Xenonauts 2 News

[p]Happy Easter everyone![/p][p]Our first hotfix (v7.18.4) has arrived for everyone to play after having spent a couple of days being tested on the Experimental branch, and our next hotfix (v7.18.5) has arrived on Experimental to replace it![/p][p]All players should now have access to the all_templates.zip file that contains all the .json game data templates so they can be modded with a text editor. Full details of this, including where to find the .zip, can be found in our last update.[/p][p]In this update we'll go into a bit more detail about modding, and also highlight a couple of things we'd love some community assistance on![/p][h3]MODDING[/h3][p]We've had quite a few players trying to mod the game since we launched a few days ago, which is great to see. Unfortunately, this has exposed some bugs in the way Xenonauts 2 supports modding, but the hotfix released onto the Experimental branch today should fix these.[/p][p]If you're trying to mod the game, you should therefore make sure you're on the Experimental branch - and I'd also make sure you're in the modding-related channels in our Discord. Our tech director has spent most of the Easter weekend supporting modders by fixing technical problems, improving documentation, and generally providing guidance and answering questions there.[/p][p]However, it is worth highlighting that these .json files were never intended to be human-readable. Unlike the text files from Xenonauts 1 they are designed to be viewed inside the Unity editor rather than in a text editor, and they are heavily compressed for performance reasons. The "community mod tools" we're talking about starting work on soon will allow people to edit these with an interface similar to the one we use when developing the game. Obviously, this will make modding much easier![/p][p]Nonetheless, we really appreciate the people who are battle-testing the modding systems already present - with your help, we'll get all the issues ironed out in no time![/p][h3]STEAM REVIEWS: YOUR FEEDBACK MATTERS[/h3][p]Players who have been enjoying Xenonauts 2 could do two things to help out the dev team and the wider community. The first would be to leave a review for the game - we’re very grateful for the feedback players have shared so far, and reviews do a lot to help the game’s visibility. They also help inform future patches and what the team focuses on next. If you’re enjoying Xenonauts 2, or just want to support the dev team, leaving a review would really help.[/p][h3]COMMUNITY WIKI[/h3][p]The second thing would be to take a look at the official community wiki and see if there's anything you can contribute to it. Xenonauts 2 can be an intimidating game for people who aren't familiar with classic X-Com, and it's really useful to have a resource people can look at to understand what they are doing wrong and how they can improve if they're stuck.[/p][p]Unfortunately, the game has changed quite a lot during development and there's still a fair amount of outdated information on the wiki - so if anyone has a bit of free time available to help clean it up, it would probably make a big difference. Anyone can edit it, so if you're interested then you can just go ahead and start making changes! [/p][p]That's everything for now - thanks for reading. Hope you're enjoying playing so far![/p][p][/p][h3]XENONAUTS 2 RESOURCES[/h3][p]Xenonauts 2 Official Wiki: Learn more about Xenonauts 2 here. If you'd like to become a contributor, then come join the community Discord and let us know in the #wiki channel. [/p][p]Xenonauts 2 Modding Wiki: This wiki contains comprehensive documentation, tools, and examples to help both beginners and experienced modders create their own custom content for the game. [/p][p]Xenonauts 2 Official Beginner's Guide: New to Xenonauts 2? Check out our beginner's guide that covers everything you'll want to know to survive the alien threat. [/p][p][/p][h3]Join the Xenonauts Community[/h3][p]Discord | Reddit | Forums[/p][p][dynamiclink][/dynamiclink][/p]

[p]This update is only accessible by switching to our Experimental branches (instructions on how to do so here).[/p][p]Changes:[/p]

• [p]Steam Cloud saves will now also track the backup save folder, as some players (e.g. those on Windows 11) were finding that their saves were not syncing. This should fix that issue for 99% of players![/p]
• [p]The afterburner button "on" state has been made a bit brighter, as quite a few users have accidentally ended up leaving them enabled and then being confused why interceptor weapons are not firing. We'll be making some additional changes to make this more obvious in the next patch, but this is a quick change that might help.[/p]
• [p]Fixed various issues and crashes to do with mod loading.
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[h3]STEAM REVIEWS: YOUR FEEDBACK MATTERS[/h3][p]If you haven’t already, please consider leaving us a review on Steam. We’re very grateful for the feedback players have shared so far, and reviews do a lot to help the game’s visibility. They also help inform future patches and what the team focuses on next. If you’re enjoying Xenonauts 2, or just want to support the dev team, leaving a review would really help.[/p][p][/p][h3]XENONAUTS 2 RESOURCES[/h3][p]Xenonauts 2 Official Wiki: Learn more about Xenonauts 2 here. If you'd like to become a contributor, then come join the community Discord and let us know in the #wiki channel. [/p][p]Xenonauts 2 Modding Wiki: This wiki contains comprehensive documentation, tools, and examples to help both beginners and experienced modders create their own custom content for the game. [/p][p]Xenonauts 2 Official Beginner's Guide: New to Xenonauts 2? Check out our beginner's guide that covers everything you'll want to know to survive the alien threat. [/p][p][/p][h3]Join the Xenonauts Community[/h3][p]Discord | Reddit | Forums
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[p]Hello everyone - we're now one day after the big 1.0 launch day, and things have gone relatively smoothly so far. Welcome to all of our new players, we hope you're all having fun![/p][p]As a few issues have arisen with the 1.0 update, we released a hotfix (v7.18.4) to deal with them onto the Experimental branch. If it does not introduce any new bugs, it'll be released onto the standard branches tomorrow.
[/p][h3]SAVE GAMES[/h3][p]There have been two main issues with save games. The first is that the 1.0 update breaks save compatibility, which has left some people upset that they seemingly cannot continue their existing Milestone 6 campaign - however, you can still access the older build on our Legacy branch if you want, and that would allow you to continue playing.[/p][p]The second issue is that the 1.0 update caused some players to "lose" their old save games. What has happened here is that the game will now automatically choose a backup save game location if the default save game path is within OneDrive or Dropbox (as these services can cause stability issues).[/p][p]In this case, your save games are not actually gone - the game is just looking for them in a new place. If you revert to the Legacy branch (which is the only way to play the older saves) then they will reappear.[/p][p][/p][h3]JSON MODDING[/h3][p]A number of players raised concerns over the last day that the 1.0 launch build "removed" modding. We initially found this a bit confusing as the 1.0 build actually expands mod support, but once we properly understood the issue we were able to find a solution that should work for everyone.[/p][p]The problem is that the 1.0 release build packs the .json data files into Unity asset bundles. We did this because it significantly speeds up load times, but a side-effect is that the files are no longer accessible to modders unless they first use a tool to extract the contents of the asset bundle.[/p][p]After the 7.18.4 hotfix, the game will contain a .zip file called all_templates.zip in Xenonauts2/Assets/Assets/xenonauts/ that contains a copy of all the .json templates in the game. Unzipping this will allow modders to resume editing the files with text editors as they did in previous versions (the game will always try to load a file directly from the file system before it starts looking in the asset bundles).[/p][p]This means that the average user can continue to enjoy the increased performance that comes from using asset bundles, while modders no longer have to use additional tools to get access to the .json files. Anyone who wants to test this can do so immediately by switching to the Experimental branch.[/p][p][/p][h3]FURTHER PATCHES[/h3][p]We'll continue to monitor bug reports over the weekend and release hotfixes for any serious issues. Fixes for less critical issues are being rolled into a larger patch (v7.19.0) that will be released for testing on the Experimental branch early next week, and will be rolled out onto the standard branches a few days later if stable.[/p][p]Once stability is in a good place, we'll be able to start moving onto larger tasks such as the dedicated mod tools - but it's still a bit too early to say when that might happen. We'll keep you updated as we move forward![/p][p][/p][h3]STEAM REVIEWS: YOUR FEEDBACK MATTERS[/h3][p]If you haven’t already, please consider leaving us a review on Steam. We’re very grateful for the feedback players have shared so far, and reviews do a lot to help the game’s visibility. They also help inform future patches and what the team focuses on next. If you’re enjoying Xenonauts 2, or just want to support the dev team, leaving a review would really help.[/p][p][/p][h3]Join the Xenonauts Community[/h3][p]Discord | Reddit | Forums[/p][p][/p][p][dynamiclink][/dynamiclink][/p]

[p]This update is only accessible by switching to our Experimental branches (instructions on how to do so here).[/p][p]Changes:[/p]

• [p]A number of players were upset that the 1.0 launch removed the ability to mod the .json game data templates, as these had been moved inside Unity asset bundles for performance reasons. The game now contains a .zip file called "all_templates.zip" in "Xenonauts2/Assets/Assets/" that contains all these templates, and modders can just unzip them to return to the previous setup (as the game will always look for a file on the file system before checking inside the asset bundles). [/p]
  • [p]Be aware that unzipping all these templates negates all of the performance increase that came from putting the files into asset bundles, so you should only unzip the files if you are actively working on a mod![/p]

[p]Bugfixes:[/p]

• [p]Fixed a crash that could occur when swapping between soldiers in the tactical inventory.[/p]
• [p]Fixed a crash that could occur when a file for a new language was added but not all data was present.[/p]
• [p]Fixed an issue that could cause the game to save over existing saves if you created a new campaign using the same name as an existing campaign.[/p]
• [p]Fixed the buttons on the Mod Manager screen all displaying the same text.[/p]
• [p]Fixed the Mod Manager "Developer Mode" checkbox not working.[/p]
• [p]Fixed the game permitting 7 Geoscape bases rather than 6.[/p]

"The year is 2009," opens the 1.0 launch trailer for Xenonauts 2, a sentence that tickles me greatly considering the game's alternate future vibes. It presents a vision of the world that differed greatly from my actual experience of worrying about swine flu and whether or not Yu-Gi-Oh! was cool any more. And yet that is the reality of the turn-based tactics game, which exits out of early access almost three years after its initial release.

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