Testing, bug fixing and game polishing is running on 100%. The same applies for all sorts of balancing and value adjustments based on gameplay experience. Community testers and us are constantly going through the game writing down notes about bugs or things that could be improved. In this phase we should have the final build for 1.17 ready within a week or so. If nothing major shows up you will soon have the new update. Now let's talk about the development from this past week.

BALANCING CHARTS

Even though it might sound boring, tons of balancing charts were created to make sure gameplay progression moves forward and every item has its place. All is being implemented and tested immediately in new builds. The main focus was at COG drillships, their equipment, interior devices and loot randomly generated in storage. This is one of the new features, where drillships will have something new every single time you visit one. The loot is still based on the drillship specialization, but the variety of possible items is much wider.

ENEMY DRILLSHIPS AND CREWS

A lot of thought went into drillship crew and their distribution around the island. In general, COGs got a lot smarter and specialized. So next time you storm a drillship, make sure you know what type it is and who might be hanging around. Refinery COGs are deadly up close, but easy to take out in open field. Also, it is beneficial to wait until all crew members leave the drillship and walk towards their locations before trying to attack. Chances of survival will rise greatly. Fun fact: you can use COG drillships to produce items, your drillship isn't capable of producing yet. So feel free to produce some of the extra ammunition in case you're running low.

QUEST SYSTEM

Quests are completed for Area 1 now, and we keep testing them in every aspect possible. Ondrej did a very good job on this since many extra actions that players had to do in the old system were removed. New quest log and system allowing you to repeat certain quests is a new addition from this week. And since it is up to player now, whether to do quests or not, you can help yourself with a little hint from the Captain whenever you get lost. Also, the difficulty selection screen finally got new art.

NEXT STEPS

Simply test, report, fix, rinse and repeat until the game is in good shape. All the new features will be available on the Preview Branch within a few days. We'll post an announcement in the Steam Discussions as well as in our Discord so keep an eye on that if you'd like to give it an early try. Alright we gotta get back to testing now, so hope you like the progress that was made this week and thanks for reading!

[ 2019-03-14 22:23:08 CET ] [ Original post ]