It's been a very busy week here. As I mentioned two weeks ago, I took a mini-holiday last week, which was nice. The day after I got back I posted the announcement of the 1.0 graduation date (Sept 2) and have been hard at work ever since.
First of all, there's a new opt-in on the Beta branch. It's not a huge update, but it did have some changes necessary for graduation. Full list of changes here:
Two new mini late-game exploration void regions
Minor adjustments, additional hints to guide players in a few stuck points
Adjust discovery sound volume
Patch for the prevented completion of Tomb of Ock Juk if Ermyr ally in late game
Fix for missing localization strings on one mission
Fix for negative fighter count
Fix for NaN on specific projectile
Fix for rare mission bug in Forbidden Planet
Suppress non-critical exceptions appearing in console, added instructions for closing console via F11
Gamepad specific help notifications
Refactor analytics to collected detailed only on opt-in branch
Removed Early Access pop-up, FPS indicator
Update game icon
Several typos
If I don't get any reports of serious issues from unstable branch players, expect this branch to be promoted to default in the next few days.
Besides this build, there's a lot of work that isn't directly related to development, including:
Updating the Logo versions and Steam store assets (and then updating them again a few days later when Steam increased the default resolutions)
Updated Trailer
Reaching out to streamers for possible coverage
Misc PR stuff
Preparing the game for release on GOG
Thanks for reading, until next week!
- Kevin
Early Access Graduation: September 2, 2024
After over a year and half in Early Access, Starcom: Unknown Space is finally getting its 1.0 full release on September 2, to coincide with the start of Steam's "Space Exploration" festival!
Recent players have been very happy with the state of the game, which has grown enormously since the start of Early Access and now has a complete main storyline with an ending (or two?).
Full release does not mean that development is done, although to ensure the best possible experience for new players, for the next few weeks I will be focusing primarily on bug fixes, missing hints, and "quality of life" improvements (plus some additional content). But after the game reaches 1.0 launch freeze, I plan to continue doing what I've done for the past 18 months: listening to players and improving or expanding in the areas they want. I've started brainstorming more side-quests and exploration rewards, and am considering ways to make the content authoring tools I've created available to modders who want to add their own anomalies and stories to the game.
Development by the Numbers
Here are some numbers to give a rough sense of how the game's scale has changed since the start of Early Access:
Betelgeuse (first Early Access build) 75 anomalies 1264 mission logic elements (the fundamental building blocks of the game's narrative content) 25,000 words Median player time to end of available content: 8.1 hours
Kepler (Current build) 225 anomalies 4926 mission logic elements 90,000 words Median player time to end of main storyline: 29.7 hours
How You Can Help
Some players have asked how they can help the game besides providing feedback and suggestions. As an indie developer, I depend heavily on word of mouth and the mysterious Steam algorithm. Besides buying the game on launch day, you can suggest the game to your favorite streamer, and/or leave a review.
Brave commanders can also opt-in to the "unstable" beta branch which gets new builds first. This branch also has more detailed anonymous analytics, helping me find and fix problems before deploying to the default branch.
But as I've said before, I'm extremely fortunate to have had an enthusiastic player base who supported the game throughout Early Access and provided enormous amounts of feedback, bug reports, suggestions, as well as encouragement. Just to put some numbers on it, I've received over 8000 in-game feedback comments via the F8 system in addition to the hundreds of discussion forum posts. While I haven't implemented every player suggestion, the game would never have reached the quality it has without them. So thank you again Early Access players, and thanks to everyone has supported Starcom games!
- Kevin
Weekly Update: July 26, 2024
The recent Early Access "last chance" sale brought in the largest number of first time players since the Icarus build, back before the game had an ending. It was reassuring to hear that overall they loved the game with few significant new problems reported. One of the outstanding issues since the start of Early Access had been players getting stuck at various points on the main story line, usually as the result of doing something slightly unexpected, which produced a sense of frustration as a clear path forward disappeared. With over 200 first time players having now completed the game, most of these areas have been addressed and I feel very good about the state of the game.
There's still one late game mission that multiple players have gotten stuck on, finding the Trinary Key parts for the Redacted quest. I'm in the process of making some minor adjustments that will hopefully make that smoother.
I'm going to be on a short family vacation from Tuesday to Friday next week, so I won't be able to respond quickly to feedback/questions.
Finally, I've been teasing the 1.0 graduation date when the game will leave Early Access. Expect the official announcement after I get back, but I'll say that it will coincide with an upcoming thematically appropriate Steam Fest.
Other tasks completed in the past week:
General full-release logistics, promotion work
Work with translator on the German localization
Started work on a late-game mini side-quest
Fixed a localization bug
Until next week!
Kepler 17316 Update
The default branch has been updated to Kepler 17316. This does not add any new content, but fixes several bugs and adds some QoL enhancements. It should be compatible with any existing Kepler saves.
Changes/Fixes:
Difficulty option at new game start (can be changed at any time from options)
Reduce memory footprint of some textures
Captain's Log notes not scaling correctly on map
Open Steam Deck keyboard overlay for new game player, ship name
Default map zoom preference not being saved
Several minor audio adjustments
Havok, fighter stats
Show dev console for unhandled exceptions
Fix for main menu not loading if most recent save is corrupt
Fix celestial artifact "highlight investigate" not shown
Fix Kyrnan alliance reward issues
Hopefully fixed "duplicate PLAYER persistent" bug
Remove unused analytics calls
Null reference check for certain enemy modules
Weekly Update: July 19, 2024
It's been a busy week. Last week's announcement of the "last chance before price increase" sale brought a lot of new players and returning old players, who had questions and feedback, so I spent more time in the discussion forums than usual. So welcome new players (and welcome back old)!
Players also helped me investigate some issues. One player found the main menu didn't load: they were just stuck looking at the space backdrop. Another player couldn't load their save.
The first issue was the result of a corrupted save.
The second was a result of the rare "duplicate player persistent" bug which prevented the player from loading their save and has been lurking in the game for quite a while. Fortunately, they submitted a save which finally allowed me to reproduce the issue. Normally, when the game is saved, the player's ship is removed from the universe and saved separately with the player object. Somehow, in this case, the player's ship was left in universe causing there to be two entities with the same id. (Unfortunately, they submitted their feedback anonymously, so I have no way to tell them how to resolve their issue)
The root causes of both these bugs were not directly related, but they revealed a problem that had been introduced with the switch to production build: the Unity error display window is gone, so players don't see any error message that hints at a possible problem. So I've changed the error handling logic to open the game's developer console, which should show the most recent exception. Hopefully exceptions remain rare, but if they do occur players will at least get a hint of what's gone wrong.
A patch for these issues (build 17316) is now on the unstable branch and will be promoted to default in the next few days. The build also adds some minor QoL improvements including changing some of the UI sounds which some players report being too high pitched.
A third issue, reported after that patch was deployed, caused players to be unable to progress on one of the early mission paths: Bribing the Ermyr to let you land on the Forbidden Planet. Not a true soft lock because an alternate in-game path existed, but definitely a bug. Apparently this bug has existed for a while, and probably had been experienced by some players, but this was the first time I became aware of it. This one will be fixed shortly.
Thanks for reading, until next week! - Kevin
Last Chance Early Access Sale!
Starcom: Unknown Space entered Early Access over 18 months ago and has come along way since then. Based on player feedback, the game is in great shape and a near-future version of the current "Kepler" build will likely become the 1.0 release. While this does not mean that I'm done with development, it does signal that the main storyline now has a proper ending, and that I do not plan on introducing any save-breaking changes after this point. The official graduation from Early Access still needs to be scheduled and depends on coordinating with some external factors, but is planned for later this summer.
The current sale is a last chance to get the game at a discount from its "Early Access" pricing. After this sale is over the price will go up to its full release price.
Once the game graduates from Early Access, I plan to continue working on the game. There are a number of pieces of additional content I have ideas for, as well as some new features, balance tweaks, and quality of life improvements. I'm also considering making some of the content creation tools I've build available to anyone interested in modding the game.
Weekly Update
In the past week I've been working closely with a German translator to create a proper professional German translation, along with getting some feedback from Alex who did the original Starcom: Nexus German translation.
Hardy, the game's portrait artist, has worked up some new store graphics that I'm excited about. Here's a preview:
In addition I've worked on some minor fixes/updates:
Difficulty option in new game
Map zoom to mouse preference not saved
Highlight investigate not highlighting space artifacts
Captain's notes no longer scaling correctly (bug introduced with a recent map optimization)
Memory footprint investigation, optimizations
Havok, fighter stats in ship systems panel
Minor sound tweaks
These updates aren't in the game yet, but will be added in the near future with some additional changes, initially as an opt-in.
I'd like to thank all the Early Access players who have supported the game and helped shape it through development with their suggestions, feedback, and bug reports! - Kevin
Kepler 17312 Update
The default branch has been updated to Kepler 17312. The main purpose of this build is it is the first public non-development build. You probably had noticed that the game says "Development Build" in the lower right corner. Besides getting rid of that text, this release build also removes some debug and profiling instrumentation. So it may improve performance for some players as those add a little overhead.
Besides that, the build adds/fixes:
F8 indicator removed from HUD (F8 still submits feedback)
Some analytics calls removed
Difficulty settings added to options menu. Difficulty is application-wide, rather than per game.
Havok charge should now persist across saves
Fixed missing localization symbol for "quick save not found"
Minor RP buffs
- Kevin
Weekly Update: July 5, 2024
Yesterday was Independence Day here in the US, here are some explosions to celebrate:
As I talked about last week, I've been largely focused on graduation related tasks: marketing materials, promotion, translation, business stuff, etc.
The opt-in Kepler branch has been updated with a new build. The main purpose of this build is it is the first public non-development build. You probably have noticed that the game says "Development Build" in the lower right corner. Besides getting rid of that text, this release build also removes some debug and profiling instrumentation. So it may improve performance for some players as those potentially add a layer of overhead.
Besides that, the build adds/fixes:
F8 indicator removed from HUD (F8 still submits feedback)
Some analytics calls removed
Difficulty settings added to options menu. Difficulty is application-wide, rather than per game.
Havok charge should now persist across saves
Fixed missing localization symbol for quick save not found
Minor RP buffs
I plan to promote this build to default in the next few days barring any reports of serious issues.
Until next week! - Kevin
Weekly Update: June 28, 2024
As posted on Wednesday, the default build was updated to Kepler 17311, which adds a number of QoL improvements and fixes.
I am currently focused on a number of tasks that are time consuming and important for the eventual 1.0 "graduation" but not directly tied in within development: editing an updated trailer, coordinating with Valve and GOG, communicating with the German translator, working with Hardy on new capsule art, etc.
I don't have an announcement for an official 1.0 graduation date yet, but here is rough outline of what to expect in the near future:
For the next month or so I will mostly be focused on launch-related activities, as well as taking a few days off here and there for some needed recharge. Expect at least one new build, but its primary purpose will be to patch any outstanding issues and test the first public "production" build . Maybe some minor new content and balance changes, but nothing risky.
Once the graduation candidate is frozen, I plan to start work on post 1.0 content. There are a few story ideas I have for additional side quests and possibly resolving one of the outstanding narrative threads, as well as some player feature suggestions. As always, players are encourage to share their thoughts on what they'd like to see in the discussion forums.
Kepler 17311 Update
Since Kepler was promoted to default, I've updated the opt-in beta branch twice with a number of fixes and changes. Several dozen brave commanders have put enough time on these builds that I feel they're ready for the main branch.
Kepler 17311 Changes/Fixes:
If a player fighter drone is too far from ship, will be instantly recalled, allowing player to use fast travel without waiting for fighters
Text scaling in Options
Option to change default map zoom behavior
Map "highlight investigate" now also draws attention to any unscanned or unsurveyed planets (a somewhat common cause of players getting stuck is players failing to notice a planet that was detected but never scanned)
Changes to gamepad controls
Change to the behavior of the gravity gun
If Lost Goryr is not found within a few minutes of spawning, location will be revealed by crew.
Minor new anomalies, off-path content
Minor mission fixes, adjustments
Shields and battlestation charges persist across saves (but not Havok, yet)
Reduced the crew repair effect for large crews
UI tips in map view
Fixed missing "The End" achievement
Removed unused resource (Metallic He) from display lists
Minor optimizations
Fixed null reference error
Various minor bugs, typo fixes
In addition to those changes, there's now a preliminary "difficulty" setting that doesn't have a UI yet.
To change difficulty, open up the developer console with F11. Then enter SetDifficult(x) where x is a positive or negative number. Negative numbers make the game easier than default, positive numbers make it harder. The scale is exponential, so start with small numbers (e.g., +/- 0.5 or 1.0).
Difficulty is application-wide, rather than per save.
