Greetings Pilgrims;
This update should work with older patches, but if you have an older game that is still in its infancy with your starting rocket in the original spot you might be in trouble. To ensure your game works well a new save is recommended, but provided you have moved onto the flat plateua your save should be fine.
Fixes
There have been a lot of helpful players, but I would like to shout out CitizenX3639. His great feedback and suggestions have made a great impact on this latest patch, and I very much appreciate the effort put into his thread.
Deposits Can Be Blocked
It was possible to place a structure over-top of a deep ore deposit if it was cracked open and ready for drilling. This has been changed to prevent any player from accidentally blocking a deposit.
Quick slotting equipment
It was possible to quick slot an equipable item. This was never intended al although I considered allowing you to quick slot items to equip them I don't think it made much sense with how equipment works. This has been changed currently to not allow equipable items to be quick slotted. We may change this in the future if we have many equipable items that would make sense a player might need to swap them around.
Rocket Fuel Clarity
Some players found it confusing that rocket fuel had to be put in the cargo of a rocket to launch the ship. I plan to add a specific slot just for fuel in the future, but for now, I have reworked the tooltip of the rocket to indicate that fuel must be placed in the cargo to clear up confusion. I do think a specific slot just for fuel will work well, but that is a larger change for a later time. This change at least brings clarity to rockets and rocket fuel.
Funding Updates
The research and development display in the research station was not updating funding accurately after completing milestones and exports. This has been changed to always update accurately now.
Changes
There have been a few small changes to improve the game.
Twice The Irrigation
The farm irrigation post that was in the center of the room has been duplicated and placed in front of both seed beds. This now clears up the walking path for players and you can use either irrigation that makes sense for where you planted.
Supply Menu Clarity
Some of the titles in the supply HUD were similar to the buttons with their background colors. Some players thought they were buttons and not titles. These have been changed and recolored to better stand out as titles for clarity.
Multi Building
Now when you build, if you have a stack of the same item that you are placing it will automatically continue to place additional items. You previously had to left-click again to begin placing and this didn't feel right. Now if you have a stack it will automatically continue to allow placing, and this can be canceled by right-clicking or pressing any quick slot key.
Grinder Changes
The grinder can no longer be used to grind foods into seeds. This will help free up grinders to keep producing coal for rocket fuel or other various dusts for crafting.
Additions
We have had some great additions to the game. Most of these are aimed at bringing life and atmosphere to the early game, while also providing a precursor to the eventual attacks that will come when you begin to Terraform Ceres.
Cave Diving
I have added two brand-new caves to the game. These can be found connected to the flat plateau edges. I made these caves go quite deep to ensure you can't easily reach the bottom until you have the equipment, oxygen points, or at least crafted several oxygen bottles. They start as normal caves with a basic cave aesthetic, but as you get deep they become very alien and gooey. Each cave has some high-quality loot and high-value export items you can collect. If you dive into both caves and collect all the loot you will also have the required items to build the "Advanced Base Constructor" which will be the linchpin in moving to mid-game. I have also included a data pad in each cave that provides more insight and precursor to what is to come once you begin to Terraform, and these are set up to be final logs from previous failed missions on Ceres.
Supply Box
I added a supply box similar to supply pods. These can be found inside each of the new caves and they are packed with goodies to help move you to the mid-game.
Farming Machine
I have added a new machine called the "Seed Extractor". This does the same thing the grinder used to do with raw foods grinding them into seeds you can plant. It was suggested to separate seeds from the grinder as the grinder is a key part of making rocket fuel, and I agreed with this suggestion.
Build Blockers
I have added huge invisible build-blocking volumes around the map in every direction. With the addition of patrolling aliens and as we move into mid-game I needed to ensure you can not get outside of the navigatable areas for AI. There is now a height limit you can go with your base. However, this is sixteen rooms high and should not come up for most players. There is also a small area along the edge of the flat plateau that will deny any building. This is to ensure you can not block enemies from jumping down to attack your base when that time comes. This also denies the ability to build horizontally forever until you get outside of the playable area of the map. You could still potentially get your character outside if you tried hard enough, but not buildings. For the most part, this shouldn't ever be felt by players who are playing predictably, but it will block wild card players from getting too crazy. If for example an amazing creator such as "Let's Game It Out" attempted to build crazy they would encounter these blockers.
Walking Mobs
I have added three types of land mobs each with 4-5 skin variations. These mobs spawn from 1 of 3 spawn locations above the flat plateau and walk a patrol around that upper area. There are 9 points they can reach and play animations before they return to patroling or head back to the spawn area to despawn for a new alien to come out. These 9 points also act as the attack points for waves to jump down and attack your base from. I want to ensure you can not just turret up a spawn point and be good, so I have encircled the building area with attack points. For now, they will of course not attack you until you start to terraform, but they do add a nice bit of life and atmosphere to the world.
Flying Mobs
I have added one flying mob with several skin variations. Like the walking mobs these will never attack before you begin to terraform, but they are present to help add life to the game. I have created 7 roosts for these mobs to spawn and fly to and from. For now, these aliens will spawn from one roost and fly overhead to another roost. When we reach terraforming these 7 roosts will also be the 7 directions airwaves will attack your base from. These completely incircle the map and are pilar-like structures with rocky nests on top.
What's Next
I am very happy to say that next is the start of the mid-game. Outside of some visuals, sounds, and effects needed to finalize the early game, I believe mechanically we are good to move forward. This is very exciting for me as I have been anxiously looking forward to working on the colony side of the game. It will be a time-consuming process, but very fun thing to work on. I would like to give a huge thank you to all the amazing players who have been giving me great feedback, suggestions, and ideas. Even the players who have just tried the demo and said they see potential all help to inspire me to work hard. Knowing you guys are excited excites me and helps push my work forward. I can't wait to show you guys what I have planned for the colony side, and then turret defense side in the future. If you want to stay up-to-date with development please consider joining the discord for maximum engagement as well as seeing pics and whatnot as I work, or even influencing that work with your live feedback and suggestions. That is of course optional and you can expect to see continued updates on Steam as they become ready. Thank you to everyone playing and enjoying the demo, I can't wait to show you what I have planned.