PULSAR: Lost Colony News

Hey everyone!

Beta 31.3 is now out! This update focuses on more bug-fixing as well as a balance pass on Sector Commanders. It’s been a while since we really worked on them, so they were certainly falling behind a little bit. We hope these changes help make them more challenging again.

Balance Changes
- Sector Commanders should clear viruses faster
- Drone-type Sector Commanders have increased system healing rates
- Ancient Sentry: Doubled ship system health, further increased weapon system health
- Ancient Sentry: Improved turret tracking behavior
- Ancient Sentry: Missiles are faster, better at tracking the player’s ship, and deal more damage.
- Deathwarden: Improved speed and maneuvering
- Deathwarden: Increased ship system health (Eng to 50, Weap to 40, Science to 50)
- Keeper: Faster and smoother movement
- Keeper: Beam damage slightly decreased, but can now rotate the beam towards the player’s ship
- Keeper: Engineering system health increased to 60
- Keeper: Laser turrets changed to railgun turrets
- Grim Cutlass: Added more crew talents
- Grim Cutlass: Crew now has more powerful repair and fire extinguishing tools
- Caustic Corsair (Alchemist): Added more crew talents
- Caustic Corsair (Alchemist): Upgraded ship components, added additional tracker missile component slot and another acid missile
- Caustic Corsair (Alchemist): Crew now has more powerful repair and fire extinguishing tools

Changes
- Tweaked the Weapbot’s AI to make it less likely to leave turret in battle to repair systems
- Added new override to Scibot’s “block long range comms” program behavior in the default AI priorities
- Reduced all incoming system damage by 30%
- Enemy turrets are a bit more accurate than before

Fixes
- Fixed an issue with the scanner HUD that could overlap ship component slots in the expanded view
- Fixed an issue with the ship attribute display not correctly updating certain values
- Potential fix for the issue related to the sensor dish not receiving input from the player controlling it
- Fixed a bug where the Scibot would enter and leave the sensor dish repeatedly
- Fixed an issue that would incorrectly apply the galaxy-wide “occasionally damaged” effect to Sector Commanders. They should always start at full hull integrity now.
- Sector Commanders should no longer warp away from battle
- Fixed an issue with the Swarm where higher-quality graphic settings had an impact on its healing rate
- Fixed a different issue with the Swarm related to random timing based on the host’s framerate
- Fixed some class-specific talents which weren’t working correctly on enemy crews
- Fixed an issue with the Defender, Railgun, Biohazard, Flamelance and Phase turret bases showing up in the sensor dish view when they should be hidden


Thank you for your time!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

Beta 31.2 is now out!

Changes
- Increased the push-back force in the warp-battle level to help prevent players from going out of bounds
- Crashing your ship into damageable components should now correctly apply damage.
- Reduced camera shake when manning turrets

Fixes
- Fixed an issue with the warp guardian instantly colliding with cloaked ships as they enter the grand warp gate
- Fixed a timing issue that related to handheld weapons when playing offline mode on Linux
- Improved crew-death stat tracking
- Fixed an issue with an NPC at the Polytechnic Federation hub not displaying their name and dialogue
- Improved the behavior of the SandShark

Thank you for your time!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

Devlog #90: https://youtu.be/CGhx3PNuW2I

Beta 31.1 is now out! This one includes some larger changes and improvements, including better support for offline mode with pausing, a collection of various performance improvements, and a new feature for handheld scanners!


Additions
- Better support for offline mode: you can now choose to play online or offline in the start game menu. You can also load a save in any mode by toggling the “Play Online” checkbox. Playing in offline mode will prevent your game from appearing in the game lobby.
- Offline Pause: Opening the TAB or escape menu will now pause the game if you are playing in offline mode. This is fairly experimental, so let us know if you encounter any strangeness with pausing. We’ve done some extra work to make sure the functionality of the TAB menu is immune to the pause, meaning you can change and update AI priorities mid-fight or use consumables.
- Scanner Minimap: Having a scanner in your inventory will add a small, simplified version of the scanner’s screen on your HUD.
-Render Scale Video Setting (Mac and Linux) - this is another video setting that can help if your machine is struggling to run the game. Right now it still scales down the TAB menu but it should exclude most of the game’s UI. We plan to work on this setting more in the future.
- Added Polytechnic Federation faction-specific dialogue to the League of Free Machines NPCs at the Estate

Changes
- Upgraded internal Unity engine
- Improved the game resolution options in the video settings - it should only show the highest refresh rates your monitor can support
- Tweaked skybox visuals to improve performance on Low and Lowest settings - those settings will now have a simplified visual but may see an increase in performance, especially if the machine was GPU limited
- Various other improvements to post-process effects should improve performance across all video settings
- Polished the look of the drop down menus
- A handful of visual and collision tweaks to the Paladin-class starship
- Improved the network security, specifically between different game versions
- Tweaked dialogue of the League of Free Machines NPCs at the Estate

Fixes
- Fixed an issue with custom lit sectors (like Outpost 448) where the lighting rotation would randomize after revisiting the sector
- Fixed an issue where ambient light could improperly show on screens and certain doors
- Fixed a screen conflict issue with the status screen on the Outrider
- Fixed an issue with the SPIKER and IMPACT guns related to the screens in the Lost Colony
- Fixed some networking issues related to elevators on planets
- removed the option to abandon the “Find The Lost Colony” mission
-Fixed an issue that would improperly spawn multiple Lava planets of the same type



Thank you for your time!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

Beta 31.03 is now out!

Additions
- Gamepads can use the on-screen keyboard to type into the chat box by clicking the chat box
- Gamepads can now access the Ship Component Overview screen by pressing left on the d-pad - will require keybindings to be reset
- New key-binding for Keyboard and Mouse setup allows for direct access to the Ship Component Overview screen (V) - will require keybindings to be reset
- Added ambient music to the main menu
- Two new general ambient music tracks should now currently play in the game
- Added the ability to back out of the virtual keyboard
- Improved the Kick Button: There is now a separate Ban and Kick button for the host.
- Added captain notification noting when the ship shuts down due to active virus limit
- Added options to assign keybindings for direct maneuvering thrusters for HOTAS setups - will require keybindings to be reset

Changes
- Slight visual improvements to the Main Menu background
- Sitting Duck virus will now disable pilot boost charging

Fixes
- The Captain’s Scavenger talent should now properly work at the 10% rate per rank instead of the incorrect 5%.
- Fixed an issue with which moons could sometimes cast strange shadows onto planets
- Fixed an error with bot pathfinding that was noticed in analytics
- Fixed an internal error that was noticed in analytics
- Fixed a few problematic probe pickup areas on asteroids
- Fixed an issue where ships could blind jump to hidden sectors that weren’t available yet (i.e. The Wasted Wing)

The Unseen Threat (possible spoilers)
- Fixed an issue with the P.T. Module: Thrust used coolant when it should not have
- The “Strike Window is now Open” mission should properly reference the playership’s name.

Thank you for your time!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team

Hey everyone!

Beta 31.02 is now out!

Changes
- Ships will now automatically shutdown if they are infected with more than 12 active viruses
- Tweaked the math on how ship boosting works. It shouldn’t apply as much drag, so it will be less likely to slow down ships already moving at high speeds.

Fixes
- Fixed a collision issue regarding the engineering system instance and the reactor structure on the W.D. Destroyer-Class starship
- Fixed issue related to active viruses being added to your cargo slots
- Fixed an issue with emissive materials on robot characters

The Unseen Threat (possible spoilers)
- Fixed a handful of reported collision and other visual issues on the Paladin-Class starship
- Fixed a handful of collision issues reported at the Polytechnic Federation hub

Thank you for your time!

Best,
The Leafy Games Team