Sound Effects Overhaul
The game now has more than just 3 sound effects. A ton of abilities and interactions now have unique sounds. Menus, UI elements, and several other dialogues that didn't previously have sounds now do!

This is the first of a series of large planned polish tasks, and should help make the game feel a lot more alive. Let us know what you think, and stay tuned for more updates!

Bug fixes + other

• You can now click on objective banners to bring up the last objective and its details
  
• Completed a minor rewrite on the camera which fixed a long-standing issues with panning and zooming that could create strange jumps, and sticky points while navigating around the map.
  
• Fixed an issue where zooming out near the edges of the map would snap you back into the center of the map aggressively.
  
• Fixed an issue with tooltips where they could sometimes stretch off the top and the bottom of the screen and get cut off
  
• Fixed an issue where loading wiki & recent winner dialogues would lock up your client
  
• Fixed an issue where the new player dialogue that prompts you to try the tutorial didn't actually do anything
  
• Fixed a few crashes/do nothing issues with editor buttons and loading behaviours caused by our recent rewrite of game engine performance
  
• Fixed an issue when creating a "standard" game where the starting storm counter was not properly being set when you change difficulty from the dropdown. This means if you were using this menu to create games they will now be harder on harder difficulties as the starting storm level isn't supposed to be 0.
  
• Fixed an issue that was causing a small amount of achievements to be unlocked erroneously upon losing a game.
  

Tutorial pass
The tutorial has become significantly outdated so we've been working it again. A lot more visual aids and explanations have been added to ease the onboarding process. Feedback would be greatly appreciated!

Bug Fixes

• Push Left ability from hurricane engine was not functioning correctly at all. Fixed
  
• removed all references to "infinite" mode. These were just mislabeled endless mode games
  
• storm text for endless games had typos and said that connecting ruins would win you the game (this isn't true in endless mode)
  
• starting a new endless game wouldn't warn you that any existing game would be deleted
  
• error dialogue now correctly shows up when trying to load an in-progress game from another player
  

New Game Mode - Endless

Endless mode is our latest game mode release, and a long awaited feature for many players. This game mode allows you to play Wastelander without turn limits, on a MASSIVE map and push your base building skills to the limit without being limited by the length of the game.



Create massive and intricate colonies over a large number of turns.



The goal in endless mode is to accumulate enough resources to activate the optional "Repair Ship" ability in order to escape the planet and survive!



Engineering Lab
For balance reasons, the Metallurgy Lab deployment does not exist in Endless Mode, and has been replaced with the Engineering Lab.



This will unlock the "Upgrade Storage" ability. This costly ability allows you to upgrade a basic storage building into it's deployment counterpart regardless of the underlying tile type. Use it wisely!





Performance improvements
Endless mode required us to overcome some major performance hurdles for the game. Due to the dramatically larger size of the Endless map we had to rewrite a lot of the engine. Creating games, loading games, idle FPS and click performance all got significant performance improvements in ALL game modes.

Miscellaneous

• Tectonic engine description stated that the effect had no radius cap. This was incorrect it was actually capped at 5 radius. For balance reasons we kept it this way and updated the description to match.
  
• Reduced the amount of scroll wheel steps required to go from max to min zoom.
  
• Improved loading menu to be more clear about progress and not lock up the process.
  
• General string and clarity improvements throughout the entire game.
  

In preparation for our Infinite mode release we have had to dramatically improve our map generation efficiency and resting FPS performance. These changes WILL affect how maps are created slightly but should also significantly improve performance and load times.

+ bug fix - "Unknown" entries on leaderboards now correctly show up as "In Progress"
+ bug fix - "The Maze" scenario had a bad configuration that would prevent some scores from uploading correctly
+ bug fix - scenarios could not be restarted instead you had to abandon them from the menu and select them again
+ bug fix - map generation bug that caused bottom left corner to have disproportionately more mountains
+ bug fix - unstoppable fissure now reveals supply drops in its path instead of leaving them fogged
+ bug fix - esc can now close open tooltips (there are rare cases where you can close dialogues while tooltips are up that needed this)

It took a bit longer than expected, but this patch will contain the first pass of our map editor. Make your own scenarios and play them, or share them with others.

The UI for this version is not polished, but we will continue to improve it over time. Please report any issues and share your creations!

hotfix a bug with agriwall
- fixed an issue with reward dialogues

escape will now close general dialogues and popups (except for item and augment selection dialogues).
- text improvements
- slightly increased small font size
- Unstoppable Fissure now reveals all tiles in vertical line, not just tiles that exploded (behavior now matches description).

We're back from vacation and working hard to get through the Early Access goals. We had a bunch of new users join us over the holidays so we're addressing some problems we noticed thanks to the increased activity.

+ Tutorial limit is now 100 turns (previously 30)
+ Fixed an issue where playing a tutorial would delete any uncompleted games you currently have going
+ Fixed an issue where tutorials didn't have a leaderboard
+ Fixed wording on Sustainable Architecture to be a little more readable (thank you Wizzer)
+ Fixed a weird issue where Wiki boxes were not rendering correctly
+ Fixed bugs with input dialogues, either not showing up (in the case of tutorial restarts) or not properly submitting fields
+ Various smaller fixes

Fixed a bug that was causing the soundtrack to only play a single song. Hopefully there is some more variety in the in-game soundtrack again :)

This patch contains a large round of UI improvements. Almost all of our button and menu assets have been replaced. Please send any feedback you have on these changes, or report any bugs you see to our Discord server.

This will be our last patch of the year, but we'll likely be following up with a number of visual and audio improvements alongside our normal planned patches next year.

See you in 2024!

Features

Scenarios
This patch contains several "Scenario" maps, which are custom maps that have interesting layouts and new challenges to solve.

In order to create Scenario maps we had to develop a map editor tool which is currently being used internally only, but will be available in the following patch for players to use to create their own custom maps!

Refactors
We had to do a large amount of refactors and infrastructure work in order to support custom maps, we've tested these for stability as thoroughly as possible, but if you see any strange issues please report them to our Discord server, or Steam Community page. Thanks!

What's Next
We'll be stopping work for a couple weeks over the Christmas holidays, so likely the next major patch will be in the new year.

Our current plan is to release the map editor as soon as possible, then go full steam ahead on Infinite mode for a release early next year.

There will likely be a handful of polish and UI / graphical improvement patches coming as well so keep an eye out for that!

Custom Games
As we start moving towards a map editor and custom scenarios, we have added the first step -> custom games. You can now edit multiple components of your custom games including:
+ Starting storm level
+ Number of Ruins
+ Number of alien shields
+ Number of turns to complete
+ Map Size

Map Generation
There are a few things we didn't like about the map generation that have been addressed in this patch to make games hopefully more fun and more consistent
+ You can no longer spawn along the edge of the map. The closest you can be is 2 tiles away so you always get the full value of your 5x5 base reveal.
+ The clearing the base starts in has been expanded to be 3x3 instead of a plus and is guaranteed to have a supply drop in the vicinity (not necessarily always within vision though). This will hopefully smooth out some of the RNG of starting areas.

New Achievements
+ 3 new achievements relating to winning games under certain turn limits.
+ Win a game on insane in under 10 minutes.
+ 2 new achievements for the new desolation levels.

Performance Improvements
Fixed some significant stutters related to clicking on cells, especially when using certain abilities or having certain augments active. Clicking in general should feel a lot smoother. There will be further performance improvements including to idle FPS as we get closer to launch.

Bug Fixes
+ Unstoppable Fissure now reveals all exploded tiles
+ Explosive growth secondary effect (+ shaped grass left behind) wasn't working
+ Fixed bug with Sustainable Architecture where it wasn't always applying the correct effects to adjacent storage buildings

New Achievements
+ Win a game on insane difficulty with 0 fog tiles remaining on the map.
+ Connect 6 different gateways, or unstable gateways on a single map.
+ Store 30 of each resource at the same time in a single game.
+ Connect to every relic on the map in a single game, on insane difficulty.
+ Win a game on insane difficulty without losing a single building to storm damage.

New Content
+ Redistributor (relic) > randomly rerolls tiles in a 3x3 target area and then fogs them. Costs 4 energy to use. Doesn't affect tiles with buildings on them or wasteland tiles
+ Unstoppable Fissure (augment) > Causes a vertical line of tiles centered on this ruin and stretching to the top and bottom edge of the map to explode
+ Isolated Fortifications (augment) > Your remote buildings are shielded while they are not adjacent to any other buildings. Remote buildings are marked by every storm.
+ Machine Protocol (augment) > When this augment is first acquired, convert all unoccupied tiles adjacent to this ruin into Node tiles.
+ Corrupted Engineering (augment) > Relics provide +2 metal, +2 water, + 2 energy income while connected. Relics no longer provide abilities.

Reworks/Adjustments
+ Ice Mine buffed > -3e/t instead of -4
+ Reusable Parts simplification > Newly constructed Platforms are scrap walled. Platforms cost 1 additional metal
+ Explosive Growth secondary effect changed > now is Water Tanks cost 1 less metal but explode during storms leaving a plus of grass if not on grass.
+ Tinkerer secondary effect changed > no longer provides a shield but instead reveals a significant area around each revealed relic
+ Hardened Pods reworked into Integrated Pods > All Supply drops on the map now have a Node tile under them.
+ Pump aquifer buff > energy cost increased to 8e but water cost removed
+ Mini Shield reworked into Cluster Shield >> Shields all tiles within range 0 while connected. Range is increased by 1 for each adjacent Cluster Shield.
+ Hydrolab reworked >> now costs 2m and has -2e/t but +1w/t. Can only be built on ice. Alternate water collection with an ability upside
+ Genesis Device rework >> Reveals the nearest unrevealed ice tile to your base. Converts the closest sand tile to each visible ice tile on the map into grass. Closest sand tiles must be in the same valley as their source ice tile. (still functions in a similar way but now has a vision component at the expense of blind global effect. Scales better with a heavy vision game but also provides vision when energy/scans are limited)
+ Sustainable architecture rework >> Water storage buildings constructed next to ice tiles place grass, metal storage constructed next to ore place scrap shield, energy storage constructed next to lava or node are shielded
+ spore tumor ability rework >> still converts valley in range X to grass but now also clears all mountains in a straight line X tiles from spore tumor. Spreads it's own valley. Cost increased to 4 water per use (essence remains the same but now is self-expanding)

Bug Fixes
- Fixed an issue where you could spawn on the very edge of the map and lose part of your starting reveal area. Base will now always spawn at least 2 tiles from the edge of the map.

FEATURES
Desolation Levels!
- Unlock a higher tier of challenge once you beat your first insane mode game.
- Each Desolation Level will add an additional difficulty modifier to your map.
- Beating a game on a given desolation level will unlock the next level. How much challenge can you handle?

Basic Achievements
- Added a small first round of Steam achievements to the game, most of these are based around difficulty levels and the daily challenge. We'll be adding many more, as well as improving the achievement artwork in the future!

Cloud Save
- Basic cloud save so you don't lose your desolation progress.

Improved game creation flow.


BALANCE CHANGES
- Rocky Stronghold buffed to shield anything next to 3 wasteland, mountain OR lava tiles
- Aerodynamic Design downside removed. All buildings next to 3+ buildings are shielded
- Mitigation Module Renamed to Reclamation Station and now functions remotely
- Scrap Beacon base cost reduced to 1m 4e (was 2m 4e)
- Energy Wall base cost reduced to 2m (was 3m)
- Agri Wall - base cost reduced to 1m 3w (was 1m 4w)
- Pump Aquifer cost increased to 6e, 1w (was 6e). Now spawns an aqueduct on all empty sand tiles adjacent to spawned ice tile.
- Hurricane Engine push left ability cost decreased to 4e (was 5e)
- Drive Anomaly now also clears ALL marks from the board before reshuffling

BUG FIXES
- Aerodynamic Design bug fix used to clash with other shield based augments preventing shielding
- Reactive Lava bug fix used to show the incorrect explosion radius around exploding lava

Hi everyone,

Now that we've got our first EA stability patch released we'd like to give a quick roadmap update so you know what to expect in the coming few weeks of early access development. This won't be a roadmap for the full EA period, just for the next 3 patches.

Patch 1 - Scaling difficulty levels past Insane - This will be an incremental difficulty toggle that you'll be able to increase as you beat each subsequent level. Each difficulty level will add an additional modifier to the map that will increase the difficulty in some way or another.

Patch 2 - Content Updates and improvements - We've been gathering a ton of data on augment / blueprint / deployment / relic usage and average scores and winrates as more and more people play games. This patch will focus on making improvements to balance, as well as adding additional augments (and possibly some new buildings).

Patch 3 - Scenarios + Groundwork for Map editor - Scenarios are a feature that existed in our earliest playtest versions of the game where you could load maps that other players had abandoned or failed and attempt to complete them from where they had been left off. We'll be making improvements to this feature concept and releasing it back into the game. At the same time we'll also be laying the groundwork for the map editor which will be released in a later patch.

Throughout this period we'll also be doing bug fixes, and polish tasks so expect a lot of additional improvements in the coming weeks! (And don't worry, Infinite mode is under way, but it's a huge project and will take some time).

Thanks a lot for playing everyone and we hope you enjoy the upcoming content!

P.S. If you'd like to chat with us or give us any direct feedback, or get help with strategies from other players, or even just share your games, we'd love to chat with you in our discord server: https://discord.gg/BVwxN3pa

Our first post-launch patch is here and a few days early! These changes are mostly focused around reported bugs, issues with the tutorial and general issues with the new player experience.

+ reinforce cost now displayed correctly if you have no metallurgy labs placed/connected
+ added intro tips whenever you start or load a game. This pool will be expanded as time goes on. Tips can be disabled in settings
+ added first anticheat measures
+ added time tracking to post-game stats
+ various additions to tutorial to help new players
+ fixed a crash when loading games with no building or fog in the bottom left corner tile of the board
+ fixed scrap beacon effect radius hover. Scrap beacon also now no longer self shields but comes with a scrap wall when placed
+ fixed issue where tooltips and dialogues could be displayed overtop of the loading page
+ lots of other bug fixes and improvements

Now that the dust is settling after our early access launch, we just wanted to post a quick update about what's next for Wastelander.

Firstly, thanks so much to all the early adopters who have purchased the game and left us positive reviews so far! All the early support has really given us a huge boost of focus and drive to start getting new feature dev underway, and we appreciate all of you!

Our first EA patch will be coming on Friday September 15th and it will mostly be a bug fix and polish patch that will contain a lot of improvements to things we noticed new players were struggling with/confused about during launch week.

After that patch goes live, we'll post another update with a more fleshed out roadmap for the course of EA development, which will contain a loose timeline of our major planned feature releases and patches.

Thanks for reading, and we'll update you again soon!

Hey everyone,

We're really excited to share that after more than 2 years of development as a two person team, we've just launched our first game today on Steam!

We've worked hard to give the game as much replay value as possible with stuff like random seeds, daily challenges, tons of different building and tech options that can be found throughout each game. Every map is a unique experience.

Thank you to everyone who participated in the betas, provided valuable feedback and made content! We hope you will enjoy the game and stick around for the many new features we have planned as part of our early access.

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Closed Beta. We got a ton of feedback and some of you submitted twitch vods and youtube videos that were super super helpful.

Now that the game is about to enter Early Access the Closed Beta is coming to an end. Due to this, ALL beta keys will be disabled on September 5th 2023 at 11am PST.

Thank you for your understanding

UI pass
LOTS of ui changes. Still not fully complete but much better. Added a placeholder loading page that will get better eventually too.

new content

• new augment Temperature Inversion: effects that produce lava now produce ice instead. Effects that produce ice now produce lava instead
  
• new augment Aerodynamic Design: buildings that are adjacent to at least 3 other buildings are shielded. Buildings that are adjacent to 1 building or less are marked by every storm.
  
• new augment Rocky Stronghold: Your buildings adjacent to at least 3 mountain and/or wasteland tiles are shielded.
  

• imitation gateway - removed drain but increased cost. Is now 10m 20e instead of 8m 12e -6e/turn
  
• matter converter - ability buffed to 3m -> 15e (was 3m -> 10e)
  
• aquifer pump - ability buffed to 6e (was 8e)
  

• removed exploit where hovering aqueducts or rails against fog would "show" you whether there was an object in the fog
  
• bug fix - reusable parts didn't leave behind a scrap wall when an existing platform was manually destroyed
  
• bug fix - materializer ability didn't trigger placement effects like grass conversion or reusable parts trigger
  
• bug fix - post-game grass stat was rounding incorrectly. If grass stat was 10% or more would round to nearest 10%
  
• bug fix - abrupt transformation was not disabling relic abilities so you could have abilities from removed relics for the rest of the game
  
• feed tumor crashes when inspecting or viewing wiki
  

Game Balance
Grass is being re-worked. As of this patch, all grass is permanent and not "generated" by buildings. Placing grass defense buildings like solar mirror will convert tiles to grass ON BUILD instead of requiring connection. Any changes to nearby terrain after such buildings are constructed will no longer cause them to try and fill this void.

• Spore Tumor no longer automatically fills radius if the surrounding terrain changes between uses. Spore tumor and feed tumor ability now list radius and number of uses respectively.
  
• Agri-Wall, Solar Mirror, Irrigation Pump, Aqueduct etc ALL spawn with their grass zone when constructed (whether connected or not).
  
• Agri-Wall buffed > cost is now 1m4w (was 1m5w)
  
• Agri-Wall only attempts to connect with other Agri-Walls before the end of every turn
  
• Sustainable Architecture Augment buffed > now affects ALL water storage buildings. Behaviour slightly tweaked to place grass under these buildings when constructed (regardless of connection) and when collected automatically does the same for all existing water storage buildings.
  
• Explode now also reveals tiles. It mostly worked like this already but it wasn't universal.
  

• Tooltips no longer show up when you're panning the map around (with click and hold)
  
• Buildings that consume storage can no longer be built if they would put your storage below zero (Alien Hive)
  
• End Turn overview only shows (MAX) when you are actually going over cap for the turn. Would previously also show MAX if you filled up your storage exactly
  
• End Turn overview pop-up stays up longer
  

Difficulty Changes
From watching some closed beta games it became clear that jump between tutorial and "easy" mode was MASSIVE. To provide a smoother ramp for new players we now have 4 difficulties.

We're still reeling from all the feedback we got from our first round of closed-beta testing. We sent out a lot of keys and the feedback is still filtering in. We appreciate everyone who participated and will be sending out more keys very soon.

The tutorial has had some walls of text cleaned up a bit and has more steps to cover some more of the critical gameplay concepts people have been confused about. We will continue to add to it as time goes on.

Next patch will contain some spicy new content as well as some balance changes!

UI Changes

• new overlay icons for nopower, nowater, disconnected, and remote that are much clearer and easier to read.
  
• new end turn report info popup that will be improved over the next few patches
  
• changed the ordering of some menu items based on priority/importance. This is mostly default buildings and abilities
  
• when you start/load a game the map will center AND zoom on the base. Clicking the disconnected and marked utility buttons will also center AND zoom on the target tiles to make them easier to find
  
• econ layer (F1) will now show actual tile income values adjusted for augments and node multipliers (instead of default values)
  
• inspecting a remote building/tile will show an explanation of what remote is
  
• added a new "recent winners" button on the homepage if you want to see how other players are doing/spec new build ideas
  
• utility buttons now show icons and titles for buildings affected by disconnect and storm mark respectively
  

• at least one source of sound loop breaking has been fixed. Hopefully soundtrack won't randomly stop anymore
  
• fixed bug where gross energy income in the post-game screen was incorrectly showing gross metal income
  
• fixed some weird bugs when creating/restarting games from inside someone else's post-game screen
  

Buffs

• reusable parts added back in. Now causes all FUTURE platforms to destroy themselves after one turn and be replaced with a scrap wall
  

• aqueduct can no longer be built on node tiles
  
• core mine is no longer remote
  

• stat tracking for econ has been changed to gross output not net
  
• final storm on a lost game doesn't hit (so your buildings and econ are preserved)
  
• updated a lot of descriptions to use new "destroy" and "convert" keywords
  
• several more objective milestones added to tutorial. Buildings unlock as you progress
  

• fixed a nasty bug where you could submit someone else's map and score as your own
  
• removed ability to open escape menu from main menu
  

Tutorial Updates

• tutorial map and objectives have been tweaked to give a better onboarding process. We will continue to work on this as feedback comes in
  

• wasteland and scrap shield effects from turn based buildings will now show a hover icon corresponding to their type so you can better understand what is happening to those tiles
  

• winning or losing a game will no longer show the final ruin reward collection and final storm dialogues before gameover state respectively.
  
• reusable parts platform augments has been temporarily disabled while we work on other systems
  
• trying out new error sound
  

• leaderboards now only show leaderboards for that seed AND difficulty. You will no longer be competing against people playing the same seed on a lower difficulty
  

This is our first major patch of the Closed Beta. We're addressing major issues with communication of game mechanics along with some balance issues.


UI Updates

• econ bar hover tooltips will now show a full breakdown of economic contribution by building to make it easier to understand how your economy functions at a glance.
  
• choice dialogues now have a placeholder icon you can click to show and hide them (if you need to see the board before making your decision). The old hotkey hack (Q) has been removed.
  
• water and energy econ sections in the econ bar will turn full red when you no longer have enough resources to make it to the next turn. Hovering over these sections will also show an additional warning explaining why the shutdown has occurred.
  
• toasts that show collection of items will now last longer and have a delay before fading out
  
• there are THREE new utility layers in the game. These will eventually have in-game UI to enable them but for now are only accessible behind hotkeys: [F1] econ layer, [F2] mitigation layer (metal value saved on this tile so far) [F3] terrain only layer (hide buildings to see where specialty tiles are)
  

• Reactive Lava DISABLED -> due to consistent problems when interacting with other content as well extremely confusing functionality we are temporarily disabling this augment.
  
• Geometric Demolition NERF -> effectively this is a bug fix but the rail from this augment will only be placed on VALID tiles. If you use bombard on a tile the tile will explode and turn to lava as expected instead of unexpectedly placing a rail instead of lava. This will also affect Faulty Wiring and potentially other content.
  
• Hydraulic Lift BUFF -> cost reduced to 2m, 8w (was 2m, 10w)
  
• Terraformer Ability NERF -> cost increased to 6e, 4w (was 8e, 2w) this was by far the most efficient source of mountain removal in the game. You will now have to develop a more significant water economy to get good usage out of this.
  
• Bombard Ability NERF -> cost increased to 1m, 8e (was 1m, 5e)
  
• Timed explosives NERF -> cost increased to 4m, 5e (was 3m, 5e)
  

• explosion, mountain clearing and wasteland generation are now tracked in post-game. You can see them under the new section labelled "Terraforming"
  
• some more descriptions that involve explosions have been further clarified (e.g. faulty wiring and bombard)
  

• disconnected buildings utility button (next to End Turn) now only cycles through disconnected buildings. Before was also cycling through unpowered and unwatered buildings (if applicable)
  
• you can now only submit ONE score per seed. If you perform better than your previous score on the same seed your leaderboard entry will update to your new score.
  
• fixed a crash when opening post-game stats of abandoned games
  

Thanks to everyone who's played the Closed Beta so far. Several people have sent feedback in along with videos and we've started working on some changes based on our observations.

Description Updates
Many keywords have had their descriptions updated to help with clarity. Please keep reporting confusing content as you find it

Miscellaneous
- building tooltips now show hotkeys (hotkeys are not customizable yet)
- tectonic engine effect is now an explode so that it interacts with augments. To compensate for this it no longer reveals tiles as it clears them.

Bug Fixes
- scrap beacon now applies its shield before triggered tile modifications (e.g. tectonic engine)
- ruin counter in the top right now correctly updates if ruins have been removed via augment abilities
- grass and shield mitigation values fixed in post-game (were always showing as 0)
- hidden cache now has its supply drops affected by your augments