Underspace News

Hello starchasers! Right now I'm knee-deep in on next big update, but I've come back with a little patch for you. But I know why you're really here, you just want to see these furry bastards.



Now, this is going to be the last patch for this month, mostly as I hunker down and finish up everything for Faces in the Fog. You'll see various little things for this around stations now, but they're not activated or ready yet. However, some features aren't things I can just hold back once they're done, so (lucky you) a few small things here and there are launching early. Yay.


Ghost ships were due to get a retrofitting upgrade... whatever with FitF. Obviously that's been implemented so we can't just leave you waiting to get devoured by phantom freighters and spooky battleships. All ghost ships now have more attacks, more loadouts, and more surprises. Be careful.


As a bunch of the upcoming quests are pirate-centric, it was appropriate to give a bunch of major pirate bases a facelift. Not all of them have it right now, but when your head is throbbing at 2AM sometimes you get the bug to just decorate a pirate cult church, you know? The Master's Ball and the Cathedral of Skies now have a ton of more detailing done up for them.


We've also got some smaller quality of life stuff requested by users. Skills now show the per-point increase (or decrease) they add before you add points, and more keybinds have been added to the game to better fit your weird playstyle.





[h2]NEW FEATURES[/h2]

• Weapon slot deactivation keys are now their own keybinds.
  
• The Master of Wormholes finally managed to track down and hire (kidnap) an interior designer for his sanctuary. The Master’s Ball now has details for its bar and starchasing section.
  
• You’ve finally put enough points into insight to be able to properly perceive the pews and potions of the Cathedral of Skies. The entire station now has been fully detailed, as befitting the headquarters of the galaxy’s most insidious cult.
  
• Ghost ships have been greatly buffed and have many new attacks and turrets to defend themselves with.
  
• Skills now display the per-point change that they do, even if no points are invested.
  

[h2]CHANGES AND REBALANCES[/h2]

• You may see some bounty boards in various areas. These aren’t available to be activated right now, but they’re there.
  
• Gravecity’s Amber Archives now also serves as a data center. Corpsefinders are often starchasers, after all!
  
• Junktech now owns the sun in their home system. They can do that.
  
• Adjusted the health values of various bosses.
  
• Buffed the drop rate for Deadforest dyes.
  

[h2]FIXES[/h2]

• Fixed some description typos for ships during the main quest.
  
• AI slot items now deactivate when in lanelines.
  
• Fixed issue where game would display some spoilery areas too early.
  
• Added some locking technology to prevent issues that would occur if the player would rapidly save or load a game.
  
• Fixed issue with Sibling In Peril where the distress signals would have the wrong icons.
  
• Fixed issues where some campaign ships would spawn with you well after they were irrelevant to the situation at hand.
  
• Fixed issue in Darkon where ghosts had overwhelmingly Macrovari names. Other people now die.
  
• Fixed issue where ghost ships would too often display the same name.
  
• Fixed issue in campaign mission 10 to hopefully prevent softlocks.
  
• Fixed issue in campaign mission 10 where Carian would appear in multiple spots. She’s not that kind of Us.
  
• Fixed some rendering issues on the Remaining Eye.
  
• Fixed issue where Salvage Scrounge missions wouldn’t work.
  
• Fixed issue where non-gun hardpoints would disable themselves upon looting an object.
  
• Fixed various typos in news stories and solar flavor text.
  
• Fixed persistence errors with lodestone cores.
  
• Fixed issue where a significant amount of the Loco Star’s hardpoints were done up wrong.
  
• Fixed issue where having too many dyes would cut off the last few.
  
• Fixed issue where purchased character customization options wouldn’t save.
  

And that's all! We'll see you bright and early in September for Faces In The Fog!

Welcome starchasers! I'm sick as hell (I mean I'm always pretty sick but I mean that I went to a punk rock concert and now I'm bedridden with the flu) but still managed to drag my mangled, disease-ravaged corpse body away from the warmth of the cats just in time to pump out a nice juicy 1.29.0 patch for you.



This is another small patch, you'll probably notice that as we get further into development that these patches will generally be more like this, as there are less and less fires to put out and less and less features that need refining or polishing. Still, many of these were requests from users from the past week or so, which we're happy to accommodate.

UPDATE HIGHLIGHTS:
In addition to some new keybinds (which are surprisingly easy to add but a pain in the butt to allow modders to add) we've got some requested UI features. You can scroll through dialogue history (though there's still a max limit to prevent insanity), scanned points of interest will tell you where you can find them again, and the energy bonuses for weapons can now be viewed.


On some stations you might sometimes find locked doors or hallways that, currently, seem to just be there or serve no purpose. Faces in the Fog is launching early next month, and with it will be coming twenty new quests and a lot of new areas. There's a bigger focus on station portions with Faces, which will see you trekking through abandoned pirate bases, solving medical mysteries, and digging through people's mail.






[h2]NEW FEATURES[/h2]

• Added keybinds that let you switch controller auto-detection on or off.
  
• Added keybinds that let you cycle through weapon groups.
  
• Energy weapons now display the damage bonuses they gain against shields, if they have any.
  
• Scanned item data now contains (if applicable) the location of where that scanned point of interest was.
  

[h2]CHANGES AND REBALANCES[/h2]

• Optimized several stations.
  
• Dialogue history now can be scrolled through.
  
• Added some optimizations to Planet Vauldric in the vague hope that it’ll run better for random users. Probably not.
  
• Added some memory optimizations when transitioning between areas.
  

[h2]FIXES[/h2]

• Fixed some typos in game skills.
  
• Fixed some missing elements in the keybind control menu.
  
• Fixed issue with the Chunidale Racetrack where the quest couldn’t be progressed if you completed two of the same circuit type in a row.
  

And one final cat to send you off with. I'll see you when I see you.

Welcome starchasers! I had mulled over delaying this patch a bit until we had something more, but a lot of the stuff here are fixes I think more than a few people would be impatient for. This also includes a big fix for THE VOID visual bug that has plagued our nation for so long. Not be confused with the void cat that plagues my house.




We're right on track for the upcoming release of Faces in the Fog, which will be out in early September. There's some cool new stuff coming there, with the major focus being new quests and content, including tons of new areas, a new bounty system, and more. Here's some teasers:






[h2]NEW FEATURES[/h2]

• The Ijuni have approved a bunch of off-world transfer requests for their highly trained pricemasters. You’ll find more of these fellows out on important stations, ready to take your hard earned cash to run a commodity check on anything your heart desires.
  

[h2]CHANGES AND REBALANCES[/h2]

• Added support for using multiple joysticks at one time. Can you beat the game using a Wiimote and some bananas now? Probably.
  

[h2]FIXES[/h2]

• Fixed issue where storms were occuring during campaign missions that shouldn’t have had them occur.
  
• Fixed issue where regional pricechecking wasn’t occurring.
  
• Fixed issue where quicksave and quickload buttons could be used in menus where they shouldn’t be activatable.
  
• Went back over some shader elements with a more discerning eye and finally fixed the black void that can occur in systems that have storms if volumetric lighting is enabled. Christ I hope this works.
  
• Fixed issue where hyperstrom wormhole hazards would persist.
  
• Fixed issue where some ships wouldn’t be able to acknowledge skills from weapons and equipment that added new skill bonuses.
  
• Fixed issue where new keybinds for M/KB setups wouldn’t save. You’ll need to set them one more time. Haha, early access!
  
• Fixed issue where if you had exactly 150 storage the storage would reset.
  
• Fixed issue where some missions would reset themselves if landing on a different station.
  
• Fixed some visual issues during the main menu.
  
• Fixed some grammatical issues during station tutorials.
  

It's been a while starchasers! Have a sale, a big new patch, and some cats. Did you know that people got the game running on the 3DS and the Nintendo Switch? I have no idea how, but I was never that kind of engineer.


Oh, and cats. People get so mad at these cats because it's "unprofessional" or something. I knew a guy who always had opinions like that in real life. God did he smell terrible.






[h2]INPUT 3.0[/h2]
A huge amount of time was spent on our new input system, which should, hopefully, be the final version. You'll still have to do a lot of setup yourself, but you were the one that decided to live the hard life and use a controller. Input 3.0 however has many new features, including the ability to rebind what axises control what, proper saving and acknowledgement of things like doubletaps and holds, the ability to bind multiple keys to a single action beyond just "shift + something", better controller autodetection, and the ability to save controller keybinds and presets (which are saved in your AppData/LocalLow/Pastaspace Interactive/Underspace/ControllerPresets folder).

You can share presets among each other, but controller support is still being worked on. It will, honestly, always remain something that's only partially supported, because as we've said MANY times before.

Still if you want to scream and cry your way to getting it up on a Steam Deck, be my guest. You're the god of your own unhappiness now.

[h2]GRAPHICAL REWORKS[/h2]
A few outstanding things in game were lagging behind in terms of quality. Vignettes or dungeons that were missing what they needed, or UI elements that didn't have their proper icons. I've gone back and done a lot here. For starters, the Harvester Grove has received a big rework, finding those secret guns and fighting down the Harvest's Queen will be a lot easier.

Did you know darn near a lot of things in game can be scanned and sold? You'd better know, it's a great money maker. But some were missing proper or up-to-date images. I fixed that.





[h2]NEW FEATURES[/h2]

• Complete and total input overhaul! You can now define and properly take advantage of doubletaps, holds, bind multiple keys, and more.
  
• Joystick and controller support has been expanded. You are now able to redefine what axises control what common actions in game, as well as load in presets for specific controllers.
  
• Specific and VERY basic controller presets for the following controllers have been added: Xbox One controllers, PS4 controllers, Logictech Extreme 3D Pro joysticks.
  
• You’re also able to import and share custom controller presets for controllers.
  
• Please note as a result all keybinds have been reset. These were using the old system so they’re totally incompatible, as such you will need to rebind any keys that aren’t the default. This will hopefully be the only time this needs to be done, at least for mouse and keyboard users.
  
• The dodge keys are now separated out from the normal strafe keys. Rebind them how you want.
  
• Added key support for activating special items (such as the Ascended Pin, Black Borm’s Treasure Map, etc).
  
• Redid icons for many scannables to be higher detail when viewing them in a menu. These were really out of date, honestly.
  
• Added missing icons for all vignettes and ambient bosses.
  
• Added a new gameplay option to disable the flying cars and ships you see on stations, to help with FPS.
  
• Undersnakes now have many new attacks. These apply to the higher level ones (vulcondas and above). Stay on your toes, bros.
  
• Cockpit customization items are now highlighted in their UI.
  
• Added an interior light when customizing your ship’s cockpit.
  
• Quitting the game now has a button to directly quit to your desktop.
  
• Starting a new game has a confirmation menu before doing so now.
  

[h2]CHANGES AND REBALANCES[/h2]

• Stations won't reflect docking queues when docking autopilot is disengaged.
  
• The Harvester Grove has received a graphical overhaul, given its models more detail and much more accurate collision.
  
• Station docking portraits will more accurately reflect the race/faction of the people operating it.
  
• Adjusted health values in Tale of the Tick to prevent exploits.
  
• Adjusted some campaign visuals for more clarity.
  
• Reduced firing distance for automated turrets on large shipwrecks.
  
• Slightly (very slightly) buffed the starter ship’s cargo hold to 15.
  
• Improved the rendering on some bottles and glasses in game.
  
• Improved controller auto-detection.
  
• Added controller support for the game’s radial menu.
  

[h2]FIXES[/h2]

• Rearranged some tutorials.
  
• Fixed issue that prevented the Runaway Train side mission from completing.
  
• Fixed some shadow rendering issues that, long term, should result in better shadows.
  
• Fixed UI issues when disabling background effects in the navmap.
  
• Missions will try to pick mission waypoints that are not too close to stations now.
  
• Fixed some mismatched campaign icons.
  
• Fixed some campaign issues where some NPCs wouldn’t be enabled.
  
• Fixed issue where inverting control axises didn’t invert firing.
  
• Fixed issue where the character customization UI wouldn’t maintain changes, at least visually.
  
• Fixed issue where some trading and vanity achievements weren’t activating.
  
• Fixed issues Hunt For The Megaborble that could result in sequence breaking.
  
• Fixed some elite Macrovari missions spawning items incorrectly.
  
• Fixed issue where quickloading a game in orbital camera mode would cause weirdness.
  
• Fixed (once again) even more rendering issues on stations.
  
• Fixed various typos in quest dialogue and entries.
  

Welcome starchasers! Have a good week? Didn't die in the summer heat? Didn't get compared to a loaf of bread and get heinously angry over being compared to a loaf of bread like my cat?


Well that's all well and good but be quiet now. It's patch time!



There's a bunch of new stuff this update that we don't have time to cover because I want to go get a cheeseburger, but I'll run through the big stuff.

[h2]NEW GRAPHICS[/h2]
Lots of existing things have gotten a bit of a graphical facelift. Docking lights have been replaced with shiny holographic docking arrows, several stations have some lighting, placement improvements (if not full models), and even more takeoff and landing cutscenes.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Unique dungeon-exclusive weapons also now have their own unique models. We've also added two new unique dungeon weapons (the Arcane Arsenal and the Cornucopia) to several neglected interiors. Keep an eye out for loot crates!


[h2]NEW (OLD) BOSSES[/h2]
The bad part about being a one man show is that if you miss something entirely and nobody else knows about it then how do you really know it's missing? Yeah see what I mean? A fair amount of storm-specific bosses were wiped out in a batch edit and never re-added or properly tested because of this. But they're here and they're back now!

Get blown up by a greedy asteroid, face a giant sentient naval mine, or get overwhelmed by a fleet of hivemind starships. But conquer them, and you'll find some new sources of lucrative loot and new (old) equipment.

[h2]MODDING IMPROVEMENTS[/h2]
You can now modify and add new starships via the modding system! This system's still in its infancy, but those experienced with it will be able to turn text files into entire new ships, or rebalance existing ones.

We're still working on getting new models and textures in entirely via a runtime-model-importer, which has had great early success. But I don't think people want the first ship mods to be about flying around Oscar's breadsticks. Maybe. You might be weird like that.





[h2]NEW FEATURES[/h2]

• Added some initial technology that allows mods to add and modify in new ships! We’ll be having more on this later, once we get things like model importing working.
  
• Added several new billboards.
  
• All dungeon-specific guns now have their own unique models.
  
• Added two unique guns to the Ordnance Tomb and Harvest Grove, respectively.
  
• Battleship Greatclaw now has a full interior.
  
• Gravecity now has takeoff and landing animations.
  
• Turns out at launch the editor wiped out a bunch of storm data entries that controlled what spawns… spawn. Which means a bunch of storm bosses that exist were never spawning. I feel stupid, but that means the game has now been updated to contain a whole variety of new critters.
  
• Re-added and fixed up Mama Mine.
  
• Re-added and fixed up the Overwhelm.
  
• Re-added and fixed up the Volatile Planetoid.
  
• The Disium now spawns disium asteroids around itself for mining. Gotta keep up with it though!
  

[h2]CHANGES AND REBALANCES[/h2]

• Updated the eyeballs of Ballden on-station characters to no longer be glowy squares that lead to the plane of eternal fire.
  
• Docking lights have now been replaced with docking arrows.
  
• Docking arrows for lanelines have gotten a small graphical rework to make them match docking arrows.
  
• Added some more clarification to certain tutorials.
  
• Marked several quest-starty-people as important in your contact HUD.
  
• Rebalanced some later stages of “Our Good Name” that were unintentionally too high level.
  
• Adjusted some scannable distances of things.
  
• The Hellmouth Prince now gives his proper broken reward. He’s not a smart guy.
  
• Improved some storm hazards, making them more dangerous and more engaging! Examples including making damaging asteroids rotate and move, or stalking rifts move faster.
  
• Added some edge case fixes for places with landing cutscenes that can malfunction and cause on-station camera weirdness.
  
• Many of the ambient starchasers that can join you in your starchasing now have new icons for their individual characters.
  

[h2]FIXES[/h2]

• Fixed issue where large ships were launching far too many permanently immortal mines too often. Sorry.
  
• Fixed UI issue where secondary heavy weapons on bombers would show both bars as being drained.
  
• Usable items (such as maps, fast travel things, quest items) are now saved by the game.
  
• Your selected contact HUD category is now saved by the game.
  
• Fixed some floating or misplaced objects.
  
• Fixed issue where some placeholder stations could have the player fall through everything.
  
• Fixed issue where some chapters wouldn’t advance.
  
• Fixed some broken teleports on Union battleships.
  
• Fixed issue where the Hellmouth Prince was missing some attacks and wouldn’t jump out properly.
  
• Fixed some issues where nonexistent mods would be loaded by accident.
  
• Fixed issues where station geometry could be walked through.
  
• Fixed issue where some storm hazards wouldn’t spawn.
  
• Fixed some issues in the capital systems that caused their skyboxes to be lower resolution than was intended.