Hard Chip News

Greetings, Hard Chip players!

This is an update from version 0.0.5.1 to 0.0.5.3 which is actually live on the playtest branch. There's quite a lot to go through. Let's catch up on all the modifications that were done!



1. New Bonus Challenges: After finishing the campaign you'll now unlock "Bonus Stages" from the main menu. There are 16 new challenges, ranging in difficulty from simple to quite hard.


Those were hidden challenges, but why keep them hidden? Even if they don't follow a linear progression of difficulty, we think hardcore players will welcome them!

Will you try to make an 8-bit multiplier?



2. New Deterministic Simulation and Microseconds resolution for scheduling: The main goal of HC is to build a basic 8-bit processor. The simulation is built around that goal. And running fast is critical for that goal. But it was a bit annoying to see a few differences in runs while designing smaller parts like gates.
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Note how the "421" tick count in the center of the screen remains the same during multiple runs!

This update allows HC to run smaller circuits deterministically. Each time, the same tick count! Now you can measure how perfect your solution is and lower that sweet sweet tick count!




3. Update Versioned Online Scores: Scores can be separated depending on the HC's build version. Why this is important? Some older HC builds would allow to "cheese". Now we can record scores with the peace of mind that the scores we are compared with are "cheese-free" (at least up to your current version of HC).




4. New signs for Up/Down Terminal, Clock and Output block: Up/Down, 1/0, +/-, Red/Blue, all those terms/colors mean the same pair of things. But it was confusing for new players to have to play with around those different terms.



The Up and Down terminals are now "Always 1 Terminal" and "Always 0 Terminal", respectively with a "1" and "0" sign on them. The clock which was a "0" sign (I know) has now a distinct sign. Same for Input and Output that were too close to each other.



5. New Select/Cut/Past/Delete Whole Segment shortcuts: Now, with a double click you can select an entire segment (continuous chain of trace blocks). Here's a quick demo:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]


Quality Of Life, Bug, and Crash fixes:

1. Input Output is shown on Intro Trace;
   
2. Music stops fix;
   
3. Remove MOS with Alt+Double Click : tentative 1;
   
4. Selection works when the mouse moves outside the die;
   
5. Force initialization of the first validator to have a visual indicator at the proper place;
   
6. GateSRLatch 1-0 terminal adjustment;
   
7. Small tooltips for readouts;
   
8. "Stick" readout icon shows action rather than state;
   
9. F2 to Hide/Show UI and/or Readouts.
   
10. The camera doesn't move between Alt-Tab
    
11. Tentative "Sequence contains no matching element" crash fix
    
12. Touching inputs cancel the validation;
    
13. Validators weren't waiting for the simulation to settle fix;
    
14. Campaign launches in deterministic mode;
    
15. Challenge Half adder terminal position;
    
16. F2 doesn't bring back objectives when there is none.;
    
17. Shorting terminals while next to each other;
    
18. Exiting modal sound;
    
19. Auto start simulation off when in the Library (demo doesn't work anyway)
    
20. Main menu shows new startup area
    
21. Adding controls in Keybindings;
    
22. Fail-safe index out of range in SceneRenderer, crash fix tentative;
    
23. No editor shortcut when on UI (text inputs bug);
    
24. Remove selected readouts feature;
    
25. Adding music in the editor;
    
26. Fix the camera lock when the middle button is pressed while exiting the editor;
    
27. BenchMark adapted to conducive gate except the Thingy one though;
    
28. Fixing campaign with conducive gate done;
    
29. Scores now are properly evaluated with one or more scores.;
    

As always, your feedback/suggestions/comments are instrumental in making this game. Join our Discord server!

Thank you for playing Hard Chip, and stay tuned for more updates and new features!

Greetings, Hard Chip players!

Quite a lot happened since update 39. We have a long list of modifications to go through and a major change of distribution. Let's get through it!



1. New from Itch.io to Steam: The reach Steam has is no secret. In 2 weeks, the new HC's Steam page matched the itch.io one's total visits. HC has been on Itch.io for more than a year now. The difference is staggering!



Consider giving a wishlist away or follow if you want to follow HC's progression on Hard Chip on Steam!

Take a look at the previous version on itch.io



2. New distribution method on Steam: with the Steam page comes all the advantages for release management. Simplified release process and updates are available in minutes. Daily quick fixes are possible. All savegames are kept automatically between updates. It's really fast. We tested a playtest version and it went well.

All HC's new versions will be uploaded to Steam only.

HC already has enough hardcore players giving a lot of feedback (meet them in the HC's discord server!), but nonetheless you could request access to the playtest build if you have good feedback to give!



Note that version 0.0.4.8-legacy will be forever up on Itch.io!



3. New Conducive Gates: before transistors had their gate split in two, each side was isolated from the other. While double gates transistor exists, this was not a proper representation of a simple planar mosfet HC is using. To allow HC to stick to a life-like simulated gate's behavior, the shape of transistors has to change. Introducing dedicated gate blocks:



From the previous shape:



This new shape allows multiple new behaviors! You can short gates now, use them to interconnect each other, connect them from multiple angles, and a lot of other fun tricks I'll let you figure out.

Note that as the shape of the transistor changes, your old saves won't work without an update on your part.



4. Update Online Scores: Online scores have been reset for the new versions of HC (0.0.5.0 and up). A lot of scores could have been made while the simulation allowed strange behavior. With so many scores, it is impossible to triage them properly. So big reset from 0.0.5.0!



Quality Of Life, Bug, and Crash fixes:
1. Instructions are not shown automatically, giving the chance to the player to figure it out by himself
2. Crash fix when creating a blueprint with an empty selection
3. Adding music in the editor, tentative 1!
4. Fix the camera lock when exiting the editor
5. "Remove all readouts" option when selecting blocks

6. Editor shortcuts are disabled when a modal is up
7. Rendering crash fail-safe, tentative fix
8. Key bindings list updated with latest controls (still static)
9. Main menu shows the new starting area (performance greatly improved!)
10. New 30fps refresh rate limits


As always, your feedback/suggestions/comments are instrumental in making this game.

Thank you for playing Hard Chip, and stay tuned for more updates and new features!

Greetings, Hard Chip players!

We're excited to announce the Hard Chip's store page has just launched on Steam! This game is a labor of love, and we're still hard at work making it even better.

What type of communication you can expect here:

Devblog Updates: Keep an eye out for regular updates on our development process. We'll share everything from new features to behind-the-scenes looks.

We Want Your Feedback: The game is evolving, and your thoughts were and still are invaluable to us. Your suggestions and feedback are key to refining Hard Chip into a game you'll love even more.

Let's Connect: Participate on this journey! The bulk of interactions are on our Discord server. Maybe it will be more convenient here? or maybe it'll be an addition? Let's try it out!

The game is still in the alpha phase. The Chapter 1: 4-bit Adder is freely available on Itch.io for the time being. Now evaluating how Steam would be better for providing the game with frequent updates to players and having a proper feedback loop with them.

Thank you for playing Hard Chip, and stay tuned!

Elorth