This update completely changes how hardware stats work. Gone is the simple menu, with numbers you click and upgrade. Now you collect 'chips' and choose which chips to slot to bolster your rig stats. Do you want to avoid combat? Slot a bunch of Masking chips. Want to kick in nodes and fight ICE? Slot more Firewall and BOD chips. You can swap up your chips easily in the real world.
Currently there are 10 chips for the 6 different stats, but this update also paves the ground work for gaining special and unique chips as rewards, or loot for hacking certain R&D nodes. In the next update, focusing more on simulating the world, companies will create new chips on a regular basis, with a new type of chip coming out on average, once per day (game time). Of course you will be able to hack their systems and download the blueprints and 3D print them yourselves, but let's not get ahead of ourselves.
Existing saved games are still valid, however you will need to build your rig from scratch. You will be given a one time payment, based on your current hardware stats, to spend on new chips, a motherboard and a power supply.
A lot of work has gone in 'under the hood' to improve performance and kill bugs. This includes a changing how the game saves and loads data between levels. This is going to improve performance and solve some persistent issues. However there are likely going to be a few bugs caused by this massive change I haven't caught, but this is a big change for the better, and I'll be tackling any bugs as fast as possible.
Please post any bugs you find in the Bug Reporting discussing. As always big updates like this can sort of be disruptive, shaking up existing games, and I apologize.
Change Log
- NEW FEATURE: Custom Rig Hardware. Your Rig is now built of several parts; The motherboard, the power supply, and chips. The motherboard is how many chips slots are available. The power supply determines how much power drain from chips you can afford. The chips determine you statistics, such as Response, Processing, Bandwidth, Firewall, etc.
- Completely rebuilt the way the game handles the transfer of game data and variables. Previously every level would load the data when the level was opened, and save the data at various points. Now the data is saved in a 'container' that exists throughout every level, and is only 'loaded' once when the game is started. This has cleared up a lot of the save/load bugs and caused the game to run much faster when transitioning levels.
- Sped up the Root Access loading text, and changed the font.
- Added feedback to the disable telecom command to let you know when to disable the node
- Rebuilt the file-upload mechanic completely, from file generation, to how they are saved and loaded, in an effort to squash the 'blank upload file' bug. I was able to replicate the bug before the changes, but not since so it seems resolved.
- Further optimized the bunker level to improve performance
- Further optimized the system level to improve performance
- Re-worked the Analayze IC display to be part of the normal UI opposed to floating in the world. This prevents the information from being cut-off, and creates a cleaner look.
- Fixed spoofing admin accounts. They can now properly be spoofed from anywhere without having to return to the User Information node. However you must have entered the User Information node at least once to unlock the ability to spoof accounts in that system.
- Fixed a bug with the chat pop-up sometimes coming up blank.
- Fixed the patrol waypoints in several systems, which was causing the patrol to get too close to the checkpoint.
- Fixed a bug causing patrols to remain stationary after bypassing them using admin privileges.
- Fixed a bug that could cause the Key_Emulator to be fired twice, causing the lock image to be superimposed over the minigame, making it impossible to complete.
- Fixed a bug causing the contracts offered after starting a company to be blank, which in turn prevented your employees from working.