some improvements for total conversion mods, which is letting Puffin get a lot further along with his Classic Fusion mod.
The necromancer is now nearing completion, pending testing at least. They are better balanced in a variety of ways, and they are now able to reanimate AI guard posts to use for their own defenses (instead of the usual turrets), which is a really cool idea that Puffin had.
Tom has been killing it with lots of bugfixes and refactors and modding-framework extensions and so on.
I also started the behind-the-scenes data additions that are required for the upcoming ship encyclopedia, and got the first bits of data in for that. These are also useful for the search on the galaxy map for units, as we can search by thematic tag, now.
More to come soon.
Enjoy!