• Made product loss by employee salaries more accurate by calculating salary per minute used (refreshed in UI once per day)

Fixes

• Fixed uint overflow causing unlimited sales for products when there are no more supported OS users left to sell to
  
• AI companies not releasing anything after buying out all their IP (won't fix active AI companies from previous saves)
  
• Product loss from player printing and OS ports were not calculated
  
• Fixed adding fans instead of removing them when delivering subpar product to followers
  
• Various other fixes

Alpha 9 is finally out!

• Software development has been completely overhauled to focus more on risk management and marketing planning than watching progress bars fill up
  
• Software quality evaluation is now more complex, amount of work done and the quality of that work is calculated seperately
  
• The amount of bugs in a product are no longer known up front making support tasks and bug fixes theoretically endless and instead hinging on good player planning
  
• Project management has been completely overhauled
  
• There is now a clear divide between digital and physical distribution, and the market changes as the years go on
  
• The player has to pay for physical copies of their products upfront to be sold or produce and deliver copies themselves using printers and couriers
  
• The player can make other companies subsidiaries when taking them over to keep them in the game and control their funding
  
• Undo button in build mode
  
• Noise levels are now calculated realistically instead of across entire rooms
  
• UI sound effects
  
• A bunch of UX improvements

Alpha 9 changes the core gameplay a lot. The main focus was to add more player interaction to the early game by requiring more attention and planning from the player during product development and release, while some of the new mechanics add risk and uncertainty to player choices, without being straight up random. Removing the development progressbar could at first glance seem to just be obfuscating information from the player, this is not the case, however. A lot of underlying code has been reworked, which makes the progressbar obsolete, as project progress can no longer easily be quantified to a percentage. The overall timescale of the game has not changed, so don’t be afraid to use your experience from alpha 8, but note that your strategy will probably not be effective in alpha 9, unless you pay attention to the new pre-marketing mechanics.

I will continue to monitor alpha 9 issues for the next couple of weeks, before I move onto alpha 10.

• Completely overhauled software feature system, to get rid of the "Select all" mechanic and add endless research
  
• Being able to move your company to a different plot
  
• Being able to rent rooms in a larger building
  
• New plot system, that includes plot "chunks" with individual characteristics
  
• Rebalanced costs, to balance out late game
  
• Rebalanced hiring and education system

You can see the entire roadmap for Software Inc. on https://trello.com/b/9I286Mhu/software-inc

Alpha 9 took at least 5 times as long as any previous alpha did, mainly due to the fact that alpha 9 touched core gameplay, which had to be rebalanced, debugged and required a lot of feedback. Most of the alphas have focused on adding new mechanics, which takes a lot less time than working on existing ones. Having to move a long distance, taking my driver’s license, suddenly not having internet and having a knife-to-finger related injury (almost healed up now) certainly didn’t help, thankfully these are all one-off adventures.

• Made product loss by employee salaries more accurate by calculating salary per minute used (refreshed in UI once per day)

Fixes

• Fixed uint overflow causing unlimited sales for products when there are no more supported OS users left to sell to
  
• AI companies not releasing anything after buying out all their IP (won't fix active AI companies from previous saves)
  
• Product loss from player printing and OS ports were not calculated
  
• Fixed adding fans instead of removing them when delivering subpar product to followers
  
• Various other fixes

Alpha 9 is finally out!

• Software development has been completely overhauled to focus more on risk management and marketing planning than watching progress bars fill up
  
• Software quality evaluation is now more complex, amount of work done and the quality of that work is calculated seperately
  
• The amount of bugs in a product are no longer known up front making support tasks and bug fixes theoretically endless and instead hinging on good player planning
  
• Project management has been completely overhauled
  
• There is now a clear divide between digital and physical distribution, and the market changes as the years go on
  
• The player has to pay for physical copies of their products upfront to be sold or produce and deliver copies themselves using printers and couriers
  
• The player can make other companies subsidiaries when taking them over to keep them in the game and control their funding
  
• Undo button in build mode
  
• Noise levels are now calculated realistically instead of across entire rooms
  
• UI sound effects
  
• A bunch of UX improvements

Alpha 9 changes the core gameplay a lot. The main focus was to add more player interaction to the early game by requiring more attention and planning from the player during product development and release, while some of the new mechanics add risk and uncertainty to player choices, without being straight up random. Removing the development progressbar could at first glance seem to just be obfuscating information from the player, this is not the case, however. A lot of underlying code has been reworked, which makes the progressbar obsolete, as project progress can no longer easily be quantified to a percentage. The overall timescale of the game has not changed, so don’t be afraid to use your experience from alpha 8, but note that your strategy will probably not be effective in alpha 9, unless you pay attention to the new pre-marketing mechanics.

I will continue to monitor alpha 9 issues for the next couple of weeks, before I move onto alpha 10.

• Completely overhauled software feature system, to get rid of the "Select all" mechanic and add endless research
  
• Being able to move your company to a different plot
  
• Being able to rent rooms in a larger building
  
• New plot system, that includes plot "chunks" with individual characteristics
  
• Rebalanced costs, to balance out late game
  
• Rebalanced hiring and education system

You can see the entire roadmap for Software Inc. on https://trello.com/b/9I286Mhu/software-inc

Alpha 9 took at least 5 times as long as any previous alpha did, mainly due to the fact that alpha 9 touched core gameplay, which had to be rebalanced, debugged and required a lot of feedback. Most of the alphas have focused on adding new mechanics, which takes a lot less time than working on existing ones. Having to move a long distance, taking my driver’s license, suddenly not having internet and having a knife-to-finger related injury (almost healed up now) certainly didn’t help, thankfully these are all one-off adventures.

Alpha 9.10.14 includes bug fixes. Final release is imminent, as long as no critical bugs are reported. I know I say this every time and then a critical bug is reported, but there haven't been any for the last couple of patches.

Alpha 9.10.13 is a hotfix for game sometimes breaking when cancelling or releasing a product.

Alpha 9.10.12 includes a bunch of bug fixes.

Alpha 9.10.11 fixes undoing a split either not working or causing the game to break.

Alpha 9.10.10 includes a bunch of bug fixes.

• The development info window now uses fractions when counting programmers and artists to correctly show employees working in any role
  
• Add team to wage negotiation window and make window scalable

Fixes

• Wrong amount of copies set to print when using percentage in project management options
  
• Game could break when updating print job list

Alpha 9.10.8 fixes some bugs in the print job list.

• Added colors back to print deal labels

Fixes

• Print job buttons were applied to all jobs
  
• Hire score column was in currency rather than percentage
  
• Loan total amount column was incorrect

Alpha 9.10.6 fixes loan window.

• Employees will have even less of a negative impact on quality when working on features they are not good with, depending on their overall specialization level
  
• Refactor and extend listview functionality to allow for columns with custom objects and easier future maintenance
  
• Turn printing job card list into listview
  
• Remove team dev speed penalty and keep better track of employees working on software at any given time
  
• Show what action is being undo'ed when hovering over the undo button
  
• The printing limit feature should cancel print jobs, not suspend them
  
• Ability to auto start print jobs for project management
  
• Ability to skip OS port
  
• Writing % in project management copy automation should order using percentage of followers
  
• Rename project mangement
  
• Completely disabled loading old saves, as people would mistakenly think they were playable when the game attempted to load them

Fixes

• Subsidiary column not refreshing in Company window
  
• Game would break when filtering the wage negotiation list by employee request
  
• Sending an employee off to education while they were in a vehicle on the way to work would insta-educate them
  
• Removed possible chance to trigger spawn code when despawning
  
• SCM not being applied for art only contracts
  
• Short circuited logic in room propagation code would cause disconnects for central heating and AC in rare circumstances for very complex buildings
  
• Various other fixes

I'm still investigating an issue when merging/splitting rooms and then undoing. If you experience any issues in 9.10.4 after hitting the undo button, please send the save file using the in-game reporting tool and describe what you did, if possible.

• Ability to accept multiple deals
  
• OS port warning will no longer show up if there are no valid OSs to port to and will only ever show up once for each product

Fixes

• Splitting rooms had small chance to break game or just not work due to floating point error introduced in last patch
  
• Fix sales presentation with more days per month
  
• The game would not mark design work as finished if it had any 100% art specializations, which could halt project management work
  
• Late employee state updates could cause game to warn player about irrelevant employee issues
  
• Elevator highlight beam would turn green no matter what furniture was below or above it
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Optimized pre-simulation procedure

Alpha 9.10.3 fixes infinite loop in courier logic.

• Increase market recognition dropdown height and put on top
  
• Differentiate between beta and alpha for project management
  
• Est. units in project info panel
  
• Improve contract result presentation
  
• Employees will move away from furniture when it is assigned to someone else
  
• Selecting furniture which is assigned to someone will highlight those employees

Fixes

• Couriers would sometimes take too many boxes with more days per month
  
• Room segments on upper floors did not have shadows when viewing lower floors causing holes in building shadow
  
• Press releases would get released for cancelled design documents
  
• Navmesh triangles are sometimes overlapped causing zigzag paths
  
• Wrong height for door nodes in pathfinding system when loading save could make pathing unstable for upper floors
  
• Fixed marketing deals with more days per month
  
• Can build quarter turn stairs so close to wall that they break floor mesh
  
• Room segments were not being validated on clone allowing for things like cased opening to the outside and eventually breaking game
  
• Workitem scrollbar wasn't toggling correctly
  
• Vacation range was not carried over when renaming team
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Optimization work for employee logic and noise calculations

The crash issue is still present, however rare, I suspect they are caused by outdated drivers. I'm including some debug info in this release, if it doesn't uncover any other crash issues, I'll release alpha 9 officially as is.



Changes

• Added left and right, half and quarter turned staircases
  
• Added option to auto-configure graphics settings
  
• Updated performance impact label for SSAA and More shadows to be clearer
  
• Added default graphics settings
  
• Info for active deals in deal window

Fixes

• Server wiring could cause endless loop crash in rare cases
  
• Bus was not being filled optimally
  
• More workshop upload error handling
  
• Various other fixes

Alpha 9.10.14 includes bug fixes. Final release is imminent, as long as no critical bugs are reported. I know I say this every time and then a critical bug is reported, but there haven't been any for the last couple of patches.

Alpha 9.10.13 is a hotfix for game sometimes breaking when cancelling or releasing a product.

Alpha 9.10.12 includes a bunch of bug fixes.

Alpha 9.10.11 fixes undoing a split either not working or causing the game to break.

Alpha 9.10.10 includes a bunch of bug fixes.

• The development info window now uses fractions when counting programmers and artists to correctly show employees working in any role
  
• Add team to wage negotiation window and make window scalable

Fixes

• Wrong amount of copies set to print when using percentage in project management options
  
• Game could break when updating print job list

Alpha 9.10.8 fixes some bugs in the print job list.

• Added colors back to print deal labels

Fixes

• Print job buttons were applied to all jobs
  
• Hire score column was in currency rather than percentage
  
• Loan total amount column was incorrect

Alpha 9.10.6 fixes loan window.

• Employees will have even less of a negative impact on quality when working on features they are not good with, depending on their overall specialization level
  
• Refactor and extend listview functionality to allow for columns with custom objects and easier future maintenance
  
• Turn printing job card list into listview
  
• Remove team dev speed penalty and keep better track of employees working on software at any given time
  
• Show what action is being undo'ed when hovering over the undo button
  
• The printing limit feature should cancel print jobs, not suspend them
  
• Ability to auto start print jobs for project management
  
• Ability to skip OS port
  
• Writing % in project management copy automation should order using percentage of followers
  
• Rename project mangement
  
• Completely disabled loading old saves, as people would mistakenly think they were playable when the game attempted to load them

Fixes

• Subsidiary column not refreshing in Company window
  
• Game would break when filtering the wage negotiation list by employee request
  
• Sending an employee off to education while they were in a vehicle on the way to work would insta-educate them
  
• Removed possible chance to trigger spawn code when despawning
  
• SCM not being applied for art only contracts
  
• Short circuited logic in room propagation code would cause disconnects for central heating and AC in rare circumstances for very complex buildings
  
• Various other fixes

I'm still investigating an issue when merging/splitting rooms and then undoing. If you experience any issues in 9.10.4 after hitting the undo button, please send the save file using the in-game reporting tool and describe what you did, if possible.

• Ability to accept multiple deals
  
• OS port warning will no longer show up if there are no valid OSs to port to and will only ever show up once for each product

Fixes

• Splitting rooms had small chance to break game or just not work due to floating point error introduced in last patch
  
• Fix sales presentation with more days per month
  
• The game would not mark design work as finished if it had any 100% art specializations, which could halt project management work
  
• Late employee state updates could cause game to warn player about irrelevant employee issues
  
• Elevator highlight beam would turn green no matter what furniture was below or above it
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Optimized pre-simulation procedure

Alpha 9.10.3 fixes infinite loop in courier logic.

• Increase market recognition dropdown height and put on top
  
• Differentiate between beta and alpha for project management
  
• Est. units in project info panel
  
• Improve contract result presentation
  
• Employees will move away from furniture when it is assigned to someone else
  
• Selecting furniture which is assigned to someone will highlight those employees

Fixes

• Couriers would sometimes take too many boxes with more days per month
  
• Room segments on upper floors did not have shadows when viewing lower floors causing holes in building shadow
  
• Press releases would get released for cancelled design documents
  
• Navmesh triangles are sometimes overlapped causing zigzag paths
  
• Wrong height for door nodes in pathfinding system when loading save could make pathing unstable for upper floors
  
• Fixed marketing deals with more days per month
  
• Can build quarter turn stairs so close to wall that they break floor mesh
  
• Room segments were not being validated on clone allowing for things like cased opening to the outside and eventually breaking game
  
• Workitem scrollbar wasn't toggling correctly
  
• Vacation range was not carried over when renaming team
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Optimization work for employee logic and noise calculations

The crash issue is still present, however rare, I suspect they are caused by outdated drivers. I'm including some debug info in this release, if it doesn't uncover any other crash issues, I'll release alpha 9 officially as is.



Changes

• Added left and right, half and quarter turned staircases
  
• Added option to auto-configure graphics settings
  
• Updated performance impact label for SSAA and More shadows to be clearer
  
• Added default graphics settings
  
• Info for active deals in deal window

Fixes

• Server wiring could cause endless loop crash in rare cases
  
• Bus was not being filled optimally
  
• More workshop upload error handling
  
• Various other fixes

I had an accident with a knife and my left thumb, nothing major, but programming is going to slow down for a while.

• Remove low skill warning when result is negligible

Fixes

• Removed deprecated Unity particle code to try and fix crash issues
  
• Ground level navmesh generation could cause entrances to be shut off without warning in rare cases
  
• Could build road while in basement
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Cache printing job to product binding to avoid lag when a lot of print jobs are active with hard limits

• Synchronize chair and computer assignments, assignment should follow computer when moving
  
• Offline OSX version now puts all data in "user/Library/Application Support/unity.Coredumping.Software Inc" to avoid permission issues, make sure to move all previous data there when you update
  
• Don't warn about no OS support if there are no viable OSs left to port to or porting is underway

Fixes

• Changing team names bugs dev team in project management and doesn't refresh work assignments
  
• In-game reporting window wouldn't attach latest autosave if available
  
• Room segments not at correct height when cloning rooms above ground level
  
• Cubicles would get negative scale when placed at odd angles against walls possibly causing crashes down the line
  
• Employees would take vacation one month early, depending on when they were off
  
• Various other fixes

I would've pushed alpha 9 officially by now, but I've seen a big increase in crashes lately, which I hadn't seen because the crash reporting system was broken up until now. I've updated Unity in hopes that this issue has been fixed, but it is currently out of my hands.

• Updated Unity to 5.5.4p1 for crash fix
  
• Limitation of time skipping when bankrupt has been cut down to 3 hours before deadline

Fixes

• Clicking cancel when updating a workshop item would decouple files from workshop item disabling updates permanently
  
• Undoing after splitting a room which caused a staircase to be destroyed would bug game
  
• Serializable vector would generate random hashcodes causing save game issues in rare cases
  
• Various other fixes

• Changed how the topbar barchart represents cashflow
  
• Difficulty should change how much timing impacts pre-marketing
  
• Added percentage to product unit barchart tooltip

Fixes

• Review score aggregate would tend to cap at 9.5
  
• Bug when placing room up against room causing wall objects to be deleted and then undoing
  
• Deleting room up against room with a window or door, added extra doors or windows when undoing, which could break game
  
• Objects deleted from changing fence style couldn't be recovered from undo (not applicable in vanilla game)
  
• Wall objects deleted due to no longer being on a valid wall (exterior or interior, outdoor or indoor) couldn't be recovered from undo
  
• Game wouldn't allow transactions with a negative bank balance even if the amount was zero
  
• Bug when having the wall delete tool open on a wall and clicking undo
  
• Various other fixes

Alpha 9.9.7 fixes room split bug and some undo bugs.

Alpha 9.9.6 is a small hotfix.

• Quality degrade warning should take into account that the most skilled employees might not be adding to quality right this second
  
• Change contract progress label from x - y to x out of y

Fixes

• Undoing deletion of wall objects, windows or doors after merging and splitting rooms had chance to break game
  
• Next print countdown when selecting printer was wrong
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Simplified new employee hitbox, as it were causing huge slowdowns from physics updates with more than a few employees/staff in game (Should see huge FPS increases across all platforms)
  
• Disabled hitbox when employee is not visible
  
• Employee arrival times are now only updated at most once per in-game minute

• Ability to replace wall furniture

Fixes

• Undoing room deletion was carried out top-down making the game not create them due to lack of support
  
• Undoing a merge made on a different floor than the current one would place new room on current floor
  
• Undoing moving wall furniture didn't work properly
  
• Print priority sliders weren't refreshed when loading save
  
• Various other fixes

• Made employee window scalable
  
• Undo furniture replacements
  
• Moved undo button
  
• Undo resets at end of day to minimize abuse
  
• Cooks will now walk to unassigned canteens to serve food if necessary
  
• Added personality localizations and fixed "Please wait" panels

Fixes

• Fixed undoing staircase deletion
  
• Selling furniture and undoing could bug game due to furniture being placed back in wrong order
  
• Deleting server farm would not add all its processes to the unsupported list
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Replace dot bar used for personalities with manual Graphics rendering
  
• Fixed legacy plot expansion code

Pushed update for Linux that fixes the refusing to launch bug.

Alpha 9.9.2 fixes

• Bug when deleting chair and PC at the same time
  
• Potential fix for end of day crash on computers with specific graphics card drivers
  
• There were no cap on initial funding for subsidiaries
  
• Various other fixes

I've decided to hold out on the discount feature indefinitely and to delay controlling subsidiary releases until alpha 10. I've decided on this, as I want to get moving on alpha 10. Alpha 9 has already taken too long. Changing existing mechanics takes a lot longer than adding new ones and I've been anxious about the response to the gameplay changes introduced in alpha 9.

To make up for not getting discounts and subsidiary control in alpha 9, I've introduced the long awaited Undo button in build mode. When I'm positive the undo button is stable, I'll release alpha 9 officially and move on to alpha 10. In the meantime, the undo button will auto save every time it's clicked with a 5 second cool down, to make sure your game can be recovered.

Changes

• Ability to undo in build mode
  
• Delete walls between rooms as alternative to right click and merge
  
• Added names to staff list and ability to assign rooms to staff using a list
  
• Updated Steamworks SDK
  
• Updated to Unity 5.5.4f1

Fixes

• Fixed bugs relating to cooks
  
• Company filter gets stuck for all releases list
  
• Various other fixes

I had an accident with a knife and my left thumb, nothing major, but programming is going to slow down for a while.

• Remove low skill warning when result is negligible

Fixes

• Removed deprecated Unity particle code to try and fix crash issues
  
• Ground level navmesh generation could cause entrances to be shut off without warning in rare cases
  
• Could build road while in basement
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Cache printing job to product binding to avoid lag when a lot of print jobs are active with hard limits

• Synchronize chair and computer assignments, assignment should follow computer when moving
  
• Offline OSX version now puts all data in "user/Library/Application Support/unity.Coredumping.Software Inc" to avoid permission issues, make sure to move all previous data there when you update
  
• Don't warn about no OS support if there are no viable OSs left to port to or porting is underway

Fixes

• Changing team names bugs dev team in project management and doesn't refresh work assignments
  
• In-game reporting window wouldn't attach latest autosave if available
  
• Room segments not at correct height when cloning rooms above ground level
  
• Cubicles would get negative scale when placed at odd angles against walls possibly causing crashes down the line
  
• Employees would take vacation one month early, depending on when they were off
  
• Various other fixes

I would've pushed alpha 9 officially by now, but I've seen a big increase in crashes lately, which I hadn't seen because the crash reporting system was broken up until now. I've updated Unity in hopes that this issue has been fixed, but it is currently out of my hands.

• Updated Unity to 5.5.4p1 for crash fix
  
• Limitation of time skipping when bankrupt has been cut down to 3 hours before deadline

Fixes

• Clicking cancel when updating a workshop item would decouple files from workshop item disabling updates permanently
  
• Undoing after splitting a room which caused a staircase to be destroyed would bug game
  
• Serializable vector would generate random hashcodes causing save game issues in rare cases
  
• Various other fixes

• Changed how the topbar barchart represents cashflow
  
• Difficulty should change how much timing impacts pre-marketing
  
• Added percentage to product unit barchart tooltip

Fixes

• Review score aggregate would tend to cap at 9.5
  
• Bug when placing room up against room causing wall objects to be deleted and then undoing
  
• Deleting room up against room with a window or door, added extra doors or windows when undoing, which could break game
  
• Objects deleted from changing fence style couldn't be recovered from undo (not applicable in vanilla game)
  
• Wall objects deleted due to no longer being on a valid wall (exterior or interior, outdoor or indoor) couldn't be recovered from undo
  
• Game wouldn't allow transactions with a negative bank balance even if the amount was zero
  
• Bug when having the wall delete tool open on a wall and clicking undo
  
• Various other fixes

Alpha 9.9.7 fixes room split bug and some undo bugs.

Alpha 9.9.6 is a small hotfix.

• Quality degrade warning should take into account that the most skilled employees might not be adding to quality right this second
  
• Change contract progress label from x - y to x out of y

Fixes

• Undoing deletion of wall objects, windows or doors after merging and splitting rooms had chance to break game
  
• Next print countdown when selecting printer was wrong
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Simplified new employee hitbox, as it were causing huge slowdowns from physics updates with more than a few employees/staff in game (Should see huge FPS increases across all platforms)
  
• Disabled hitbox when employee is not visible
  
• Employee arrival times are now only updated at most once per in-game minute

• Ability to replace wall furniture

Fixes

• Undoing room deletion was carried out top-down making the game not create them due to lack of support
  
• Undoing a merge made on a different floor than the current one would place new room on current floor
  
• Undoing moving wall furniture didn't work properly
  
• Print priority sliders weren't refreshed when loading save
  
• Various other fixes

• Made employee window scalable
  
• Undo furniture replacements
  
• Moved undo button
  
• Undo resets at end of day to minimize abuse
  
• Cooks will now walk to unassigned canteens to serve food if necessary
  
• Added personality localizations and fixed "Please wait" panels

Fixes

• Fixed undoing staircase deletion
  
• Selling furniture and undoing could bug game due to furniture being placed back in wrong order
  
• Deleting server farm would not add all its processes to the unsupported list
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Replace dot bar used for personalities with manual Graphics rendering
  
• Fixed legacy plot expansion code

Pushed update for Linux that fixes the refusing to launch bug.

Alpha 9.9.2 fixes

• Bug when deleting chair and PC at the same time
  
• Potential fix for end of day crash on computers with specific graphics card drivers
  
• There were no cap on initial funding for subsidiaries
  
• Various other fixes

I've decided to hold out on the discount feature indefinitely and to delay controlling subsidiary releases until alpha 10. I've decided on this, as I want to get moving on alpha 10. Alpha 9 has already taken too long. Changing existing mechanics takes a lot longer than adding new ones and I've been anxious about the response to the gameplay changes introduced in alpha 9.

To make up for not getting discounts and subsidiary control in alpha 9, I've introduced the long awaited Undo button in build mode. When I'm positive the undo button is stable, I'll release alpha 9 officially and move on to alpha 10. In the meantime, the undo button will auto save every time it's clicked with a 5 second cool down, to make sure your game can be recovered.

Changes

• Ability to undo in build mode
  
• Delete walls between rooms as alternative to right click and merge
  
• Added names to staff list and ability to assign rooms to staff using a list
  
• Updated Steamworks SDK
  
• Updated to Unity 5.5.4f1

Fixes

• Fixed bugs relating to cooks
  
• Company filter gets stuck for all releases list
  
• Various other fixes

Just wanted to note that I have not dumbed down gameplay in this update, the changes to the alpha phase are mostly superficial.

Alpha 9.8.2 fixes

• Searching when filtering column would break game
  
• Bug in how patents were transferred from subsidiary

I've been considering whether to skip alpha 9 completely and move straight on to alpha 10, as the feedback has been kind of mixed and I don't want to give a bad impression for first-time players. I've decided to stay with alpha 9 and do one last overhaul of the alpha phase by making code and art progress easier to read using a small generic number, rather than the "lines of code" metric, and putting an estimate of the final value in the design document window.

I want to stress that having a progress bar no longer makes any sense, as the underlying quality of a product can no longer be condensed into a single number without being very misleading, and it would ultimately make the game more confusing.

Changes

• Switched to code/art units and added estimate in design document (all current contracts will fail)
  
• Made alpha phase endless, where code quality will very slowly decrease when being over developed
  
• Added ability to filter lists by column values
  
• Add the (Any) indication to leader role labels
  
• Disable confirmation dialogs option
  
• Task type filter now shows everything when all toggles are off, which they are by default
  
• Running out of company names will no longer result in an error but will be logged
  
• Ability to instantly release products using modded software from console
  
• Add in-dev OS dependency warning

Fixes

• Newspaper will not mention lack of potential sales for new companies, since it's relative
  
• In-house products should not count towards sequel bonus
  
• Failed steam workshop mods will now show real name in bug report and a list of mods that failed to load are given in the options window
  
• Mod loading code wouldn't note software type name in error message when failing to parse XML
  
• Various other fixes

Just wanted to note that I have not dumbed down gameplay in this update, the changes to the alpha phase are mostly superficial.

Alpha 9.8.2 fixes

• Searching when filtering column would break game
  
• Bug in how patents were transferred from subsidiary

I've been considering whether to skip alpha 9 completely and move straight on to alpha 10, as the feedback has been kind of mixed and I don't want to give a bad impression for first-time players. I've decided to stay with alpha 9 and do one last overhaul of the alpha phase by making code and art progress easier to read using a small generic number, rather than the "lines of code" metric, and putting an estimate of the final value in the design document window.

I want to stress that having a progress bar no longer makes any sense, as the underlying quality of a product can no longer be condensed into a single number without being very misleading, and it would ultimately make the game more confusing.

Changes

• Switched to code/art units and added estimate in design document (all current contracts will fail)
  
• Made alpha phase endless, where code quality will very slowly decrease when being over developed
  
• Added ability to filter lists by column values
  
• Add the (Any) indication to leader role labels
  
• Disable confirmation dialogs option
  
• Task type filter now shows everything when all toggles are off, which they are by default
  
• Running out of company names will no longer result in an error but will be logged
  
• Ability to instantly release products using modded software from console
  
• Add in-dev OS dependency warning

Fixes

• Newspaper will not mention lack of potential sales for new companies, since it's relative
  
• In-house products should not count towards sequel bonus
  
• Failed steam workshop mods will now show real name in bug report and a list of mods that failed to load are given in the options window
  
• Mod loading code wouldn't note software type name in error message when failing to parse XML
  
• Various other fixes

Alpha 9.7.6 fixes a bug when looking at an employee portrait directly after loading a game and a rare bug in the navmesh generation code.

• Improved blueprint and employee thumbnails
  
• The arrival time textbox in the staff window now controls arrival time of new hires
  
• Nerf printing deals again
  
• Remember chosen support team
  
• Added port warning when sales have hit OS audience reach

Fixes

• Fixed reflection shader breaking game on Linux and OSX
  
• Disable employee bladder and hunger when they are on their way home
  
• Save file size wasn't updated immediately
  
• Fixed path weighting not being consistent in both directions making employees take detours in some cases
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Paths between doors are now cached to reduce significant stress from TA* pathfinding
  
• Improved fetching room edges, which greatly improves room cloning time among other things
  
• Bug in selection code could cause big slowdown with many employees selected
  
• Improved navmesh generation time and object avoidance

Alpha 9.7.4 fixes trees staying when building rooms.
Alpha 9.7.3 fixes not being able to load new saves.
Alpha 9.7.2 fixes mod loading and marketing warnings on contract work.

Sorry it took so long. I'm hoping to release alpha 9 officially soon, however I'm still not completely confident in how the new mechanics are presented.

Changes

• Furniture status now degrades while time is being skipped, this will greatly increase repairs needed for some furniture(PCs and servers should be the same)
  
• Created 2 new product printers and added SFX
  
• Courier now has box capacity instead of product capacity, so copy printing can scale
  
• Added courier animation
  
• Show current shipping capacity in distribution window
  
• Shift+x to close active window
  
• Game should remember its auto save file and not overwrite existing auto saves
  
• Ctrl+S should save to current save file if any, otherwise autosave
  
• Updated marketing tutorial
  
• Turned down noise level of computers
  
• Don't keep products in design for project management when they are done and leader doesn't have any action points, just queue them up for dev
  
• -OffsetWindow can be used to make multi monitor work on Windows if window is not centered
  
• Change vacation end to range with number instead of month
  
• Save past peer reviews
  
• Toggle to see assigned furniture
  
• Balanced post-marketing effort needed to compete
  
• Balanced hosting, printing and marketing deals (Active hosting deals from old saves will give too much money)
  
• Deal filter
  
• Improved all colliders to make selection more accurate, especially for employees
  
• Print deal failure consequence should be to pay half of remaining copies and 5% reputation hit depending on severity
  
• Ability to create team from team selection window
  
• Furniture and blueprint thumbnail generation improved
  
• Added crunch time for teams which makes employees work faster at a cost, excluding founder
  
• List of active distribution deals in distribution window
  
• Added follower warning popup to projects promoted to alpha
  
• Work item buttons can blink red to help the player take action
  
• You can now control name generation for individual company types in mods using the NameGen tag
  
• HR is enabled by default for teams with an HR educated leader and HR options no longer do anything by default (previous saves need to enable wage and complaint handling manually)
  
• You can now see which products your receive or lose royalties from in the finance window
  
• Changed style of snap point indicators when placing furniture
  
• Updated to Unity 5.5.3p3 to get profiler working

Fixes

• Quality decline warning didn't account for leaders working any role
  
• Fixed navmesh generation near pallets and tables which could cause an entire room to become unreachable
  
• Audio visualization would crash graphics card on DirectX 9
  
• Fixed employee base skill increase based on work being done
  
• Team vacation end month wasn't saved
  
• Fixed main menu news not showing
  
• Employees taking double vacations
  
• Game would break completely in main menu if settings file was locked
  
• Project management wasn't hyping in dev phase
  
• HR now forces education instantly
  
• Employees would repeatedly be trained for HR by HR if that was the last education chosen by the player
  
• Salaries weren't calculated for employees on vacation or education
  
• Can't move furniture when bankrupt
  
• Wall lowering affected wall segments on lower floors
  
• Employees wouldn't eat at tables with serving trays on it
  
• Destroying a room would sometimes fail to reset people in it making them stuck in the air
  
• Various other fixes

Alpha 9.7.6 fixes a bug when looking at an employee portrait directly after loading a game and a rare bug in the navmesh generation code.

• Improved blueprint and employee thumbnails
  
• The arrival time textbox in the staff window now controls arrival time of new hires
  
• Nerf printing deals again
  
• Remember chosen support team
  
• Added port warning when sales have hit OS audience reach

Fixes

• Fixed reflection shader breaking game on Linux and OSX
  
• Disable employee bladder and hunger when they are on their way home
  
• Save file size wasn't updated immediately
  
• Fixed path weighting not being consistent in both directions making employees take detours in some cases
  
• Various other fixes

Optimizations

• Paths between doors are now cached to reduce significant stress from TA* pathfinding
  
• Improved fetching room edges, which greatly improves room cloning time among other things
  
• Bug in selection code could cause big slowdown with many employees selected
  
• Improved navmesh generation time and object avoidance

Alpha 9.7.4 fixes trees staying when building rooms.
Alpha 9.7.3 fixes not being able to load new saves.
Alpha 9.7.2 fixes mod loading and marketing warnings on contract work.

Sorry it took so long. I'm hoping to release alpha 9 officially soon, however I'm still not completely confident in how the new mechanics are presented.

Changes

• Furniture status now degrades while time is being skipped, this will greatly increase repairs needed for some furniture(PCs and servers should be the same)
  
• Created 2 new product printers and added SFX
  
• Courier now has box capacity instead of product capacity, so copy printing can scale
  
• Added courier animation
  
• Show current shipping capacity in distribution window
  
• Shift+x to close active window
  
• Game should remember its auto save file and not overwrite existing auto saves
  
• Ctrl+S should save to current save file if any, otherwise autosave
  
• Updated marketing tutorial
  
• Turned down noise level of computers
  
• Don't keep products in design for project management when they are done and leader doesn't have any action points, just queue them up for dev
  
• -OffsetWindow can be used to make multi monitor work on Windows if window is not centered
  
• Change vacation end to range with number instead of month
  
• Save past peer reviews
  
• Toggle to see assigned furniture
  
• Balanced post-marketing effort needed to compete
  
• Balanced hosting, printing and marketing deals (Active hosting deals from old saves will give too much money)
  
• Deal filter
  
• Improved all colliders to make selection more accurate, especially for employees
  
• Print deal failure consequence should be to pay half of remaining copies and 5% reputation hit depending on severity
  
• Ability to create team from team selection window
  
• Furniture and blueprint thumbnail generation improved
  
• Added crunch time for teams which makes employees work faster at a cost, excluding founder
  
• List of active distribution deals in distribution window
  
• Added follower warning popup to projects promoted to alpha
  
• Work item buttons can blink red to help the player take action
  
• You can now control name generation for individual company types in mods using the NameGen tag
  
• HR is enabled by default for teams with an HR educated leader and HR options no longer do anything by default (previous saves need to enable wage and complaint handling manually)
  
• You can now see which products your receive or lose royalties from in the finance window
  
• Changed style of snap point indicators when placing furniture
  
• Updated to Unity 5.5.3p3 to get profiler working

Fixes

• Quality decline warning didn't account for leaders working any role
  
• Fixed navmesh generation near pallets and tables which could cause an entire room to become unreachable
  
• Audio visualization would crash graphics card on DirectX 9
  
• Fixed employee base skill increase based on work being done
  
• Team vacation end month wasn't saved
  
• Fixed main menu news not showing
  
• Employees taking double vacations
  
• Game would break completely in main menu if settings file was locked
  
• Project management wasn't hyping in dev phase
  
• HR now forces education instantly
  
• Employees would repeatedly be trained for HR by HR if that was the last education chosen by the player
  
• Salaries weren't calculated for employees on vacation or education
  
• Can't move furniture when bankrupt
  
• Wall lowering affected wall segments on lower floors
  
• Employees wouldn't eat at tables with serving trays on it
  
• Destroying a room would sometimes fail to reset people in it making them stuck in the air
  
• Various other fixes