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shapez 2 Demo Learnings & Extension
To start us off, we have an exciting announcement. A lot of you asked for us to extend the demo, so we did! The demo has been extended until Monday, March 25th. This gives you a whole extra month to try out the demo or get truly creative with the tools at your disposal. However, we currently have no plans for any additional updates for the demo. Youll have to do with whats there now! If you havent already, be sure to opt-in for the Pins branch to try out Pins and complete some new challenges! You can read about how to install the update here: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2162800/view/4042612637275401107
Weve received a ton of feedback from all of you. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you so much! Hearing your thoughts and having discussions with all of you really helps us out developing shapez 2. Theres been very little negative feedback, though there were some recurring topics worth pointing out. First up, the reusability of shapes and production lines wasnt great. You at times had to remove what you just built to make space for a completely different shape. This simply doesnt feel good, as if youre not really progressing. Weve already taken action to address this and have already significantly changed the research system to allow you to reuse shapes and expand upon your existing production lines. If youre a Patreon, you already have partial access to the reworked system.
(New research system menu mock up early WIP) There were a lot of suggestions for features and changes we were already working on, but did not make it into the demo. We sadly had to cut out some features to make it in time for the Steam Next Fest. Included in this list are a lot of the further performance enhancements we explained in devlog 011 as well as certain Quality of Life features for the Blueprint library, which was missing folders, icons and more. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2162800/view/3710460746137286714?l=english The Pin Pusher you could unlock in the Pins branch has already seen a significant rework to make it more interesting than just pins being essentially a fifth shape. You can find all the suggestions we are planning to add to shapez 2 on https://shapez-2.nolt.io/. Make sure to use the filters available to get a good idea of what were currently working on and what were planning for the future.
There were quite a significant amount of issues with the exclusive fullscreen mode of shapez 2. This includes difficulty alt+tabbing, flickering during the load screen, overlays not working or functioning correctly, misaligned cursors and certain crashes. These issues can be traced back to Vulkan, the graphics API we are using, and Unity, the games engine. We expect these issues to be resolved if we were to switch to DX12, so thats something we are currently considering. Rebinding keybindings and overlapping keybinds is something that could use some love. We plan to really improve this experience ahead of Early Access. Performance in general was really solid, especially considering not all the optimizations we were working on made it into the demo. Some players were encountering unexpected performance issues however, even on systems that should easily be able to run shapez 2. We are looking into these edge cases and hope to fix them, but with some many possible PC configurations we cant promise to fix them all. The brave pioneers who journeyed to the farlands may have seen some graphical issues along the way. If you move far enough away from the hub, the map would get choppy because of floating point issues. We plan to fix this, but its currently not a priority for the Early Access release as most players will never come across this. We are happy though that most players did not encounter any issues during their time with the demo.
Currently, were focusing on the mid- and end game where youre really expanding your factory with the use of space platforms. We are prototyping and finalizing the mechanics we have planned for this portion of the game. This includes trains, space belts, fluids and the new research tree.
Work in progress Progress is being made on improving the simulation to be fully precise, even when out of view. This feature was disabled for the demo as the scale is quite small, but this is something that needs to work in the full game. Slowing down the tick rate of the parts of the factory that are out of view allows for massive performance gains and will keep the game running smoothly when your factory reaches gargantuan sizes. Once were happy with the state of the mid- and end game mechanics, well move into production mode again. This is where we work on art for the mechanics, refinement, balancing, quality of life improvements and wrap it together into a finished product.
We move into the bug fixing, localization and quality assurance phase once all the features are in. This is the last step, and after this the game is ready to release in Early Access. Its our goal to deliver a very polished experience straight from the get-go. Thats to say, while the game will release in Early Access, we internally treat it as the big 1.0 release. [hr][/hr] To close it all off, here are some player stats from the demo: The demo was played by 109,477 unique users so far. The median time played comes in at 48 minutes. The milestones you hit are as follows:
Thank you again, and see you soon. ~ Tobias & the shapez 2 team
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/
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[ 2024-02-22 15:02:34 CET ] [ Original post ]
Hello everyone! The demo period has been very insightful for us, so today wed like to talk you through some of our learnings from the demo and our plans leading up to the Early Access release. Though, theres something else wed like to tell you first!
Demo extension
To start us off, we have an exciting announcement. A lot of you asked for us to extend the demo, so we did! The demo has been extended until Monday, March 25th. This gives you a whole extra month to try out the demo or get truly creative with the tools at your disposal. However, we currently have no plans for any additional updates for the demo. Youll have to do with whats there now! If you havent already, be sure to opt-in for the Pins branch to try out Pins and complete some new challenges! You can read about how to install the update here: https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2162800/view/4042612637275401107
General feedback
Weve received a ton of feedback from all of you. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you so much! Hearing your thoughts and having discussions with all of you really helps us out developing shapez 2. Theres been very little negative feedback, though there were some recurring topics worth pointing out. First up, the reusability of shapes and production lines wasnt great. You at times had to remove what you just built to make space for a completely different shape. This simply doesnt feel good, as if youre not really progressing. Weve already taken action to address this and have already significantly changed the research system to allow you to reuse shapes and expand upon your existing production lines. If youre a Patreon, you already have partial access to the reworked system.
(New research system menu mock up early WIP) There were a lot of suggestions for features and changes we were already working on, but did not make it into the demo. We sadly had to cut out some features to make it in time for the Steam Next Fest. Included in this list are a lot of the further performance enhancements we explained in devlog 011 as well as certain Quality of Life features for the Blueprint library, which was missing folders, icons and more. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2162800/view/3710460746137286714?l=english The Pin Pusher you could unlock in the Pins branch has already seen a significant rework to make it more interesting than just pins being essentially a fifth shape. You can find all the suggestions we are planning to add to shapez 2 on https://shapez-2.nolt.io/. Make sure to use the filters available to get a good idea of what were currently working on and what were planning for the future.
Known issues and plans to fix them
There were quite a significant amount of issues with the exclusive fullscreen mode of shapez 2. This includes difficulty alt+tabbing, flickering during the load screen, overlays not working or functioning correctly, misaligned cursors and certain crashes. These issues can be traced back to Vulkan, the graphics API we are using, and Unity, the games engine. We expect these issues to be resolved if we were to switch to DX12, so thats something we are currently considering. Rebinding keybindings and overlapping keybinds is something that could use some love. We plan to really improve this experience ahead of Early Access. Performance in general was really solid, especially considering not all the optimizations we were working on made it into the demo. Some players were encountering unexpected performance issues however, even on systems that should easily be able to run shapez 2. We are looking into these edge cases and hope to fix them, but with some many possible PC configurations we cant promise to fix them all. The brave pioneers who journeyed to the farlands may have seen some graphical issues along the way. If you move far enough away from the hub, the map would get choppy because of floating point issues. We plan to fix this, but its currently not a priority for the Early Access release as most players will never come across this. We are happy though that most players did not encounter any issues during their time with the demo.
Moving forward
Currently, were focusing on the mid- and end game where youre really expanding your factory with the use of space platforms. We are prototyping and finalizing the mechanics we have planned for this portion of the game. This includes trains, space belts, fluids and the new research tree.
Work in progress Progress is being made on improving the simulation to be fully precise, even when out of view. This feature was disabled for the demo as the scale is quite small, but this is something that needs to work in the full game. Slowing down the tick rate of the parts of the factory that are out of view allows for massive performance gains and will keep the game running smoothly when your factory reaches gargantuan sizes. Once were happy with the state of the mid- and end game mechanics, well move into production mode again. This is where we work on art for the mechanics, refinement, balancing, quality of life improvements and wrap it together into a finished product.
We move into the bug fixing, localization and quality assurance phase once all the features are in. This is the last step, and after this the game is ready to release in Early Access. Its our goal to deliver a very polished experience straight from the get-go. Thats to say, while the game will release in Early Access, we internally treat it as the big 1.0 release. [hr][/hr] To close it all off, here are some player stats from the demo: The demo was played by 109,477 unique users so far. The median time played comes in at 48 minutes. The milestones you hit are as follows:
- 73% of players reached the Stacker milestone, with a median time to complete at 15 minutes
- 48% of players reached the Blueprint milestone, with a median time to complete at 49 minutes
- 29% of players finished the demo, with a median time to complete at 2 hours and 49 minutes
- 6,7% of players finished the extra demo challenges, with a median time to complete at 5 hours
Thank you again, and see you soon. ~ Tobias & the shapez 2 team
Be sure to wishlist shapez 2 and play the demo!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/
Join the community:
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[ 2024-02-22 15:02:34 CET ] [ Original post ]
shapez 2
tobspr Games
Developer
tobspr Games
Publisher
Coming soon
Release
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19.99 €
Game News Posts:
46
🎹🖱️Keyboard + Mouse
Overwhelmingly Positive
(7837 reviews)
Public Linux Depots:
- [0 B]
shapez 2 is supposed to be the long-awaited sequel to the original shapez - an automation, management & factory-building game currently available on Steam - built for audiences both new and old.
Our aim with shapez 2 would be to create a worthy successor to our original title - one which has a much higher production value, more content, better replayability and, crucially, looks more visually pleasing - this means that we’d like to include many more features for you… And we’ve outlined some of our ideas below!
Though we're still working on the prototype, we've got a solid vision of how the game could look - one that we'd love to share with you and get your feedback on. We would also like to point out that funding for shapez 2 isn’t yet fully secured - so whilst we’ll do our best to see this project through to completion, the outline below is our vision for our ideal game, rather than a set of specific promises.
Gameplay Overview
The goal of shapez 2 is to build, automate, and scale your factory in order to process increasing numbers, types, and colours of shapes! You’d be building machines, placing conveyor belts, and designing vast networks in order to transport your goods. Whilst to begin with you’d be focused on extracting pure shapes from the ground, you would soon discover a vast array of colours - unlocking an even vaster number of combinations... And, well, then the fun begins.All sounding a bit familiar? Don’t worry, we plan to shake things up a bit this time… As you’ll see below.
2D + 3D
shapez 2 will, by default, have a 3D view. However - we know how crucial being able to build efficiently is, so you will be able to seamlessly toggle between 2D and 3D!Layers
Complementing our new 3D view, shapez 2 will also feature multiple layers! Whilst in shapez there was only one additional layer (the wires layer), shapez 2 will provide players with up to 3 layers to switch between. You'll be able to place buildings, conveyor belts, and wires on each of them! (And, don't worry if you like to keep things simple - the additional layers are completely optional!)View into the machines
Whilst shapez only had ‘closed' buildings (which could sometimes make it difficult to see what was going on!), in shapez 2, all buildings are ‘open' - allowing you to see exactly how your shapes are being processed! This is a big one for us - and we're hoping it'll make it easier for new players to get into the game. It'll be a much more visual process!New engine, better performance, better accuracy
We're writing shapez 2 completely from scratch in an entirely new engine! This'll allow us to maximise performance (using all available cores & GPU power), leading to vastly improved performance, even with our new 3D visuals. (It's actually insane to us how many different buildings shapez could handle, considering it's basically a website!)Islands
shapez had a very uniform map (which severely limited exploration) - and that's something that we wanted to change this time. In shapez 2 space will no longer be unlimited - instead you need to craft islands to expand your base!This feature works well with our next one… Mass Transport!
Mass Transport
With the addition of new biomes, you'll be needing new infrastructure to transport your resources over long distances! In shapez 2, there will be a mass transport feature unlockable through the research tree. (More on that later!)Whilst these may not look exactly like trains, they'll behave in a very similar way!
Pipes & Fluids
Another new addition for shapez 2 - pipes! Not only will there be a number of new fluids, but colors will be fluids rather than being transported on a belt. (Not to worry, though - you'll still be able to package them on belts with a new building that we're introducing!)Research Tree
On the topic of replayability, we're introducing a new research tree - featuring a number of branches designed to make progress less linear! Whilst there will still be a main branch (i.e. cutters, rotators, pipes, stackers), there will be additional sub-branches, allowing you to focus on each of the available buildings and unlock upgrades for them (for example, the 180-degrees rotator is an available upgrade after unlocking the default rotator. You don't have to unlock it, but if it looks useful to you, go for it!)Blueprint Library
This was a feature that was actually planned for shapez, but sadly never made it into the original game. We'll fix this in shapez 2 by adding a complete blueprint library, as well as the ability to load/share blueprints easily!... and more:
- Modding support
- New shape mechanics
- Multiple game modes
- Customizable game creation
- All-new soundtrack
MINIMAL SETUP
- Processor: 3Ghz+ dual coreMemory: 4 GB RAM
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Graphics: DirectX 10.1 capable GPU wit 1024 MB VRAM
- Storage: 2000 MB available space
- Processor: 3Ghz+ quad coreMemory: 8 GB RAM
- Memory: 8 GB RAM
- Graphics: DirectX 11 capable GPU with 2048 MB VRAM
- Storage: 2000 MB available space
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