​ Couple of days late! We're back with another Dev Blog to give you an update on how we're tracking. There's been some great releases thus far, and I for one can say I've very much been enjoying all the new Display Module updates. However as much as logic updates are great, one of the most exciting additions recently is Fog of War. Not necessarily because of that feature alone, but because of what that feature is leading us into. Now let's say this up front, the main reason for this Dev Blog is to inform you that our release cycle is changing for a bit. Up until now it has been a steady two week release cycle, and has worked great overall. Moving into larger development projects for the game though has seen these two week turnarounds become more difficult, and resulted in slower progress on these larger projects. To rectify this we are now going to be operating with a four week release cycle, at least for the time being. With more similar scale projects ahead in the development timeline you will find us choosing to swap to four week release cycles a bit more frequently. Let’s talk about the development project that has spurred on this change. NPC Faction Generation At the moment StarMade’s default faction stations would randomly spawn on the start of a new universe and populate the galaxies. Additionally you would occasionally encounter pirate ships and a battle would wage. This has been the most basic NPC faction generation, but we have much larger plans for NPC Factions, so in revisiting the system everything has been built from the ground up.
There’s a number of aspects to NPC faction generation. Thinking about the playtime of games gives a rough look at how complex their NPCs need to be. A simple game like Counter-Strike, in terms of round time, means that any NPC bots just need a rudimentary understanding of how to play, rather than complex strategic calculations. Progressing to most real-time strategy (RTS) games and the logic and calculations and strategies that NPCs employ during gameplay is far more complex, as those games are often a lot more drawn out. Now think about StarMade and consider a server that you could return to play on over days, weeks, months. All that time there’s additional NPC factions that will exist in the universe, doing their thing with their goals that they wish to work towards. It’s just scratching the surface to the breadth we wish to give NPC factions, resulting in a constantly evolving landscape of gameplay as time progresses. This is especially significant for singleplayer gameplay, and something that StarMade has been lacking thus far. This is just the starting phase of all we wish to do with engaging content that evolves over time through gameplay. Setting a solid foundation for NPC faction generation is paramount to the stability of everything else planned. Hence the move to extend the release cycle periods. If we picture NPC factions like a jigsaw puzzle, there's a lot of elements coming together…

• Newly designed ships and stations for our Default factions (Trading Guild, Scavengers, Outcasts)
• Numerous ship fleets from our fleet competition that will be for procedurally generated factions
• Fog of War to encourage exploration, but also to hide what the other factions are doing, making it more engaging in the process depending on whether they're friend or foe.
• Many new features for factions or that factions will be engaging with (e.g. the Trade Network)
• A robust faction generation system to handle generation, exploration, expansion, gathering resources, diplomacy, etc.

Key Features:

• Procedurally generated infinite universe, with quadrillions of galaxies - The universe is massive. It'd take approximately 10,000 years to cross from one end to the other! Singleplayer and Multiplayer worlds can be heavily customised with our extensive config options.
  
• Developed for scalability- We have a broad range of graphical and performance options that cater to our low-end users as well as those with heavy rigs and servers.
  
• Advanced Build Tools - Powerful and easy to use building tools, quickly design awesome ships, stations and bases. Including functions: Copy & paste, undo, redo, replace, symmetry modes, shape assistance systems (spheres, cycles, torus and more) and rotation of templates.
  
• Modular Weapon Systems - Combine weapon systems for countless configurations of weapons. From sniper beams to swarm missiles.
  
• Comprehensive Rail & Logic Systems - Use the rail system to build moving parts. You can do anything from simple elevators, sliding or rotating doors, to complex cranes.
  
  Tinker with our logic systems to control any system in the game, be it weapons, lights, rails, or explosives. Logic covers all basic gate types for convenient use (AND, OR, NOT, DELAY, Flip-Flop), allows in flight control and wireless connections between entities. You can use it for simple things like timers, switches, buttons. Or, build complex systems like working clocks and even a real CPU.
• Community multiplayer (dedicated servers) - Play with others in our community hosted servers. Our configs allow administrators to customise core game mechanics for a tailored experience. Most settings can be tweaked to squeeze the best performance out of hardware.
  
• Platform independent (Windows, Linux, Mac) - StarMade is completely platform independent. We support the three most widely used operating systems.
  
• Free to play in alpha - We offer the full game free to play while in alpha development. Play our game through this period for free while in return we receive invaluable feedback and bug reports.

• OS: Ubuntu 14.04 - 64 bit
• Processor: Intel Core i3 (2nd Generation and above) | AMD FX 6xxx or equivalentMemory: 4 GB RAM
• Memory: 4 GB RAM
• Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 260. 275. 280. 460 SE. 550 Ti | AMD Radeon HD 4870. 5770. 4890. 5830. 6770. 6790 or equivalent with OpenGL 2.1Network: Broadband Internet connection
• Storage: 3 GB available spaceAdditional Notes: 2GB of memory must be available for StarMade. Lower specs may work by modifying graphics and other performance options. Try out our demo to get an indication for your system. System components such as Integrated Graphics cards may not be supported. Requirements may change in further updates.

• OS: Ubuntu 15.04 - 64 bit
• Processor: Intel Core i7-2600 @ 3.4 GHz | AMD FX-8320 Eight-Core @ 3.5 GHz or equivalentMemory: 8 GB RAM
• Memory: 8 GB RAM
• Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 560. 650 Ti. 750 | AMD Radeon HD 5850. 6870. 7790 (or equivalent)Network: Broadband Internet connection
• Storage: 3 GB available space