Hello guys!
Finally, after many months of wait, the version 0.1 of H2o is up!!
First of all I have to tell you that a discount will come with this update (40% off) but 9 hours after the release because I messed up between Paris Time and US Pacific Time... So if you want to buy the game, you can wait for the discount.
That said, if you want to support H2o a bit more, you can buy it now.
You are all welcome anyway!
As I said in the previous announcement, many things have changed but not necessary "visible" things. I will not repeat myself too much here but I wanted to inform you about what is better and what might be problematic with this version.
Among the most important changes: the client/server communication code has been totally remade so that the server can have full control over the clients.
The primary objective of this modification is to put an end to the cheaters attacks.
Not all of them will be stopped but the most harmful cheats we have seen before will not be possible to reproduce. (eg. kill somebody by the press of a button, give yourself items, etc.)
As I said, many other things have changed but this is far the most tremendous modification of this update. But even if it can sound like a good thing (and it is), there are also downsides, and that's what I want to point out here.
To give you an idea, the client was controlling most of its own behavior in the previous version. Such as moving, dealing damages, interacting with objects, firing a gun, etc.
I guess you can imagine how this can be dangerous (because it is known that the client should never be trusted), but also, with this system, the lags had way less impact on the player's experience, it was less visible even if it was there.
Now, the Server is behind (almost) every actions of the clients, and gives its approval before letting the client do something. Some behaviors like the movement calculation are simulated on the client side and corrected by the server if the simulation went wrong (if the player went too fast or if he crossed a wall). So, if the communication between the client and the server takes too much time, the game will be less reactive for the player.
You will say that it's the definition of the "lag".
And you would be right, but that's a normal issue if I may say so.
The real problem we have now (at least, it freaks me out) is that the building system of H2o uses way too much of the CPU when the server becomes crowded with players constructions.
What could happen basically would be to have a server that reaches the limits of the CPU: the frame rate of the server would drop and this would prevent the server from sending enough packets through the network to maintain a good ping. And if this happens, no matter the speed of your connection, your client will lag as hell.
Sorry for this technical speech, but all that to explain that if this problem comes up too quickly, we will probably be forced to wipe the servers more often to maintain a playable experience on the official servers, at least up to we build up a solution to the CPU over-consuming building system.
We already have possible fixes for that, but we need a bit of time to implement it the best way.
Well, enough of downsides!
I'm pretty convinced that once this is solved the game will finally be Stable. And we cannot get around this, so.. better focus on this last big issue ASAP and jump onto the interesting stuff after that.
Here is the list of the notable modifications that come with the version 0.10.00!
IMPROVEMENTS:
- The client/server communication has been totally remade. Following the authoritative server logic.
- The game is compatible with Linux, server and client (the server only support x64 architectures).
- The user interface has been fully remade.
- Small visual improvement.
- The UI will now scale accordingly to the screen resolution (even to 4K).
- The jetski and the hovercraft have now Headlights. With 3 modes Auto/On/Off.
- The sea plane is equipped with machine guns.
- Opening the map doesn't lock the controls anymore, when the player moves with the map opened, the map will fade out to become barely visible, the opacity comes back when the player stops moving.
- The crafting menu shows how many items you are crafting and you can directly see if you can craft something without mouseover the item.
- A "P" icon shows if your vehicle is currently parked in a shipyard or not.
- Some improvements regarding the vegetation around the map, but still a work in progress. See the known issues for more details.
- It is now possible to zoom in with the turrets by holding the aiming button.
- Automatic reload for turrets.
- The console has a history: you can press up or down to retrieve your last commands.
- A message has been added when a player tries to destroy his territory center, informing the player that destroying it will destroy his whole base.
- The in game voice chat has been fully remade and improved.
- The third person camera of the vehicles collide with the environment and the players constructions. To prevent the raiders from inspecting a base by looking through the walls before attacking.
- A black reflection cube has been added to the shipyards in order to hide the reflection of the vehicles and ships parked inside it. (the content of shipyards is still visible from below though).
- The sight of the sniper rifle oscillates slightly so it is more difficult to use. Possibility to hold his breath by holding the sprint button, consuming his stamina quickly.
- Small villages in ruin have been added around the map in shallow areas, these villages contain much more looting crates than anywhere else.
- The equipment of a dead player (jacket, helmet, etc) will now appear in his loot so the other players can take it.
- An announce command has been added, used like the chat command by an admin. It will display the message just above the middle of the screen (in big, red, flashy characters) in addition to the chat message.
- The fishing process is synchronized with the other players.
- Automatic server message. This can be defined in the announcement.cfg file, in the server folder.
- The production offices (shipyards and turret supports) now take account of the items that will be consumed in the player's current crafting list in the calculation of the amount of items that are required to start a production.
- It is now possible to rotate the camera around an aircraft by holding the aiming button in third-person view.
- Footstep sounds have been added when walking on shallow water.
- The dry shot sound when trying to fire an empty weapon is now synchronized with the other players. (And it is now played only once, not repeating if the player holds the fire button)
- Unity engine has been updated from version 5.4.3 to 5.6.
- The steam SDK used in the game has been updated from v1.34 to v1.39.
- Many other little things that are too numerous to be listed here.
CHANGES:
- FIXED: Starting the production of a vehicle or a turret only consumed 6 of the 9 different items required to craft it.
- FIXED: Entering a vehicle when the player stands aboard a ship doesn't make the vehicle uncontrollable anymore.
- FIXED: The vehicles that have just been created appear sometimes frozen and cannot be moved. (still some cases of this bug, but it should happen less than before)
- FIXED: The vehicles were sometimes starting with a little movement forth.
- FIXED: When a player entered or left a vehicle. Some kind of annoying "teleportation" was happening during less than a second. Now the vehicle smoothly keeps its velocity when the driver jump off the craft, with no teleportation effect.
- FIXED: When a player was trying to start the production of a vehicle or a turret, if the production was aborted by the system because he had finally not enough resources or because of an obstacle in the production yard, the resources of the player were consumed for nothing. (even if it wasn't enough to start the production).
- FIXED: Sometimes when a player leaves a turret or jetski an error occurs, and the body of the player remains in the turret or the vehicle, for the other clients, but not for the player himself. this means that he can be somewhere else. (cf. when you see a player swimming above a jetski)
- FIXED: Repairing a oil barrel now stops the flames if it was on fire.
- FIXED: It was possible to swap the fuel contained in a oil barrel with another item, so that the item was placed in the barrel. Anyway the wrong object in the oil barrel was deleted once the barrel was closed.
- BALANCE: The percentage of apparition of the resources has been increased by 100% (twice more resources spots will repop every 40 minutes).
- BALANCE: The opacity of the water (outside and under water) has been slightly reduced.
- BALANCE: The movement speed has been reduced when walking in shallow water.
- BALANCE: The jumping range has been modified to exceed less the movement speed of the player when he triggered the jump.
KNOWN ISSUES:
(To be fixed in upcoming patches)
- The Building system consumes way too much CPU when the server get full of player constructions. (1st priority)
- The helping text when placing structures (telling if you are inside of your territory or too close to another one) has gone missing.
- The underwater vision improvement granted by the diving mask is currently broken.
- The map is bad sized in lower resolution that the screen maximum resolution.
- Some of the new trees don't have any colliders.
- The icons on the map are badly oriented, but at least the upper side of the map is the north x).
- The position of the other clan members and territories is still half functional.
- The selected server in the list (Play menu) isn't highlighted.
- The ping displayed in the server list isn't accurate (a new master server system will come shortly).
A new Trello page has been created to sort bugs: Trello You can leave comments there if you wish to help.
Please keep in mind that we never tested this version of the game during a long time with many players connected, some issues might show up and we will do all we can to fixe every blocking error as fast as we can.
We will update the game at the end of each month form now, without considering hotfixes.
Thanks again to my well known moderation team and to Metos and Crysis who actively and happily helped me to develop H2o during the past two months. This update wouldn't be what it is now without them.
And thank YOU, who support H2o since the beginning without loosing faith.
Thank you guys! With all my heart...
I still feel deep inside like it's only the begining and I trully wish this will mark the starting point of a bright future for H2o and its development team.
ADDITIONAL NOTES:
The servers have to be updated as well!
The official servers will wipe with this update.
Remember you can follow the development and take part of it on Trello
