I'm working on a big content update at the moment and trying to slash the tech debt on this project down, which is why there hasn't been an update for few weeks.
Fixed an issue where more than one probe could not be deployed at once without refreshing game screen
Additional minor fixes
New Features Friday: Jubilee Edition
Hi All, this is a bigger update than usual this week and an earlier update than usual. We missed last week's update due to personal reasons, and this one is coming early because of the long UK bank holiday weekend!
In this update we introduce three feature overhauls
Atlas
One of the biggest criticisms so far has been the inability to track systems visited and keep a catalogue of them. Atlas provides an improved version of jump history. Atlas contains a 100 location jump history of where you've jumped, a listing of where all your structures and ships are located (even if you leave them in a system), and a new imaged system tool
System imaging
We've introduced a new probe type. A system imaging probe is a single-use probe that can be deployed in a system to take a snapshot of it. This snapshot is saved to a datacard (also craftable). All imaged systems saved to datacards that are currently in your inventory can be viewed through the Atlas. Unlike jump history and ship locations, imaged systems can be searched either by system name, or (more conveniently) resource type or name. This means that you can image a system then type in "copper" and it'll show you which planets have copper (or indeed if any planets have copper).
Additionally, because datacards are objects themselves, you can trade datacards with systems you've imaged stored on them. This makes space exploration a profitable mechanism where by discovery is rewarded.
We will gradually be updating the search tool in atlas to support searching for resources of a specific property (e.g. strength > 500 etc.)
Captain's Directory
We've introduced a new captains' directory that allows you to search for other players. Via the Captains' directory you can edit your character avatar which will be visible to other players. We will be gradually introducing more social features to Captain's directory to make it possible to friend, ally with and form groups with other captains. We'll do this as we introduce mechanics that benefit from co-operative play.
Additional notes
We've introduce new additional crafting objects (along side the new feature objects, such as imaging probes and datacards).
We've completed the necessary backend code to support tooling. This means that certain recipes may soon require a prefabricated tool before it can be crafted
We've introduced some minor bug fixes
New Features Friday: AI Markets, Key Controls, Daily Credits & new content
In this update we introduce two key new features "AI Markets" and keyboard controls.
AI markets allow you to trade with stations without having to find another player to buy, or sell you the goods you need. AI markets will eventually be expanded to allow higher class market devices to provide better quality resources, and a wider range of pre-fabricated products.
Keyboard controls allow you to use hotkeys to access key screens, we're still in the process of updating the interface to provide tips on what these hotkeys are, and to rebind them to different keys as you see fit.
We've also introduced a daily credit allowance, every 24 hours, you can claim 1000 credits by click the calendar icon next to your credit total at the top of the screen
Today we also introduce new crafting recipes, these recipes include new miners, in particular a new suite of class 2 miners (and some improved class 1 miners) as well as a new ship and new class 2 mining platform. A special thanks to our new content creator Alexandra for her work creating these assets and setting them up!
We've also introduced some bug fixes for bug reports we've received.
New Features Friday: Login with Steam & Probe Results
Login with Steam
Login with Steam. It's probably one of the biggest complaints I've had so far, and it's a fair one. The login system is confusing and difficult and relies of a OTP authentication method.
This game was originally designed without sale on Steam in mind and so integrating with Steam was slightly more difficult than planned. However, we're now fully integrated!
Probe Results
We now show probe results independently of the main inventory. This means you can now see the result of what the probe harvests.
Further Crew Updates
We've introduced additional updates to how ship stats are now shown. This should make it easier to see the positive (or negative) impact a crew is having on your ship.
We've also fixed a bug with the crew system where crew backgrounds were not showing up correctly - along with other minor bug and behaviour fixes.
Minor Update
In this minor update, we introduce a couple of bug fixes, and a new view to the ship screen that allows players to see the combined stats for their ships. This is done to help players see the benefits of adding crews to their ships, and the effect crews have on their ships.
We've also introduced more abilities for crews that increase the diversity of crews skills.
New Features Friday
Crews! That's right, they're here. We've just implemented a new crew system that allows you to recruit members to your ship, assign them to positions and from those assignments gain stat boosts. Here's the gist of the mechanics.
- A crew member has a level, a class, stats (strength, speed, intellect), a personality type and an ability. - Levels affect the effectiveness of a crew member's abilities, and the size of the team the crew member manages, the bigger the team, the more life support you'll need to support the crew member and their team. - Stats will be used later for assignments and missions, where you deploy a crew member (or multiple crew members) to complete missions - Each crew member has an ability, this ability yields improvements in a ship's stats. This ability might increase jump range, or decrease fuel usage, it might mean that generators use less fuel, or supply a greater amount of power. - Each crew member has a personality, this personality affects other crew members (if your ship has more than one crew member), the personality can increase the effectiveness of other personality types, or decrease the effectiveness depending on the mix of personalities aboard your ship - no personality is inherently bad, but some are more useful than others, and some work better with others
Things to know: - This is a big new update, although on its surface it may not seem like a lots changed, under the hood it has required major modifications to the core game code - There's still new content to come, we're still introducing new personalities, new abilities, and the ability to send crew members on away missions, all of this will be coming over the next few weeks - Crews are procedurally generated and still experimental! I haven't made available all the personality types and abilities yet. This means that, if you recruit a crew member now, your crew member's abilities and personality might change - We're still updating related assets to match the new code. For example, some ships may not yet have crew slots available on them, these will be coming soon (a couple of days at most)
TL;dr the hard work developing the crew code is done, now the fun part of release lots of content on top this code begins, stay tuned over the next couple of weeks as we bring in loads of new content.
As always, please join us on Discord where you can share thoughts, feedback and complaints!
Minor Update: Oh CRUD
Hi All,
Sorry for the barren week of updates and bug fixes, alas, I have been moving house and been otherwise occupied. In these latest updates, I've introduced some more CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete), which means:
You can now move stuff between inventories - particularly useful if you want to use your ship's inventory for storage whilst using another ship to jump to a different system
You can now delete stuff from inventories - no more pesky leftover resources or spare components or parts you've crafted, inventory deletion allows you to get rid of stuff
You can now destroy ships - This only works if you have more than one ship in a system (otherwise you would strand yourself) - note that by deleting a ship, you also delete the contents of it's inventory, any parts or equipment attached to it.
I plan to (at some point) provide a mechanism for resource recovery (e.g. I'm destroying this ship, and I got 200 copper back, 100 ore, and 20 crystal), but this will be part of a future update and may require you to - for example - visit a ship breaking yard to recover said resources.
We've also done minor bug fixes and improvements - including a pesky bug where it was possible for two captains to get the same Captain's Code.
Missions Fixed
So, let's be honest... That Mission system. Amirite?
In this update we refined and overhauled the mission system to make on-boarding simpler. This should lower the chance of soft-locking early in the game by giving the player a solid base of resources and material to work with.
We also introduce some smaller bug fixes and general Quality of life improvements.
As always this is still an early access game, so we expect to improve substantially on this system as we introduce more mechanics and structures.
If you have any bugs, feedback, or just want to hang out and chat with other players, join us on Discord
New Features Friday
It's time for our first feature release following our launch into Steam Early Access. This feature release we introduce both new schematics, new materials, and new gameplay mechanics.
A new scanner system as part of the Jump Drive menu, allows you to scan systems before jumping (provided you have a scanner installed on your ship)
Two new ships, The Pytheas-X is a nimbler, class 1 ship, which allows you to attach an additional harvester (a nuclear reactor) along side solar panels, and also allows for the attaching of a scanner
The Hippalus is the first class 2 ship, which allows you to attach class 2 components, and mining equipment, making it possible to mine on the move
New class 2 probes for general, mineral, gas and ferrous metal extraction are now available
New class 1 probe, for harvesting wood from a planet (where wood is available)
A new gas extraction miner for extracting gas from a planet as part of either a mining platform or a mining ship
Fixed a bug where crafting would remove all materials of a certain type from inventory
Fixed a bug where hoppers refused the selection of certain types of resources when harvesting
Fixed a bug where the nuclear reactor would not have any nuclear energy available to start harvesting
Fixed a bug where probes could be deployed to a planet where no resources existed that the probe is capable of harvesting
Updated Dient system to include all major metal groups (to make life easier)
As always, if you experience any issues or bugs, always happy to help diagnose and fix them, message on our Discord
Bug Fixes: Round 3
Thanks to everyone in the discord for a great conversation, and for submitting so many bugs, we've squashed a lot of bugs both on the server, and on the client and this patch fixes those client side bugs
Fixed an issue where the quality stats for objects being crafted were being computed wrong. They're now correct as defined in the usage guide.
Fixed an issue where the credits wouldn't update when you buy an item on the market
Fixed an issue where structures wouldn't be created when crafted
Fixed an issue where mining platforms would not allow you to mine resources if the resource selected was a general type e.g. minerals, chemicals etc.
As always, keep sending us stuff. Join us on Discord or email bts@adamgreen.tech
