This will likely be the last demo update as I push toward the retail release. All the systems for release are now set, and I will begin further polish of missions and existing systems. The permanent demo will be updated alongside the retail version, when released, to ensure the quality remains comparable.
Adjusted the volume for the additional AI voice lines added to the tutorial in the previous update. The new lines had a higher volume than the existing audio files and were quite jarring.
Made another pass at making the AI fighter materials more visible to the player.
The targeting lead pip scale was reduced by 20%.
Adjusted the rotational damping behavior of the mouse steering system. When the input is below half of the max input, the dampening will increase. This serves two purposes; It increases the rotational braking power after a hard turn to curb overshooting the intended stopping point and creates finer control when making small aiming adjustments.
Added a new control for “space brake”, which is only available when compensation is OFF. When held down the computer will override all player movement inputs and use the thrusters in tandem to cancel all fighter movement. It won’t be instantaneous and will have the same behavior as switching from compensation OFF to compensation ON while at zero throttle. If using throttle locking, the brake will zero the throttle before activating.
Adjusted the camera clipping distance. This solves a geometry rendering issue at the horizontal extremes for 32:9 “super-ultra-wide” monitors.
Added limited pilot FOV adjustability. The binding controls are “FOV Increase” and “FOV Decrease” and can be adjusted during gameplay. The default FOV(70) is the maximum limit and the minimum is 55 degrees. This was mainly to accommodate players using a 32:9 monitor ratio where the full field of view is pretty dramatic. The limit can later be adjusted according to feedback.
At player request, I set the gun reticle and targeting sprites to the same distance from the pilot camera for 3D stereo rendering purposes.