Hey, it's been 2 months since the 0.3.2.5 release and normally I release an update every 2-3 months. This time will be different, as 0.3.3 turns out to be bigger than I thought, and making the models/all the graphics also took more time than expected. I would expect the 0.3.3 "Kalm Update" to release somewhere around April. I will of course keep you informed by writing devlogs like that at the end of each month!

Ok so first, what happened in 2 months?

Rykllan and I had a lot to do in our private lives, that's why to not delay the update even further, we decided to hire Lucas (from the Discord server) so that he could help us speed up with the models. He's been working on new launchpad models, on new office model, and recently he's been working on a rigged low poly Starman model for the renders. :D
Rykllan, however, is working on the new Falcon model, which is looking f***ing sick and will look beautiful in the game, on the renders, and eventually on the merch!
He's been also working on 6 new arts for the managers:
Wait.. what? Managers? Launch Director? What is this? Wait... is this... automation???? Yup, it's a long-awaited automation :3

Managers

I could make 8 toggles for you to just click and activate, but that would be boring. Instead, I designed a system where you hire managers (with their own appearance), and you will have to pay them for their work. You will not be able to hire all managers at the same time, I think the max will be around 5 on easy and 3 on hard. When you hire a manager, you will not be able to fire him for some years. All of this will still require some planning from your side, but I think this will be fun, if not, I will change it in the updates - it's just early access overall, and I love to test new ideas!

Contracts

The contract system has been redesigned and rewritten from the ground up. Basically, what I wanted to fix was that players sometimes didn't get anything to launch for years, and also the random bidding system, which was too random.
I combined offers and contracts together. Now you will get normal payloads as offers, which you can just accept. There shouldn't be a time without payloads for you. I made contracts relatively rare, but now I've increased the value of them (You will get more money per launch). Offices will now no more be a part of the contract bidding system. The deadline system also has been redesigned, I now no more plan to simply delete the payloads after their initial deadline. You will still be able to launch them for some years, but you will pay yearly increasing fines until you do so. There will be a launch-in-time bonus (random), and some payloads will require a brand new booster to launch (this will go down over time, as the commercial market realizes that reused rockets are safe to use).

Payloads

Payloads also got quite a few ground-breaking improvements.
First off, payloads like LinkLink or Materials will STACK! :O On the payload panel, bottom-right, you can see the "x12" mark, which means that there are 12 payloads of the type stacked. Another cool performance improvement is that when you try to launch LinkLinks, in the Launch Setup Window you will only see as many LinkLink payloads as you can launch with the selected rocket. That way, you won't see hundreds of LinkLinks in such a small list, which also improves the performance drastically. I also improved the window appearance.

Vehicle Service

I added another tab to Vehicle Window, where you can see all of your built vehicles at once and service them. You can static fire/refurbish/launch each of the vehicles from this menu.

Earth to Earth

EtE is a sister feature to LinkLink, you will be able to create the Earth transport service and get some additional funds from it.

Other

You can now see Moon/Mars from Earth!
Mission reports now show as normal notifications (to simplify the UI), and you can close all notifications at once.
Aaaaand pinned windows will now save their positions (even when you close the game or reopen the windows)!

Conclusion

The work on EarthX did slow a little and there's still a lot to do, but we are working as fast as we can! All of the stuff above will be a part of the 0.3.3 "Kalm Update". The last EarthX content update is going to be EarthX 0.3.4 "Moon Update". I hope you have a great day/week/month! See you next time:) Denis

[ 2021-02-27 18:00:41 CET ] [ Original post ]