A major new version of the Ascent game client has been released to all players after extensive testing and development with our Beta group.
The new client enhances all aspects of gameplay and ties in with the new server infrastructure to provide you with a greatly improved game experience. The visual look and feel of the game has been updated, and a large number of Quality of Life fixes and bug fixes have been made.
The new client and server architecture are ready for the next phase of development, but more about that soon.
Enhancements and QoL improvements
The game engine has been upgraded to a new version. This means everything from the physics system, loading times, stability, memory managements, visuals, audio, and networking performance have all been improved
The game server has also been upgraded from libraries current in 2013 to libraries current today. Most server-side operations are faster as a result, and several long standing server-side issues have been fixed
The game server infrastructure has also been upgraded. The main effect is greatly improved performance for large player-built colonies and starbases.
New shaders and effects system means every frame looks better than previous versions.
Graphics quality settings have been bumped up. What is now "Fantastic" is significantly more expensive to render than it used to be. The old "Fantastic" settings have been demoted to "Beautiful" for players with older systems.
A computer command has been added to delete structures in colonies and starbases. This is intended to interface with third party colony planner tools, which will need to be updated to work with it.
The elected player Senator for a system now displays when you are near the star in space. The system used to show governors at planets (and still does) but now Senatorial seats are displayed in the same manner.
NPC trading in particular and daily batch processes in general have received a number of enhancements with this release.
Large colonies and starbases are now much faster to update server-side as a result of a combination of infrastructure upgrades, library upgrades and code review.
Programmable habitat domes now process a bit faster server-side making them a little bit more intuitive to use. It should be a tiny bit easier for new players to configure a breathable atmosphere, the right temperature and gravity ranges etc.
Autopilot EOD camera and map visuals have been updated. These should now look better and be a bit easier on the eye
Ships you have parked in space (either because they are a carrier and you undocked, or by mounting a Hawk on them and undocking into the Hawk) now have their own Autopilot category and icon, making them easier to find.
The effect of overloaded mass on Hawks and Carrier-borne ships has been reduced. This should make switching between your carrier and smaller craft, or a larger craft and Hawk much more convenient and viable for regular gameplay.
Available zoom-out distance for larger ships has been increased by player request
Zoom levels no longer reset when you hyperjump or use a jump gate
Fixes
Stock markets will no longer display player buy or sell orders where the player can't afford to buy the goods anymore or does not have space in their warehouses to fit the goods.
Numerous small annoying issues with stock markets and batch processing have been fixed
A rare issue with displaying player-made jump gates has been fixed
Some minor fixes to NPC commands have been made. Specifically, the text queries for the NPC's current route, ejecting cargo, querying their passenger quarters
A rare issue with seeing other ships (NPCs, other players, and your own parked ships) where it would display multiples of the same ship has been resolved
Parked ships were sometimes initialising with the wrong set of colliders, making it hard to dock with or interact with them
Parked ships sometimes didn't follow planetary rotation properly, meaning they would blip away from you instead of remaining in place when grav anchored around a planet
Other minor bugs with the dock/undock process for Hawk and Carrier operations
Numerous other minor fixes have been implemented
Known Issues
Night vision mode is not applying to all objects in this version of the client. A fix may be available in the near future
Server Upgrades Complete
Server upgrades are now complete. There will be no further interruptions to service.
Server Upgrades
Over the next 120 minutes we will be performing server upgrades on Ascent, including fixes for several small server-side bugs.
Players will experience some interruption to service during this time, but you will not lose any progress.
Incidentally, this is the first interruption to our service since 2013!
We will post a new notice when the upgrades are complete.
President RAMs through local market changes
President RAM has instructed the UNCA controlled local markets to accept the following new goods:
Beer at 600 credits
Wine at 650
Graphene at 1,100
Cigars at 700
Electronics at 800
Mech parts at 750
Mining robots at 980
Farming robots 980
Gems 100,000
Tritium 3,000
Deuterium 30,000
Uranium 15,000
Magnesium 7,500
Antimony 20,000
Gold 40,000
Tobacco 200
This is intended to stimulate demand for tier 2 goods and provide players with a new market.
There some more server side changes in the pipeline that should arrive in the next 24 hours, and a NEW CLIENT is at last approaching beta.
Donald Trump, or Leprosy – you decide (election update)
We're faced with a stark choice for their latest Presidential elections. A candidate by the name of Donald Trumpet, or a more established player named Leprosi.
Donald Trumpet aims to “Make the Inner Nine Systems Great Again!” by building a wall to keep pirates out and making the pirates pay for it. He plans to fix the economy “I have the best economic plans” although it is unclear how any of these goals will be achieved.
Promising to grab Developers Fluffy Kitten Studios “by the kitten”, Trumpet suggests he will force the developers to fix more bugs.
Previously completely unknown to the playerbase and with no apparent government or political experience, Trumpet is pitching against against establishment candidate Leprosi, who has been a Star System Senator for several terms and has numerous achievements and alliances within the community.
Presidents can approve gates to and from the inner nine systems, change the prices paid for resources there, and designate a system to be guarded by UNCA dreadnoughts - eliminating piracy in that system.
Check out the politics forum for these candidates and others.
Elections Announcement - ALL SEATS INCLUDING COLONIAL PRESIDENCY
Every Colony and Outer Star Base with a population has a Mayor. Every populated planet has a Governor, and every populated star system has a Senator.
There is one Colonial President. The President can change the prices the inner 9 systems offer, and as of this term direct one fleet of UNCA Dreadnoughts to one system, eradicating and preventing further piracy in that system.
Mayors have authority to change colonial laws. Governors can rename planets. Senators can rename systems, plan and approve Player Constructed Gates. The President can plan and approve gates to the inner nine systems and has a direct line to both UNCA in game and developers outside of it.
Senators and Governors of large populations of players are also considered to be representatives by developers.
Elections for all seats are now open and remain open until the 7th of this month. This includes all Mayor, Governor, Senator seats, and the Colonial Presidency.
Please head over to the politics forum (read the rules!), announce your candidacy and platform for each seat (above Mayor) you intend to contest.
1.4072 - new combat quests begin!
<*>New combat quests are now making their way into the game.
<*>A bug where the "End EVA" button was erroneously disabled has been fixed
<*>Asset bundles are no longer used by Ascent. Consequently the game is now larger installed on your hard drive, but downloads a lot less and now uses less memory. This also removes a way for memory leaks and crashes to occur.
<*>Some other small bugs have been fixed
1.4067 - some more polish
Game Engine updates - should reduce some of the memory leaks and crashes some players have experienced
Radar now notifies you with a text popup when it detects salvageable wreckage - this should help people searching for wreckage
Reports of gem clusters hiding from radar have abated - likely a recent patch has resolved this rare issue
Some small bugs have been fixed
1.4063 - misc polish items
<*>Radar clutter reduced
<*>Objects in the radar now have a minimum size - should help with salvage missions on a low resolution monitor
<*>Salvage missions are now adamant about not spawning near stars
<*>NPC traders can now be told to dump items of cargo. This means they'll sell the items the very next time they see a buy order - regardless of price
1.4062 - Terraforming and Leviathan OFFICIALLY LIVE!
<*>Terraforming is now officially live! Players can band together and alter gravity and radiation (with shielding or emitters) in a vast cooperative megaproject to permanently change a planet's habitability!
<*>The mighty Leviathan, with over 160,000 tonnes of cargo space is live at last. Our biggest ship so far, it's ideal for serious freight or combat operations.
<*>As always, several bugs have been fixed this release.
