Hello, captains!

[h3]Participate in the Steam Awards - you get free badges![/h3]

• Nominate BattleGroupVR
  
• Open & close it
  
• Leave/update a review
  

Vtuber VR_MYA_ agreed to share her BattleGroupVR playthrough vid for the Turn-Based Fest

Very cute Japanese Vtuber playing serious VR games:
[previewyoutube=hZ0oqkmvC2A;full][/previewyoutube]

BattleGroupVR is on sale for the Strategy Fest. It is a good time to suggest this game to a friend and play together on the weekend.

If you ever thought it would be fun to add anime to the game, here is a vid with Japanese Youtubersteamhappy

You could also Join Discord to find the co-op teammates

Version 1.0 is being released on July 31st!

The Final frontier is here. Thank you for supporting BatleGroupVR during these 3 years!

Drama of the distant galaxy

Decky from our community will do a live broadcast on BGVR Steam page this Sunday. Rumor is there will be a real time performance of intergalactic battle spiced up with community lore. If there will be enough people in the chat box, we will do a giveaway of Star Survivor a small action roguelike game in space.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1178780/BattleGroupVR/

Psst.
Join Discord to stay updated on BGVR2

[h2]BattleGroup VR has been in development last 7 years. Initially, it was supposed to be a single-player game, but then the modding, multiplayer, and conquest modes were added. There will be one last update with localization and subtitles and the game will enter 1.0 the Final Frontier.[/h2]



[h3]Thank you for your support, and valuable feedback through this process. It would not be the same without your support. Developing BattleGroupVR my first commercial game. While I had previous hobbyist experience coding for fun. This was the first time anyone other than myself could enjoy it with me. That being said - I had no idea what I was doing.[/h3]

[h3]Unfortunately, the codebase is not how I would build it today. Due to my lack of experience when I started almost a decade ago, the game is very difficult to maintain and expand on. For one, I basically made all the missions by hand with no reusable system to run them on it's just one big script per mission. Terrible design choice, but I didn't know any better at the time. In addition, the scope of the project expanded beyond the single-player experience, and other features were sort of tacked on as the vision arose so it's a pile of spaghetti code entangled within itself.[/h3]



[h3]It is much harder to rewrite/refactor everything vs starting fresh from scratch. Therefore, I made a decision to wrap things up with BattleGroupVR and will finally release it in Version 1.0 in a couple of months. The game has been feature complete and stable for a long time now. I could then start on a new project, now I have the experience to improve it.[/h3]

[h3]I am currently working on Star Survivor (it's vampire survivor in space) it is a good quick project to practice what I've learned from BattleGroupVR. You could check it out in SpaceOwl bundle to get 10% off both.[/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/32094/SpaceOwl_Games/

If you have been on the fence because of the EA status, I can assure you it is in its final form just awaiting a relabel. The next discount for 20% off we be available between May 9-16. Please give it a try!

[h2]BattleGroupVR2?[/h2]
[h3]I intend to revisit this after a few other projects. I want to expand on this idea and incorporate more open-world elements found in other space games. I envision an open sector map where you are a mercenary fleet (as you are now) but instead of a linear single-player campaign, you can travel around and pick up missions from various quest givers (hopefully with a modular mission system so players can create missions to populate the world with). Fly around mine asteroids, trade goods along dangerous routes for profit, get attacked by pirates... hunt them, explore - all the hallmarks of scifi games like Elite Dangerous except all from the bridge of your flagship in VR.[/h3]



[h3]I hope to see some of you in the future when I have something to show as I will need captains to test :)[/h3]

- Commander Ken

Hello,
I have rebuilt the voice command system to no longer be dependent on Windows Voice recognition system which only worked on certain systems with the correct setup. This will be ported over to Quest soon as it should be compatible with Android devices.

There is a new sandbox tutorial to test out the voice commands under the Tutorials menu. The original Windows API will remain for now as a 3rd option in the Options Menu.

Other Fixes:
- Fixed fighter squadrons unable to move

fixed spectator mode eyescan selection for buttons and ships
- fixed invisible turrets when swapping equipment
- improved ship turning at close range
- fixed orbital bombardment locations falling outside of map

Hello,
Conquest has been reset! The map has been refreshed with double the number of sectors. Everyone will be starting fresh and hopefully the new rules will help with the mode becoming too static:

- Dreadnoughts will be limited to 1 per fleet.
- To unlock dreadnoughts, you will need to capture and hold the center planet Ragnarok for a cycle.
- Warplanes will decay if no one passes through them.
- Battlestations have been buffed.

If all goes well and no major problems pop up, conquest will be available to Quest later this week.

Hello,
I've been working to integrate conquest mode into the quest standalone version. This is almost complete but will require a reset of the conquest server as it will be expanding the map with more sectors. A few new rules will be introduced:
- Dreadnoughts will be limited to 1 per fleet.
- To unlock dreadnoughts, and you will need to capture the center planet Ragnarok.
- Warplanes will decay if no one passes through them.
- Battlestations have been buffed.

If you would like early access, please switch your games branch (right click game -> properties -> beta) to "devreview" to have a run through and verify the server is working properly. Let me know in the discord if you run into any trouble. I plan on updating Quest users with access early next week.

fixed skirmish ai not activating
- fixed workshop unitslot not showing ship
- map mission select auto position adjust more stable
- shield overload can no longer be activated if ship is below needed health
- changed active ability button active vs cooldown color circle
- fixed issue with cooldown starting before ability finished
- added repair and resupply all buttons
- fixed coop mode unable to target special ships
- extended bomber supply from 200 to 300

Fixed issue where joining a coop game would send you to a standard multiplayer lobby instead of the coop lobby. Missed side-effect from the multiplayer refactor. Please let me know in the discord if you run into other multiplayer issues.

updated bindings control to include thumb directional pad vector2.
- added a new feature to the long-distance move command, the thumb pad will now adjust the height while the trigger is held.
- refactored multiplayer prefabs to work with Quest restrictions
- refactored object pooling manager to work with Quest restrictions
- fixed custom ships imports for hiding weapon meshes and loading sounds

Fixed issue with multiplayer games where ships would be undetected well within scan range
- Fixed boarding party so it no longer immediately captures ship and fixed captured ship team switch but weapons still fire on new friendly.

Increased ship behavior settings (keep range, flank) to update every second from 15 seconds for a more responsive feel.
- Selection hand menu behavior button now highlights when ship is not on default settings.
- Captain profiles in the fleet setup can now be selected with eyescan hover + trigger/grip instead of pure physical contact and only trigger.
- Removed leftover heavy log reporting

fixed issue with radar showing targets that were beyond scan range, causing them to be visible but not able to be targeted
- fixed issue with radar using incorrect scan range when detecting enemy ships
- fixed line formation spots 9 and 11 in the same location
- increased projectile life from 8s to 10s
- added a notification when all equipment is unlocked in Upgrade Station

Following up on the reports people have sent in regarding the bug where enemy ships go missing and players are unable to complete the mission. Looks like some strange error where a collision ends up setting the ship position to NaN (not a number). Not sure what causes this so I implemented a catch where the ship will reposition itself to its last valid location. Hopefully, this will bypass and correct any one-off random accidents... or worst case it will put the ship back into a position where it will immediately go NaN again, please let me know if you see more ships disappearing after this patch.

Other Changes:
- friendly warpout radar holograms now remove themselves from radar correctly
- fixed mission brief cutoff
- fixed local coop PC player not returning target agency to units when no longer controlling them
- docked ships no longer require a captain

One of the main bugs I've been trying to track down is where you cannot complete a mission due to a mystery enemy remaining on the map that you cannot find. I have not been able to replicate this on my end making it impossible for me to fix it. I have created a tool that will print out all the ship status to help narrow what might be going on when players encounter it. So, if you run into this issue, there is a new button at the rear of the bridge below the Emergency Exit button to print out a report. This will log the game state and open a File Explorer to the generated text file called "shipreport.txt". Please send this file to me over Discord or email to battlegroupvr@gmail.com
Thanks for your help in finding this bug!

Other Fixes:
- Fixed ships not being able to target/switch targets in conquest.
- Fixed helm control target panel not showing fighter hologram

Fixed multiplayer clients not being able to see ships when hosts can see them
- Fixed custom workshop ships loading
- Fixed custom ships not having shields in skirmish

Fixed issue with ships not being rendered during multiplayer sessions.

fixed formation not transferring to the second position when the leader dies
- fixed docked captains deleting in conquest
- fixed map ceiling height
- fixed boarding party ship capture, captured ships will sell for salvage at end of mission
- disabled weapon LODs in ship config

fixed special weapons missing icons.
- added stricter map bound limits, all ships can no longer go beyond the bounds of the map. Attempting to weed out the "missing ship" bug where there is a mystery ship preventing mission success.
- fixed scanner visible range, ship visible flag for targeting was broken allowing ships that were not in scanner range of any ships to be fired upon.
- adjusted conquest sector visual sizes for more spacing and less clutter.

added turret LODs to hide turrets at long range for performance
- fixed conquest formation loading issue preventing conquest scenarios from completing loading

Happy new year! Hope everyone had a good holiday. First new patch of the year is as follows:

- Improved ship movement: Corrected an issue where the z-rolling of the ships caused it to pitch up whenever it was turning. Moved the z-rolling to its own layer so now the ships should turn directly to their target.

- Improved formation saving: Reworked the save files to include recording of formations and their settings. So on warp in they will reform with the same members and configuration as the previous mission.

- Fixed extended range and long-range scanners modules to calculate and improve stats appropriately.

- Fixed bombers not being targetable by fighter laser weapons.

- Adjusted ship map icons 30% smaller.

- Added power bar to conquest sector inspect screen to show the relative strength of the two fleets.

- Added health and supply bars to fleet management screens.

Performance Optimizations
Optimized bridge and lobby mesh and textures to reduce draw calls. Optimized radar shaders. Should give better performance around +10fps on most scenes. You can enable the original high-resolution bridge environment by setting the quality option to "high".

[h2]Other Changes[/h2]
- Adjusted map interactions, attempting to fix glitches where move commands are ignored. Unknown if this actually changed anything.
- Fixed hidden ships not counting towards mission complete
- Fixed conquest battle defense platform showing as target after destroyed
- Fixed range module stacking

Small Feature Update: Skirmish

Added Skirmish file browser so you can save multiple scenarios.


Added unit selection hand overlay to include basic editor features like clone and delete to streamline skirmish setup.

Bug Fix Notes:
- fixed coop fleet summary and ship editing not loading
- fixed conquest loading campaign fleet instead of conquest server data
- fixed skirmish map not saving unit positions from editor

Hello Captains and Commanders,
It has been a while since the last update. Sorry for the radio silence, I have been busy with personal events but have not stopped working on the latest update. This one took a lot more work than anticipated as it required refactoring of the entire single-player campaign to support multiplayer.

Story Mode Campaign Coop
This new 2-player cooperative mode can be found in the main menu in Play. It is the entire single-player story campaign but now you can enjoy it with another first officer. You will have the option to host or join a game, no settings required and it is always password protected. You will then have the option to create a new co-op fleet or use a previous one. The host will be in charge of selecting missions, starting mission briefings, and initiating warp-outs during the campaign. Each player will be in charge of his or her own fleet and the game will respond to both as if they were one, which means enemy fleets will be scaled to match the sum total of you and your ally's combined forces.



[h2]Other Notes:[/h2]
Multiplayer has been down the past few weeks because of an update Google had made to their STUN servers which affected the multiplayer framework I use (Photon Bolt) so there was an extra delay in getting that updated and fixed as it was all related to this patch it had to come packed with this update. Sorry for the delay on that.

I hope you all enjoy and please let me know if you run into any issues over on the discord as this is a brand new feature that required a lot of internal refactoring, I expect to have missed lots of stuff.

Discord Link: https://discord.gg/4aCZ56W

Apologies again for the long-overdue update. Development slowed significantly during this build since working with multiplayer networks sucks and everything takes 3x as long to sync and test, it really killed the mood. But now that's finished, I am happy to get back to regular bug fixes and updates.

Fixed Mission 10 spawning detached from flagship
- Fixed sound effects popping/clicking
- Fixed bomber fire events in multiplayer
- Fixed long-distance move height in spectator mode

Small Update - 6/21/21
- Added SteamVR bindings for 'none' and 'openxr' paths
- Spectator mode long-distance move half-height fix
- Fixed enemy warp out ships not being removed from battle

Known Issue:
Left hand model/controller inverted on Oculus Rift S, this is a SteamVR issue, and it is fixed in 1.18.2.
You can opt into the SteamVR Beta branch if you are experiencing this issue. In Steam library, right-click SteamVR -> Properties -> Beta Tab -> from the dropdown select "SteamVR Beta", that will start the update to the newest version.

Converted VR interface to OpenXR:
This update switches out STEAMVR API in favor of OpenXR API to allow greater marketplace compatibility.

Both Oculus App and SteamVR Launcher support OpenXR API. If the game does not detect your headset, make sure your Oculus App or SteamVR is up to date and for SteamVR users, that the OpenXR Runtime is set to SteamVR (SteamVR -> Settings -> Developer -> Set OpenXR Runtime). Oculus App usually defaults as OpenXR Runtime. Please let me know in the discord (https://discord.gg/4aCZ56W) if you run into any issues.

Other changes:
- Added "cease fire / open fire" and "reverse engines / forward engines" to voice commands.
- Mission difficulty adjusted to exclude NPC ships when weighing your fleet for enemy difficulty calculation.
- Changed cannon turret inaccuracy, smaller turrets are now slightly more accurate where large cannons are slightly less.