Imagine Earth News

Fellow space colony managers,

we recently discovered a new planet - say hello to Thera. In addition, our world management system needed some adjustments. All building upgrades were rebalanced and the resource simulation was revised. And of course there is so much more.....

• New bonus mission on planet thera - a planet like earth
  
• New vegetation graphics
  
• Upgrade balancing
  
• Resource simulation revised
  
• Assimilators & Xrathul Harvester interaction with bombs
  
• New trailer voiceover
  
• Other improvements
  

The latest planet that you can unlock in the bonus galaxy is Thera. It might remind you of another planet you left long ago, right where you grew up before you joined the colonization business and started building a better future in space. Make sure that history wont repeat itself on this planet...


We added some edge modells to forests so they look more organic and more round than triangle. As simply as this is said as astonishing it does look in the game.




All the upgrades in the game have been revisited and rebalanced. We mostly made them cheaper and more powerful to increase their strategic value.

Furthermore the visualization has been improved so you can see the most important numbers at a glimpse.




In order to make the upgrades more significant, we also had to adjust the complete resource simulation.

Let's have a look at the most important change: The production and consumption values of all buildings are now per space minute instead of per space second.
For example the tax value of a district now represents what is collected within a full space minute. 1/60 of the amount will be added to your budget ervery space second.
If your colony makes a profit of +300€, it will take one space minute until the full amount is added to your budget. This equals +5€ per space second.

This allowed us to increase the production and consumption values of all buildings which makes them easier to read and compare.
Money related values have been increased by factor 10. Energy, food, goods and rare resources have been increased by factor 2-4. The same goes for emissions and field pollution.



In addition it allowed us to halve prices and money budget and to reduce the size of a resource cargo from from 1.000 to 100 units. These values are now easier to read and compare with the production as well.



These flying enemies are now attackable with ideon bombs and explosive devices, which will be thrown on them by your drones.
To do so you can simply hover and click the flying enemy unit and pick the item of your choice. Thisway you also get a context info about their motives and vulnerabilities.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=55&v=FtihRNHqwQA

As you can hear the game features and mechanics are now explained by a native speaker with a compelling voice. As soon as we find time to redo the intro/trailer we also want to have this voice for Lima, the leading character in the game.

• The inventory is now accessible through the tool ring for fields where it makes sense to use items. In addition you can open the construct ring with a right click any time.
  
• Tower upgrades are also constructable through the tool ring when you have bought the corresponding item from a trader.
  
• No distorting ringing sound for infos anymore.
  
• Joe's 50k Sales Goal on Mission Joma is only triggered when Joe was not already fired by the boss... oups, that was a spoiler ;D
  
• On Planet Iqunox you have to craft medicine now instead of just selling medical substence harvested from corals.
  
• Rounos Native Quest now tells you to build towers to repress uprisings of angry natives.
  
• Mission Joma: We added a "Buy Scanner" goal to make more clear how to proceed in the mission.
  

• The fieldmarker was redesigned to look better!
  
• Tons of forest models have been optimized and graphics reworked.
  
• Underwater build animation got fixed.
  
• Hospital icon fixed, pumpkin shadow fixed.
  
• Rooftop of the saw mill construct fixed.
  
• Palms bigger and bump map fixed.
  
• Reconstruct icon fixed.
  

Dear Space Colonists, our monthly update of Imagine Earth this time adds a background story frame to the campaign and a new additional vegetation set.

• Mushroom Vegetation
  
• Epic background story
  
• Resource Storage
  
• No More Fake AI on Rounos
  
• New Flashy Quest Icons
  
• Other improvements
  

Maybe you where one of those who perceived our planets as a bit too normal and not very alien-like. We had the same feeling for some time and saw chance to try something new in terms of vegetation. The whole set of forests (8 bioms + 1 underwater) is now being replaced on two of the six campaign planets to make their themes more diversified. It also triggered us to do another set of vegetation besides trees and mushrooms. Could be giant ferns or totally alienated, glowing crystal plants. Any ideas?




We heard it from time to time and felt the same way. The campaign was lacking a bigger context for the story. We have added this now in the form of cut scenes told in the campaign screen. This links all the missions to a big picture and a real goal that is followed by you and the other companies.




A minimum of 10% goods will always be put into storage if you prioritize a certain resource. That keeps you from waiting for a resource package you wanted to store when the production value of the resource is low.




On the Rounos mission we had a scripted enemy which could finally be replaced by our AI. In addition we have polished the mission on planet Rounos. There were serious balancing issues that are hopefully working out much better now.

Important note: All old savegames on Rounos wont work anymore. Sorry, but this was necessary.




You can recognize much easier when there are important events somewhere on the planet. Quest icons have pulsing markers around themselves. In addition these quests are arranged in an own line in the bookmark panel. You can jump to these Events simply by pressing TAB.

• New resource warning icons
  
• Achieved goals will be shown and highlighted in cut scenes
  
• AI cares about food & goods diversity
  
• Traders will trade craftable Icons only occasionally
  
• Fires won't spread so fast anymore
  

• Forest had plus on themselves
  
• pollution effects were to high
  
• Improved pest and epidemic particle effects
  
• AI relied too much on oil platforms
  
• No AI enemies where spawning in competition mode
  
• Natives mood and goods usage
  
• Native camp model had reflected surfaces
  
• Fishery reduced its own productivity
  
• Game crashes with access denied folders
  

Dear Space Colonists, our monthly update of Imagine Earth this time focuses on improving the visualization of building productivity and quality of life for cities.

• Joma Extended & "Healing" for Temples
  
• Fusion Reactor
  
• Fire Station
  
• Money and Tax Balancing
  
• New UI for Details on Productivity and Quality of Life
  
• Other improvements
  

It's now possible to donate items and resources to other colonies. For now this has only relevance for the missions, but in the near future we will be working on a diplomacy system.

We have extended the Joma mission to make use of this feature with respect to the epidemics and Birons. This gives you the chance to take a decision at one point that will have influence to a later part of the mission.



The cure spell that is now available in temples neutralizes pathogens that can pose a threat to more complex forms of life on site - in other words, you can use it to heal epidemics.


This new building is introduced in the Rounos mission.



The fusion reactor generates thermonuclear energy of nuclear fusion. Lithium is needed as a raw material, which can be extracted from asteroids on most planets. There is only relatively little radioactive waste and the reaction can be aborted safely at any time.

The "divertors" upgrade improves binding of impurities from the plasma and reduce maintenance and disposal costs. The "reactor extension" upgrade expands the reactor so that additional energy can be produced.

This building most likely will need some additional balancing, since it's the first time a building consumed rare resources.



The fire station is an upgrade for city districts and the logistics center. It ensures that fires in the vicinity are automatically extinguished by a drone. In addition, the probability of forest and building fires is halved.


Currently you always have loads of money in the long term. We are trying to improve the balancing of this a bit. In the first step we have increased the start budget and decreased tax income. At the same time we have increased the tax bonus you receive when your people have a high quality of life.



Over the course of the last years Imagine Earth has become a quite complex game. A part of this complexity is how productivity is influenced by nearby buildings and local factors like ground fertility.

With this update we are introducing a new info panel that is shown when a building is clicked. It sums up the productivity and lists all the influencing factors and their strength. This will make it a lot easier for you to understand what is going on and how to increase the production output of your colony.



The second part of this is how the quality of life in cities is influenced. A high quality of life will give you a tax bonus and a low quality will decrease your income.

Buildings like the park district, health district and campus district increase the quality of life in surrounding districts. Other factors will decrease it. The new info panel lists the details on this, so you always know what's going on.



Finally the former building info panel in the bottom left of the UI is replaced with a minimal version that shows the building's / object's name for the selected field and its production value / remaining resources.

• You can open the build ring by right-clicking on any field now
  
• Added explanations for epidemics
  
• Bookmark panel no longer "clicks through"
  
• Research and development panels no longer change the planet zoom level
  
• Visualization for items received during the mission
  
• Changed influence area visualization for cannons, shield, fire stations and more
  
• Fixed city car animation problems
  

Dear Space Colonists, our (almost) monthly update of Imagine Earth this time focuses on a remake of the Joma mission that introduces new buildings, items, threats and a new race - the Birons.

• Birons on Joma
  
• Trade with other colonies
  
• Warehouse level 2
  
• Epidemics, medicine and health district
  
• Chemical plant
  
• Meteor shower (new threat)
  
• Worker drones
  
• Seed bombs
  
• New AI features and other improvements
  

The Joma mission was last mission from the old days of Imagine Earth. We decided to rework it and add some new goals and story to it, to make it more interesting. All the new features mentioned below are introduced in the mission.

The Birons are a new race that are introduced on Joma and are the first contact with another colony on a planet in the course of the campaign. They build small colonies and are focused on producing resources and items and trade these things.



Other colonies are now ready to trade overproduced resources, harvested rare resources and items with you. They pay less than the merchant would, but are willing to trade any time.



The warehouse can now be upgraded to level 2, after this has been unlocked in the research system. It doubles the storage for rare resources and adds a second harvester drone to the warehouse.



Epidemics are a new threat that can occur anytime. The probability is increased by local pollution, high temperatures and buildings like the cattle breeding or chemical plant and mushroom forests.

You can cure the epidemic with the new item "Medicine". It can either be crafted using chemicals and corals or bought from the trader.



The new health district improves the quality of life of the surrounding districts. In addition, the spread of epidemics is prevented and the probability of an outbreak is halved.

It's medical lab doubles population growth in surrounding districts and the university hospital increases the radius of the health center in which epidemics are prevented, the quality of life is improved and medical laboratory affects population growth.



The chemical plant produces all the chemicals needed in society. Production is increased by gas deposits as well as neighboring chemical plants. Inconspicuous, for example, for medicine and fertilizer production.

Fiber-reinforced plastic reduces the maintenance cost and risk of an incident by using fiber-reinforced plastic instead of metal. This avoids corrosion. Laboratory optimizes the production process and reduces quality-related production losses.


https://youtu.be/L05FQNedVxs

Meteor showers are a new force of nature. They come down as a burst of 3 to 6 small meteors that cause about 40% damage to normal buildings.

Single meteors can be shot by laser and pulse cannons or stopped by a city center or frontier tower with shield generator.



All basic maintenance and incident works are now done by worker drones. This includes shipping the construction site for a new building, relocating existing buildings, repairing damaged buildings, extinguishing fires and dropping items like explosive device or seed bomb.

To make sure you always have enough worker drones available, the logistics center comes with an additional drone.



The seed bomb is a new item that grows the optimal forest on any field. This field can be located within or near your colony. The item can be crafted using nitrokirlide and timber.

• New outro soundtrack
  
• Mouse-wheel zoom now also rotates the planet towards a selected field
  
• Research: Frontier tower level 2
  
• Fixed quickload/-save (F4 and F5)
  
• Ocean now starts to rise at 25% global warming (previously at 50%)
  
• Colorize buildings by their type (navigation menu)
  
• New animation for constructed buildings
  
• Improved ideon crystal graphic
  
• AI: Use cannon and shield to defend against Xrathul harvesters
  
• AI: Craft items if needed or resources available
  
• AI: Buy tech license if needed