Lord of Rigel News

Greetings Lords of Rigel!

We’re approaching the end of the road for EA1, and part of the final push is the implementation of our last main quality of life feature: loading and saving build queue presets. Along with this feature there will be some bug fixes for reported issues including Gaia transformation filters for megastructures and improving the space monsters usage of the optimized tactical AI system.

The preset build queue system lets you create and save build orders. These include buildings and support units. Certain items tied to specific star systems (Colony Bases, warp infrastructure, megastructures) aren’t in the build order system and require you to intentionally create them. Building a ringworld is a major effort and does require the attention of the emperor! Saved queues are held in a save file, and can be used between games if there is a certain build order that you like.

Overall, with auto-build, auto-design, colony focus instead of sliders, the planets menu for sending colony and outpost ships, auto-explore, and build queue presets Lord of Rigel has a number of automation tools that let you focus on high level decisions without letting the game outright play itself. These tools should help with end game micromanagement.

Image 1. Creating Preset Build Queues

Image 2. Loading Preset Queues

For this week’s deep dive: star shaders!

We wanted a slightly more naturalistic look for stars in LoR compared to some other 4x games. Like in real time star appearance is set by their temperature and mass. Cooler red stars also have larger solar flares and sunspots and hotter bluer stars have fewer flares and spots. The shader for stars also has a slight effect for “limb darkening” which is that the outer edges of a star or gas giant are darker because there is less gas or plasma that light is passing through. Some slight noise is also used for the convection cell effects but that’s more noticeable just on the edges or around sunspots.
More exotic star types have different materials. Brown dwarves use a modified version of the gas giant shader. White dwarves and neutron stars have an almost featureless core but have particle effects that are stylized and hint at the magnetic fields. Neutron stars also have Einstein rings, distortion caused by their mass. Neutron stars also have a pulse effect in the galaxy and system views to hint at the radiation beams from their poles, but at a much slower rate than most actual pulsars or magnetars for visual purposes.

As we go into EA2 we’ll start going into the two new species, the Tulocks and the Synth and how their gameplay differs.

Image 3. A red giant star in system view

Image 4. Star shader material

Image 5. Neutron Star and Einstein Ring

Let us know what further changes you would like to see or if you have encountered any technical issues. Please post on the forums, reach out to us via Discord or send an email: [email protected] Saved games and clear steps to reproduce the bug are critical. It helps us more quickly track down the bug and get it fixed. Additional information on bug reporting tips can be found here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/437440/discussions/.


As always, we appreciate the feedback, conversations, and support from all of you!

Greetings Lords of Rigel!

We’re working on an update that will involve some cleanup to the order of operations at the end of turns, adjustments to autoturn and key inputs, and making the auto ship designer smarter about ship class use and space use. Some other adjustments include build queue filters considering items you have added to the queue. In the coming weeks we’ll be talking a bit more on what to expect during EA2.

For this week’s deep dive: the Xantus

We wanted the Xantus to fit with the mysterious shape shifting spymaster alien archetype.

Image 1: The Xantus are supreme spies

At the same time their reputation would also mean there would be some consequences for them like economic isolation so this goes into their traits as excellent at espionage but a poorer starting economy. In terms of backstory the Xantus we know of are an offshoot of a superorganism on their homeworld.

Image 2: The homeworld Xanthak

They reproduced how to make a brain and more conventional biology from a crashed ship during the last great war. From that they became self-aware, and also aware of the dangers in the galaxy. Design wise their default form we based a bit on cuttlefish in terms of skin and the eye shape.

Image 3: Xantus head concepts

Image 4: A Xantus researcher

Xantus ships we wanted to feel like stealth craft while keeping flowing forms with hints that the crew might be taking on any shape within it, much like how the Selach ships are fluid filled.

From what we’ve seen the Xantus have been an unexpected hit!

Image 5: Xantus Starship

Let us know what further changes you would like to see or if you have encountered any technical issues. Please post on the forums, reach out to us via Discord or send an email: [email protected] Saved games and clear steps to reproduce the bug are critical. It helps us more quickly track down the bug and get it fixed. Additional information on bug reporting tips can be found here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/437440/discussions/.


As always, we appreciate the feedback, conversations, and support from all of you!