Approaching Infinity News

It's finally here, the crafting beta starts today!



https://youtu.be/ynff1lkY7DY

Major Changes:

• There are fewer parts, but each one is special ;)
  
• There are more recipes, allowing you to specialize
  
• You will see exactly what you're going to build
• before* you build it
  
• You can add extra parts or data to get a crafting level boost!
  
• Some recipes require essences (harvested from creatures and rare plants)
  
• There is plenty of built-in help!
  
• You can buy schematics and essences at stations
  

Crafting:


Salvage:


Essence Extraction:




The "Mods" system. This is where you will be able to upgrade the stats of existing gear, or change the damage type of your away team guns. Cool stuff. But I need another week to get it running, and this way you can test what I've done so far while I get mods together. It's another level of multi-tasking for me.




Re-writing the auto-explore!

• I really really fixed that monster image not found issue
  
• I discovered that pacified carnivorous plants are walking around! (fixed)
  
• I made DNA/essence drops from stationary creature not appear on their own tile 😉
  
• I fixed an issue where knowledge of alien ships wasn't being saved.
  
• I Fixed "art with no window" bug.
  

• I gave the extractor melee weapon its own sound.
  
• Clearcutting will not damage plants that are pacified by the naturalist
  
• I'm allowing the grappler to work on aquatic creatures 😄 (Fishing season!)
  
• Aquatic-only creatures will take damage if they are not in water.
  
• I made tooltip backgrounds fully opaque.
  
• Dead Vordalene now have a 50% chance to spawn some basic crafting parts. I hate to make them targets but it makes sense to me...
  
• Virologist skill is now twice as strong.
  
• I made diseases less prevalent in easy-difficulty games, and more in hard and insane.
  
• Some essences (mass, luster, shock) now spawn in space in appropriate locations.
  
• I created the salvage lab device which will give back more parts when salvaging items.
  

All of the about should be available for all players, version 1.9a6.


(Crafting is still disabled. It even says so on the title screen, in red.)

But even if you can't play it, check out these work-in-progress shots:

The new crafting screen, with a list of recipes, the ingredients that go into that recipe, a tooltip explanation of an ingredient, and a preview of the exact item you will craft. You can even choose among 3 versions, and use extra parts and data to increase the level of the item you'll make:

The salvage screen, with all available equipment, icons displaying whether or not you'll learn a new recipe and also how much your crafting level will increase, and the center column displaying exactly how much of each ingredient you'll obtain by salvaging.

There are still 2 more crafting-related screens that need to be made: "mods" and "extract". I'd like to release a crafting beta next Friday, but we'll see how it goes. I still feel good about completing this cycle by the end of the month.

And here is the art for the new "consumables" you'll be able to make and use:





Dr. Incompetent has been doing beginner guides for games for a few years now, and (unknown to me) during the space exploration fest, he started one for Approaching Infinity.

Today I was looking for the link (here it is), but what I found was even better: a video review, released just today!
https://youtu.be/Egqb_c62jD8?si=uSwUm0az3pkfAQgj

It really makes me feel like all my hard work is paying off. Take a look, leave a comment, maybe subscribe? He's got a very relaxing voice ;)

Somebody got killed by an image not found. In fact, that thing has taken several captains down, both in space and on planets. Then I found out that tooltips didn't work in the officers screen anymore.

Even though I'm in the middle of this crafting project, I can't stand to see these kinds of issues. So I released a hotfix. You'll notice a few cosmetic changes, and also get to see some (but not all) of the new crafting work.



The science skill "Ship's Surgeon" hasn't had a valid effect since 1.9 began, I just never told you :O
So it has been replaced with "Naturalist" (thanks to members of the Discord helping me to flesh out this idea!)

This new skill is all about being at peace with nature (yes, seriously)
"Some creatures become non-hostile. level 1: plants and prey animals. Level 2: insect, aquatic, and silicon life-forms. Level 3: predators, slimes, and apex creatures. If you move into their space, you examine them for DNA (25%/level) and essences (10%/level)."

"What are essences?" you may ask. Well, let's talk about...



As you may know, the current project is a complete reworking of the crafting system. You probably don't know many details. Let's fix that!

There are now only 14 crafting parts instead of 25. Each one is more unique, and 5 of them are actually naturally-occurring things you can collect from various environments.




Crafting recipes can now have as few as 2 ingredients for really simple things, all the way up to 11 for crazy-high-tech things like the Singularity Launcher or a quantum shield (though the most anything has at this point is 9).

This solves a long-time problem the game's crafting system had: a knife was just as difficult to build as a warp drive. Not anymore!

Some of the more esoteric items will also require "essences": distillations of natural qualities like heat, speed, and reason. These can come from rare plants, monsters, and even planet surfaces. They're spawning now, so you can start collecting them for later. There's even a new melee weapon that guarantees you extract essences from plants and creatures.

I just built my first weapon with the new crafting system yesterday. Here's how it looks:






The Steam Exploration Fest has been really great for Approaching Infinity, lots of new players, Discord members, and more positive reviews. In fact, it's the 4th largest period of wishlist additions ever. THANKS!

But the sale is ending today. If you're on the fence, this is your best chance to get the game at a big discount. But hey, I've been doing this for a loooong time and I don't plan stop. Approaching Infinity will be here when you're ready ;)

These last 4 years of Steam Early Access have been quite a journey, and the end of this 12-year project is in sight! Full release is planned for August 2025 (next year), and you can see all the major steps that need to take place right here in the Starmap:

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/551620/view/3714965613418825879


I just finished the complete user interface overhaul, 9 months of grueling work bringing the game up to modern user-friendly standards. And the feedback from that monumental undertaking has been 100% positive. I'm glad I did it. Here's the trailer:

https://youtu.be/-dVKi-Alj5U?si=eGwYw2QezhJVkGaE

Next stop is reworking the crafting system from the bottom up, and that has already begun. You can follow development and contribute feedback and ideas on our discord:
https://discord.gg/mWymeRz37n

I've commissioned 2 artists to make new promotional art for Approaching Infinity. The first one is done, and you can now see the results. The 2nd is Kenny Dalman, the artist who created the alien portraits. I've seen some progress shots, they're great!


At the last minute, Kenny sent me a preview:






The UI Skin DLC has been updated to work with the new UI!






Crafting has been temporarily disabled because that's the next system that's being rewritten. You'll have freedom to create what you want, when you need it. As long as you have the parts...

It's underway right now, and my plan is to finish it by the end of September. You can follow development on our discord. and find out things like:

• There will only be 14 crafting parts
  
• Each one will be more unique and have a description and specific uses
  
• 5 of them will be naturally occurring
  
• Rarity is "baked in" to the new system
  
• A warp drive will be much harder to build than a knife (finally!)
  
• I'm introducing a "modding" system for upgrading existing gear
  
• The crafting lab is going away
  
• I've already replaced the first Tentaculon quest with something else...
  
• You'll be able to craft consumables like medkits, rad remover, and squik poison!
  

To see the rest of the steps to reached the planned August 2025 release, see the Starmap:
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/551620/view/3714965613418825879



If you love the game, and you've appreciated these last 4 years of updates, please consider writing a Steam review today. Every single one counts. Thanks!