Per Aspera News

As your colony grows and your reach expands, you'll discover looming menances and mysterious combatants. You'll need to defend your colonists by researching military tech and building an army of assault drones. In this blog and in the video below, we reveal a quick overview of the combat in Per Aspera!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3sQl2I7_vw

Enemy assault drone forces beginning to congregate at two drone hives!

Once you uncover an enemy base, you'll need to pause your terraforming efforts and redirect your energy towards managing this new threat. These forces may seem puny to begin with, but without any defenses of your own, they'll make short work of your base. To avoid watching your colonists' and base's demise, you can begin researching a new branch in the technology tree: Military.

The beginning of the Military technology tree.

The Military technology tree has several different paths and upgrades available for you to prioritize. You can focus on increasing your production by prioritizing research into more efficient assault drone factories. You can build better defensives by researching improved drone hives or building better shields for your assault drones. You can also increase your overall drone capacity or augment your assault drones' weapons and speed.

A group of one hundred assault drones stationed in their drone hive, vigilantly protecting our colony.

Whichever route you decide, you'll need to get started by building at least two crucial buildings. First, you'll need to build an assault drone factory to produce your units. Next, you'll need to construct a hive. The drone hives serve two purposes: they house your assault drones and also serve as a defensive bastion for your surrounding buildings.

Our combined forces handily crushing the enemy drones and destroying their solar farms.

After you've finished manufacturing your assault drones, you're nearly ready to begin the attack. Gather together your forces and decide on a strategy. Will you focus on crushing the enemy's power sources or prioritize nullifying their assault drones? Do you prefer to play defensively or love sabotaging the enemy's production with quick, decisive skirmishes?

The combat lens demonstrating where our force's current targets are and whether there are any approaching enemy drones.

The combat lens is key to prioritizing and identifying threats. Whether you're staging your forces before an attack or making tough decisions during the heat of the battle, you'll want to frequently consult this lens. Using the combat lens can help you quickly establish where your forces are stationed or where they're currently en route to. The combat lens can also help you locate your enemy's forces and even see if they're on the move.

Slowly removing all traces of the enemy.

Once the enemy's drone forces have been forcibly deactivated, you may be tempted to leave. That would be a mistake, however -- you'd find that the enemy base will begin to repair and rebuild the damage done. It's important to clear out the rest of the base whenever possible to prevent them from building back up. Once the enemy has been completely eradicated, you'll be able to move your own colony in and claim those precious resources as your own!

[h2]Per Aspera releases in TWO days![/h2]

It feels unreal to type this... but Per Aspera releases this Thursday! The game will be available Dec. 3rd at 9am PST sharp and will cost $29.99 USD. We're excited to share this game with all of you and watch how you terraform Mars. Thank you for your support and see you on Thursday. 🤩



https://store.steampowered.com/app/803050/Per_Aspera/

It's that oh so wonderful time of the year and Raw Fury is feeling particularly festive. For Rawcember 2020 we've got tons and tons of hotness for you including game announcements, game launches and deals on all your future favourite games! Keep your eyes on the Raw Fury social accounts for updates but here's a few things to kick it off!


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It's the last day of the Autumn sale so be quick!

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The quest to terraform Mars for human habitation will be complex and difficult. Remember that this isn’t the first time this mission has been attempted! As you explore Mars, you’ll discover countless failed attempts scattered throughout the surface of the Red Planet. We’ve divided the terraforming process into five distinct stages, each with their own unique challenges, innovative projects, and rewards:

1. Sublimating the dry ice poles
   
2. Creating an atmosphere
   
3. Ecopoiesis
   
4. Green Mars
   
5. Breathable Atmosphere
   

Once you establish your base and welcome your first colonists to their new home, you’ll need to begin the first stage of the terraforming process: melting the poles. Why is that the beginning of your journey to terraform a new home? Mars’s ice poles contain an immense amount of CO₂. Releasing these gases are necessary to warm the climate: they’ll trap heat and trigger a runaway greenhouse effect!

A ring of greenhouse gas factories and biodomes working to terraform Mars!

Once the poles are sublimated, the next step is to create an atmosphere that increases pressure and aids rising temperatures. There will be many different ways to accomplish this: one example is by building greenhouse gas factories that free the CO₂ trapped in Mars’s regolith.

J.M Graham’s mountain model for ecosynthesis on Mars.

The next three stages involve introducing oxygen into the environment and eventually balancing the planet’s overall CO₂ and O₂ levels. “Planetary Ecosynthesis as Ecological Succession.” by J.M Graham explains these stages elegantly by comparing ecosynthesis to a mountain descent. “The present climate of Mars can be compared to a very high mountain on Earth, one higher than any real mountain that exists in fact. The prebiotic stage of ecosynthesis employs planetary engineering techniques to bring the climate of Mars at some latitudes into the range of that in the terrestrial Dry Valleys of Antarctica. At that point the introduction of the first microbial ecosystems can begin. Continued modification of the planetary climate will permit the introduction of a sequence of ecosystems from tundra through boreal forests to temperate ecosystems.”

An aquadome slowly propagating bioengineered cyanobacteria over time into an ocean.

In other words, once Mars’s climate becomes similar to an Earth polar desert, we can begin to introduce extremophile life forms. These microbial ecosystems will begin to slowly convert CO₂ into much needed oxygen. Present-day scientists are currently experimenting to see whether bioengineered extremophiles can survive on (and even modify!) Mars’s harsh environment. By creating a simulated engineered Martian environment, scientists tested five genera of cyanobacteria and three eubacterial strains. Based on preliminary results, some specific extremophiles can survive! You can read more in this absolutely fascinating paper: “Extremophiles for ecopoiesis: desirable traits for and survivability of pioneer Martian organisms” by Thomas, Boling, Boston, Campbell, McSpadden, McWilliams, and Todd.

An airship full of colonists travelling to a Martian research outpost over a blue lake!

By building aquadomes and biodomes in Per Aspera, you’ll begin to spawn cyanobacteria, lichens, and green algae across Mars. Eventually as you progress further down the proverbial mountain, continue to research innovative biotech, and get closer to fulfilling the dream of a habitable Mars, your planet will be able to support more advanced lifeforms. Your biodomes and aquadomes will then begin to introduce genetically modified plants and eventually even animals!

This is fine.

In the final stages of terraforming, it will be incredibly important to control your levels of oxygen, limit your CO₂ to 5% or lower, and to introduce nitrogen into your atmosphere. All of these carefully combined will allow humans and animals to naturally breathe on Mars sans any gear! While simple in theory, this balance will be tricky to achieve. If you allow your oxygen levels to surpass 30%, you may personally discover that high levels of oxygen are incredibly flammable. Work quickly to get it under control or run the risk of watching your colony burn down.

Another important part of this stage is reducing radiation. Once your space elevator is complete, you’ll be able to launch a special project designed to tackle this problem: the magnetic dipole shield. Launching this large dipole in L1 (between Mars and the sun) leaves Mars in a safe magnetotail and stops the stripping of the atmosphere. You can learn more in the talk “A Future Mars Environment for Science and Exploration” which begins at the 1 hour and 36 minute mark.



https://store.steampowered.com/app/803050/Per_Aspera/

Meet the daring and ambitious Nian Zhen voiced by the amazing Yong Yea! Yong Yea is a prolific actor who you may know from Warframe: Proteus, Rune II, and many other titles. Yong Yea plays the businessman Nian Zhen.



One of the richest men in the world, Nian is beloved and has many fans. He captivates hearts and minds with his innovative business practices and generous philanthropy. Nian gave away a large portion of his wealth in order to provide nutrition and health assistance to those suffering from the great famine back on Earth.

“I am willing to earn your trust, but it will be entirely up to you whether we become allies.” -Nian Zhen

Nian founded his first company in Taipei at only twenty-three years old with a couple of dollars in startup capital and a mere three workers. His first company provided bigger tech companies with plastic molding parts. Eventually, he opened his first 3D printing factory in Singapore and within a span of just twelve years became the main provider of 3D printing components for aerospace, military, and consumer product industries.

“All conquests have two sides. And I hope you’ll realize that we’re on the same side.” -Nian Zhen

In addition to his businesses and philanthropy, Nian leads the seven-person Operational Committee of The Eastern Coalition. TEC is composed of seven east asian countries. Nian’s personal motto is, “Taking initiative is much more effective than words.” With his huge amount of determination and courage, Nian will never stop implementing his ideas until he succeeds.



https://store.steampowered.com/app/803050/Per_Aspera/

A newly built spaceport blasting off.

Once you get your base’s foundation established on Mars, your first order of business will be to begin interplanetary travel by building a spaceport! Once your spaceport is complete, you’ll no longer be restricted to building on the Martian ground… you’ll unlock the Orbital View! This view will allow AMI to undertake special space projects - the first special project begins the migration process and concludes with welcoming your first colonists. As your colony grows and your research uncovers new discoveries, new special projects will become available!

A few of the different projects in the orbital view!

Your number of operational spaceports determines how many projects you can work on at once. Some projects are ongoing -- for example, if you have the space for them, you can continue to welcome new colonists to Mars indefinitely by continuing the migration project. Other projects are limited to a single time such as repairing a damaged satellite... or crashing Deimos into Mars. Some things you can only do once; there's only one Deimos after all!

Building a new foothold by launching an additional landing site.

When you begin the game, you’ll have a single landing site and a small amount of materials to get your base started. You’ll begin in the Syrtis Major Planum and be restricted to Sector 4. But from humble beginnings come great things: eventually your colony will stretch across the entire planet and become a true ecumenopolis. In order to grow your colony, you’ll use special projects to expand AMI’s operational reach. By launching satellites, new sectors are unlocked and available for AMI to explore and build into. You can slowly snake along the planet and expand your colony into these new sectors… or you can launch a new foothold entirely by building an additional landing site!

Melting the poles to create an ocean... with nukes!

While these are the basic special projects, eventually you’ll be able to implement bleeding edge scientific advancements. Remember that your main directive is to terraform Mars; to transform it into a verdant paradise deserving of humanity’s second home. In order to accomplish that unbelievable feat, you may be tempted to resort to extreme measures that have never been seriously attempted before: like nuking the poles to create oceans, crashing Deimos into the surface of Mars, or building an orbital mirror array via a space elevator. You can also try less extreme options such as importing excess greenhouse gases from Earth or building a fleet of cargo ships to bring your colony ice from Europa or nitrogen from Titan.

[h2]Reddit AMA & Campaign Streams[/h2]

Next Monday we'll be hosting an AMA on Reddit's /r/pcgaming subreddit! Join us November 23rd at 12pm ET to ask any and everything you've wanted to know about the game and to learn more before the big day!

We've begun sending out keys to our favorite streamers. They'll be exploring Mars and showing off the first five hours of our campaign mode! Here's a couple of the ones we've enjoyed so far:

• shenryyr's stream
• SplattercatGaming's stream
• Charlie Pryor's first look at Per Aspera

https://store.steampowered.com/app/803050/Per_Aspera/