PULSAR: Lost Colony News

Hey Everyone!

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Beta 26 is out now! This update includes an upgrade to the core game engine, as well as three new ships with unique systems and various ship components! In addition, we’ve made multiple improvements to VR support!

New Ships: This update is the first where we’re adding three new ships at the same time. Each of these new ships were crafted with the goal of making them a unique experience.

The first ship is the Nomad 5 produced by SunCircler. This ship is a civilian vessel and wasn’t built with heavy combat in mind. Crews who begin in this ship have no faction. They start at chaos level 3 and have sub-par ship components making this ship challenging for players, especially early on.

The second ship is a relic from the Old Wars known as the Interceptor; it has been restored and retrofitted with modern technology, allowing it to properly interact with today’s systems. The interceptor is unique because a shield generator can’t be installed. Instead crews must utilize one of the ship’s unique features: field repairs. While it’s not as economic as going to a repair depot, captains on the Interceptor can use processed scrap to heal the ship’s hull, even during a fight.

The third ship in this update is also a relic from the Old Wars, only it was a ship on the opposite side of the battles. The Sylvassi Swordship was faithfully restored and retrofitted to be usable today. Its design is very different from the other starting ships and it comes equipped with a unique ability; once per jump the pilot can fire a frontal beam that can deal enormous damage to unsuspecting ships. It works well when used in tandem with the ship’s cloaking system, and it was feared by humans during the Old Wars. It also comes equipped with a host of new ship components that are uniquely Sylvassi in style.

This update also adds improvements to VR support. While there are still some rough edges, we’ve tried to take your feedback and our own experiences with the game to improve upon the usability and comfort. Some of the bigger changes we’ve made are to many of the interactive menus while playing the game, movement controls, and piloting.

Many of the interactive menus are now attached to the motion controllers, allowing players to more easily interact with them. The Main hud is also attached to the two controllers and should hopefully make it more readable and interactable. The offsets of these menus can be adjusted in the vr offsets menu.

We’ve added options for snap turning and the ability to customize the degrees in which the camera rotates. We’ve also added a toggle function for running which should make the experience more comfortable, especially on the rift.

A note about piloting: By default VR players will be restricted to the Manual Flight mode and the first person camera mode. We have found these to be the most playable and comfortable modes when playing in VR with controllers. For those who don’t want these restrictions, it’s possible to disable them in the VR settings menu, just keep in mind that we don’t recommend piloting with those restrictions turned off and that our tweaks to the vr controls have been made with those restrictions in mind.

Besides that, we’ve added some quality of life changes to the game. A few of them include: the addition of access hatches on Cornelia Station, the Estate and the Roland which help players maneuver those larger spaces faster than before; the talents menu opens to your specific class right away; the dialogue window allows for more text to be displayed; the computer screen shows which programs are currently active.

We’ve also done a number of other additions and improvements which you can read more about below. This update has taken longer than we originally anticipated, but we hope the new stuff makes up for the wait.

Additions

• New Ship Class (The SunCircler Nomad 5 - Economic All-Purpose Space Vehicle) - This ship is intended to provide experienced players with an added challenge. This starting ship begins at chaos level 3 with low-quality ship components and no active faction. This makes early game much more difficult and hopefully provides an engaging challenge to players looking for a harder game. We anticipate crews starting on this ship will tend to avoid all-out conflicts in space until they begin to improve their ship. This ship has only one basic turret slot instead of two, and its startup switchboard is much closer to the bridge which is fairly unusual.
  
• New Ship Class (Interceptor - Restored Old Wars Relic) - This ship is a refurbished relic from the Old Wars back when Atriums, Shields and Teleporters were not widely used. This ship has had some of those amenities added, but it doesn’t come with a shield generator and it’s impossible to install one. Its hull is designed to take a beating and can be repaired using scrap while away from a repair depot. Processed scrap can be used to repair the hull even in the middle of a fight! This ship also has a reactor that periodically leaks radiation into the engineering bay.
  
• New Ship Class (Sylvassi Swordship - Restored Old Wars Relic) - This ship is a refurbished relic from the Old Wars. It has a cloaking system that charges very quickly, as well as a beam weapon called the Sword than can be activated once per jump by whoever is piloting the ship. It also starts with several new programs.
  
• Interceptor Screens - The Interceptor has been retrofitted to use a modern computer OS but the screens are still the authentic monitor-based screens used in the Old Wars. They are older and more utilitarian.
  
• New System - Field Repairs for the Interceptor - The captain has the ability to repair the Interceptor’s hull at any point by consuming processed scrap. 1 processed scrap will repair 100 points of hull. While it may be cheaper to purchase repair at a repair depot, this system allows one to repair the ship’s hull mid fight.
  
• New System - Sword for the Sylvassi Swordship - Powerful front firing beam weapon that the Pilot aims and fires. This weapon can be used once per jump and is very taxing on reactors, often accumulating lots of heat during the firing process. Its potential for ambush tactics made it feared among humans during the Old Wars.
  
• New System - Locked Ship Components - These ship components can’t be uninstalled, sold or swapped. They can, however, be upgraded. If a ship component is locked it’s usually a special part of the ship or intended to be part of a playstyle.
  
• New Ship Component - [Warp Drive] Old Wars - Super Jumper - increases warp drive range each time the manual program charge is activated. Resets each jump.
  
• New Ship Component - [Hull] Interceptor Hull - Unique to the Interceptor - This hull is exceptionally strong and has unique properties that allow field repairs, yet it isn’t compatible with shields.
  
• New Ship Component - [Main Turret] Retrofitted Coil Gun - Projectile-based main turret. Originally manufactured during the Old Wars, it has since been refurbished and improved.
  
• New Ship Component - [Nuclear Device] Tactical Nuke - Cheaper nukes with smaller blast ranges, ideal for heavy assaults within close / medium range
  
• New Ship Component - [Warp Drive] Old Wars Super Jumper - This warp drive will increase its jump range each time a fuel capsule is used at the manual program charging station. This effect resets after each jump.
  
• New Ship Component - [Reactor] Leaky Reactor - Powerful reactor that occasionally spews radiation. Label Reads “DO NOT USE”.
  
• New Ship Component - [Shield Generator] Sylvassi Shields - This shield generator has a unique function that increases shield charge rate when shield integrity is above 50%.
  
• New Ship Component - [Reactor] Sylvassi Reactor - A competent reactor with a lower maximum temperature.
  
• New Ship Component - [Processor] Sylvassi Cyber Defense Processor - A more efficient Cyber Defense Processor.
  
• New Ship Component - [Processor] Warp Range Processor - Adds +1 range to the warp drive
  
• New Ship Component - [Processor] Research Pipeline Module - Adds one fuel capsule whenever a new talent is researched
  
• New Ship Component - [Processor] Improved Defenses - Increases effective hull armor
  
• New Ship Component - [Program] Extended Shields - Increases max shields by 80 for 60 seconds
  
• New Ship Component - [Program] Quantum Tunnel - Advances the current research track by 1 step
  
• New Ship Component - [Program] Burst AV - Removes one random active hostile virus from the ship
  
• New Ship Component - [Program] Random Access - Fully recharges one random uncharged program
  
• New Ship Component -[Program] Sylvassi Capacitor - Provides 5 warp program charges on execution
  
• New Ship Component - [Cloaking System] Sylvassi Cloaking System - More power efficient cloaking system
  
• New Ship Component - [Processor] Warp Range Processor - Increases warp drive range
  
• New Sector - The Processor Shop - Sells a large selection of ship processors
  
• New Sector - The Program Shop - Sells a large selection of programs
  
• New Sector - The Virus Shop - Sells a large selection of viruses
  
• New Sector - The Sylvassi Shop - Sells various Sylvassi related ship components
  
• New Talent - Turret Cooling Optimizations - (Weapon Specialist) +5% to crew turret cooling rate per rank (5 ranks)
  
• New Talent - Turret Cooling Optimizations - (Engineer) +5% to crew turret cooling rate per rank (5 ranks)
  
• Cornelia Station now has Access Hatches that lead to deeper parts of the station and back to the teleporters.
  
• The Estate now has Access Hatches that lead to various parts of the ship as well as back to the teleporters. It also now has a repair depot available in the sector
  
• Added Forward Spotlight on the Carrier
  
• Added Forward Spotlight on Roland
  
• Added Forward Spotlight on Outrider
  
• Added Forward Spotlight on Destroyer
  
• Added Forward Spotlight on Fluffy One
  
• Added visual space particles to the Carrier, Fluffy One, and Caustic Corsair ships. These particles help illustrate ship movement.
  
• Added a colored border to current selected ship when starting a game. This should help signify which ship is selected and the color illustrates that ship’s faction.
  
• The game settings now have a way to toggle sprinting instead of requiring the sprint button to be held continuously.
  

VR

• Upgraded internal VR plugins
  
• UI tweak - The right and left sides of the HUD are now paired to the right and left controllers. Players can adjust the offsets of these in the VR Setting Menu under Offsets.
  
• UI tweak - The Tab Menu is now attached to a VR controller. This should make it quicker and more intuitive to use the menu.
  
• UI tweak - The Escape Menu is now attached to a VR controller.
  
• UI tweak -The “Z” menu is now attached to a VR controller
  
• UI tweak - The NPC dialogue window is now attached to a VR controller
  
• UI tweak - The store window for both Items and Ship Components are now attached to a Controller.
  
• The Z menu has new option to reset VR orientation and Skip Warp
  
• The controller bindings for Steam VR have been updated to Steam’s new binding system. This should make it easier to customize controller support or build support for other VR controllers
  
• Added a Snap Rotate option in the VR menu. There is also a setting for customizing the degree of each snap step.
  
• Fixed an issue with action prompts being rendered behind objects
  
• Fixed an issue when VR players playing under the roomscale settings would zero out their perspective when attempting to reset their orientation
  
• Fixed an issue that sometimes prevented VR players from being able to process scrap
  
• Piloting in VR has been tweaked - It’s now set to a first person perspective with manual controls, this, from our experience is the most usable setup for VR players
  
• Drop Down Menus should be working better in VR
  
• Fixed an issue regarding your player character’s image moving around during class selection
  
• VR players can toggle sprint (as mentioned above)
  
• Ship’s log should work better in VR
  
• VR now responds to the game’s graphics settings
  
• The Motion, Healing and Damage vignette strengths have been reduced
  
• Improved the look of the vr controllers in game
  

Changes

• The Dialogue Window for interacting with characters has been greatly tweaked, allowing for more text to be displayed but also (when the camera permits) better shows the individual you’re currently talking to.
  
• Opening the talents menu should now show the talents for your current class
  
• The Roland-class starship now has two access hatches to make travel to the teleporter and cargo room faster from the bridge
  
• Multiple space backgrounds have been tweaked, they should be slightly brighter.
  
• Nuclear devices updated across the board. Overall cheaper and slightly lower ranges / damage
  
• Programs on the scientist computer screen now show when they are active (if applicable)
  
• Chaos level increases from ship destruction and warping is now half of previous values
  
• Barrage program - increased active time from 8 to 15 seconds. Decreased boost amount from 50% to 35%
  
• Updated Abandoned Station: added lighting, added more props and pickups, tweaked materials, tweaked mission text, lowered buy-in for AOG crews
  
• Updated Cryogenics Station: added lighting, added more props and pickups, edited text for Alosius Grec and Yiria Sali, decreased credit reward, fixed an issue with the turrets not attacking properly
  
• The cryo chamber cargo assets have been updated with the current character models
  
• Updated WD Toxic Waste Mission Planet: tweaked materials, tweaked Reese Novo’s dialog, raised credit reward, fixed pathing issue with station interior
  
• Updated Rocky Plains Mission Planet: changed lighting on planet and station interior, tweaked materials, added more props and pickups, edited Kirod Ennish’s dialog, decreased credit reward and removed reputation reward
  
• All installed nuclear devices now increase the intimidation rating of dialogue choices
  
• Armored drone modifier now boosts hull armor less than before
  
• The default flight and camera mode for new players or those who reset settings are Manual and Hybrid, this can still be changed at any time while piloting by pressing X and Y respectively
  
• Captains Waypoints should not only be more accurate when determining the fastest route, but also update faster. Curren players who are still syncing galaxy data may not see the waypoints until it’s all synced however. (1-2 minutes)
  
• The scrapyard is now listed on the Starmap legend
  
• We’ve made some tweaks to how armor scales and how it affects damage reduction, this should allow armor to play a better role when reducing damage for particularly bit hits
  
• Sensor readout now shows Ship Type instead of GX ID
  
• The ARX-TGT processor now also provides a turret cooling bonus in addition to turret damage
  
• Reactor coolant is now more effective when cooling turrets
  
• Turrets now cool down faster after overheating
  
• The WD Destroyer’s screen type was changed to the WD style
  
• Starting WD Destroyers now begin with a WD classic Captain’s Chair
  
• WD Destroyer no longer have the boost to turret damage
  
• WD Destroyer’s Armor bonus is now +25% instead of 50%
  
• The WD Destroyer’s hull is now locked
  
• The WD Destroyer’s reactor now begins with a slightly weaker reactor
  
• Tweaked the starting orientation of ships in the Estate Sector to a more interesting view
  

Fixes

• Player names should not appear if they are in different areas (i.e. different interiors)
  
• Fixed a networking issue regarding Scrapyards
  
• Fixed a teamspeak issue regarding game names with more than 18 characters. The game should limit the names properly
  
• Fixed a few fire issues found on the Intrepid and the Roland
  
• Fixed a room culling issue found on the Roland
  
• The in-game bug reporting system should be improved
  
• Fixed a few small visual issues on the WD Annihilator
  
• Tweaked a visual issue found on the Carrier
  
• Fixed a few symmetry issues that were reported
  
• Fixed an issue regarding fires not being visible due to culling reasons
  
• Fixed a character head flicker issue
  
• Fixed a lighting issue regarding The Estate’s thruster lights
  
• Fixed a pathing issue found on one of the cave planets
  
• Fixed a screen culling issue found near the bridge of the Roland
  
• Fixed a pathing issue found on WD Base Planet
  
• Fixed missing collision in Dutain’s Garage race sector
  
• Fixed missing materials in Sylvassi Cypher Lab
  
• Fixed missing materials on red dunes planet
  
• Fixed floating assets on artifact planets
  
• Fixed issue with temperature on artifact planet 3
  
• Fixed floating asset on Fluffy One ship
  
• Fixed an issue that might have been causing false positives with an in-game security method
  
• Added a small change to potentially help an issue regarding bots occasionally firing through walls
  
• Fixed an nav mesh issue found in the cargo area of Fluffy One
  
• Fixed a potential networking issue regarding the Atomizer
  
• Fixed an issue regarding bots occasionally becoming invisible when playing Liar’s Dice
  
• Fixed an AI issue regarding the Weapbot on the Carrier
  
• Fixed a potential issue that might occasional prevent fires from starting on the Carrier
  
• Fixed a networking issue regarding players entering and exiting interiors
  
• Fixed a bug that would occasionally render players invisible if they died on a separate ship
  
• Fixed a few minor errors found on some abandoned ships which may have been leading to some issues
  
• Fixed an issue with nukes when they were not manually detonated
  
• Fixed a pathing issue at the Grey Huntsmen station
  
• Fixed a minor visual issue on one of the cave planets
  

Thanks for your time and feedback!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

We wanted to give an update on some of what we’ve been working on. We’re in the process of upgrading the version of Unity we use as well as many of the plugins and libraries used for development. This should set us up for better performance and compatibility as we get closer to release. We have also been working on a lot of new content, some of which will be part of Beta 26.

This update is taking longer than expected and it will still be a while longer before it’s ready for release, but we wanted to at least provide some info on what will likely be in Beta 26:

New ships and components! We are developing 3 new starting ships for Beta 26. This will include a civilian ship that could provide a fresh challenge for experienced crews. In addition, two artifact ships from the Old Wars will soon be uncovered! While these will be available to play upon release of Beta 26, later they may need to be unlocked in order to play them.

Beta 26 will include a core engine upgrade, we’re moving from Unity 2017.4 LTS to 2018.4 LTS. This brings us the latest bug fixes and features from Unity. We’re experimenting with some new rendering systems and scripting runtimes to improve performance and compatibility. In addition, we’ve updated and reconfigured plugins that needed the new version.



We’re working on some improvements to the VR experience. We’re updating to newer versions of the SteamVR and Oculus SDKs to better support newer hardware and VR features. We’re adding support for SteamVR Input to better support all types of controllers and easy rebinding through the Steam client. VR players with motion controllers will have overhauled menus that better utilize both hands and are more fun to use!

The voice chat system has been partially reworked to allow for more options. You’ll be able to select separate capture and playback devices just for voice chat. It will also remember the preferred devices more accurately than before.



Other improvements include a redesigned dialogue window for interacting with NPCs and an additional pass to update some planets and missions. This update will also fix a number of reported issues and introduce a few new quality of life additions.

We’ve also been working on the Academy (the game’s tutorial which goes over the basics of operating a ship and filling each class role) and the Lost Colony itself (which is the end-game scenario)! These won’t be ready for Beta 26, but they will very likely be appearing in the next couple updates.

Thanks for your time and patience!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

Devlog #82: https://youtu.be/oTf5-iNH-hI

Beta 25 is out now! This update focuses primarily on improving the planets currently in the game. We did this by adding additional details, more enemy variety, and more rewards for exploring. Some planets only needed a few touch ups while others have been heavily overhauled. Some planets and stations related to missions haven’t been changed yet, but we’ll be making a pass on them soon. Around 45 planets have been worked on for this update.

Part of the planet pass was adding additional rewards for exploring them, to do this we’ve added a few new pickup types that you can find planetside. We have Fuel - which adds 1 additional fuel capsule to your ship supply. We have Credsticks, which of course add credits to the ship account, we also have Experience pickups, which may be a little harder to find, these add 1 additional XP point to your crew experience!

This update also adds an additional method for acquiring a Lost Colony Data Fragment (reminder: the Lost Colony hasn’t been added yet). The new method involves exploring planets and discovering ancient Sylvassi structures known as “Cyphers”. Each of these ancient ruins contains a cryptic puzzle that the crew can work together to solve. We don’t want to give too many details away, but we tried to design a puzzle that could benefit from teamwork and communication while also being possible if you’re playing solo. The complexity of the puzzle increases based on the number of human players in the session.The Sylvassi Cypher Lab on your starmap is a great place to head to get started!

This update also contains unlockable uniforms! These new looks work the same way as the other cosmetic features but can help add a bit more character. Many of the uniforms allow color tweaks to further player customization!

Additionally, this update contains some changes to how starship turrets operate. They now use a heat-based system similar to how the hand-held weapons work. This allows crewmembers manning turrets to potentially fire their turrets faster than before, but with the added risk that if they fire too much too fast the turrets could overheat and be unusable for a short time. The turrets will cool faster if the engineer is using coolant. We believe this change allows for a bit more agency in the turret seat.

Additions
- New Item Pickup Type: Fuel - Picking up this fuel capsule will add 1 to your ship’s fuel supply.
- New Item Pickup Type: Experience - Picking this up will add 1 point to your crew’s experience.
- New Item Pickup Type: Credstick - Picking this up will add a handful of credits to your ship account.
- New Item Pickup Type: Credstick Pile - This pile of credsticks will add several hundred credits to your ship account.
-New Cosmetic Item Type: Uniform - You can now switch which uniform you wear. Faction restrictions have been removed and several new options are available. Some uniforms allow players to modify up to two of the uniform’s colors.
-New Uniform (Human Male and Female): C.U. Vice Admiral - Unlocked when 250 levels are earned playing as the Colonial Union faction.
-New Uniform (Human Male and Female): W.D. Vice Admiral - Unlocked when 250 levels are earned playing as the W.D. Corp.
-New Uniform (Human Male and Female): Lab Coat - Unlocked when 100 levels are earned playing as a Scientist.
-New Uniform (Human Male and Female): Civilian Clothes (Striped) - Unlocked after 25 levels earned
-New Uniform (Human Male and Female): Civilian Clothes (Solid Colors) - Unlocked after completing 60 Jumps.
-New Uniform (Human Male and Female): Civilian Clothes (Variant) - Unlocked after 200 levels earned
-New Uniform (Human Male and Female): Civilian Clothes with Robot Hand and Foot - Unlocked after 180 levels earned
-New Uniform (Human Male): Civilian Clothes with Robot Arm - Unlocked after 125 Levels Earned
-New Uniform (Human Male): Civilian Clothes with Robot Leg - Unlocked after 25 Crew Deaths
-New Uniform (Human Female): Civilian Clothes with Robot Leg and Arm - Unlocked after earning 220 levels
-New Uniform (Robot): Body Type 2 - Unlocked after earning 100 levels.
-New Uniform (Sylvassi) Ancient Sylvassi Suit - Unlocked after completing the Sylvassi Cypher Lab Quest.
-New Quest Item: Ancient Sylvassi Tablet
-New Sector: Sylvassi Cypher Lab - Shown on the Starmap, this sector is the central research base in this galaxy for the study of Sylvassi Cyphers and ancient Sylvassi culture.
-New Steam Achievement: Cypher Master - Gained from completing the Sylvassi Cypher Mission.


Changes
-Ship turrets now generate heat when fired and can overheat. This works similarly to how guns work on foot. Using reactor coolant applies to all turrets onboard, causing them to cool down faster depending on the coolant pump speed. Turrets can overall fire faster than before but turret operators will need to consider the heat buildup over time. Turrets operating themselves will manage their heat automatically but won’t fire over 60% heat, limiting their usefulness compared to a manned turret’s damage potential.
-Some of the turrets found in the game have had their stats adjusted to compensate for the change mentioned above.
-Planet Pass - Many planets have undergone many changes, from optimizing the levels, adding additional details, new rewards, more enemy variety and more!

Fixes
-Fixed a collision issue found inside KOW’Z Retreat
-Fixed a visual issue found within KOW’Z Retreat
-Fixed a few texture seam issues found on the Forsaken Flagship and a toxic planet
-Fixed an exception found in the racing sectors
-Ships can no longer warp to invisible sectors (sectors that haven’t been unlocked yet)
-Fixed a bug regarding armor for the Destroyer, armor flaw and shutdown defense
-Fixed an issue with non-Captain players potentially having a minor performance issue due to the AI priorities system
-Fixed a syncing issue related to the Sandshark
-Fixed an issue regarding ship fires not spawning correctly




Beta 25.1 Release Notes

Beta 25.1 is out now! This hotfix is focused on fixing some of the issues that have been reported and also helps provide a few more options to help turret cooling. We’ll likely be looking at adding or tweaking talents to help crews cool their turrets in a later update.

Additions
- The W.D. Cruiser now has an additional ship attribute: +15% Turret Cooling

Changes
- The BKP-WPN-POWER ship processor also now also affects the cooling rate of the turrets
- The Barrage ship program now also affects the cooling rate of turrets

Fixes
-Fixed a bug that would kill players upon immediately entering one of the Sylvassi Cyphers
-Fixed a bug that would incorrectly respawn enemies in the abandoned station mission
-Fixed a bug that would incorrectly respawn enemies on the planet crash 2 mission
-Fixed a collision issue found in one of the apartment areas in the Colonial Union Hub
-Fixed an issue that would incorrectly unlock the Ancient Sylvassi Suit based on the completion of an earlier mission instead of the intended one
-Fixed an issue that could show a third robot body type as unlocked, despite there being no option
-Fixed a bug where the control tips were not showing correctly. If you want those tips turned off you can uncheck “Show Controls” in the Game Settings






Beta 25.2 Release Notes

Beta 25.2 is out now! It contains changes and fixes based on player feedback. It also contains updates to a few planets. Thanks for all the feedback and bug reports!

Additions
-4 NPCs and mission added to snow planet

Changes
-Changed item levels and rarities on several items across several planets
-Ship turrets cool 15% faster overall
-Galaxy faction spread on is now more deterministic / repeatable

Fixes
-Fixed placement of a teleporter screen found on a mission planet (kiln seed request)
-Fixed issue with nukes that caused them to not apply their range stat properly. Certain nukes now have much larger ranges so keep that in mind!
-Fixed issue with Infected spreading through the galaxy that could cause the faction to not control much of the galaxy by Chaos Level 6. This will only apply to galaxies going forward (no forced reset)
-Fixed game loading issue that could cause saves to not load properly when the galaxy needs to be recreated in cases where the saved current sector no longer exists
-Fixed issue with cloaking systems in cargo causing a ship’s cloaking system to incorrectly shut itself down even when fully powered
-System power conduits can incorrectly factor components in cargo into the power levels displayed and could affect power distribution. This should be fixed.


Beta 25.3 Release Notes

Hey everyone!

Beta 25.3 is out now! It should address the component loading / saving issue reported since Beta 25.2. Thanks to everyone who reported the issue, it was very helpful in figuring out the problem.

We think, in many cases, Beta 25.3 should be able to load saves with the missing components as long as they weren’t re-saved (or auto-saved) after a component was lost.

Fixes
-Fixed loading / saving issue with ship components introduced in Beta 25.2

Sorry for the inconvenience and thanks for your time!


Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

Devlog 81: https://youtu.be/ONTZWHxwDCM

Beta 24 is now out! The main focus for this update is Steam integration and some ship combat variety!

To start off, the game now supports new features when playing on Steam.

We’ve added support for Steam friends including the ability to directly join a friend’s game and invite other players into your crew through Steam. You can also see information about a friend (role and crew level) in the Steam friends list while they are playing.

When logged into Steam, the host can now optionally start a Secured Game, which offers some additional account-based features for crews. This allows in-game kicks to be more permanent, and the game lobby shows you games where your friends are playing as well as games where people who you have blocked or previously kicked are playing. You can now also add your crewmates as Steam friends via the Tab menu.

Steam achievements can now be earned. Some of these may be immediately achieved based on your previous statistics, but others will not. We’re starting with 26 achievements and we’ll likely be adding more as we continue to develop the remaining parts of the game.

Steam Cloud Support allows saves, progress data, AI priorities and input bindings information to be saved on the cloud so they can be accessed on a different computer.

As for ship combat variety, we have added quite a few more enemy ship modifiers for unmanned drones. The modifiers change various aspects of the enemy ships and stats. For example, ships with the “irradiated” modifier can impart radiation into your ship when they deal hull damage, and ships with the “corrupted” modifier continually broadcast the corruption virus and can attack ships of the same faction. Some of the other new modifiers are negative modifiers that weaken enemy stats, which we hope adds another layer of decision making to the fight.

The negative modifiers are more likely to exist near the lower chaos levels to help keep the difficulty curve from being too harsh. We’ve also taken the time to rename the drones in the game. While the previous names were practical, we thought there was additional room for variation. Additionally, faction-specific drones have slight differences between them.

We will be working on an issue with bot pathfinding for a hotfix in the near future. A content / polish pass of planets is planned for Beta 25.


Additions
- Steam Friends: You can now join games from the friends list. As host, you can invite friends to your crew from the friends list, and you can add friends in-game through the Tab menu. Additionally, friends of the host do not need to type in the correct password to join their private game.
- Secured Games: Hosts can pick the secured game option when starting or loading a game. Secured games enable Steam account-based online features like friends, persistent kicks as well as viewing which games in the lobby have friends or people you have kicked previously. Secured games require players to be playing through Steam in order to join.

NOTE 1: Secured games are also susceptible to Steam activity (if it goes down for maintenance, then secured games will too).The normal game mode is still available for those not playing on Steam, and Steam players can join normal games.

NOTE 2: Kicking a player in a secured group will block them from all future games you host. If you wish to undo this you must find their steam ID and remove it from the “Blocked ID’s section of your settings.xml file. Alternatively you can just delete the entire settings file and it will reset all blocked Steam IDs.

- Steam Cloud Support: Support for saves, progress data, AI priorities, and bindings files
- New Drone Class: Drone Overseer - This drone can coordinate field repairs to other drones in the sector mid-fight. The other ships will need to lower their shields for a brief period of time in order to receive the repair, which opens up a window for your crew to deal some direct hull damage!
- New Drone Modifier: Corrupted - Continuously broadcasts the Corruption virus. It also attacks any ship it detects regardless of faction. It is also flagged so no reputation loss with occur if you defend yourself.
- New Drone Modifier: Irradiated - When a ship with this modifier deals hull damage to your ship, it imparts radiation inside your ship.
- New Drone Modifier: Legendary - This ship is a better version of the “Elite” modifier. Its ship components are better and finely tuned. Be careful when choosing to fight a ship with this modifier.
- New Drone Modifier: Secure - A ship with this modifier has a much higher cyberdefense and can resist being infected with viruses very well.
- New Drone Modifier: Vulnerable - This ship has armor and shield weaknesses, both are reduced by 50%
- New Drone Modifier: Neglected - A ship with this modifier hasn’t been maintained in a while and it’s starting to show. Turret damage and charge speeds are reduced by 50%.
- New Drone Modifier: Brutal - A ship with this modifier is finely tuned to deal as much damage as possible.
- New Drone Modifier: Frozen - surrounded by cooling gas which helps manage its heat, if you fly very close you might also benefit from the effect.
- New NPC: The Sylvassi Skiah has a structure set up in Cornelia Station in the hopes of getting daring crews to take out some Sector Commanders.
- New Mission: “Defeat 3 Sector Commanders” - Assigned by Skiah in Cornelia Station. This offers a few rewards, one of which will be a Lost Colony Data Fragment when implemented.


Steam Achievements
- Steam Achievements: Now possible to unlock. The game has 26 achievements listed below:
- Veteran Crew: Reach Crew Level 25
- Galaxy In Chaos: Reach Chaos Level 6
- The Wasted Wing: Complete the Colonial Union faction mission line
- Call of The Void: Defeat the V’uurog
- The Swarm: Defeat the Swarm
- Researcher: Research 10 talents
- Pacifist: Reach crew level 10 without dealing any damage
- The Madman’s Mansion: Complete the Alliance of Gentlemen faction mission line
- Dice Champion: Win a game of Liar’s Dice
- Hold Still: Heal 5,000 hit points on your allies
- The Grim Cutlass: Defeat the Grim Cutlass
- The Great Biscuit Race: Win the Fluffy Biscuit sales competition
- The Forsaken Flagship: Complete the W.D. Corporation faction mission line
- The Ancient Sentry: Defeat the Ancient Sentry
- Extortionist: As captain, extort 25 ships
- Explorer: Make 150 jumps
- Diplomat: As captain, pacify 25 hostile ships
- Seeking Death: Defeat a deathseeker
- The Caustic Corsair: Defeat the Caustic Corsair
- Leap of Faith: Blind jump 5 times in a single game
- Biscuit Madness: secret
- Master Chef: Perfectly cook 5 biscuits in a row
- Big Spender: Spend 100,000 credits in a single game
- Sandscarred: Win the Sandscar Arena
- No Questions Asked: Complete Rumibard Warger’s artifact collection missions
- First Place: Win the Ion Races

Changes
- Renamed common drone ships in galaxy based on faction owner:
- C.U. Scout Drone >>> C.U. Ranger
- C.U. Security Drone >>> C.U. Guardian
- C.U. Tactical Drone >>> C.U. Arbiter
- W.D. Scout Drone >>> W.D. Scout
- W.D. Security Drone >>> W.D. Warrior
- W.D. Tactical Drone >>> W.D. Vindicator
- Bandit Scout Drone >>> Bandit Clunker
- Bandit Security Drone >>> Bandit Ripper
- Bandit Tactical Drone >>> Bandit Marauder
- C.U. Ranger, W.D. Scout and the Bandit Clunker have a chance to have obsolete hulls, making them easier to defeat.
- Bandit specific drones will generally have stronger sensors, be harder to detect, and move slightly faster.
- CU specific drones will generally have 15% faster charging shields.
- WD specific drones will generally have stronger weapons with 15% more damage.
- Research materials from probes can now be any type.
- Other ships you encounter can now be damaged when you first encounter them.
- UI tweaks - Enemy health bars should be easier to differentiate from allies.
- The above-player crew health bars have been removed, although you can see information about their health if you have a hand-held scanner equipped.
- Load game UI has been tweaked
- Drone modifiers are much more likely to appear
- Significant tweaks to how enemy ship components are leveled up as chaos increases, the result should be certain ship components spike up in level more often while the average component level is the same



Fixes
- Spreadshot turret should be firing in a proper spread now
- Sensor screen tweaks to help prevent incorrect order of UI elements especially when scanning for components
- Heal grenade launcher model updated
- Fixed an issue regarding autosaves
- Fixed an issue that caused Fluffy Biscuit mission “Deliver Biscuits to Restricted CU Site 881” to fail upon start
- Fixed a collision issue found in the Caretaker’s room on the Estate.
- Fixed a collision issue found on the abandoned robot factory planet
- Fixed a texture error found on the abandoned robot factory planet
-The “Compare Ship Components” shop menu now correctly shows a decrease in min shield integrity as a positive and an increase in Min for QT shields as a negative.


Beta 24.1 Release Notes

Beta 24.1 is now out! This addresses some of the early feedback and reports we received so far from Beta 24. As always, thanks for your feedback and suggestions!

Changes
- You can now change your in-game online player name when logged into Steam. In the game options you can type whatever name you want to appear in game and it should work in secured games. If you want to use your steam handle you can leave the field blank.

Fixes
- Destroying unclaimed ships now doesn’t cause reputation loss
- Hunt The Resolution mission should no longer cause rep loss





Beta 24.2 Release Notes

Beta 24.2 is now out! It contains a handful of tweaks and fixes based on the feedback and reports we’ve gotten!

Changes
- For those who want to keep their privacy, there is a new option to play secured games more anonymously. You can toggle the “Allow Crewmates To View Steam Profile” in the game options to control the ability of fellow crewmates to view your profile or request to add you as a friend while playing in secured games.
-Tweaked the material properties for some planet creatures

Fixes
- Unsecured games should no longer have Steam profile / friend options in the TAB menu
- Shield generator tooltip now shows correct shield recharge rate





Beta 24.3 Release Notes

Beta 24.3 is now out! This one is focused on improving AI navigation on foot.

Changes
- Updated default AI priorities for PiBot to disable Align Ship To Sector when the Captain hasn’t set a waypoint
- Bot pathfinding / jetpack use tweaked to help avoid some situational issues we found
- Crew bots movement and animation speed tweaked to be a little slower

Fixes
- Certain achievements related to completing missions were not triggering properly. This should be fixed now for the Wasted Wing, Forsaken Flagship and other achievements.




Thanks for your time!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

Devlog #80: https://youtu.be/VSGxyV4WVks

Beta 23 is now live! It’s mainly focused on adding end game content for the Alliance of Gentlemen faction. In these new missions, your crew will be stealing cargo from a W.D. transport ship, breaking a prisoner out of a secure prison, and gathering equipment in order to pull off a heist in the mansion of the notorious businessman Torsten Rowe.

In addition to the new content, we also added penalties and bonuses to player death. Your maximum health will now degrade each time you respawn. Conversely, each jump you make will increase your maximum health and can even surpass what you started with.

We made an additional pass on a few of the currently implemented Sector Commanders. The two that received the biggest changes were the Grim Cutlass and the Ancient Sentry. You can read more about the changes below!

This update concludes the faction-specific end game content that we have planned. There will be a handful of other non-faction related ways in which you’ll be able to gain Lost Colony Data fragments, which we’ll be adding in the near future. We’re excited to hear feedback on the new content as well as the other additions. Thank you for any reports!


Faction Specific Additions (potential spoiler warning!)
-New Sector: WD Transport - A W.D. ship holding cargo and flanked by armored security drones
-New Sector: Hollow Rock - Secret CU prison sector for especially dangerous prisoners
-New Sector: Old Factory - Abandoned robot factory
-New Sector: Torsten Rowe’s Estate - The Madman’s Mansion
-New Area: The Captain’s Quarters on the Estate
-New Planetside Enemy: Downed Protector - A massive creation, luckily it’s already defeated...
-New Planetside Enemy: Guard Drone - Teleporters guards to its location if it spots intruders
-New Planetside Enemy: Assassin Bot - This entity can be slowed, but not stopped entirely.
-New Item: The P.U.N.T. Chip - A missioned related item
-New Item: Estate Access Card - Grants access to the Captain’s Quarters on the Estate
-New Mission: “Open Call” - Given through long range comms (requires AOG faction, crew level 3 minimum)
-New Mission: “Break Out Conrad” - Given by NPC the Caretaker in the Captain’s Quarters of the Estate (requires mission “Open Call” completed and related quest component in cargo)
-New Mission: “Investigate Prison Cell” - Given by NPC Saliki in the Captain’s Quarters of the Estate (requires mission “Break Out Conrad” to be in progress)
-New Mission: “Retrieve Robot Head” - Given by NPC Conrad in the Captain’s Quarters of the Estate (requires mission “Break Out Conrad” completed)
-New Mission: “The Madman’s Mansion” - Given by the Caretaker in the Captain’s Quarters of the Estate (requires mission “Retrieve Robot Head” completed)
-Added 4 New Mission NPCs

Additions
-New System: Fluctuating Health - Each time your character dies, their maximum health decreases. If you character does not die in the current sector, their maximum health can increase in small increments upon warping.
-New System: Pin Screens - Screens near security checkpoints. These screens require the correct pin to be entered before they can be unlocked. The pin numbers can be found somewhere within the sector on data pads or memos.
-New System: Limited Teleportation Dock - You can teleport into certain restricted stations only if your ship is located within a specific area.
-New System: Mission Status Toggle - Allows us to show or hide different elements in a level based on the status of a specific mission
-New Item: Revitalizing Syringe - Using this consumable item will not only fully heal you, but will also increase your maximum HP to its highest possible state.
-New Sound Effects: Robot and Sylvassi will sound appropriate when damaged
-Captains can now target destroyable space objects. They appear on the top-right corner as condensed versions of normal ship targets.
-New Ship Component: CU Long Range (tweaked) - The Grim Cutlass has modified this main turret.


Changes
-Captains can move cargo to other cargo slots (including hidden cargo slots) without having to be near a repair depot.
-Enemy AI Aiming has been tweaked. They are slightly less accurate and sometimes take longer before shooting / in between shots.
-Enemy AI weapon distribution has been altered. They are less likely to be equipped with the really powerful weapon varieties.
-AI behavior for Repel Invaders and Defend Self (Ship) has been improved. AI will now begin to search for potential intruders.
-Enemy AI crews will now have talents randomly applied to them.
-AI movement has been tweaked
-Updated default AI priorities regarding the Defend Self (Ship) behavior. This is a slight tweak and won’t give a prompt to players to reset to default AI priorities.
-The Grim Cutlass now has improved shields and upgraded cyberdefense. Its crew has also been given upgrades.
-The Grim Cutlass’s crew now starts with better weapons.
-The Caustic Corsair has had its toxic interior effect removed.
-The Ancient Sentry’s EMP ability has been replaced with an overcharge generator in its core.
-The Ancient Sentry now has two destroyable systems embedded in its hull. The first system allows the Ancient Sentry to repair itself over time. The second system allows it to fire missiles. Destroying each system will prevent the Ancient Sentry from performing that specific ability.
-The jump count restriction for the W.D. mission “Weapon Demonstration” has been removed. This allows crews to leave and revisit once they are a higher level / better equipped without the mission failing.
-Targeting drop-down option in the TAB menu for captains has been changed to two options: Auto-target and clear target. You can still click on the ships directly in the upper right to target them individually.
-Tweaked the current ship target visuals
-Decreased likelihood of cargo inspections. They should no longer be assigned until chaos level 3, and they should also be rarer.
-Heavy Pistol has been tweaked, it fires slower and does a bit less damage
-Elite versions of humanoid enemies have had a few tweaks

Fixes
-Fixed an issue with extracting special components, now preventing them from also dropping when the same ship is destroyed
-Fixed a naming issue with the I.M.P.A.C.T. prototype.
-Fixed a few issues occuring on BSOs (boardable space objects - stations with windows)
-Improved the networking on missiles exploding in space
-Fixed animation issue that could result in characters repeatedly playing the death animation based on where they died.
-The language filter should produce fewer false positives.
-Improved visuals for Burst Rifle
-Automated Trading Station shopkeepers should now be easier to talk to in certain situations
-Fixed a lighting issue on the W.D. Cruiser
-Fixed crew bot issue that broke their ability to navigate the ship after they play Liar’s Dice
-Fixed a sound issue on the Ant Colony Planet


Beta 23.1 Release Notes

Beta 23.1 is now out! It should hopefully help with alleviate a crash issue that was introduced in Beta 23. Thanks for sending in those reports!


Additions
-Piloting and Captain’s Chair UI for enemy ships now shows when shields are fully offline by hiding the shield integrity bar.

Fixes
-Fixed an issue that could cause a crash on certain computers
-Fixed a networking/timing issue found on the Downed Protector in one of the new AOG missions


Thanks for your time!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team