Iron Roads News

[p]Iron Roads released on iOS a few days ago, and such is the scale of the App Store more people have played in the last few days, than in the last few years. The larger player base is heartening, but it has unearthed a few well hidden crashes that we are fixing with this small patch[/p][p]- There is a fix for a bug that could cause a crash with long trains exiting non-stop zones[/p][p]- Drawing stations off the edge of the map is now disallowed, as it caused a crash[/p]

[p]After a year of feedback and updates, we are now in a position to expand the Early Access version of Iron Roads to mobile platforms. [/p][p][/p][p]Today we are excited to release it on Apple’s App Store for iPhones, iPads, Mac and Apple TV![/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]We need a bit more time to polish the Android version so that will arrive in April.[/p][p][/p][p]This doesn’t change anything for Steam players. The game is identical across all platforms, with the only difference being in the interface. We will continue to develop it as we have been, keeping all platforms in sync. We have also taken this opportunity to refresh the Steam page with new screenshots and an updated video![/p][p][/p][p]With mobile in mind, we’ve also added Cloud sync for save games. If you sign in with Discord to both Steam and Mobile versions, your save game is synced across devices. This also works if you want to synchronise the game across different Steam copies.[/p]

[p]0.7.5 is a small maintenance patch ahead of mobile release on Thursday![/p][p]Iron Roads will now switch out of gamepad mode if you use mouse or keyboard, and back again when the gamepad is used. This should make it easier for those who are mixing inputs. This patch also fixes:[/p]

• [p]A bug with Desert Dew scenario where aluminium was being created rather than Desert Dew![/p]
• [p]A bug with nonstop zones that broke stations with nonstop zones at each end[/p]
• [p]A formatting error with growth notifications[/p]

[p]The headline feature in this update is controller support. With a controller plugged in you should see the Steam Deck control icons appear onscreen. This is brand new, so if you have any issues with us, please get in touch![/p][p][/p][p][/p][p]Currently we haven't tested this with controllers other than SteamDeck and Xbox, so if you are using a playstation controller, or a nintendo pro controller, and you have issues, please get in touch as we'd love to support all controllers,[/p][p][/p][h2]Resource changes[/h2][p]Since Beta 3 perfume was required to grow towns, but it was not required to maintain them. The same has long been true of train parts. Unfortunately this led to those resources stockpiling. To solve that:[/p]

• [p]Perfume is required to maintain large towns. If you fail to supply it to them, they will shrink![/p]
• [p]Train parts are required to maintain more advanced trains and keep them running well[/p]

[p]This improves the late game, as you need to keep these chains running well, not just create a stockpile of resources and move on.[/p][p][/p][h2]Bugfixes[/h2][p]We've also been fixing bugs and other issues. Some notable ones:[/p]

• [p]Save games are trimmed in size. Some history is now dropped from graphs, but large games load and save much faster[/p]
• [p]The town badge highlights passengers that have been waiting too long by showing the number in red and bouncing the icon [/p]
• [p]An issue where the perfume contracts would not complete has been fixed[/p]
• [p]The edit service will now show an add town button when a stop is obscured by the window so you can add it to the route![/p]
• [p]The R&D token count is shown on the research screen[/p]
• [p]There is back button on train info screen so you can more easily check statistics when buying a train[/p]
• [p]A problem was fixed that stopped some waypoints from being added to routes[/p]

[p][/p][p]Thanks as always for the feedback, enjoy the update![/p]

[p]The headline feature for the update we are currently testing in the beta branch is controller support, but we've just pushed a new build to that branch to fix a number of bugs:[/p]

• [p]Save games are trimmed in size, some history is now removed from graphs, but large games load and save much faster. This also removes an occasional crash with very large games[/p]
• [p]The town badge highlights passengers that have been waiting too long by showing the number in red and bouncing the icon [/p]
• [p]An issue where the perfume contracts would not complete has been fixed[/p]
• [p]The edit service will now show an add town button when a stop is beneath is so you can add that more easily![/p]
• [p]The R&D count is shown on the research screen[/p]
• [p]There is back button on train info screen so you can more easily check statistics when buying a train[/p]

[p][/p][p][/p][p]To access the beta branch[/p][p][/p]

• [p]Open the Steam client library page[/p]
• [p]Right-click on your copy of Iron Roads in the library page and select Properties[/p]
• [p]Choose the Betas tab[/p]
• [p]Click the Beta Participation dropdown and choose [c]beta-test[/c]. You should not need a password[/p]

[p][/p][p]We'd love to hear any thoughts from Steam Deck users in particular about the controller support, but as always any feedback is gratefully accepted![/p][p][/p]