In the last developer log I covered some of the visual changes coming to the planet map. These changes were made to improve the visual look, but to also provide better visual feedback to the player. Visualizing height, for example, ties into one of the new power generation methods being developed.
Power Generation & Distribution
Solar panels will provide power during the day and perform best in hot, dry biomes.
Wind turbines will provide a relatively steady rate of power and perform best at higher elevations.
Power poles can be constructed to connect power back the primary facility as well as other structures that may need power.
Power Usage
Some of the existing structures, such as the vehicle bay and mining station, will be updated to require power. Power requirements are still being adjusted and balanced and I look forward to feedback on this front when it becomes available on the experimental branch.
Roads
In addition to new power generation I’m also adding in the ability to construct roads. Roads will provide increased movement speed for vehicles.
This is quickly becoming a rather large update and taking a bit longer than originally intended, but I’m happy with the over all direction it’s going in.
I plan to have a version available on the experimental branch within the next couple of weeks. Let me know what you think of the new content in development.
Alright, I know I’ve been quiet for a while, but that’s only because I’ve been working on some rather big changes. In the last developer log I went over the new mission system and story campaign progress. While more development has been done on that front, I wanted to talk about some big changes coming to the planet map.
Planet Map
According to the surveys that I put out, a lot of you want additional construction and expansion opportunities on the planet map. This is something that has been on my todo list for a while. Part of the coming story/mission progression will include more points of interest, discoveries and new surface side structures.
The planet map itself is something that has been on the list of things to improve as well. The time has come and the planet map is getting a rather significant face lift.
This is still a work in progress, but the planet map now has visual height variety, proper coastlines and some new biome textures and detail objects.
Elevation
The most notable change is a change in visual elevation. Planet map tiles now have varying heights. I’ve made this change both for the visual impact as well as the functional relevancy of terrain elevation for some upcoming surface side structures.
Biome Textures & Details
Biome textures and visual details are also being updated/overhauled. Details, in this case, represents the artwork inside a tile biome such as trees, crystals and giant mushrooms. New details are being added and most of the existing detail models are being replaced or upgraded.
Detail variation is also being worked on so that, for example, the Fungal Forest biome pulls from a few variations of giant mushroom models instead of just one to make the biome look more visually interesting.
New shader effects are being added for trees to add wind animation to leaves.
Water & Coast Lines
The water shader has also been improved to include transparency, new wave animations and animated shoreline waves.
A lot of work is going into updating the visual elements of the planet map. Some of these changes mean additional work to fix path finding and building placements, but development on that has been started. Stay tuned for additional developer logs covering more of the new planet map content.
Thanks for all the support and feedback. Let me know what you think of these new changes.
So it has come to my attention that there are a few issues with the new scheduling system. After running some tests, the colonist schedules are a bit too rigid. Colonists are not performing work actions during sleep/recreation times even if their needs have been met. This leads to a bit too much time where colonists are just wandering around aimlessly even though they could or should be performing work related tasks.
This patch update adds in some changes to how colonist schedules function to help make your colonists a bit more efficient. This should also help alleviate some confusion on why colonists aren’t doing their jobs.
Thanks for all the great feedback and bug reports. Certainly let me know of any issues with this latest update.
Sleep/Recreation periods increase priority of eating/sleeping, but now also allow for work actions if needs are met.
Improved text quality of colonist and research subheader buttons
Pinned inventory item tooltip now displays total count
Robots now have a separate attribute handler. Any mod changes to GDColonist data will have to be updated.
Robots now move at 50% speed when power is low or empty
Changed formatting of shortened forms of long numbers to display only one decimal place. Example: 10.23k will now display as 10.2k
Changed how text is displayed in story windows
Fixes
Fixed: Pinned inventory items not displaying icon
Fixed: Pinned inventory items not displaying text correctly
Fixed: Robots idle during sleep/recreation/training periods
Developer Log #68
Howdy Folks!
The latest update focused primarily on content related to the facility. The next content update will shift focus to additional surface expansion, primary campaign goals and perhaps a bit more.
Update 30 Survey
If you have a few minutes and want to let me know what you think of the game and what you’re most interested in about it, then be sure to check out the survey link below.
The game is currently a bit of an open-ended sandbox. My plan has always been to include more story content as well as an overall goal to the game. This is something I’ve been working on for a long time and it’s now ready for some implementation. I’m currently working on a new mission system that will replace the getting started guide and add many new missions to direct the player towards story goals.
Missions will provide more information as well as trackable objectives. Missions will be used to guide the player toward story goals as well as provide, in some instances, new rewards.
I’m also looking into adding smaller side missions that would be generated by colonists. Colonists could make requests such as wanting a functional kitchen, an assigned bed etc.. These side missions could result in various rewards or positive/negative results depending on user choices.
Story Content
While I have a story system in place that is primarily used for expeditions, this system didn’t have a very good front end for creating these stories. Up to this point I’ve been writing content in a word processor and then manually setting up all of the functional data for a story to work in-game. This resulted in a few problems:
Stunted content: Due to not being able to see how a story segment flowed lead to writing shorter content with fewer options.
Errors: Manually setting up the data was more prone to errors from user input
Slower iteration: Testing stories was slower as I had to set up the data, load it in, test and repeat.
Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve completed a dedicated story editor to solve these issues.
With the new story editor, I can easily view the flow of a story, it’s less error prone in terms of having correct data structure and I quickly test a story to see how it’s working. An additional benefit is that modders will be able to use this tool to create story content as well.
Using the new story editor, I’ll be able to create story content much more quickly and easily for future releases. This means you’ll get more story content, as well as stories with more choices and depth.
The next update will focus on adding the first chapter of the primary campaign. This will include new expeditions, discoveries, research and surface side structures. Much of this is still being worked on so, unfortunately, I can’t go into too much detail on exactly what will be included. What I can say is that there are some big changes and additions in development. More information will be available as development continues.
Thank you, everyone, for the great feedback and support.
Patch update 30.4 addresses a few more reported issues and adds a couple of quality of life changes.
Bed Assignment
When assigning colonists to a bed, a check mark will appear next to colonists that already have a bed assigned.
Planet Minimap
Vehicles will now appear on the planet side minimap. Vehicles on the minimap are colored differently depending on their type. This was technically a bug, but I’ll count it as a new feature.
Holding shift while using keyboard camera rotation will snap the camera to 90 degree increments
Colonists will now target the closest crop location to plant first
Colonists will no longer perform any work duties during recreation hours. This was changed to resolve some priority issues with none work related actions.
Fixes
Fixed: Vehicle bay not constructing in some instances
Fixed: Colonists damaging objects that aren’t constructed yet during high stress reaction
Fixed: Colonist stuck in pick up and drop off loop if unable to generate a path to a crop field or aeroponics farm
Fixed: Memory transfer station not saving/loading assigned colonist data.
Fixed: Colonists continue to use memory transfer station after training schedule period has ended
Fixed: Colonists not prioritizing using the memory transfer station over other training activities.
Fixed: Colonists not dropping held items before going to a attribute training or memory transfer station
Patch Update 30.2
Howdy Folks!
Another day and another patch update. Patch Update 30.2 addresses a reported issue with sleeping actions as well as a rebalance of hunger and sleep action thresholds during relevant activity hours.
Sleep on floor action now based on fatigue refill rate instead of raw time. Sleeping on the floor will take longer than sleeping in a bed.
Eating actions should now perform if hunger is above 25% during recreation activity hours
Sleeping actions should now perform if fatigue is above 25% during sleep activity hours
Sleeping actions should now perform if fatigue is above 70% during recreation activity hours
Eating and sleeping actions should now perform if relevant need is above 70% during free time activity hours
Eating actions should now perform if hunger is above 95% during work, training and sleep activity hours
Sleeping actions should now perform if fatigue is above 95% during work and training hours.
Fixed: Colonists not performing sleep action(s) during free time activity hours
Fixed: Some actions missing proper name/description
Patch Update 30.1
Howdy Folks!
An issue was reported regarding save games created in the previous update not loading in Update 30. This tiny patch should resolve this issue. Certainly let me know if there are any other issues.
Fixed: Save games from previous version not loading correctly in some instances.
Training Update Now Live!
Howdy Folks!
Update 30 :: Training is now available for everyone! A huge thanks for the feedback and bug reports during the testing phases. This update adds new equipment to train colonist attributes as well as a new station for training job role experience from one colonist to another. There are also many additional tweaks, changes and fixes.
Training Attributes
Colonists can now train muscles and athletics in the added gym room. Smarts can be trained at the reading station which is a new addition to the recreation room.
The memory transfer station allows you to copy job experience from one colonist to another. Training activities, for attributes and job roles, will only occur during training hours which can be configured in the new schedules interface.
Schedules
Gain more control over colonist activities throughout the day with the new scheduling system. Schedules can be created and managed in the new schedules management screen.
Recreation and sleeping hours decrease the colonists’ “needs action” threshold. This means colonists will be more likely to eat and or sleep during these activity hours. Colonists will still sleep/eat during other hours, but only if the need becomes critical.
Actions related to training will only be performed during training hours. Free time hours allow colonists to perform as if there is no schedule. They will eat, sleep, work etc. as they would previously without a schedule.
Tech Tree Update
Technology research projects now show more information at a glance including research cost and item unlocks. I’ve also made some small changes to research order as well as research costs.
Be sure to check out the release notes below for the full list of changes and fixes. Thank you all for the amazing support and feedback.
Added Memory Transfer Station for training colonist jobs
Added Training guide topic
Added new surface POI for memory transfer blueprint
Colonist Schedules
Added colonist schedules to colonist section of management interface
Colonists will now only perform certain actions as determined by their schedule
New colonists automatically assigned to default schedule
Added Schedules guide section
Updates
Colonists now gain a negative stress effect when over 75% fatigued
Updated icon of colonist section button in management interface
Updated look of research tech tree
Updated look of listed colonists in rosters
Update look of assigned colonist list item in bed assignment interface
Lowered research cost of Power Storage research
Minor change to early research project order
Added new opening splash screens
Added splash screen when returning to main menu
Updated look of discovery and guide section list items
Discovery and guide section list items will now stay highlighted when selected
Fixes
Fixed: Hover icon for reachable construction not updating correctly if colonists are on expeditions in some instances
Fixed: Input key still triggering if typing inside of a text input field
Fixed: Colonist not removed from roster if dead
Fixed: Colonist not removed from assigned bed if dead
Fixed: Attributes showing incorrect tooltip type in colonist info panel
Fixed: Some colonist attributes showing a change rate in tooltip info even when there wasn’t one.
Fixed: Some data, importantly colonists, not getting correct instance id values after loading game. This caused a conflict with colonist assignments such as rosters and beds.
Fixed: Missing punctuation characters for chinese font
Fixed: Chinese font not appearing in drop downs
Fixed: Receiving notification of new surface resource deposit for a deposit that was already found in some instances
Training Update Now On Test Build Branch
Howdy Folks!
The Training update is now available on the Test Build branch. A huge thanks for all the feedback on the Training update while it was on the experimental branch. This new update is now ready for the final round of testing.
About Test Build Branch The optional Test Build branch is for testing the latest features before they go live to everyone. As it is a testing version there can be more bugs/issues than in the normal version. If using the Test Build branch, please report any issues you encounter or any feedback on new game play mechanics. Your feedback and/or reports will help to ensure the final version is the best it can be.
