Rokh
Some channels of the Discord re-opened!
Following the requests from some players, we decided to re-open some channels on our official Discord. With the previous build being reinstalled on the official servers, we felt it was necessary for players to have channels to help each other or new players, or simply to chat!
The reopened channels are:
- General Chat
- Help
- Looking for Players
- Screenshots
Content creators can also post on:
- Livestreams
- Youtube_clips
- content_creators
We won't be as daily active as we used to be on it, but we will do our best to gather some info on a weekly basis and share some news on it about the bug fixing process that we have already started.
Thank you Colonists!
ROKH Dev Team
ROKH - Rollback expected at 6 PM CET Today
We are pushing live the previous version of ROKH at 6 PM CET (1h45 from now). Your steam client will udpate at that time, while we wipe the official servers and reinstall the previous version of the game. Expect them to be down for one hour.
Thanks a lot, and see you again on Mars :)
ROKH Dev team
ROKH to be rolled back to the pre-patch version
Given the current servers situation, and following your requests, we have decided to come back to the version of ROKH from before July 13. This version suffered less from the various game-breaker bugs many of you are experiencing right now. This is the only alternative we have for the moment while we fix the current issues that appeared after July 13 patch (fatal errors and many of you kicked back to lobby).
To apply this change, unfortunately we need to wipe the official servers to come back to the previous version of the game. If you have your own private server, you will have to do it yourselves following the commands in our dedicated Linux server setup guide or contact your own server provider.
Really sorry for this inconvenience but given the current situation, this is the only solution we have so you can still enjoy the game on the various official servers.
This rollback update should happen in the next couple days, stay tuned here to get the precise hours and date.
Thanks to all of you,
ROKH Dev Team
ROKH Development Status - What's next with the game
We are very grateful that, despite several issues, most of you have recognized the great potential of ROKH. Your love of the game's concept, core gameplay, and visual style has helped us keep our heads up high, even during troublesome server and technical issues. But, we're not going to be taking it easy on ourselves, as our goal is to convert as many of those "red thumbs down" reviews on Steam, into "blue thumbs up".
We feel that the recent crafting update, which smoothes out a lot of issues with crafting, is a good start, but it's not enough. Players have been consuming the content faster (great!) but started going into less tested areas of the game with bigger bases, exploration of new zones of the map etc… This brought back some strong stability issues. Since launch, we understand that connections and server instability have prevented the game from being widespread by players, medias and influencers as they blocked you for having a long term enjoyable experience. The depth of the crafting and building features in ROKH make some bugs very hard to track and solve. We need more time and more quality insurance resources to fix them. The challenge that we, as an Early Access developer, face right now is that we have to prioritize fixing and expanding the game with limited resources.
With the current state of the game, we estimate it will take two months of dedicated and intensive testing and tuning to be able to give you a truly bullet-proof game. That means, unfortunately, that we have to streamline our process, and focus our team on exactly what needs to be done.
As such, we've made some decisions today that, while they might not make us popular in the short-term, will help us give you a great game in the coming months. For starters, support has to be reduced. It's an ugly fact, but there it is, and so - the official Discord will switch to read-only starting today. We will, however, continue to be responsive and keep an eye on the Steam forums. Official Servers will still be up, so you can keep playing, however, we are going to trim down the number of servers available. We're also going to take a longer time between issuing updates, to make sure they are ironclad before they are released.
We want to thank you all very much for your support and feedback and our best way to express that gratitude is to work hard to give you the game we promised you. Also, huge thanks to our incredible moderators and testers who participated in deep testing sessions and discussions on their free time.
We are moving forward with great confidence. ROKH is our dream game, and we're only part-way to making it a reality, so let's all get there together.
Thanks for your understanding, and we hope to see you on Mars soon.
ROKH Dev Team
P.S. If you are a developer that believes in this project and want to get involved, please ping us at hello@rokhthegame.com.
Week 8: New update is live! Discover our new streamlined crafting, improved mining and more!
We are happy to announce that our newest patch is now live, we are currently wiping and updating the servers. They should be up in the next hour. Get ready to (re)discover the Red Planet!
As presented in previous devblogs, we are confident that this patch (biggest since our release) will change in a better way how you are experiencing the game right now.
With a streamlined crafting, you’ll reach the building stage earlier, allowing you to concentrate on optimizing the perfect Martian base with your friends.
The crafting UI has been greatly improved for a smoother experience too.
Unfortunately, these changes require to wipe all the official servers as most of the crafting recipes have been modified. If you own a private server, you will have to wipe it as well to play with this updated version of the game.
While mining and extracting raw resources, you will get more information (quantity left in a node, name of the resource, level of pickaxe required). By pairing that with the highlighted stats in the crafting UI, be sure to make better crafting choices.
A lot of new animations have been added, for a more dynamic player experience while you are exploring the Red Planet. Community objectives have been reworked, we hope they drive players to collaborate together on each server!
Finally, a lot of fixes have been added in this patch. Feel free to share your comments, feedback, bug reports as we are monitoring daily the Steam forums, our Official Discord Channel, as well as our social medias (Facebook and Twitter).
If you report a bug, please follow the instructions provided on the Steam forums ( How to report a bug ) or on Discord, it helps us debug in a more effective way and helps also our moderators to relay the information! (Big shout out to them: Beaker86, DoctorPelusa and HolyAvengerOne, thanks for your awesome help!). Thanks also to all players who played a bit of the experimental build in the previous days, and provided us really valuable feedback.
Finally, given the many changes and fixes provided with this patch, many threads from the Steam forums will be no longer relevant, expect some of them to be archived.
But enough of chitchat, here are the patch notes 😊
Patch Notes: Build 819
Major Features
Streamlined Crafting experience
The entire crafting experience has been reworked to be more understandable and provide a better sense of how to progress and thrive on Mars. All recipes, material requirements, amounts and values have been tweaked and adjusted as part of this change.
Notable changes include:
- Removed size variation of various components to unneeded reduce clutter in the crafting window.
- Many recipes have had their required components adjusted or changed.
- Updated base crafting times on several components
- Implemented stat requirements needed for some higher tier recipes, requiring special or more unusual materials.
Improved Crafting Window
Swapping between tools was a big source of feedback from the community. As part of this update, Crafting has been moved to a single unified screen, and draws from equipped items on the tool belt to derive available recipes. The UI has been adjusted to reflect these changes, and better display crafting progress and selected tools and recipes.
Notable changes include:
- Crafting is now a unified screen opened by default with [R] (in addition to clicking while holding a tool)
- Tools currently on the toolbelt are available for use within the Crafting window.
- Materials and components will now display their most important stats based on selected Recipe.
- Materials and components will now filter to only show usable items based on selected Recipe.
- Crafting no longer has an independent Carry Weight and instead uses the Colonists’ carry capacity.
- Each tool will now remember the previously selected recipe, allowing for easier navigation and component crafting for complex recipes.
Mining and Extraction
As part of the improvements listed above the gameplay of mining and gathering resources has had several improvements to aid colonists in finding the materials they need.
Notable changes include:
- Mining UI will now display total remaining resources in a node and the extraction difficulty level.
- The HUD will now display amount of materials gained per successful strike, in addition to the current total in in the backpack.
- Implemented improved animations and impacts for extraction, and fixed desync on strikes.
- You will no longer be locked in place while mining.
- Implemented a Fail animation for attempting to extract from nodes that are too difficult for equipped tool.
- Adjusted overall distribution and amount of resources in starter area of the map.
- Elemental metals can no longer be mined in their native form, and must be refined from ores.
Long-Term Objectives
Reworked the Long-Term Objectives (Accessed in game with [O]) to add more progression as well as new unlockable recipe rewards.
Notes:
- Deep Space Transmitter can now be correctly crafted. Note: The recipe has changed slightly as part of the previously listed Crafting changes.
- Two new objectives will become available for the server once the initial objective has been completed.
- Faction Standing and new recipe rewards will become available to all of the servers Colonists based on the objectives the server chooses to pursue and complete.
- More objectives are planned for the future!
German Localised Client
German can now be selected as a language option from the Options Menu.
Steam Achievements
A starting assortment of achievements have been enabled in Steam that can now be earned in game.
Additional Changes and Improvements
- Repair and Salvage adjusted to make it much easier to select individual components.
- Marked Official Gportal Servers in Browser list.
- Servers that you have a character on will now be reflected in the Server Browser.
- Movement animations have been improved while holding tools and empty-handed.
- Colonist Oxygen tank is now a maximum capacity of 3000.
- Tweaked balance of items found in caches and crates.
Bug Fixes
Stability
- Fixed a server crash loop caused when a door was locked in an open state.
- Fixed a server crash relating to Gas Reclaimers piping into a sealed space.
- Fixed a server crash when salvaging a Gas Reclaimer.
- Fixed a client crash when placing something in your backpack while crafting.
- Fixed a client crash when switching from recipe book to inventory window.
- Fixed a client crash when moving items into repair workbench slot.
- Fixed a client crash when opening a storage chest with an Advanced Interaction screen open.
- Placing large numbers of solar panels will no longer cause a server to lag.
- Fixed a client crash when swapping between tools with a tooltip open.
Crafting
- Durability loss is now correctly applied it individual parts in a tool or workbench.
- Fixed Crafting window opening on top of the [Esc] Menu.
- Rad Shield recipe does not show the full name of the required substance.
- Added missing icons on recipes.
- Fixed issue after crafting where the item stack is not updated when it is dragged from the input slot back to the backpack.
- Fixed a bug that prevented Take All Output from functioning correctly on some workbenches.
- Name and total amount of Materials now display correctly inside of Manufacturing Tool.
- Fixed bug with Pressure Kiln preventing it from crafting some recipes.
- Fixed bug with Boiler preventing it from functioning correctly.
- There is now feedback for when a workbench has too little power to function.
- Current power will now update in real time.
- Fixed a bug that caused material state changes to behave inconsistently.
- Pressure and Temperature requirements now display correctly on recipes that require it.
Building
- Crafted Battery Charger will now gather energy correctly.
- Roaster will now connect to circuits correctly.
- Can no longer use salvage and repair interfaces when the workbench belonging to the tool has had components removed through Salvage.
Other
- Portable Electrolyzer, Smelter and Recycler are no longer visually equipped in the Colonists hands while moving.
- Fixed several machines and crafted objects that did not visually reflect the material they were crafted from.
- Fixed issue that caused screen to lock up if more than one tutorial was opened at a time.
- Backstory UI can now be closed with [Esc].
- Fixed a bug in localized clients preventing inventory items from displaying the correct text.
Hope you enjoy the patch! See you on Mars Colonists!
ROKH Dev Team
Week 7: Laying the foundation for our big patch next week!
We hope everything is doing well on the Red Planet! Since last week announcement we have noticed some strong reactions to the crafting streamlining patch that we will be pushed live next week. From what we have read, everyone praises the fact that this will greatly reduce the tool switching actions while crafting. Some of you have expressed concerns about losing the depth of crafting with the recipes simplification. We wanted to repeat here that our team has designed this simplification in a great way: it removes the shallow repetitive crafting actions. We are confident this will help players to focus on strategic choices related to the resources and parts stats to optimize their crafting results in a great way.
Remember also this is only the V1 of the rework of the crafting system and we are already designing a V2 which is far more ambitious. For example, it will not rely anymore on the tools equipped in your toolbelt, but on all your backpack. It will also display each version of the same tool, so you can choose between the low quality and high-quality tools. This will allow players to manage the durability damages in a really efficient way.
Finally, remember that we are planning a server wipe for this patch. All official servers will be wiped to update the game. Most of the items recipes have been changed, so a server wipe is required. We will communicate a precise date and hours for the patch later next week.
Community Creations
We had some really cool creations from the community since last week!
Firstly, let’s present you the 4th of July Contest Winner!
Lukas did a really great job with his base with this beautiful US flag integrated in the whole structure! Especially the blue part of the flag replaced by windows, that’s a clever move 😉!
Congratulations to him, he wins 3 steam keys for his friends!
Apart the 4th of July contest, we have seen some other really cool bases too:
Jonas’s base looks really cool:
As well as the one from SkankinMoe:
Finally, Bustaeddy knows how to mark his territory ^^
Development Follow-up
Unfortunately, we were not able to push live a hotfix this week. The team is indeed fully committed for the next patch with the crafting streamlining and is also debugging this future build at the same time. We hope you understand that hot fixing is always problematic, especially when you already have an ambitious build ahead of the live one.
With the size of the current team, and the ambitions we have for the next patch (in terms of features improvement or debugging), we cannot handle both at the same time.
Right now, most of the big bugs we are addressing are related to stability in the new build. So far, the biggest red flag bugs from the current live version that were causing crashes have been addressed in the new build.
We have also narrowed down some issues with the pressure system. Thanks to your report we have identified that gas flows inconsistently through pipe networks. It is more prevalent in networks connected to a gas reclaimer or a pump. A simple setup with a storage tank should work though.
Also, we do not forget to solve ASAP the connection issues. This is a time-out issue caused by several problems, and we are solving them one by one. We thank you again for your patience.
Don’t forget to join our Official Discord for report and feedback ( Join here, and to continue the information flow on our Steam Forums. We thank again for this continuous info which helps us a lot to improve the game!
See you soon,
ROKH Dev Team
Week 6: Introducing the improved crafting system (currently tested)
As mentioned in last week update, we will soon publish a big content update that will change a lot of things in ROKH, especially our main game feature: the crafting system.
From many comments we received, it appears indeed that even if many of you love the depth of the crafting system in ROKH, you need to craft many tools and machines before reaching a certain level of advancement in the game.
The impact of raw resources used in the game is also one the of strongest point in our crafting system. Each component built using specific resources will direct have consequences on the crafting tree: your end-product is conditioned by the crafting choices you made earlier (reversible of course using the salvage system).
The first main problem is the divided aspect of the current crafting UI system, especially when it comes to craft complex items. Each recipe is enclosed in specific tools (or machines), and you soon have to switch between them in your toolbelt. This is the only way to craft all the components you need for the desired end-product.
Some advanced players have quickly mastered the minimize and switching tool actions. But we noticed that even if you get used to it, it can still be a frustrating process, and needed to be improved.
The second issue was about the complexity of the recipes. Many players complained about that: they were too many intermediate recipes before reaching the end product. We felt it was important to simplify the recipes, allowing players to reach the building stage of the game faster.
The third problem we identified was related to the input slots while players look for the ingredients in their backpack. With all the various items you can get in ROKH, the backpack can quickly become messy, and finding the right input in the crafting UI using the right panel can be frustrating, even with the research function.
Remove frictions from the crafting experience
Improving the crafting UI is the first goal here:
On this screenshot, you can see that all crafting items equipped in your toolbelt are displayed on one single screen. You can select the tools using the icons on the left. Note that the UI takes in account only the crafting tools (tools with recipes).
You can launch a crafting process on the manufacturing tool and jump right away to the assembly tool by clicking on its icon. The experience is a lot smoother, and brings a great dynamic to the crafting experience.
Simplify the input selection
This new system also introduces a clever sorting function: no tedious scrolling to find your ingredients! Once you have selected a recipe, if you have the requested ingredients in your backpack, they will be automatically displayed on the right part of the screen. If you have multiple times the same parts made from various resources, they will also be displayed.
Reflect the stats and benefits on the crafted item
Finally, the impact of the resources or components used in the crafting process needed to be highlighted. It needs to be clear what benefits you will get with your end product if you select a part/resource with specific stats.
With the new UI, the most important stats of your end product are indicated clearly under the input slots. Based on that, each ingredient you could use has the respective stats highlighted.
It applies also a color system to reflect the optimization level of your choices.
Simplify the recipes, reduce the crafting steps
It was important to smooth the crafting process by reducing the steps required for frequently produced items. In the meantime, we needed also to maintain the crafting depth we already have, but making it more accessible.
Several choices have been made. The crafting is split into 5 disctinct tiers, instead of the 4 previous tiers which were less distinct. The size variations we had before (XS, S, M…) on many parts is no more, it means everything is easier to find, because there is less clutter in the inventory. We have also reduced the number of components and their ingredients. For that, we have converted many components to become parts. We thought that it was too complex, without adding valuable depth.
The goal here is to allow players to reach the advanced building stage, so they can get big bases with lot of machines, workbenches and concentrate on optimizing their shelter.
A new recipe system that will require a server wipe
For this crafting streamlining, we will change the data on basically every recipe, and some items will be moved or merged into others. For that reason, this update will require a server wipe.
We have always been reticent to wipe the servers since the launch of the game. Some players have spent a lot of time building their bases and we are aware that it is frustrating to lose his data after playing for a long time. But thanks to this crafting streamlining, players will be able to reproduce in a quicker and smoother way what they had built before. By highlighting the right stats when crafting, players will also do better choices than they initially done.
In conclusion, we are confident that this improved crafting system provide great value to ROKH, by opening up the gameplay surrounding crafting. We hope it removes constrains felt by many players and to let them build advanced bases.
By implementing this new recipe system, we are building a solid base for improved crafting UI. We hope you have noticed the improvements described above. Know that this is only the V1, and we are already working on a V2. Right now, this UI still relies on the toolbelt. But we are designing an even more advanced version that won't even require to equip tools in the toolbelt. This version will "scan" your backpack, displaying a single-screen crafting menu. You will get more info on it really soon.
Current situation Servers and Connections issues
We take the opportunity of this devblog to also let you know the current servers and connections situation. Some players are currently having some strong severs and connection problems.
One of the issues reported to be impacting some players related to when they attempt to connect to a server and are eventually kicked back to the lobby as unable to connect. We understand this is very frustrating and want to assure the community that we are working on solutions.
The issue is related to server performance and impacted by some other factors including:
- Hardware of the host machine
- Current server population and load
- Gameplay bugs that impact the server
With help from the community we have already identified some issues and are working to address them as a priority to improve overall server performance and reduce the frequency it occurs.
Also, some servers are down because of some corrupt databases (they are not appearing in the list), or in restart loop (they appear grey, then white in the list, but crash instantly). We are working daily to remove the various bugs which could cause these issues. In the meantime, we thank you all for your patience, and please keep reporting on the forums. When reporting a bug please follow the instructions here so we get the maximum of info to correct them:
How to report bugs
See you soon Colonists!
Week 5: Hotfix deployed & designing a new crafting interface
We hope you are doing well since last week :) ! First of all, we wanted to thank some players on the Discord channel and the Steam forums who helped us really well to identify an issue regarding the queue length on the servers.
This problem seems to happen when someone overpressurizes a habitat.
It causes the queue to go super high, and because other players are also doing things it never catches up.
This could be the key to allow some servers which are down for a while to finally restart.
Community Creations
ХаиМ sent us his creations on Facebook, and we were amazed by the different bases he has created with the game! Especially the Deep Space Transmitter frame on the pyramid! Congrats ːsteamhappyː!
Like him, if you want us to display to the community the best creations, don't hesitate to send us your screenshots on social medias!
Cofresi also did a solid base, completely double layered to avoid radiations
Improved Crafting Interface
We are also working on a better crafting interface to reduce the frictions of gameplay in the game. We have gathered all your feedback & suggestions on the steam forums and Discord.
Following that input, we have designed a new interface which allows to have all your tools displayed on one screen. You won't have to switch tools with your toolbelt in the crafting process.
The deep crafting system being a central feature of the game, these changes will change the way you are playing ROKH in a really good direction.
We will do an announcement in the coming days to introduce you this new system before it's available in an upcoming build.
Stay tuned and see you soon!
ROKH Dev Team
Hotfix
We have pushed a new build to Live. Server admins will need to update and restart their servers to get the latest build!
Hotfix - Build 816
- Fixed an issue in the pressure system that could cause server queues to continually increase to very high values, making them unable to be connected to.
Hotfix Incoming
We will be pushing a Hotfix at 4.00pm EDT to fix two critical issues that have been reported and are affecting Live servers. Details are below.
Hotfix Notes (Build 815)
- Addressed an issue in the pressure system relating to the Gas Reclaimer that was causing servers to crash and continuously loop on startup.
- Fixed an issue where using the Wrench to repair an item would sometimes crash the client when reaching 100% completion.