Just cleaning up a few bugs and issues that cropped up in yesterday’s patch. Keep those reports coming!
HotFixes:
Corrected an issue that made some guns not fire
Corrected an issue that prevented factories from being placed
Corrected a rare issue that caused plants to form inside of tiles
Guns now have their default shell throwing particle setup
Optimized the rendering of plants
Added sounds for several kits
Patch v0.4680 - Oh Look, A Shiny!
Hey ArkCoNauts!
Another big round of fixes and polish come your way today, as the quality of life passes continue. We’ve got some fun additions, including a much improved minimap system, and expansion of player inventory! We’ve also empowered the NPC’s to help protect your base, and they will now fire on enemies within range.
Headline Features:
Formations have been rewritten to improve and expand their functionality in the near future.
New generation/growth algorithm for all formations in all biomes, they should be a lot better!
Minimap!
Revamped Knowledge Tree
Revamped Early game experience
Changes & Additions
Moved the Full Inventory alert to below the clock
Added sounds across the board and better animated banners
Added full video tutorial recap accessible via codex entry granted after tutorial
New formatting for knowledges screen
Various theme tweaks to the crafting screen.
Reworked science xp usage system
Five new NPCs added
Prevented double reloads of guns
Added new emitters to guns
Added a reload bonus to guns, manually reload before you run out of ammo to reload faster
Added an audio indication as your gun runs out of ammunition
New more detailed minimap
All schematics use their result item name in the schematic list now
Rebuilt formation system (plants and other world objects)
Adjusted progression unlocks
Creatures now can inflict a range of damage
Creatures now have a range of health
Gun damage range has been adjusted
Increased player base inventory to 30
NPCs that have weapons now attack enemy creatures in range
Chat bubbles now have more consistent formatting word wrap
Adjusted arklight clip
Adjusted jelly mount stats
Adjusted lat/long/elevation items to be more efficient (you still will require the same number of items however will not have to hunt for 3 separate items)
Several fixes for the “Save Gilbert” quest
Mech Anomaly no longer spawns the Mech partly underground
Tooltips will now show if a kit needs extra stations to be equipped
Adjusted MCP and death mechanics
Kits have been adjusted and re-ordered
Early kits no longer require an outfitting station
Adjusted projectile xp requirement
Added mouse over labels to many plants
Added mouse over labels to creatures
Added sounds to doors
Added the crab mount’s jetpack sound
Placeables now sleep/wake based on having players near them, will improve performance.
The saw has been rewritten to perform smoother.
Various new placeable rules to work with the new formation system.
Fixed rules relating to system and invisible tiles in their relation to placement and removal.
Master pod no longer has cryorods in it and will no longer produce them
Master pod generates a regeneration buff periodically around it
Command node was moved to rank 1 base construction
Cryopod 1 was moved to rank 1 base construction, Cryopod 1 can now be crafted with basic workbench
Fixes
Formations will no longer grow inside of tiles.
Formations growth limits are now correctly obeyed.
Numerous fixes and adjustments for NPCs, NPC animations, and NPC quests
Corrected an issue that allowed more than one Dennis to exist
Fixed several issues related to killing certain creatures with AoE weapons
Corrected an issue that prevented NPC chat appearing in multiplayer
Corrected an issue with projectiles needing optimizations
Patch v0.4545 - Party Time, Excellent!
Hey ArkCoNauts! More polish and fixes coming your way today, as we smooth out the game and continue to do quality of life improvements to improve the overall experience. More importantly, we introduce the party system! Keep track of friends, or troll them! Polish will be the focus in the near future as well, so keep the feedback coming.
Headline Features:
New Party System and Social UI! (check the quick menu in bottom left corner)
Many Networking Fixes!
Changes & Additions
Added Hourly Autominer grant to Rob
Increased protovine drop rate
Added an Inventory Full alert icon
Creature aggro alerts are now drawn over the lighting
Various in-game text and health bars have been moved to draw over the lighting.
Updated ProtoSeed icon
3 new NPCs have been added
Added an audible change to weapon firing when clip is running low
Added hover text names, mouse over to see somethings name
Added banner text to alert players to when items go into their reward bin
Laser picks now have a slight recoil
Craft result window added
Added banner text to alert player to inventory overflow
New Party system! Much easier to play with your friends now!
New Social Menu (accessed via the quick menu in the lower left) to manage parties.
Chat window now lights up for a few seconds after a message is received.
Added indicator for when the players inventory is full.
New Codex Required’ and ‘Task Complete’ popups now have sounds and are animated.
Servers can now define a custom port (use command line argument -port: to define it in the server, and define it in game like so ‘ADDRESS:PORT’)
Added hue dynamics to some creatures
Fixes
Fixed some AoE issues in MP mode
Fixed a memory leak in critters
Fixed various issues related to edges of tiles between other tiles.
Fixed some issues with alternate worlds (dungeons included) that made players disconnect when transferring between worlds.
Fixed an issue that was preventing tickets from being filed
Frame Rate Improvements
Fixed a performance issue related to quests in alternate worlds.
Fixed a bug where placeable could be activated through a UI menu
Fixed a network loop error
Fixed an issue where dome world chests could delete a player’s stored items
Fixed an issue where guns placed in crafting slots would lose stats
More performance optimizations
Fixed an issue where laser picks could pass through locked tiles
Fixed an issue where day and night could lose sync in MP Mode
Fixed an issue where world chunks would not load correctly in MP randomly.
Steam Summer Sale Special Items!
Hey ArkCoNauts! It's that time of the year again, and the summer sale is upon us! To celebrate, we've come up with some crazy new vanity items for you, in typical Handyman Style! Please note, you must own the game to claim these items.
Once we start dropping the codes, they will be validated through our Steam API here:
http://handymanstudios.com/steamapi/
Keep that link handy, because throughout the sale there will be codes aplenty, starting with our livestream at 1PM Central, with www.twitch.tv/ReclaimJoey and continuing till the sale ends!
Here are our first crazy creations to preview! These are claimable items, so visit the link above to snag yours!
As we brace for impact for the summer sale, we bring you another huge update! This one brings in new NPC’s for you to meet, Steam Inventory integration, bug fixes, video tutorials, and more! You’ll see a lot of quality of life features coming in here, such as level up banners, exposure warning, and other information to better understand what’s going on around your character. As always, keep those bug reports coming in, and we look forward to your feedback!
Headline Features:
New integrated video player to help with the tutorial as well as codexes in the future.
New In game Tutorial videos provided and voiced by: Martin Olav "Mr Crow" Andersen (AKA: TheNorseCrow)
Weapon Reforging and release of R&D section of knowledges (Disclaimer: there is an issue where using the auto button to place a weapon into crafting slots then removing the weapon will remove the weapon’s stats. the weapon can still be reforged however it will not be able to be used until it is reforged)
7 New NPCs hidden around the world and in dungeons for players to find!
Corrected player movement when moving up/down/jumping from slopes
Steam Inventory integration
New Steam API Created from scratch to give us more control
Added new banner popups for various progression unlocks (codexes, knowledges, ranks, tasks completed)
Added lots of new tasks for players to enjoy and experience on the edge of space!
Changes Additions
Updated Roof Exhaust Placeable to be animated
Updated PipeVent Placeable to be animated
Adjusted Fineous’ flying height over MCP
Biome overlay effect has been intensified
NEW Exposure warning alert added
New Level up alert for knowledges
Added banner text to indicate when player is not close enough to activate an item
Changed Button art for selecting avatars
Added some text shadows to make reading easier
Added an animated loading spinner on loading screens to indicate unseen functions being processed
All phase carbine weapon types now reload 33% faster.
Phase Shotguns damage has been increased
New jelly net mounts
Outposts have been fixed and spawn more frequently and more of them
Fixed a performance issue related to placeables that cost 10x the normal amount of time to render the scene.
Added Claimable items (secrets!!)
Vehicle consumable items can now be stacked up to 50
All weapon schematic costs have been tuned up slightly, with the advent of reforge schematics
Transportation tree has been rebalanced and allows earlier access to them
Updated a ton of armor icons with their unique icons
Increased the granularity of exposure math
Crab and JellyNet mounts now destroy themselves when out of fuel
New NPC Chatter Matrix so NPCs can talk amongst themselves.
AoE damage was cleaned up
Generic tool tips to indicate the powered icons
PIOS items now have better descriptions to help reinforce their use
Rare chests in the world no longer give unlimited loot (QQ)
Granted items in the Knowledges window now have tooltips
Moved the Codex to a separate window
Updated descriptions for vanity items
Updated skiffpad discription
Updated Command node discription
Adjusted shaders to improve appearance
Fixes
Changed helmet flash effect to be better aligned with the player
Corrected an issue where items could be lost when removing inventory size boosters (items removed now go to the rewards menu instead of creating world items)
Fixed an issue that caused rifts to spawn inside or near player constructed bases
Fixed an issue when merging stacks where the source item had the wrong number of charges
Fixed an issue where biome effects were not visible
Patch Delay
Hey ArkCoNauts!
We wanted to let everyone know that we are going to have to push the patch back by one week. Paul has been waiting on some assistance from Valve regarding the features he's working on, and that has delayed him by fair bit. We want to be sure to get everything done, and that we roll out working Steam integration features as planned. We'll keep you guys posted!
ArkCo News - 5/25/15
Hey ArkCoNauts!
Things are moving right along with the next patch, and we're working like crazy on more new content and features. Our last patch brought in everyone's favorite derpy shark with people teeth, Fineous. While we saw a few hiccups with dialog, we were able to stomp out most of those issues, and continue to iron out the NPC system. This has set the stage for all of Fineous' crazy friends to make their appearances
http://i.imgur.com/nFCyzF9.gifv
http://i.imgur.com/I9pumZZ.gifv
To get into a little more detail about what to expect, let's talk about the rest of our cast of NPC's. Unlike Fineous, they will be scattered around for you to run into, rather than waiting around your base. Once you meet them, and help them out, you will be able to gain the anchor for them as well, and collect them all for your home base. Who wouldn't want to live with Business Ape?! Ok, so maybe he gets his own room. Joking aside though, we feel that we have a good solution for allowing players to decide when and where the NPC's spawn. Additionally, collecting NPC's will start to grant bonuses to you for having them around. These guys will definitely keep you all busy as you gather them up and take them home.
http://i.imgur.com/s0vDVYc.gifv
http://i.imgur.com/UKcNYsj.gifv
While the NPC's are nearing completion, we're also working on another long awaited feature: The wormholes! When complete, you will be able to hop to entirely different maps and explore new worlds in addition to your main world. These alternate worlds will present you with fresh sources of additional materials, and plenty of new things to discover. These will be stable wormholes, unlike our first iteration, and you will be able to visit them over and over! While the first implementation you'll see will be kept somewhat simple, more types of alternate world will be added over time, we have more than plenty of ideas for things we can have lurking about behind the portals.
If that doesn't have you excited, we are also preparing to unleash Steam Inventory integration. What does this mean? Tradable armors, weapons, and other redeemable goodies will now be available, letting us give you all sorts of new shinies which you can redeem by codes! I don't know about you guys, but this is one of the moments I've been waiting for above all else. There's nothing more fun than being able to shower the community with awesome gear to use in game, and I am very much looking forward to putting this awesomeness to work!
On the community side, I do want to put a reminder out there that Jake is now doing weekly livestreams to keep everyone even more up to date on the latest happenings, and what we're working on. We stream every Monday night, starting at 8PM Eastern. (Except this week, due to the holiday we will be streaming Tuesday the 26th at 8PM Eastern instead) In addition to catching up on the game, I'm usually there with a few spare copies in hand to give away, so if you don't have a copy yet be sure to come hang out! You can find the Twitch channel at:
Be sure to follow the channel to get notified when we go live! Thanks as always for reading, and we'll see you next time with ArkCo News!
Patch v0.4271 - Let There Be Loot!!!
Hey ArkCoNauts!
Who’s ready for some loot?! Or maybe I should ask if anyone is not ready, because it’s loot! This patch brings a couple of long awaited features, world loot, and the map system! As always, we know there will be bugs, as this is our first pass on these features. Be ready to shoot those bug reports our way, and we will iron them out as soon as possible.
Headline Features:
World Loot!! This patch introduces world loot both in chests and breakables scattered throughout the world. Get ready to explore and have it pay off, and keep your eyes peeled for chests. You can take the chests home with you! Loot in the dome chests will be somewhat less exciting till we hook in the new goodies later on, but free storage for all!
Map System! Our map system makes its debut this patch as well. Edge of Space brings a whole new twist to navigation with our draw-your-own map approach. Draw maps, save them, and even generate an item version to share with friends on your server! See your friends while you play with them.
Mech Anomaly!! Experience THE mech for the first time, and get a taste of the future! You can’t take these home yet, but you can cause plenty of chaos while the anomaly is active!
Changes & Additions
World generation now spawns random placeables (breakables and chests)
Proto biome breakable world objects now have loot in them
Proto biome world chests now have loot
New Codex Window! Hit “U” to open
Re-tuned plasma torch crafting mats to include an organic element and to produce more torches at a time
Added a consumable in inventory when saving map (trade and consume to share the map)
Added a player “pin” for the map
North Pole Defense now has a very rare chance of dropping from artillabears, penguins, and plasma-fisted polar bears
Tuned Proto Biome resource generation
Added a slight personal lighting to avatar for those extra dark nights
Added crystals to caves which give off light, SHINY!
Crafting ammo now always goes to the rewards window
Components to get to the Headhunter dungeon now drop from small red crabs, nautilus, raptors and plasma trees
Penguins have been updated to drop penguin dungeon nav data
Command centers have had their power outputs increased across the board to supplement the other methods of getting power “soon”
Optimizations to placeables
Optimizations to projectiles
Fixes
Fixed an issue that allowed multiple dungeon nav data to be fed to skiffpad
Fixed an issue that prevented weapon projectiles from being seen when fired near some placeables
Fixed an issue where creature projectiles were not impacting player
Fixed an issue where ammo counts could get out of sync in MP mode
Fixed an issue where player projectiles could cause frame rate drop in MP Mode
Fixed various issues with quests/dialogs
Fixed an issue where player’s sci-xp could be lost upon returning to a world after completing Fineous’ last quest
Sharktastic Hotfixes
Just a few quick fixes for the Fineous patch, taking care of some of the major bugs. Keep those bug reports coming, as always, we very much appreciate them!
Fixes
Fixed conversation issues with NPCs
Fixed an issue with certain quests not working after restarting the game.
Fixed an issue where merging stacks could result in a stack of zero items.
Fixed an issue where quest rewards could be doubled.
Patch v0.4152 - Fineous Has Landed!
Hey ArkCoNauts! Another patch coming your way, this time introducing NPC’s into the game! Fineous is absolutely dying to eat you all, I mean MEET you all! Along with the first implementation of the NPC system comes a rework and rebalance of loot, as well as sound improvements across the board.
Headline Feature:
NPC System is being introduced for the first time! This is our first run, so there may still be issues with the NPC and/or his quests. Please be sure to report those via the in game ticket system, or on the forums so that we can iron out the bugs! Note, this is only one of many NPC’s to come, and is intended to test the system overall.
Note: There are still some issues to clean up
We are working on these issues and will hotfix them soon
New players in a world with a set Fineous will have quest chain restarted (SP and MP)
Players returning in an MP world with a set Fineous will be returned to the last step of the quest chain.
Changes and Additions
Changed Cryopods to regenerate cryorods over time
Removed cryorods from drops and crafting
Phase rifle 1 - 6, phase carbine 1 - 6 and projectile rifle 1 -4 all have completely redesigned sounds
New Looting system for all creatures, plants, and dungeons
New Creature spawning system: More consistent and controllable
Adjusted player chat bubble
Journal now autofocuses on current objective
Adjusted the opening positions of UI windows
Added the ability to scroll the inventory while holding an item
Added pointers explaining the health, shield, and energy bars in the tutorial.
Added steps in the tutorial for spending Science XP, changing options, and opening the Billboard.
Added a UI Toggle button (F11 by default).
Updated creature spawning and loot generation to a new system. In general, players should encounter more creatures.
Tasks now have a message when complete and a message when they give rewards.
Several minor performance improvements.
Fixes
Fixed an issue where if you had a quest, exited to the login screen, then chose a different character, the previous character's quests could appear in the tasklog
Fixed an issue with respawn locations in tutorial
Fixed an issue where the helper arrow would remain (from tutorial) if player logged out
Fixed an issue with the ScienceXP bar where it would not update properly in multiplayer or when changing the maximum ScienceXP.
More UI windows are now closed when pressing Esc.
The Task Log once again auto-selects a quest if there isn't one already selected.
Fixed an issue where the Task Log was not cleared when players logged out to the character select screen.
Fixed an issue where rewards would not be granted if an invalid item is on the list
Only placeables that require power will show the warning message.
Tasks once again place rewards in the Rewards window instead of directly in the inventory.
