Ahoy, Captain!
We’re working toward our first major update. As we implement new features we trial them on a publicly available Beta Branch for feedback and testing – you can read about our previous Beta Branch updates involving Prisons, Apothecaries and Crew Traits here:
http://steamcommunity.com/games/551860/announcements/detail/1655508872001587931
To learn how to gain access to the Beta Branch, click on this link:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/551860/discussions/10/1698293255137774100/
If the version number in the bottom-right corner of the Main Menu ends in 8433 or later, you have the correct version.
This latest update focuses on the following key areas:
- Supplementing the save system outlined in the Roadmap.
- Adding a "Quick Start" way to commence playing, that skips the opening section
We understand that the game could, at times, be absolutely brutal to new players. Our previous update went some ways to alleviate those issues, and the following help, too:
Magistrate & “Magistrate Saves”
Accessed via the Tavern option in Port, the Magistrate offers you the chance to create a manual save (what we call a “Magistrate Save”). To perform a Magistrate Save, you must use a Captain’s Log. These are finite items spread throughout the world that you must find (and are described later in this post).
Your Magistrate Save and Autosave are tied to the same playthrough. If you die, you no longer have to resume from the start of the game, but can now continue playing from your last Magistrate Save. You have one Magistrate Save per playthrough, so performing a new Magistrate Save will overwrite your previous one. Your moment-to-moment progress is still constantly autosaved as it has always been.
We feel this method retains the danger of loss should you die, but takes the extreme edge from having to restart the entire game, potentially losing so much playtime that it became frustrating. Now, you have a decision to make: Do you expend these rare items to create a Magistrate Save, or keep going and risk losing more progress?
The Magistrate is where you can also submit your charts of the local area and be paid Gold in return. This is a low-risk way to earn money, particularly helpful if you’re recovering from ship destruction.
Shipwrecks and the Diving Bell
There is a new upgrade available from ports: The Diving Bell. This can be used to gain access to new events scattered around the world: Shipwrecks.
Aside from the more common standard shipwrecks, there are rarer, former Empire flagships to find. If the player uses the Diving Bell on one of these “Golden Shipwrecks”, they can obtain a Captain’s Log, which is required to perform a Magistrate Save.
Golden Shipwrecks are rare. You’ll find one in an entire region, or two in the largest ones. Some regions may not have one at all. If you’re lucky, you may happen across one, otherwise you’ll have to go looking for them.
Quick-Start
We’re aware that some players starting a new game wish to just dive straight into the action, so we have created a Quick-Start option. When you commence a new game, tick the appropriate box to be spawned in a place where you can immediately get going.
-- The ship icon shows where you begin a Quick-Start game --
In order to teach all of the new mechanics in this and the previous update, we have made some adjustments to the start of the game. Now, once you leave the area where the Cult attack the Port, you will be funnelled to a map where new players will be taught everything. We’re also expecting to use this map as an opportunity to teach systems we have planned for the future. Outside this new port in the fourth map is where a Quick-Start game commences.
Because we’ve had to change the map to accommodate these new systems, your saves from previous versions will not work with this latest update. Your main branch saves will work if you opt out of the Beta Branch, but any previous Beta Branch saves will no longer work.
Difficulty
While some of the changes in this, plus previous updates, have made the game less frustrating by removing friction points, we’re aware that some players find the game too easy.
In this update we've made Hard mode spawn tougher enemies in combat. Throughout Early Access we’ll be continually tweaking the difficulty, plus adding options and systems that offer a tougher challenge for those that want it.
New Ships
We’ve added two new Ship Classes to fill the gaps in the roster: The Corvette and Cruiser. This smooths out some of the sudden jumps the AI make in ship size.
As part of our roadmap plans, we’ll be offering more ship variety that affects gameplay and player choice in what they upgrade to.
Miscellaneous
There are of course a whole host of other bug-fixes, polish and quality-of-life improvements included as part of this update, and we will post the entire changelist in the patch notes of the major update when it is released.
The following things are worth calling out though, because they’ve been mentioned in feedback a few times:
- Going into and out-of the full-view of exploration mode is now a lot faster
- There have been new events added to the map where the Cult attack the port, so there is no repetition here now
- Events with an exclamation mark can now have positive outcomes
- New Keyboard Shortcut for returning crew to their saved positions (Default is "z"). The keyboard shortcuts are listed in the Launcher Input Tab. In a future update we’ll add this as a screen within the game to rebind them to your preference
- Moved the camera closer when boarding (or being boarded by Haliphron & Mutiny). Lots of boarding changes to come in a future update!
Once the Beta Branch version has received sufficient testing and feedback, we’ll migrate all these changes across to the main game.
-- Haliphron versions of the new ships --
We'd love to hear your thoughts on these latest systems, so follow the instructions in the link to find out how to gain access and provide feedback:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/551860/discussions/10/1698293255137774100/
Our longer-term plans can be found here:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/551860/discussions/6/1693788202021118098/
Once the new major update has gone live, we’ll talk about the next focal points for the team.
Thanks for all of the support and feedback :)
The Abandon Ship Crew