Stormworks: Build and Rescue News

Dear Stormworkers,

This week is a minor update week! We are adding new communication channels between add-ons and mods so that they can communicate with each other.

This is a useful new extension to the modding API to allow add-on creators to communicate between different add-ons. This means you can have add-ons that can extend each other, or otherwise just react.



We have been using this new API ourselves and now the hospital ships will travel to some missions where they can be useful. This means that you will have a floating hospital en-route to mission locations to assist in career mode.



As well as this new extension, we have implemented some fixes and improvements. Please see the patch notes below for full details.



We continue working hard on the new Oil Industry Major Update! It is almost ready and we can't wait for release.



Much love
The Stormworks Developers



Patch Notes

v1.6.15

Feature - #8113 Cross script commands

This week's update features a new addon lua feature and 3 small fixes as we prepare for the release of the upcoming major update.
Cross script commands allow addon scripts to send commands to each other as if they were a player.
For this week's update we have also updated the default AI hospital boats to navigate towards emergency missions to provide closer hospital destinations for missions at sea.

Fix - #16497 #16886 #17848 Fix equipment not being dropped from characters respawning with the UI button before death
Fix - #16480 Removed non-functional clear axis button from gamepad controls
Fix - #16779 Buzzer sfx blending speed (volume near sfx start)

Addon Lua:
- Added server.command(message)
- Default ai now save their current paths
- Hospital boats navigate toward missions
- Hospital boats now wait for much longer at the end of their path

Dear Stormworkers & Roughnecks,

The Oil Drilling Update - our next major update, is due out on Thursday 16th March 2023 at 5pm UTC!

Drilling for oil is coming to Stormworks via a series of new components and systems to facilitate creating and operating rigs.

Oil drilling is very complex and there are a lot of nuances, and a variety of techniques, with differences between on-shore, off-shore, geology considerations, and generational changes. While Stormworks will simplify drilling, the principles remain, and our goal has been to encourage design with logistics and operation in mind. Lets talk about what that means:



Oil Deposits

Under the world of Stormworks there will be hundreds of oil deposits, of varying depth and size. Survey data for these deposits can be purchased from various oil sites.

The Well Head

Well heads will be a new component that form the starting point of a well. They can be established on any flat surface, above or below the ocean. They incorporate the drill head, and some plumbing, and act as the interface for the well.

Drilling Rods

Drill rods will be new 10m long physical rods that can be chained together to form longer rods. These rods can be fed into and recovered from a well.



Rod Handling

There will be various robotic parts for grabbing, handling, feeding, joining, separating, and driving rods. For example, you will need the rod threader to merge two rods together, and the driver is required to turn the rods for drilling.

Slurry

Slurry, or drilling mud, is required for drilling. Slurry must be pumped down the rods into the drill head to lubricate drilling and transport the cut stone and material away from the drill head. The slurry must be circulated and cleaned in mud scrubbers to remove the debris and keep the well drilling.

Refining

We are also adding some new parts to allow fractional distillation of oil into diesel and jet fuel!

We are really excited to launch this new update and look forward to sharing it in a few weeks. In the mean time we have next weeks minor update, and we continue work on finishing this update and many others!



We look forward to hearing your thoughts on this new update!

Much love
The Stormworks Developers

Dear Stormworkers,

Today we release the Physics Sensor Minor Update! This includes the new physics sensor, which is a new component giving composite logical output including positional and rotational information.



This data output is particularly useful for microcontroller designers who are interested in building their own gyros and other motion control systems, which should now be much easier and practical.



This component is in response to player requests on the issue tracker and we continue to enjoy hearing your thoughts and ideas and implementing them when possible!



As well as this new component feature, we have several useful fixes and improvements! Please see the patch notes below for full details.

Much love
The Stormworks Developers



Patch Notes

v1.6.14

Feature - Physics Sensor (#10065 #10119 #3793 #4465)

The physics sensor component combines functionality of several other sensors into a convenient single block.
The sensor outputs position, rotation, linear and angular speeds over 14 composite channels detailed on the component.

Fix - #16642 Wheel secondary physics issues for clients
Fix - #17831 Seafloor generation issue
Fix - #15856 No longer convert rescued survivors to static NPCs, instead update their display name to 'Rescued'
Fix - #13931 Ai boats/aircraft now track damage and despawn after 2 mins if above threshold
Fix - #13936 Return value of getZones not including Zone parent vehicle data
Fix - #14017 Added editor arrows for wings
Fix - #14835 Fixed teleporting under the map through very tall terrain
Fix - #13078 Rotor physics mirroring issues
Fix - #14848 Metal ore foundry mesh issues
Fix - #14851 Gold foundry mesh issues

Addon Lua:
- Added setCharacterTooltip and setCreatureTooltip for renaming non-player Characters and Animals

Dear Stormworkers,

It is announcement week! Next week is minor update update week, and next week we will be releasing the recently announced physics sensor, as well as other fixes and improvements.

A new major update is on the way! We were hoping to announce this week, but as always, we are very cautious to announce anything until it is ready, and there are some more improvements that we want to get finished.



Our Update Announcement Strategy

Big updates are exciting, and when you are working new features, it is very easy for developers to get carried away with enthusiasm. We are no exception, and it is thrilling to see things come together and think about the new possibilities that this new work unlocks! We would love to share every step with players, but this can result in an overall negative player experience, as players would see the many ideas that don't work out, get cancelled, or de-prioritized. We are also big believers in doing rather than talking, and the focus has always been about the product and real value, rather than words or promises.

So, our strategy is to get new features to a stage where we are happy, then share the news to players with the confidence that we can deliver.



Studio Plans and Development Strategy

Stormworks released on Early Access on 28th Feb 2018, almost 5 years ago! And we had the invite-only beta 6 months prior. For years we released updates every week, and now every 2 weeks. There have been dozen of major updates and even two DLCs. Players have amassed over 6000 years of playtime.

We are very fortunate that Stormworks is a popular game, and making updates for players and seeing their reactions is very rewarding. This is something that must continue and we want to do our best to serve our players as best we can.

The challenge we are increasingly facing is that after 2 years of pre-release development and 5 years of servicing, the code becomes more and more fatigued. The Stormworks source code excluding third party libraries and comments is over 15 million characters. On top of this, we have made all the easy updates, and a lot of the not-so-easy ones. Stuff that should be easy turns out to be very complex to integrate with those 15m characters of existing source code. What is left tends to be difficult to deliver.

Our current strategy is to just get on with it and do the jobs, no matter how difficult. Obviously, this is a short term strategy and in the long term, there are better ways to serve our players.

So, our long term strategy is a new game and we have some very ambitious plans. Moving forward is important, so the new game won't be Stormworks 2, but it will be design and vehicle building game, taking lessons from Stormworks and from what our players have told us. We are discussing a lot about player authorship, modding, gameplay and purpose, and a lot of things never done before in a game.

Stormworks updates will continue, and we will work on our new game in parallel.

We look forward to hearing your thoughts and feedback! Catch you next week for the minor update.

Much love
The Stormworks Developers

Dear Stormworkers,

This week is update week and we have added 24 new occupation themed outfit items for your characters!

These new outfits can be accessed and tried out via the wardrobe in game. These new outfits are based on workplace attire and include clothing from surgeon and nurse uniforms to park rangers and fishermen.



This update also includes several important fixes and improvements. Please see the patch notes below for full details.

We have a big announcement to make next week about a new update so please be sure to come back for that!



We look forward to your thoughts and feedback on this new update!

Much love
The Stormworks Developers



Patch Notes

v1.6.13

Feature - 24 New Occupation Themed Outfit Items

Rework - Steam Train Wheels balance and fixes (#16227 #14723 #14697 #16960)
Rework - Updated and improved the default cargo containers (#9615 #10724)
Rework - #7841 Updated the Helicopter preset vehicle and added a Default Container preset
Fix - #5126 #4135 Fixed various hangar door sounds, indoor zones and airstrip lights
Fix - #12983 Police station door and other physics fixed
Fix - #15564 Fixed thin tile physics issue
Fix - #16221 Prevented memory leak caused by LODS when there are no tile sin LOD range
Fix - #14595 Rope length output node now updates dynamically
Fix - #15169 Sync resource storage data on game join
Fix - #16146 SpawnVehicleRope using the wrong data for loaded vehicles
Fix - #16288 Respawn issues when respawning under delayed damage
Fix - #16404 Ski mirroring issues
Fix - #16184 Coal hopper network events for sub-bodies

Added new sound effects for the Wildcat and [REDACTED]

Addon Lua:
- #16090 setVehiclePosSafe behavior reworked to avoid unreliable internal data
- #3854 Added setAudioMood which allows setting the audio mood to a higher level for a peer which naturally decreases over time
Added setAudioMood calls to the default missions script
- #15918 Add support for map label type 0 to prevent crash