August was about consequences. Ships blow up the way they should, your own ship got a proper info screen, and the crew started telling you when things go wrong.
All of this is coming this year.
Ships blow up properly
A ship that takes too much damage no longer just disappears. Its devices detonate one by one - weapons, generators, tanks, batteries - then a shockwave rolls out from the hull, and only then the hull itself falls apart. Crew in spacesuits get blown out into space in their bubbles. Crew without suits don't.
Hit the bridge and the fight ends right there: wreck an enemy control panel and the ship detonates immediately. Your ship plays by the same rules.
Ship info screen
Your ship got an info screen - every device and every crew member in one place, click any of them for details.
We also put ship identity in order. Ships now have a class, a model and an AI model - and the AI catalog differs by faction, so you learn to expect a certain behavior from a certain name.
On top of that come scanner tiers. Hover over any ship and you see its name, class and mass. Whether you also see its AI, crew, weapons or cargo depends on how your control panel compares to theirs. Locked lines tell you which scanner level you need.
Docking assist
Small modules were nearly impossible to dock - they wobbled, overshot and refused to line up. Now the ship pulls itself into position and rotates into the right angle on its own, without slamming into the partner. Flying picked up a bit of lateral inertia, so the ship slides through turns like something with mass. The minimap now shows silhouettes of stations and wrecks.
The crew speaks up
When a crew member drops to critical health, they tell you themselves - a popup with their portrait and a line in their own voice. Harry keeps reminding you while anyone stays wounded, and gets less polite about it over time.
Ibuka got an affinity score. It tracks how you play, not what you say, and it doesn't touch gameplay at all - it changes one conversation at the very end, plus an achievement for those who fully win her over.
Generators need fuel
Generators run on cognitite now. Each one has a tank, burns slowly while it's on, and shuts itself off when empty. Mining stopped being optional.
Repair bots got proper priorities: control panel first, then hull breaches, then power, oxygen and everything else. When spare parts run low, they recycle more aggressively.
Spacewalk polish
The camera now follows the bubble while you control it. Every suit got a lamp that cuts a circle out of the fog, so you can see what you're floating toward. Interior fog changed too: what you see inside a structure depends on your control panel level, and each crew member reveals a small field of view around them.
Also: the ship leaves a faint dark wake as it moves. Purely cosmetic, and we love it.
Story progress
The pirate citadel got its first full version. Mission six got its mining habitat with a full set of dialogues. The cognitite caves grew - more ore, and a new hazard: a ball of lightning that patrols the tunnels and doesn't care about walls. Plus a new side quest and a few more things we won't spoil.
And Naira got more of her episode this month. She's the Friday's security officer - ex-Paragon security, tough, short-tempered, with a code of honor she doesn't bend. Her level grew, her dialogues got another pass, and she comes with a special ability nobody else on the crew has. We'll leave that for you to find out.
What's next
Tuning explosions and docking based on playtests, the next pass on the pirate citadel and mission six, and getting the cognitite economy to feel right end to end.
See you in the next devlog!