Hello everyone!

Last devlog we talked about trains, so let's look at your other option today: Space Belts. You'll likely be using these a lot, so let's take a look at what we're working with.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[h2]News[/h2]

[h3]Devlog survey[/h3]
We're really interested to learn if there are ways for us to improve the quality of the devlogs and/or align them more with what you'd truly like to know about shapez 2! This survey includes questions about quality, usage of visuals, your interests as well as a suggestion box where you can suggest topics for future devlogs. So whether this is your first devlog or you've already read all twenty(!) of them, we would really appreciate it if you could take the time to check out the survey!

[h3] Fill out the survey here! [/h3]

[h3]Alpha 20[/h3]

Not only do you get Devlog 020 today, Patreons also just got access to Alpha 20! This new build includes everything mentioned in this blog, plus a bunch of new features and visuals. Updated content includes train collision avoidance, simulation improvements, map generation improvements, new visuals for a couple of buildings and much more.

[h3]Disclaimer[/h3]

Just a reminder, everything shown in this blog is still in development and is still subject to change. They're not quite placeholders anymore, but the visuals of the Space Belts are not finished yet. Your thoughts and feedback are welcome, as always!

[hr][/hr]
[h2]A brief history[/h2]

Space Belts are an essential tool to transport large quantities of shapes between platforms. Ideal for short distances, they allow you to easily cross a gap or connect a train station to your factory for pickups or deliveries. However, their original design was quite different from what were working with now. Lets walk you through it!

[h3]Just build it yourself![/h3]
Initially, you were expected to build connections using these platforms manually. You would place platforms and then build belts and launchers on them to create connections. It quickly became obvious that this is very burdensome to do all the time for every connection (as you may expect), so we started working on improvements.

Old build

[h3]Space Tunnels[/h3]
One of the first improvements was the addition of special tunnel platforms. These allowed your connections to transport shapes under other platforms, making connecting across sections much easier. Additionally, their ability to consistently transport large quantities of shapes essentially made them function as Space Belts, but without the flexibility of seamlessly splitting and merging. The tunnels exist as their own form of transport alongside the buildings you know from shapez 1, as well as Shape Launchers.

Old build

[h3]Hyperbelts[/h3]
The first step towards improving space platform connections was Hyperbelts. Despite the fancy name, it was just a tool that allowed you to easily place prebuilt versions of the space platforms with belts & launchers without having to build all of it yourself. It was based on the idea of belt placement in your factory, but very simplified - it didn't support merging or splitting unless you manually made platforms to do so.

Old build

This system is what you saw in the demo and this is as expected something we got a lot of feedback on. Technically we couldve made more prebuilt versions to allow for more complexity, but it would still be clunky and not very pretty. We can do better.

[h2]Space Belts[/h2]
With a ton more feedback under our belt, the Hyperbelts flaws became clearer and clearer. Aside from the lack of complexity we already mentioned, it was also just very slow. They moved shapes at the same speed as all other belts in your factory, and when youre crossing larger distances, it really did take a while before your shapes got anywhere. Essentially, what we needed was a system that had all the functionality of regular belts, but much larger, faster and independent of platforms. So, we made just that.



Enter: Space Belts. Theyre huge belts that support up to 12 regular belts across 3 layers, move shapes way faster and retain the flexibility you expect from belts, all without needing platforms to build on! This makes Space Belts your best option to connect platforms over shorter distances. If you need to move something over long distances however, Trains are the better option.

Shapes moving across the Space Belt



When there are Space Belts, you also need Space Pipes. With the recent fluid system rework, it became possible to transport fluids across notches with pipes. This then allowed us to make the prototype of the Space Belts younger brother, Space Pipes! These work identical to Space Belts, but move fluids instead of shapes and have a different look to reflect this. Have a look at the concept below.

This may or may not be what it will actually look like

[h3]Merging with Tunnels[/h3]
For close-distance transport, we would now have both Space Tunnels and Space Belts & Pipes. The key difference between the two is that Tunnels can move shapes under a platform, bypassing it without slowing down. However, they can only go straight and have a range of 4 chunks, which is where Space Belts and Pipes come in.

Now, youll likely come across a situation where youd like to place your Space Belt across a platform, without connecting to said platform. Thats where you connect a Space Tunnel to your Space Belt! However, keeping Space Tunnels and Space Belts separate doesnt make much sense anymore as they work closely together now. So, Space Tunnels now have a brand new visual that matches that of the Space Belts, theyre both part of the Space Belts category in the UI and Tunnels can now be integrated into the smart-placement tool.



[h2]Whats next?[/h2]

Space Belts are already in a really good state, but there are some improvements yet to be made. As we just mentioned, the Space Tunnels still need to be integrated into the placement behaviour of Space Belts. Thats to say, Tunnels should automatically be placed when you drag a Space Belt across a platform.

We are already considering other ways of improving them even more, however: a topic that has come up internally is that merging or splitting across different factory lanes and layers in space is too troublesome for too small of a result. To make this easier, we are evaluating Merge/Split Balancers. These special space platforms would have one side that can receive up to 12 belts and another 36 split across 3 other sides. The Merger takes up to 36 input lanes and distributes contents evenly across up to 12, while the Splitter takes up to 12 input lanes and distributes the contents evenly across up to 36.

[hr][/hr]

Well, that's everything for now. The bottom line is that Space Belts should act similar to regular belts, but a lot bigger. Anyway, progress is going very well and we have plenty more to show, so we hope to see you again for the next devlog.

~ Tobias & the shapez 2 team


[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

X / Twitter Discord Reddit Patreon

Hello everyone!

It's finally time to talk about possibly the most anticipated feature of shapez 2: Trains! We'll keep the intro short, but please remember to wishlist shapez 2! There's a high chance you already have (in which case, thank you very much!), but every single wishlist helps out!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


[h2]Disclaimer[/h2]

Please note that the vast majority of train visuals are placeholder or early concepts. The mechanics and balancing explained in this blog are also subject to change, depending on community feedback. To read more about how we implement new content and the current state of the game, check out our previous devlog!

You can explore everything you see and read in this blog yourself in Alpha 19, available to Patreons.

[h2]Our goal for trains[/h2]

Wed like to quickly preface the blog with our intentions for trains. Their purpose is to transport a large amount of shapes over large distances. While tunnels and space belts work fine to connect nearby platforms, trains will connect your distant platforms that mine that specific shape you really need, but spawned multiple sectors away.

Ultimately, our goal was to create a fun, long-distance transport option that fits well into the existing shapez world and the mechanics youre used to. It should be easy to get into but provide depth for optimization and versatility. For this reason weve omitted signals and other, more complex train mechanics in favor of a simpler line system that still offers a lot of depth for those willing to invest their time into optimization.

[h2]The basics[/h2]

To get started, lets place a station! You can also choose to start with the track or a depot, but well start with a station as they come with a pre-build segment of track. The station building tells a locomotive where to stop. To load and unload the wagons you need to place Train Loaders and Train Unloaders, both of which are available for both shapes and fluids. Each (Un)Loader can service one wagon.

Once the stations are in place, its time to place tracks. You dont have to worry about the length of the line, as placing tracks is completely free. Connect the stations by track in any way you want, but do keep in mind that tracks are directional. Additionally, trains have to slow down when making a turn and speed up on long, straight sections. Youll want to minimize the amount of turns a train needs to make in order to maintain a high speed.



When your stations are connected, you wont have to worry about making a loop or a place where the train can turn around: tracks are double-sided. When a train reaches the end of a line, it will flip to the bottom side of the track and turn back to where it came from. This helps a lot with space management as you wont have to worry about frontal collisions or need to make two tracks to allow trains to travel back and forth. However, trains traveling along the bottom of a track cannot be serviced by stations and only travel in a straight line. If the line has junctions or switches, you may still need to complete a loop to get your train back to the start.



Now that youve connected an input station and an output station, its time to get a train running. To spawn a train, you need a train Depot. This depot is one chunk big and allows you to spawn a single locomotive that cannot carry any products by itself. To add capacity, youll need to attach a Wagon Extension to the Depot. You can choose between two types of cargo wagons: Shape Wagons and Fluid Wagons. Filler Wagons are also available to space out two cargo wagons, but cant be used to transport products. Youre free to mix and match the wagon types, theres no need to stick to just one. With these wagon extensions attached, any train spawned by the Depot will pull a single wagon for every extension. If youd like a second train, youll need to place a second train Depot with its own wagon extensions.



A train will automatically spawn from the depot and do its thing: it will follow the track and stop at every station it comes across. It will load shapes at Train Loaders, and unload shapes at Train Unloaders. This is the simplest use of trains: a single train moves along a line and does its thing. You can stop there, but theres a lot more possible.

[h2]Lines[/h2]

If you were to give every single line its own track, youd need to reserve a lot of space for all the tracks youd need. Instead, you can work with colors! When placing a track or a Depot, you can currently pick between four colors: red, green, blue and white. The color determines which line which train will follow. For example, a train from a red Depot will always follow the red line in case of a switch.

The colors come into play once you merge two or more tracks of different colors into a single track. If you have a green line and you merge a red line onto the same track, the track will become both green and red in the direction of the track. This means that both red trains and green trains can travel along this line! If you were to split the green line off this track, youd get your separated red and green tracks back.



A track can support all four colors simultaneously, giving any piece of track an effective limit of four different lines. If you require more lines, youll need to make a parallel track that travels in the same direction or separate your train network into smaller subnetworks. When traveling along the bottom of a track, trains will no longer follow their line and only go straight at switches.



[h3]Crossings[/h3]
If you need to cross tracks, there are two ways to do it. The first one is to simply create a crossing by placing a second track across an existing track to create a crossing. At a crossing, lines and trains can only go straight. If you want to give trains the option to merge into the other track as well, you need to manually build a switch.



However, the second way is a lot more fun: just make a Train Launcher! Just like with conveyor belts, you can place a launcher that will launch the train into the air and across any other tracks and onto the catcher. Unlike the conveyor belt equivalent, you can change the strength of the launcher to determine how far the train will fly.



Before you ask: Yes, the Train Launcher also works on trains at the bottom side of the track.



[h2]Balancing[/h2]

So after all this, you may wonder why youd use trains instead of tunnels or space belts. Aside from being way cooler, its a matter of cost, speed and throughput.

[h3]Costs[/h3]
Below, you see a table with the costs of running a train. For this example, we run a single train with three wagons between two stations with capacity for all wagons.

[hr][/hr][table noborder=1 equalcells=1]
[tr]
[th]Object[/th]
[th]Chunk cost each[/th]
[th]Amount[/th]
[th]Chunk cost sum[/th]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Locomotive[/td]
[td]10[/td]
[td]1[/td]
[td]10[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Wagon[/td]
[td]5[/td]
[td]3[/td]
[td]15[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Station[/td]
[td]1[/td]
[td]2[/td]
[td]2[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td]Platform[/td]
[td]2[/td]
[td]6[/td]
[td]12[/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td][/td]
[td][/td]
[td][/td]
[td][/td]
[/tr]
[tr]
[td][/td]
[td][/td]
[td]Chunk cost total[/td]
[td]39[/td]
[/tr]
[/table][hr][/hr]

39 chunks may sound like a lot, but the best part is that tracks are completely free! This means that no matter the distance, be it 5 chunks or 500, the cost remains the same. Additionally, locomotives dont require fuel and theres no maintenance fee either. If you compare this to our other mass-transport options like Space Belts and Space Tunnels, both of which have an effective per-chunk cost of 1, trains become increasingly more chunk-efficient the longer the distance traveled. The cheapest possible setup for a functioning train is one locomotive with one wagon running between two stations, which would cost you 21 chunks.

[h3]Throughput[/h3]
Shapes and fluids are loaded on a train in packages. A single wagon has capacity for three packages one for each building layer with each package having a capacity of 960 shapes or 9,600 L of fluids. This gives every wagon a maximum capacity of 2,880 shapes or 28,800 L of fluid when using all three layers. Trains will only pick up packages that are completely filled, giving a wagon a minimum required load of 960 shapes or 9,600 L as well.

A wagon can only pick up one package per layer. If you only use the bottom layer of the station, the wagon can only pick up one package: it does not automatically place a second package on top of the first one. Additionally, Loaders and Unloaders can store up to two full packages per layer. To make full use of both the wagons and the (Un)Loaders, youll want to split the load across all three layers.

When it comes to speed, trains are considerably faster than the alternatives. If you were to move shapes across a distance of 300 chunks using space belts, youd be looking at almost an hour of travel time! A train however, will cross that distance in under 30 seconds. Trains slow down for turns and take some time to get back up to speed, so every corner will considerably increase the travel time of a train. Adding wagons to a train does not affect the speed or acceleration.

To summarize the balance, space belts and tunnels are ideal for short-distance connections between platforms. Trains are what youll want to use for medium and long distances. Theyre incredibly versatile and you can add or remove trains and wagons as needed. However, it takes time to set them up and poor planning and/or using too many trains can create bottlenecks when collision avoidance enters the fray more on that next.

[h2]Future possibilities[/h2]

[h3]Collision avoidance[/h3]
In the latest Alpha build (Alpha 19 at the time of writing), trains still just phase through each other. However, were currently experimenting with a collision avoidance system. How it will work exactly is still to be determined, but a train should brake when another train gets in its way. Once the path is clear, it should continue its journey.

This also means that congestion would be possible if you have a lot of trains on the same line or have a very busy crossing. Avoid conflict points, build station bypass tracks and use the line colors to the best of your ability to avoid gridlocking your entire transport system.

[h3]Colorblind features[/h3]
Since were working with colors, were planning to use the same color pattern shaders we showed in the last devlog for the line colors as well. How exactly this will look depends on what the final train and track visuals end up looking like.

We have some more ideas, but they require more testing before we can say with certainty they'll make it into the game. Names pending.

• Side swapper track: Special track segment that will flip the track and allows trains to swap to the other side while continuing in the same direction, without slowing down.
  
• Locomotive recoloring platform: Change a locomotives line color and reroute them on the fly with a special platform.
  
• Vortex train launch: Launch trains directly into the Vortex to deliver a large amount of shapes at once.
  

Hello everyone!

We have something a little bit different for you today! Our topic for this devlog is the future more specifically, where we are with the development of shapez 2, what still needs to be done and how were looking at the Early Access release. In general, it should give you a better insight of how we work.

You could technically call it a roadmap, though all the information wed like to be included is a bit too wordy to be put into a single fancy image. Youll have to do with a 5-page devlog again. Sorry!

[h2]Demo reception[/h2]

To get us started, lets talk about the demo again. Two weeks ago we shared a survey with everyone. Theres a lot of very useful information here that will help us determine the sentiment on the demo now that its over and gives us more to work with when it comes to the eventual release of the game. However, we would like to share the results of one of the questions.



These are the grades you all gave the shapez 2 demo. Of course, these results will be biased. We shared the demo within the Discord and the blog, so the people filling out the survey will be big fans of shapez. Its safe to assume that the grades will be higher than they would be if we were to ask a group of players that have no prior knowledge of shapez.

However, even if we were to subtract a point of every grade for a possibly more accurate score, were very happy with the responses. It fills us with confidence that the demo gets such high scores, considering the flaws it had most of which have been fixed by now.

[h2]Shapez 2 today & the road ahead[/h2]

Shapez 2 and the development thereof is looking very promising. With the demo, we were able to show what were capable of, now that were more than just a single person working on a game. We want to deliver the same quality for Early Access, but aspire to go beyond.

The biggest challenge we face now is to finalize the newer mechanics. The demo mostly consisted of proven mechanics, things from shapez 1 that we know work well. Shapez 2 and its Early Access will of course have a lot of new mechanics as well, which require more iterations and testing to make sure theyre functional and fun.

So, let's start to look ahead. There are three phases: developing the core mechanics, making them work in the game & polishing everything up for publishing. This system is used when it comes to developing mechanics, but it also applies to the game as a whole.

[h3]Phase 1: Game Mechanics[/h3]

The beating heart of any game are the mechanics and core elements. Were still partly in this phase, developing new mechanics, reworking old mechanics and gathering feedback on everything to make sure it all feels right. Its a lengthy process, but you cant really continue when parts of the core game are still missing.

Currently, were happy with the following major mechanics:

• Fluids
  
• Wires
  
• Crystals
  
• Research
  
• Building layers
  
• Blueprint library
  
• Pin mechanics
  
• Space belts & tunnels
  
• Shape types (including the reworked Windmill shape)
  
• The majority of buildings
  
• Colorblind mode (see below!)
  
• ...and many more smaller features and improvement to tie everything together
  

• Trains
  
• Chain miners & Fluid Extractors
  
• Infinite Research (not yet started)
  
• MAMs (Make Anything Machines): Everything you need to make a MAM is in the game, but there currently is no incentive to make it without the Infinite Research goals.
  

Hello everyone!

Its been a while since you last had a look into our progress. In fact, we havent really updated you since the release of the demo! While we already did a deep dive into the evolution of the Research System (which you can read here), its time we show you what other parts of the game weve been working on and what will be available in Alpha 18.

[h2]News[/h2]

[h3]End of the shapez 2 Demo[/h3]

The demo will soon be coming to a close. It will remain available until Monday, March 25th, 10 AM CET. This gives you the entire weekend to give the demo a go and see what shapez 2 is all about, or finish the projects youre currently working on! Pick up the demo here:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


[h3]shapez 2 Demo feedback survey[/h3]

A ton of you have already given us your feedback and thoughts on the demo and its system. As always, thank you so much for your time! We have a couple more specific questions wed love you to answer.

[h3] Find the survey here! [/h3]

[h3]Alpha 18 release[/h3]

We just released Alpha 18, which includes all of the changes mentioned in the blog and a little bit more. If you'd like to test it and share your opinions with us, consider subscribing to our Patreon!

[hr][/hr]
[h2]Devlog 017[/h2]

[h3]Production[/h3]

The Windmill shape has been reworked. The previous design was the only shape type that was asymmetrical and always looked a bit awkward because of this. The new design is symmetrical, allowing for better looking shapes in our opinion. The shape goals with Windmill quadrants have also been changed to make better use of the new design. It may take a bit of time to get used to it, but let us know your thoughts!




We have a new design for the Pin Pusher youve seen in the bonus build of the demo. Before, it only placed one pin in one quadrant, but it now places a pin under every existing quadrant. This changes where in your production line it would be best to use the Pin Pusher, as you may need to utilise a couple more cutters if you don't want pins under everything.

A grey circle after going through a Pin Pusher

Inspired by the original shapez, weve added Chain Miners and Chain Fluid Extractors that youll be able to connect to your main extraction platform. This saves you from having to go through the trouble of having to set up multiple platforms and connect them all. It also allows you to use all nodes of a cluster if one of the nodes is completely surrounded by other nodes without blocking any of the adjacent nodes. The map generation has seen some changes to allow for better usage of these chain miners and extractors.

Visuals are still WIP

[h3]Transportation[/h3]

The old hyper belts (single platforms with four belts on them) were replaced with Space Belts. These new belts work similar to regular belts in that you can split and merge them, but a space belt carries four regular belts on three layers and can split the load into different directions. They are quite a bit more versatile than tunnels, but move shapes at a lower speed. Use them for short-distance connections between platforms or train stations.

Trains now travel along a solid set of rails, instead of the old rainbow ones. This makes the rails look a lot more weighty and inline with platforms. You can place a station platform along any set of rails. Connect the station with your factory using your second-favorite mode of transport, load them on a train and watch your shapes go off into the sunset.

You can build centralised train stations and connect them with your factory using space belts

We are still determining what role exactly trains should fill in shapez 2, but we've been getting some good feedback from the Patreon testers in the Discord. We hope we can share more about trains soon!

The first prototype of the 3-way splitter is here! While its still missing the visuals to make it make sense, we know its been a highly requested feature and are glad its making its way in.



We are working with a new Fluid Simulation system that should be more accurate and intuitive. To make sure the pipes feel good to use and keep the simulation running smoothly, were essentially working with a signal-like system. If theres any fluid anywhere in a continuous pipeline, any connected building will be able make use of it. There will not be any fancy liquid simulations or advanced pumping mechanics. Additionally, Fluid Tanks are now directional to prevent back flow.

You now start with a new Vortex platform layout. Its a 3x3 platform with a Miner on every side, supported by Chain Miners. These will pump up the shape output of the Miners so you have enough shapes to keep you busy until you unlock Chain Miners yourself.



[h3]Mechanics[/h3]

There has been some progress on the wiring content for the game. We now have functioning Buttons, Displays, Virtual Rotators, Virtual Analyzers and Virtual Unstackers! Its still early days for wiring so theres still a lot of progress to be made.



Alpha 18 has the brand new Blueprint Library design. Essentially, it works just like the files in your operating system. Youll be able to organise all your blueprints into separate folders by simply dragging and dropping them as you wish. If youd like to use a blueprint, you can drag the file into the hotbar for quick access.

Want to organise your blueprints without launching the game? Just head into the blueprint folder using something like Windows File Explorer and youll find everything exactly as you left it in game. Your library is synced between save games and devices.



[h3]Various other changes[/h3]

• A lot of rendering refactoring & performance improvements
  
• Various improvements and extra visuals for the UI in many parts of the game
  
• Further changes to simulation ticks & steps per unit to fix (some) precision issues
  
• The shader of the shape viewer has been improved. Shapes now reflect some light.
  
• We brought back larger platform layouts as optional unlocks.
  
• The max range of tunnels has been changed from 3 chunks to 4. Their entrances now input and output shapes on 3 layers, with 4 belts on each layer.
  
• Platforms are now one tile bigger in every direction. This has decreased the gap between platforms and belt launchers had their range reduced to match this change.
  

Hello everyone!

A popular point of feedback on the demo was the research system. It's kinda a hassle to navigate and you couldn't really play how you want to play, unlock what you want to unlock. We went back to the drawing board and took another look at the research system, There's a new system now, and we'd like to explain it to you! However, we think it would be interesting to walk you through the history of the research system.

If you'd just like to read about the newest system, feel free to skip to design #4.

So to get where we are now, we had to make a number of iterations of the research system, see what elements worked and which didnt and then improve upon that iteration by making a new, hopefully better one. Lets walk you through these iterations, so you have a good idea of our progress!


[h2]Design #1: The initial research tree[/h2]

Way back when, the research system had a classic tree structure connecting one research to the next. Every research could require multiple previous ones and each and every individual building and building variation had a unique research youd have to unlock.



While such a research tree would be functional in the end youd have everything this design brings a couple of major problems.

Features were extremely broken up. You had to complete multiple separate researches to unlock all the bits and pieces of a single mechanic. You could make painters but wouldnt have a way to move paint around to make use of the new unlock. Youd also be missing out on a lot of quality of life features that make building a lot easier, so you waste a lot of time and space building elaborate factories while a single unlock would make that system a lot easier and compact to work with.

The researchperbuilding system also means the tree would be extremely large and overwhelming. It was hard to find out what exactly you were working towards, if you could even find what youre working on right now.

What we needed was a new tree design that combined various buildings into single researches to make the tree more compact and easier on the eyes.


[h2]Design #2: Main progression line with categorized subtrees[/h2]

For this design, we went with a linear research tree a tree trunk, you could say. Core elements such as rotators and stackers would be right at the top and the main mechanic you unlock when completing the research. Many of the smaller bits and pieces were unified as part of these core unlocks to make sure you unlock all the necessary buildings you need for the main new mechanic.



Other unlocks that werent part of the core mechanics would be in separate, smaller subtrees. Youd have a subtree for belt speed, one for building speed, one for blueprints, etc. This removed the clutter from the main tree and organized all the other unlocks in separate tabs.

This design made it a lot easier to see the next big thing you were working towards, and made it impossible to miss any core mechanics youd need to progress the game. The fact that youd immediately have all the elements you needed to fully enjoy the new mechanic prevented a lot of frustration that came with the old design.



However, this design too came with issues. The splintered subtrees would still make it difficult to find some researches, since some researches could fit in multiple categories. Is fluid packing part of fluids, or part of transport? It also made it difficult to keep track of your progression across subtrees: you sometimes had to flip through multiple tabs to find out what you just unlocked and where a new research had just become available.

Additionally, it was hard to understand the connection between the main progression line and the subgoals. The small trees give you a general impression of what you had to do to progress unlock one belt speed increase to unlock the next increase but subgoals also needed you to progress the main progression line at times. The only way to find out about this was to guess. Cant progress this subtree? Got to be the main line.



The tree-like design also just didnt really add much. Some researches would be locked behind other researches just for the sake of looking like a tree. You had to unlock the CCW rotator before you could unlock the 180 rotator, even though you can definitely do without the former to use the latter.

To add insult to injury, some unlocks most would consider essential and were huge QoL improvements were spread across these subtrees. You had to go out of your way to unlock splitters and mergers for example, and while you could technically progress without them, it made complex factories unnecessarily painful and inefficient to build.

While this iteration fixed a lot of the issues of the first design, it brought a whole host of other issues to light. So, we went back to the drawing board.


[h2]Design #3: Milestones & Side goals[/h2]

We decided to ditch the trees and go with stones instead. This new design consolidated the main progression line into milestones: bigger, more meaningful unlocks. Every milestone you reach is like a whole new world of options and side goals to explore. The tree structures and all the separate tabs were completely removed and everything was centralized within the new milestones. Essential quality of life unlocks like mergers and splitters are now unlocked from the start, and more minor unlocks could be found behind optional side goals you unlock with the milestones.



It was now extremely easy to understand when you unlock what mechanic and when new side goals become available. You have complete freedom in choosing what side goals you want to take on, as you no longer have to unlock full cutters to unlock the swapper, for instance. Milestones are now the only dependency.

This iteration of the research system is the one currently seen in the demo. While it worked well enough for the part you could play in the demo, some issues started popping up here and there. Thank you again for all the feedback!



The big issue here is that the progression of the shape you needed to make to unlock the milestones didnt really progress in a logical way. The required shapes were too different from each other, and with the limited space available especially before you unlock space platforms it required you to demolish your previous work to make space for the new production line. This process is very mentally draining and doesnt feel as rewarding as it could. The milestones should incentivise growth, not feel like a rogue-lite game.

Additionally, the long, single line of milestones made it difficult to keep track of all the available and completed side goals. You had to navigate back and forth constantly to find the ones you wanted. Again, since the demo wasnt that large, this isnt that big of a deal yet. When all the milestones become available in the full game however, finding anything will be a struggle. Adding more goals to the game would be a challenge as well as theyre tied 1:1 to the milestones, but it would also make the previous problem worse.


[h2]Design #4: Evolving milestones & Side tasks progression[/h2]

With all that in mind, we move on to the research system thats currently available in the latest Patreon-exclusive Alpha. We stick with the milestone system, but have made a handful of big changes.

Milestone goals are no longer limited to one shape type. Some goals may have multiple shape requirements that either build upon shapes you had to deliver previously or will be reused in a future goal. This is a fairly standalone change, but theres more.



Introducing: Research Points. Optional unlocks, like belt speeds and blueprint limits, are no longer tied to goals. Instead, youll be rewarded Research Points by completing Side Tasks, which in turn are unlocked by reaching new milestones like before. These side tasks start off simpler than milestones, but you unlock new, more difficult side tasks by completing them. These side tasks lines (name pending) can have between 3 and 7 tasks and will continue to ramp up in difficulty until you reach the end of the line. Side tasks can also award other minor rewards alongside research points, like extra blueprint points and platform limits.



The research points you obtain can be spent on whichever upgrade you like as long as you have completed the milestone to unlock the mechanic you want to upgrade. All possible upgrades are now on one dedicated screen a shop, as it were instead of being tied to a long, single row of milestones. You can really go wild with your research points: want to max out belt speed in the early game? If you can afford it, its yours.



This system is quite a big departure from the iterations we had before, but it brings a lot of improvements to the unlocking experience. Milestones now feel even more important and rewarding to unlock. They clearly show what you get by unlocking them, without being bloated by small upgrades. The research points and the shop where you unlock upgrades gives you both a lot of freedom to play how you want to play and also makes it a lot more clear what upgrades are available. This also helps make the game more replayable you could decide to focus on different upgrades and challenge yourself in new ways.

The new system is clearly the perfect solution to all current and future problems and will never have to be improved ever again! is what we tell ourselves to sleep at night.

Joking aside, wed love to hear your feedback on the new research system. It wont be added to the demo, but it is currently available to Patreon supporters.

[hr][/hr]
With all these iterations, the research system of shapez 2 is the single most reworked element in the game. Its really important to get this right. The game should feel both challenging and rewarding, without being frustrating. We will continue to tweak this system until we nail the balance!

That's the devlog! We hope you enjoyed reading about the history and old designs of the research system. See you again soon!

~ Tobias & the shapez 2 team


[h3]Be sure to wishlist shapez 2 and play the demo![/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

X / Twitter Discord Reddit Patreon

Hello everyone!

The demo period has been very insightful for us, so today wed like to talk you through some of our learnings from the demo and our plans leading up to the Early Access release. Though, theres something else wed like to tell you first!


[h2]Demo extension[/h2]

To start us off, we have an exciting announcement. A lot of you asked for us to extend the demo, so we did! The demo has been extended until Monday, March 25th. This gives you a whole extra month to try out the demo or get truly creative with the tools at your disposal.

However, we currently have no plans for any additional updates for the demo. Youll have to do with whats there now! If you havent already, be sure to opt-in for the Pins branch to try out Pins and complete some new challenges! You can read about how to install the update here:

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2162800/view/4042612637275401107


[h2]General feedback[/h2]

Weve received a ton of feedback from all of you. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you so much! Hearing your thoughts and having discussions with all of you really helps us out developing shapez 2. Theres been very little negative feedback, though there were some recurring topics worth pointing out.

First up, the reusability of shapes and production lines wasnt great. You at times had to remove what you just built to make space for a completely different shape. This simply doesnt feel good, as if youre not really progressing. Weve already taken action to address this and have already significantly changed the research system to allow you to reuse shapes and expand upon your existing production lines. If youre a Patreon, you already have partial access to the reworked system.

(New research system menu mock up early WIP)

There were a lot of suggestions for features and changes we were already working on, but did not make it into the demo. We sadly had to cut out some features to make it in time for the Steam Next Fest. Included in this list are a lot of the further performance enhancements we explained in devlog 011 as well as certain Quality of Life features for the Blueprint library, which was missing folders, icons and more.

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2162800/view/3710460746137286714?l=english

The Pin Pusher you could unlock in the Pins branch has already seen a significant rework to make it more interesting than just pins being essentially a fifth shape.

You can find all the suggestions we are planning to add to shapez 2 on https://shapez-2.nolt.io/. Make sure to use the filters available to get a good idea of what were currently working on and what were planning for the future.


[h2]Known issues and plans to fix them[/h2]

There were quite a significant amount of issues with the exclusive fullscreen mode of shapez 2. This includes difficulty alt+tabbing, flickering during the load screen, overlays not working or functioning correctly, misaligned cursors and certain crashes. These issues can be traced back to Vulkan, the graphics API we are using, and Unity, the games engine. We expect these issues to be resolved if we were to switch to DX12, so thats something we are currently considering.

Rebinding keybindings and overlapping keybinds is something that could use some love. We plan to really improve this experience ahead of Early Access.

Performance in general was really solid, especially considering not all the optimizations we were working on made it into the demo. Some players were encountering unexpected performance issues however, even on systems that should easily be able to run shapez 2. We are looking into these edge cases and hope to fix them, but with some many possible PC configurations we cant promise to fix them all.

The brave pioneers who journeyed to the farlands may have seen some graphical issues along the way. If you move far enough away from the hub, the map would get choppy because of floating point issues. We plan to fix this, but its currently not a priority for the Early Access release as most players will never come across this.

We are happy though that most players did not encounter any issues during their time with the demo.


[h2]Moving forward[/h2]

Currently, were focusing on the mid- and end game where youre really expanding your factory with the use of space platforms. We are prototyping and finalizing the mechanics we have planned for this portion of the game. This includes trains, space belts, fluids and the new research tree.

Work in progress

Progress is being made on improving the simulation to be fully precise, even when out of view. This feature was disabled for the demo as the scale is quite small, but this is something that needs to work in the full game. Slowing down the tick rate of the parts of the factory that are out of view allows for massive performance gains and will keep the game running smoothly when your factory reaches gargantuan sizes.

Once were happy with the state of the mid- and end game mechanics, well move into production mode again. This is where we work on art for the mechanics, refinement, balancing, quality of life improvements and wrap it together into a finished product.



We move into the bug fixing, localization and quality assurance phase once all the features are in. This is the last step, and after this the game is ready to release in Early Access. Its our goal to deliver a very polished experience straight from the get-go. Thats to say, while the game will release in Early Access, we internally treat it as the big 1.0 release.

[hr][/hr]
To close it all off, here are some player stats from the demo:

The demo was played by 109,477 unique users so far. The median time played comes in at 48 minutes. The milestones you hit are as follows:

• 73% of players reached the Stacker milestone, with a median time to complete at 15 minutes
  
• 48% of players reached the Blueprint milestone, with a median time to complete at 49 minutes
  
• 29% of players finished the demo, with a median time to complete at 2 hours and 49 minutes
  
• 6,7% of players finished the extra demo challenges, with a median time to complete at 5 hours
  

Hello everyone!

Thank you all for playing the shapez 2 Demo! As a little thank you gift, we have a small content update for you. This update adds pins to the game alongside some new demo challenges to go with it! Be sure to read on, as the update wont automatically install.

[h2]New content[/h2]

The new update brings pins to the game. These pins arent a shape, but do occupy the space theyre placed in. This allows you to put shapes on top of the pins and create so-called floating layers. You can gain access to pins by unlocking the new Pin Pusher milestone in the research menu, situated between Space Platforms and Demo Challenges.



It may not sound like much at first, but it adds a lot of new challenges and possibilities. The challenge goals at the end of the demo have been updated to require the use of pins, so be sure to give this new mechanic a go and let us know what you think!

If you're ever unsure on whether or not a shape is using a pin, remember to click on the shape you need to make to see a 3D view!



[h2]How to install[/h2]

Now, this addition required us to make some changes to the research unlocks. As to not erase your research progress, this update has been added as a separate game branch. Youll need to manually opt in for this branch. You can still load your existing savegame in the Pins branch, however you will lose all progress past the space platform unlock. If youre planning to do this, please make sure to make a backup of your savegame before you overwrite it in the new branch. A savegame from the Pins branch is incompatible with the main demo.

[h3]To install the new update, follow these steps:[/h3]

Wait for the game to fully update and play the game!



Please keep in mind that this update does not fix the known issues of the demo. We are actively working on fixing these, but this most likely wont be ready before the end of the demo period. Additionally, the new pin branch hasnt been tested as much as the main branch, so please report any bugs you may find!

We recommend you play the base version of the update first before diving into the update, though theres nothing stopping you from going with the pins version immediately.

Hope you enjoy the update!

~ Tobias & the shapez 2 team


[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

X / Twitter Discord Reddit Patreon

Hello everyone!

Today is the day! You can officially play the shapez 2 Demo, right now! We wont keep you any longer, you can download the Demo straight away below:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

The Demo is available for Windows, Mac and Linux systems and requires a 2-button mouse with scroll wheel to play. Controllers are not supported right now, but will be in the future.



Please note that Demo save files will not be compatible with the Early Access version of the game, planned for later this year. Blueprint save file compatibility is likely but not guaranteed.

Got a question for us? Be sure to check out the FAQ below in case we already answered it:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/2162800/discussions/0/4148445959734030278/


Want to get in touch with us about your feedback or a bug you encountered? The best way is to join the shapez 2 Discord server, and head over to the dedicated Demo feedback channels. You can join here.

If you're not on Discord, you can instead head over to the Steam forums and make a topic on your issue. Well check the forums regularly, but support can be slower than through Discord. Additionally, well keep an eye on the shapez subreddit and our X (Twitter) mentions, but the two ways we mentioned above are much preferred.



[h3]What to expect[/h3]

You can expect around 2 hours of gameplay in the demo, depending on how you play. During this time, you can unlock the following:

• Half Destroyers
  
• Rotators (90 CW & CCW, 180)
  
• Second building layer
  
• Stackers
  
• Cutters
  
• Trash
  
• Blueprints
  
• Swappers
  
• Space Platforms
  
• Speed upgrades for belts and many of the buildings above
  

Hello everyone!

Were incredibly excited and proud to finally announce that the shapez 2 Demo will become available this very month! Starting from January 25th, youll finally be able to play shapez 2 to your hearts content. The demo will be part of Februarys Steam Next Fest and will run until February 26th.

In case you need a refresher, check out the shapez 2 Reveal Trailer here:

[previewyoutube=0VO_52LJ268;full][/previewyoutube]
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


[h2]What to expect[/h2]

The shapez 2 Demo will feature about 2 hours worth of content, depending on how minimalistic or elaborate you build. However, theres no limit to how long you can play!



Everything up to and including space platforms is unlockable, which is done by completing specified shape delivery goals. Rewards include destroyers, rotators, stackers and a second building layer to go with it. Youll unlock basic access to blueprints to duplicate production lines or share them with your friends or the community. Most main goals come with one or more side goals that give you various upgrades and buildings to further optimize your factory with. Additionally, youll encounter some Demo-exclusive challenges to rack your brain over once youve unlocked everything!



The Demo is fully fledged with a tutorial, tips that appear while you play as well as a Knowledge Panel in case youre stuck. It fully supports English, German, Chinese (Simplified & Traditional) and Japanese. Additionally, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Korean, Turkish, Polish, Russian and Thai are supported through community translations. Keep in mind that the quality of community translations may vary, so be sure to let us know if anything could be improved.

Please note that Demo save files will not be compatible with the Early Access version of the game, planned for later this year. Blueprint save file compatibility is likely but not guaranteed.


[hr][/hr]
So far, shapez 2 has only been available to a limited audience. This Demo finally allows us to get feedback from the broader community and will really show us what still needs to be done before we enter Early Access. The quality of the Demo is representative of the quality of the final version of the game, barring any feedback we may receive. We are very ambitious to make the Early Access version feel like a full, finished game, so your feedback on the Demo will truly be invaluable to us.

If youd like to join the conversation and give us feedback directly, you can already join the shapez 2 Discord server! There will be a button in the game to take you there. The Steam forums are also always open for you to leave your thoughts.

See you soon!

~ Tobias & the shapez 2 team


[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

X / Twitter Discord Reddit Patreon

Hey everyone!

Before we get into this progress devlog, I, the tobspr team and everyone else involved with Shapez 2 would like to wish everyone a merry Christmas and an amazing 2024. It's been a wild year and were super proud of what we have achieved so far. We can't wait to show parts of it to you with the upcoming demo!

We will be taking some time off these holidays, but well be back next year to deliver you the Shapez 2 Demo to everyone in February. More news on this next year!

If youd like to stay up to date with all the news and development of Shapez 2, be sure to wishlist and follow the game here on Steam! It helps us out a ton. Click the button below or click here.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


[h2]Giveaway[/h2]

To celebrate the season, we're giving away a set of Shapez Cookie Cutters! They're brand new and not yet available anywhere else, so this is your chance to be among the first to build your shape production line in your kitchen. Catapults not included.



[h3] Participate here! [/h3]

You'll need to have Shapez 2 wishlisted in order to participate. Once you have, be sure to check out the list of other actions you can do to gain more entries and increase your odds of winning! All actions will support us directly.

The winner will be contacted at the beginning of next year.


[h2]News[/h2]

[h3]Shapez Mobile Release[/h3]

Two weeks ago, we released the original Shapez on mobile devices! The game features all the content of the PC version up to level 20. You can play the first 7 levels at no cost at all. The full game is available for $4.99/4.99.

Watch the trailer:

[previewyoutube=QJAxyd8jifI;full][/previewyoutube]

Find the game on your preferred platform:



[h3]Alpha 15 release and Demo Early Access[/h3]

We released Alpha 15 this week, which features all changes mentioned in this progress devlog. Additionally, the Shapez 2 Demo is very nearly finished, barring any bug reports and feedback we get.

If youd like to help us test the game and get early access to our latest development on Shapez 2, consider subscribing to our Patreon!

[hr][/hr]
[h2]Devlog 015[/h2]

[h3]New content[/h3]

We added sound effects to every building in the game to match their animations! You have to pan your camera quite close to the building to really hear it, but even if its just a faint sound, it adds a lot of life to the machines and makes this space factory game feel a bit more realistic. Looking forward to everyone experiencing the new sounds!

What do you mean, theres no sound in space?

[h3]Game Design & Balancing[/h3]

Weve re-reviewed the content on the tutorial and made some changes to make hints more compact, yet efficient. They should be a lot more clear and easier to follow!

Buildings will now automatically rotate to fit the direction of the belt or building its being attached to. This will make placing buildings require less actions, but manually rotating may still be required in certain configurations.



Tips are now shown more prominently for a few seconds, so theyre less easy to miss. Of course, you can turn tips off if you dont need them.



The prediction icons are now always shown on unconnected belts & building ends, as well as vortex inputs. This functions both as an indicator of what shape is being made, and a reminder that you still have work to do!



In addition to a previous change that automatically places splitters when connecting belts, this function now also applies to attaching buildings to a belt. Merging in this fashion is still being worked on.


[h3]Visuals[/h3]

We improved the shape visualization and shapes now also have their LODs, the latter of which will both improve performance and make them more readable from a distance. Generally, more LODs have been added to pretty much everything. LODs are neat.

We made some changes to Rotators to make them more visually distinct from processing buildings. This comes down to applying the visual language we discussed in Devlog 013. Further changes for the Rotators will come at a later date.



Placement indicators for half destroyers, full cutters and halve swappers have been improved. Their functionality and direction are now more clear and should prevent the unnecessary frustration of placing blueprints the wrong way around.



The Vortex received a number of changes. Have a look!



In general, a lot of small tweaks and improvements were made across the board in preparation for 2024.


[h3]Development[/h3]

Weve made lots of performance improvements and the game should now run a lot more smoothly especially on lower-end systems. You can expect an increase in FPS of up to 200%! We expect Shapez 2 to run stable on hardware as low as Intel UHD Graphics with the right settings.

We added a shader quality setting and added shaders for the lower settings.

Map generation has been vastly improved in terms of performance, with improved loading times and reducing stutter when moving around the map quickly.

[h3]Audio[/h3]

New music tracks have been added. The vibes are immaculate.

We also added more interface sound effects, plus a setting to mute the audio when the game is not focused (you clicked outside the game window).

[h3]UI/UX[/h3]

The game now uses physical keys for keybinding. For the users of QWERTY keyboards, nothing will change. However, users of other keyboard layouts will no longer have to start the game off rebinding all the keys. The game now uses the physical location of the key to determine the default keybindings instead of the letter itself. For example, for AZERTY keyboards the game will now default to ZQSD instead of WASD for camera movement.

General improvements to UI and UI readability have been made, including conflict indicators, miner placement indicators, additional tooltips and several easy-access ways to get to various menus. Youll also get a little popup dialogue when finishing the demo.



We added a feedback button to the game that will redirect you to the Shapez 2 Discord server, where you can easily provide us your feedback in the dedicated channel.

Belt catapults now show clearly when theyre not properly connected to the Vortex. They also delete belts in between a catapult and the receiver whenever theyre placed on a belt.



The main menu has seen several improvements and its looking amazing, if we say so ourselves! You can find a preview on YouTube below:

[previewyoutube=UMimVRKZPDI;full][/previewyoutube]
[hr][/hr]
Thats it for now. Its a bit of a shorter one as there are no big ticket new additions this time around. Were very happy with the current state of the Shapez 2 demo and are super excited to let you all play Shapez 2 for the first time in February. Stay tuned for news on that soon!

If youd like to give us a Christmas present, wed really appreciate it if you could add Shapez 2 to your wishlist. Thats all we want this year!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

For now, were gonna enjoy our holiday break and well be back with another devlog next year!

~ Tobias & the shapez 2 team

[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

Twitter / X Discord Reddit Patreon

Hey everyone!

Ever had your thoughts wander off to shapez while on the train, at work or at a boring family gathering? What if you could take shapez with you at all times?

We are super excited to announce that, in collaboration with Prismatika & Playdigious, shapez is now available for Android and iOS!

[previewyoutube=QJAxyd8jifI;full][/previewyoutube]

Experience everything shapez has to offer up to level 20 on your phone or tablet! Play in portrait or landscape mode and switch between the two with a flip of your phone.

You can pick it up and try it for free by pressing either button below.



You can play through the first 7 levels for free, no strings attached. The full version of the game is available for $4.99/4.99. If you're quick, you can benefit from the 10% launch discount!

Shapez Mobile includes all features you unlock in the PC version, except wires. Additionally, cross-platform saves are not yet supported at launch, but do let us know if this is something you'd like to see!

We hope you enjoy shapez Mobile!

~ Tobias, Prismatika & Playdigious




[hr][/hr]
[h2]FAQ[/h2]

If I own shapez on a platform already, do I get the mobile version for free?
Unfortunately no, this is not the case. Getting the game on mobile wasn't cheap and we believe the resulting game is worth the cost!

How well does shapez mobile run on older phones?
We expect the game to run at playable levels on all devices that support the required OS versions. If you find the game does not run well for you, be sure to let us know!

How well does shapez mobile run on tablets and folding phones?
The game runs well on tablets and especially the modern folding phones. You can change the size of the UI to meet your personal needs!

Do you plan to add wires in the future?
No plans at the moment. We'll see what the future brings!

Are there plans to release the puzzle DLC for mobile?
We also have no plans with this at the moment, but if the game does well, who knows!

Hey everyone!

Its time for another progress devlog! Last month weve been hard at work nailing down the details of the upcoming Shapez 2 demo. To get into the upcoming Steam Next Fest, we have to submit the demo early January. With the holidays coming up, that means theres a lot to do!

We would like to humbly request you to add Shapez 2 to your Steam wishlist. It helps you, it helps us, and its completely free. Sounds like a fair deal! Just press the blue button below, or click this bit of text.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[h2]News[/h2]

[h3]Alpha 13[/h3]
Alpha 13 went live last week and includes all the changes mentioned in this blog and more. Its available to our Patreon supporters!

[h3]Steam Next Fest Demo[/h3]

Our current focus is set on the Shapez 2 demo that will be available to play for everyone in the upcoming Steam Next Fest in February. Patreon supporters were given early access to this demo version and will help us find issues and leave feedback on the demo version. This way we can make sure the demo is the best it possibly can be when the time is nigh and it becomes available right here on Steam.

You can expect a dedicated devlog all about the Steam Next Fest demo soon.

[h3]Looking for testers[/h3]

We're looking for new testers, preferably ones who haven't really played shapez before. If youre interested in the game but haven't actually had the chance to play, make sure to sign up through the Alpha Playtesting form!

[hr][/hr]
[h2]Devlog 014[/h2]

As we hinted at earlier, this month we are focussing on refining the content we already have instead of working on brand-new content. We already have all the content you will find in the demo after all! So think bug fixing, perfecting key game mechanics and more optimization. However, lets start with a couple of things that are new-ish to the current build.

[h3]New content[/h3]

We added a brand-new overview mode that will show islands, trains, shapes, rails, tunnels and more when zoomed out very far farther than the Overview mode youve used so far. You can now zoom out four times further than before! Maybe space isnt big enough to house the factory youre going to be building after all



One of the highlights of our past month is the Operation Preview feature. This feature will calculate and preview the resulting shape in real-time while youre placing buildings. With this new tool in your hands, it should be a lot easier to spot an error and snuff it out before your belts are filled with a shape you didnt want to make.



The Full Cutter now has a mirrored variant, which can easily be swapped to by pressing F (by default).



The map generation has been reworked entirely. You can now configure the generation when creating a new game, but for now only the seed can be changed. This does mean you can share the map seed with others now! Additionally, more resources will spawn in the starting area to make long-distance transportation less of a necessity in the early game.

We added more knowledge panel entries for most mechanics, as well as an introduction when starting a new game. This introduction will tell you about your goals, how you progress and how you can pull up the knowledge panel when youre stuck. The panels will only show up when theyre relevant.



[h3]Game Design & Balancing[/h3]

Major changes were made to the progression system in the demo. Tunnels are now unlocked alongside islands, which in turn are unlocked right after platform buildings. Splitters and mergers are now unlocked at the start, so belt placing should feel a lot better in the early game. Additionally, the demo now includes asteroids with colored shapes.



You can expect to spend around 2 hours on progression in the demo. Youre free to continue playing as much as you like after everything is unlocked, but you wont unlock anything new.

The tutorial has been reworked to be much more expansive and complete. Every step in the tutorial is accompanied by a video that helps visualize the step. We hope the tutorial is now clear enough to teach the ropes to someone who has never played a factory game or anything similar before.



The Rotator buildings rotating speed is now directly linked to the belt speed instead of the cutting speed. This should make it easier to keep your belts running smoothly!

Weve reworked the way you place buildings and grow your factory. Its now much easier to replace buildings as pressing the Shift key will now always override whatever building is currently placed. Weve done a lot of finetuning and made various fixes for blueprint placement.




[h3]Visuals[/h3]

New shape resource node visuals have been introduced that are dynamically generated based on the contained shape. Youll see the change just below the upper plate: all the shapes you see will be the same as the shape you get when extracting from that node. Shapes with squares will clearly be more square compared to the pointy star shapes. Its a minor change but it will add some more flair and detail to the game!



Weve made various improvements to the shaders for buildings, island hover effects, blueprints & blueprint placement, the selection of buildings as well as the island grid visualization.

We added new visuals to belt launchers (yeeters) and catchers and updated the visuals for notches, shape patches and playing fields.



Various improvements have been made to shadows. They now render from farther away, space stations now have shadows on both high and extreme settings and asteroids and miners have shadows on extreme settings. In general, shadow quality should be much better than before. On the topic of quality settings, fluid deposits now have reduced visuals on lower quality settings.

All LODs (level of detail, read this devlog for more information) for all remaining buildings that will be available in the demo are done, which will help with performance a lot for all quality settings. These buildings are the full cutter, halves swapper and rotator. Miners, shape patchers and fluid asteroids now also have their LOD.


[h3]Development[/h3]

Two things in this section. First up, weve made further improvements to rendering performance. This, as always, is an ongoing process, so theres plenty more to come! Second, we introduced the Building Details graphics settings that should vastly improve the performance when set to low. This setting will make the game run a lot better on low-end systems.


[h3]UI/UX[/h3]

We made a lot and I do mean A LOT of changes to the UI and UX in the past month in preparation for the demo next year. Lets start off with a couple highlights.

The entire toolbar has seen a lot of updates with a new look and feel. The button icons are now more distinct from the buttons themselves, and the functionality clearly stands out in bright shapez 2 orange. The lock indicators of locked buttons have their opacity decreased to look less clickable than before because, well, theyre not. Additionally, the buttons have been reorganized.



We reworked the pre-load splash screen and improved the games startup time. There will be a brief loading screen to pre-load shaders and other visuals so the game will run a lot smoother during gameplay.



The last selected variant of a building is now stored and re-selected when you select the same building. For example, if the last variant of the Full Cutter is the mirrored variant, said mirrored variant will be selected by default the next time you select the Full Cutter.

Steep camera angles are now somewhat being restricted the more you zoom out. This is required to guarantee the game will continue running smoothly. We'll keep a close eye on player feedback for this change.

Interface settings & features were added for the following:

• Zoom sensitivity
  
• Invert zoom
  
• Mouse panning
  
• Mouse panning speed
  
• Invert vertical angle
  
• Lock cursor to window
  
• Move camera with floors
  

• Entire Toolbar has been reworked & reorganized
  
• Selection is no longer undo/redoable and also less permanent
  
• First polishing pass on english translation
  
• Default keybinding rework:
  - Knowledge panel is now 'G'
  - 'Space' now toggles between buildings / islands mode
  - New: Switch between toolbars ('' and 'Shift + ')
  - Toggle layers: 'L' -> 'V'
  - Delete: Can now also use 'X'
  - Pipette / Clone: 'G' -> 'F'
  - Center on HUB: 'Space' -> 'H'
  - Create waypoint: 'M' -> 'L'
  
• Allow replacing catapults with belts
  
• Mirror inverse (SHIFT + F) now works again
  
• Reworked all translations
  
• Tooltips for research nodes now show the actual speed changes
  
• Less suggestions are now shown when you have lots of pins
  
• Contextual keybinding hints have been moved next to the toolbar, also show some "standard" keybindings when nothing is selected
  
• Removed icons for keybindings since they were confusing -> Now text is always shown (i.e. "SHIFT" instead of arrow icon)
  
• Show future milestones in research tree for demo builds
  
• UI adjustments, cleanup & polishing, for example moved buttons into panels
  
• Cleaned up layer manager, consolidated UP/DOWN buttons into keybinding hints
  
• Compass now shows a west half indicator together with the current milestone shape
  
• Fixed hover animations being dependent on simulation speed and not disappearing when game is paused
  
• Added toggles instead of dropdowns for on/off settings
  
• Moved research button to the top right of the screen
  
• Fixed research nodes not being clickable and thus not unlockable
  
• Removed screenshot-without-ui feature since you can press F2 and then F4
  
• Reworked tooltip & cursor info
  
• Improved island grid visuals & add indicator around cursor while placing an island
  
• Removed unused "focus on selection" / "convert path to blueprint" feature
  
• Fixed tutorial videos not loading on Linux / Steam Deck
  
• Allow replacing extractors with an extractor that is differently rotated
  
• Shape packers/unpackers now show shapes per crate in details
  
• Fluid packers/unpackers now show liters per crate in details
  
• Rework camera indicator (lower left), now also show zoom level & zoom stages in camera indicator
  
• (Re-) Aligned HUD elements and reduced padding to the screen borders
  
• Reworked layer display & moved to right lower side of screen
  
• Reworked hotkey display on right side screen panels
  
• Reworked visualizations panel and moved to lower right as well
  
• Updated research tree UI, now showing the names of upcoming milestones
  
• Fixed completed research nodes not having tooltips, also show tooltips in suggestions & pinned research
  
• Hover effects for buildings now fades in / out
  
• Increased speed of main menu animations
  
• Input / output indicators when placing now have different sizes depending on the layer> i.e. Stacker input on layer 2 has a smaller arrow while placing
  
• Streamlined panels -> Clickable panels now have the border, "background" panels are just a flat panel (i.e. blueprint currency)
  
• Updated style of icon buttons to be more holo
  
• Allow saving selection with Ctrl + S already (to avoid having to press Ctrl + C and then Ctrl + S)
  
• Decreased UI blur amount
  
• Research unlock notification now has a short 5 second timer on the continue button to avoid accidentally skipping it
  
• Fixed jump to hub not actually jumping to the hub & also it now resets the zoom level (but not the rotation anymore)
  
• Show CPU & GPU info in settings menu to make it easier to see if the game is running on an integrated GPU
  
• Decreased opacity of toolbar "locked" indicators to avoid looking like they could be clicked
  
• Fixed "pending" selection looking like it would be above buildings
  
• Fluid resources visualization has been removed
  
• Fixed island grid visualization being "below" the islands making it a bit confusing
  
• Fixed train station visualizations being too big
  
• Fixed stacker output preview being shown at wrong location
  

• Moved layer switch buttons to layer manager again
  
• Moved skill academy above toolbar to be more noticeable
  
• Show cost while placing space belts, and better show when running out of platform blocks
  
• Added continue button to main menu
  
• Show platform limit increase in research tooltips
  
• Allow deselecting building/island selection with right click
  
• Show warning on first game start when playing with integrated / low end GPU
  
• Swapped hotkeys for delete - default is now X with Del being the secondary key
  
• Improved delete-area icon
  
• Show space belts also on extractor tab now
  
• Improved clarity/sharpness of mouse icons
  
• Reworked preload / splash screen, improved game startup time
  
• Last selected variant (i.e. rotator) is now stored and re-selected
  
• Do not show train visualizations when trains are not yet unlocked
  
• Hide main button panel when none are visible
  
• Show incompatible savegames in menu (i.e. outdated version, or Demo vs Full edition)
  
• Updated credits
  
• Updated game mode selection
  
• Added header for pinned shapes (Active Sidegoals)
  
• Added hint on blueprint library when there are no entries on how to save a blueprint to the library
  
• Flipped halves destroyer icon to align with the building functionality
  
• Disallow binding windows key
  
• Improved sharpness & Clarity of icons on lower resolutions
  
• Added hint in research unlock notification that you can find more information in the knowledge panel
  
• Made toggle buttons look less like they have been disabled
  
• Fixed invalid mouse sprites
  
• Added popup when changing language to require restart
  

Hello everyone!

One of the biggest differences between Shapez 1 and Shapez 2 is, of course, the visual upgrade. The transition from 2D to 3D is an enormous task, and we spare no effort to guarantee we will ace this step forward. For this devlog, we asked Nils, our 3D artist at tobspr Games to take you through the process of how we settled on the design philosophy of Shapez 2 and what we have to keep in mind whenever we design something.

Before we get started, please make sure you have Shapez 2 wishlisted! We have some exciting times ahead of us, and it would be a shame if you were to miss out on future updates! :)

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[h2]News[/h2]

[h3]Alpha 12[/h3]

Last week saw the release of Alpha 12, a huge update that focuses on improving the onboarding experience of Shapez 2. We are currently working on polishing this experience to a near-final state, barring any feedback we may receive from you. Want to try it out for yourself? Consider joining our Patreon!

[hr][/hr]

[h3]Nils here![/h3]

Even though Shapez 1 was a pretty complex game, it wasnt what we would call a looker. The graphics were simple and readable, but not exactly aesthetically pleasing. Its programmer art, as our lead artist would say! This is fine for those who value function over vanity, but it makes it difficult to attract new players who arent experienced factory builders already. If you take a look at a game like Satisfactory, a game thats both complex and beautiful, it appeals to all kinds of players. It has the visuals to be interesting to players who are new to the genre and the gameplay to teach them the ropes, while also being complex enough to keep veterans engaged.

This is something we feel Shapez 1 lacked. While the low-stakes gameplay was very friendly to new players, the visuals made it more of a game for people interested in IT and programming. So, for Shapez 2, Tobias envisioned a sequel that takes all the gameplay strengths of its predecessor, but takes the jump to 3D and makes it look good while keeping the game accessible.

One other change we deemed important is the complete removal of black box buildings. If you look at the buildings in Satisfactory, Factorio or Dyson Sphere Program, the resources you feed into a machine disappear into nothingness. A couple seconds later, a product pops out, and you have no clue which steps happened in between. We think the segmented nature of the shapes allows for a non-black box approach where you can see exactly what a machine does by simply looking at it doing its thing. We are not smelting iron, copper and Arachnian stalagmites to create the inverse Galerian crop circle or whatever. We cut squares into smaller squares, circles into slices, paint and then stack them. We can animate every step in the journey a shape takes, from extraction to delivery.

There are some exceptions to this rule, however. Some processes would be too difficult to animate and take more time than its ultimately worth. An example would be the packing of a thousands shapes into a small crate it makes sense from a gameplay perspective, but would visually not work well.


[h2]Getting started[/h2]

We started off with a very basic aesthetic, inspired in some ways by Mini Motorways. Limited geometry, a desaturated color palette and no fancy effects. No metallic objects, reflections or bevels. We made a few concepts for the general theme of the game and worked together with the community to settle on the space theme Shapez 2 now sports. With the theme set in place, we could now start detailing with shading, reflections and metallic objects.

The visual language for the buildings repeating patterns, colors and design choices developed over time. Back when I joined tobspr Games, all I had to work with were some very basic visuals Tobias made. Essentially, it was my job to make them look good! I proposed a few early design ideas, created animations and defined design rules that we still adhere to today. Some of these early ideas are still present in the current version of the game, like the animation for the lifts.



[h3]Pinpointing our vision[/h3]

The direction we wanted to work towards could be described as a marriage between the realism (physicality) of factories and the abstraction of space. Good examples of this are the belts and belt corners. Instead of being a simple 90 degree curve with a stretched texture, or a hard UV seam like many other games do their belts, we made something akin to how a real belt functions. These belts have a texture looping around rollers, cartoonified a bit by hiding certain complexer parts of the mechanism. This way, the belts get the vibe of a real factory, with enough abstractness to allow for greater creative freedom. More examples will follow later on!

In general, were aiming for a highly polished look with tons of detail, many of which may never be seen by a lot of you. The buildings would hold up in a (non-existent) first person mode, even if we didnt design them with that goal in mind. With the use of LODs, a consistent design language and a lot of iterating, we ended up with the world we imagined. It captures the spirit of Shapez 1, while looking a lot more appealing (to most), as well as being more readable and easier to understand.





With this design philosophy in mind, lets dive into some specific examples!


[h2]Designing buildings for Shapez 2[/h2]

The building blocks that make up the core of Shapez 2 stayed largely the same as in Shapez 1. Quite literally actually, as the game is still logically separated in square blocks of one. Since the functionality of a lot of buildings is directly taken from Shapez 1, we only had to come up with ways to visualize their inner workings. This turned out to be quite the challenge, however. With the technical and artistic constraints we were working with, it became very difficult to come up with the designs.

A lot of the technical constraints are set to make sure the game keeps running smoothly. We had to limit animations and forgo most of Unitys basic systems in order to support large factories. We cannot use baked animations, for example. If youd like to read more about the performance constraints, be sure to check out devlog 011!

[h3]Four pillars of design[/h3]

Readability, building uniqueness, building uniformity and coolness. These are the four design pillars we try to adhere to. However, within these four pillars, we can already find two conflicts: readability versus coolness and uniqueness versus uniformity. Lets go over both these conflicts!

Readability versus coolness
In a nutshell, readability is the ability for the player to easily differentiate between buildings and understand what a building does from a distance, in our case about 30 meters away. For this reason, buildings shouldnt have too much visual noise and animations should be simple, e.g. not have too many moving parts. Coolness is all about how fun and interesting the game looks.



Of course, it would be fun if we could give every building big lasers, launchers and complex animations, but this comes at the cost of readability. The more flair a building gets, the more detailed it gets and the less readable it becomes. If we make every building a big light show, youd have no clue whats going on after youve placed a couple down.



Uniqueness versus uniformity
This conflict links directly to readability. You need buildings to look and feel unique to make them stand out and make their function clear. However, the game should look coherent and every building should share one visual design language.



Every building should follow these four pillars of design. They should look cool, yet readable. To be readable, they should look unique, yet similar enough to fall in line with the other buildings.

[h3]Design pipeline[/h3]

Each and every building has to go through a long string of departments and stages before its finalized form makes it into the game. Their journey is as followed:

Polishing (Quality Assurance)

Of course, this is a very simplified look at the entire process. It makes sure we dont miss any crucial oversights, like animation clipping between adjacent buildings or concepts not adhering to the aforementioned design pillars.

[h3]Logistic versus processing buildings[/h3]

We differentiate between logistic and processing buildings. Belts, mergers, splitters and lifts are logistic buildings; they move shapes around. Buildings like cutters, stackers, painters and swappers are processing buildings; they make changes to the actual shapes, producing different shapes.

The function of a building will also determine their design language. Logistic buildings have lightweight, open designs that clearly display what theyre transporting. They have unique designs per build layer to differentiate them, and have one central orange element that does something, like the pusher element in a splitter. Processing buildings should stand out and really look like buildings. They have very boxy designs and have thick, orange borders, yet should retain a unique look to differentiate them. With these differences, players should easily be able to tell the difference between the two types of buildings, even from far away.



[h3]Design limitations and rules[/h3]

With all this in mind, we face a handful of limitations when it comes to designing buildings, the design pillars aside.

Shape supports should be handled in some way, they may not just spawn in or magically disappear



One issue were still actively working on are the supports for multi-layer buildings. As you can place buildings below these belts, the belt supports can conflict with the building below. Not having any supports looks weird, but theyre technically not relevant for gameplay.

[h3]Casus 1: The (full) cutter[/h3]

Anyone familiar with Shapez 1 will probably recognise the cutter:



This building works well in the Shapez 1 style, but it doesnt translate well to Shapez 2. Tobias created a basic model for the cutter, which gave me a rough idea on how it should work in 3D as an open design. However, the visuals needed a complete rework.

This presented quite the challenge, since in Shapez 2 the building operations are not dependent on camera rotation, but tied to the world as it were. This is necessary, as blueprints wouldnt work if the buildings would change the axis they work on. If the cutting angle would be baked into the building itself, said angle would change if the rotation of the blueprint would change. This also means youd get a different output every time you rotate a blueprint.

You can see the solution below. The blue half circle indicates which part of the shape is manipulated. The same principles extend to the Swapper as well.



[h3]Casus 2: Lifts[/h3]

To introduce a completely new problem to developing this game, we decided to add layers. You have to be able to move a shape from one layer to the layer above or below. Lets go through all the boxes it has the mark off, shall we?

Lifts should

• not clip
  
• not use baked animations
  
• support a fully upgraded belt
  
• be able to stop if the output stalls
  
• not use more than 2 moving parts
  
• support corner and backward delivery options
  
• make sense when viewed from above
  
• fit the general style of the game
  
• not take up too much space (open design)
  
• look solid and sturdy
  
• have visible support for moving parts
  
• have a looping animation
  

Thats quite a lot of requirements to work with, but were very happy with how it turned out. The current design is almost a year old by now, yet its still one of my personal favorites.

Not to mention you can make stuff like this:



[h3]Its in the details[/h3]

As we mentioned before, we went for a very polished, yet stylized look. Almost every building currently has one or two little details that you can discover if you zoom in close enough. Lets have a little peek:



The belts were made to emulate the look of real conveyor belts, including a bit of suspension that holds everything in place. We made sure the UVs and textures arent stretched and decided on handling the change of direction of belts in a way where they feed into each other instead of warping.



Or take a look at the painter, which is admittedly still very much a work in progress as far as shaders are concerned and will get another overhaul later. We wanted the painter to adapt to the height of the shapes coming in. So, we added a hinge and allowed the roller to move up and down as shapes of different heights are fed into the machine.



[hr][/hr]
We hope this devlog showed you a complete picture of our design process for Shapez 2. Of course, we also hope you enjoyed it :)

If you have any questions, be sure to join the Discord server.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

See you again in two weeks!

~ Nils & the Shapez 2 team


[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

Twitter / X Discord Reddit Patreon

Hey everyone!

Happy progress blog day! Weve been working a lot on the visual presentation of Shapez 2. This includes everything from making the game easier to navigate, as well as making the whole factory-building aspect (which is quite important in Shapez 2, Id say) smoother and a bit faster.

As always, these blogs are bi-weekly! One week, it's all about the progress we made developing the game. Two weeks later, we do a deep dive into one specific mechanic or feature that warrants some explaining. We plan to keep this cadence going until the full release of the game, and probably even after!

While youre here, make sure you have Shapez 2 wishlisted! Not only does it allow you to stay up to date with the latest know-how on the game, it also gives Shapez 2 a better shot at getting featured by Steam. It would help us out a ton, thanks!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[h2]News[/h2]

[h3]Alpha 11[/h3]

Alpha 11 is available to our Patreon supporters and features all the improvements we mention in this blog, alongside a handful of smaller changes (like bug fixes). These alphas are as per usual available for Windows, Mac and Linux systems.

[hr][/hr]
[h2]Devlog 012[/h2]

Well first tackle some changes that directly impact how you build your factories. We will then move on to the visual changes that will improve the overall gameplay experience.

[h3]Game Design[/h3]

It's finally here: Introducing the Blueprint Library! While still a work-in-progress, it allows you to save and load blueprints to your heart's content. You can also copy the blueprint to share with others through a simple text message, or dive into your game files to find the Blueprints folder. From here, you can share the blueprint files with others or back them up for later use.

This is just the start of our plans for the Blueprint Library. We'll be adding a bunch of features to organize your library, like folders and customizable icons.

You can now also research discounts for your blueprints that allow you to place the specified amount of buildings free of charge.



We made some changes to the way you connect two space stations to each other using belts. When placing belts, the game will automatically place receivers on station notches for you when you place the catapult. There is now also an indicator for this mechanic to make it more clear.



Deleting one of the outputs of a belt splitter or merger will now automatically remove the left-over connection of the deleted output. So, when deleting an output, a three-way splitter will turn into a two-way splitter and a two-way splitter will turn into a regular belt.



We added some new station platform designs. Have a look!



The shape & fluid patches have been updated with a new potential layout. These changes are accompanied by updated visuals for the fluid patches, as well as the outer walls of fluid and shape miners.




Additionally, a starting map will now spawn resource patches closer to the HUB, lowering the amount of transportation necessary in the early stages of the game.


[h3]Visual Updates[/h3]

A new design for the Full Cutter has been added, and the name for the Full Cutter will just be Cutter going forward.



New Halves Swapper design & animations have been added.



The HUB was rotated 90 degrees so the initial camera position now faces north. This should make it easier to get your bearings when starting a new game!

The tunnel entrances and exits are now finally centered! No more throwing shapes through solid walls.



New indicators for mismatched belt directions have been added. Weve all messed this up before, so now it should be easier to notice when something is off! The current visuals are placeholders and will be changed in the near future.




[h3]UI/UX[/h3]

Weve been putting a lot of work into updating the UI and UX in the latest Alpha versions. Lets take you through the highlights!

The icons for the toolbar, all the buildings and some UI elements have been updated in a new style. Thank you to the people in the Discord for your initial feedback on these new visuals!



Additionally, the icon for certain key bindings have been updated to be more readable. For example, the 'SHIFT' key binding is now reflected with a single-family home, the arrow you see on most keyboards.



The Skill Academy we covered in Devlog 010 is now implemented, and will give you quick tips on newly unlocked features. Be sure to read them if you ever run into a skill, uh... issue.



Unlock notifications now display videos of the newly unlocked buildings, which show how theyre used.



Updated placement grid and Layer UX visuals now indicate which layer is selected. This should make it easier to build across multiple layers and keep track of the layers on which youre building.



The lock indicators are now always shown, so youll always know which slots are locked and which ones aren't.



Building descriptions are now shown when selected and are unique per variant. The descriptions for every building and its variants have been updated along with this change.

Several improvements have been made to the main menu and settings page. These improvements include drop-down lists for most settings and clearer key bind settings, as well as a confirmation prompt when leaving the graphic settings page with unsaved changes.




Were experimenting with hover indicators when hovering buildings or islands. Hovering is the state the building is in when the building is selected but not yet placed. Please let us know your thoughts on these indicators!



[h3]Balancing[/h3]

Were working on rebalancing various goals to make the progression of the game feel more rewarding. The Tunnels, Chunk Limit 1 and Blueprints have been moved to unlock slightly earlier, while the splitter & merger goal will take more shapes to unlock. Platform and chunk limits have been increased.

Half Swapper and Full Cutter speeds have been changed. For both, youll now only need 4 to keep up with a full belt.



[hr][/hr]
And that wraps up everything for this devlog! Be sure to leave your thoughts in the comments, or join the discussions on the Discord server.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


We hope you enjoyed reading devlog 012, see you again in two weeks!

~Tobias & the shapez 2 team

[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

Twitter / X Discord Reddit Patreon

Hey everyone!

We get a lot of questions about performance, so we thought it would be a good idea to take you through our progress of optimizing Shapez 2 to run as smoothly as possible. We asked Lorenzo, one of our developers, to take you through everything. This is a very technical blog, so if you're not experienced with this stuff, feel free to skip this one.

Before you dive in, be sure to wishlist Shapez 2 if you haven't already! It helps us out massively. Thanks!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[hr][/hr]

[h3]Lorenzo here![/h3]

In our journey to evolve the shape of Shapez from a 2D game to a stunning 3D experience, we've encountered numerous exciting challenges and opportunities. This transformation not only adds depth to the game but also infuses it with more personality, gameplay possibilities, and aesthetic appeal.

However, this transition has not been without its fair share of obstacles. The move to 3D has introduced a multitude of development challenges, spanning game design, artistic direction, and technical implementation. Perhaps one of the most significant technical challenges lies in rendering 3D objects.

In Shapez 1, rendering was relatively straightforward, with one sprite per building. In the 3D realm, each building has thousands of triangles to render, different materials and animations. For large factories, this requires a considerable amount of optimization, both in the simulation of these entities and in the rendering process.

In this devlog we go in-depth in a lot of the rendering optimizations tailored specifically for Shapez 2, as well as what is missing and what are the next steps in keeping a stable frame rate with massive factories.



[h2]Introduction[/h2]

Performance has always been at the forefront of our development philosophy. Right from the beginning, we made deliberate choices to ensure the game's efficiency. In the game context, we can split the performance into three categories: Simulation, Rendering & Interfacing. The simulation changes from Shapez 1, as well, as some insights of how we are pushing the performance for large factories can be found in Devlog 001. The interface, meaning, every interaction that the user communicates with the game and reflects both in the simulation and rendering, is very circumstantial. It can be optimized on a case-by-case basis. The rendering issue, however, is one of the biggest challenges to overcome. We already did a lot, but given the massive scope that we aim for, it might not be quite enough yet.

To kick this devlog off, let's first discuss a bit about how the rendering works (in a very high-level way).

[h3]Overview of the rendering workflow (CPU-GPU)[/h3]
It is important to understand that CPUs and GPUs serve very different purposes. I like to think of the CPU as the solver of all problems: no matter what you throw at it, it can handle it to some degree. Sure, if you jump around instructions and memory, the performance will degrade, but it is not compared to how a GPU would handle it. CPUs pipelines help process many instructions per cycle while branch predictors try to minimize the amount of incorrect jumps and L1, L2 & L3 caches reduce RAM fetching latency. On top of that, processors today come with many cores, but leave the responsibility of using such cores to the developer. More on this later.

The GPU on the other hand is a hardware specialized in processing a single instruction for a very large amount of data. That's why it shines in computer graphics and game development: just think about the number of pixels in your screen, the number of polygons a model has or the amount of rays that need to be traced to render one frame of a path-traced scene. As mentioned in the previous paragraph, it is not so good at switching state (branching). In other words, drawing two different objects once is slower than drawing one object twice.

With that in mind, the processor is the part that will handle all the input, interfacing, and simulation for game development. And after all that, it will dispatch to the GPU what it wants to draw. In order to draw something into the screen, the CPU needs to pass some data to the GPU: a mesh, transformation matrix and a shader (yes, this is very, very oversimplified). Imagine if we want to draw our very hard-working belt. The CPU, after processing the simulation, asks the GPU: Hey, would you be so nice to draw this belt mesh at this position using this shader right here? While youre at it, draw this shape in this position slightly above the belt and so on.

[h3]Culling[/h3]
The CPU tells the GPU (nicely or not) what it should draw, and the GPU complies without hesitation. What data is communicated is crucial for performance. Imagine telling the GPU to draw every object in your scene? Even the ones behind the camera? The GPU does not have a lot of context to work with and will process most parts of its rendering pipeline until realizing that the object is not in view. Defining which objects are visible in the current view is called Frustum Culling. Ideally, this should be performed by the CPU.

The way that the data is communicated is also very important, that's why the Khronos Group at some point realized that their OpenGL was too high-level and created Vulkan, a very low-level API for interoperating between CPU/GPU. Unfortunately, Steam character limit wont allow us to go in depth, but you can read more about it .

[h2]What we have been doing[/h2]

Alright, now that we are in sync regarding how CPU and GPU need to communicate, let's talk about what already has been implemented in Shapez 2 to maximize the performance.

[h3]Game Object avoidance[/h3]
We steered clear of Unity's Mono Behaviors for core components that demand high performance. Except for the UI, almost all of our systems are written without Unity components. This allows us to employ a better architecture following C# principles and have fine control over all aspects of the game, including the performance.

[h3]GPU instancing[/h3]
In Unity, to draw geometry on the screen, draw calls are issued to the graphics API. A draw call tells the graphics API what to draw and how to draw it. Each draw call contains all the information the graphics API needs to draw on the screen, such as information about textures, shaders, and buffers. Less draw calls are better, as the GPU has less work to do and less switching to perform. One of the most important optimizations in the rendering of Shapez 2 is using the full potential of GPU instancing: grouping objects with the same mesh and shader in a single draw call.



In my assignment to enter tobspr, I was tasked to create a shader that would logically render many materials based on some mesh data. So I did, but In order to fully explore the potential of such a shader, I decided to run some tests comparing the performance of drawing Game Objects vs. batching all rendering in a single instanced draw call. For the test, I used 64643 = 12k low-poly belts and the results were astonishing:



[h3]Material combination[/h3]
Our buildings and space stations are composed by different materials:



Since each building might be composed using multiple materials, this would require multiple draw calls per building. To improve it, we combined all of them in a single shader. This allows us to have only one mesh for each building main part which is drawn with a single material, thus a single draw call. The material split is made inside the shader using the information of the UV0 channel, which encodes the material index per vertex data. Additional moving parts and effects need to be drawn separately.



[h3]Mesh combining[/h3]
Having a shared material for all buildings reduces tremendously the number of draw calls, but it also provides the foundation for a very interesting optimization: mesh combination (also sometimes called mesh baking). At runtime, buildings on the same island are combined into a single batch dynamically. Since the material is unified and the mesh contains all buildings, we can render tons of buildings with the most varied materials in a single draw call.

The example below uses only two combined meshes to draw all of these buildings main components:




[h3]Level of Detail (LOD)[/h3]
We take vertex count very seriously, even one extra vertex can become 300,000 extra ones when rendering very large factories. To support very detailed, yet scalable meshes, we created different meshes for each building in different levels of details. The model that is actually presented on the screen is calculated at runtime based on the camera distance.



[h2]What's the problem, then?[/h2]

With all those optimizations, the rendering performance should be excellent, right? Well, it is, but we always want more. Better performance means bigger factories, more compatibility with older hardware and less hardware pressure. The question naturally becomes: what can be optimized next? So far, you might have recognized a pattern in the optimizations above: they are all targeted at optimizing the GPU rendering process. Less draw calls, less vertices, less context switching. Indeed, the hardest part of rendering is always focused on the GPU, and were getting very close to the scale we are aiming for. However, all of these techniques put further pressure on the CPU, which already needs to deal with the simulation part. As Tobias always says, each 0.1ms saved from the rendering will be well spent in the simulation, allowing for further complicated factories to run.

During development, we avoided using Unity components as they are generally not very performant. Core components have been written with performance in mind, employing several algorithmic optimizations to ensure everything runs smoothly. However, the code executed by the CPU is still written in C#. This comes with limitations on how performant it can be, as the language offers a trade-off between productivity and runtime performance.

The table below provides some insights about the performance of each language for single thread tests. The algorithm executed is the same, yet the time difference to execute it can be abysmal.


Source

[h2]Enter DOTS (or part of it)[/h2]

Unity is a beginner-friendly engine with a lot of features both to help you get started and for veterans to write very complicated systems. However, although there are many highly optimized systems and a high influx of new optimizations, the underlying structure was not created with performance in mind. During the past decade, the engine race was quite fierce between Unreal and Unity. Numerous debates over which one is the best one, forced Unity hand to take their lack of performance into consideration, thus yielding a completely new paradigm with a powerful tool belt to back it up: the Data Oriented Technology Stack (DOTS).

It was created with the slogan: Performance by default and since its impressive debut in Megacity (2019), has received dozens of improvements. DOTS is a combination of technologies and packages that delivers a data-oriented design approach to building games in Unity. Applying data-oriented design to a games architecture empowers game creators to scale processing in a highly performant manner. It is composed mainly by three technologies: ECS for Unity, Burst Compiler & C# Job System.

ECS is a data-oriented framework focused on structuring the code in a very different manner than traditional Object-Oriented (OO). Instead of mixing and matching data and implementation. As the name suggests, ECS has three main parts. Heres an excerpt from Unitys own documentation:

• Entities the entities, or things, that populate your game or program
  
• Components the data associated with your entities
  
• Systems the logic that transforms the component data from its current state to its next state
  

• Limited C# Subset: Burst Compiler operates on a constrained subset of C# and does not support, by design, inefficient patterns.
  
• No Garbage Collection: Manual memory management eliminates the need for garbage collection, reducing time spikes.
  
• No References, Just Plain Data: Data is stored without references, facilitating faster memory access.
  
• Adjacent Memory: Most jobs are written reading/writing to contiguous memory, making it possible to use vectorization (SIMD) and efficient use of CPU caches.
  
• Parallelism with Job System: Enhanced parallel processing capabilities.
  

• It can be challenging to split the workload between multiple threads;
  
• Most games are not coded with that in mind and have data dependencies everywhere;
  
• Race conditions, deadlocks and complicated issues might arise
  
• Most games do not have a lot of processing to do (generally the rendering is the performance culprit)
  

• Persistent GPU
  
• Scriptable layout
  
• DOTS instancing shader variant
  
• Compatible with DOTS
  

• Due to the nature of a culling algorithm, vectorizing the code is very challenging, but we believe a part of it could still benefit from the AVX set;
  
• You can see that each decoration is culled sequentially in a single thread. Each decoration could dispatch one job per thread, or the jobs could be scheduled to run at the same time. For higher numbers of cores, both could be combined to achieve even more parallelism.
  

Hey everyone!

Its time for another progression blog. These past two weeks were all about visual improvements to the shapes, building and various menus & UI!

As per usual, make sure you wishlist shapez 2 here on Steam to support the development of the game! Following the game will also make sure you stay up to date with the latest news. Thanks!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[h2]News[/h2]

[h3]Alpha 9[/h3]

Since Devlog 008, we have released two new Alphas! Patreon Supporters gained access to Alpha 9 last week, with all-new progression, research UI, new visuals, massive performance improvements and much more! If youd like to get your hands on the latest Alpha version, consider supporting us on Patreon.

[hr][/hr]

[h2]Devlog 010[/h2]

So, what have we been working on the past month? Lets talk you through the highlights.

[h3]Visual update to shape designs[/h3]

We made a couple of changes to the general look of all shapes in the game. The sides of shapes are now solid black and the height of every layer has been lowered. This will make shapes with many layers a lot less tall and clunky than before.

Be sure to let us know what you think about these changes!



[h3]Progression Rework[/h3]

We have completely reworked the progression of the entire game. We swapped around the Halves Swapper and the Stacker, as we found that the Halves Swapper was too complicated to be unlocked that early into the game. While we were working on this change, we figured it was a good time to look at the rest of the progression. We got a ton of feedback from the community on the progression system, so we made a lot of changes to the later stages of the game especially. We hope that the newly reworked progression system will feel more natural than the previous one. Patreons can experience the new progression in Alpha 9.



[h3]Building design updates[/h3]

Stackers have been updated to be more of a challenge to use. The old design, with the input on one side and the output on the opposite end, had one very clear, obvious and quite boring optimal setup that everyone would use.

The new design has the output at a 90 degree angle compared to the input, either on the left or the right. This will make Stackers a bit more tricky to use, and allows for multiple different solutions to the problem.

We also made stackers faster to keep optimal designs similarly compact even with the added space for creative problem solving: now instead of needing 5 Stackers per full belt, you will only need 4!



All variants of the Rotator building have updated design concepts to more clearly display their use.



Half Cutters have been renamed to Half Destroyers to more accurately reflect their functionality. Their design has had a big update, featuring a fancy laser beam of destruction.



Additionally, the Full Painter building has been updated with a new design concept.



[h3]Skill Academy[/h3]

We added what we call the Skill Academy. Essentially, these are tips that appear in the top left corner to guide new players through the early stages of the game. This is not the tutorial, but should help prevent confusion when players are new to shapez or factory building games as a whole. These can be toggled off, if desired.



Speaking of the tutorial, you'll also spot the "First Steps" section. This is, in fact, the tutorial. It will guide you through the early sections of the game while you're playing, by giving you pointers to what things are what exactly is expected from you while playing Shapes 2.

[h3]UI updates[/h3]

A lot of screens got various degrees of updates. The research screen got a reworked concept, and should now more clearly show what you can unlock, when you unlock them, and how you unlock them. The progression system has also received an update, with side goals that are unlocked once reaching a specific main goal.



The research unlock screen got updated to display the new tools you unlocked and how they work. The current visual of the unlocked tool is a placeholder.



The in-game shape viewer has had an update to make the shape code editable, allowing you to view any shape you want. Hours of entertainment guaranteed!



Finally, we gave the building and island toolbars a fresh lick of paint for better readability.



We would love your feedback on all these UI updates, so let us know what you think!

[h3]Blueprinting[/h3]

Blueprints have received a big update in two parts. Now, when selecting one or more space stations, youll get an overview of all buildings and connections, as well as the total cost of everything thats placed on or connected to them. Youll also get a more in-depth overview that breaks down the amounts for each type of building.



The second big update lets you copy, cut, rotate and paste your selection of space stations. This means youll be able to grow the factory faster than ever and increase your throughput with just a few clicks, as long as you have the resources!



You can accumulate more blueprint resources by delivering shapes of completed research.

[h3]Performance Improvements[/h3]

We made big strides when it comes to performance! Below, you can watch a showcase of what it's like playing on a Macbook M1 Pro at 4K. This save features 540.000 buildings.

[previewyoutube=ZuY9avTWe8Y;full][/previewyoutube]

Of course, the FPS isn't the greatest, but these machines aren't really made for games. You would already hit 60 FPS on modern machines. Shapez 1 would already run at 1 FPS under these circumstances.

We still have a lot more performance improvements planned, so the game will run even better when we enter Early Access. Rest assured that we work very hard to make this game playable on as many machines as possible!

[h3]Various other changes[/h3]

The procedural map generation has been improved. You should now come across more interesting shapes to work with. The nodes remain placeholders for now.

The Overview Mode view for these resource nodes has also had a visual update!




Tunnels can now be set to automatically place tunnels connection your space station.



We added a new concept design for the 1x1 Shape Miner platform. Just look at this little guy go!



We continue our work on trains and will soon be ready to do a deep dive into how exactly they will work and what you can do with them.

Additional mouse and keyboard settings have been added to the settings menu, allowing you to set your horizontal and vertical mouse sensitivity, as well as the keyboard camera movement speed. It goes up quite a lot, in case time is of the essence.



[hr][/hr]

Thats everything for this blog. Let us know if you like what youre seeing! The next blog will go more in-depth again, so on the lookout for that one dropping in two weeks.

Again, please consider wishlisting the game if you havent yet!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


We hope you enjoyed devlog 010, and well see you again soon!

~Tobias & the shapez 2 team

[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

Twitter / X Discord Reddit Patreon

Hey guys!

While we are currently super busy working on Shapez 2, we have partnered with Prismatika & Playdigious to bring shapez 1 to mobile devices!

Shapez Mobile will release on December 5th on iOS and Android.



Be sure to pre-register so you get a notification when it releases (You can also just search for "shapez" on the app store):



You will be able to play the first 7 levels for free, and then you can unlock the full game until level 20 for a price of $4.99, with a 10% launch discount!

The game will be feature par with the desktop version until level 20, so basically everything except wires.
Cross platform saves will not be supported on launch unfortunately - but let us know if this is a feature you'd like to see!

We are super hyped, and hope you are too!

~Tobias

Hey everyone!

Were working on a new shape type thats coming to shapez 2: Crystals. These crystals will massively shake up the endgame and come with a couple of handling instructions.

Before we get into it, be sure to wishlist shapez 2 if you havent already! It really helps us out with the release of the game.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[hr][/hr]

[h2]Devlog 009 - Crystals[/h2]

While were still in the early development stages of crystals, we would like to walk you through how they work and our vision for the mechanic. Be sure to let us know what you think!

Please keep in mind that the current visuals for the crystals are placeholders and will be changed before early access.

[h3]What are crystals?[/h3]

Crystals are a brand new shape type you will encounter in the final stages of the game. Theyre pieces of solidified colored paint that are quite brittle in nature and should be handled with care. This fragility means crystals come with their own set of rules and mechanics, which will shake up the production order youre used to and provide greater depth and diversity when it comes to producing shapes.



You'll come across the basics of crystals in the final milestones of the game. The more complex crystal milestones will be an optional challenge for those who dare.

[h3]Creating crystals[/h3]

Crystals are created using the Crystal Generator, a machine that will turn any paint you pipe into it into a hardened shape. The shape the crystal takes on depends on what you use as a mold: the Crystal Generator will fill up any empty spaces including supports of the shape you send through the machine up to the uppermost layer of the shape.



Doesnt matter if youre a bit square or a star as long as the space is occupied by any shape, even other crystals, the Crystal Generator will not pour paint into it. Additionally, crystal isnt any specific shape, like a circle or a square, and cannot be painted after hardening. Its 100% solid crystal with the color of the paint you used to create it.

[h3]Handle with care[/h3]

The tricky thing with crystals is their aforementioned fragility; if youre not careful with them, theyll shatter into millions of incredibly tiny shapes, unfit for production. Thats to say, they break and disappear.

So, when it comes to keeping these crystals intact, there are two rules to keep in mind:

1. Separating (cutting, swapping) two or more connected crystal parts will cause all adjacent crystals to shatter. Crystals can be safely separated from normal shapes (molds), however.



To help you determine when two crystals are connected, here is the code:



2. Dropping crystals on top of another shape using a Stacker will cause the dropped crystals to shatter. Shapes can be safely dropped on top of crystals, however.



[h3]A brand new challenge[/h3]

The inclusion of crystals will seriously change up the way you need to think about creating shapes. It essentially inverts your production; instead of directly producing the shape you need, you need to produce the exact opposite and leave the spaces you want the paint to harden in unoccupied. The molds themselves could be considered an intermediate-level shape goal, with parts that can either be discarded or reused continuously.

Considering the fragility of crystals, its wise to delay the inclusion of crystals in your production chain as long as possible. Prepare everything you can, produce the ideal mold for the crystal shape goal you need, and only pour the paint after everything else is done.

If your shape goal only requires one color of crystals, you will only need one mold. However, if multiple colors of crystals are required, youll need one mold for every color and pour the paint in stages. Once all the different crystal components have been poured, combine the crystals using a half swapper, for example. Just remember: do not separate or drop crystals!



[hr][/hr]
Thats all we have to share on crystals for now. This mechanic is still in early development, so be sure to let us know your thoughts on this addition! You can join the discussion on the shapez 2 Discord server.

If you like what you see, be sure to wishlist shapez 2 to support the game and stay up to date with development!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


~Tobias & the shapez 2 team

[h3]Join the community:[/h3]

Twitter / X Discord Reddit Patreon

Hey everyone!

Its been a little while since the last devlog. Weve been very busy with the Gameplay Reveal trailer from two weeks ago, which was then followed up by Gamescom.

However, were back now! So lets discuss what weve been working on since devlog 007.

[h2]News[/h2]

As previously mentioned, we finally released the Gameplay Reveal Trailer for shapez 2! Thank you to everyone who joined us for the premiere and supported the trailer.

In case you missed it, you can find the trailer here:

[previewyoutube=0VO_52LJ268;full][/previewyoutube]

If that got you as excited as we are, be sure to wishlist the game and follow shapez 2 to stay up to date with the news!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[h3]Reinforcements[/h3]

The astute among you may have noticed a second logo at the end of the trailer. We are working with Gamera Games who you may know from Dyson Sphere Program to publish the game in Greater China & Japan. They will also handle the Simplified Chinese translations for our announcements and devlogs!

Additionally, we have enlisted the help of Game Drive, a games marketing agency. As were moving ever closer to the Early Access release next year, marketing becomes more and more important for the growth of the game, so we need some extra manpower!


[h3]Alpha 7 Build[/h3]

Alpha 7.4 of shapez 2 is currently available on our Patreon and has been for a bit. A lot of the changes youll read about below have already been implemented in this build. If youre interested in giving this new build a go, be sure to subscribe to our Patreon to get access, alongside a host of other great benefits!

[hr][/hr]
[h2]Devlog 008[/h2]

So with all that out of the way, lets dive into the new devlog.

[h3]Rendering & graphical performance[/h3]

After watching the trailer, a lot of you had questions about the performance of the game. Once you really got going in shapez 1 and made a huge factory, or made a make-everything-machine or two, the simulation could start to lag quite badly. So understandably, when people saw the graphical uplift of shapez 2, people assumed this would make things worse. Well, fret not!

Unlike Shapez 1, Shapez 2 is made in Unity with C#. This gives us a lot more tools to optimise the simulation and prevent unnecessary use of your systems resources. One of the changes is that the game now supports multi-threaded processing, so the simulation and the game wont run on just one of your CPUs cores. The biggest change however, is how we handle off-screen simulation. Instead of just fully simulating everything in your factory at all times, were limiting the simulation of the portion of your factory that isnt currently on your screen to just 2 times a second down from the full 60 times a second while still running at full precision. You wont notice a mechanical or visual difference at all. However, itll make sure the simulation runs smoothly regardless of the size of your factory.

We stress tested this system on a mega factory of 360.000+ buildings and it works great. In fact, you saw this very factory in the trailer! Our goal here is to allow for about 1 million buildings on a modern PC build for the release of the game.



Do keep in mind that the massively improved graphics will mean you most likely wont be able to sneakily play Shapez 2 on the school computer as you could (and we know you did) with shapez.io. You will require a bit more computing power to run this at a smooth frame rate; without any tweaking of the settings, that is!

To counteract the increased resource demand of the game somewhat, there will be a host of graphical options to tinker with, alongside a minimal mode. This mode will reduce the visuals to an absolute minimum and allows Shapez 2 to be played on laptops. This mode has been tested on a Microsoft Surface Pro and runs fine!

Exact minimum and recommended system requirements are to be determined and published closer to the release of the game. If you want to give it a try right now though, be sure to download the free alpha version through our Discord server! As the game still has a lot of optimisation to go in its current state, its safe to say that if your PC runs Alpha well, it will be able to run it in the future.

[h3]Trains progress[/h3]

We know youre excited for space trains, and were working hard to make them a reality. Youve seen them in action in the trailer, so youll have a good idea of the vision we have for them. Do keep in mind that the trains are still subject to change.



However, a lot of work still needs to be done to make trains fully operational, but were on track to have the trains depart for Early Access next year. We hope to do a devlog dedicated to trains in the future, once theyre finalised.

[h3]Barreling[/h3]

In devlog 006, we introduced you to the world of fluids. One of the topics we addressed here was fluid packing and cross-island transport. As theres no way of moving fluids directly between islands, youd need to produce barrels to keep the fluid in, fill the barrels, then move it by your preferred mode of transportation. Once at your destination, youd empty the barrels and pump the fluid back into your pipe system.

We feel like the process of producing barrels didnt quite fit. Having to deliver shapes somewhere to produce the barrels made fluids a hassle to use. It didnt add anything interesting to the mechanics, just more tedium.

Instead, the Fluid Packer building will take the fluid and freezes it into blocks that can be transported however you wish.

[h3]Auto pinning side goals[/h3]

As the side goals are very important for your progression through the game, we want to make them a bit more prominent. Now, side goals are automatically pinned if you produce the shape they require.

We will continue working on the early game and research experience and are planning to add a full tutorial.



[h3]Visualisation layers in overview mode[/h3]

We added brand new visualisation layers to the overview mode. You watch a neat little demonstration here:

[previewyoutube=pJmYjAyCzbg;full][/previewyoutube]

The layers now include:

• Islands grid
  
• Shape Patches
  
• Fluid Resources
  
• Shapes
  
• Explored Areas & islands
  
• Tunnels
  
• Train Items
  
• Train Lines
  
• Train Stations
  

Hey everyone!

Its been a long time coming, but its finally here: we now have a Reveal Trailer for shapez 2!

[h3]Watch it on YouTube:[/h3]

[previewyoutube=0VO_52LJ268;full][/previewyoutube]
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

Shapez 2 is all about building the biggest shape-producing mega-factory you could imagine. With the infinite canvas of space to exploit, its up to you to create a machine that can extract, cut, paint and assemble the shapes you need to progress and grow your factory. Start off with the humble gray circle and work your way up towards increasingly more complex shapes while unlocking new machines, upgrades and modes of transport along the way.



You can play shapez 2 however you like! Make a spaghetti belt factory even you no longer understand, or optimize every little detail in the production process. Make one big mega-factory, or split the production chain across multiple smaller factories that you connect by space trains. Theres no threat of alien invasion or worse: running out of resources. Take your time, experiment and build a factory you can truly be proud of!



[h2]Thank you for your support[/h2]

Whether youve been with us from the early days of shapez.io or are only passing by just now, we thank you for the time and support weve received over the past couple of months and years. We owe much to the community, and without you, shapez 2 simply wouldnt be possible.

[h2]Help us test the game[/h2]

Eager to give the game a go? You can join our Discord server to access the public build of shapez 2 and give us feedback on the gameplay and the stability of the game. If youd like to support us early, head over to our Patreon! Patreon supporters get access to the latest alpha build whenever a new one releases. Together, we hope to bring the Early Access of shapez 2 to you in 2024 in the best possible shape it could be.

Be sure to wishlist shapez 2 on Steam! Indie games like shapez 2 heavily rely on wishlisting to reach a broader player base. Wed really appreciate your support, and youll be kept up to date with news about the game!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


[h3]Follow us on our socials:[/h3]

Twitter Discord Patreon

Hey guys!

First of all, I apologize for the short break on devlogs. We are super busy working on the reveal trailer right now (which we want to showcase somewhere in August) which is why I simply lacked the time to do those detailed devlogs!

[h2]News[/h2]

Be sure to wishlist & follow Shapez 2 to receive important updates and notifications about playtests!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

[h3]New Team Members[/h3]

Our team has grown, so that we are now 6 people in full time, and about to become 7!

Currently we are:
Tobias - Producer / Developer / Game Designer
Daniel - Lead Artist
Nils - 3D Artist
Dimitri - Game Designer (part time shapez, part time secret unannounced kiwi project)
Lorenzo - Developer
Stefan - Community support + Quality Assurance
Nicko - Developer (Starting in July)

[h3]Alpha 6 Builds[/h3]

We are currently working on finalizing Alpha 6 which will still take a while, but if you are interested in trying it out and get involved in the development process as early as possible, our Patreon Supporters already have access! Subscribing to Patreon also gives you a few other benefits, like exclusive discord channel access, live Q&As, Steam Keys and more.

Alpha 6 will probably launch as a Steam Playtest, but we will announce that in a later news post!

[h2]Devlog #007[/h2]

Alright, time for a new devlog! In this devlog, I want to go over the changes we've made since the last update:

[h3]New HUB effects & indicators[/h3]

The visuals of the central hub have been reworked! First of all, there are now indicators that show you whether the shape you currently deliver is required for any research. A red "X" means you are definitely delivering a shape that is used nowhere in the game (very useful!).

Also the hub now glows more the more shapes you feed in :)





[h3]Progression[/h3]

Alpha 6, as the first alpha, will have actual progression! We expect around 10-15 hours of gameplay already. We also made a small tool to help us balance the research tree, which you can check out here!



[h3]Overview Mode Improvements[/h3]

The overview mode (when you zoom out far) got a lot of improvements and also visualizes trains & tunnels now properly. However, it is still very much work in progress!



[h3]Megafactories[/h3]

For our trailer we started to build a megafactory already, and here are some impressions!



We still need to add a lot of graphics optimizations (a lot of things are still rendered at the highest lod, regardless of the distance) but the simulation can already simulate factories that big! The factory in the screenshot consists of around 360,000 buildings.

As you can see, the idea is that in the endgame, instead of building your buildings individually, you build modular islands (like a "stacker" / "cutter" island) and blueprint / reuse them! Basically like playing shapez 1, but you built the buildings (=space stations) yourself :)

[h3]Tunnels[/h3]

Tunnels are a way to transport shapes up to 10 space station chunks wide, but only in a straight path. We updated the visuals, although tunnels are still work in progress, game design wise!



[h3]New Placement UI[/h3]

When placing space stations, you now have a proper "blueprint" look, as well as indicators what shapes you are about to mine:



Same goes for buildings:



And you now also get indicators during placement:



[h3]Improved Research UI[/h3]

The research UI has been improved quite a bit. The main milestone is now shown much more prominent, and you can now also see which milestone unlocks which upgrade:



[h3]New shape patch visuals[/h3]

The shape patch got reworked, and you can also see the reworked materials here:



[h3]HUB Island Improvements[/h3]

The HUB island has been improved visually, but there are more changes to come!



Also the notches have been improved, and they now glow when a catapult is placed:



[h3]Updated pipe meshes[/h3]

Pipes have been updated (even after the last devlog) and also upward/downward pipes now show the fluids correctly:



[h3]Updated Shape Miner + Extractor Visuals and Animation[/h3]

The shape miner space station has also been improved and now has a (WIP!) animation:



The extractor is now also connected to the shape patch:



[h3]Updated Main Menu[/h3]

Finally, here's a screenshot of the updated main menu:





----------


I hope you enjoyed the devlog and the new style of showing the changes from the last update! Wish you a great start into the week!

~Tobias

PS: All screenshots are taken from Alpha 6, which is already available to our Patreon supporters.


[h2]Wishlist Shapez 2[/h2]

Be sure to wishlist & follow Shapez 2 to receive important updates and notifications about playtests!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

Hey everyone!

Today I wanted to give you some insights about the fluids in Shapez 2!

As always, be sure to wishlist & follow Shapez 2 to get a notification on important updates:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

Alright, so let's dive into the devlog!

[h2]Devlog 006 - Fluids & Painting[/h2]

[h3]Recap - Shapez 1[/h3]

Shapez 1 didn't have fluids, and colors were simply items that you could mine, just like shapes. The painter would then take those items as an input and modify the shape color:



This worked, but for Shapez 2 we wanted something more interesting and also more "visual" and easy to understand. This is why we are introducing fluids:

[h3]Fluid Extraction[/h3]

The first step to acquire fluids is to find a fluid resource on the infinite map. In the area close to the HUB you will be able to find the 3 primary colors: red, green and blue. Farther apart, we can imagine that there will also be secondary colors, but that's not settled on yet.



We still haven't figured how those fluid resources should look, so they are still placeholders in the game.
Daniel already made some concepts for them, but all of these are super early!



Once you found a resource to mine, you can place a fluid extractor island on it. Again, this is only a placeholder:



There is already a concept for it as well, but again, very early!



On the miner itself, there will be a fluid patch, similar to the shape miner, where you can place pumps to extract fluids. Pumps currently extract 1200 Liters per minute, but this is not final. Currently the unit used to measure fluid volume is liters, although we could imagine introducing additional units in case we ever want to add steam for example.



[h3]Fluid Transport & Simulation[/h3]

To transport fluids on the island, you can then place different types of pipes. There are straight, corner, junction and cross pipes. As everything in the game is open, we wanted the pipes to also be open so you can see the fluids actually flow through your factory!



Fluids are simulated at a fixed tickrate right now. Basically every pipe has a "storage" called "FluidContainer" internally. The size of that storage is 50 L for pipes currently.
Every container then stores the current flow to the adjacent containers.
When updating the simulation, it basically goes like this:

1. Iterate over all containers and "spread" fluids.
Every container can only store one fluid at a time, so once it is "tagged" with that fluid, it can only store that fluid until it is entirely empty again. More about that in the "Mixed Pipes" section.

2. Compute & propagate pressure differences
Pressure in a container is simply computed as value / maxValue. The simulation then tries to achieve a state of "balance" where all containers the system have the same pressure.
However, just trying to average the container levels won't work great, because then the throughput will be extremely low at some point.
Thus, instead of storing only the pressure, we also store a flow rate, which is determining how much fluid from one container flows to another container in one tick. The flow rate only changes very slowly, and increases / decreases based on the pressure difference.
There are still some issues that a lot of fluids simulations typically have, for example dealing with waves. But we already have a few ideas how to tackle them!

3. Clamping & clearing
In the last step, all containers that are empty are now un-tagged, so they can receive a different type of fluid again. Also in case any container did over- or underflow, it will be clamped.


While the fluid simulation can be a little technical, our goals is and was that if you just want to use fluids, it should be intuitive and "just work". With the current system in place and the visual indicators, we feel that already is the case, but we are very interested in your feedback!

[h3]Mixed Pipes[/h3]
Since mixed fluids in the same pipe wouldn't really make sense, we don't allow them. Instead, every fluid container can only store one fluid and is tagged with that. Transfer between containers then only works if they have the same fluid:



There are also buttons to flush pipes or the entire network, in case you mess up.

[h3]Secondary & Tertiary colors[/h3]

In order to produce secondary and/or tertiary colors, you can mix colors with the color mixer:



[h3]Cross-Layer Transport[/h3]

Fluids can be transported up and down, however, in order to transport them up you will have to place a pump:



The pump will limit the flow to one direction, so you can also use it as a gate to prevent backflow:



We are also considering to add a building just for that, in case it becomes a commonly used pattern.

Instead of going for an overly complex system, the rules for cross-layer transport are very simple: Fluids only go up in a pump, and they go down in regular pipes. This should be very intuitive and still allow for some interesting designs. However since it's not final - let us know what you think!

[h3]Buffering[/h3]

In case you want to store some fluids, there is also a fluid tank, and because of the cross-layer pipes, you can also stack them on top of each other:



Keep in mind that, because the simulation effectively averages the pressure, the tanks will only fill once you have a surplus of fluid in the system.

[h3]Painting[/h3]

There will be different types of painters in the game, for now we have planned a topmost painter and a full painter. The topmost painter only paints the highest layer of a shape where as the full painter paints the whole shape (and needs more paint in exchange).

Here's an early concept of the topmost painter in action (the animation is currently broken):



As you might have seen, there are multiple inputs - and again, due to the multi-dimensionality of the game, you can build some pretty cool & compact setups!



[h3]Fluid Packing & Cross-island transport[/h3]

If you read the past devlogs, you might wonder how you actually transport fluids between islands, since there is no building space for pipes in between.

Disclaimer: The following mechanics are work in progress and we don't know whether they will end up exactly like this in the game. However, let me explain what we have right now!

To transport fluids, first you have to produce barrels. Barrels are produced from shapes, and the size & color of the barrel depends on the used shape:



Once you produced the barrels, you can now fill them using the fluid packer:



Then transport them between islands and unpack them again.



Since barrel production is pretty slow, you can also recycle the production by returning the empty barrels again (as seen in the above gif)

We are not 100% certain this feature will be a great fit, so be sure to leave your feedback on it, so we know whether you like it or not!

[h3]Color Blind Support[/h3]

As soon as colors are a crucial part of the gameplay, we have to think about color-blind support as well.
We are still looking for good ways to make it easier in case you are affected, such as patterns, or different symbols for fluids. If you have any ideas please let us know!


[h3]Wishlist Shapez 2[/h3]

I hope you enjoyed the devlog, and I wish you a nice remaining weekend!

And as always, be sure to wishlist & follow Shapez 2 to get a notification on important updates:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


~Tobias

Hey everyone!

First of all, I want to apologize for the late devlog. A lot of stuff is happening right now, and it's hard to find time in between!

[h2]News[/h2]

We are slowly growing the team - last week we welcomed Lorenzo who will help with the Development, so there are now 5 people working full time on shapez 2!

[h3]New Soundtrack[/h3]

Shapez 2 will ship with 40 minutes of soundtrack from Petter Sumelius, the composer who also made the amazing shapez 1 soundtrack!

Additionally, there will be a supporter edition that will add additional 40 minutes of soundtrack to the game, composed by Petter as well!

[h3]Wishlist shapez 2[/h3]

Be sure to wishlist & follow shapez 2, so you get a notification on any significant updates!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

And if you want to try out the current alpha, be sure to join the shapez 2 discord!

[h2]Devlog - Research, Progression & Blueprints[/h2]

Please note: A lot of content shown here is subject to change. While we are already satisfied with the new research system, we can not guarantee it will end up exactly like this in the final game.

[h3]Recap - shapez 1[/h3]

In shapez 1 you had a linear level system, where you had to deliver one certain shape to complete the level and unlock the next technology.
Additionally there were 4 different upgrades where you could increase the speed of buildings.



While efficient, this system leads to some issues. First of all, having a purely linear structure means that even if the next level contains a building / technology you don't need or want, you still have to unlock it to progress.

Additionally, it means that the replayability is not really good, because every playthrough looks exactly the same, without a lot of meaningful choices.

Which is why for shapez 2, wanted to rework the system.

[h2]What we tried - and didn't work[/h2]

Our first approach making a big research tree. There was a "main" goal section in the middle, but otherwise it was just all research nodes in one single tree:


(The image is quite large, you can click to enlarge it)

However, during playtesting, it showed that this was way too confusing. It was almost impossible to figure out which upgrades to go for next, which ones were more important or even required, and which not.

Thus, we decided that we needed to go for a hybrid approach instead.

[h2]New approach - Categorizing upgrades[/h2]

To make the upgrades easier to understand, we started separating them into 3 different categories:

[h3]Milestones[/h3]
Milestones are upgrades that unlock new technologies which allow you to produce new types of shapes. These upgrades are required for the progression within the game and can not be skipped, for example painting shapes. Milestones are supposed to be large goals you work towards for a while, while also pursuing other goals in the meantime since they can take a while to complete.

Basically we went over all upgrades and asked the question "Will the game experience be bad if the player doesn't unlock this?". For the current alpha, we already ended with 14 milestones, although we plan to add a lot more content, even for the early access release.

[h3]QoL Upgrades[/h3]
Quality-of-life upgrades are upgrades like the storage, counter-clockwise rotator, decorations, labels and so on. These are upgrades that you can go for if desired, and they can make a lot of sense for your factory, but they are not required to progress in the game. Thus, you have a lot more choice if and when during your playthrough you want to unlock them.

[h3]"Flat" Upgrades[/h3]
Flat upgrades are upgrades like Belt Speed, Platform Limit, HUB Size which just have different tiers (i.e. Belt Speed 1, Belt Speed 2, ...). Those upgrades are supposed to be infinite, but we haven't figured this out exactly yet.

[h3]Organizing the upgrades[/h3]

To connect the upgrades together in the research UI, we started with a linear progression at the top.
We put the milestones in a linear order, which is very similar to the levels system in shapez 1.



Then we started categorizing the QoL and Flat upgrades into different categories like Transport, Processing, Fluids and so on. Each category got their own little tech-tree, in which you can unlock the QoL upgrades, as well as an area at the bottom for the flat upgrades to better separate them:



The QoL and Flat upgrades can depend on previous upgrades, as well as milestones. For example, if a QoL upgrade requires red circles, it will most likely depend on the "Painting" milestone. This is also shown so you have an idea which shapes you can already produce, and which ones need new technologies first.



You can also pin all upgrades to your screen to track them:



With this change, you now have a lot more control when to unlock optional upgrades, while still having a guideline through the game progression! While we really like the new system, we'd love to hear your feedback and thoughts on it though!

[h3]Random Goals - Replayability[/h3]

While the new system makes the replayability a little better, it's still not great. Thus, we are planning to add a "seed" to the research tree.

All shapes you have to produce are then randomly generated, instead of predefined. There is a standard seed (0) which is the default research tree, but you can enter another seed to get an entirely different set of shapes.

This means that whenever you want to start a new playthrough of shapez 2, you don't end up having to produce the same shape again and again, but instead every time it's a new one!

Additionally, this also allows us to have a much better difficulty setting than just increasing the amount of required shapes for every goal:

Basically, we will develop an algorithm that allows to create a shape requirement, given a set of currently available technologies and desired difficulty. The more difficult, the more steps (like cut, rotate, ...) and resources need to be chained to produce the shape.

If you then play on "easy" difficulty, you will get shapes that require far less steps than on "insane".
Of course, in the beginning of the game both modes will still require simple shapes (since you can't produce more complex ones) but especially in the end of the game it will be a huge difference!

We hope that this makes the game a lot more replayable and I'd love to hear your thoughts on it!


[h3]Blueprints[/h3]

A big, if not the biggest complaint in shapez 1 was that blueprints unlocked a little late.
Basically the issue with blueprints is, the earlier they are unlocked, the simpler the blueprint shape needs to be (because you can't produce more complex ones at that point).

For shapez 2, we wanted to change this, so we came up with the idea of blueprint points:

You unlock blueprints very early, and in order to gain the blueprint points (BP), you need to deliver a certain shape which is then converted into points:



Once you unlock new milestones, you also unlock new shapes you can deliver to more efficiently generate the blueprint points:



Basically if you deliver the left shape, you get 1 blueprint point, whereas you get 100 if you deliver the right shape.

Copying structures or islands then cost blueprint points, and exponentially more the larger the blueprint or island is:



This allows us to make blueprints available a lot earlier, but still having interesting blueprint shapes later in the game!

Let us know what you think about this as well!

PS: There will also be a blueprint library - you can already share and load blueprint strings in the current alpha, but we want to make it easy to also create collections of blueprints, store them, share them and so on! But more on that in another devlog!

[h3]Wishlist & Follow Shapez 2[/h3]
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


Have a nice remaining weekend, and I hope you enjoyed reading the devlog!

~Tobias

Hey guys!

In this devlog I wanted to share some insights how the map in shapez 2 works, which is mainly based around the concept of building space stations platforms.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

Here's a quick screenshot of how the islands look like, although it is already outdated:



However, to understand why the concept ended up the way it is, we need to look at how shapez 2 evolved:

IMPORTANT NOTICE: This devlog includes a lot of old screenshots, alpha footage and placeholders. The final game will look very different!


[h2]How it started[/h2]

Back in July 2022 when I started prototyping shapez 2, this is how it looked:



As you might notice immediately - I actually started with a hexagonal grid. This originated from a survey on the shapez 1 discord, and was basically my starting idea to distinguish shapez 2 from shapez 1:



It quickly evolved, and starting from the beginning I already wanted all machines to be open:



However, once I actually started to implement basic belt placement, I ran into the first issues already.



Placing straight belts on a hexagonal grid is possible, but only in 3 directions. This leads to weird looking sharp-turn belts. Disabling sharp turns didn't make it any better though, since then connecting machines got really annoying, and you still can't have straight belts in all directions:



Additionally, symmetry and tilable designs are possible, but work very differently in a hexagonal grid:



Which is, after long consideration, I decided to drop the hexagonal grid, in favour of allowing to build multidimensional factories (which we will cover in another devlog!).

[h2]Infinite map?[/h2]

I definitely wanted to have an infinite, procedurally generated map for shapez 2. However, to make it look more interesting than in shapez 1, initially I wanted to introduce a concept of "Biomes". Biomes could be areas that contain exclusively red color patches for example. This would also incentivize the new mass transport features.

Here is a first overview how it looked with those different biomes:



The result was not pleasing, but because I wanted to keep shapez 2 abstract, I couldn't just introduce styles like "Forest " or "Water" which would have made it more interesting.

Thus we came up with the "Islands" concept (they are still called like this internally), which evolved around the idea of, while still having infinite space, having to build the playable area yourself:



The idea was that you could craft islands by using shapes:



Basically better islands would cost more and/or better shapes, and they could also have shape and color resources.

After a few iterations, we simplified the crafting dialog:



However, while playtesting, we found that the crafting mechanic wasn't really interesting. The main issue was that the organic factor was entirely missing, thus every playthrough would be the same. And I didn't want to introduce randomness into the crafting, since that would not fit the concept of shapez.

To fix this, we decided the resources should instead spawn procedurally on the map again, and to mine them there will be special miner "islands":



Here is an early screenshot of the map, although the resource distribution is temporary and will change!



I hope you can already see at which scale you'll be able to build within shapez 2!

[h2]Modular Designs[/h2]

Another feature of the islands was allowing to build modular - the idea was that in the lategame, you no longer have to build individual islands but instead you have an island that contains only cutters or stackers and you can rearrange them - building on a much, much larger scale. The idea was basically that these modules are like a building from shapez 1, but instead it was built and designed by yourself!

(If you want to find out more about building modular, Giantwaffle showed it during his exclusive stream of the alpha)

This is a first draft how I wanted it to work:



[h2]Art Style Change[/h2]

During the transition, we also introduced an art style change, which is a topic for another devlog!
However, because we changed to an "Abstract Space" style, the islands now became space station platforms:



[h2]Island Layouts[/h2]

I wanted to have different layouts of islands which allow for interesting combinations, while not being too simple. Inspired by the idea of "Pentominos", every island consists out of chunks which are up to 16x16 tiles large.


(Image source)

The layouts for the islands are not determined yet, but we will try to make sure that every layout has a use and it doesn't get too much of a puzzle (i.e. there should be some puzzle aspect - but it could also get very frustrating if the layouts don't fit together nicely).

[h2]Inter-Island Transport[/h2]

Additionally to the mass transport (trains - covered in another devlog) we of course also need local transport between islands.

To make the islands actually meaningful, it was clear that we can not just allow transport on all sides of the island. Otherwise, there would be no actual difference to an infinite map.

Thus, we came up with the idea of "notches", only allowing to transport shapes at certain locations of an island:



The concept is very simple: There is a building (we call it "belt port" internally) that allows you to catapult shapes over a certain range. Because the distance between two islands is higher than the maximum range of the belt port, transport is not possible. But because the "notch" has 4 tiles that are closer to the other island, these are the places where you can exchange shapes between islands.

A notch allows for 4 of these buildings per layer - so once having unlocked 3 layers, that means effective 12 belts throughput (throughput of the belt ports is identical to the belts):



Notches are displaced, so that if both islands have a notch at this location, you actually get twice the throughput:



As you can see, they are also bi-directional (which is actually something we are considering to change - let us know what you think!)


[h2]Island costs[/h2]

We spent a long time thinking about the costs of the islands. Since we removed the crafting mechanic, at this point the islands were entirely free to place.

The first idea was to make them still cost a certain shape. However, then we figured it makes a lot more sense to instead keep them free, because it would fit the concept of shapez best - buildings are free as well, after all.

This incentivices playing around with the islands, rearranging them, deleting them without having any penalty attached to it.

To still reward building optimized factories, we then introduced a "limit" to the maximum chunks you can place, which can be increased via research. Every island consists of multiple chunks (as shown above), so larger islands are more "expensive". But because it is just a limit and not a cost, you can just play around find out what works best for you!



As you can see, the cost if the island (4 chunks) is shown when placing it, as well as the current usage and the limit.

Of course, the limit can be increased via research, and we actually want to make it an infinite research so your factory can grow forever!

[h2]Further topics[/h2]

Writing this devlog has actually been incredibly difficult, because there are so many more topics I could dive into, but even writing this together already took quite a while! (Which is why I had to delay it by one day).

However, I wanted to already give you an insight on what topics you can expect from further devlogs:

- Fluids & Fluid packaging
- Multidimensional factories
- Crystals
- Trains
- Research Tree
- New blueprint system & currency
- Art style change
- ... and so much more!

If this was an interesting read to you, please let me know in the comments so I know the devlogs are appreciated!

And if you want to stay informed about the upcoming devlogs, giveaways and more, please follow the Shapez 2 store page:

[h2]Follow to get updates[/h2]

PS: In order to get updates, be sure to wishlist AND follow Shapez 2, since just wishlisting doesn't give you any notifications on new events & updates!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


Have a nice remaining weekend!

Tobias

Hey everyone!

As promised in the last devlog, I wanted to cover the changes and new mechanics regarding item stacking in Shapez 2!

However, I wanted to also quickly mention that we have a new logo for Shapez 2:

[h2]New Logo[/h2]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

Let us know in the comments if you like it!

Devlog - Stacking
Please note: This devlog might contain spoilers regarding shapez 1, if you haven't completed level 20 yet.


[h2]Recap from shapez 1 - The old system[/h2]

In shapez 1, the stacking basically works like this:

If you combine two shapes, let's say, two halves, it will combine them on a single layer:



However, if you try to stack shapes that have overlapping parts, the right shape will stack "on top" of the other shape, effectively getting smaller:



The reason for the upper shape is getting smaller is making sure you can still read both layers.

It can get more complex quickly though - what if the shapes only partially overlap?
In this case, you will produce an overhang:



If you now try to cut this overhang, the right side "falls down" and gets bigger again:



Here for example is how you produce a shape that has a "floating" piece which is not connected to anything else (like in the logo):



Using this mechanic is required to produce the logo (level 20) shape - and it can be very unintuitive.
In fact, it is so unintuitive that we got hundreds of bug reports about "broken stacking mechanics" so far!

[h2]The reason to change[/h2]

When making a survey in the shapez 2 discord about the stacking mechanics, this is what we got out of 927 votes:

A) 31%: I have completed level 20 in shapez 1, and figured the solution on my own
B) 51% I have completed level 20 in shapez 1, but I looked up the solution fully or partially
C) 3% I stopped at level 20
D) 15% I stopped before level 20

Seeing that only 18% stopped at level 20 or before - it shows that this is really represents the core audience of shapez, having played the game at least for 10 hours +.

And yet, out of the 82% who completed level 20, effectively 62% had to look up the solution on the internet!

This showed us that the mechanic definitely needs a change, and this is what we did in Shapez 2.

[h2]Stacking in Shapez 2[/h2]

Our goal for Shapez 2 was, besides of making all buildings open, making the game more accessible. This also includes making all mechanics feel like a challenge, but not like a bug, and thus they have to be intuitive.

I'll simply show the exact same setup from above, but this time in shapez 2. (PS: There are alpha builds available in the discord, if you want to try it yourself!)

Again, if you combine 2 halves, it looks like this:



If you stack 2 shapes that have overlapping parts, it looks like this:



If you stack 2 shapes that only partially overlap, it looks like this:



So far so good - but what happens if you now try to cut the overhang?



As you can see, there is now a little animation showing how the overhang is falling down and resizing to its original size.

This also applies if you try to build a floating shape:



As you can see - the overhang now falls down as well!

This means that floating shapes, which are not connected to any adjacent shape, are not possible in Shapez 2 - are they?

Let me introduce you the new pin mechanic!

[h2]Pin Pushers[/h2]

To allow to produce floating shapes in shapez 2, we wanted a mechanic that makes more sense and also looks "reasonable" with the new 3D environment - having parts just float in the air would look weird and inconsistent.

Thus, we are introducing a new mechanic - the pin pusher.



It introduces a new "shape part" type (Short code: "P-"), that is a little different compared to the other shape parts. It effectively removes a whole quadrant and replaces it with a single pin.

Utilizing the pin, you can create floating shapes again:



This makes whole process a lot more intuitive. And you can produce some pretty .. interesting shapes! Notice how the right shape is actually the "a" from our new logo - a shape you can only produce in Shapez 2!



[h2]The algorithm[/h2]

The shape stacking logic has been created completely from scratch in Shapez 2. It now does an actual, physics based simulation of the shape (which is of course cached, so it's very efficient).

The first step is identifying "groups" within a shape. 2 parts of a shape count connected if:

- They are on the same layer
- They are adjacent quadrants (i.e. top right and bottom left wouldn't connect)
- Both are a "full" shape - that means, not a pin

A group is connected physically, so it means that when it falls down, all parts fall down by the same amount.

After identifying the groups, we run our "physics" simulation which basically applies gravity to all groups, until the shape is not changing anymore.

This might sound rather complex at first, but the behaviour is actually a lot more intuitive if you try out!

PS: Again, there are alpha builds available in the discord, if you want to try it yourself!

PPS: If you are interested in the exact details - you can find the C# Source here! We are always happy to get suggestions on the code, just like in shapez 1.

[h2]Further mechanics[/h2]

The floating shapes mechanic was a beloved mechanic from a lot of veteran shapez 1 players, and we are very well aware that the pin pusher mechanic simplifies the process quite a bit. Especially for those who love (hard) puzzles, there is now a gap.

However, don't worry - this is why we are introducing additional shape mechanics as well, such as crystals!

Be sure to follow the Store Page to get notified about new devlogs covering those mechanics!



PS: Did you notice all GIFs loop seamlessly? This was actually a lot of work! If you like the devlogs, let us know in the comments so we know it's appreciated :)

Have a nice weekend!
Tobias


[h2]Wishlist & Follow Shapez 2[/h2]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

Hey everyone again!

The response to the latest devlog was super positive, so I thought I'd try to give you more regular updates now! This devlog is covering the topic of cutters, rotationally dependent shapes and much more. Enjoy the read!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/



Why cutters are difficult

[h3]How it started[/h3]

Cutters have often caused confusing in shapez 1 already. Here's a quick reminder how they work:



Basically the right side of the cutter always outputs the right half of the shape, no matter the orientation.
There is actually a good reason to not just cut the shape in half like a wedge on a belt: It would break blueprints.

Imagine having a blueprint with cutters and rotating it - the blueprint would now work differently, being effectively useless.

However, we felt that this is still a suboptimal solution, since there were frequent "bug" reports of the cutter not working, which was due to a misunderstanding how it works.

For shapez 2, we wanted to revisit this mechanic, and here's what we ran into:

[h3]Making the cutter 'open'[/h3]

As mentioned in the previous devlog, one step to make the cutter more obvious was to make it fully animated:



However .. Besides of the animation & mesh being work in progress, I'm not sure this makes it any better at all to be honest. While the process is more visible - it's still very hard to determine how the cutter will cut.

[h3]Camera Rotation / North indicator [/h3]

Another issue is - while the camera rotation in shapez 1 was fixed, you can fully rotate the camera in shapez 2. In order to determine how a cutter will cut, you now also have to factor in the camera rotation. For example, if you revisit the gif from above - are you wondering why the cutter is putting the right side on the left belt?

This is actually because the camera is rotated by 180 degrees - the cutter is actually facing downwards.
To better show in which direction the camera is currently facing, we added a small compass:



As well as a small indicator (WIP!) on the shape:



[h3]Belt Relative Rotation[/h3]

At some point, there was the suggestion for belt relative rotations. What does this mean?
Basically, right now, all shapes always point upwards. This means that the cutter also always has to cut from top to bottom.

If the north of the shape would now be aligned instead towards the direction of the belt, the cutter could always cut in that direction, because even if you rotate the cutter, you'd get the same result.



While this would partially solve the cutter issue - it now introduces a whole bunch of other issues.
For example, as you can see in the gif, it's now extremely hard to predict how the stacker will combine the shapes, because they rotate on every belt corner. Which is, after quite an extensive discussion on the shapez 2 discord, we decided against it.

[h3]Rotation for Research Goals[/h3]

Another issue we ran into: In which direction would you actually have to deliver the shape into the hub?
In shapez 1, the shape had to be rotated in the correct direction in order to be accepted.

However, can you spot the issue on this screenshot?



Because the camera is rotated by 180 degrees, it looks like you would be delivering the shape in the correct rotation, while in fact you are delivering a shape that is flipped.

This lead to a lot of confusion - and even bug reports like "HUB is not accepting shapes".

To avoid this, we simply now allow the shape to be delivered in any rotation into the hub (However - if you are looking for a more hardcore experience, we are considering to add an achievement to deliver all shapes in the correct orientation! And probably also an option in the game creation settings, although probably not on the initial release).

PS: Did I already mention the artists are currently reworking the hub? Follow the shapez 2 store page to receive future updates!



[h3]Operation Previews[/h3]

Another improvement we made to make using cutters (and other buildings) a little easier: Whenever you are about to place a building, it shows you the predicted output:



[h3]Simplifying the onboarding / "Light" Cutter[/h3]

We've been really trying a lot to make the cutter easier to understand, however even with all the improvements, the cutter can be hard to understand.

Because the cutter is the very first processing building you unlock, we felt that it can quickly overwhelm new players.

Thus, we came up with a solution - A "light" cutter which only outputs one half of the shape, and trashes the other side. This avoids the whole directional conflict, has a much simpler animation, and is easier to understand:

(The mesh is a placeholder)


Later in the game, you can then unlock the full cutter as an additional unlock, effectively "flattening" the difficulty curve a bit, while you can still choose to rush it.

And the great thing is, the light cutter still has its use case after unlocking the full cutter: If you only need one half of the shape, it's more efficient (space & throughput) to use the light cutter.

[h3]Follow & Wishlist![/h3]

Be sure to follow Shapez 2 on Steam to receive notifications about future devlogs!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

I hope you enjoyed the read, and stay tuned for the next devlog, where we will cover the new stacking mechanic in Shapez 2!

~Tobias

Hey everyone!

I wanted to give you an update on the development of Shapez 2, our current plans and more!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

News
[h2]Funding Secured[/h2]

Shapez 2 will be partially funded by the German Government via the "Computerspielfrderung des Bundes". This allows us to produce the game with a much higher quality, more content and bigger team. We are super excited and extremely grateful that we can now produce the game with all the features & content we have in mind!

[h2]We are hiring![/h2]

Speaking about a bigger team - we are currently looking for a Senior Unity Developer as well as a Community Manager! If you are based in Germany and want to work in a small, super motivated team as well as having a huge impact on Shapez 2, please apply!

[h2]Alpha Gameplay & Screenshots[/h2]

If you are curious how Shapez 2 will look and feel, you can check out this exclusive alpha gameplay stream from Giantwaffle! We usually don't allow anybody to show the game outside of the discord, but we made an exception to get early feedback. Keep in mind this is a very early version of the game with still months of development to come, but we think it already shows very nicely in which direction we are heading!


We've also updated the Store Page with current Screenshots from the Alpha!

PS: We are currently not looking for more alpha testers, but follow the Shapez 2 Store Page to get updates when we do!

Devlog
[h2]Simulation Updates[/h2]

I wanted to give you a quick idea how the simulation works in Shapez 2, to also explain why the simulation performance will be up to 30 times better than in Shapez 1!

All buildings in Shapez 2 are represented via a concept called "Belt lanes". A belt lane has basically 3 relevant parameters: Current Item, Progress, Next Lane.
The lane then also has a "Belt lane definition" which stores parameters as the duration, speed, world position etc.


These belt lanes know about their next lane, so for the simulation, it is not relevant to which building a lane actually belongs - the simulation itself does not have the concept of buildings.

When you place or remove a building, a graph of those belt lanes is built. In order to make sure the simulation runs at full precision, we have to build the graph and compute which dependencies every building has. This results in a flat list, which is built individually for every island (thats what we call the space station platforms internally).

You can see an example of the update order here - as you can see, the buildings at the end of the chain are updated first, and the extractors are updated last. This is extremely important, since otherwise you would constantly have gaps between items on the belt (And it also means loops are less efficient - so don't build loops! :))


[h2]Belt Simulation[/h2]

To better visualize and debug the simulation graph, we have created a small tool for which we ported the main parts of the C# Simulation (since Shapez 2 is written in Unity) to TypeScript.

You can give it a try here, and also have a look at the simulation code here!

Basically the simulation works like this:
From the last lane (on the right) to the first lane (on the left), the simulation first computes how far the item can maximally progress (reading the MaxStep from the next lane). Then, it computes how much the item can actually progress based on the time elapsed, and moves it as much forward as possible. As a last step, it updates it's its own MaxStep property. You can visualize the property by checking the "Show max step" checkbox.

The computation of how far an item can progress can get rather complex, because there are two dimensions to take into account: Time and Distance.
An item can not progress faster than the maximum speed of the lane, which is the main limit of the throughput. However, items must also not overlap when being rendered, which is why between two items, we have to ensure there is always a distance of 0.5 units.

This sounds simple at first, but can get pretty complicated. For example, if you have two lanes which have a length of 0.5 world space units and a speed of 1 unit/second, it means an item needs 0.5 seconds to reach the end of a lane.
If the second lane has an item at 50% progression,it means it is at 0.5*50% = 0.25 units. if both lanes are directly connected, it means an item on the first lane can only move 0.25 units on the first lane as well, until it would intersect with the item on the second lane. This is what the MaxStep property basically stores.

However, there are buildings which have lanes that have a length of 0 units, but still a duration. Imagine the rotator for example - it has 3 lanes: Input Lane, Processing Lane, Output Lane.



The processing lane has a duration of 0.5 seconds by default, but it has a length of 0 world space units.
If we now look at the graph using the world space length as the dimension from left to right, it looks like this:




However if we look at the graph using the time as dimension from left to right, it looks like this:


If you look at the visualization (again, link), you will see that in the world length dimension the item just stops (and would rotate in the real game) whereas on the time dimension, it just continues to progress.

Depending on the complexity of buildings, this can be a pretty daunting task to get right, especially if we want to get all buildings to run at 100% precision.

[h2]Visualization of Items[/h2]
Another big problem is that we can not "hide" items, because all buildings are supposed to be fully open. In almost all other factory games, buildings are solid structures that have inputs & outputs, but they just "consume" the items and output others. Because shapez 2 is fully open, this adds a lot of new issues (but we think it is worth it!):


For example, splitters can sometimes still have overlapping items:


This is super hard to fix, because we can not simply "warp" the items, however we will cover this in another development log!

[h2]+3000% Simulation Performance[/h2]

You might ask why we are doing all these efforts to put the nodes into a graph structure. The main reason for this is that we want to make the simulation 100% precise at just 2 UPS (Updates per second).
This means that islands which are not currently in view can be updated at 2 UPS instead of 60 UPS.
Compared to Shapez 1 (and almost all other factory games) this is a huge performance improvement - to put it into numbers, about 30 times faster.

We've done some initial tests and it seems that factories with >1,000,000 buildings and thousands of islands are just fine.

However, we want more - and thus we're also building the simulation to support multiple threads. Because every island is it's own graph, we can update islands independently of each other, and then update the "shared" structures afterwards. If we use 8 threads instead of just 1, this means the simulation would in total be about 240 times faster than in shapez 1.

Realistically, we will hit other limits (like memory bandwidth), but in general you can expect the simulation performance to be at least magnitude better than in shapez 1, and probably also compared to other major factory games.

Of course, this is only the simulation - if you choose to select ultra-high graphic settings for example, the game can still run slow if you don't have an appropriate setup.

However, we are giving our best to make sure huge factories run perfectly smooth!


[h2]Graphic Requirements[/h2]

We've received a lot of questions about the system requirements with the all-new graphics. We know that one advantage of Shapez 1 was that it ran well with low requirements, and our goal is to make sure that Shapez 2 also runs on low end setups, which is why we will also include a "minimal" graphics mode which will make the game run very ugly, but also very fast. Tests have shown so far, that it should be no issue playing on an integrated laptop GPU for example, but we will keep you updated with definite stats closer to release!




That's it for today, and we will keep you updated on the development progress - Please let us know in the comments if you liked this technical insights and would like to see more!

And last but not least, be sure to wishlist & follow Shapez 2 if you haven't yet!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

~Tobias

Hey everyone!

We wanted to give you an update about the current state, plans and roadmap of Shapez 2.

First of all, if you haven't wishlisted and followed the store page yet, this is the best way to get notified about updates, giveaways, release dates and more!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/


[h2]Roadmap & Funding[/h2]

We want to develop Shapez 2 much more sophisticated than Shapez 1 - with a larger team, all kinds of new features, content, quality-of-life improvements and all-new 3D graphics.

This implementation would not be possible with our current resources, which is why we have applied for funding from the German government.

We hope to have the response by the end of February, which would allow us to start with the production of Shapez 2 in March. In case we get a positive funding response, the timeline & roadmap would look like this:

Steam Demo / Next fest: Either February or June 2024
Steam Early Access: ~Mid 2024
PC 1.0 Release: Mid 2025
Consoles Release: TBA

We would be self-publishing the game on Steam (except for the Asia region), but once we have the funding secured, we will also look for a publisher for consoles. Once found, we can also announce a release date on those!

[h2]Game Theme & Features[/h2]

While Shapez 1 had a very abstract, minimalist art style, we want to re-work the art-style to look a bit more interesting and exciting. However, we'd like to point out again that we still want to keep all the core mechanics that define shapez - No enemies, no building costs, no stress, and so on. Making the visuals stand out a little more allows us to get more people excited about the game though - and personally, we really like the planned direction!


While we are talking about the theme and space stations, here's some concept art already - our vision on how we want the game to look and what we will aim to produce once we get the funding response. Hope you like the new direction as much as we do! (Please note: This is just concept art. We haven't started with the actual production yet, so it's still a long way to go until the game actually looks like this, if ever!)



Besides of all the new features (multi-layers, trains, blueprint library and so on) that we plan to implement, I'd like to highlight one specific feature: The blueprinting of entire space station platforms.
Later in the game, you will be unlocking the ability to copy & paste whole stations, so you can start building on an entirely different scale. For example, you can build a "cutter", "stacker" and "rotator" platform, and then move and duplicate those modules as required, building huge factories consisting of thousands of buildings with a single click.

[h2]Surveys[/h2]

As a preparation for a potential production we prepared a few surveys, and we plan on doing a lot more in our Shapez 2 Discord!

We are really trying to involve you as much as possible - for example, the change to the space theme was actually driven by community surveys!

Here are a few past and actives surveys, to give you an idea what those are about:

Initial Art Style Survey
Cutters
Second Art Style Survey
Space Stations Survey
Miner Modules
Should we add multiplayer - Survey
Game Name Survey
Visual Style Survey
Grid Survey (ongoing)
... and much more!

As you can see, we are really looking to involve you in the development & decisions and are trying to make sure we are building a game that everybody loves as much as we do!

[h2]Giveaways[/h2]

Once we have settled on a release date, we will run multiple giveaways for Shapez 2 keys on different platforms. To make sure you don't miss out on those, we recommend to:

- Join the Shapez 2 Discord
- Follow + Wishlist the steam page




[h2]FAQ[/h2]

We frequently get similar questions, so we wanted to start a small FAQ!

Q: What will be the price?
A: We can't give an exact price yet, but our current estimate would be around 25-30$/ on Early Access Release.

Q: What will be the state on Early Access?
A: We want to make sure the game is already very polished, playable and enjoyable on Early Access release (comparable to other major games in the genre). During Early Access, we will aim for 3-4 major updates instead a lot of smaller ones, which justify picking up the game again (in case you ever stopped).

Q: When will the game release?
A: If we can secure the funding, we would plan to release in Early Access Mid 2024.

Q: How can I support you?
A: If you like our games and what we are doing, we have a patreon which also gives you discord benefits!
You can also check out our other games, like Kiwi Clicker or YORG.io!

Q: Will my PC be able to run it with the all-new graphics?
A: We will be very focused on performance, and we are even considering to add a "low-spec" mode with largely reduced visuals. We are aware that a major advantage of Shapez 1 was that it ran on various setups, and we'll give our best to ensure Shapez 2 does too!

Q: What operating systems will the game support?
A: Shapez 2 will be available on Windows 7 or newer, macOS and Linux.

Q: Will I get a discount if I own Shapez 1 already?
A: Unfortunately, no.


Have a nice weekend!
~Tobias


https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/

Hello together!

First of all, we are still waiting for the answer of the funding for Shapez 2, which we expect in January or February. So, since the funding is not settled right now, we can't guarantee that Shapez 2 will ever be released.

Since the prototype is finished (reminder: you can try it out in the Discord server!) and we can't start production yet, it will be a bit quieter around Shapez 2 for the next months.

Nevertheless we wanted to show you the concept art we had in mind for Shapez 2.

At first glance, Shapez 2 looks completely different from Shapez 1, and I understand if that seems unexpected. However, we are very keen to keep the gameplay (what shapez is largely about), and of course expand it. That is, it will still be about processing abstract shapes, resources are infinite, buildings are free, there are no enemies and the focus is on building the factory.

However, we believe that we can make the game much more interesting and tangible by introducing a new visual theme. This will also allow us to introduce new gameplay mechanics, like asteroids and space station modules (more on this when we get the chance).

Please let us know what you think in the comments!

PS: Be sure to wishlist and follow Shapez 2 on Steam, if you haven't yet!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/



~Tobias

Hey all!

As some of you might have noticed, we just launched the Steam store page for Shapez 2!

Please wishlist the game, follow and share it on social media! This really helps us incredibly, and shows that we are on the right track!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/



If you're curious what the current state of the prototype is: Waffle did a live stream of the game's prototype, which you can watch here - even though there's no real progression yet and the art style isn't final, it already gives a good first impression, and we are pretty happy with the results so far!

And if you want to actively participate in the development process: We make regular polls and accept suggestions in the shapez 2 discord!

Finally, a disclaimer: We won't get the answer from the funding until February. That means, even if we are optimistic, that we can't guarantee at all that the prototype will become a finished game (But again - wishlists help!). In case you want to generally support us, we launched a Patreon Page though, which also gives you a special discord role!

Enjoy your weekend!

~Tobias

Hey all!

You might have noticed that it's been a bit quieter around shapez lately. That's mainly because I'm already working on shapez 2!

Unfortunately, the basic structure of shapez 1 is such that it is very difficult to add new features. So it makes more sense to work on shapez 2 - in a new engine, with new features, and much more!

I also have a lot of ideas for shapez 2, and to summarize them all, I have prepared a website - you can find everything about shapez 2 there, and it will be constantly updated to match the current status of the development:

shapez 2 About Page

I'm really excited to hear what you think about the new features - feel free to let me know in the comments, and don't forget to follow us on social media!

~Tobias

Hey all!

Since I was asked very often, I just released a new update for shapez that allows you to play the full version of shapez in your browser, completely without downloading Steam!

All you need is the Full Edition of shapez (base game + Puzzle DLC (!), see below). Then go to shapez.io and click on "Sign in via Steam" in the bottom left corner. As soon as you are logged in you can play the full version in your browser, including the Puzzle DLC!

Currently mods still only work in the Steam version, but I'm currently looking if there are possibilities to integrate mods in the browser version.

Furthermore there are some improvements to the base game:

- The tutorial for the first levels has been significantly improved
- General cleanup of the UI (more to come!)
- More sound effects
- Fix that some saves could not be deleted anymore

Have fun with the update!
~Tobias

PS: In case you're wondering, the reason you also need the Puzzle DLC is because the web version requires the Puzzle DLC backend for authorization. I wanted to make it separate at first, but then it got complex very fast - and then I thought better this way than not at all!

PPS: I am working on a small side project - Kiwi Clicker - Wishlist it now to get notified about updates!

Hey everyone,

As you might have seen, the logo has changed a bit overnight, as well as the name of the game - "shapez.io" is now just called "shapez". I decided to do this because ".io" games have a relatively negative image, and because shapez is anything but an .io game. As part of that, I also took the time to improve the artwork a bit - I hope you like it, especially the new store page capsule!

In the course of this I also just released the 1.5.2 update:

Probably the most interesting for many players is the "VRAM glitch", where the map background would not update anymore, mostly in fullscreen. It should hopefully be fixed now - If not, please contact me in the discord server!

There are also some performance improvements, a bit of UI cleanup and updated translations.

PS: We also have started working on shapez 2, but more on that soon!

Wish you a lot of fun!
~Tobias

Hey all!

From now on shapez.io is also available on macOS. There is currently only an x64 build but ARM builds are planned (The x64 build runs fine on M1 though). I wish you a lot of fun!

Also, please report any issues in the discord server!

PS: You might have to restart steam first :)

Unrelated: If you haven't yet, be sure to check out the Compact Machines mod - it's awesome!

Hey guys!

It took a bit longer than expected, but I'm happy to announce the winners of the the $1,200 Modding Contest!

Since there were so many great mods, I have decided to introduce an additional 4th and 5th place, each valued at $50.

So, here are the results!

[h2]Contest Winners[/h2]
[h3]1st - $500 - Shapez Industries by Sense_101[/h3]
[h3]2nd - $250 - Multiplayer by DJ1TJ00[/h3]
[h3]3rd - $125 - Shapez Expanded by WaffleDevs & Crimbusjimbus[/h3]
[h3]4th - $50 - Buy Land by StealthC[/h3]
[h3]5th - $50 - Packaging by zoidran[/h3]

[h3]Most game changing - $100 - Hexagonal by Dimava[/h3]
[h3]Most creative - $100 - Cursed Shapez by Crimbusjimbus[/h3]


Also the Security Bounty of $100 goes to Emerald Block for finding a bug in the filename sanitization!

Thanks for everybody who participated! And to the winners: Please check your inbox on mod.io the next few days so I can distibute the prize money!

~Tobias

Hey there!

I just released the 1.5.1 update on Steam, which adds official support for Mods!

[h2]Installing Mods[/h2]

So, how do mods work exactly?

First of all, the official platform for mods can be found at shapez.mod.io. On this platform you can share and download mods! (An in-game mod browser is also planned, but that might take a while)

To install a mod, you need to extract the downloaded ZIP file. In the ZIP file there should be a single file with the extension ".js". You have to copy this file into the mods folder.

You can find the mods folder by going to Settings > Mods > Open Mods Folder in the game.

[h2]Modding Contest[/h2]

As already announced, the official modding contest ends herewith. I will now look at all the mods and choose the winners!

Next week there will be an announcement with the winners of the contest, in which I will also present the mods.

In addition I plan to regularly choose a Mod of the Month! I will also make this dependent on how many new mods are created.

[h2]Mod Recommendations[/h2]

There are already over 50 mods published, so I thought I'd already recommend a few to get you started!

[h4]shapez Industries[/h4]
Adds a lot of new buildings, new shapes, research, upgrades - by far the biggest mod so far, changing almost the entire game.


[h4]Hexagonal[/h4]
All shapes now consist of 6 parts instead of 4!


[h4]shapest[/h4]
Adds entirely new mechanics for shape and color processing!


[h4]Pipes[/h4]
Adds pipes and fluids to the game!


[h4]Buy Land[/h4]
Makes the game more challenging by having to unlock building space!


[h4]Mirrored Buildings[/h4]
By far the most requested feature, now available as a mod!


[h4]Cursed Shapez[/h4]
"Adds a Variant of the Stacker, Mixer, Cutter, Quad-Cutter, Filter, Mixer, and Painter that would make any veteran shapez player cry."


[h4]Shapez Expanded[/h4]
Lots of new buildings and mechanics!


[h4]Multiplayer[/h4]
Adds experimental support to play shapez.io with your friends!

[h4]wrexcavator[/h4]
Unlock strong buildings by harvesting "wreck" resources.

[h4]Blueprint Library[/h4]
Allows to save and restore blueprints!



... and a lot more, to be found at shapez.mod.io!


Wish you a lot of fun with all this new content and looking forward to your feedback!

PS: Be sure to join the official Discord Server to discuss anything about the game and/or mods!

~Tobias

Hi all!

After a long break I finally found time to work on shapez.io again, and I've taken the opportunity to add official support for mods!

The 1.5.0 update adds support for mods, and it will be released on February 25th 2022. (Save the date!)

Since mod support without mods is no fun, I have decided to host a contest, so that there are enough interesting mods at the release of the modloader! So here it is:

Modding Contest

The contest starts today and ends on February 25, 2022, 12 PM CEST. The following prizes are available:

$500 - First Place
$250 - Second Place
$125 - Third Place

$100 - Most game changing mod
$100 - Most creative mod

There is also a $100 budget in case someone discovers critical security holes in the modloader.

[h2]Conditions of participation[/h2]

To participate, your mod must be uploaded to shapez.mod.io by the end of the contest (This will be the official site for downloading mods for shapez.io). You must also have a valid PayPal account to receive the prize money.

You can upload as many mods as you want. However, you can only win one prize. After the deadline I will look at all the mods and choose the winners within a week.

The winners will then be published here as an announcement. I will then contact the winners on mod.io to distribute the prize money.

[h2]Mods Tutorial - Getting Started[/h2]

The modloader is currently only available in the "1.5.0-modloader" branch on Steam and it is already on the master branch on GitHub. I recommend using the latest version of GitHub, so build the game from source.

Finally, here you can find instructions on how to create mods as well as prepared example mods: shapez.io Mod Examples on GitHub.

Since not everything is documented yet and there are even more possibilities than demonstrated by the examples, I recommend you to join the official Shapez.io Modding Discord Server. Here you can ask other mod developers and for advice and help!

Good luck!
~Tobias

Hey guys!

First of all, congrats to the winners of the Puzzle Contest! I am preparing the 3D Printing now, and hope to be able to start shipping the prizes within the next weeks.

However, I have good news - I just released an update, both for the base game and the Puzzle DLC!


Here's whats new:

[h2]Building Outputs[/h2]

You can now hold "ALT" while hovering a building to see the last shape it produced! This should vastly help, both for the Puzzle DLC as well as when your belts are too fast to see whats actually going on. There's also a setting to have this always on while hovering buildings now!



(Thanks to Sense101 for this addition)

[h2]More Zoom & Better Map Overview Performance[/h2]

The map overview should now be more performant, and thus you can now also zoom out farther (Around 2 times more)!



(Thanks to PFedak for this addition)

[h2]Puzzle DLC: Next Puzzle Button[/h2]

As promised, there is now a next puzzle button! When you start a puzzle, and click "Next Puzzle" it will choose the next puzzle from the list you opened the puzzle from (E.g. the builtin puzzles, or a certain difficulty). It will skip completed puzzles though (I haven't found a good way for choosing whether to include those or not, suggestions appreciated!).



[h2]Puzzle DLC: Search Function[/h2]

Also as promised, you can now search by Puzzle Title, Author, Short Key, Difficulty and Completion Time! This works really nice in combination with the "Next Puzzle" button. For example, if you'd like to play through all contest puzzles, you can now search for "Contest" and then navigate with the "Next Puzzle" button. Or you can make series of puzzles with the same name!



[h2]Further changes[/h2]

There are also a few tweaks & fixes worth mentioning:

• Edit signal dialog now has the previous signal filled (Thanks to EmeraldBlock)
  
• Further performance improvements (Thanks to PFedak)
  
• Improved puzzle validation (Thanks to Sense101)
  
• Input fields in dialogs should now automatically focus
  
• Fix selected building being deselected at level up (Thanks to EmeraldBlock)
  
• Updated translations
  

Hey guys,

I'm pleased to announce a super cool contest!

[h2]Challenge[/h2]

Build the coolest puzzle in the Puzzle DLC! Your puzzle name must start with "Contest" and be submitted within the contest timeframe. At the end of the contest, I will choose 5 winners, I will use likes but also creativity as a metric for choosing the winners!

[h2]Prizes[/h2]

The 5 winners will get the shape icon of their puzzle 3D printed and sent! It will roughly look like this:



It is not entirely decided whether it will be a keychain or full-sized shape, but I think it's a really nice contest prize!

[h2]Duration[/h2]

The contest starts now and ends at August 14th, 12:00 CEST. It will then take me a few days to choose the winners, and probably 2 or more weeks to get the prizes printed and sent over to you!

The winners will be announced on the Official Discord Server , you'll need a Discord account so you can PM me in case your puzzle gets chosen.

Also there is now a "puzzle-contest-promo" channel, where you are allowed to share your puzzle once a day to get some attention!

PS: Next update will be for the Puzzle DLC (see last announcement), and the one after that is planned to be mod support!

PPS: If you are interested in the 3D printed shapes and can't wait, check out the shop:
shapez.io 3D Prints

Disclaimer: I know likes are not the perfect metric for this contest, which is why I'll manually go over all the puzzles as well! Also given the feedback from the discord survey, there will most likely be a few more contests with the other options (Like most compact MAM) in the future, don't worry :)

Hey guys!

This is the first update for the Puzzle DLC since the release on Tuesday! Here are the included changes:

[h3]Changes[/h3]

Goal acceptors now reset after getting no items for a while

This fixes a big complaint about being able to "cheat" on puzzles by queuing items on a belt for example. Now the goal acceptors will reset whenever they don't get any input for a while, which should effectively prevent this :)

Further Changes

• Added button to clear all buildings / reset the puzzle
  
• Allow copy-paste in puzzle mode
  
• Fixed level achievements being given on the wrong level
  
• Fixed blueprint not properly clearing on right click
  
• Updated translations
  

I'm happy to announce that the Puzzle DLC for shapez.io is NOW available on Steam!

The Puzzle DLC adds a new game mode where you have to build shapes with limited space and buildings.

There are pre-made puzzles, but the biggest feature is sharing puzzles with the community - You can tackle puzzles from players around the world or create your own puzzles with the puzzle editor!

In addition to this, there is a new soundtrack created especially for the DLC by the original artist!

I think the Puzzle DLC turned out super cool, and I'm looking forward to your feedback!

Here you can find the DLC: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1625400/shapezio__Puzzle_DLC/

~Tobias


PS: If you enjoy the soundtrack and want to support the Artist, the soundtrack will be released within the next few days, including the new music from the puzzle DLC! Be sure to check it out:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1573840/shapezio_Soundtrack/

The Puzzle DLC is now available to Wishlist!

The Puzzle DLC introduces a new Puzzle Mode to shapez.io, in which you produce one or more shapes with restricted space and buildings.

Solve hundreds of puzzles with different difficulties or create your own and share them with the community!

> More Information & Wishlist it here! <


The Puzzle DLC will be available for purchase starting June 22nd for $4,99. Initially I planned a lower price, but there's quite a lot of stuff, and I think it got really, really cool!

[previewyoutube=-KEKTvuP_Cg;full][/previewyoutube]

PS: I also released a new game, schoolbreak.io! It's about creating chaos in school. I'ts very different, but be sure to give it a try, I spent a lot of time on it!

Stay safe,
Tobias

Hey guys!

While I was working on the Puzzle DLC, I wanted to build something completely different, and here it is - schoolbreak.io!



The game is about either creating chaos in the school as a student, or protecting it as a teacher. So schoolbreak is also my first real multiplayer game!

If you are wondering now if there will be a multiplayer version of shapez.io I have to disappoint you, unfortunately the engine and the type of the game doesn't allow it :(

But you can look forward to the Puzzle DLC! The store page for it will go live soon, but when exactly I can not reveal yet :)

So - if you'd like to try something new and silly, I'd be really happy if you gave schoolbreak a try, I put a lot of work and love into it!

~Tobias

This update is only a bugfix update while I am working on the Puzzle DLC :)

Unfortunately, in the past there was the occasional case that a save was corrupted, for example if the computer crashed while saving.

The 1.3.1 update now makes a backup before each save, and saves the file first to a temporary file, and then moves it. This means that a lot would have to go wrong for a save to be lost, and even then the game still keeps a backup of the save.

I hope that now no saves are lost and I apologize for all lost saves so far!

Hello everyone!

After a long time there is a big update for shapez.io - Achievements!

There are now 45 Achievements you can unlock. Also the Steam Overlay and screenshots work now (on Windows)! I am curious if you will find the hidden Achievements ;)

Furthermore you can welcome a new member in the shapez.io team - Say hello to Greg! He is now working full time on shapez.io and will provide you with updates in the near future!

Speaking of updates - Soon (until mid 2021) the first DLC for shapez.io will be released: shapez.io Puzzles! This will introduce a puzzle mode where space, resources and buildings are limited. There will be predefined puzzles, but also a level editor and community area where you can create and publish your own puzzles. It might also introduce new buildings.

As soon as I have more information, you will hear from me!

You might be wondering why there is a new publisher listed - I am very happy to announce a partnership with Doyoyo Games!
It's incredibly hard to publish a game in China, and they will stand by my side. This will greatly improve the experience for Chinese players:

- Improved translations by native speakers
- Building a Chinese community
- Answers to your questions & support in Chinese
- Special content adapted to the unique Chinese cultural background

Thank you for your support! And look forward to the next updates, it will be really cool :)

~Tobias

Hey guys!

Here's another update with fixes and quality of life updates, a lot of them come from the community (you!) actually.

I took a bit of a break after the wires update since that was really a huge update, but I really like working on shapez, so be prepared for a few upcoming updates! (For the roadmap check the last post).

This update includes:

[h3]Fix item readers and some other buildings slowing up belts, especially if they stalled (inspired by Keterr's fix)[/h3]

Well, this one was a bit annoying to track down, but belt readers (and basically every other building) could actually slow down a belt under certain circumstances.

This should fix the throughput issue, however there are some other issues left which I am aware of, for example the double painter being *just a tad* too slow. I'm working on that!


[h3]Added the ability to edit constant signals by left clicking them[/h3]

This should be a huge QoL - since before, you would have to destroy and re-place the signal!


[h3]Prevent items from being rendered on each other when a belt stalls (inspired by Keterr)[/h3]

This is pretty easy to show within an image:




[h3]You can now add markers in the wire layer (partially by daanbreur)[/h3]

Markers now remember in which layer they were created, and also restore to that layer when clicking it.
They also have a different icon now:




[h3]Further changes[/h3]

- Allow to cycle backwards in the toolbar with SHIFT + Tab (idea by EmeraldBlock)
- Allow to cycle variants backwards with SHIFT + T
- Upgrade numbers now use roman numerals until tier 50 (by LeopoldTal)
- Add button to unpin shapes from the left side (by artemisSystem)
- Fix middle mouse button also placing blueprints (by Eiim)
- Hide wires grid when using the 'Disable Grid' setting (by EmeraldBlock)
- Fix UI using multiple different save icons


Looking forward to your feedback!

Hey guys!

This isn't a huge update and contains mostly community fixes and translations.

However, I thought this would also be a nice spot to talk about future (big updates):

My roadmap looks roughly like this:

- Puzzle Mode (E.g. have a fixed amount of space to produce an item, etc.)
- Blueprint library
- Steam Achievements
- More Game Modes (e.g. Sandbox) and customizable map generation
- (Maybe?) a Minimap
- Mods (This will take a while though)

I can't promise when the next big update will happen, but it is planned and I'll keep you updated!

PS: There is a speedrun challenge running in the discord which ends this evening - be sure to check it out! :)

Have a nice Halloween!
~Tobias

I'm excited to announce that after several months of work, the Wires update is FINALLY ready!

Besides an impressive amount of new content, the update also brings significant performance improvements and a lot of Quality-Of-Life features.

Since the update is really HUGE, I created an an extra page for it, which summarizes all changes - I highly recommend to read it before playing the update, it will (hopefully! :D) answer most of your questions:

shapez.io/wires

You can download the update now - it should update automatically. If it doesn't try restarting Steam!

Thanks to everybody who has supported me for this update, be it testing, contributing or giving feedback!

Stay Safe, and I'm really excited towards your feedback!

I have awesome news, the wires update will be released on October 9th, 10 AM CEST!

All information can be found here:

shapez.io/wires/

PS: It's super cool! :D

Looking forward to your feedback!

The wires update will be coming very soon and I'll announce an exact date later this week!

In the meantime, here's a spoiler (Don't mind the gif compression):



(PS: The core gameplay actually won't change. This is all optional lategame content. And it's not as complicated as it might look)

Hey guys!


First of all, I apologize again for no devlogs the past month, but I have been super busy again. However I have a lot of cool new stuff to show!

Disclaimer: All this stuff is not final, meaning it can change until the release. Also a lot of artwork ist still dummy artwork!

PS: All content in this post is already available to be tested in the alpha! If you are interested in trying it out - Join the discord server!

Alright, let's get to the content!

Summary

For those who haven't read the past devlogs: The wires update is a huge update coming to shapez.io soon. It adds an additional "wires" layer which you can switch to and allows you to build logic gates, filters, and much more! It is additional content, meaning it will be unlocked after finishing level 18. However, the requirements to reach level 18 will be lowered.

Read this post to find out more about the update. Warning: Spoilers!


Logic wires

I have decided to split the update into two parts. I felt like the energy part didn't really fit into the game so far, so I will wait with that. Instead, I will focus on the logic wires entirely for the update.

So, what can you do with logic wires?



[h2]Generating Signals[/h2]

A signal can either be a shape, color or a boolean value (0 / 1). They look differently on the map, which you can see in the screenshots below.

[h3]Constant Signal[/h3]

This one is simple: You input a shape, color or boolean value when placing it, and it will emit this value.



[h3]Button[/h3]

This building can be placed on the regular or the wires layer and will emit an 1 when pressed and 0 otherwise:



[h3]Hub[/h3]

The hub has a special connector which allows to read the currently required shape. This will allow to make an "automated make-everything machine"!



[h3]Storage[/h3]

All storages now have two pins: One which returns if the storage is full, and the other returns which item is currently stored:



[h3]Item Reader[/h3]

This building is still in progress, but it will be a 1x1 building where you can put an item in and it will emit that item on the wires layer. It will also pass through the item on the regular layer, so you can just place it somewhere on a belt.

[h2]Using signals[/h2]

[h3]Logic gates[/h3]

There are multiple logic gates already available: AND, OR, NOT, XOR and a transistor-style building.





[h3]Shape processing[/h3]

This is still in progress. However, you will be able to virtually:

• (Un-)stack a shape
  
• Cut a shape
  
• Rotate a shape
  
• Read the color and shape type of a given quadrant
  
• Maybe: Paint a shape
  
• Maybe: Mix colors
  

• Shape processing with wires
  
• Migration of old savegames
  
• Re-Balancing the upgrades
  
• New levels
  
• Performance improvements
  
• Testing!
  

Hey guys!

I'm sorry for not writing a devlog for about two weeks, I have been super busy in real life because I'm currently moving and also have a lot to do on my main job!

New way to submit feedback, bugs, suggestions

I have been working on changing the way to provide feedback, since I got overwhelmed by the amount of suggestions and feedback (I get like 300 messages a day ...).

So, here is how I ask you to provide feedback, report bugs, submit suggestions etc etc.

I kindly ask you to start from the top and work through to the bottom, without skipping steps.

Warning: Spoilers!

Hey guys!

Since there was no announcement or update since a week, I thought it'd be time for a new devlog!

There are currently no updates because I am working on the huge wires update, which changes the game in a way that I can't make any minor updates until I release it. I plan to release the wires update mid/end July but that is just a rough guess!

So, I thought this post would be a good opportunity to show you what I am currently working on!

The wires update will be split into two parts: Energy and Logic. Let me go through both of them:

[h2]Energy[/h2]

There will be an energy generator which produces energy from a given shape. The shapes most likely will get more complex the more generators you place - or something similar (I haven't figured out all details yet):




After supplying shapes, the energy generator will produce energy on a secondary layer, the wires layer (WIP Artwork):




There will then be multiple use cases, for now I stuck to one new building (There will come more!). The new building inverts all colors of the given shape. This gives you the ability to produce black!

Here is how the color inverter looks in a regular layer:



As you can see, there is a small battery icon, showing how much energy the building currently has stored. Currently one energy is enough to invert 4 shapes (All numbers subject to change).

Notice that every energy consumed also produces waste. You will have to feed that waste back into the energy generator, otherwise the building will stall.

Here is how a setup producing black items could look like:



[h3]Energy > What's missing[/h3]

There is a lot more stuff planned:

- Splitters / mergers / tunnels for wires (They'll work a bit different than the regular ones)
- Different artwork for the waste
- More buildings using power (I have a lot of ideas, stay tuned!)

Notice that this won't change the existing gameplay. It will kick in past level 18 only (You will slowly start to unlock wires after level 18, although the requirements for level 18 will be lowered).

[h2]Logic[/h2]

There have been many requests on introducing logic into the game, and I also think that's what most of you think when I say "wires". So here's my concept on the logic:

- There will be logic wires, seperate from regular wires
- A logic wire can transport either a Shape, Color or Logical signal (ON/OFF)
- Logic wires are instant

So, what can you do with logic wires? Let me introduce the options you have first:

[h3]What you can do with logic wires[/h3]

1. You will be able to place levers in the regular layer, which emit an ON / OFF SIgnal to the wires layer

2. You will be able to place AND/OR/NOT/XOR gates which work with ON / OFF Signals

3. You will be able to extract signals from buildings. For example:

- You can read what is the current required shape by connecting a logic wire to the hub

- You can read which was the last item a balancer or belt left through by connecting a logic wire to it

4. You will be able to feed signals into balancers. There will be a "filter" pin and you can put it on an input slot of a building. As soon as you connect a shape or color signal to this input, it will only accept this given shape.


5. You can work with logic shapes: You can cut, rotate, stack, de-stack, paint and unpaint them.

Example use:

You can retrieve the current required shape from the hub, figure out which shapes and colors the individual quadrants require, and then build a machine which automatically delivers the right shapes!





I am still finalizing the concept but I feel like this could be a super cool addition to the game!

Let me know what you think!

~Tobias

Hey guys!

While I was working on the wires thingy I also did a lot of performance improvements. Originally I planned to release both together, but I figured that it would be cool to already have those improvements out! (Also feels bad to have no update for a week :P)

So, this update adds huge performance improvements to your factories, which have the potential to double your fps!

[h2]Performance Improvements[/h2]

I don't want to go into details, but I mainly optimized belt and tunnel performance. Previously, every belt was a single entity and managed the items on it. Now, there are belt paths which are much faster to compute since they can move items much more efficient.



As you can see, only the position to the first item on the path (The small purple rectangle) and the distance to the next item (the number shown on the right side of an item) are stored now.

To update a belt path, I can now simply reduce the distance on the last item and continue so until the whole belt has progressed (while reducing the spacing). This is much faster to update!

I also improved the performance of tunnels since I know that many of you switched to them to save performance! They should also be much faster to compute now :)

And to make it even better, rendering of belts should now also be faster due to the new system!

[h2]Further changes[/h2]

[h3]Earlier Blueprints[/h3]

The shapes required until unlocking blueprints have been reduced so that you effectively unlock blueprints earlier. I am trying out those values and will see on how that works, or if further adjustment is required!

Changes:

• Level 8: 1250 -> 1000
  
• Level 9: 1750 -> 1400
  
• Level 10: 2250 -> 1600
  
• Level 11: 3000 -> 1800
  
• Level 12: 4000 -> 2000 (here you get the blueprints)
  

Hey guys!

You might have been wondering why there have been no updates for 4 days (Well, never thought I'd write something like this ... :D) however that's because I am still working on the wires update plus some performance improvements!

Since this will take a while I thought it'd be cool to stream the development, so you can still see whats going on!

So, I will be streaming on twitch.tv/yorg_io occasionally now!

If you are interested on how this will look, you can also look at todays stream recording.

PS: In this stream I've been working on performance updates which have the potential to double your framerate! If you are interested on how your current savegames will perform with the update, you can already test them on the shapez.io beta (Please note that the beta will be broken regulary though).

Looking forward to meeting you in the stream!

~Tobi

You might have noticed there haven't been any updates the past two days, which is because I was very busy on working on the wires update!

I am currently running a huge survey and I would recommend you to join it!

First, read my summary and ideas about wires (spoiler!):

https://gist.github.com/tobspr/c3cbc5fd3d4d254711ec3574cf6db19d

Second, join the Discord Server and vote for the ideas in the `#surveys` channel!

I'm looking forward to your feedback!

Hey guys!


Another daily update for you! :)

[h2]Color blind mode[/h2]

It has been requested many times, and even if it might have been a minority I felt it would be unfair not work on a solution - so here it is!

There is now a "Color blind mode" setting which enables you to view the colors below your cursor:



[h2]Shape Explorer[/h2]

I thought this would be a cool feature, and while mainly implemented for the color blind mode, you can now click the "info" icon on every shape to view its detailed information! This is also active without the color blind mode enabled.




[h2]Configurable Autosave[/h2]

You can now configure the autosave interval:



[h2]Updated smart-tunnel placement[/h2]

The smart tunnel placement feature has been reworked. It will now only replace the belts between two tunnels if the whole gap contains belts faced in the right direction.

If you drag the tunnels, it will still replace the belts though. I haven't found a good fix for that yet :/ (In order to implement this properly a big refactoring would be required first).

[h2]Fixed blueprint bugs[/h2]

Sometimes the belts would be messed up when pasting a blueprint. This should be fixed now! (Contribution by hexy)


[h2]Further changes[/h2]
- The soundtrack now has a higher quality in the standalone version
- Added setting to disable warnings when cutting / deleting more than 100 buildings (by hexy)
- Fix camera moving weird after dragging and holding (by hexy)
- Fix keybinding for pipette showing while pasting blueprints
- Improve visibility of shape background in dark mode
- Added sound when destroying a building (Not entirely happy with that yet, tho)
- Added swedish translation
- Update tutorial image for tier 2 tunnels to explain how to mix and match them (by jimmyshadow1)
- Updated translations - Big thanks to all translators!


I also added a link to the Official Subreddit to the main menu since a lot of people were asking! :)

Hey guys!

I'm back from my vacation and already have an update prepared for you! I'll give you a quick summary and then tell you a bit about my future plans as always!


Changes

[h2]Pipette[/h2]

Many people have requested this - You can now pick-up the building below your mouse cursor with "Q" (configurable)! The pipette is available from the very beginning. Looking forward to your feedback!




[h2]New soundtrack[/h2]

The game soundtrack has been extended and now consists of 4 songs with over 13 minutes of playtime! It should be much less repetitive now - looking forward to your feedback!

It was composed by Peppsen - you should definitely check him out on Soundcloud!

[h2](Almost) unlimited marker names[/h2]

Markes can now be 71 characters long! You can totally break your UI with this now, but I don't feel responsible! (Contribution by Joker-vD)



[h2]Compact Building Infos[/h2]

There is now a "Compact Building Infos" setting which will hide the description and image from the building info panel. This can be useful if you want it to be more compact.



(PS: You might notice I also fixed the hub marker being overlayed by the panel)

[h2]Dark theme everywhere[/h2]

The dark theme is now also active in the menu! (Contribution by dengr1065).



[h2]Improved Keybindings Panel[/h2]

I reworked the panel in the upper left which shows available keybindings - Now it is more consistent, and the shortcuts for cutting, pasting and deleting have been moved there as well.

It was also not showing the right shortcuts sometimes, which should be fixed now.

[h2]Further changes[/h2]

- Minor performance improvements by caching extractor items (by Phlosioneer)
- Automatically deselect area when selecting a new building
- Fix belt planner not placing the last belt
- Fix buildings getting deleted when right clicking while placing a blueprint
- Fix for exporting screenshots for huge bases (It was showing an empty file) (by xSparfuchs)
- Fix buttons not responding when using right click directly after left click (by davidburhans)
- Fix hub marker being hidden by building info panel
- Disable dialog background blur since it can cause performance issues
- Added simplified chinese translations
- Update translations (Thanks to all translators!)


What's next?

There is a lot on my todo list, but the next thing will be the wires update! I actually made a survey in the discord which showed a more or less clear outcome:



So, the wire update will take some time (expect two weeks at least!), so I will keep you busy with minor updates while working on this huge update - just so you know what's going on!

I am also aware that the game can run pretty slow on later levels, especially if you don't delete old parts of your factory after they get unused. This is something on my todo list which I want to work on after the wires update! (Since it got prioritized 2nd highest by you!)

Besides of that, there are a lot of minor things (Like support for color-blind people, fixing bugs and more!) which I will be working on in parallel!

Hey guys!

I thought it'd be worth to make a separate post on what I'm currently working on and what is on my mind. (Probably will do more dev-logs in the future).

First of all - I will be in vacation until Monday, 22th. I won't respond on discord, steam, reddit and E-Mail. Hope you will survive that! :P (This also means no daily updates within that time - sorry!)

Now that we have the bad news out, here's what I am planning with the new wires update!


[h2]Wires Update[/h2]

So, I had a lot of thoughts about how to make the game more interesting late-game and came up with this wires idea:

Once you complete level 18 (Goals until there will be lowered, so you reach it quicker), you unlock a separate layer where you can put wires on.

You will then be able to switch between the "default" layer (with the buildings) and the "wires" layer (Containing the wires connected to the buildings). Imagine a circuit board where you have the transitsors (=buildings) on one side, and the wiring on the other.


Here is a draft on how it could look:




Features I can imagine:
- Levers on the regular layer which emit an "on"/"off" signal to the wires layer
- Connecting wires to a balancer for example allows you to enable/disable inputs of it
- Maybe there would be special "power sources" which can be connected to buildings to vastly speed them up?
- Maybe you could read items from a belt?
- Maybe you could read the current goal from the hub?
- And/Or/Not gates in the wires layer

There are lots of potential ideas but I still haven't found a really good use case. The only one I can imagine currently is building a make-everything factory which you can then customize via levers.

So, I need your ideas guys! Join the Discord Server and leave your suggestions and feedback in the #wires channel!

[h2]Upcoming Price Changes[/h2]

I always try to be as transparent as possible with the community, and right now I consider an upcoming price change, once the the wires update will be out.

Since I am in close contact to the community, I have actually made a survey regarding this on the Discord Server and I highly recommend you to parcitipate!

PS: shapez.io will NOT be on the steam summer sale! This is because the game is too fresh and is not even allowed to have a discount 30 days after launching. So, it is unlikely that there will be a sale within the next 2 months at least!

Belt Planner
Many people complained that placing straight (long) belts is currently hard, and this update addresses this!

You can now hold SHIFT (configurable) while placing a belt to activate the belt planner. It will try to connect the point you drag from to your cursor and place the belts once you release your cursor. You can right click or release SHIFT to cancel it.

I experimented with automatic orientation, but in the end I decided to make it flipable manually by pressing 'R' - Really looking forward to your feedback on this!



Further Changes

- Added continue button to main menu and add seperate 'New game' button (by jaysc)
- Added setting to disable smart tunnel placement introduced with the last update (Since it can produce unwanted side effects)
- Added setting to disable vignette
- Update translations (Big thanks to all translators!)


What's next?

I will create another post today containing my ideas about circuits and how I plan to continue with the game - stay prepared!

Hey there!

I just pushed another update with a lot of cool stuff!

Reworked Markers

Markers now are way cooler! First of all, the HUB Marker now shows a compass once your hub is no longer visible:



But even better: You can now include short keys in the markers which will render as a shape!



Explanation: Short keys are a way of describing how a shape looks. For example, the shapes above are called "CgScScCg" and "RpRpRpRp:CwCwCwCw" - If you are interested in more details, check out the Shapez.io Viewer which is a tool to generate and view the shapes!

If you enter a short key as a marker name, it will automatically render it everywhere - Isn't that cool!?

Mirrored Painter

So, many people were asking about mirroring buildings, and the main problem here was the painter - Which is why I added a mirrored variant! I feel like this should be enough and there is no further need for mirroring then - Let me know what you think! (It is unlocked the whole time)




Tunnel Placement

When placing tunnels, the game is now much smarter about that! An image says more than a thousand words, so lemme show it off:



They will automatically remove unused belts inbetween now and you can now drag them properly!



PS: 1.1.13 was a minor update which only updated translations, which is why I didn't post about that :)

Performance Improvements

Awesome news - the game will now run up to 60% faster!

I spent my whole Sunday on tweaking the performance of the game, especially regarding belts. The biggest improvement was caching the connections between buildings by precomputing a dependency graph.

This allows me to perform a lot of calculations when you place/remove a building and not doing it every tick! (Should have done that earlier, but I simply didn't get to it).

So, this is only one part of a huge series of performance improvements I have planned - But it should already run much smoother now!

PS: This only affects the tick-rate. The rendering remains unchanged, but optimizations there are planned too. However, the tick-rate is the major part which potentially causes lag.

PPS: Performance improvements and refactorings always have big potential to break stuff - Please report anything suspicious in the discord! :)

PPPS: Looking forward to insanely big mega factories now!

PPPPS: If you're a C++ guy you'll know why I used the affix and not the suffix on the announcement cover ;)

My Strategy Game Bundle

I also just released the "tobspr's Strategy Game Bundle"! It includes all my strategy games:
- YORG.io
- YORG.io 3
- shapez.io

If you enjoyed shapez.io, you should definitely have a look, and its also a great way to support me!

Check it out here: tobspr's Strategy Game Bundle



Have a nice remaining Sunday!
~ Tobias

Hey guys!

Finally got the 1.1.11 update out (Thats a lot of '1'!), which includes a lot of minor changes as well as quality of live improvements!

Additionally it includes 3 user contributions, so let me go through all changes!

Changes
[h2]Reworked pinned shapes[/h2]

When you pinned a shape, the shape plus the required amount was saved and stored in the left side. This led to several issues, mainly the goal not updating or shapes not being removed when no longer being required.

This update fixes it: When you pin a shape, only the shape is saved. The required amount then is automatically computed, depending if its required for an upgrade or the next level.

Once the shape is not required anymore (Thus, for no upgrade and not for the next level as well), it will automatically unpin.

Finally, once you have reached the required amount on a given shape, it will render transparent, so you know which shapes are already completed.

[h2]Cutting and pasting areas (Community contribution)[/h2]

You can now cut areas with 'X' once you have blueprints unlocked! Also, you can now paste the last blueprint with 'V'. This is a huge quality of live improvement!

Notice that there is one issue: Cutting will actually cost blueprint shapes, so moving buildings will actually cost something. I'm considering to make this free, just letting you know so you are not confused.

This has been added by hexy - thanks a lot!

[h2]Exporting your base as image[/h2]

This is a standalone only feature - You can now press F3 to export your whole base as an image! This can be used to generate super cool images of mega-bases! Just like this one here (Click to view full resolution):




[h2]High-precision mode[/h2]

This is a standalone only feature as well - There were a lot of complaints about belts not being compressed even if they should. For example:



This is caused by the dynamic tick-rate. The game automatically reduces the precision the bigger your base gets, to make sure it still does run somewhat smooth. Additionally, transferring items from a belt to a building and vice-versa always needs at least one tick - if your ticks are too low, this can be the bottleneck.

Since there is no possibility of fixing this while maintaining good performance, I now gave you the choice - You can now select the 500hz simulation target in the settings to make sure your simulation is super precise! (And slow, and will burn your pc ...)


[h2]Further changes[/h2]

• Improved upgrade number rounding, so there are no goals like '37.4k', instead it will now be '35k'
  
• You can now configure the camera movement speed when using WASD (by mini-bomba)
  
• Selecting an area now is relative to the world and thus does not move when moving the screen (by Dimava)
  
• Fix bug regarding number rounding
  
• Fix dialog text being hardly readable in dark theme
  
• Fix app not starting when the savegames were corrupted - there is now a better error message as well.
  
• Further translation updates - Big thanks to all contributors!
  

Hey guys!

So, I spent some time on getting the linux builds to work and just published them!

Please give me feedback if everything works properly, because admittedly I'm not a linux expert! :) (So, even if everything works, feel free to leave me a message in the #feedback discord channel so I know everything is good!)

While I was on it, I figured it would be easy to also integrate steam cloud saves - so those are also available in this update now!

Besides of that, I'm currently working on a fix for broken savegames, this has the following reason:

- The game saves your progress automatically and asynchronous, to make sure it doesn't lag
- This process can (especially on larger bases) take up to 5 seconds or more.
- If you exit the game within that time, the write-process will be disrupted and thus you will end up with a corrupt file
- Unfortunately its not possible to restore the file, once corrupted.

The fix here is to implement a mechanism which many programs already have: Write a secondary file, and once written rename it to the original file. This ensures that the content is written as whole.

It's not easy to integrate and takes some time, but I'm giving my best!

Be sure to also check the Roadmap Announcement to see what I'll be working on!

PS: If you are interested in helping with the translations, check out the Translations on GitHub!

PPS: Northernlion played shapez.io! This is so cool! Check out the video


PPPS: I'm so overwhelmed by all this positive feedback! Love you guys! (And I can hardly keep up, please don't be mad if I don't respond instantly!)

Hey guys!

First of all, HUGE thanks to this insane crazy positive feedback towards the game! Steam is currently even featuring the game on the front page and there has not been a single negative review yet!

This is really overwhelming and I'm super motivated on pushing out updates to improve the game! I have a lot planned, be sure to check out the roadmap post! :)

So, lets get to the actual content - I used my free day today for an 1.1.9 update:

TRANSLATION SUPPORT

The game is now available in different languages! For now there are English, French, Portuguese, Czech and Spanish (Latin America) - But everybody can contribute!

If you would like to help out, you can check out the documentation here:
Translations on GitHub


FURTHER CHANGES

This update only includes a few small adjustments and fixes - I need more time for a big content update (Hopefully this weekend!).

- Update stacker artwork to clarify how it works
- Update keybinding hints on the top left to be more accurate
- Make it more clear when blueprints are unlocked when trying to use them
- Fix pinned shape icons not being visible in dark mode
- Fix being able to select buildings via hotkeys in map overview mode
- Make shapes unpinnable in the upgrades tab (By hexy)


Big thanks to all of you for this amazing support!

Hey guys!

First of all, thank you for all the positive feedback on the game! I really appreciate it and it shows me that this game has potential, as well as motivating me to push it even further!

I am trying to be in constant contact with the community (you!), especially on discord - I'm usually available there the whole day and trying to respond to everything (Although this can get hard at some point).

I'm also doing surveys there (Like the circuit survey) - So I really recommend to join the discord if you want to know whats going on!

I also appreciate all the pull requests I am getting (Those are community contributions), although there are just too many - Reviewing and testing them takes time, and not every PR does add an immediate value, and might even break the game. So - I'm trying to catch up, but please notice that it might take a long time until your PR is merged / commented on! :)

So, getting to the point - Here are my plans on what I want to implement. Not all of those are finished ideas and might drastically change, but I thought it'd be worth mentioning so you can see how this game will evolve!

PS: If you are interested in more details, check out the Trello Page - It also lists known bugs and stuff.

PS2: I'm working on the game in my free time (I still have a full-time job) - This means it will take some time for everything to be implemented and updates will take a bit longer. I'm trying to keep you constantly updated though! My long term goal is to be able to work on shapez.io full time.

Roadmap / Planned Features

[h2]Wires[/h2]

This is a topic which I suggested and which so far has received over 200 votes (The highest voted survey in the shapez.io history).




This definitely will be fun to implement! I plan to add wires at a late state of the game, where you have most things unlocked - So this is actually a huge feature which will only affect a minority of players, but I still think its super cool!


[h2]More buildings[/h2]

There are several buildings I can imagine, but its really difficult to add new buildings - Every building could potentially break the game or make it less fun actually.

Things I'm considering:
- Compact 1 to 2 balancer (Alternatively compact 1 to 3, and replace the two 2 to 1 mergers with a single 3 to 1 merger to reduce amount of variants)
- 3x1 / 4x1 stacker
- De-stacker (Somebody already made a PR)

This is not a complete list and there is no guarantee that any of the above mentioned buildings will make it into the game! Still, I thought I'd share with you what I am considering so far.

[h2]Color blind mode[/h2]

Right now the game is unplayable as soon as you have to mix colors. I want to make it accessible to everybody and thus there is the need for a color blind mode.
This is a super difficult topic, and I still haven't figured out on how to solve it in an elegant way. (Ideas appreciated!)


[h2]Story mode[/h2]

Right now there is only one mode, and one could call it the "Sandbox" mode - no costs for buildings and no restrictions on how many you can place (Except for blueprints).

I plan to add a seperate story mode where every building has a cost (The cost will be a certain shape) - I definitely need to try out how this feels when playing it!

[h2]Customizable Maps[/h2]

I think it would be super cool to be able to influence the map generation - Share seeds with friends, control which shapes appear on the map and in which density.

[h2]Mods[/h2]

So, this is a big topic. I haven't decided yet on how I want to distribute the mods, but seeing the amount of contributions on github I can imagine a lot of potential mods! This is something I'm still planning (I also need to do some research on how the steam workshop works).

[h2]More types of shapes[/h2]

This is a difficult one, since every shape part needs to be stackable on others. People have already created more shapes in their self-built versions of the game, but those partially don't stack well (They look super cool though!).

[h2]Even more ...[/h2]

So, this is just a super small list of what I am planning so far! I did miss a lot of stuff for sure. However, trying to keep you updated and I'm looking forward to your feedback!

shapez.io will launch on steam on the 7th of June - Be sure to add it to your wishlist!

The steam version will be and stay feature equal with the itch.io version for a while - I don't want to give people a disadvantage for buying it on itch.io. This doesn't mean I don't have plans for integrating steam achievements or cloud saves though :)

Looking forward to your responses and I hope you'll enjoy the game!