Hello, dear community! Sorry for no news from us during so long time, but finally we completed the huge update and we glad to show you the result of our work! First of all, we want to note that our goal for this update was to turn the game from "pure sandbox" into actually a game. In this update we made a lot of big changes, and here is the most significant of them:

Tutorial

Added interactive tutorial. We realized that the game is quite complex and many people asked us for a tutorial. Also lack of tutorial was the main reason of negative reviews, so we finally added it! Tutorial does not explain absolutely every aspect of the game, because there is too much various features which should be explained and we will improve a tutorial later, but for now it should explain basics and make the game friendly for new users. Tutorial can be easily accessed right from main menu.

New space stations

Previously space stations was not too big, their size was almost the same as player's ships, but now we added completely new modules designed specially for space stations, , so now they look much more impressive. Such stations not only looks much better but also they are much more optimized than before, so now there are 12 stations in the system without significant loss of performance. You may note nice yellow lights which will direct you to correct docking port Also now you can repair your ships when docked on station Besides that, now space stations are stable and no longer should fall on planets.

Completely new interface for trading

Previous trading interface was so inconvenient that even we are not always understand how to use it :) But new clean and intuitive interface should make trading enjoyable.

Pirate ships

Before this update, enemy ships can be encountered only via sandbox tools (except one ship for combat missions), but now we finally added them as a part of normal game! Now many various ships may be encountered outside of starting planet and during combat missions. Also we glad that almost all ships was provided by community! We opened a new opportunity to participate and development so we received a lot of saved files with a ships.
The system is new, so for testing purposes we informed about it only people in the Discord chat in order to be sure that the system will work and efforts of community will not be wasted. Once we will be sure that everything works fine, we will inform everyone in this blog so everyone will be able to send us its blueprints. Ships from everyone which will be used for pirates and other factions.

Resource distribution and new small asteroids

Now various resources located in various places. You no longer able to build a warp drive using only resources from starting planet. Now if you want to find additional resources, you should travel to another planets, but during this you may encounter an enemies. Also we added additional type of asteroids, small asteroids which can be gathered relatively fast and will be destroyed with special destruction effect.

Procedural missions

Missions was implemented before, but it contained too many bugs. Now the system is much stable, now you may encounter many various types of pirate ships and interface is much more convenient and easy to use.

Reputation system

Now most modules is locked and you no longer can build a battleship right from the beginning. First you should gain reputation and unlock new modules. Reputation can be gained for missions, trading or hunting on pirates.

Significant optimization, physics stability and time acceleration

We significantly improve a physics and its stability! Now you can use time acceleration up to x8 without significant loss of simulation accuracy. This important fix makes the game much more enjoyable and if you love orbital maneuvering, now you can really perform it and waiting will not be so boring.

New visual effects

Added glow effect for many parts, such shield, warp drive, mining laser, debris and it looks very nice! This is how it looks with this effect on and off
Background completely changed, now it much beautiful and more optimized!

New modules

Added new small rocket launcher and new model for tractor beam which didn't had it before.
This is only the most significant changes, but you may find a lot more various improvements and fixes in full change log. Also we want to remind that you may discuss an update and communicate with us about everything in our Discord chat. link

CHANGE LOG

Improvements

• Added many new pirate ships which was created by community, those ships will attack outside of home planet and also will be used for missions as a targets
• Unity engine updated to version 5.6
• Added turret based rocket launcher which launch small unguided rockets with high rate of fire
• Added introduction message at the start of the game
• Added small energy shield
• Added possibility to change size of energy shield on X and Y axis separately
• Added special system which will spawn enemy ships with different complexity in different locations (on others planets you will encounter bigger and more dangerous ships)
• Added more stations to different planets and asteroid belt
• Now combat missions will send you against many different pirate ships, target will be chosen randomly
• Reputation system and unlockable modules
• Size of planet increased in 1.5 times. Mass and sphere of influence in 2 times.
• Added interactive tutorial!
• New game mechanics for NPC shipyard, now you may purchase modules when you are docked to shipyard (no longer necessary to keep your ship inside a shipyard.
• Shipyard removed. They has been so uncomfortable, now stations have engineering bay
• Brand new NPC space stations with its huge modules! Now it really looks like a space station. New names for space stations
• Trading interface and usability completely redesigned. Now it is much more intuitive and convenient to use.
• Added possibility to repair modules on NPC stations for credits
• Recourse distribution completely redesigned. Now not all resources can be found on home planet, so you need to explore other places for more rare resources.
• Added small asteroids which contains only 1 resource and can be gathered relatively fast after depletion, asteroid will be destroyed with special destruction effect
• A new asteroid will be spawned near planet each time when another asteroid is destroyed
• Added new model for tractor beam
• Now sandbox mode is disabled by default
• Now you will receive reputation and credits for each destroyed pirate ship
• Also you will receive reputation for trading
• Warp drive is improved and fixed. Now it have resizable radius and proper power consumption.
• Nuclear reactor now consumes uranium
• Many improvements for procedural missions, now the system works properly
• Amount of asteroids decreased from 400 to 200 for optimization purposes
• In non-sandbox mode only one type of the ship is available to start
• Starting ship now have solar panels by default
• Added button "Stabilize orbit", which will activate autopilot which will automatically maintain circular orbit around a planet or star, even if the ship will be affected by external forces. Manual control will deactivate this mode.
• Added sandbox button "Test spawn ships" which will spawn every type of enemy ship near your ship for testing purposes
• Added sandbox button to add Uranium
• Added new sandbox / debug tool, "Teleportation" which allows to move any object to desired point.
• Added possibility to repair modules for CR on stations
• Starting ship now have solar panels
• Each time when small asteroid is destroyed, a new asteroids will be created somewhere else
• Added button to sell modules of NPC station and also additional information about price of each module. Now damaged modules will be sold on reduced price depending on its condition
• Enemy ships now have less HP and less powerful weapons, otherwise, they are too strong
• In non-sandbox mode not all starting ships is available
• Added a lot of new localizations lines. All newly added lines was translated by Yandex translator, so it may contain a lot of mistakes which can be fixed by everyone who wish to help with localization.
• Optimization: Algorithm of structural integrity is significantly optimized, now destruction of ship it much more smoother and cause much less noticeable freezes
• Optimization: Default amount of asteroids is reduced for optimization purposes
• Optimization: Optimized rendering of trajectories
• Physics: Physics now more stable on x2 and x4 time scales (however, it is still less accurate than on x1, but it is more accurate on x0.5 and x0.25). Also now you can increase time scale up to x8 without significant loss of accuracy of simulation, which makes orbital maneuvering much more enjoyable.
• Physics: During docking, less massive ship will be moved to more massive (and never vice versa) which is especially important during docking to huge space station
• Physics: Added random factor to damage during atmosphere friction, as result, not all modules with the same HP exploded at once and overall explosion looks much better
• Physics: Collision damage reduced, modules will no longer explode on weak collision
• Usability: When player ship respawned, camera already located in default position
• Usability: Now mining laser have maximum efficiency not only at closest distance but also on some distance away
• Usability: Now mining laser will shut down automatically when the ship have no available free storage space for gathered resources.
• Usability: Now when camera target destroyed, the camera will continue to follow a position of destroyed object
• Usability: Now you can open shipyard menu by "B" hotkey
• Usability: Everywhere where you need to use left shift on keyboard, now you also may use right shift as well
• Usability: Now you can open shipyard build many by B key as well as for own engineering bay
• Usability: Camera focus (by T or GUI button) a bit more comfortable now
• Usability: Added possibility to lock view on a planet or star the same way as on any other target
• Usability: Console is improved. Added an option to display console automatically when any error occurs. Only red console lines now enabled by default
• Usability: Second click on "accepted missions" button will close the window
• Usability: Now you can click on "eye" icon near messages to select target
• GUI: Completely new GUI for trading. Previous GUI was very inconvenient and non intuitive. New one should be much better
• GUI: Completely new GUI for missions
• GUI: Added information about mining rate in mining laser window
• GUI: Added indicator for mining laser which provides useful information about mined resource, rate of mining and makes mining more enjoyable. Also now there is minimum distance to asteroids where you can mine at 100% efficiency
• GUI: Redesigned GUI circle for asteroids
• GUI: Now you can select a planet and find out its parameters
• GUI: GUI elements in left bottom corner of the screen a bit rearranged in order to fix a visual gap while sandbox mode is disabled
• GUI: Relative velocity window a bit expanded in order to contain longer words after localization
• GUI: Main menu redesigned, added buttons: Load, Single player, Multiplayer (Now people should not have question "where is single-player?")
• GUI: When you are going to dock with NPC space station, you will see a noticeable indicator (nice looking yellow lights) which will direct you on correct docking port
• GUI: Any notification now will be visible on screen at least for 20 seconds
• GUI: Updated description for "Show HP bars" button
• GUI: Now you can see drop zone circle for delivery missions
• GUI: Now you will see an indicator when enemy ship going to attack you, also you may click on this indicator in order to select those enemy ships
• GUI: Now you will see an information about price for module which is going to be sold and also colored notification if price will be reduced due damages.
• GUI: Added info about characteristics for rocket launchers on its interface
• GUI: Added panel which display required reputation for next modules
• GUI: Added possibility to display center of thrust and its relative coordinates
• GUI: After you completed a quest, you will see a message about gained reputation
• GUI: Added text description for all modules. Now much clearer what each modules supposed to do.
• Graphics: Space background completely replaced. Now it is looks more like a real galaxy and it is more optimized.
• Graphics: Added shadows
• Graphics: Added glow post effect for station's windows, shield generators, debris, tractor beam module and some others things
• Shield: Added activation and deactivation visual and audio effect
• Shield: Added small shield generator
• Shield: Now size of the shield may be adjusted by each axis separately, which makes it looks much better
• AI: NPC ships now know how to use their shield, they will activate it in combat mode
• AI: NPC ships now will attack player ships when he Is outside of his home planet
• AI: Enemy NPC ships will despawn automatically when in non-combat mode for a 2 minutes
• AI: Enemy NPC now react on nearby target and attack them
• AI: Enemy NPC constructed from the same modules, but it have less HP and less powerful weapons, otherwise, NPC is too strong and not interesting for gameplay
• AI: Now AI will use torpedo launchers against its targets
• AI: Now AI will continue fire even if some debris located on the line
• Balance: Fire rate (delay) for torpedo launcher changed from 1 to 10
• Balance: Both small maneuvering engines now have a bit different properties
• Balance: Consumption of uranium for nuclear reactor reduced in 10 times
• Balance: Reduced damage from collisions
• Balance: Rebalanced prices for all modules

Fixes

• Fixed an issue when you can't build modules (due red preview) while FPS is low (however, it creates a problem for multiplayer, but we will fix it later). Actually, options "Compensate FPS" is removed and enabled by default, so now you will always have 60 FPS, if load is too much, the game time will be slowed down in order to maintain 60 FPS.
• Now camera properly focused on the center of mass
• NPC Stations now should be fully stable and they should not lose its orbit after a time
• Fixed audio and visual effect of mining laser
• Console no longer cause memory leak
• Now time 70m 20s will be correctly displayed as 1h 10m 20s
• Shield now properly protects against laser beams
• Fixed a short freeze when you deactivate resource connectors
• Physics now more stable on x2 and x4 timescale (however, it is still less accurate than on x1, but it is more accurate on x0.5 and x0.25)
• Engines now works properly on x2 and x4 timescale
• Fixed a situation when you can't transfer resources using a slider and you need to move it a bit
• You no longer can dock to the NPC station if you are not sent a request for docking
• Fixed an error when command modules was destroyed during manual control of turrets
• Total mass no longer displayed for debris and asteroids (it was incorrect)
• Now when turrets in auto mode, it will properly attack targets which are already in range
• Button "Remove selected ship" from sandbox menu now will remove entire ship even with rotors or pistons
• You no longer have access to NPC stations when docked to it (connectors, mounting points, etc.)
• You no longer can sell station's modules when docked to the station
• Fixed an error when game cannot be saved if second part of rotor or piston has been destroyed
• Cargo gate no longer have "useless" in its description
• Fixed respawn for new missions
• Fixed save/load for missions
• Proper prices for station after loading
• Container for delivery missions spawns always around the same planet where the stations located
• No longer possible to sell modules while not docket with shipyard
• Everywhere where you need to use left shift on keyboard, now you also may use right shift as well
• Fixed a problem when you can buy resources, credits will be spend but you will not receive a resource
• Fixed a problem with disappeared trade button
• Trading window no longer located outside of the screen by default
• Now docking port can be docked to station only if another port is activated
• Fixed an issue if command module will be destroyed during docking phase
• Fixed camera rotation when you press "reset view"
• Resized GUI panel for "relative velocity" value so now it can fit long words on other languages (German for example)
• You no longer can buy half of a rocket, or 0.3 of rocket, only integer number
• Fixed tooltip for HP button which was outdated
• Trade transfer panel on top by default
• Small shield have smaller maximum radius than a big shield
• Fixed fast spin of camera when you press "reset view" or focus on new target
• Indicator of forward direction now always directed in correct direction
• Fixed error when you try to build second command module on second ship
• Fixed error when docking port is destroyed, connected to another docking port but not attached to anything else
• Fixed own engineering bay after docking to station
• "Station count" and "Asteroid count" in world creation window now works again
• Fixed missed on-hover tooltip for engineering bay
• Fixed buttons for sell and repair modules on station
• Now you can properly use own engineering bay after you used NPC shipyard

[ 2017-04-19 20:58:54 CET ] [ Original post ]