Residual News

IT’S .. A.. WRAP! …sort of ! Last week I mentioned that I stopped adding big-features, and during this week I also stopped adding small features, and the amount of bugs showing up is now a small drip of silly little things. So let’s call it what it is: Residual is now at release-candidate status!

What’s left is porting the code to the console versions. Starting with Switch, because hardware wise it’s the slowest, and development/code wise it’s the easiest to quickly test things out on. We then make sure everything works and runs as it should. Any bugs showing up at this porting stage are most likely code-bugs, and they will be easier to spot since code is often used in many different areas. Based on the experience we build up with porting the other Orangepixel games, I’m not expecting huge obstacles, we can probably guess where the problem/work will happen, but it will be exciting to see the game run on Switch !

Exciting couple of months coming for the world of Residual !

One of the last Residual DEVLOG’s talks about the addition of tiny-features that I could still sneak into the game in recent weeks:

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

Full changes list:

• added: interface music
  
• added: extra tree designs
  
• added: improved rock-drop sounds
  
• added: extra creature-sounds
  
• added: new achievements: Saviour, MEchanic, Foody, Janitor, Technician
  
• added: new achievements: Crasher, Galactic-fisher, Fruit picker, Fruit lover, Shroom sampler, Tourist
  
• added: Lore and Hologram log-screens to Stats menu
  
• added: catching fish now adds random value to speed (more chance it won’t land in water again)
  
• added: completed Dutch translation
  
• fixed: freeplay-rune in galaxy view overlaps text
  
• fixed: snapshot mode pans out of bounds
  
• fixed: door not requiring power, just a repaired gadget
  
• fixed: EDP triggering dialog twice
  
• fixed: EDP not showing creating of devices/technology
  
• fixed: no select-sound in Artifacts
  
• fixed: back on residex with Mouse doesn’t work
  
• fixed: select-sound on galaxy view and residex view
  
• fixed: oil sometimes spawning on vines
  
• fixed: destroyable rocks looking like inner-corners
  
• fixed: some fish didn’t show “pickup notification”
  
• fixed: smash/chop animation
  
• fixed: losing items when giving to EDP without enough nanobots
  
• fixed: random crash on EMP FX
  
• fixed: possible random crashes on getMyRandom() calls
  
• fixed: some devices becoming invisible
  
• fixed: fish vanishing in water
  
• fixed: artifact-container vanishing
  
• fixed: “repair-ship” mission not showing requirements
  
• fixed: being able to lift-off with a damaged ship
  
• fixed: graphite usage when creating nanobots
  
• fixed: fullscreen pref not saved (mac)
  
• fixed: fullscreen hint-text shows \r for line break
  
• fixed: not showing travel-agency screen if NO save game, but 1 or more runestones
  
• fixed: mouse controls in setup menu
  
• fixed: fixing/repairing tools doesn’t decrease nanobot count
  
• fixed: setup->input interface issues
  

Since I pretty much put a stop on big-features for the game, as these are the final weeks before we start porting to consoles, I’ve been very busy looking into small features I could still safely add ! These are for the most part cosmetic things, so we now have a larger collection of creatures thanks to adding more bodies,heads and tails. Last weeks version of Residual had 890 creatures, and this version is touching the 3000 !

Linking in to those creatures, the Residex has undergone some changes, and is now much better (I was never happy with that screen in the options>stats menu). Now you get to browse the creatures by “species” discovered, and then show the various creatures within that species. The system is very crude, a species is basically a body-type, but it works! It makes browsing all your discoveries a lot easier and more organised. The creatures now also come with names which is a combination of their head,body and tail descriptor.

The game also comes with a new font, this is so that we can have a good font used for all languages (previous font had no support for cyrillic languages like Russian!) – and of course this week is extremely full of fixes, tweaks and improvements as we’ve been play-testing the game all week long. It’s cool to see how stable the game is, mostly based on the fact that only 2 or 3 bugs came in today as I type this.. and I already fixed those before they came in!

Yesterdays devlog shows the creation of the little diorama’s in the credit screen:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]




Full changes list:

• added: new font (supports cyrillic)
  
• added: increase in interface-resolution (bigger font, works better)
  
• added: redesigned Residex
  
• added: Furnace can now also prepare fish/mushrooms
  
• added: made scanning creatures easier (they are less likely to run away when being scanned)
  
• added: show “identified species” when using dna on prev-scanned lifeforms
  
• added: first 8 achievements
  
• added: more tree-variations
  
• added: caught fish or jumping fish, will continue swimming if landing in water
  
• added: camera-cinematic when random event happens
  
• added: crafting-animation and short delay
  
• added: show +1 in energy and food bar for x seconds when it increases
  
• added: increased aggressiveness to creatures at night
  
• added: PDB dialog for putting useless resources in the furnace
  
• added: save-game stays after lift-off so you can go back and fix hyper-gate
  
• added: chop-able tree-growth to devices and areas?
  
• added: roof engines now remove ooze from their vertical-plane
  
• added: event – break down gadgets in switches for roof engines
  
• added: new variations of creature bodies+heads
  
• added: drink from filled flask in hands (not just through inventory)
  
• added: analyze information to the portal
  
• added: unlocking of Echonium transmitter near portal
  
• added: Give hyper-shards for a single freeplaymode on completion/survival
  
• fixed: Furnace device knowledge never gets unlocked
  
• fixed: tall-pushables aren’t blocked correctly by floor
  
• fixed: back-button in galaxy doesn’t work with mouse
  
• fixed: not being able to place items near echo-pillar
  
• fixed: device-placement blue-floor rendering is bugged
  
• fixed: capping mission-list on visor screen
  
• fixed: increased size of visor screen
  
• fixed: increased tab-pages on visor screen
  
• fixed: getting an “eat …” message at Cotton
  
• fixed: showing “use phaser” when on ladder (which can’t be done)
  
• fixed: can’t pickup dilithium or sealant when stems are at the same spot
  
• fixed: players “indoor” status didn’t get reset correctly at all times – causing host of problems
  
• fixed: auto-pickup fieldgenerator even if disabled in options
  
• fixed: floating items in hand when using visor-animation
  
• fixed: uiinventory has word: Requires – non-translated
  
• fixed: create-resources mission now completes if device already created
  
• fixed: translate creature sleep-time to planet-based hours
  
• fixed: improved device-placement
  
• fixed: water-drinking effects are now more balanced
  
• fixed: residex creature rendering bugs
  
• fixed: die/pass-out at teleporter still makes you teleport
  
• fixed: spread resource-pockets based on min-depth values
  
• fixed: player getting locked at slurper-plants or after dropping on the floor
  
• fixed: tree disappears bottom of screen
  
• fixed: some generators not being able to fixed due to switch being not placed in visible location
  
• fixed: inventory decreased double when using furnace
  
• fixed: end-screen text rendering
  
• fixed: high-temperature make you exhausted/sleepy faster
  
• fixed: not all artifact-containers got placed
  
• fixed: cleaned up teleporter code, fixing multiple bugs in the process
  
• fixed: crafted items now get mounted in hands instead of placing in backpack
  
• fixed: improved end-screen
  

Another week closer to a full game, and this week sees the squashing of close to 60 different bugs but also small things that I don’t like or need little improving. So a “fix” could also be something simple like: “move the dialog up 8 pixels”. It’s all a bit of polish mixed with bug-fixing and making sure we have the most kick-ass game possible!

I’ve been pushing daily-updates, since we now have a QA team testing the crap out of this thing, so I want them to have the latest build available. That means version numbers increase with a letter (0.32a..b..c..g) during the week, and on Friday we push out a fresh new version!

I would call the current build pretty much feature-complete. There are no plans for adding big new things, the coming week I’ll just be adding achievements, and we’ll have to worry about translation (especially the font used, since it doesn’t support languages like Russian.. so I have to figure out a solution for that – meaning, find a font that works for such languages).

So not a lot of things to mention in this weeks update, except that IF you update: delete your save-game files, because you’ll most likely miss out on triggers and events and dialogs. So update, and start a fresh new crash..uh.. game!

Last week I introduced a cuter-version of PedeyB to the game, and in yesterdays devlog I talked about that and more!:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]


Full changes list:

• added: “Come share your postcard at the discord.gg/orangepixel with fellow adventurers”
  
• added: sub-mission for crafting power-pack for first door
  
• added: tileset winner planets
  
• added: clean up “completed” missions from mission list
  
• added: fallback language support
  
• added: Freeplay planet count to Solarsystem view
  
• added: ladder blueprint now also unlocks after big drops
  
• added: message explaining use of silo’s
  
• added: marker above spaceship when need analyzing hull
  
• added: solarcell charges faster inside ship
  
• added: Eyecatchers will throw out a memorycard
  
• added: Water flask
  
• added: extra credit diorama’s
  
• added: little “highlight” shine spark to pushables
  
• fixed: some “log-data” crates spawn in water
  
• fixed: disabled certain EyeCatchers from spawning above ground
  
• fixed: broken backpack items will now first have to hit the ground
  
• fixed: cancel snapshot still shows discord message (and makes postcard)
  
• fixed: “take a nap” line also shows if player just died/health==0
  
• fixed: postcard now contains galaxy and planet name
  
• fixed: discoverylist and languagelist not loading
  
• fixed: slight increase in statusbar resolution
  
• fixed: alt+tab when in fullscreen now properly handles rendering and focus
  
• fixed: corrected interface-background scaling
  
• fixed: selecting windowed resolution pushed game in fullscreen on first try
  
• fixed: power-source crafting not being triggered
  
• fixed: hologram right pillar rendering bug
  
• fixed: not being able to place a silo or non-mining device
  
• fixed: reorganised PedeyB dialog text
  
• fixed: “craft energy source” mission added twice
  
• fixed: Hologram text now part of orange-dialog (not PedeyB)
  
• fixed: disabled game running at higher than 60fps on PC
  
• fixed: removed echo-pillar over-spawnage in the underground
  
• fixed: roof Generators and EchoPillars underground only added in “mainpath”
  
• fixed: fish walking/sliding on ground
  
• fixed: fish dropping dead (magically)
  
• fixed: increased duration of campfires
  
• fixed: campfire dying out after cooking is done
  
• fixed: cookables in inventory not detecting nearby campfire
  
• fixed: assigned same key to multiple actions
  
• fixed: wrong labelling in DNA Scanner results
  
• fixed: feeding EDP with resources won’t trigger mission-completed
  
• fixed: resin-fluid rocks don’t vanish (unlimited resin)
  
• fixed: died while on ladder locks movement
  
• fixed: Graphite not highlighted in scan
  
• fixed: Fruit+Graphite same index color
  
• fixed: dead fish can’t be picked up under water
  
• fixed: torch should be tool not item
  
• fixed: crash when eating “forget” shroom
  
• fixed: when swinging on one vine, other vine shouldn’t take over if we touch it
  
• fixed: eyecatcher8 should not spawn aboveground
  
• fixed: upgrades should use different message
  
• fixed: vertical door closes with wrong images
  
• fixed: short delay between jump presses
  
• fixed: “constructing …” comes from palyer, should be printer-message
  
• fixed: shorter delay on re-using spaceship door
  
• fixed: grabbing graphite out of backpack, and putting it back, decreases mission progress
  
• fixed: cactus sometimes gives wooden stick as item
  
• fixed: treasure spawning in water
  
• fixed: placing ladder at same spot as existing ladder
  
• fixed: don’t make inventory drop out when inside ship
  
• fixed: visited-planet count not correct
  
• fixed: long-planet names mess up load-game interface
  
• fixed: prepped credits for localisation
  
• fixed: Postcards now saved to user/ folder
  
• fixed: no more “oil” hint
  
• fixed: teleporter not working when placed high on platform in world
  
• fixed: crash when pulling fish out the water
  
• fixed: nano-bots in inventory showing 0 (you don’t really have them, they are for EDP)
  
• fixed: player passing-out doesn’t restore “indoor” world state correctly
  
• fixed: don’t allow teleporters on floating-platforms
  
• fixed: residex not correctly storing creature-locations
  

This is, easily, the most stable version of the game so far. And the changes list shows why – it’s a list with few tiny new things, but mostly a bunch of fixes! I just ended a play session in the game, and even though the game is very stable, there are still a bunch of things I want to improve and every gameplay session goes hand in hand with a bunch of changes on my to-do list.

One thing that has been bugging me was the little hovering bot that flies along side the player. This is PedeyB – or PDB the Personal Disaster Bot.. and I never really liked him! OR at least not how he looked. I wanted him to look cute, but there’s not a lot of room for cuteness in a 10×10 sprite… until this week I found a way to improve him.


Left is old, Right is new



Adding those little feet that wiggle about a bit, makes him so much more likeable, and that tiny visual change also comes with some newly written dialog. He’s really a bit of a character now.. and has this weird romantic thing for the ship’s replicator. Strange!

Few more weeks of fixing and tweaking, and we’ll call this puppy done!

I also added a few more eyecatchers, make sure to check the video below for the first batch that was added last week:

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]


Full changes list:

• added: more eyecatcher objects
  
• added: language select
  
• added: blueprint for echonium-transmitter now unlocked at better time in game
  
• added: planet-core heath mapping
  
• added: gave PedeyB more character/cuter look
  
• added: Random-Events handling code
  
• added: Event – suit-malfunction
  
• added: Event – toxic rain
  
• added: Event – damage to devices
  
• added: PedeyB log – last messages in Visor
  
• added: woofer-sound now also scares creatures
  
• added: Event – Ship attacked by Ooze (re-repair!)
  
• added: Event – broken backpack
  
• added: suit-malfunction messages to visor
  
• added: “share your postcard” message box to snapshot mode
  
• added: EDP show how many devices we already have
  
• fixed: rendering bug on “destroyable blocks”
  
• fixed: PedeyB avatar during hologram
  
• fixed: permadeath setting information
  
• fixed: spacing between empty and use on residex screen
  
• fixed: mouse controls in input-screen
  
• fixed: arrow-keys now show up as dpad icons during instructions
  
• fixed: fishing-rod now a Tool instead of object
  
• fixed: speed of planet-rotation in galaxy-views
  
• fixed: galaxy-view background art/clearness
  
• fixed: don’t pop-up dialog when player on instable/moving floors
  
• fixed: fish on dry-land turn into “dead fish” food
  
• fixed: dead-player won’t create triggers for surrounding creatures
  
• fixed: trimmed windowed-resolution options (removed weird ones)
  
• fixed: remember navigation in menu-screens (settings)
  
• fixed: repair at echo-pillars now always triggers (was timer-delayed)
  
• fixed: general interface interaction cleanup
  
• fixed: disabled placing device at same spot as other device
  
• fixed: blocking player from packing-up device when holding something else
  
• fixed: powerrelay switch with connector not capable of grabbing connector and connecting it
  
• fixed: faster banter/talkback events in dialogs
  
• fixed: inventory handling for “groups” of items
  
• fixed: toxic-rain shouldn’t hurt player indoors
  
• fixed: snow starts falling during intro
  
• fixed: egg-wasps fly upwards immediately
  
• fixed: arachnoid can now be “scared” back to it’s nest
  
• fixed: added correct black edges to intro animation
  
• fixed: backdrop for on-screen instructions
  
• fixed: fish not spawning
  
• fixed: can’t use torch to light campfire
  
• fixed: “discovered by” on visor rendering width
  
• fixed: extra spacing for visor text
  
• fixed: bug with deuterium-slurpers
  
• fixed: dialog-caching events (when old dialog is still shown)
  

What a week! The game is REALLY coming together in these final weeks, and it shows in all areas of the game. There's a couple of amazing new things in this weeks update, starting with the Artifact-screen, including a hundred (!) artifacts for you to scavenge for on all the planets. Each planet has 1 or 2 artifacts, and every artifact is at least hidden once... you just need to crash, and crash again to find them all ;)

I also started work on adding "eye-catcher" art. After noticing that most interesting screenshots are with the water-falls in there adding nice environmental light.. I figured I needed something else! So eye-catcher art was made and will be scattered around the universe. Weird plants, futuristic looking objects, and just a bunch of other pretty stuff. It already creates a couple of amazing screenshots, so I couldn't help myself and create a few wallpapers for the discord.gg/orangepixel .. like this one:



The final awesome addition to this weeks update comes in the shape of a whole new intro!  The original intro was once created in a rush because of the Kickstarter demo, but this time Dylan (the intern) put some good time into a sweet animation of the main character in his spaceship, and with some code work and special effects on my end, we turned it into a sweet crashing animation! - If you have access to the early build make sure to reactivate the intro in the preferences menu)

See below for a full list of changes and tweaks, all the result of polishing, as explained in last Thursday devlog:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]



Full changes list:

• added: tileset-art credits
  
• added: 100 artifacts
  
• added: Artifact database screen
  
• added: arrow-key controls for menu/interface
  
• added: extra Metal+Deuterium drops on the planet
  
• added: spitplants can be burned
  
• added: throwing rocks at split-plants to destroy them
  
• added: egg-nests can be hit or burned
  
• added: egg-wasps - need to fly away from water (or if player is too far away)
  
• added: completed the "well done" screen
  
• added: "eye-catcher" scenery objects
  
• added: tileset-inner-corners; fixing rendering uglyness
  
• fixed: background descrepency
  
• fixed: improved intro-crash
  
• fixed: "cold, need solar suit" message overlapping with getting out of crashed ship on cold planets
  
• fixed: mouse-controls in Universe viewer
  
• fixed: better spread of Artifacts across planets (all artifacts at least placed once)
  
• fixed: tweaked rules for rain on a planet
  
• fixed: can make unlimited nanobots (with no Graphite)
  
• fixed: rare case of Metal spawning at top left or top right of the map (out of reach)
  
• fixed: text-overlap issues in Visor
  
• fixed: overkill of fire-triggers on oil-surface
  
• fixed: controller disconnecting and reconnecting not being detected
  
• fixed: "Astronaut unlock" dialog showing up twice
  
• fixed: dna-scanning when creatures are moving around
  
• fixed: stingwasps don't fly upwards fast enough