Development Update: 2021-02-05
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Hey folks!
Time flies, and since the last couple of weeks, so does our spaceship, when it is properly equipped! Let’s take a quick look at what’s new.
[h2]Starmap Improvements and Universe navigation[/h2]
While Starmap is far from finished, we can now take a look at our surroundings. The Starmap is hierarchical, meaning that we can look at system level, galaxy level and whole universe level. Distance changes by orders of magnitude in each level, so if you engines can fly you from planet to planet, it doesn’t mean you can use them to go from system to system. And intergalactic travel between galaxies billions of lightyears away from each other will probably require some new means of transport. Wormholes? Curvature engines? FTL drives?
[h2]Basic Space Travel[/h2]
If you have the necessary tech researched, built and sufficiently powered, you can pick a destination in the Starmap, and your ship will take you there! You will see the space move, engines burn, and your avatar move in the Starmap.
Space travel implementation uses forces to push your ship in the game universe, so you will have to install at least one engine for each direction you will want to move in.
[h2]Easier Electricity Grid split detection[/h2]
Electricity grid is my secret passion, so I can't stop adding updates for it. This change will make it much easier to heal a "split brain" condition, where your grid is severed and needs to be reconnected. Parts of the grid that do not have link to your Ship Computer will show up in gray, and the lines will be dashed. Impossible to miss!
Electricity Connector tool now has a shortcut (G, as in Grid, rebindable). It has never been easier to jump in to connection mode and add a new link.
The newly dragged connection line will become solid once you drag it to a reachable and connectable device. This will result in less errors and less “busy work” trying to connect devices in the right way.
[h2]Research Tree improvements[/h2]
Like the Starmap, the Research Tree widget is now full screen. It also contains extra details about your ship computer’s memory and storage, which used to be inconvenient to find.
[h2]Copy Configuration tool[/h2]
After playing for a while, I felt that configuring some components was a little tedious. You will not want to click on 20 solar panels and change their auto cleaning settings one by one, right? Now you can paste a configuration from any copyable component to multiple others in matter of seconds. Here’s an example where I pick a plant and copy it to a dozen of other planters. Efficient!
[h2]Data Overlay improvements[/h2]
You will no longer have to guess if that’s your funky custom red light, or is the temperature going over the roof. All visual data overlays will disable game lights.
In addition, you won’t have to guess which shade of red is pleasantly warm, and which is scorching 600C, visual overlays will now display a tooltip beneath the cursor with the details of the hovered location.
[h2]Doors and Airlocks will use Electricity[/h2]
Doors and airlocks will now be grid enabled, and will require electricity to be operational. During the open/close cycle, electricity consumption is higher, so the door can get stuck if you don’t have enough energy to spare.
[h2]Build Menu with split categories[/h2]
The build menu was split into multiple categories, it will be easier to quickly find the device you want to build. Oh, and you can press B (rebindable) to activate the build menu without moving your mouse.
[h2]New OST Track[/h2]
Oh, and there is this new chilly OST track that I quite like.
There could be more noteworthy items, but I’ll just leave the full list of changes here and sign off.
[h2]Full list of changes since 2021-01-23[/h2]
v0.3.3 (2021.02.04)
- Don't show non existent shortcuts when controller is in use
- Improve gameplay with controller
- Improve random ship generation algorithms
- Show more details in rooms and section overlays
- Show oxygen, temperature, insulation and airtightness levels under mouse cursor when these overlays are activated
- Make environment tab more consistent with overlay buttons
- Toggle overlays by clicking environment tab icons
v0.3.2 (2021.02.03)
- Restore the ability to connect electricity node to multiple connectors at once for grid redundancy
- Make repeated press of the shortcut toggle tool on / off
- Automatically refresh electricity grid UI elements
- Put Doors on electricity grid
- Fix electricity grid not active right after loading the game
- Fix mouse wheel scrolling game camera beneath some scrollable widgets
- Disable in-game lights when showing a color overlay
- Remove electricity node switch from connectors
- Refactor the UI creation code
v0.3.1 (2021.02.02)
- Fix WIP Starmap component on Ship Computer drawing -20kW
- Don't play dialog sounds multiple times if text changed too quickly (i.e. when loading a tutorial)
- Fix a few small issues with tutorial
- Fix broken feedback form text area widget
- Improve research tree / starmap widget navigation
- Reorder save menu items
- Add shortcut for build menu (b)
- Reorganize build menu
- Don't show zero production on some producer components (i.e. battery)
- Make space background show actual ship motion vector in the universe
- Begin initial implementation of space travel
- Change main menu space background
- Fix battery energy production / consumption value ranges being zero in energy node UI
- Start work on Ship system
- Implement engine autopilot
- Organize energy connections in better way
- Switch research and starmap widgets to full screen
- Show cooldown prompt when clicking the overheating event icon
- Fix energy connector failing to disconnect components outside CPU grid in sandbox mode
- Fix load game panel incorrectly resizing itself after showing a save without image
- Fix drone pathfinding failing to reach tightly packed solar panels for cleaning
- Fix loading saved game would not correctly restore some worker tasks
- Make default lights dimmer
- Add shortcut for energy connect tool (G, as in Grid)
- Add shortcut for repair and remove tools (F and V)
- Add shortcut for task priority tool (J, as in jobs)
- Add copy paste configuration tool (P shortcut)
- Change overlay colors to be less aggressive
- Improve tool shortcut behavior
- Change how removal tool works
- Prevent silent energy connector backlink failures that resulted in ghost energy grids
- Fix some events showing incorrect start time
- Make electricity grids without ship computer show up in a different way
- Don't show energy consumption in energy overlay for grids that are disconnected from the ship computer
- Improve energy connect tool visual feedback
- Fix energy connection tool visual problems
- Automatically enable electricity overlay when switching into grid connect tool
- Add a full discharge robot / drone recharge lockdown mechanic
- Fix energy grid split brain situation in certain connector configurations
- Add more restrictions to energy node connectivity
- Show tool shortcuts where possible
[h2]Follow the Development[/h2]
[h2]Add Stardeus to Wishlist[/h2]
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1380910/Stardeus/
Hey folks!
Time flies, and since the last couple of weeks, so does our spaceship, when it is properly equipped! Let’s take a quick look at what’s new.
[h2]Starmap Improvements and Universe navigation[/h2]
While Starmap is far from finished, we can now take a look at our surroundings. The Starmap is hierarchical, meaning that we can look at system level, galaxy level and whole universe level. Distance changes by orders of magnitude in each level, so if you engines can fly you from planet to planet, it doesn’t mean you can use them to go from system to system. And intergalactic travel between galaxies billions of lightyears away from each other will probably require some new means of transport. Wormholes? Curvature engines? FTL drives?
[h2]Basic Space Travel[/h2]
If you have the necessary tech researched, built and sufficiently powered, you can pick a destination in the Starmap, and your ship will take you there! You will see the space move, engines burn, and your avatar move in the Starmap.
Space travel implementation uses forces to push your ship in the game universe, so you will have to install at least one engine for each direction you will want to move in.
[h2]Easier Electricity Grid split detection[/h2]
Electricity grid is my secret passion, so I can't stop adding updates for it. This change will make it much easier to heal a "split brain" condition, where your grid is severed and needs to be reconnected. Parts of the grid that do not have link to your Ship Computer will show up in gray, and the lines will be dashed. Impossible to miss!
Electricity Connector tool now has a shortcut (G, as in Grid, rebindable). It has never been easier to jump in to connection mode and add a new link.
The newly dragged connection line will become solid once you drag it to a reachable and connectable device. This will result in less errors and less “busy work” trying to connect devices in the right way.
[h2]Research Tree improvements[/h2]
Like the Starmap, the Research Tree widget is now full screen. It also contains extra details about your ship computer’s memory and storage, which used to be inconvenient to find.
[h2]Copy Configuration tool[/h2]
After playing for a while, I felt that configuring some components was a little tedious. You will not want to click on 20 solar panels and change their auto cleaning settings one by one, right? Now you can paste a configuration from any copyable component to multiple others in matter of seconds. Here’s an example where I pick a plant and copy it to a dozen of other planters. Efficient!
[h2]Data Overlay improvements[/h2]
You will no longer have to guess if that’s your funky custom red light, or is the temperature going over the roof. All visual data overlays will disable game lights.
In addition, you won’t have to guess which shade of red is pleasantly warm, and which is scorching 600C, visual overlays will now display a tooltip beneath the cursor with the details of the hovered location.
[h2]Doors and Airlocks will use Electricity[/h2]
Doors and airlocks will now be grid enabled, and will require electricity to be operational. During the open/close cycle, electricity consumption is higher, so the door can get stuck if you don’t have enough energy to spare.
[h2]Build Menu with split categories[/h2]
The build menu was split into multiple categories, it will be easier to quickly find the device you want to build. Oh, and you can press B (rebindable) to activate the build menu without moving your mouse.
[h2]New OST Track[/h2]
Oh, and there is this new chilly OST track that I quite like.
There could be more noteworthy items, but I’ll just leave the full list of changes here and sign off.
[h2]Full list of changes since 2021-01-23[/h2]
v0.3.3 (2021.02.04)
- Don't show non existent shortcuts when controller is in use
- Improve gameplay with controller
- Improve random ship generation algorithms
- Show more details in rooms and section overlays
- Show oxygen, temperature, insulation and airtightness levels under mouse cursor when these overlays are activated
- Make environment tab more consistent with overlay buttons
- Toggle overlays by clicking environment tab icons
v0.3.2 (2021.02.03)
- Restore the ability to connect electricity node to multiple connectors at once for grid redundancy
- Make repeated press of the shortcut toggle tool on / off
- Automatically refresh electricity grid UI elements
- Put Doors on electricity grid
- Fix electricity grid not active right after loading the game
- Fix mouse wheel scrolling game camera beneath some scrollable widgets
- Disable in-game lights when showing a color overlay
- Remove electricity node switch from connectors
- Refactor the UI creation code
v0.3.1 (2021.02.02)
- Fix WIP Starmap component on Ship Computer drawing -20kW
- Don't play dialog sounds multiple times if text changed too quickly (i.e. when loading a tutorial)
- Fix a few small issues with tutorial
- Fix broken feedback form text area widget
- Improve research tree / starmap widget navigation
- Reorder save menu items
- Add shortcut for build menu (b)
- Reorganize build menu
- Don't show zero production on some producer components (i.e. battery)
- Make space background show actual ship motion vector in the universe
- Begin initial implementation of space travel
- Change main menu space background
- Fix battery energy production / consumption value ranges being zero in energy node UI
- Start work on Ship system
- Implement engine autopilot
- Organize energy connections in better way
- Switch research and starmap widgets to full screen
- Show cooldown prompt when clicking the overheating event icon
- Fix energy connector failing to disconnect components outside CPU grid in sandbox mode
- Fix load game panel incorrectly resizing itself after showing a save without image
- Fix drone pathfinding failing to reach tightly packed solar panels for cleaning
- Fix loading saved game would not correctly restore some worker tasks
- Make default lights dimmer
- Add shortcut for energy connect tool (G, as in Grid)
- Add shortcut for repair and remove tools (F and V)
- Add shortcut for task priority tool (J, as in jobs)
- Add copy paste configuration tool (P shortcut)
- Change overlay colors to be less aggressive
- Improve tool shortcut behavior
- Change how removal tool works
- Prevent silent energy connector backlink failures that resulted in ghost energy grids
- Fix some events showing incorrect start time
- Make electricity grids without ship computer show up in a different way
- Don't show energy consumption in energy overlay for grids that are disconnected from the ship computer
- Improve energy connect tool visual feedback
- Fix energy connection tool visual problems
- Automatically enable electricity overlay when switching into grid connect tool
- Add a full discharge robot / drone recharge lockdown mechanic
- Fix energy grid split brain situation in certain connector configurations
- Add more restrictions to energy node connectivity
- Show tool shortcuts where possible
[h2]Follow the Development[/h2]
- Join Kodo Linija Discord
- /r/stardeus on Reddit
- @StardeusGame on Twitter
- @dev_spajus on Twitter
- dev_spajus on Twitch (streaming the development on most work days EU time)
[h2]Add Stardeus to Wishlist[/h2]
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1380910/Stardeus/