Along with the 5.1 titans making it into freeplay, this optional beta has a bunch of fixes and improvements to make the game more stable.
Let’s go over a few things related to these optional betas for people who haven’t participated in them before. Firstly, please note: optional betas are limited to the Steam Windows 64 bit build, and may be missing localisations in some newer or updates areas.
WARNING: YOU ARE STRONGLY ADVISED TO MAKE A SAVE BACKUP
Saved games are in C:\Users[YOUR USER NAME]\AppData\Local\EotU\Saved\SaveGames
We highly recommend making a backup of your saved games before you run an optional beta, on the off-chance that some changes cause them to be corrupted. More info on where games are saved is in the Steam forums (but some of the information here will soon be obsolete, if this beta goes to plan). Copying the data in that folder to somewhere else will keep it safe from any potential issues.
Code: customtitans
If you would like to join the beta, the code is customtitans. If you don’t know how to join a beta and would like to, follow the instructions below:
- Find Empires of the Undergrowth in your Steam library, right-click on it and choose "Properties"
- Choose the "Betas" tab
- In the box titled "Enter beta access code to unlock private betas", enter customtitans
- After the "Access code correct" information appears, make sure you've chosen "Open beta" from the "Select the beta you would like to opt into" drop-down menu
- Press close - the game will now update to the beta branch.
Updates / Changes
- 5.1's titans can now spawn in huge creature landmarks in freeplay
- Added a system to restore saves from backup in-game rather than manually (not yet localised)
- Added some extra protection when reloading or quitting the game when defeat rewards are being saved
- Increased save backup number to 5 (up from 3)
- Bullet ant tech tree video added
- Scroll added to behaviour toggles box (will only appear when needed)
- Added more recent localisation for Polish and Czech
- Updated lighting for custom game levels and extra levels and changed some underground tile grids to the new ones
- Whip spider main menu icon is replaced if arachnophobia mode is active
- Added arachnophobia hat to all hybrids
- Creature stat list can now show percentages to a single decimal point
Fixes
- Reduced chance of all backups corrupting
- Fixed some small reverb problems in Tier 5 lab music
- Food taken from dead critters should now look closer to what it comes from
- Wood ants now turn to their targets before each shot
- AoE resistance now displays as a percentage in the Inspect tool
- Creatures mounted on another are now killed when shaken off and landing off the tile grid
- Fixed low resolution shadows in Tug of War 3
- Large underground creatures in 5.1 and 5.3 can now only demolish a tile if at least one of its neighbours is demolished
- Quadrupled VRAM allocated to overground tile grid textures - should improve issues when rapidly moving camera around the map
- Inspect tool health-per-second now includes buffs (such as the Matabele medic aura)
- Fix for whip spiders rapidly pinging from their creature encounter narration in 3.2
- Bullet ant species hex now used in the improvements menu
- Allowed marker placement through some plants that were blocking it in 3.2
- Matabele colonies should now always drop termites when they sell a tile
- Creatures that reach zero health while mounted will always drop to the floor to actually die
- Water on the minimap removed on 5.3
- Termites will no longer take sun damage in the ending cinematic of 5.3
- End game messages now say the NG+ level that has been unlocked if this is not the first NG+ completion
- Corrected some issues in the credits
- Fixed a ping issue in Occupation 2
- Texture size optimisations (should help with some blurry issues)
- Skimmer in Battle Arena will now fly and land when there are enemies at the midpoint
- Fixed some overhanging moss in the final formicarium / terrarium
- Fixed an issue where loading a damaged creature with a star level would restore its health
- Prevented ants walking into a rock in 5.1
- Fixed an issue where several ants hatch costs were being affected by upkeep in custom games
- Fixed an issue where bullet ant lean pupation was not applying in custom games
- Fixed an issue where UI scaling 150% would cause formicarium rewards to be off the bottom of the screen and hence unselectable