Today we come to you with a rather sad but unfortunately inevitable message.
The company behind our game is out of money and we cannot afford to upkeep the running costs.
Sales have been miserable across the last 2 years and Pantropy was making low 3-digit numbers per month, which is not enough to pay any of the running costs.
We have been at this point before and decided to put more of our own money into the company and try to save the game but that didn´t go well and we ended up burning even more money.
We want to thank everyone who believed in us during this time and gave us support and say sorry that things didn´t go to plan. We really wanted this to be a good game.
Ultimately, we have decided to remove Pantropy from Steam. We don´t want new buyers to be frustrated by a game that will not be developed any further. Also our company will shut down and will be liquidated.

Thanks for reading this! Stay safe!

The Pantropy team

Pantropy V.0.6.724

[Added] Warning when your mech is being attacked

[Fixed] Incomplete item description in crafting panel
[Fixed] Not being able to click on recipie items in crafting panel
[Fixed] Mobs disappering
[Fixed] Androids became inactive after some time
[Fixed] Camera alignment when entering a hover bike after destroying one
[Fixed] Spawning in the desert when exiting the game in a mech in singleplayer
[Fixed] Floating mobs near POI's
[Fixed] Jetpack not recharging while in a mech
[Fixed] Getting stuck on a hoverbike
[Fixed] Dead crate would sink when dying on water
[Fixed] Needing to restart miningstations after loading game
[Fixed] LMG turret no longer searched for mobs after loading game
[Fixed] Playg

[Remove] Hatchet - had no function

[Changed] Underground hatches can only be placed 50 meters above sea level
[Improved] Expanded entering-area of T2 mech to the front
[Improved] Reduced degradation of miningheads by 30%

[Added] Singleplayer
[Added] Androids
[Added] Android Bases
[Added] Android Raids
[Added] Artillery
[Added] Toggle sprinting (double tap shift to enable/disable)
[Added] Sounds to forest warden
[Added] Sounds to nest hatchling
[Added] New animation to nest hatchling
[Added] Creatures finding their way back home
[Added] T1 Scout Mininglaser
[Added] T2 Scout Mininglaser
[Added] T3 Scout Mininglaser
[Added] T2 Mech Mininglaser
[Added] T3 Mech Mininglaser
[Added] Splatter effect to creature eggs
[Added] Dedicated field to drop items
[Added] Dedicated field to dispose items
[Added] Feature to rotate walls
[Added] Hearing capability to creatures
[Added] God mode in singleplayer
[Added] Large worm to desert biome
[Added] placeable window pane
[Added] placeable shutter for window frames
[Added] feedback sound when hitting a player, creature or mech
[Added] Visible hit markers
[Added] Sounds when grabbing ores and fruits
[Added] Sounds when consuming fruits and bandages
[Added] Sounds to hatchlings
[Added] New impact particle effects to bullets
[Added] Creature nest guardian
[Added] Acid attack to nest guardian
[Added] 1% chance of ores dropping a rare mineral that can be researched to gain RC
[Added] Capability to drop one item from a stack by clicking the right mouse button
[Added] A map marker that marks the location of your death
[Added] A map marker that marks the location of your base
[Added] Terrain tesselation
[Added] Optional Motion blur
[Added] Surface wetness
[Added] Wond shader for desert biomes
[Added] Hover Bike
[Added] A limit for how many turrets can be placed on a base
[Added] New Mech health system
[Added] Swimming
[Added] Losing 1% of credits in a credit disk on death
[Added] Toggle running to mechs
[Added] Non-Building area around territory buildings
[Added] Building restrictions around Territory Buildings
[Added] Range attack to desert worm
[Added] Idle sounds to all creatures
[Added] Bird
[Added] Hearing capability to Alpha, Hatchling and Forest Warden
[Added] Toggle run to mechs
[Added] Sounds when creature is dying
[Added] Size and color variations to mobs
[Added] Health bars to creatures
[Added] Ambient creature sounds coming from creatures which are close to a player
[Added] Android reputation system
[Added] New Loot-Table-System for android bases
[Added] Android Drones
[Added] Healthbars to turrets and mechs
[Added] Armor display
[Added] Level upgrade sound and UI pop-up
[Added] Crafting level bonus info in crafting panel
[Added] Research level info in research station panel
[Added] Creatures scream when they hear a player nearby+
[Added] Unload-Ammo-Option when right-clicking guns in inventory
[Added] Icon to Window-Pane
[Added] Blinking light to dropbox for better visibility
[Added] Proto-Pants to game
[Added] Chat messages directed at faction members
[Added] Chat messages directed at group members
[Added] Chat messages directed at specific players
[Added] Chat messages directed at players nearby

[Fixed] Doors of android bases were unlocked in singleplayer
[Fixed] Android bases being placed too close to player bases
[Fixed] Mobs attacking player
[Fixed] Sellings stacks to the andorid market
[Fixed] Mobs ignoring player
[Fixed] Nesteggs spawn white androids
[Fixed] Mechs having the wrong guns attached after a server restart
[Fixed] Creatures spawning a wrong 3d model after dying
[Fixed] Dead creatures not appearing after being killed using a mech
[Fixed] Ramp snapping
[Fixed] Solar panels not working
[Fixed] Doors staying slightly open
[Fixed] Creatures glitching and rubberbanding
[Fixed] Savefile got corrupted and loading screen doesnt close
[Fixed] Doors disappearing or not showing up
[Fixed] Mech Armour uninstalls when you take a hit
[Fixed] Android shops would not show up after re-entering game
[Fixed] Creatures not spawning after re-entering game
[Fixed] Selling stacks of items
[Fixed] Refinery Non-Additive mode description
[Fixed] Worldcrates having the wrong 3d model
[Fixed] FPS suddenly dropping due to nearby android-bases and not recovering
[Fixed] Creature movement syncronization
[Fixed] Creatures walking backwards or suddenly turning
[Fixed] Creatures running without moving
[Fixed] Creatures not reacting to players
[Fixed] Mechs colliding with trees
[Fixed] Mobs disappearing after killing player
[Fixed] Mobs disappearing after entering a mech
[Fixed] Being unable to reconnect to a server after a disconnect
[Fixed] Mobs disappearing after killing player
[Fixed] Leaving game while in mech leaves you in the center of the map
[Fixed] Forest warden instantly kills player
[Fixed] Forest warden hurts player without attack animation
[Fixed] Walkers were unable to hit player who was directly beneath it
[Fixed] Creatures following player forever
[Fixed] Forest warden was running around player instead of attacking him
[Fixed] Day/Night cycle was not working
[Fixed] Rocks were flickering
[Fixed] Baseparts were not appearing
[Fixed] Invisible baseparts
[Fixed] Baseparts with the wrong 3d model
[Fixed] Dead creatures having the wrong 3d model
[Fixed] Dead creatures not showing up
[Fixed] Inconsistent shooting when the game ran at more than 60 FPS
[Fixed] Shotgun disappeared when aiming
[Fixed] Creature eggs not breaking
[Fixed] Faction turrets not working
[Fixed] Player turrets not using ammo
[Fixed] Player turrets not finding a target
[Fixed] Player turrets shooting endlessly at dead target
[Fixed] When leaving a mech while holding a shotgun broke the UI
[Fixed] Option to enable/disable ambient occlusion
[Fixed] Not being able to place barricades / half barricades
[Fixed] Font of banner messages did not display numbers
[Fixed] Not being able to grab fruits from plants
[Fixed] Player IK for the shotgun
[Fixed] Door movement was dependent on server framerate resulting in slow doors
[Fixed] Rocket launcher
[Fixed] HE Grenades
[Fixed] Remote charges
[Fixed] Player model had broken hands
[Fixed] Hands of grenades and remote charges were casting shadows
[Fixed] Grenades falling through world
[Fixed] Not being able to destroy creature nests completely
[Fixed] Impact effects were sideways
[Fixed] Not being able to grab loose ore from nodes
[Fixed] Camera direction changed when switching between FPV and TPV in a mech
[Fixed] Stored energy not being displayed in base energy storage device
[Fixed] Repairing an item required more than displayed
[Fixed] The very first basepart in a new world would not show up
[Fixed] Variable market prices of the android market
[Fixed] Item buy panel not closing when hitting the close button
[Fixed] Worldcrates not showing up
[Fixed] Custom player marker not working
[Fixed] 3d model of forest warden
[Fixed] Name of palyer rank not showing up on some monitors
[Fixed] Access to creature denied‘ message removed from all creature drops
[Fixed] Distant terrain shading
[Fixed] Foundations were not removable using C.M.T.
[Fixed] Players falling through foundations
[Fixed] T-2 Doors not working
[Fixed] Outputlogs were too big and created problems on server
[Fixed] Motion blur could not be deactivated
[Fixed] Ores not respawning
[Fixed] Refinery not refining ores when combined input value was greater than 90 *
[Fixed] Refinery not refining ores when input stack had less than 80 items in it *
[Fixed] Mobs getting stuck on creature eggs
[Fixed] Medpacks were not working
[Fixed] Removed any mentions of centrifuge when refering to the refinery
[Fixed] Upgrading parts (i.e. generators) that can not be upgraded removed them
[Fixed] Broken Armor Plates could not be removed from mechs
[Fixed] Mech Mininglasers had the wrong title
[Fixed] Energycells were not rechared unless completely empty
[Fixed] Energycells could be overcharged
[Fixed] Walkers not returning to their spawn point after follwing a target
[Fixed] Window frames still used glass*
[Fixed] The message "Access to creature denied" was still shown*
[Fixed] AA-Turret stated that it needs 120mm rocket instead of 30mm rockest
[Fixed] Player Turrets not going offline when a player goes offline
[Fixed] Zeus Aircraft created a lot of performance issues
[Fixed] ID mismatch issue on the client resulting in item management issues
[Fixed] Dead mobs not having any items in them
[Fixed] Moving items with shift clikck moves them to a previously opened box
[Fixed] Crafting station using items from boxes
[Fixed] Crafting station putting items into boxes
[Fixed] Research station not working
[Fixed] Base not showing up
[Fixed] Base not having any colliders
[Fixed] Anti-Gravity Foundations
[Fixed] Ores not respawning in singleplayer
[Fixed] Anti-Grav Foundations
[Fixed] Worm not coming to surface
[Fixed] Activating shield on Tomahawk blew it up
[Fixed] Turrets made noise when spawning
[Fixed] Player got pushed underground when attacked by worm
[Fixed] Plasma impact sounds were too loud and could not be turned off
[Fixed] Reverse stereo effect of some creatures
[Fixed] Miningstations recharging their energy cells
[Fixed] Hoverbike could not be destroyed
[Fixed] Drone could not be destroyed
[Fixed] T-3 Siege Mech could not be placed
[Fixed] Small lag spikes caused by OnGUI calls
[Fixed] Player weapon sounds sometimes cut off
[Fixed] Turret shooting target when it is not fully turned towards it
[Fixed] Turrets were shooting through bases
[Fixed] Bullets were not hitting baseparts when player was standing on it
[Fixed] Player seeing blood impacts when getting hit
[Fixed] Players being able to open all locked items on the staging server
[Fixed] Nest Alpha sometimes killing players with one hit
[Fixed] Mobs randomly disappearing and reappearing when sitting on hoverbike
[Fixed] Melee creatures walking too far
[Fixed] Mobs teleporting themselves to the player
[Fixed] Map-Marker showing up multiple times on compass
[Fixed] Eggs not disappearing when damaging them
[Fixed] Mech plasma cannon had no sound when fireing
[Fixed] Bug that would spam errors on the server console
[Fixed] Mobs following players for too long
[Fixed] Drills not being used up by miningstations
[Fixed] Mobs not respawning

[Improved] Shadows
[Improved] Walkers were rarely hitting player
[Improved] Decreased maximum shadow render distance
[Improved] Shadows overall
[Improved] Animationspeed of nest hatchling
[Improved] Decreased oil generator brightness
[Improved] Creature network performance
[Improved] Building part placement
[Improved] Performance of creatures
[Improved] Nailgun was shooting too straight
[improved] Pigs were running too slow and not far enough
[Improved] Attacking behaviour of hatchlings and the forest warden
[Improved] Balancing of all miningtools across all values
[Improved] Laser effect of player miningtools
[Improved] Ore break particle effects
[Improved] Ore break sounds
[Improved] Hitting ores with pickaxe
[Improved] Bullet spread of all player weapons
[Improved] Texture of fruits
[Improved] Selection of items in toolbar
[Improved] Reduced screams of pigs
[Improved] Crosshair of the AR
[Improved] Reduced size and glow effect of bullets
[Improved] Bullet drop of all weapons
[Improved] Footstep sounds on sand
[Improved] Blood particle effect
[Improved] Meelee creatures trying to attack a player in a base
[Improved] Reduced volume of pigs walking sound
[Improved] Reduced damage of scout mech LMG
[Improved] Simplified refinery by removing the ADDITIVE mode
[improved] Creature eggs now only spawn on the terrain
[Improved] Reduced research cost of coal generator to 170 RC
[Improved] Reduced research cost of electric smelter to 150 RC
[Improved] Reduced research cost of refinery to 120 RC
[Improved] Player now loses ALL items from his inventory when dying
[Improved] Reducing health of pigs from 60 to 30
[Improved] Increased health of forest warden from 120 to 160
[Improved] Increased the amount of iron ores on the map from 1000 to 1800
[Improved] Getting more falldamage and from shorter heights
[Improved] Shadow quality
[Improved] Ambient lighting
[Improved] terrain rock performance
[Improved] terrain rock shader
[Improved] foliage textures
[Improved] Moon light color
[Improved] Grass shader
[improved] increased Cost of T2 Mininglaser for T3 Mech
[Improved] Mobs losing aggro after 20 seconds instead of 60 seconds
[Improved] Loading times
[Improved] Performance of server Version
[Improved] Performance of pathfinding
[Improved] Reduced noise while loading
[Improved] Walkers no longer spawn in groups of two but spawn alone
[Improved] Sounds of all creatues
[Improved] Swimming animations and added sounds
[Improved] Meelee attack of Alpha, Hatchling and Forest Warden
[Improved] Find target function of Creatures and Turrets
[Improved] Pathfinding System
[Improved] Loading times of server and singleplayer
[Improved] Performance of server and in singleplayer
[Improved] Melee attacks of creatures
[Improved] Hearing capability of all mobs
[Improved] Melee attacks of creatures
[Improved] Hearing range of alpha, hatchling, nest-male and forest warden
[Improved] The selected view angle is now saved when exiting a mech
[Improved] Small Medkits are now stackable
[Improved] Rare minerals now have an increased chance of dropping from ores (6% chance instad of 2%).
[Improved] Player now spawns with a better pickaxe when joining a server for the first time
[Improved] Grid lines of map no longer change when lowering tecture resolution
[Improved] Refinery now processes 10 ingots at a time
[Improved] Cursor now locks to the screen when you click back into the game
[Improved] Healthbars of creatures now activate when they target a player
[Improved] Reduced light intensity of chest light

[Changed] Increased hatchling melee damge to 18
[Changed] Increased nest-male melee damge to 30
[Changed] Increased nest-alpha melee damge to 49
[Changed] Increased forest warden melee damge to 25
[Changed] Reduced walker shots from 8 to 4
[Changed] Increased desert worm's health to 800
[Changed] Reduced 7.62mm Ammo Damage per hit from 12 to 8
[Changed] Reduced bullet speed of LMG turrets by 50%
[Changed] Reduced search and attack ranges from LMG turrets
[Changed] Turrets of friendly bases are now attacking players who deal damage to their base
[Changed] Reduced health of LMG turrets from 2000 to 500
[Changed] Reduced health of Forest Warden from 160 to 140
[Changed] Reduced health of Nest Alpha from 350 to 250
[Changed] Reduced health of Nest Male from 250 to 150
[Changed] Reduced health of Hatchling from 100 to 80
[Changed] Armor bar now only represents the amount of armor pieces the player is wearing
[Changed] Reduced energy consumption of Standard-Refinery from 31 to 25
[Changed] Removed random damage output of pickaxe and set damage per hit to 8
[Changed] Healthbar of turrets activates when it targets a player
[Changed] Added more spread to turrets
[Changed] Added 4 sec. delay before a turrets starts fireing at player
[Changed] Added limit to the amount of android bases (128)
[Changed] Android bases now decay after a certain amount of time
[Changed] Android bases no longer repair themselves
[Changed] Decay time is reduced on all bases


[Removed] Damage of guns was dependent on value of weapon
[Removed] Sunshafts
[Removed] Screenspace reflection
[Removed] Base decay in singleplayer
[Removed] Window pane from all window frames
[Removed] Some plants that caused performance issues
[Removed] Decals from all ores

Hello,

the time has finally come to push our countless fixes, additions and improvements to the public branch. We have been actively working on the staging branch since sebtember of 2020 and tested 492 internal patches since the last public patch. We are now at a point where the game is running stable and relatively bug free thanks to the help of a lot of community members who helped us testing the game.

There are so many fixes and additions that i can't possibly address all of them in one post so let's break down the most important changes.


Singleplayer

The first change that you are going to notice is in the main menu. You can now choose between singleplayer and multiplayer.
Whe singleplayer does not differ much from the multiplayer experience besides the obvious fact that there are no other players.
However we introduced AI players(Androids) to the game to make up for the lack of players in singleplayer and on low population servers.


Androids

Androids are part of both factions and will claim territories over time and build their bases around the world.
Some of these bases are heavily defended but have a lot of loot in them. Androids will keep you alone as long as you don't agrevate them by killing them or raiding any of their bases.
If you do decide to raid one of their bases for the sweet sweet loot in them you will lose reputation points and they will come to raid your base.


Resource Gathering

We refined the whole mining experience by balancing the amount of ores each tool can mine and we split the mech mining lasers into T1-3 tools for a more linear progression.
The latest addition brings collectable ores to the game that lay around the world and can be picked up.


New Vehicle

We added a hover bike to reduce time spent walking around the map while gathering resources or killing animals for research credits.


Movement

The player movement was improved by adding swimming capabilities and adding a function to toggle running.

Creatures

We added the desert worm and a bird to the game and added a lot of new sounds to our creatures.
Creatures are no longer as laggy as they were in the past and they now differ in size and color.
We also added health bars to every creature, mech and turret. Corpses of animals will now show up every time a creature gets killed. We improved the performance of the pathifinding massively so creatures are no longer standing still for a long time while trying to find a path.


Base System

We fixed some major issues with the base system. Base parts are no longer vanishing and can be upgraded or removed without any issues.


This version of the game is a much needed improvement to the current public version. We are not done yet since there are still bugs to fix and features to implement.

But at least I hope you have fun playing our game and wish you the best.

- Julian and Sebastian

Hello,

it is finally ready – the androids are now live on our staging branch.
In this post I want to go into detail on how the system works and the thinking behind it.

The initial idea was it to have an AI controlled opposition that is a little smarter than the forest warden. We want to make the game gripping and fun even if the player is playing in singleplayer or on a low population server.

To acomplish this goal we introduced ‚player-like‘ robots which are part of the faction called ‚Androids‘.

These androids:
-claim territorys
-mine ores
-build bases
-and raid players with a bad reputation.


I differentiate the android system into two main categories: macro and micro.
The macro level of gameplay is controlled by the grand strategy sytem (GSS). The GSS is responisble for finding the next territory an android should claim (this search is performd every hour of gameplay).
Whenever the GSS has found a territory it sends out an aircraft with a few androids in it that lands in the territory and claims it on touch down. Initially i had an android run to the faction building, destroy the turret and go into the building to claim the territory but that cost way to much performance and was causing too many bugs. So i removed that detail and just claim the territory on touch down.
Once the aircraft has landed the builder-android gets to work and starts building an outpost or a fort. An outpost is placed when the territory was free and a fort is placed when the territory was claimed by another faction.
Every android has a primary and a secondary weapon so the builder might hold a C.M.T but he can pull out a pistol when you attack him or his base.
You can find encrypted data and some other tier-1 items in the outposts but forts have tons of encrypted data and high-tier loot but are very well protected.

The GSS will place an ‚Economy-Base‘ every 90 minutes in a friendly territroy. These economy bases hold mining or smelting equipment and accommodate mining- and builder-androids.
These economy bases hold a lot of useful loot and come in different sizes. Bigger bases hold more loot than smaller ones. You can find encrypted data, ores, ingots and miningtools in thses bases.

You will loose ‚Android-Reputation‘ when you raid any android base. This stat can be found under the faction tab beneath the player rank. Every 30 minutes the GSS finds the player with the worst reputation and raids him. The Reputaion is cut in half when a player is raided and you will gain one reputation point every minute.
Based on the value of your base the GSS determines how many androids to send to you.
Every raid party consists of one or more ‚Rocket-Raiders‘, one or more ‚Rifle-Raiders‘ and one or more ‚Android-Drones‘.
They will get shipped to you in an aircraft that lands near your base and they will try to destroy every active-basepart (generators, smelters, turrets, lights etc.) on it.
You will not be attacked if you are offline but when you go offline while your base is being raided you might not have a base anylonger when you get back on.
So you will be let alone by enemy androids as long as you are not attacking them or get to close to their bases.

Now, the micro level of gameplay is what happens when you raid an android base or get raided by androids.
If you start raiding an android base you will not only be attacked by the androids surrounding the base and the turrets that might be on the base but also by waves of android-drones that spawn over the base. The amount of waves of drones that you have to fend off is determined by the value of the android base.
These android-drones are a new mob and are equipped with a laser that fires for two seconds and can be outmanouvered if you are quick on your feet. Stand still and you will get roasted. These drones are difficult to hit and will drop no loot (this will probably be changed later). But you will find plenty of loot inside the base.

These drones are also part of every raid-party and will attack your base from above while the androids attack your base on the ground.

Android bases that have been damaged will repair themselves and restock their loot over time. The androids in the base will only respawn after a server restart or when loading the gamefile.

We will improve the android system over time and expand on it but we have to focus on polishing and bug fixes for now.
I hope you have fun testing the androids and if not, then please let us know your thoughts through our discord channel.


- Julian

Hello,

I have been reworking our pathfinding system in the past week.
The old system was quite slow and resulted in mobs freezing in place because they had to wait a long time for a path to be found.
Handeling pathfinding on large maps is generally quite difficult but i found a way to increase the performance massively.
We have 16 million pathfinding nodes on the map. Each node stores a position and whether it is occupied or not. Loading all of these nodes into memory on start would be very inefficient.
That is why i switched to serialization for my new pathfinding system.
Previously i solved this memory issue by storing these nodes in a texture map but that allowed for the system to only find one path at a time. So whenever a group of pigs got scared and wanted to find a path then each one of them had to wait for every other pig to have found a path. Sometimes pigs would wait up to ten sconds until they got their path.

My new system allows for multiple paths to be calculated at the same time. I have set the system to run six pathfinding processes at a time and i run them on seperate threads. Most of Unity‘s classes are not thread-safe but you can run an A* function in a seperate thread without big issues.
Running the calculations on seperate threads is also reducing lag on the main thread which was another limiting factor for the old pathfinding system.

The Results:

Finding a path with a distance of 80 meters took the old system 0.342 seconds or 17 frames (with 60fps).
The new system takes only 0.038 seconds or 2 frames for the same path. That is 10 times faster than the previous system(or an 800% increase in performance)! And since the new system can find six paths at a time it would end up to be more like a 4800% increase.

However when 100 creatures request paths at the same time we would still have some creatures that freeze in position because they need to wait until their path is calculated.
To hide this waiting period I added a neat loop that makes creatures run in a circle when they are waiting for a path. This is way better than having them freeze in place and you might find the same behaviour in mobs of other games.

This patch will come to the staging branch in a couple of days. I already started to work on the android systems but I want this patch out before i continue workin on it.

Issues with the Base System

We have been experiencing various issues with our base system ever since i re-coded it back in late 2018. We had serious performance issues before the re-code because a lot of our base parts used to have a component called „BoltEntity“ on them.
The BoltEntity is part of the Bolt Networking Engine and is responisble for synchronizing data among the server and clients. More BoltEntites on the map meant less frames so we reduced the amount of BolEntites by creating a sub-system that handles data on a micro level and reduced the need for BoltEntites by 1000%.

This sub-system has been a trouble maker ever since. We had invisible baseparts, visible base parts but without colliders, doors that could not be opened, crafting stations that put items into other people‘s bases, bases that switched owners mid-game, base parts that could not be removed and many other bugs.
All of these issues are finally fixed and we are now at a point where the base system is as solid as a rock or as one of our staging testers put it: „in all these years i have never seen it so stable“.
I know putting this quote in here is like patting myself on the back but i am very excited that my system is finally running smothly after putting so many hours of my life into it.


Mechs

We simplified the old mech health system where every part of the mech had it‘s own health by assigning each mech with just one health property. Now each mech has one health bar and armor slots. The armor plates absorb all damage until they break and then the mech itself takes damage.
The old system was prone to bugs and was flawed in it‘s design so a new system was long overdue.

The player is walking a lot in the initial stage of the game. He is walking from one ore to another or from one creature to another.
We added the Hover Bike in order to reduce this dead time between actions, which is a cheap and fast way to traverse the map.

We also introduced a system that limits the amount of vehicles a player can place. The server can only handle a limited amount of vehicles. This helps massivley with the performance of the game.

Mobs

The Alpha-Nest-Creature is now back in game. Every creature nest is guarded by one of these creatures. They have a range attack in form of spitting acid and a melee attack.
This makes the creature nest removal much more challenging.

Diagnosis

I wrote an extensive diagnosis tool while trying to debug some of the above mentioned base sytem related bugs. This tool helps us a lot in finding bufs as it can diagnose all base parts, mechs, mech weapons and the ore system. The desperation to fix our base system lead me to write this tool but honestly i should have written something like this earlier. It helps alot when tesing the game.

Next up

The highest priority at the moment lies in bug fixing so i will spend most of my time debugging and fixing bugs which our loveley testers are finding daily. I will also finalize the android system in the upcoming weeks so look out for that and we have some interesting game changes in mind that will improve the overall experience.

- Julian

Hello,

two months have past since the last update and we fixed a ton of bugs, added some new content and improved the game overall. In fact we made so much progress that i can‘t possibly address it all here so i will just go over the most important changes.

Mining:

Our miningtools were really unbalanced so i set out to introduce a linear progression to the mining process. First i replaced the Scout Mech Mininglaser with three variants: T1, T2 & T3 each one has similar miningrate to the player miningtools but the T1 can mine only T1 ores while the T3 can mine T1-,T2- & T3-ores. I also replaced the T2 Mech Mininglaser with two variants: T2 & T3. Then i fixed the overall miningrates of each tool. Previously it was really frustrating when you upgraded your pickaxe with a T1 miningtool and found that it did not mine as many ores as the pickaxe. Now every new tool is producing more ores than the previous one.
We wanted to make the whole process of mining more satisfying since this is where the player spents a lot of time. We added new sounds and new breaking particles to all ores which make it much more appealing to mine ores.
Furthermore, we also added some rare mineals to the ores which have a 1% chance of dropping and can be researched in the Research Station to gain Research Credits.

Player Bases & Structures:

I made the entire base building system a lot more stable.
We had some major issues with our base systems where parts of the base would be invisible, have the wrong 3d model or not show up at all. It took me a lot of debugging but i found all issues and fixed them. Now you can be sure that when you remove a part that it actually gets removed or that the new part you placed is showing up.
I also made the walls rotateable which results in many new ways to build a base.
Additionally we added a base-marker that marks the location of your base on the map; you can enable/disable it under the „MY BASES“ tab.
We also simplified the process of refining ingots in the refinery by removing the ADDITIVE mode.
The refinery now produces one new ingot by combinbing the values of two ingots from the input.
All player turrets are now fully funtional again and are quite deadly. They use up the ammo and are no longer constantly shooting at a dead target.
The movement speed of doors was dependent on the framerate of the server which resulted in slow or fast moving doors. I fixed this issue and doors are now opening and closing at a constant speed.
Furthermore we removed all window panes from every window frame. These window frames can now be closed by putting a window pane into or by adding a shutter to the frame. The shutter can be opened and closed to make it possible for players to shoot at whatever is lurking outside.

Creatures:

For the longest time we had an issue where the drop of a creature would have the wrong 3d model. For example after killing a pig it would turn into a dead walker or forest warden. I was finally able to fix that issue once and for all. Sometimes the dead creatures would not even show up but i fixed that issue as well.
Then we introduced two new mobs to the game: the large desert worm and a nest guardian.
The worm lives in the desert and only comes up when a player is nearby. The worm has 450 health and can only move underground. It‘s limited meelee attack range make it voulnerable to ranged weapons. The worm drops T2 ores and research data.
The nest guardian is a grown up verison of the hatchling and guards the creature nests. It has a meelee and range attack. It is no easy feat to kill him since he has 200 health and can predict your movement to thrown acid at the perfect time at you. This makes the process of destroying creature nests much more challenging. I also fixed the issue where creature eggs would not get destroyed when shooting at them.

Weapons and gunplay:

We refined the gunplay a lot by adding feedback sounds and hit markers when hitting players, mechs or mobs. I also introduced a new bullet spray system that is predicabtle and can be counteracted by moving the mouse. The previous system just gave the bullet a random rotation when it left the barrel but now the whole camera moves slightly when shooting. The damage of a bullet is now no longer relative to the value of the weapon but the value of the weapon still has an effect on the bullet spray.

Mechs:

Fixing the issue where the camera points into a different direction when switching between first person and third person was something that i wanted to do for a long time and now i finally had the time to do it. I also fixed an issue where the game would break when the player got into the mech while holding the shotgun. We reduced the damage of the Scout Mech LMG from 12 dmg to 7 dmg to match the damage of the AR of the player because the LMG always felt a bit over powered.

Whats next?

We started a staging branch testing server that you can join to try this new version of pantropy before it goes live on the public branch.
Check out our #Information channel on our discord for more informationon how to join the staging branch: https://discord.gg/JjwxT9tE
We will keep a close eye on our discord server and note every bug report that comes our way and fix the most important bugs first. In the meantime we will finish the development of the android system, add a new system for collectables and add random events to the game like creature attacks or android raids.

I hope you had a pleasent christmas,
Julian

We have been quite busy during the past Month; we got our first implementation of the androids done, have launched the staging branch to our discord community and fixed some long time bugs like the shadow flickering.

Lets talk androids first. Our androids are still quite simple: They are flown into a territory that they claim and then build a little outpost in the landing area.
This is currently all that is active on our staging branch but we do already have the systems finished that are needed for more features like the mech transports, base defense or raiding.
I will be working on implementing these features this week.

As mentioned above the „claim territory & build oupost“ feature is currently the only active option.
For that feature to work i had to develop an algorithm that analyses the terrain and finds a spot where the GSS could place a base.

You can see here a quater of the map and a lot of squares which are the ouput of the algorithm. Every square represents a space whre a small 2x2 oupost base can be placed. This algorithm is fundamentally importent because it is always used when the GSS wants to place a new base on the map and it has already proven to be very reliable because i could not find any base that was part way inside a rock or a mountain.

Now that i had a reliable way of finding a spot for a base, all that was left to do is to fly the androids to that spot and let them build their base.
Then i moved on to implement a feature where the androids would raid bases in a foreign territory but i had to disable it before publishing our first patch to the staging branch because it caused the game to lag and i had no time to fix that.

Shortly before opening up the staging branch i had to create the UI for a main menu where you can choose between singleplayer and multiplayer.
At first I ran into a lot of issues with the singleplayer but fixed these one by one and now we have a working singleplayer solution.
On the 27th of september we opened up the staging branch and we quickly ran into a lot of old bugs.
Since then i have been on a bug-fixing-spree and i already got a ton of bugs fixed including:

- Mech armor would uninstall itself when the mech got hit – FIXED
- Android shops not working at all – FIXED
- Shadows flickering badly – FIXED
- Creatures sliding or teleporting when getting hit – FIXED

Now that some major issues are out of the way i can focus on finishing the implementation of our androids so look out for that in the next devlog or check it out for yourself on our staging branch:

https://discord.gg/6Dx9rwf


- Julian

We made a lot of progress since the last update and we want to show you what we have been up to for the last couple of months:

The first thing I did was to test the androids on our development-server.I quickly found out that the way we handle these androids was not very efficient and used up a lot of resources. With only 20-30 androids on the map I was left with only 10 FPS on the server.

The main problem was that when we wanted an android to build a base - he had to be visibly on the map in order for this base to be build.

This is the result of trying to implement the android system onto our already existing creature system.

The data of each creature would only be alterd when a creature was on-screen. This meant that in order to build a base an android had to be on-screen because the system that builds this base is attached to the android‘s game object itself.

Back in 2018 when i developed the whole creature system i wanted to make it as efficient as possible and i did that by only changing the data of a creature when this creature was on-screen and near a player. Sadly this approach did not work well in combination with our androids because androids would need to build bases even when they are off-screen. So I set out to change the underlying creature system to work like this.

The new system is way more efficient and does not require an android to be on-screen to work. Our grand-strategy-system which is responsible for the actions of all androids can now build bases, mine ores, transport goods from one base to another withour needing any androids on the map.

We also switched from a role-based-action-system to a job-based-action-system which means that the grand-strategy-system creates jobs and assigns them to unemployed androids. Our androids are now capable of managing an entire base. This means that they gather resources, deposit resources into storage chests and then smelt these resources. They also repair any damaged part or replace baseparts that have been destroyed. They can resupply turrets with ammuniton and resupply mechs with charged energy cells and ammo.

The next thing I have worked on is an AI for our mechs. We want our androids to operate mechs in order to transport items from one base to another, guard monuments/bases or use them to raid player bases. So I developed a system that links our already existing mech-system with the above mentioned creature-system.

While working on the mechs I fixed bugs that existed since 2018. For example we had players who reported that their scout mech suddenly had a gun from a T2 mech attached to it.

This bug is finally fixed now.

Also we had issues where the dead bodies of creatures would not spawn when they were killed from within a mech. This is also fixed now.

Then there were a lot of cases where the 3d model of the bodies of creatures would not match the creature you killed. For example you just killed a pig and the dead body of the dead pig would turn into a forest warden or a storage chest.

This bug has been fixed aswell.

Lastly I have implemented an artillery installation for our androids.

This artillery will be used by androids to lay siege on your base. It requires energy to run and has a limited range of 750m.

You can stop this by killing the androids who are operating the artillery or destroying the base it is standing on.

We want to fix as many bugs as possible and improve the gameplay next.

I will keep posting updates on our discord, steam and here on kickstarter.

Feel free to checkout our latest devlog on Youtube too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGEeyuX1WXQ&ab_channel=Pantropy