This update is a smaller one and focuses on engine changes, new modding tools and modding tool fixes.
Note for linux users
We're continuing to investigate issues with custom music. We don't have a time frame on a fix at the moment but we will keep you updated with any advancements on the issue.
Nova Park
Return to Nova Split in this virtual blueprint of the park before it was destroyed. This track makes use of our lightmapper update mentioned below to provide more vibrant lighting.
Nova Park is part of the free tracks expansions. Simply download 1.2.3 to get this track added to the Extras category on the menu.
There's even more free content coming in the near future, so stay tuned!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceklYdgY9fk
Unity Tools
For the full Unity Tools changelog, see the what's new section of the documentation website:
https://ballisticng-documentation.readthedocs.io/en/latest/unity_tools/whats_new.html
Lua Scripting
Lua scripts can now be written for custom tracks! These allow you to build your own procedual animations and create new behaviours, gameplay features and modify stuff like ship physics and AI settings for your tracks.
Scripts are sandboxed and can only access what the game tells them they can access, so are safe to have in tracks.
The hologram on Nova Park is an example of Lua being used to drive an animation!
Layout Creator Visuals Update
Recently myself and community member Kabelsalat released two tracks based on layouts we created for each other and this update incorporates the style into the layout creator play mode. This is also the style that was used for Nova Park.
Tracks are here, by the way ;)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2248225033&searchtext=
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2248229262&searchtext=
New Terrain Shaders
Two new terrain shaders have been added that take the base established for the Terrain 4 Blend shader and implement vertex color based texture blending.
We have also provided a .blend file with a material inside which will allow you to preview vertex color texture blending as you're painting them in Blender.
Note: These shaders require the new Encode In Tangents options to be setup in a lightmapping options script to work, otherwise lighting will override the vertex colors used for blending. See the documentation website for more details.
32-bit Lighting
Lighting is now 32-bit instead of 8-bit. We haven't updated any internal tracks with this so this change at the moment is entirely for mod creators and Nova Park.
Lighting will continue to be 8-bit until you rebake it on your tracks, after which the track will be upgraded to 32-bit.
So what does this do exactly?
Up until now lighting in BallisticNG has been stored using single bytes per color channel. This provides a whopping 16,777,216 possible colors, but we can go way higher then that.
32-bit stores these colors using 4 bytes per channel instead and it effectively gives you HDR. Where having lots of bright colors would previously blend into white, those colors in the updated lightmapper will bleed into each other and make a brighter blend of themselves. This also affects lit objects like ships too.
Ship cockpits are an exception to this change as letting really bright tiles light them up can bllind you with the canopy enabled, so cockpit lighting remains the same as before.
Example Code Mods
A github repository for example code mods has been created. Right now this contains an example Grenades weapon (thanks Kabelsalat for the voice line!).
If you'd like a hands on example of writing code mods, here's the link: https://github.com/bigsnake09/ExamplesNG
The compiled and ready to use mod is also provided ;)
Changelog
Credits
- Vista added to credits for contributing logos for M-Tech and Lance Systems (precision delta). You can check out the new logos in-game along the start grid for Nova Park.
Layout Creator 2
- Now uses VLM 2 for baking lighting when entering play mode
- Play mode now uses the new virtual environment visuals from Nova Park
Tracks
- Added Nova Park
User Interface
- Fixed the wrong tooltip showing for the speed measurement option
- Fixed the level up overlay not showing when returning from campaign events
- Fixed name tags and shield bars rendering on top of other important UI elements
Engine
- Implemented a LUA interpreter for running user scripts on tracks
- Lighting colors are now stored in 32-bit, removing the previous headroom for lighting where colors would end up combining into white.
- Survival togglers now check for empty meshes before attempting to split vertices for the survival environment
Code Mods
- Added URL to the modding folder that links to a github repo of example mods
- Data types from mods can be exposed to the LUA interpreter by attributing a class or struct with [ExposeToLua]
- Fixed the wrong directory being fed to mod registers if there are code mods that are disabled
- Custom huds can now be registered from pre-loaded HudComponents objects, allowing huds to be stored in and loaded from NGA files
- Implemented asset loading API. See the Unity Tools documentation for more information.