Oct 16, 2020

What's Upcoming - Steam Achievements and Leaderboards

Absolute Territory - centaurianmudpig

Welcome along, pilots, to the latest news update for Absolute Territory. It's just been over 6 weeks since Absolute Territory was released on Steam amidst hundreds of improvements and enhancements over several updates.

Today, I'm happy to reveal some of the new features that will be making themselves into the next update.

Steam Achievements

There will be 45 Steam Achievements to unlock across the Absolute Territory campaign and Level Editor. 43 of these are for the campaign, ranging from completing each mission, completing the campaigns across higher difficulty levels, and specific actions and objectives.

The 3 achievements in the Level Editor will help guide you from creating a simple mission towards discovering the tools to design more complex and compelling adventures to share on the Steam Workshop.

Steam Leaderboards

How good of a pilot are you? Now you can find out! Steam Leaderboards have been added to Squadron and Gauntlet game modes, replacing the local leaderboard. You are no longer competing against yourself. See how you stack up against your friends and the rest world!

Sep 28, 2020

Game Update: Ver 1.1.0

Absolute Territory - centaurianmudpig

The latest update for Absolute Territory (Ver 1.1.0) has been published and brings more than 50 individual additions, improvements, and bug fixes.

Heads Up Display (HUD) art improvements

As mentioned in the last news update, I've been busily improving the existing in-flight HUD elements, covering the primary, secondary, shield & armor, speed, and range bars along with targeting brackets and waypoint indicators.

These have been designed to draw your eyes towards them when needed, i.e. when taking a lot of damage, and provide a significantly better experience in the presentation of information at a glance.

Based on your feedback, waypoints are now context-sensitive depending on the required usage. Find yourself in an asteroid field and the waypoint will no longer confusingly tell you to use your autopilot, but to exit the hazard first!

New 3rd Person Views

Increase your situational awareness in 3rd person with additional sides and rear views. You can also toggle the HUD on/off (which was added quielty in the last update).

Waypoints

Improved visual indicators for waypoints for better "at a glance" awareness.

Broken with a line: Autopilot required but obstructed (either by hazard or nearby enemy)
Broken: Autopilot required
Unbroken: Can be reached without the need of autopilot

Improved missile experience for starting missions

The introductory experience for missiles was not as fun as it could have been. Due, in part, to including the Javelin Heat Seeker missile in the loadout when going up against fast-moving enemies. It just didn't have enough time to reach the exposed tailpipe of its target before it had turned around, therefore losing its lock on the heat signature.

Introducing the Lancea Friend or Foe missile, with significantly improved tracking ability over Heat Seeking variants but with a lower explosive yield. To make up for the lower yield, the base ammo count has been increased.

The existing Spiculum Image Recognition missile has had its settering velocity/acceleration reduced in-line with other seeking missiles which will bring better accuracy, and less wild behavior when being launched.

Random Crashes on AMD Graphics Cards

There was an issue for AMD Graphics Card owners where Absolute Territory would randomly crash. This was related to the Unity version used to build the game. I've updated to a newer version of Unity which has fixed this issue.

Full Patch Notes

1.1.0 (20200928)
Overview - Improved the majority of in-flight HUD elements. Added additional views to 3rd person. Improved missile experience for starting missions. Various improvements and bugfixes.

Unity
Amend - Updated Unity to 2019.4.10f1
Amend - Updated TextMeshPro to 2.1.1
Amend - Updates Jobs to 0.2.10
Amend - Updated HybridRenderer to 0.5.2
Amend - Updated NodeCanvas to 3.1.0
Amend - Updated Rewired to 1.1.36.1
Amend - Updated Aura 2 to 2.1.14

General
Added - Default display name for all vessels, used for when the Display Name field is not populated within the Level Editor
Added - Short description for selected Campaign Mission, underneath the campaign drop-down box within the Campaign Menu.

Amend - Radar blips no longer use the camera space for position calculations
Amend - Moved Level Editor button from the Simulator Menu to the Main Menu to make it more obvious

Missions
Amend - Adv Tutorial 201: Killing the Vomitoria too quickly would prevent any further progression

Gameplay
Added - Added Lancea FF Missile

Amend - Replaced Javelin HS with Lancea FF missile as a loadout in the first 3 campaign missions, for a better missile introductory experience
Amend - Spiculum Missile: Reduced Steering from 120 to 90 DPS on all axis
Amend - Spiculum Missile: Reduced Steering Acceleration from 240 to 135

Fixed - Null Reference Exceptions when exiting or restarting a mission during the Autopilot cinematic
Fixed - AI afterburning no longer causes the player camera to shake

Visuals
Added - In-flight External Camera Views

Amend - In-flight HUD graphical improvements across the majority of HUD elements
Amend - Waypoint Icon now context-sensitive based on Local Waypoint or Autopilot destination
Amend - Waypoint Indicator text now displays "Exit Hazard" if within a hazard zone and "Use Autopilot" when out of hazard for static waypoints
Amend - Reduced size of Help Glyph icons
Amend - Help Glyphs, Missile Alert, and Received Transmission Text now positions and resizes based on required usage
Amend - Help Glyphs: Controller Glyphs no longer disappear when interacting with the mouse, and will remember the last used controller
Amend - Missile Alert warning now has a bar representing the distance of the closest missile locked onto the player
Amend - Unintentionally removed Depth of Field effect, when the effect is enabled, from the 1st person cockpit, but looks better for it
Amend - First Person Neutral Camera Sway reduced from 0.25 to 0.15, for less noticeable effect on the cross-hair (if you focus too much on it)
Amend - Increased size of Explosion_003 M (Missile Explosions) Particle Scale from 14 to 20, to make these explosion effects stand out more at a distance

Fixed - Video Options post-processing effects no longer defaults to on when progressing to the next mission
Fixed - AI piloted ships using Hi-Rez assets no longer use opaque cockpit models to reveal there is no actual pilot!

Sep 6, 2020

The mysterious case of premature missile explosions. Plus new Workshop Mission.

Absolute Territory - centaurianmudpig

Premature missile explosions

The mysterious case of premature missile explosions when being launched from an AI fighter was amusing when I first witnessed it, yet it seemed more prevalent in the Gauntlet scenario than I have ever seen before, and only for AI fighters.

The problem was down to re-using pooled assets, a neat performance trick to avoid garbage collection. However, an important value was not getting updated, resulting in a premature missile explosion on launch.

Maintenance teams have been made aware of this oversight and will be applying firmware updates to all missile launchers to avoid any further occurrences.

Projectile weapon performance

For improved effectiveness at long-range combat, Laser and Neutron bolt projectiles have increased range and muzzle velocity. The hitboxes surrounding all fighters have been increased, making fighters easier targets.

New Workshop Mission

In Broken Dreams you find yourself separated from your destroyer group. Outnumbered and facing superior enemy forces you are forced to fight your way through. Can you and your wingman make it home?

Subscribe to and play Broken Dreams mission here.

Version 1.0.2 (20200906) Patch Notes

Overview - Efforts towards reducing the frustration of missing targets when guns are locked onto the lead indicator. Maintenance crews received additional training to ensure missiles do not explode immediately on launch. Bug fixes to the Level Editor.

General

Amend - Removed reliance on Gun classes finding Vessel parent class, now parsed as required
Amend - Removed unused model mesh colliders from fighters that still had them

Input

Amend - Moved Balance Power control from keyboard key 'Shift + `' to 'Shift + 4' to avoid accidentally activating the Steam Overlay
Amend - Moved Match Speed Mode Toggle from keyboard key 'Shift + 5' to '5'

Gameplay

Amend - Increased projectiles muzzle speeds for improved effectiveness at long-range combat against more maneuverable targets as below:

- Laser Bolt from 900 to 1200
- Neutron Bolt from 750 to 1000

Amend - Increased projectile ranges to provide extra flexibility as below:
- Neutron Bolt from 800 to 1400
- Particle Bolt from 800 to 1000
- Plasma Bolt from 600 to 800

Amend - Shield Bubble Colliders for fighters scale increased for larger hitboxes as below:

- Agria: individual mesh colliders removed and added the expected Agria Shield Bubble collider (scale 2.5,2.75,2.5)
- Argonaut: scale increased from 1,1,1 to 1.3,1.3,1.2
- Drosophila: scale increased from 1,1,1 to 1.4,1.4,1.4 (pos. offset from 0,0,0 to 0,0,-0.5)
- Furax: scale increased from 1,1,1 to 1.3,1.5,3
- Gladius: scale increased from 1.25,1,1 to 1.5,2,1.3 (pos. offset from 0,0,0 to 0,-0.5,-1)
- Guardian: scale increased from 1,1,1 to 1.2,1.4,1.3
- Raider: scale increased from 1,1,1 to 1.1,1.3,1.3 (pos. offset from 0,0,0 to 0,-0.25,0, rot. offset 0,180,0)
- Raptor: scale increased from 1,1,1 to 1.2,1.6,1.2
- Sarcophaga: scale increased from 2,2,2 to 2.5,2.75,2.2 (pos. offset from 0,0,0 to 0,0,-0.5)
- Sarcophila: scale increased from 2,2,2 to 2.5,3,2.2 (pos. offset from 0,0,0 to 0,0,-1)
- Vomitoria: scale increased from 1,1,1 to 1.5,1.75,1.2

Amend - Gauntlet scenario corrections:

- Mission 8 Wave 1: Guardian ship names now correct
- Mission 9 Waves 2: Now spawns all 4 Drosophila (instead of adding 3 x Vomitoria to 1 x Drosophila)

Fixed - A spawned in AI fighter, with a launcher used previously on another fighter from the asset pool, firing off a missile from that launcher causes the missile to explode immediately

Level Editor

Amend - Player Preset/Loadout Preset 'Save As' dialogue prompt title has been corrected to reflect saving loadout presets

Fixed - Clicking Launch button without saving a new mission first locks player into an eternal Loading screen
Fixed - Preset Names with '_' in their name are not listed but still saved

Sep 1, 2020

Absolute Territory: The Space Combat Simulator launches on to Windows PC

Absolute Territory - centaurianmudpig

Absolute Territory: The Space Combat Simulator is available to buy on Steam for Windows PC.

Join the Imperial Hegemony and reclaim Bold Peace from the invading Endophora and restore Absolute Territory for your empire. Experience a story-driven campaign directed by briefings with 21 missions and 6 Imperial space fighters to fly with cockpit interiors.

For the thrill-seekers, get straight into the action with Squadron and The Gauntlet scenarios.

Or create custom missions with the Absolute Territory in-game Level Editor. Challenge your piloting skills, develop unique scenarios you only previously imagined. You decide the challenge by adjusting the environment and opponents. Fight with the most devastating weapons against lighter opponents or truly test your skills against-all-odds.

Share your custom mission with other Absolute Territory pilots in a few clicks, or explore the workshop, subscribe, and play potentially infinite missions created by players like you.

Absolute Territory: The Space Combat Simulator featuring:

Fight in WW2 style space fighter dogfights in first and third-person views
Experience a single-player campaign with 21 missions and 7 Imperial Hegemony space fighters to fly
Master the Newtonian style physics with an emphasis on fun over realism
Override the Flight Computer for RCS and pull off daring maneuvers
Circle strafe your opponents or perform epic slides
Evade incoming weapon fire using manual thruster controls
Create custom missions with an easy to use and robust Level Editor with access to all 11 Imperial Hegemony and Endophora space fighters, and a full arsenal of weaponry to choose
Subscribe and play from a variety of player-made custom missions in the Steam Workshop.
Improve your combat skills against waves of increasingly difficult opponents
Take the ultimate challenge of The Gauntlet

Buy it now for a -10% launch discount.

Aug 21, 2020

Absolute Territory Releasing September 1st, 2020

Absolute Territory - centaurianmudpig

Releasing 1st, September 2020, Absolute Territory: The Space Combat Simulator is the single-player space combat action game set in a futuristic setting with 11 flyable space superiority fighters and lumbering warships to destroy. Reclaim Bold Peace from the invading Endophora and restore your empires Absolute Territory. Experience a 21 mission story-driven campaign directed by briefings. Improve your skills against the Endophora in the waves game mode, then push yourself to the limit in the Gauntlet with 12 missions against combined Endophora and Imperial Hegemony forces. Need more? Create new encounters using the powerful in-game level editor and share them on Steam Workshop.

Features

Pull of maneuvers like never before with Newtonian flight physics
Master 11 types of space superiority fighter
Create your own adventures with the in-game level editor
Share and play community-created missions with Steam Workshop
90s space sim nostalgia rekindled

Checkout the store page for new Absolute Territory: The Space Combat Simulator screenshots.