Hey Folks!
Update v0.14.4.2 is now available on Steam, and your clients should be updating shortly.
This is a feature update to our "Across the System" milestone, which includes several player-requested features, new content, and significant bug fixes.
Saves from v0.14.0.0 and later should work. Note that if you were experiencing issues in the older save, this patch may fix some, but others may persist depending on the cause.
Note: 📢 indicates changes inspired by community feedback!
📢You can now custom name items and containers in-game.
📢There's a new body type available in character creation.
📢Characters can now enter exclusive relationships (called "loops") with others, which opens up the potential for more...spicy moves.
📢NPCs now have relationship preferences, so flirting won't always work on everyone.
📢You can now specify your own character's relationship preferences in chargen. (Controls AUTOTASK behavior.)
2 new music tracks that will play while on VENC/Encantado aerostat.
New paperdoll/portrait art for repair parts, components, scraps, batteries, and cloth.
📢Message log now uses more natural language (Dynamic names, verbs, pronouns.)
Added missing descriptions for components.
New encounter text for first arrival at VNCA/Newcal aerostat.
Fewer lag spikes when AIs are considering tasks on large ships and/or with many input ingredients to choose from.
Gas containers, pumping, and exchange code should perform better now.
Doors opening/closing should use fewer cpu resources.
Social items no longer spill all over the OKLG floor.
Double discomforts/moodlets will no longer appear on characters.
Emptying ship batteries no longer causes an infinite loop error.
📢New tutorial for when Roster permission is first mentioned.
Aero races should now be more doable/balanced, and fixes for several racing bugs.
NPC ships no longer trigger TRACK WARN alarms when nobody is at their helm.
NPC ships no longer go full beans when undocking, but instead keep to a speed limit.
NPC pirate and officer pilots no longer request refuel help from player.
NPCs should no longer teleport outside their ships when that ship unloads.
The yellow pressure suit is now equippable.
AI should now stop exercising if they are suffocating to death.
Items like bandages and liquids should no longer auto-slot into wounds.
Reduced VREL/VCRS spikes when using rotational controls in orbit.
Honeypot mission now correctly checks if target sees player as their lover, instead of other way around. Also, honeypot mission will no longer target the player.
Items with "just right" damage amounts no longer appear all-black.
Fewer stuck or glitched items in paperdull UI when handling stacks. (Especially on wounds.)
Characters should no longer get more fatigued every time a save file is loaded.
EVA battery charger no longer heals self when it is damaged or destroyed.
Plotting a course from VORB to OKLG will no longer start the plot at VNCA.
Characters should no longer t-pose if loaded off-screen.
Dead bodies no longer disappear while player is standing aboard a ship docked to a station.
Atmosphere scrubbers no longer cause the game to soft lock in the presence of methane or ammonia.
Main menu buttons no longer get "stuck" or ignored if user dismisses intro screens with keypress.
BBG logo music now waits for mixer settings to be restored before playing, to avoid volume spike.
Several typo fixes.
Many of the changes in this update are things that have been suggested by players, and we wanted to try and get some of them in while they wait for ship combat to be ready.
First of all, players can now give items custom names! Hovering over the name of an object in the MTT now reveals a pencil icon that, when clicked, opens a dialog box for renaming the selected object. No more losing that power drill in a sea of similar crates!
We also finally added a new body type to the game. A lot of players wished for a more feminine body type so we added the option to character creation, it's purely cosmetic and doesn't affect any of the clothing sprites already in the game.
You can now change this during character creation, the same way you change facial features, hair, skin, etc. And a new button on the mirror's lower left corner allows you to toggle between face and body views.
You'll also notice chargen has a new section for "Flirts With." This is in response to player feedback that our relationship system needed some work. Players were finding they could "win" any conversation by simply seducing the NPC, and the NPC had no preferences or ways to object. (Also, captains set to AUTOTASK would often start flirting or getting "Lover" status with other NPCs, despite players preferring otherwise.)
AI will now have preferences that dictate with whom they want relationships (or "loops," in Ostranauts parlance). This includes not only sexual orientation, but also monogamy vs. polygamy. And these new character generation checkboxes will tell your captain which targets are okay to automatically flirt with.
And in exchange for making "loop" relationships harder to attain, they now come with greater rewards. Characters can now engage in more intimate activities with their loop partner, with significant emotional rewards. Players can also, of course, ignore "loop" relationships altogether, if they wish. A manual interaction from the player is required to initiate any "loop."
Also, as part of this change, we decided to spruce-up the logging a bit to make it easier to read. Now, the logs will attempt to use more natural language when choosing names vs. pronouns, and matching verbs, instead of using everyone's full name all the time.
This patch also includes 2 new soundtrack pieces from Josh Culler, which you'll hear when visiting VENC/Encantado aerostat maps. We've also improved the air racing experience there for players interested in trying their hand at that.
A few new performance improvements will hopefully be welcome for players with particularly large ships and/or lots of tasks to perform. We found a few ways to improve how AIs search for those solutions, as well as with gas and door logic.
And some long-standing bugs are finally squashed! The social moves you may have seen littered around stations should now be gone, and the dual discomfort/moodlet bug is now fixed. A newer bug with empty batteries soft-locking the game is also fixed, plus a similar one when an atmo scrubber was running on Venus.
Plus, a raft of other fixes and improvements, too numerous to detail completely here.
As always, there's plenty more for us to fix, change, and add! And we'll be continuing in roughly that order. In the meantime, let us know if this patch helps you out, as well as if it reveals new problems!
Best,
Daniel Fedor
Founder, Blue Bottle Games, LLC