After wednesday’s appetiser on the experimental branch it is time for the main course. This patch introduces a brand new Skrill enemy, the hunter!
This skrill is most commonly found in packs with skrill grunts. However it is much faster than the grunts and it has a special attack that can cripple ships by infesting the ships with eggnites. These creatures attach themselves to a ship's power generation devices and partially drain them of power which can cause some systems to run much less efficiently. Which can make you an easier target for the skrill grunts since the hunter itself doesn't do much damage. Fortunately these eggnite projectiles cannot go through shields so make sure to keep them up if you don’t want your ship to be infested. Additionally hunters also dramatically boost the aggression of all other skrill around them. So don't think you’re going to be safe if you’re in a large ship now as these creatures will now attack you as well.
The eggheads at Logicorp have created a new terminal which lets you control individual systems from a single terminal. Its primary functions include the ability to switch power groups on the fly so if you have damaged or destroyed generators you can now transfer power from an intact generator to this damaged group. Additionally you can also control the life support systems for every room through the engineering terminal, making it a little easier to cut off life support to certain sections of the ship which you are not using or use it for some more nefarious activities.
Another major addition is the inclusion of repair drones. With this we are giving players the ability to repair hull and engine damage. These drones can be launched using a disposer and then be controlled by use of a normal terminal through the sensor menu. In order for a drone to do its job it will have to be loaded with iron. Which means that you will have to eject a crate of iron along with the drone and then tell it to grab it from the drone menu. Now the drone is ready to repair and follow any target that you give it. The repair drones have a maximum follow range of 4 kilometers and they will go into sleep mode if they are ever out of range and stop following your ship.
These busy little bee’s can be built in the assembler using iron, brass and silicon.
As a final cherry on top we have overhauled the cockpit marker compass to now be constrained in a circle instead of the edges of the screen. This should make finding your targets much easier as we’ve also changed up the way we display markers which are on top of each other. They will now expand and display all of the text in one or two lists around the target marker. Additionally targets which are behind you will also have a secondary arrow next to them indicating that they are behind your ship, and you now have the ability to deselect targets by pressing “Y” (rebindable in the options menu). In upcoming updates we will also add filter options to give pilots even more control over their interface.
We have noticed some issues with performance and networking when playing multi-player, and we will be focussing on resolving these issues over the coming weeks. This might however limit the amount of new functionalities in the next update, but we feel like focussing our efforts on a smoother and more stable playing experience should be top priority.
Thank you all for playing and if you want to stay up to date with all Interstellar Rift news you can follow us on Twitter, Facebook or you’re free to leave your thoughts on our forums! We hope you’ll enjoy this new update and we’ll see you starside!
- The Split Polygon Team