Star Explorers News

I think I used this version number already ... oh well.

The game has not really been changed much. However, when you click on the mothership, the words "Target Sector" have been changed to "Mothership Sector" because that is the sector being shown.

Also, in the last build I was testing the wormhole device, and left it set to "on" by accident. It is now turned "off" so you in new games you will not start with the wormhole device installed. The wormhole device allows you to interact with your ship's inventory no matter where you are. This is an expensive item that normally only appears later in the game.

Somehow I had linked the fruit creation script to both trees and plants, where it was only optimized to work with trees. The result was way too many fruits spawning on a planet and frame-rate going down to 4 fps.

Tests have confirmed that a more reasonable number of fruits should now spawn, even on worlds where there were too many in the previous build.

Enjoy!

Okay I wanted to apologize for the price change announcement. Thanks to the last few updates, more people have been playing the game, which is great!

However, there are some bugs that I thought had been squashed long ago that seem to be rearing their ugly heads once again, making me very uncomfortable with the idea of raising the price of the game.

So I am retracting my announcement about the change from $4.99 to $9.99.

Normally I would just say, hey I will fix those bugs and keep going. However, I genuinely have tried and they somehow never go away. Most of the issues in this game can be resolved by saving the game and reloading it. But that is not a thing I want to charge a premium price for at this time.

Here's an image from the game that represents roughly how I am feeling about things right now...


Version 6.0 is still scheduled to happen. I imagine some time before 2025, or maybe early into the new year. There may be a price change later, if I can resolve some of the underlying issues with the game first. Or it will be the same janky experience with a few extra features stapled on. I will let you all know.

For anyone who bought the game because of the imminent price change announcement, I did not intend this to happen so I am sorry. If you feel like you have been manipulated unfairly, please send me a message an I will try to find a way to make things right. Sorry about that!

Your inventory panel will now show all the accessories you have acquired in the game. These are not new items, but things that already existed in the game.

The Star Chart Upgrade, the Backpack and Storage Expansions, and several other items, when used, would take an effect on your game, but in some cases there was no visual indication that you had used the item. Rather, the item would simply disappear and the effect would take place from that point forward.



Now you have a simple, visual representation of which effects you have acquired. In the image above, you can see icons for the Star Char Upgrade, as well as the Storage Wormhole.

Currently this feature simply shows the icons. It does not let you click on them or learn what they do, once they have been used. I am thinking of adding this functionality though. I am also considering the idea of removing, or replacing these accessories. Right now the game only has a total of 10 possible accessories, so there is no need for removing or replacing them. But if I come up with some interesting accessory ideas, we may see this idea implemented.

[h3]Price Change[/h3]
Regarding the upcoming price change, I am trying to coordinate it between a few different online stores. It may take a couple more days to get done.

Fruits are now edible. You can pick them up, and they will appear in your inventory. You can also sell them (though I have not actually tested this yet).

Eating them may have an effect, and it may not. The effect may be good, or it may be bad. Fruit is a gamble...

The color and shapes of fruit should provide a consistent effect, so once you have eaten a round, orange fruit, you will know what all round, orange fruits do.

Most fruit should be static, behaving like fruit on earth. Fruit that interacts with you or other creatures should be rare. Static fruits will have the same effects as their moving counterparts, as long as the color and shape are the same.