Alpha 12 spilled over into Thursday, but is now live!
The Biodex
The Biodex is an encyclopedia of information which players populate by using their abilities on species! You need to Register the animal species you've unlocked in the Research Tree there before you're able to place them into your H.E.L.O. Please note that animal support in the H.E.L.O. is in our next release, so you won't be able to place animals until Alpha 13!
Players can obtain one of three information Biodex entries by scanning animals and clicking on them.
Players can obtain one of three habitat information Biodex entries by taking a picture of the animal and clicking on them.
Players can obtain one of two life cycle information Biodex entries by using the DNA extractor on adult animals and clicking on them.
Players can obtain one of three social information Biodex entries by using their observation abilities and clicking on them.
The only way to get the reproduction entry of the biodex is to use the DNA extractor on a baby animal.
As you use your abilities, information will be unlocked. After you've unlocked each piece of information in the Biodex, the species is Registered and ready to be placed in the H.E.L.O.
Players can only investigate Biodex entries for animals that have already been unlocked in the Research Tree.
Players must fully acquire all Biodex entries for an animal species before they are Registered and are able to place them down in the H.E.L.O.
Each species contains different sets of Biodex entries, so you'll have to use your abilities on different animals of the same species to fully unlock each entry.
Players can't access the animals in the H.E.L.O. until a future release.
Plants are automatically populated in the Biodex and can be used in the H.E.L.O immediately after unlocking in the research tree. This may change later.
Pollinators and Decomposers will be available in the Biodex for Registering at a future date.
The DNA extractor has turned to an ability. Start any of the food web quests and get to the DNA extractor quest task for them and it will be added to your skill book. DNA extractor items don't work anymore with this change.
Added hotkeys for different UI: B for Biodex and R for the Research Tree.
The options menu always has priority in terms of showing up above every other UI.
Content
Added two new vendors: Carpet Diem and Up the Wall! These two stores share one storefront in the marketplace area of the Student District. Walter will now sell all wallpaper options, and Carpathia sells carpets. (Of course, you can put carpets on your walls and wallpaper on your floor and ceiling if you want!)
Added over 20 solid colors of wallpaper/carpets for your room, available from Carpathia!
Overhauled the animal placement in all biodomes! Animals are now more evenly spread and are placed in areas that make sense! Reptiles in the desert can be found in secluded, rocky areas; burrowing owls hang out near the saguaros they call home, and babies are never far from their parents.
The Espeth Park Map has been changed to make the travel from the tutorial room to the Student District more direct as some new users were getting lost.
Alpha 11: H.E.L.O. Phase 1
Today is a big, big update, which is why it's going out so late! We've been doing last-minute bug fixing all day to make sure it's ready to go out to you all -- and now it's time!
The Holographic Environmental Life Observatory (H.E.L.O.)
H.E.L.O. Phase 1 is now in! This means that we've added the ability to create your own custom biodomes and add plants. Time will pass, and they can reproduce vegetatively, but they can't reproduce via pollination/fruiting yet since there are no pollinators to place in! This means that we've also added a Research Tree to unlock the species, and have reworked the level system to work alongside this. Read on below to learn more about all the new features.
To get started, first make sure you're Level 3 or higher and head over to Dr. Sandrine Reneau near Tyto Academy in the Student District. In coming weeks, we'll be adding some formal quests and interactions with her to introduce people to the H.E.L.O, but for now just chat with her to access the user interface.
Basic H.E.L.O. Gameplay
Talk to Dr. Sandrine Reneau at Tyto Academy when you're Level 3 or higher to create your first HELO biodome.
Players may create up to 10 biodomes across all 5 biome types (Mojave Desert, Great Plains Grassland, Amazon Rainforest, Himalayan Forest, Alaskan Tundra).
Players regenerate impact points every week (five minutes while not fast forwarding) to spend on placing down plants.
Players can put their biodome in fast forward to go five times faster.
Players may also pause their biodome if they wish.
Plant reproduction have been added. Most plants need pollinators to reproduce, but some plants are vegetative which means they generate some brood on their own. Those plants will be able to reproduce now, while others will have to wait until following weeks when pollinators and animals are added, so you can place those nearby to assist in reproduction.
Plants have the following states in their life cycle: Stasis, Blooming, Fruiting. Only fruiting plants will reach the fruiting state; however, this will not successfully create fruit until you are able to add pollinators in coming weeks.
Clicking on plants opens a UI that details information on that plant group.
You can unlock additional zones in your H.E.L.O. biodomes by leveling up. The available space will automatically increase across all biodomes as you increase your Ecology Level.
Research Tree
Players unlock species to place in their H.E.L.O by unlocking them in the Research Tree.
Select the Research Tree Icon on your top bar when you are Level 3 or higher to start unlock species for your HELO.
Players earn RP (Research Points) by doing ecology related quests and by leveling up. Each level up starting with level 3 rewards the player a significant amount of research points.
Spend Research Points to purchase species in any of the five biomes to unlock species for that HELO biome.
The Research Tree is organized in sets of species that must be unlocked together. Once a set is unlocked, you automatically progress and are able to unlock the next set until all species are unlocked. In the future, we will add a Custom mode that allows for more choice in the order of unlocking.
Reworked Experience and Level System
The experience curve and levels were re-balanced.
Definitions for how much experience is associated to which level has changed. Having your level changed during this process is expected.
Level ups now have an animation!
Leveling up rewards the player with Research Points.
Quest experience reward changed across different quests.
As noted above, some levels also award additional zone unlocks in your H.E.L.O.
Feedback! We'd love to get your feedback! Please head to the discussion forums to let us know what you think of the H.E.L.O., report bugs, give suggestions on how to improve the gameplay, etc. We also have a list of current known issues there! http://steamcommunity.com/app/544290/discussions/0/135508489635246497/
Content & Additional Changes
We've also added additional content outside of the H.E.L.O. this week!
Baby Animals! First, baby animals were added to the preset biodomes. We'll be adding additional quests in coming weeks that take advantage of the fact that we now have these adorable babies running around!
Furnish Store Added We're also added our first walk-in store to the Marketplace in the Student District! Furnish is a furniture store that sells exclusive items on display in its showrooms.
Don’t worry—the other vendors in the Commons area haven’t gone out of business, and will still be more than happy to sell you items!
Additional Changes
Dr. Sandrine Reneau was added by the Tyto Academy building.
The Vendoring UI is now draggable and should pop-up correctly on all resolutions.
Alpha 10.1 HELO Phase 1 Delayed - SORRY!
Hey everyone. The team worked incredibly hard this week and tried to get this finished today. Unfortunately, it just didn't happen. There's a number of reasons for this, including a rare and unfortunate issue with one of our server providers that slowed down development, but it is what it is.
To be safe and not miss the deadline again, we're going to roll this planned update into Alpha 11 scheduled for Wednesday, February 8th.
To make up for missing our expected deadline, please accept this adorable abomination one of our animators mistakenly created:
This has since been fixed. =)
Title: Alpha 10: Pre-Update to HELO Phase 1 on Friday!
Our main part of Alpha 10 this week is adding plants for HELO, the create your own ecosystem. We need a couple more days to finish that up though, since there are a lot of related systems: skill tree unlocking, a lot of UI for going into your domes, placing plants, etc. Expect Alpha 10.1 on Friday that will add these, but we still wanted to do an update this morning with the rest of the improvements that are ready!
Bug Fixes/Tweaks
Max's camera chip reward from "Picture Perfect" now gets consumed upon being used.
Pets no longer block players from interacting with NPCs when they are dismissed.
Players can no longer consume items that they already have in their wardrobe, pet inventory, or paint items.
Clicking on a NPC, player, or animal now outlines the target instead of showing a green circle under the target.
Mac Version!
We also have a first version of the game available for Macs, OSX, too! This does have some additional bugs over the Windows version that we are still working on, listed below. We'll start advertising the Mac version in a week or two once we've had more testing and debugging time on it, but wanted to let people start testing it alongside us now, since it is ready for that.
Known Mac issues
Once in fullscreen mode, you cannot click on buttons in the game. Please only therefore play Windowed mode until we can fix this.
Shift-Tab does not bring up Steam overlay in the game. None of the Steam services (screenshot, FPS, etc.) are working.
Correct screen resolutions available aren't available to choose from when testing on a retina screen Macbook. Not yet sure if it is a Mac or retina issue.
There are a variety of art shader issues that need to be improved, such as ceiling lights during the onboarding appear off, or flickers in moving hair styles.
Alpha 9: Abilities Outside of Quests!
Hello, all!
This week, for Alpha 9, we have the pre-cursor to many of our upcoming updates, which is being able to use your abilities outside of quests. Right now, this will allow you to see information about the animals in the game world, such as observing a species in order to learn about its social habits.
Being able to use your abilities outside of quests is important because in the near future, this will be used to register information pages in the Biodex to populate information and make a species available for placing in your custom ecosystem (H.E.L.O.). For more about what's coming up, remember to check out the forum thread on upcoming releases at this link.
Please note that these abilities only work on animals, but plants. Plants are something that we plan to enable in the future, but we have some technical problem solving since the plants are all grouped for optimization purposes rather than being read as individual species that would enable these abilities and scanning.
ALPHA 9 PATCH NOTES
Gameplay
Players can now use abilities on animals to get information. Each ability gives different information on the species, and information may even vary between the same species.
Scanning a species then selecting their information pin will reveal one of three different Interaction information pieces you can obtain.
Observing a species then selecting them will reveal one of three different Social Life information pieces you can obtain.
Taking a photo of a species then selecting their information pin will reveal one of three different Habitat information pieces you can obtain.
DNA Extractor: This will become an ability in the near future and it will reveal one of three different Life Cycle infos you can obtain; for now, it's still a quest-specific tool.
Content
Added two new species in the Mojave biodome: coral snake, and the Gila Monster.
Added a new quest "Where Polar Bears Roam" in the Tundra biodome.
Added a new quest "Venom Verification" in the Mojave biodome.
Tweaks
Players can now use either right click or left click during observation mode to gather an evidence.
Abilities now fire off reliably, so players should no longer find themselves clicking or pressing their ability key multiple times before firing.
"Nothing happened" notifications no longer display when a player uses the wrong ability during an Analyzer quest
Alpha 8: Camera Mechanic as Quest!
Hello there! We're caught back up with our appropriate Wednesday releases, and have a lot of very aggressive development goals over the next few weeks. We also updated our Development Thread with what these goals are, so you can read and leave us feedback on what we have in our development pipeline! Read here.
ALPHA 8 PATCH NOTES
Gameplay & Content
The camera ability can now be used for quests!
Added in two new quests that use this mechanic: Animals with Shells (Hakeem in Espeth Park) and Pouncer in the Dark (Cherie in the Rainforest Biodome).
Bug Fixes & Tweaks
Pets in the Pet Tab no longer show their 2d textures. They have their own portraits now!
You can now click through your character to interact with NPCs or other objects (rather than your character blocking the click if its head or body was in front of the NPC).
The quest tracker now correctly displays abilities/items that need to be used for certain tasks.
Each zone now has its own minimap zoom settings saved.
During argument building, evidences can now be dragged out of the arguments.
Having your mouse over your pet no longer displays the interaction icon.
Server announcements now show up in a different color to distinguish between player chat text.
Alpha 7: New Ability and Content!
This week we have a new ability for you all: a camera ability! For now, it takes pictures in first person mode, but in the following weeks we're intergrating it as a quest mechanic, so stay tuned! Also, we're springing back to tropical snowless Espeth. This means we've changed the Student District level back to pre-winter wonderland. We hoped you enjoyed them as much as we did!
ALPHA 7 PATCH NOTES!
Content Updates
Added a quest to the Tundra biodome: "Here, There, A Polar Bear"
Added the camera quest to Espeth Park: "Picture Perfect"
Removed the winter-themed decorations, vendor items, and quests
Gameplay
New quest in Espeth Park is available and rewards the player an item that grands the new camera ability
Character Customization UI during onboarding has been updated
Bug Fixes
The drag operation was taking priority over clicking on items in your inventory hot bar. It should now be easier to click on items in your inventory and hotbar
Fixed a bug where swapping two arguments around lead to them being stuck in place when you press the argue button
New Known Issues(s)
Right clicking and dragging on the categorization UI where your options are, let's you move them around.
Character Customization Picture. Ignore the "skip onboarding" button on the top right. Non-devs must experience Joel's uhmm... charming dialogue during onboarding.
Alpha 6: Content and Tweaks!
Hello, all! We're a couple days late this week as we did an Unreal Engine update and were introduced to some new bugs we had to overcome or work around. One of these workarounds means that Temporal AA is temporarily removed, but should be back in next week.
Otherwise, this week is mainly about some content and tweaks. We've been working on some larger updates for the following weeks, and will soon jump over to update the expected live release schedule based on the work we've been doing over the last few weeks. We have to get far enough to be able to estimate when a new feature will actually be ready, first. :)
ALPHA 6 PATCH NOTES!
Content Updates
One new quest in the Himalayan biodome. Flow of Matter: Himalayas
Geppetto Jam now has voice acting completed.
Pollinate and Prosper now has all working voice acting.
Level Map was changed in the Student District to make Geppetto Jam easier to complete.
Fixed an issue where a rock and a block of snow we're preventing one of the evidence actors from being accessible during the Pollinate & Prosper quest.
Bug Fixes and Minor Changes
Going to the Student District no longer spawns you above the Transit Center.
Observation ability cooldown is reduced to 1 second from 5.
Resetting quests no longer resets the Welcome Citizen quest progress.
Quest Accept and Complete Screens now have hover overs for quest items.
We've increased the length of a day in Ovo.
The cursor no longer becomes an interactable icon when hovering over characters during quest dialogue.
Also remember that you only have LESS THAN ONE WEEK for the Winter Updates before they're coming down. If you haven't gotten your Snow Buddy or done the winter quests, you'll want to do that soon!
Alpha 5: Alaskan Tundra Biodome Update
Today is a big one, and we had a few things to fix up, so it's one day late. Oops!
For Alpha 5, we're launching the Alaskan tundra biodome! The Alaskan tundra is a harsh landscape with short summers and long, freezing winters. Most plants grow very low to the ground to withstand high winds, and many animals have white coats to blend in with snow during the wintertime. Despite its unforgiving climate, the tundra is still home to a wide variety of flora and fauna.
Tundra Biodome
This is a brand new biodome available from the Transit Center, with a new biodome supervisor, and a set of quests added!
Tundra Biodome Food Web
Tundra Biodome Food Web 2
Gathering Jewelsa
The Flow of Matter
Other
Interacting with NPCs with right click now selects them as the target.
Fixed a bug where zones disappear when traveling between zones and logging out.
Alpha 4: Winter Update!
The Winter Update is here! Enjoy a limited-time-only winter wonderland in the Student District. Don't worry, one of the quests has you figure out how in the world there's a winter wonderland in the middle of the Espethian rainforest.
Winter Updates for a Limited Time Only!
Only available until January 10th (removed in Jan. 11th update).
Winter-ified the Student District for the Winter Holidays with Snowbuddies, strings of lights, and clumps of snow! These decorations will be available until January 10th.
You can now make your own Snowbuddy in your room! Find the Snowbuddy vendor to start with a “Snowone” base then buy accessories. You’ll have to use the room decoration system to carefully place them in your desired Snowbuddy. This will only be available for purchase until January 10th this year.
New Quests in Student District: “Non-Reciprocal Item Transferal Day” and “Snow Day.”
Example of a custom Snowbuddy you can make in your room! Get a Snowone base then add eyes, mouth, arms, whatever you want!
Additional Customization
Added a platform system for your room! You can now buy stairs, platforms, and posts in various styles to add lofts and other creative layouts to your apartment.
Added more clothing and paint options with the vendors.
Launcher Revamp
Redesigned user experience for the launcher.
The Launcher now has links to Support, Account, Bug Report, and the Community Hub and Refer-a-Friend program available for easy access.
Adjusted launcher scaling so that the “Play” button won’t be pushed off the screen in smaller resolutions.
Other Updates
Added a progress bar to the quest tracker for visualization on quest progress.
Pressing tweak on existing furniture objects no longer resets the object’s position or rotation.
Added an unstuck button to the Options Menu to make this easier to find; you may also still type /unstuck.
Added a support link to the Options Menu to make that easier to find.
Furniture items now stack in your house inventory rather than taking separate item slots.
Added a 1 second cooldown as a default for items that can be used.
Added a flashlight feature for some additional sight in the night. Press F to toggle it off and on.
