Genre: Real Time Strategy (RTS), Simulator, Strategy, Indie
RimWorld
Alpha15c in testing on unstable branch
Alpha15c is currently on Steam's 'unstable' branch for public testing. This update fixes some important bugs and yield significant CPU usage optimizations. It also adjusts a few balance points for a better experience. I invite everyone willing to choose the unstable branch and test it out! I invite feedback in this forum thread and in the comments here.
Save compatibility: Savegames from the unmodded game will be compatible from earlier Alpha 15 versions.
Mods compatibility: Data and XML mods will be 100% compatible from earlier Alpha 15 version. The API for code mods is also unchanged, and so should remain compatible. However, since the core game has been recompiled, some mods may need to be recompiled as well before they work again. Mod authors may want to look at Alpha15c to check and prepare compatibility. (This shouldn't require any actual code or data changes, but may require recompiling your code).
Once Alpha15c is confirmed stable, I will release it to all users. Hopefully within a day or two.
Detailed change list:
Alpha15b - Tiny fix to early game raid timings
A tiny update to Alpha15b has been released that fixes a small bug with Cassandra Classic and Phoebe Chillax.
These storytellers were miscounting the days since game start, and so were sometimes incorrectly sending a several raids in the 5-10 day range, making this crucial part of the early game far too hard.
This update is tiny (two lines of code) so it shouldn't affect compatibility with saves or mods.
However, because it will shift the storyteller's timer, it may cause some players to get a string of raids in a row, or a long peaceful period. This will only happen once.
EDIT: It does seem it may be possible for this to break mod compatibility, maybe. It's possible that even the tiniest change to code can cause the binary APIs to fail to link up. I'm very sorry if you're affected by this and am hoping to avoid breaking releases for a while while we work on a large Alpha 16 update. This is a somewhat-unavoidable challenge that comes with opening the entire codebase to modders (instead of keeping their code in a walled kiddy garden).
Alpha 15 - Tutorial and Drugs released!
I'm happy to announce that we've just released RimWorld Alpha 15! This version adds a rich tutorial, an intelligent learning helper to help you pick up the game, a new drug system, deep drilling to provide resources in the end game, and a giant pile of other smaller improvements and fixes. A full change log and detailed info is below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sp3Mh3a7Ifk
For Steam players, if you want to continue with Alpha 14 for any reason, you can get on the 'alpha14' beta branch in Steam. In the Steam Library, right click RimWorld, click Properties, go to the Betas tab, select 'alpha14' in the drop-down list, and restart Steam.
Non-Steam players who wish to update can simply download from the same download link as before; it has been updated to the new version. They should install the new version in a clean empty folder.
Save compatibility: As usual, Alpha 15 will not load Alpha 14 save games by default. However, a user did put together a guide that allows you to manually update save files with some text editing. Check it out here if you really want to try to continue that Alpha 14 colony.
Mod compatibility: Some purely XML mods will be compatible between versions. However, most significant mods will need to be adjusted and recompiled. Beware: If a mod author updates their existing mod to the new version, it'll stop updating on the old version. You may wish to turn off Steam auto-updates if you really want to avoid this.
Change list:
Tutorial
Learning helper
Drugs system
Deep drilling
Misc
Alpha 14e - Fixes for game-breaking bugs
Some rare, game-breaking bugs were reported. Some are crashes; others critically break AI behavior. So I fixed them.
Savegames should continue to work from before. Some savegames that were broken before will now load.
Mods should also mostly be compatible, but there may be issues in some cases given the complexities of how the code links up.
EDIT: I've added a public branch called Alpha14d that will allow you to continue to play on Alpha 14d, if you want to for compatibility reasons. However, I highly recommend you upgrade ASAP. This branch will be removed in the future. You can access the branch through the RimWorld -> Properties -> Betas menu in Steam.
The build number is now 1249.
Change list:
Fix: Hard crash when bed-sharing pawns have zero chance to do lovin', passing a PositiveInfinity mean-time-between to the random event checker, causing it to enter an infinite loop.
Fix: AI stuck when warden chooses to feed a prisoner by taking food from an empty food dispenser.
Fix: AI stuck and performance chugging from colony animals starving while being restricted to not touching walls, and locked inside.
Mitigate: Sometimes, NPCs in parties, marriages all freeze and just stand there.
Mitigate: Game can save a corpse with null innerPawn, which makes the save unloadable.
