Hello, dear Fractal Space players! A new update is now live on Steam! Version 0.592 is available! This version includes hundreds more bug fixes, reported by our dearest fans, which we would like to thank before we continue :) We will be sending hundreds of keys to the many players who requested them since previous 0.591 was live. Get ready! Alright then, what's new?

NEW

JETPACK | Customization

JETPACK | Physics Improvements

• Make the vertical compensation of initiating the Jetpack during a fall, feel much smoother
• Eliminate all "abrupt stops" while using the Jetpack
• Create a smoother Jetpack momentum feel

HYPER-SHOT | Improvements

• Hyper-Shot sounds have been added
• Sound fixes when starting to charge Hyper-Shot
• Hyper-Shot Level 2 now charges significantly faster than Level 1
• Various bugfixes linked to Hyper-Shot mechanic

FRAGILE | Windows

VISUAL | Improvements

Crates

Lights

OTHER | New Additions

• Smashers: Death by being crushed by moving platforms or Smashers will now instantly fade-to-black

• Taser-Gun: The character will now still squeeze his finger even if there is no more ammo remaining, as he tries to shoot.

• Terminals: Textures of Terminals and locks have been slightly improved. White lighting is present on them (especially sides/back), as it was always intended.

• Power Cores Now have gradual appear visual effect when respawned, like Cubes.

• Chapter 1: Triggers / Spawning / Despawning optimizations have been applied to Chapter 1 only. As these optimizations may create new bugs, it was only applied to this Chapter (and a bit in Chapter 3). Let us know if new bugs appear. This optimization should result in slightly less mini-freezes as you make progress through the level, but will potentially take longer to save Checkpoints in some areas on low-end PCs.

• Chapter 1: Added a new button to open / close Door 1 and Door 2 in the first Camera Room, in case you lock yourself in with the vertical moving platform. If you are detected, they remain unusable until Camera is Cleared (intended).

• Chapter 1: First Camera Room: There is now a Laser Field that will kill you below the vertical moving platform, as you should not be able to exit through here. There is now a visible gap between vertical moving platform and walls, so you can clearly guess that there is a trap below (light goes through the edges)

• Chapter 1: Picking up the Taser with a Cube in hands, will now automatically drop the Cube to ensure you see the Taser.

• Chapter 2: You can now skip the corridor that leads to the Big Room in New Game+, by using Hyper-Speed + Dodge

• Chapter 2: Door to the final lift of the Chapter, now uses a Pressure Plate instead of a switch - requires you to disable Zero-G

• Chapter 3: Initialization Room now has more lasers protecting the first Generator to destroy - this is to make it more clear you wont survive trying to go through. In addition, there are now static lasers, requiring you to either crouch or jetpack above them to reach the Generator. New static lasers when entering this area as well, to force you to be more careful after moving the Platform 1.

• Chapter 4: Processing Center Atomizer destructible floors now look cracked to have a more fragile appearance. The Protection Grid also now looks stronger.

• Quick Save: Requesting a Quick Save while the game is already saving a Checkpoint, will now force the Checkpoint save to finish instantly, to avoid you having to wait a few seconds for it to finish, before the Quick Save can finally be performed. This may result in a mini-freeze when requesting a Quick Save while the game is already busy saving your checkpoint - but should avoid you having to wait. If this mini-freeze is too much on low-end machines, let me know and this will be reverted.

CHANGES

• Optimization: Various Triggers and other events in Chapter 1 and Chapter 3 have been optimized. These optimizations will over the next few updates be applied to other Chapters, and be improved. The goal for them is to reduce mini-freezes while making progress.

• Jetpack Color: Default Jetpack flames color is now changed from Yellow to Cyan (Arctic)

• Headbob: Headbob movement while walking has been changed slightly to feel smoother and more natural. It may feel weird at first - or maybe you wont even notice :)

• Dodge: Requesting to Jump while already Dodging used to continue the Dodge, and perform a Jump at the end of the Dodge. This could be a few seconds later. This has now been changed to start jumping instantly - interrupting the Dodge but still providing you with higher momentum for the Jump.

• Chapter 1: First Cameras room (last room of the Chapter): You can now see better the Camera 3D Models, as there is better lighting next to them. First Camera is now behind a window that clearly shows the rest of the station outside (intended):

• Saws: Now have a more precise damage collision system. Should improve cases where players head is inside the saw without being damaged. Good idea to check if some saws no longer work correctly after this change.

• Chapter 1: Changed the first Cube room: the Respawn button has been removed. The Cube will now automatically be respawned in front of the exit door, if its placed where you would be softlocked, once the player touches the ground. This makes it more discrete, and still handles the potential softlock. This auto respawn system is disabled in NG+ if you have Dodge, as its not required.

• Chapter 1: First Power Core will only respawn in front of the fist Power Core Slot if you had reached that area with the Power Core in your hands.

• Chapter 2: Vertical Room large moving platforms are now made of 4 (now red) moving platforms instead of one large one. When opening the Exit, the light of the moving platform that stops becomes white, in order to make it clear that it is not an active danger of falling anymore:

• Chapter 2: First shooting cameras room: If you use the Override Door button, the saved Checkpoint will now respawn you force-crouched behind the boxes (intended), to ensure you will not be softlocked in an imminent death checkpoint save, if a projectile was currently heading towards you at the time you interacted with the Door Override button.

• Chapter 2: Very last room, the breakable window to get out of the optional Upgrade Terminal, now has many more lasers to make it clear you cannot survive entering it without first disabling the lasers, or going through the vent instead.

• Chapter 3: Various lighting improvements, including the Sequence Room

• Chapter 3: From Cold to Warm hint text in the Tunnel, is now white instead of cyan to avoid confusion in the order / hints

• Chapter 4: The Sun Control Room is now accessed from below, instead of on the right (when looking at it).

• Chapter 4: The Train Ride: Imminent Death system now displayed correctly. Has been changed to make it harder to be skipped in New Game (only 2s before death). If you are in Speedrun Mode or in New Game+, Imminent Death limit is now moved to be lower than normal, allowing you to continue performing your previous speedrun skips.

• Chapter 4: Various lighting improvements

CHAPTER | Fixes

• Chapter 3 and Chapter 4: All lights re-adjusted to avoid the too bright intensities of lights when Bloom is enabled. Some are still intentionally brighter than others - but If you still find some that are way too bright (blinding) or way too dark, please report them as visual bug.

• Chapter 1: Pandoras Box at the beginning of the level, was using the old visuals. Now updated.

• Chapter 1: Various collision bug fixes in the very first lift when using Dodge (could stand where you shouldnt)

• Chapter 1: Various collisions bug fixes with Cubes on the ledge to exit the Prison of Lasers for Cubes room

• Chapter 1: Fixed door appearing as you stepped in for the Lift just after the dual smashers area.

• Chapter 1: Fixed 2 infinite Relocations when trying to go through unintended paths

• Chapter 2: A bug could cause Relocation from beginning to Jetpack area (!) is now fixed.

• Chapter 2: Fixed exploit in which you could skip from the roof of the dual Cameras Room, directly to the Bridge (not intended).

• Chapter 2: Fixed exploit in which Dodging through a laser field that would kill you, would save at the next checkpoint, allowing you to skip a room (and creating bugs along the way)

• Chapter 3: Entering The Cube (after using the first mandatory Encryption Key) could sometimes cause missing objects before the Tunnel entrance. Lasers by the entrance vent will no longer be disable as you move forward.

• Chapter 3: Many various visual bugs have been fixed

• Chapter 3: In rare cases, very fast smashers in the Red area could be out of sync. Should not happen anymore.

• Chapter 3: The musical Hacking in Chapter 3 to access Room Control, could sometimes not play the sounds correctly for some players. Should now be fully fixed.

• Chapter 4: It was possible to complete the Sun Orientation puzzle with only B as a deployed wall. Should not be possible, and should now be fixed.

• Chapter 4: Various screens were displaying multiple times Door 1 when incorrect (upgrade before fast-shooting Camera)

• Chapter 4: Now impossible to enter the UV-color-Sequence room by entering from below, just after breaking the Breakable Window of the Sequence Room (laser field will now be active if you try)

• Chapter 4: In the room just before the fast shooting Camera, the bottom laser field of the moving dual-laser-field could sometimes be missing.

• Chapter 4: When entering the flames area (just before Processing Center), you could drop down rapidly through the closing vent and be locked out, and you could see the world being de-spawned. Now fixed.

• Chapter 4: Processing Center large crushers now change color (blue/red) appropriately when moving.

• All Chapters: Various collision bug fixes with some pillars throughout levels.

BUG | Fixes

• Save System: Rare bug with Save System could cause the rooms to be in an incorrect state (missing objects, lasers OFF instead of ON, etc.). I could not reproduce those, as it seems to be machine-specific depending on how fast the save process is, based on hard drive speed, etc. Many changes were made to the save system to make this more robust, hopefully solving all these rare cases of incorrect saved data. This is a dangerous change; to be tested if there are any new bugs linked to saving / dying rapidly while the game is saving a Checkpoint, etc.

• Relocation: Imminent Death message for relocation that kills the player character, were not being shown correctly and would display Relocation instead. Should now be properly fixed.

• Ceiling Clipping: In some cases, when very close to the ceiling - an object below you forcing you to touch the ceiling, for example - you would see through the ceiling (clipping bug). Should now be fixed.

• Jump Exploit: At low FPS, your character could jump slightly higher. That was enough to reach unintended areas. This should now be drastically improved, and it will be much harder to manage to reach unintended places at low FPS.

• Cube Exploit: It should no longer be possible (or much harder) to get Cubes stuck in between vertical pillars, preventing various exploits.

• Smasher Exploit: Fixed an exploit that would allow players to sometimes go through smashers, especially easier at lower FPS. If this happens, the player character will now be killed appropriately.

• Dodge Exploit: Fixed a bug that could allow to jump at the same time as starting Dodge, resulting in being able to Dodge twice without touching the ground.

• Fan Exploit: Mitigated (or fully fixed), an exploit in which the player could go through a full-speed fan even without Hyper-Speed in Chapter 3. Maybe other fans have the same bug, to be checked.

• Speedrun Mode: A bug was causing Laser collisions to not be correctly enabled/disabled when Speedrun Mode state was changed while in a level. This only applies for the lasers which should have collisions in Speedrun Mode.

• Hyper-Speed: Pausing the game with Hyper-Speed active, would then continue to be active (intended) when game is resumed, but without the Hyper-Speed visual effects (unintended). Hyper-Speed visual effects are now properly re-applied when the game is resumed.

• Quick Load: Fixed various gameplay bugs that could happen if requested to Quick Load exactly while shooting a button - could cause the player to not be able to jump for a few seconds.

• Jump: Fixed a bug that could prevent the player from Jumping after a Quick Load in which the Quick Saved player position was on a slope instead of flat ground

• Disable Cutscenes: Fixed a bug that could cause skipped cutscenes to not react to the next activation (from a button, or any other type of trigger for the cutscene), if a quick load was performed just after interacting with it

• Upgrades: Hyper-Shot upgrade icon was not showing

• Terminals: Now easier to interact with terminals when crouched, or in Zero-G and slightly lower height than the Terminal screen

• Footsteps: Sometimes, the first footstep sound when starting to move would not be played. Now fixed.

• Tablets & Power Cores: Fixed blinking blue/red tablets and power cores at low FPS.

• Retractable Walls: Made potential improvement for retractable walls/platforms which can sometimes be visually deployed when they should not (and usually, not fully deployed when this bug happens). Its a blind fix, meaning I couldnt reproduce the actual bug on my machine, so Im not sure if this is fixed. But here's hoping its improved ;)

• Screens: Fixed some screens which were not displaying their text correctly after recent optimizations of 3D texts (Chapter 4 Generator screens, Chapter 2 Special Thanks title, and more). Please report any other screen that seems to not display its text correctly.

• Overlapping Cutscenes: A very rare bug could cause 2 cutscenes to play at the same time. This should no longer happen. In the event that you manage to make 2 cutscenes play at the same time (very rare), it should now correctly play them one after the other in a sequence.

• Tablets: Removing a Cube that is below another Cube (stacked) was no longer provoking flying cubes anymore from the latest update. However, this could still occur with Tablets. Should now be solved.

• Cubes: Quick-Saving while a Cube was falling in the void, would then result in the Cube never being respawned if you were to Quick-Load to that save with the Cube falling in the air. Could also happen if you were to simply push the cube off the ledge, instead of picking up then dropping the Cube.

• Red Pillars: Could have a hole, missing face on the red pillars. Fixed in most cases (some remain).

• Dodge: Various bugs were fixed if the player requested to Jump just after a Dodge was initiated, including various exploits

• Vents: If you placed Power Cores / Cubes in the middle of an open Vent Door, Quick Saved, then closed the vent, and then Quick Load to the save with the Vent Door open, it would provoke the Cubes/Power Cores to fly a bit. Now it should be fully solved and keep the objects precise positions.

• Objectives: Playing with Objectives disabled would still play Objective sounds when an objective was accomplished. Now fixed.

• Module Management: Fixed a bug in which Module Management could be displayed over Pause menu, if it was being shown while the Taser was Toggled ON.

• Taser Ammo Indicator: Reduced unintended flickering of the Ammo display on the Taser-Gun, after the Train Ride in Chapter 4.

• Death: Requesting Quick Load or Last Checkpoint after Death, will no longer cancel the fade-to-black (which allowed you to see for a short amount of time after death)

• Death: Pausing the game while dead will keep a black background, to prevent you from seeing the world while being dead

• Taser: Fixed a bug that prevented aiming laser from turning on correctly, if insta-reload was meant to be done instead of reloading animation (ex: picking up healthpack at the same time as reloading)

• Taser: Fixed many bugs related to playing both reload & heal animation at the same time (not intended, the first one requested should play, the second one should be instant)

• Keypads: Using keyboard to interact with keypad buttons should now play the sound, just like using the mouse cursor

• Cubes: Fixed a rare bug that could cause Cubes to be non-interactable, after a quick sequence of Quick-Save/Quick Loads while the Cube is being respawned