Hi All,
This version was all about completing the final deliverables for the 1.0 release. We are so close now. We have had a ton of great input over the last 14 months in Early Access, and we really appreciate you taking this journey with us!
Major additions:
- Professional Voice Acting.
- Localization to French, German, and Russian.
- VR motion controller support for VIVE and OCULUS
Here we go.
Professional Voice Acting:
Hiring professional voice talent was new to us, but in the end we think that we found the perfect voices for each character. In fact, originally we were not going to professionally voice Mac, Skid or the Computer but in the end the quality of the main cast's voice acting was so high that we decided to voice everything because the difference between the professional voice acting and the text to speech was just too glaring.
We now have over 2 HOURS of spoken dialogue in the game between Elsa, Carl, Jamison, Mac, Skid and Janeframe (the Computer) It was surprising how much voice work is actually in the game, over 18000 words.
We originally tried to have the voice work done locally, but it was too short notice for the local studios, so we decided to try to to do it ourselves. We put together detailed character packages and posted on a couple big voice acting sites (Voice123 and CastingCallClub) and what do you know, we got over 300 auditions over the course of a week. We narrowed and narrowed and finally both Richard and I independently came to the exact same picks for the voices (so no arguing there, phew)
After that we interviewed each actor over Skype and answered questions, we finally had a group table read using a 5 way Skype call. It was really incredible to hear the voices of our characters come alive after 8 years of developing them.
Once the table read was done, recording started individually by each voice actor, and they delivered audio files weekly for about a month. And now we have it all compiled together and balanced and in game, ready for you to hear. We hope you love the voices as much as we do.
Note: The old text to speech voices are still in there and are individually selectable via the sound menu for nostalgia sake.
Localization to French, German, and Russian:
This version was also about getting the localization system ready for public consumption. We were contacted by some fans of SPAZ 2 and decided to Localize French, German, and Russian. French and German because they are fairly large sections of our European player base, and Russian was picked because of its large player base and for having an entirely different alphabet from Germanic languages.
Having fans translate the game was a great choice we think. They really understood the feel of the SPAZ universe and sometimes even suggested inside jokes from their own languages to replace our own. All in all it was a great experience and the translators were super dedicated. They translated over 30,000 words type dedicated.
There may be some translation issues or missed spots so please report any mistakes or omissions. Its a lot of words, and things will have been missed/mislabeled. The translators will want to fix them and we want them fixed! :)
Once the localization has settled, we will be releasing custom localization XML files. This will allow player localization to any language. The process we went through with the translators should have knocked off most of the translation rough edges. Long term, we would like to hook up player translations to Steam Workshop, though that probably wouldn't be before 1.0.
For official translations we are going to see how the current translations do sales wise before branching out further. Managing an official translation takes considerable time and a non trivial amount of funds. So for example if the translated versions suddenly explode in sales, it makes doing other languages more attractive. This is all new to us, so we need to see. In any case we will support custom translation by players, so if there is an interest in a particular language, a translation will always be possible.
VR motion controller support:
As a final step to our VR support, we have added motion controls to SPAZ 2 VR. Richard has prepared a video linked here to explain it a bit. Even if you don't have VR, you may be able to get a bit of a sense of how SPAZ 2 feels in VR.
https://youtu.be/r8b5cgoaL9M
One motion controller is for aiming and ship functions like boosting shields, reloading, and camera controls. The other controller is for movement, switching weapons, and switching ships. It was quite a challenge to get all the SPAZ 2 functions on the few controller buttons, but we managed it by using the grip button as a sort of “shift key.”
Gameplay wise, shooting is definitely my favorite on the motion controls. Lazing targets is just cool. Flight wise there are three modes. Controller relative (point where you want the ship to go), Helmet relative (forward means go toward where you are looking), or Ship relative (pressing left turns you left) Find a mode that is most comfortable to you. Note: VR also allows you to use a regular XInput style controller instead of the motion controls. This behaves the same as on the flat screen.
This version will bring our VR support to completion aside from bugs. Please please give it a try if you can and let us know if you have problems (especially with the motion controls)
Additional Fixes/Changes:
- Fixed issue where sometimes the camera could get caught flickering when toggle camera was selected right before pause.
- Made AI captains attack Bandit Hives longer so they try to destroy them more vs just raiding them for supplies.
- Fixed case where captains would raid bandit hives with bounties instead of trying to destroy them.
- Made local governors more likely to clear bandit hives from their territory.
- AI captains more likely to complete Starbase building tasks where they have to pay a portion of the cost themselves.
- Made the blocked port checker a little more forgiving to allow fitting parts in spots that look like they should allow parts to fit.
- Fixed bug where sniper cannons and mass drivers would cause a hitch in the enemy ship's movement when they hit.
- Fixed exploit where you could disband a starbase you own to get salavge access to the store inventory which you do not actually own.
- Fixed Starbases not dropping their Stockpile contents when disbanded.
- Fixed mouse over resource values disagreeing with Starmap values (Ceil/Round Conflict)
- Fixed Join faction button round off error, reporting relations too low when it is possible to join.
- Fixed issue where bombs on strike craft would impact the player ship when starting combat.
- Added Starmap Explored button to the Sandbox level setup options. This makes the starmap fully explored on start.
- Accessing Cheat menu easier for a variety of keyboards: (Left Alt or Right Alt or AltGr) + (F7 or 0)
- Starbase bounties are now checked vs the bounty taker's relation with the owner. So friends will no longer attack your bases.
- Bounty takers will now take into consideration their relations with the faction leader before taking on a bounty to destroy a starbase (So player friends won't attack the bases in the Player faction, even if the player does not own that base)
- Fixed issue where you could contextual target parts in the inventory level, causing Battle Wagon to attack them.
- Fixed issue where you could lock onto an ally outside of battlewagon mode, then switch to battlewagon mode and your ship would automatically fire at your ally.
- Fixed fighter docking issues on high speed motherships where they couldn't catch up.
- Increased Rez drop from zombie Starbases from a flat 200 to 400-1000 based on the size of the base.
- Fixed case where you could mark a part for hot swapping in the inventory level then attach it to your ship using the tractor instead, leaving the part in a weird state.
- Starbase threat level now properly updates when you level up.
- Starbase threat updates when transferred to a new owner to reflect their tech level
- Fixed knocked off enemy parts attached to player ship not consuming any capacitor power. In fact, it was stealing the power from the old ship.
- When the player rams a ship, the ship being rammed now takes it as a hostile act. Especially so if they are an ally and there are not hostile ships left in the region. Allies now react to being rammed to death for free parts after battles conclude.
- Fixed case where after player lost a battle and player continued instead of loading that the winning ships did not recover their strike craft and their health was not updated to the proper post battle health.
- Taught Motherships not to avoid Strike Craft and since they will rarely collide due to being at different Y heights. (Also taught strike craft not to avoid motherships)
- New AI flight system that attempts to de-clump the ships and keep ships at optimal range with each other. Also smooths out their decision making so they stick with ideas longer and don't criss cross each other so much while re evaluating.
- New weapon analyzer that weights damage potential of all equipped weapons and decides the best combat range based on that.
- AI ships better at deciding when to boost engines.
- When clicking “Fight” on a station, you need to click the button a second time within 3 seconds to prevent accidental fights.
- On Easy and Normal difficulties the max stars for AI strike craft are 4 for larges, and 5 for mediums and smalls. Hard and Insane unchanged.
- Fix for case where ship parts could not reattach sometimes when they were knocked by enemy captains.
- Fixed issue where zombie strike craft spawned from eggs were much higher in Y than regular strike craft.
Going Forward:
With the addition of voice acting, localization, and the completion of VR, our Early Access goals are now complete. We still have a bit of tuning and bug fixing to do, but the codebase is mostly on lockdown now in preparation for 1.0. Even seemingly simple changes sometimes cause nasty bugs, so we have to let the build settle before release.
Once 1.0 releases, we will be spending time on a Mac and Linux port right away. Then we plan to re-open the code base in response to the new player input that “hopefully” floods in.
It has been a really long road for SPAZ 2 (5 years as of September 1) but we are thrilled with the results and the support you all have given us!
Andrew (Blorf) and Richard (Narlak)
