This week I let the partially-implemented robot hacking system simmer for a while to instead focus on other developments.


First up is a rather common feature for classic roguelikes, the ability to tag items with player-specified text as a memory aid. Tagging is usually a part of the item identification process, and due to the nature of Cogmind's items and ID system it's almost never useful, hence the absence of a tagging feature all these years. However there are a handful of special cases towards the end of the game where you may know what a particular unidentified item is (based on where you found it) but not want to immediately attach-ID it.

Here are a couple silly examples of tagging inventory items.



And here's a more realistic use (albeit with a silly tag), also demonstrating how the tag appears in the item info window itself.



I'm sure this feature could also be used for just fun screenshots and jokes, too ;)


There are already a ton of ways to get data directly from Cogmind, or indirectly through the wiki or about leaderboard player performance, but one of the external pieces of data we don't yet have is robot stats.

I certainly don't want to make players record individual data points from the game to populate the wiki, so for that and other uses I've added a command line option that automatically generates a CSV file containing all the robot data. The item gallery CSV export has already been used to generate the wiki's item pages, but there's been no corresponding feature for robots, until now :)

Here's a sample excerpt of the export, which in its entirety includes 179 lines and over 8,000 data fields o_O



Obviously there are going to be massive spoilers in the complete file, but people who do this will be aware of that fact :P

Again, you don't need any of this to play since object data is available in game, but some players like to have it around as an external reference.

In other data news, we have yet another performance analysis vector, this time from PlasticHeart who's set up a page that shares graphs describing peak state part occurrences among winners, allowing you to more easily see what they were using at their strongest before going on to win.

For example here are the most often equipped utilities--you can see the importance of storage!



The contents will naturally be skewed towards flight in general, because they can pull off wins much more quickly :P (It'd be interesting to compare this data set to another that only takes each player's highest scoring win to see if/what is different.). Flight players may not use so many Lrg. Storage Units, but they'll rank extra high here because combat players often use several at once!

The page is not yet automated, but is based on recent Beta 6 scores.

Note there are somewhat bigger spoilers in other graph categories in terms of item types you might see in the late game!


One of my main Cogmind dev tools, which I started releasing freely five years ago, has been updated. You can read details in the REXPaint 1.04 release notes.

People have been making cool art, maps, mockups and all sorts of things with it...



On that note, if you've dreamed of making a roguelike of your own and need some extra motivation/resources/structure, that event I mentioned last week has begun! Check out the first week of the tutorial/code-along series for beginners and experts alike.

Just think, this can happen to you just like it happened to me years ago when I first got into this :P




Although I didn't work on hacking this week, it's about time to reveal some more details about how this new system will work, to avoid rampant speculation based on just the tidbits I've been handing out so far :P

First a bit of history.

Back in the pre-Alpha days (2015 and earlier), robot hacking was never fully realized, since ideally it would be designed to fit in with all the other systems but there had really been almost no playtesting since the 7DRL and three quarters of the world had yet to be created, so there wasn't much to go on at the time. Rather than build up something large right away, a better long-term approach would be to just add a smaller functional placeholder that could be tweaked or possibly replaced when necessary as the rest of the game took shape.

So then, as now in Beta 6, there were just a handful of general options running the spectrum from "temporarily disable" to "permanent assimilation." As it was clearly an underdeveloped system tangential to everything else going on, Alpha players almost entirely ignored robot hacking for a long while, exploring other mechanics instead.

Then came late Alpha, and it was discovered that a Cogmind could stack Hackware like there's no tomorrow and literally own anything in the complex, especially later in a run. Here's an example of this type of build, in a screenshot shared by zxc:



A +247% to hacking and the ability to hack robots around corners before they even know you're there? That sounds mighty OP xD (zxc used such a build in early 2017 to achieve the highest ever Cogmind score, a record which still stands to this day)

Certainly it takes skill to set up, but roguelikes should technically get more challenging as a run progresses, not easier, and that's generally how Cogmind works except when it came to strategies abusing this mechanic :P

Flight hackers had their fun with magic wands for a while, then of course I had to nerf it, explaining the diminishing returns of high-level robot hacking over the length of a run as a result of the system adapting its defenses. That said, even the nerf itself was just a temporary band-aid, because clearly much bigger changes were necessary as part of a new system, and that point would be coming in late Beta given that all the other systems were pretty much done.

And that's where we are now, preparing to welcome the last major system. ("last" on the list, but don't worry I have more secrets planned, plus of course there's always this which might happen :D)

I've been collecting and mulling over ideas for how to revamp the robot hacking system for more than a year now. There were quite a few reasonable possibilities to think through, but also a lot of potential pitfalls! Devs are unlikely to get a system absolutely perfect the first time, but as long as it has a solid foundation it can be tweaked and expanded without too much trouble if necessary. So this foundation is extra important. I've never spent this long designing a single system before (17 hours just designing!), and it's gone through lots of iterations and refinements (all on paper) as it starts to look both relatively balanced and interesting.

It's also worth pointing out that I'm very glad I didn't move on this system earlier, or try to have a complete extensive system available from Alpha 1. It would have had a negative, limiting impact on other developments, and much about the current state of Cogmind's world and content has enabled me to make smarter choices about how to best integrate robot hacking into it all, be it the tactics, strategy, or lore. In short, doing this earlier would've meant more wasted effort and less pleasing results.

So what is this new system already?!

Well, last time I showed you that UI animation, and that's where it all begins. With this machine.



Some of you noticed a certain "RIF Installer" in the Scan window of that earlier gif, and this is what it looks like. Every garrison will now contain one of these, and it's your choice whether to use it and deal with the consequences, and of course take advantage of the benefits!

You'll only have to do it once, and the first garrison appears on -8, so that would be your earliest opportunity, though you can do it at any time. You still get all the other benefits of a garrison on top of that, and there will be another advantage particular to robot hackers that we'll get to later.

RIF stands for "Relay Interface Framework," and with that you'll theoretically have access to dozens of ways to manipulate other robots via the Complex-wide garrison relay network. Like a number of other major strategic decisions, however, this comes with a drawback as it will prevent you from forming certain... alliances ;)

Such is the cost of effectively linking up with 0b10 to facilitate access to their systems. And from this point you can probably infer that the new robot hacking system only works on Unaware! This is just the first of several limiting factors--robot hacking will be quite useful, but not a panacea. It'll be what an interesting system should be: very effective when used creatively, but also challenging you to create manageable situations to begin with. Unlike the Alpha approach of "it's an enemy, overload/assimilate it!!!" there will be many unique encounters and different methods of approaching each. As with other strategies, planning ahead will be very beneficial, and to me that also really fits the theme of a robot hacker, whether a stealth hacker or combat hacker or anything in between.

Planning ahead will also be facilitated by the fact that the new system will be removing much of the RNG from robot hacking :D

But more on that and other details next time--there's still tons more to explain, and this is a good stopping point.

Cogmind is currently 10% off through July 5th, both on Steam and DRM-free from the site. As mentioned before, unless I get some kind of a deal from Valve (unlikely to happen again) there aren't any plans to discount by more than 10% during Early Access, which could go on for quite a while because the list of potential content is basically endless xD

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

The IDE's wait is over! I'm now back to real coding again. With the new robot hacking system fully designed, this week it was time to actually start building it all.

Last time I shared an initial mockup of the UI layout, which has since changed significantly. It's getting closer to what it'll probably look like, and I noticed it was kinda fun to see how the idea was changing as I played with it, so here it is as a time lapse:



That's still just a mockup--more changes are likely before I piece that bit together. (Also note that as a mockup, the contents themselves will not fully make sense and aren't quite realistic, so don't try to read too much into it :P)

I haven't needed the UI yet since none of the hacks themselves have been implemented, but the system's foundation is getting pretty solid. First up was adding the new mechanics for getting access to robot hacks in the first place. I'll be covering the system and its design in more detail later on, but know that you'll not have access to most hacks unless you do... this first:



You'll also need to collect this new type of hackware!



Still a long way to go before this collection of features is done, but it'll be worth it.

Seeing as I'm retiring the old robot hacking system, may as well share a shot of its spreadsheet calculations that I used to aid in its design some years ago:



This is common in design, to have spreadsheets where you can enter hypothetical values and see how they affect outcomes. I'm by no means a math whiz, but predictions like this make the testing and balance effort go so much more smoothly. Without something like this, grounding the design in too many guesses would be a recipe for wasted dev time!

The new spreadsheet I've already put together has a larger and more complex data set :P. It helped me set all the base values earlier this week--now I "just" have to code all those hacks...


Many of you are probably aware that the current robot hacking scheme includes a relatively easy command, PARSE, one that I was initially planning to remove under the new system.



I've decided to keep it, while adjusting and improving it at the same time to make it more useful.

It'll still basically open up an extra page of info about the target, and you'll still do it via Datajack, but it'll be both freely available and you'll be able to do it to almost any bot. So my question to you is whether or not there's anything in particular you might want out of this new PARSE data?

I already have a new mockup complete with some fresh ideas of my own that have convinced me it'll be worth keeping, but thought I'd bring it up to see if there's any other input before I work on that.


There has been some recent talk of putting Cogmind's lore into a markov chain generator to see what kinds of things could result, and although interested I didn't have any time to play with it myself. Then a couple days ago Raine did just that and shared some results with us. Pretty funny stuff...

It's fun guessing where each piece of this new "lore" originated.



That's some nice tech...



And this sounds like a different game entirely xD



Unfortunately some of the others, including some good ones, can't be shared without clearly spoiling parts of the game :P


Last year on r/RoguelikeDev we held our first annual "Tutorial Tuesday" event, a couple months of weekly assignments for building your own roguelike, along with a primary tutorial to guide complete beginners and also help provide structure for other devs using their own libraries and languages. There were lots of participants and it was a great success.

We're doing it again for 2018!



It starts next week, so if you want to try your hand at roguelike development and need that extra push to help you get started and build momentum, consider joining! It'll take just a day or less of your time each week, and by the end you'll have your own roguelike you can build on :D

Lots of other people will be doing the same steps during the same weeks, so there'll be other devs who can possibly help answer your questions if you have any, and obviously there's the motivation of working on a project alongside a bunch of other people. You can get help on the sub in the upcoming weekly threads, or more immediately via our Roguelikes Discord in the dev channels.

The schedule and more info can be found in the announcement.

If you don't have a preferred language or library, it'd be a good idea to get a head start on the first week by checking out the python tutorials linked last year. We'll be following a different libtcod tutorial this year, but you'll want to know some of the language first.

Note that libtcod is the library I first used when I began creating roguelikes years ago, and it makes things very easy for you, taking care of all the heavy lifting so you can focus on adding all your cool roguelike ideas :D

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

As per the roadmap, the next major feature is robot hacking, and I've finally reached the final stretch of the design phase. Just the design phase!? This is a huge system, and building it for both balance and fun on the first go is going to take some doing. I've already spent more time just designing the system than any other in the game. It's for the better, though--the design seems to be coming along well after all this refining... Soon it'll be time to put it into practice!

I don't have much to share for it yet, except for one of the latest mockups:



This is a rough WIP and could still change alot. (I haven't really spent much time delving into the UI aspect yet, just planning the underlying system and all its related mechanics and capabilities.)

Later I'll be writing a lot about this feature, but don't want to share too much too early--let's wait until things are more certain :P

In other features, a little glowing `@` marker will pop up to show the direction of Cogmind when offscreen.



No one asked for this, probably because the map will never hop around on its own without your explicit command (and there's also always the commands to recenter the view), but I can see it occasionally being helpful to know this. In particular while working on hacking ideas I saw one new potential situation where it could become useful, so put this system together yesterday.

And as someone who never uses the Evasion window (it's useful! just not the way I play), I needed someone else to remind me that it still contained a modifier for "Cloaking," even though Cloaking Devices were repurposed and based on the actual part name associated with that mechanic it should be called "Phasing," so that's fixed for Beta 7:



Note that as of this week over on our Roguelikes Discord we now have three #cogmind channels instead of two. There are just too many deep spoilers, too spoilery even for the regular hidden "spoiler" channel xD. This will allow people who don't want to unwittingly learn about all the extended end-game content to still have a place to talk freely about the many other branches.


I finally got a chance to update the online gallery for REXPaint, one of my main Cogmind dev tools. If you like Cogmind's aesthetic or other retro-ish art and games, you'll probably like what you see there :D

Some of the newer samples:




Having already done a number of Cogmind Beta 6 streams recently (still happy with that Pure Core challenge coming through with a win!) I switched over to do another POLYBOT-7 run, only my second so far... and won again! This time it was New Game+ mode, so harder than last time.



I did a little summary of that, including links to the videos if you're interested. (For those of you who haven't heard about it before, POLYBOT-7 is my free Cogmind spin-off project.)

I've done "so much" streaming this past month that I got invited to become a Twitch Affiliate. Hahaha... My channel is basically me playing the games I make. Now I just need more games xD. Hm, I've never streamed X@COM ;)

Honestly I don't plan to do a ton more streaming or change what I do--I basically stream in a more concentrated burst in the weeks after release, then rest the channel while putting as much time as I can into developing the next release. But hey as an Affiliate I guess we could get a custom emote!

If you'd like to read some more Cogmind-related material, this week for r/RoguelikeDev's latest FAQ Friday I wrote a bit about naming things. (There are a few small spoilers in there, but it mostly avoids spoilery material.)

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

GDPR updates--DONE!

Taxes--DONE!

Time to get busy with the stuff we all actually care about!

That said, there wasn't a ton of "proper" progress this week since I still had to catch up on personal chores neglected during Beta 6 development xD

Still plenty to share with you today...


Last time I reported that 87.9% of our 256 achievements had been earned by at least one player, and now that number is up to 91.0%. That leaves 23 achievements that haven't yet been earned by anyone, nearly half (11) of which are various types of wins. That set will naturally take a little while longer to complete since wins can require dedicated non-overlapping strategies. By comparison already 26 (70%) of the win-type achievements have been earned so far.

All but two of the remaining 23 are unhidden.

I should mention that among the unhidden ones, Executioner ("Evolve 7 weapon slots.") cannot actually be earned as you might expect due to a bug in the check. It is technically possible, but requires a special item used under the right conditions--kudos if you can figure that out before the achievement is properly fixed for Beta 7 ;) (Collateral Damage and Watch This! are also broken--you'll have to wait for Beta 7 for the fixed versions of these.)

Here's the full list of achievements no one has earned yet:

• Watch This! ~~ Sneak attack a Watcher and destroy it in one hit.
  
• Executioner ~~ Evolve 7 weapon slots.
  
• Cannon Specialist ~~ Destroy 100 hostiles with at least 90% of damage dealt by cannons.
  
• Explosive Specialist ~~ Destroy 100 hostiles with at least 90% of damage dealt by explosives.
  
• Pyromaniac ~~ Cause 20 hostiles to meltdown.
  
• Collateral Damage ~~ ???
  
• Curator ~~ Reach 100% gallery collection.
  
• Superachiever ~~ Earn 75% of achievements.
  
• Perfect Achiever ~~ Earn all other achievements.
  
• Gladiator ~~ Destroy 200 hostiles via melee.
  
• Desperate Times ~~ Enter a main complex map at -3 or above as a naked core with no inventory items, and find an exit (do not have to remain naked).
  
• Fearless ~~ Enter a Garrison with below 10% core integrity and survive it.
  
• MAIN.CPP ~~ ???
  
• Inspector Gadget ~~ Win while only evolving utility slots.
  
• Hardcore ~~ Win with 400 hostiles destroyed but no more than 4 utility slots.
  
• One Last FU ~~ Win after entering an Access garrison.
  
• Partners In Destruction ~~ Win fighting alongside the Warrior.
  
• The Little Core That Could ~~ Win without attaching any propulsion.
  
• Look Ma, No Swapping! ~~ Win the Fragile Parts challenge mode.
  
• Unstoppable ~~ Win the Gauntlet challenge mode.
  
• Stunt Win ~~ Win the Inhibited Evolution challenge mode.
  
• This Only Looks Like Junk ~~ Win the Scavenger challenge mode.
  
• Master Trapper ~~ Win the Trapped challenge mode.

As you can see, a number of of the win achievements also happen to be challenge modes, which will be easier to access once there's an in-game menu for them. Right now it's mostly long-time players who are going for those anyway (and they've already completed the hardest ones, so these others are just a case of when they want to win them).

Hardcore, One Last FU, and Partners In Destruction are probably the only three remaining achievements that are tougher and we won't see a lot of players accomplishing.

The following achievements have only been earned by a single player each:

• Guerrilla Style ~~ Trigger reprogrammed (or placed) traps on 30 hostiles.
  
• Minesweeper ~~ Extract 30 traps.
  
• I Wish There Was More ~~ Reach 100% lore collection.
  
• Shutout ~~ Seal, jam, or destroy all Garrison Access machines in Access.
  
• WMD ~~ Destroy 100 robots in a single turn.
  
• Most Wanted ~~ Trigger high security 4 times.
  
• Full Golem ~~ ???
  
• Traitor ~~ Kill Warlord in his base and escape.
  
• Mad Max ~~ Win with 200 hostiles destroyed and without attaching any propulsion except wheels.
  
• Grand Amoeba ~~ Win the Devolution challenge mode.
  
• Terminals Are For Geeks ~~ Win the Simple Hacker challenge mode.
  
• Super Mutant ~~ Win the Unstable Evolution challenge mode.

Again there are a few challenge modes since not many players have gotten around to trying those, but the majority are simply more difficult achievements.

All other achievements have been earned by at least two or more players.


Ape3000 has been expanding his wonderful leaderboard data (beyond the already wonderful graphs) to include global lifetime rankings across a number of categories:

• Achievement%
  
• Lore%
  
• Gallery%
  
• Time played (h)
  
• Number of wins
  
• Best speed run (turns)
  
• Best speed run (minutes)
  
• Lowest score win
  
• Best part rating
  
• Peak influence

For example:


There are also alternative versions that include only Beta scores, or only Beta 6.

Many thanks to Ape3000 for putting these together!


Since I haven't been doing fun stuff like designing and coding, in between other work I've managed to fit in more streaming than usual to take a break and try some things I haven't gotten to share on stream before.

Having already streamed a regular Beta 6 win a couple weeks ago, last week I went for a challenge run, the hardest one there is: Super Gauntlet. I died while approaching the late-game, but it was fun :D There's a summary with some images and YouTube links on the forums.

Here I jumped down a Chute because that's often a good idea :) (in this case alert was getting high after blowing up way too much stuff and having trouble locating an exit)


Hello and goodbye.


Then this week I streamed another challenge, Pure Core (no inventory allowed!), and won this one \o/. You can find the full summary on the forums, which also links to YouTube.

I can't show any of the later screenshots from this run because spoilers, but here's my drones finding some exits out of -6/Factory, although I didn't take these until I'd later identified them because I had a particular destination in mind and didn't want to get sidetracked considering I couldn't carry an inventory but was playing a combat build anyway! :P


Now that there are enough runs building up, and some are of a different type than others, I've split my YouTube channel into multiple playlists to help make it more obvious what's what.

I'll start to cut back on streaming as Beta 7 work gets underway in earnest now that all these other things are out of the way. (Although I'm thinking of doing another POLYBOT-7 stream soonish.)


Pimski has translated PlasticHeart's flight prep guide from Japanese, so if you're interested in how to get a flight build up and running, check that out! Certainly don't ask me, because I am a combat player even when it's a bad idea xD. That said, flight builds are generally an easier way to learn more about the mid/late-game, and how you'll probably get your first win if you haven't already.

Expert players have also been working together on a comprehensive "community guide" that covers all the branches and lots of content and strategies, so hopefully that will be out at some point as well.


So far I only have a few tiny things to share in terms of features for Beta 7...

Some very special parts cannot be repaired by Repair Stations, but you won't know that unless you remember the few rules involved, or actually try to repair it and the station says it's not possible. I've wanted to do something about this for a while, so I've found a way to fit that information into the UI as a new indicator (which is also described directly in the context help).



In an even more minor modification, the robot speed format now matches Cogmind's own format while in Tactical HUD mode, rather than always showing it as both percentage and in time units.



I've been planning out the next major feature to come, which is at this point mostly ready for the implementation stage, but there'll be no details on that for a while.

A slightly less minor thing: EA contacted me to say they'd like to put Cogmind on their platform (including Origin Access). EA sucks, but I dunno, I guess it could be good for publicity. Hard to say exactly what kind of benefits it might have since I doubt they'll give me any kind of real numbers to make a decision based on...

This is the third major company to contact me since the Steam release, but I'm still just plugging along by myself :P

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

There's been a fair amount of achieving going on in the past 10 days :)

Of our 256 achievements, so far all but 31 have been earned by at least one player. That's 87.9% of the total. At this point the highest achievement rate by individual players is around 66%.

Looking at the top of the global achievements list...



It's mostly what we'd expect, although worth pointing out it's kinda funny that The Most Popular Achievement will unlikely ever actually reach #1. Uninvited Guest in particular is an achievement that everyone will get on their first run, and technically speaking we'll always have new players joining who haven't yet finished a run to get the, um, "most popular" :P

Crack Shot and Storm Trooper are also both very common scenarios when just starting out (especially Storm Trooper among beginners who haven't yet learned how to maximize accuracy).

All these are pretty basic achievements though--all the really fun stuff is still a lot lower on the list as different players aim for different goals. We'll look at some of those another time.

I may also later add the global percentages to the in-game UI for players connected to Steam.

Speaking of achievements, remember that collage I made for the Beta 6 release? Just a fun gif related to that: To create the background I added a debug command in the game's console which creates a new window over everything and randomly fills it with achievement icons, automatically saving a whole bunch of screenshots that I could then pick from.



Trippy, eh? :D


As usual following a major release, I've collected a bunch of stats to share.



You can read all the details on the forums.

It'll be fun to look at achievement progress across the entirety of Beta 6 once the next release is out, but let's not get ahead of ourselves xD


Our community has been quite active lately! (And not necessarily tied to this particular release :P)

A group of expert players have begun collaborating on a sort of detailed "complete guide" to Cogmind. There's nothing to show yet, but it's taking shape. It's also going to be chock full of spoilers.

The spoiler-free "guide" I wrote, a.k.a. the 60-page manual, has also been reformatted to a very nice PDF version for Beta 6 by Phragmented.



It's available as both a standard PDF document with chapters, and a printable booklet. You can download both here.

For the community of Japanese players, PlasticHeart has shared with us his guide for preparing for a flight/hover run. He then even translated Valguris' quick guide to the early game (the original is a useful read if you are relatively new to the game). Cogmind itself doesn't support translations, but from what I've seen even having the manual translated has brought in new players from Japan.

There's been a fair number of players streaming this week, including... me :). I was going to stream last week but a household emergency put a stop to that, so this week it was finally time for some Beta 6. I streamed twice, a single run spread across two days, and won it. Just barely. In epic fashion. So it was definitely worth it :D. It got pretty slow at certain points with all the talking and strategizing, but we came out on top in the end. There's a full summary of part 1 and 2 on the forums, including links to YouTube.

zxc also spent a while streaming and uploaded his 701-turn speedrun to YouTube. Speedrunning is in vogue again now that there are a couple of achievements for it :P

Probably the community news with the biggest OMG factor is that Ape3000 has continued expanding and refining his wonderful player progression graphs yet further, and they now include everyone on the leaderboards! Some more samples:









There are over 20 graphs for each player. Check your own progress on the website. (Don't bother looking at mine, because unlike most players I don't migrate my data between versions and have always started with a fresh build each release :P)

As a reminder: If you don't want to upload your score data you can still create the graphs yourself if you can run the scripts found here.


Fortunately there's a ton to play with in Beta 6, because Beta 7 will probably take a while.

Lots to do with the new robot hacking system (still in planning stages), but there are also some external factors at play...

Rather than working on Cogmind, I've already had to spend much of my dev time this week dealing with the new GDPR thing coming out of the EU. This involved lots of research and subsequent updating of my website, forums, blog, mailing lists, etc... At least it's a nice initiative and a worthy cause.

Anyway, yay that's mostly done at this point, but next week I'll be consumed by... taxes.

As you can see the upcoming week is going to be pretty boring :/

For this reason I'm going to skip next week's SITREP and focus on getting these and other annoying chores out of the way before really focusing on the next release. I'll still be around in chat, though, and will almost certainly stream again before the next SITREP, so maybe I'll see you there :)

Cogmind made a Top 100 indie games list. There are so many good games out there now that these lists are pretty subjective, but hey I'm not gonna complain! (Sure has been a while since Cogmind had any coverage from any major news outlet, though xD)

Today also marks the third anniversary of Cogmind's public Early Access program! With other games this might not be something worth celebrating, implying that it's taking forever to finish the game, but Ive put in over 6,000 hours of work in that time, and although it would've been appropriate to launch 1.0 last year I decided not to. For the time being I'd rather just keep making major additions to the game for free, which makes more sense to do under EA rather than "full release." After all, traditional roguelikes that keep getting updates for a long time are great, and it's hard to stop working on this when there are so many more ideas and it's "only" been five years so far :P

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

Time to start achieving! While Beta 6 brings with it a ton of other improvements and tweaks, the big new thing is a large collection of achievements to earn, 256 of them spanning six categories. All players have equal access to the achievements system, regardless of whether or not on Steam. More info below!

• NEW: 256 achievements (available both on Steam and in offline/DRM-free versions)
  
• NEW: 35 new score sheet entries (total = 697)
  
• NEW: Achievement names and their icon appear over the map when earned (deactivate or change duration in advanced.cfg: achievementPopupDuration)
  
• NEW: Achievements earned reported in message log (toggle in advanced.cfg: showAchievementMessages)
  
• NEW: Achievements earned specifically at end of a run appear in new area to right of end game stats
  
• NEW: Achievements newly earned throughout a run listed towards end of score sheet
  
• NEW: Composite achievement percent listed among score sheet meta data and and scorehistory.txt
  
• NEW: Achievements browsing UI (contents sortable and filterable)
  
• NEW: Bidirectional automatic syncing between achievements in your local game meta data and Steam records
  
• NEW: Optimized startup time, reducing it by about one-third
  
• NEW: RTS-style map panning in true fullscreen mode, and new menu option for controlling speed
  
• NEW: Added to manual's Key Holding section a mention of holding "wait" key while waiting for a hostile
  
• NEW: Updated Dismemberment immunity trait description with explicit notice that it does not prevent the side effect of slashing weapons
  
• NEW: Optional Terminus style map glyphs for size 12 and 14 ASCII mode players (see manual under Advanced UI > Fonts)
  
• NEW: Optional classic IBM VGA style map glyphs for size 14 ASCII mode players (see manual under Advanced UI > Fonts)
  
• NEW: Datajack descriptions explicitly indicate their base chance to rewire traps (10%)
  
• NEW: Score sheet records number of moves per propulsion type
  
• NEW: Game over screen shows total number of new achievements earned during run
  
• NEW: challengeSuperGauntlet description in manual explicitly mentions lack of garrisons at -10/-9
  
• NEW: Two challenging (spoiler) plot points that didn't originally earn bonus points now do
  
• NEW: "Records" submenu added to game menu, containing links to Gallery/Lore/Achievements data
  
• NEW: Export achievements data to TXT, HTML, or CSV for external reading/processing (exports based on selected filters/sorting)
  
• NEW: Pre-attack warning about Researchers in view takes effect even if previously scanned (can disable in advanced.cfg: alwaysWarnAboutResearchers)
  
• NEW: Core Analyzer effect description explicitly states that critical hits and disruption effects are also applied to affected cores
  
• NEW: Dedicated section about achievements added to the manual
  
• NEW: Multiple previous autosaves from current run are stored in parallel (adjust number of saves in advanced.cfg: autosaveCount)
  
• NEW: While manual hostiles/allies/parts labels active, panning the map view automatically calls up same-category labels where applicable
  
• NEW: Escape also clears active map object labels even if disableEscMenuAccessKeyboard/disableEscMenuAccessMouse true
  
• NEW: Traps with damaging AOE effects now include salvage mod in their description
  
• NEW: Gallery item info includes description for those items which have them (e.g. important for traps)
  
• NEW: Melee weapon info explicitly lists the disruption stat (only two melee weapons have that property)
  
• NEW: Projectile weapon info explicitly lists the spread arc stat (very few weapons use that relatively new mechanic)
  
• NEW: Extreme slow movement warning also applies when attempting to swap positions with allies
  
• NEW: Items crushed by cave-ins reported in message log
  
• NEW: Safe to hold a wait key while waiting for System Backup Module (etc) to reduce corruption to 0% (autoblocks command for 2s on task completion)
  
• NEW: Use '>' on top of a Drone Bay to automatically release all its drones without attaching it (RMB on self for mouse users)
  
• NEW: Melee Analysis Suites increase minimum damage of melee weapons
  
• NEW: Specific amount of corruption caused by impact destruction revealed in manual and context help
  
• NEW: Manual includes step-by-step Attack Resolution section outlining defensive order of operations once an attack hits a robot
  
• NEW: All Alpha supporter names registered since Beta 5 added to in-game list (see Credits menu)
  
• MOD: Cave Seal allied faction priority changed
  
• MOD: Removed "Parts Merge Repaired" from score sheet since no longer possible for now
  
• MOD: Removed "Zionite Hack Detections" from score sheet since no longer possible
  
• MOD: Removed "Impact Corruptions" from score sheet under Highest Corruption (unused)
  
• MOD: Timer length doubled on the "final" Archives event
  
• MOD: Log message for critical strikes on immune robots only shown if the attack hits armor (which still confers the damage bonus)
  
• MOD: While using any LOW_CONTRAST renderFilter, on-map resource alerts override default color with black lettering
  
• MOD: While using any LOW_CONTRAST renderFilter, path visualization shown lighter to be more visible against brighter background
  
• MOD: Part range circles and robot motion trails appear much more nicely when combined with LOW_CONTRAST background settings
  
• MOD: While using showMapBorders option combined with a LOW_CONTRAST renderFilter, map edges displayed with a brighter line rather than modified wall color
  
• MOD: While using ` or dedicated mapshift mode, if LOW_CONTRAST renderFilter active the surrounding known cells are brightened even more than usual
  
• MOD: Floor foreground darkened more than usual under LOW_CONTRAST renderFilters to make FOV edges easier to distinguish
  
• MOD: Updated rendering of LOW_CONTRAST renderFilters to improve visualizations for: SFX, potential cave-ins, ally transfer area, explosion targeting AOE
  
• MOD: Improved LOW_CONTRAST animations: Sensor Arrays, Terrain Scanners, Structural Scanners, Spotter scans, Triangulator, and some processor activations
  
• MOD: Exposed ground appears slightly lighter in low-contrast mode (applies to both tiles and ASCII modes)
  
• MOD: Improved header line drawing on Advanced commands page animation when viewed in a low-contrast mode
  
• MOD: Part autosorting defaults to on
  
• MOD: Hardlight Generator effect description more specifically lists types of incompatible shields
  
• MOD: Score sheet "Communications Jammed" entry expanded to include distress signals from non-combat to combat bots
  
• MOD: Score Sheet "Damage Inflicted > Projectiles" entry split into "Guns" and "Cannons"
  
• MOD: Score sheet ally-related tallies exclude drones
  
• MOD: Removed turn numbers preceding special messages for machine hacking output (e.g. unique door access codes)
  
• MOD: Gallery/Lore buttons removed from game menu top-level button list and Credits menu (still accessible via hotkeys and new Records menu)
  
• MOD: Game menu submenu buttons horizontally centered in widescreen layouts
  
• MOD: Default hotkey for Alpha Supporters list now '0'
  
• MOD: Pre-Beta 3.1 cogmind.cfg file no longer converted to multifile format on importing
  
• MOD: Game count not incremented for aborting ("quit, delete save") below -9
  
• MOD: Total game time not incremented for self-destruction below -9
  
• MOD: High Security response dialogue no longer delivered by ARC
  
• MOD: Item info window simultaneously displays any description and gallery collection status
  
• MOD: Gallery item info no longer includes fabrication stats (still available via export feature)
  
• MOD: Label Supporter Items option no longer required for '!' marker items not yet collected for gallery (always shown by default)
  
• MOD: Scan Cloaking entry removed from robot info window since it became accessible via the new Traits popup in Beta 4
  
• MOD: Borebot weapon no longer a prototype to reveal its name (since it cannot be acquired)
  
• MOD: Improved visibility of explosion count on info page for multi-explosion weapons (consistent with multi-projectile weapons now)
  
• MOD: Derelicts of classes with variants at more than one tier list them all in Analysis() output
  
• MOD: Prototype ID Bank terminal hack has a static base chance rather than being based on the number of prototypes, which is now based on security level
  
• MOD: Stricter penalties if Zion repeatedly calls loyalty into question
  
• MOD: Roster dispatches a little more likely to refill used squad slots
  
• MOD: Tweaked targeting behavior of AOE-equipped robots
  
• MOD: Desublimator slot count reduced to 1, mass lowered to 6
  
• MOD: Quantum Capacitor no longer compatible with Weapon Cyclers
  
• MOD: EMDS energy and matter costs increased
  
• MOD: Hyp. EM Gauss Rifle spectrum changed to Fine
  
• MOD: Base penalty for overweight hover increased from 40 to 60
  
• MOD: Base penalty for overweight flight increased from 50 to 80
  
• MOD: While overweight, robots running on flight propulsion lose the ability to fly over other robots
  
• MOD: Traps always trigger while overweight, rather than using a mass-based multiplier
  
• MOD: Investigator movement speed increased 50%
  
• MOD: Score sheet Melee Sneak Attacks no longer counts those against broken or unpowered targets
  
• MOD: Upload Scores option now off by default
  
• MOD: Anonymous player scores no longer uploaded
  
• FIX: Combining Transmission Jammer w/Transport Network Coupler to block Hauler reinforcements didn't count as Communications Jammed in score sheet [Joshua]
  
• FIX: Additional energy capacity provided by LRC Energy Wells not automatically restored on entering a new map [Joshua]
  
• FIX: Certain types of followers stuck in a separate unattached part of the complex could slow down the game, especially on large maps [Joshua]
  
• FIX: Trap Extractors did not count trap for gallery collection purposes [Joshua]
  
• FIX: Unable to insert-ID an alien artifact at a Scanalyzer if no other scanalyzable items current in inventory [Joshua]
  
• FIX: Unable to indirectly hack analyses for a number of derelict classes [Joshua]
  
• FIX: Unidentified prototype energy/matter containers in inventory reflected their actual contents in HUD readout if preloaded [Joshua]
  
• FIX: Impact weapons not showing new momentum-modified damage values in inventory and part list info ('q') mode like other melee weapons [Joshua, zxc]
  
• FIX: Core reset while info ('q') mode active later created empty schematics lists on status page and at Fabricators [Joshua, Valguris]
  
• FIX: Followers sucked into chutes remained allied but would not follow again if you meet up with them later [Valguris]
  
• FIX: DC usage would leave out random map locations that should be revealed [Valguris]
  
• FIX: Active Particle Chargers destroyed or removed in info ('q') mode did not immediately modify damage data for affected weapons [Valguris]
  
• FIX: If no unfiltered label parts in view, not possible to use '3' to call up filtered labels [Valguris]
  
• FIX: Having two info windows open and right-clicking inside the second at the position of an object under it opened its info instead of closing [Valguris]
  
• FIX: Core resets rendered Z-Drones unable to explore or share FOV data [GJ]
  
• FIX: Still possible for 0b10 Decoder Chips to crash on attempting to reveal an item outside FOV under special circumstances [GJ]
  
• FIX: Loading a Fragile Parts challenge run in progress failed to apply the mechanic [GJ]
  
• FIX: Tiny decimal values close to zero showed as larger numbers in Tactical HUD energy-change-per-move readout [Pimski]
  
• FIX: Researcher hostility checks did not take into account active Cloaking Devices [Pimski]
  
• FIX: Workers pushing disabled bots on floors with only one chute located in hidden corridor could cause slowdown in Factory [Laida]
  
• FIX: Hostile Programmers assimilating Watchers made them neutral rather than hostile [Laida]
  
• FIX: Crushing DM with treads triggers the normal reaction [8fpsbossfight]
  
• FIX: Under certain conditions attempting to exit Waste might warn about leaving behind more allies than known [fpsbossfight, b_sen]
  
• FIX: Tutorial message referencing Gallery/Lore access commands referenced old key commands [Rob Hewitt]
  
• FIX: Options menu Upload Scores context help referenced old URL [Ezghoul]
  
• FIX: New part caches added to Materials may overlap Storage stairs if latter placed in a room rather than corridor [Jazzer]
  
• FIX: Item info ALIEN type label followed by a dark 'd' [Amphouse]
  
• FIX: Game hangs if attempt to move while completely surrounded by walls/earth and corruption causes a misdirection [NoCreativeNames]
  
• FIX: A certain Zion dialogue encounter was slightly too long to fit in the popup window [nuzcraft]
  
• FIX: Attempting to use the swap menu on an empty slot with less than 30 energy prevented the action, even though the requirement is 20 [zxc]
  
• FIX: Counterattack warning event may come on the following map if escaped fast enough and at exactly the right time [lsend, Sherlockkat]
  
• FIX: Potential crash on startup when using a certain LOW_CONTRAST renderFilter in advanced.cfg
  
• FIX: advanced.cfg did not properly bound values for mapCombatLogMaxLength, mapCombatLogDuration, mapAlertDuration
  
• FIX: While using any LOW_CONTRAST renderFilter, black lettering of temporary part status labels would change to a non-black value when updating
  
• FIX: Score sheet undercalculating Robots Melted entry (excluded non-delayed melting)
  
• FIX: Beta 4 robot label behavior update unintentionally removed all labels from non-FOV hostiles

256 of them! I didn't have any specific target number in mind when creating this initial set of achievements--it just turned out that way based on the many different things there are to currently do in Cogmind.

When you earn an achievement there's now a pop-up in the bottom-right corner of the map.



And any earned at the end of a run will be displayed next to the stats window.



Your score sheets now also include a list of the new achievements earned that run.



Available achievements, and those earned throughout all runs, can be browsed, filtered and sorted via the new interface accessible from the game menu. As you can see in the demo below, this interface is much more functional than Steam's, offering the ability to toggle different categories, filter by unlocked state, and order in four different ways.



For an online list of achievements you can check Steam's global achievement list, or for a better organized list see the latest SITREP.

If you'd like to avoid spoilers, don't use third-party achievement managers that reveal hidden achievements! They will spoil achievements which have been hidden because they involve plot points. There is no need to expose and aim for any hidden achievement, as they are things you'll uncover naturally through regular play.

All achievement descriptions refer to requirements that must be completed within a single run, except where otherwise noted or obvious. For those of you who've been playing for a while already, know that only a small handful of achievements are retroactive, those which will check your lore and gallery collection progress at the end of a run, whereas pretty much everything else will only be earned the first time you do it as of Beta 6.

So how to earn all these achievements... well, many of them will come naturally via simply using different play styles, hitting all the plot points, and going for all the endings. However, some will require actually aiming for the achievement (i.e. not something you'll probably "accidentally accomplish" through normal play). All achievements are known to be completable by players who've done these things in the past--they were created based on player stats collected over the years, all of them on regular difficulty. Some of them are extremely challenging though! If you have trouble with some of the achievements, note that all of them are equally accessible regardless of difficulty setting, so just pop into the options and try some runs that way :D

As with the item gallery and lore collection, you can export your achievements via buttons at the bottom-right of the interface. convenient for those of you who'd like to review you achievements outside the game or maybe process them via other means. Three formats are supported (TXT, HTML, CSV), and whatever filters and sorting you have active at the time are reflected in the exported data! (For sample images of each of the exports, see SITREP #20.)

Like other Cogmind meta data, achievements support Steam's cloud saves, and there's even bidirectional syncing so that even without cloud saves active, if you reinstall Cogmind elsewhere it'll still download all previous achievements from the Steam database. Playing the DRM-free version then later migrating over to Steam will also upload all previously earned achievements that are not yet earned on Steam, as long as you copy over your /user/ data as with a normal version migration.

If for some reason you want to remove all your achievements, for example having earned many on lower difficulties and want to try again from scratch on a higher setting, add "resetAchievements=1" to advanced.cfg. This change cannot be reversed so you'd better be sure! The resetAchievements option is only valid for non-Steam players due to automated syncing while connected to Steam.

Finally, if you're interested in the development side of things--why some achievements are hidden, the methods and purpose behind achievement selection, how they're categorized, how the icons were created, and much more, check out the latest article on my blog.




Cogmind's initial startup speed has gotten slow over the years with all that data, so I've managed to cut the time down to two-thirds of what it was by multithreading the most demanding bits, namely particles and sound effects. Here's a simple diagram comparing Beta 5 and Beta 6 on that front:



I've also expanded the autosave system to also save an adjustable number of sequential backups at a designated interval, so if (for example) a power outage at exactly the wrong time manages to corrupt your save, there'll be a backup from not long before that :)



Prior to Beta 6 Cogmind already included a couple of autosave mechanisms, the first which automatically saves your current run's progress at an adjustable interval, and another which makes a backup copy of the current save and all settings once per day. But in the aforementioned power outage scenario you'd only be able to restore progress to wherever it was the previous day (assuming the current run was long enough!).

It requires renaming the file you want to use as your current save, but you probably won't ever need this feature anyway, and old files will be deleted automatically--it's all handled silently in the background. You can also turn off the feature entirely by setting the interval to 0 (advanced.cfg "autosaveInterval"). Those of you who've been playing prior to Beta 6 may want to consider lowering the interval, since the old default value under the previous sytem was 5 (minutes), but I think with the new system it makes more sense for it to be around 3 or less. (Anyone just joining us will have the new default, but those with an old config value will not have their old value overwritten, so this is something you'd have to do manually if you like the idea of having autosaves closer to your current one.)


While you have any hostiles/allies/parts labels manually activated, more will continue appearing automatically as you pan the map! No more repeatedly hitting '3' to look for that elusive item :P



These additional labels also obey the item filters added in Beta 5.

By request, RTS-style panning is now a thing--moving your cursor to the edge of the screen can pan the map once you activate this feature in the options. It's off by default, and in turning it on you can also select the panning speed. This type of panning is of course only available in true fullscreen mode.



Part Autosorting now defaults to on, but its original default was off, so if you've been playing before Beta 6 and have not activated it manually, I'd suggest turning it on to take advantage of automated organization for your parts list. (As a reminder, if you want your parts to autosort but allow you to retain manually assigned weapon order--since that determines firing order--you can deactivate weapon autosorting behavior in advanced.cfg: partSortIgnoresWeapons.)

This feature is not only useful for increasing the effectiveness of part management, it also comes with a cool animation :D



The game menu has been rearranged to combined the gallery, lore, and achievements under a single "Records" menu at the far right. (It's likely we'll be getting some other options on that page later.)




There weren't a large number of mechanics tweaks or additions this time around, just some changes focused on niche cases...

Melee buff! Melee Analysis Suites now increase minimum weapon damage. This will help improve melee-focused builds, especially those which are multiwielding and/or using impact weapons. You can see the effect reflected in the info ('q') mode values.



All varieties of Drone Bays can now be activated more conveniently without even attaching them--see the new description.



This is great for those situations where you're already decked out, inventory full, and don't really want to drag along a newly discovered bay but would like a little drone buddy or three to scout ahead. Drone Bays are still often good to carry around as makeshift armor, or to recall drones for repair and storage.

We have a few more changes to moving while overweight...

The most noticeable will be for flight and hover, which have had their overweight penalties increased, making it less effective to build an intentionally overweight flight-combat build to take advantage of superior firepower while still being significantly faster than wheels and legs. Flight-combat is certainly still very viable, it'll just require more skill to pull off. Basically if you're going overweight on flight or hover you'll want to readjust your loadout, and if it's happening mid-combat due to propulsion loss you'll likely want to make those adjustments immediately (it'll help to carry backups or have more support than needed at any given point).

Flight also loses its ability to fly over hostile robots if overweight, so the point is: You really don't want to be overweight on otherwise fast propulsion :P

Aaaand reason #3: Traps have a 100% trigger chance if you're overweight! This doesn't mean much for bots on treads and legs, which always or almost always trigger traps anyway, and move slow enough that they can often spot them a ways off, but it's a big jump for relatively trap-safe flight/hover. Technically if you really hate traps you might already be using a Structural Scanner or one of the other trap detection methods to solve that problem, but again you probably want to avoid being overweight in the first place.


By request we have additional alternative ASCII map fonts at smaller sizes.

Terminus 12:



Terminus 14:



And my personal nostalgia-inducing favorite, IBM VGA 14:



That's one I would love to add at all sizes, but it really only works at the traditional size it was designed for. (Unlike, say, a modern fixed width font like Terminus which is pretty awesome at all sizes.)

There's also some love for those of you using a LOW_CONTRAST render filter (first added in Beta 5), courtesy of POLYBOT-7 development. A number of people have been activating low-contrast mode, though this was a hackish feature in the first place because lots of Cogmind code and scripts assumed the background is black, so it looked funky in quite a few places. For the P7 aesthetic I went in and changed that assumption in a number of places where it was more accessible. Examples below:

Path visualization is now much more visible. (All sample images are using the SLEEPY preset.)



FOV edges are somewhat easier to see.



(The following are all before-and-after gifs demonstrating adjustments.)

Activating an Optical Array.



Motion trail fading.



AOE visualization edges.



Structural Scanner and cave-in visualization.



SFX visualization.




Robot labels for those not in view were somehow completely broken by other changes a couple versions ago--those are now labeled again.



Impact weapons display damage values properly modified by current momentum. Other melee weapons were doing it right, but a typo left out the impact category...



AOE traps give their salvage modifier in their description.



Items with description info (e.g. traps) will still show it even when the Show Supporter Items option is on.



Removing an active Particle Charger, or having it destroyed, immediately updates damage for the weapon(s) it was affecting.



Forced spread weapons now list "Arc" as an explicit stat (with its own context help), as well as a clearer multi-explosive indicator.



I added a Disruption stat to melee weapon info, for the couple of late-game impact weapons that use it.



By request, the message log now reports what items were crushed by a cave-in. Nooooooo!!!




Special thanks to all our Beta 6 prerelease testers, who helped clean out a few bugs that slipped through the cracks, especially bugsniper for reporting a nasty crash on seeking lots of help from Zion, and Valguris for finding several different issues.

And thanks to everyone for your Steam reviews! In case anyone missed it, there's a pre-1.0 medium-term goal you can help with which could affect the future of Cogmind development. Check out the original announcement for more info.

There is currently a 10% discount on Cogmind to coincide with the Beta 6 release. As a heads up, this is the largest discount Cogmind will have during Early Access unless at some point Valve decides to again offer exposure for a larger discount like they did in December, in which case I might take them up. (But I wouldn't count on them doing that again, there being so many games out there these days :P)

Beta 6 saves are not compatible with previous versions, but even if you're on Steam and have autoupdates enabled, Beta 5 is still available via its own branch and you can roll back to finish a run in progress first if you like.

The Beta 6 countdown begins! It's coming May 8th, but that's my morning when it'll be released, technically still Monday evening/night in the western hemisphere where most of the players are.

In preparation for that, the full range of achievements have been uploaded to Steam, although again they aren't technically accessible in the current public build, even though Steam insists on showing them on the store page...



You can check out the full list on Steam's global achievements page, but I wouldn't recommend using third-party achievement managers unless you want to be spoiled, since they will spoil the third of achievements which are meant to be hidden. Also: As always, here's your reminder that achievements are equally available both in the Steam and DRM-free versions.

If you're interested in why some achievements are hidden, the methods and purpose behind achievement selection, how they're categorized, how the icons were created, and much more, check out the latest article on my blog.



Testing is going well, just a few more bits to fix up and polish then we'll be all set.

Ape has already added achievements to his graph-generating script:



See more graph samples in last week's SITREP.



Actually, for the record, may as well list out all the achievements that are part of Cogmind's first batch (this way it's also better organized than the global Steam list, which is mostly random at the moment).

Mechanics:

• Close Call ~~ ???
  
• Universal Adapter ~~ ???
  
• Hehehe ~~ Reprogram a trap.
  
• Wheee! ~~ Intentionally trigger a Chute Trap.
  
• It Was An Accident, I Swear ~~ ???
  
• Part-time Excavator ~~ Use a melee weapon to dig through 10 walls or earth.
  
• Unlikely Earthworm ~~ ???
  
• Hey, That's Mine! ~~ Attack 5 Recyclers attempting to collect parts.
  
• Loot Pinata ~~ Destroy a Hauler.
  
• Treasure Hunter ~~ Destroy 20 Haulers.
  
• Use The Force ~~ ???
  
• Risk Taker ~~ Attach an unidentified prototype.
  
• Adventurous ~~ ???
  
• Alien Tech ~~ ???
  
• System Compromised ~~ Reach 10% system corruption.
  
• Z1$+NX3F=JRE3_ZNQR ~~ ???
  
• Maybe Next Time I'll Detach My Launcher ~~ ???
  
• Backstab ~~ ???
  
• Short-term Sacrifices ~~ Escape a Stasis Trap with help from an explosion.
  
• Just Shoot The Terminal ~~ ???
  
• Release The Drones! ~~ Have 6 drones at once.
  
• Subspace Traveler ~~ Find a way to teleport.
  
• Storm Trooper ~~ Miss 5 shots in a row.
  
• Crack Shot ~~ Hit 10 shots in a row.
  
• Please Form A Line ~~ Hit 2 robots with a single projectile.
  
• Quick And Dirty ~~ Destroy 5 hostiles via explosions in a single turn.
  
• Power Corrupts ~~ Terminally corrupt a robot.
  
• It's Just You ~~ Cause a robot to meltdown.
  
• Fist Fight ~~ Destroy a hostile by ramming.
  
• Overkill ~~ Fire 10 overloaded shots.
  
• Batter Up ~~ Knock a hostile robot into an exploding machine.
  
• Watch This! ~~ Sneak attack a Watcher and destroy it in one hit.
  
• Deadly Force ~~ Melee attack a hostile using 4 momentum.
  
• Ambidextrous ~~ Destroy 2 hostiles with one melee volley.
  
• Oops ~~ ???
  
• No Explosion For You ~~ Shoot down a launcher projectile with a defensive utility.
  
• Oh No You Don't! ~~ Destroy a Saboteur before it succeeds.
  
• Ride The Lightning ~~ Use a Fabricator to destroy an enemy.
  
• Let's See Who's Tougher ~~ ???
  
• Uninvited Guest ~~ Be spotted by an Operator that then summons reinforcements from its Terminal.
  
• One Hack Too Far ~~ Trigger an investigation by being traced to a Terminal.
  
• Troublemaker ~~ Cause a robot to call for help or reinforcements from a nearby Garrison.
  
• Party Time ~~ ???
  
• Significant Disruption ~~ Raise alert high enough to trigger an assault dispatch.
  
• Slippery One ~~ ???
  
• Hunted ~~ Simultaneously tracked by 20 hostiles.
  
• My Command Is Your Wish ~~ Build an ally via Fabricator.
  
• Just What I Needed ~~ Build a part via Fabricator.
  
• Part-time Mechanic ~~ Repair a part via Repair Station.
  
• Safety First ~~ Identify a prototype via Scanalyzer.
  
• Dynamic Key ~~ Use an Operator Data Core before it expires.
  
• Novice Programmer ~~ Hack 10 machines.
  
• Librarian ~~ Hack 10 different Terminal records.
  
• Armchair Analyst ~~ Download 3 robot analyses from Terminals.
  
• Everything Is Under Control ~~ Lower alert using a Terminal's Purge Threat hack.
  
• GoHome() ~~ Use a Terminal to recall an active squad.
  
• Shopping List ~~ Hack Hauler Manifests at a Terminal.
  
• Brute Force ~~ Use a Force() hack.
  
• True Hacker ~~ Install a Trojan().
  
• Quantum Hacking ~~ Set up a three-Terminal botnet.
  
• A New Friend ~~ Rewire a robot.
  
• Factory Defaults ~~ Reboot a hostile robot.
  
• Error 47 ~~ Overload a hostile robot.
  
• Assimilation Complete ~~ Assimilate a hostile robot.
  
• No Signal ~~ Block an Alarm Trap transmission.
  
• Total Silence ~~ Jam 10 distress signals or other communications.
  
• I Spy ~~ Use an Imp. Sensor Array (or better) with Imp. Signal Interpreter (or better).
  
• Omniscient Cartographer ~~ Use an Imp. Terrain Scanner (or better) with Imp. Terrain Scan Processor (or better).
  
• Knowing Is Half The Battle ~~ Enter 10 identified exits.
  
• Can't Catch Me ~~ Reach a speed of FASTx3, or 4 spaces per turn.
  
• Cya! ~~ Fly over a row of 3 hostiles.
  
• The More The Merrier ~~ Have 5 allies.

Style:

• Turtlemind ~~ Have 2% or less core exposure.
  
• Can't Touch This ~~ Absorb 1,500 damage using shields.
  
• Executioner ~~ Evolve 7 weapon slots.
  
• Perfect Aim ~~ Have +40% targeting accuracy for ranged weapons.
  
• More Dakka Please ~~ Fire 10 projectiles in a single volley.
  
• Gunslinger ~~ Destroy 3 robots with a single volley using secondary targeting.
  
• Gun Specialist ~~ Destroy 100 hostiles with at least 90% of damage dealt by guns.
  
• Cannon Specialist ~~ Destroy 100 hostiles with at least 90% of damage dealt by cannons.
  
• Explosive Specialist ~~ Destroy 100 hostiles with at least 90% of damage dealt by explosives.
  
• Melee Specialist ~~ Destroy 100 hostiles with at least 90% of damage dealt by melee weapons.
  
• Shocking Conclusion ~~ Corrupt 50 hostiles.
  
• Pyromaniac ~~ Cause 20 hostiles to meltdown.
  
• Guerrilla Style ~~ Trigger reprogrammed (or placed) traps on 30 hostiles.
  
• Tank ~~ ???
  
• Friend Of Zion ~~ ???
  
• Heroic Deeds ~~ ???
  
• Whoosh! ~~ Move with 4 overloaded hover or flight units.
  
• Speed Demon ~~ Reach a speed of 10 spaces per turn.
  
• Supersonic ~~ Reach a speed of 20 spaces per turn.
  
• Dodgeball, But With Guns ~~ Reach 75% evasion.
  
• Assassin ~~ Sneak attack 15 hostiles.
  
• Sniper ~~ ???
  
• Dramatic Entrance ~~ ???
  
• Decoder Ring ~~ Obtain 50 pieces of intel from one or more 0b10 Decoder Chips.
  
• Freeware ~~ ???
  
• Prolific Hacker ~~ Hack 50 machines.
  
• Pwned ~~ Hack 50 hostiles.
  
• l33t h4x0r ~~ Have +100% to hack success.
  
• Maximum Efficiency ~~ Succeed at 10 hacks on a single Terminal.
  
• root@ ~~ Succeed at 3 manual hacks on a single Terminal.
  
• War Machine ~~ Build 10 allied bots.
  
• We Are Legion ~~ Have 20 allies at once.
  
• Beloved ~~ Acquire 75 allies across an entire run.
  
• Generalissimo ~~ Oversee 75 ally kills across an entire run.
  
• Collateral Damage ~~ ???
  
• What Is This Thing? ~~ Discover the use of Self-destruct Interrupters.
  
• Deconstruction ~~ Destroy a robot via core entropy.
  
• Max Potential ~~ ???
  
• Hard Hitter ~~ Inflict 200 damage against an enemy with one shot from a single weapon.
  
• Sunderer ~~ ???
  
• Packrat ~~ ???
  
• Production Line ~~ Build 10 parts.
  
• Remodeling ~~ ???
  
• More Power To You ~~ ???
  
• Minesweeper ~~ Extract 30 traps.
  
• Superinsulated ~~ Become immune to electromagnetic damage.

Progress:

• The Most Popular Achievement ~~ ???
  
• Back For More ~~ Complete 50 runs.
  
• 5k Club ~~ Earn 5,000 points.
  
• 10k Club ~~ Earn 10,000 points.
  
• 20k Club ~~ Earn 20,000 points.
  
• 30k Club ~~ Earn 30,000 points.
  
• 40k Club ~~ Earn 40,000 points.
  
• 50k Club ~~ Earn 50,000 points.
  
• This Is Interesting... ~~ Reach 25% lore collection.
  
• I Think I Know What's Going On ~~ Reach 50% lore collection.
  
• I Was Wrong! ~~ Reach 75% lore collection.
  
• I Wish There Was More ~~ Reach 100% lore collection.
  
• Just Browsing ~~ Reach 25% gallery collection.
  
• Tester ~~ Reach 50% gallery collection.
  
• Collector ~~ Reach 75% gallery collection.
  
• Curator ~~ Reach 100% gallery collection.
  
• Made in Tau Ceti IV ~~ Enter Factory.
  
• Dangerous Findings ~~ Enter Research.
  
• Denied? ~~ Enter Access.
  
• \\IAMDERELICT ~~ ???
  
• I'm Back, Baby! ~~ Exit Proximity Caves.
  
• Tourist ~~ Visit 3 branch areas.
  
• Adventurer ~~ Visit 2 special cave areas.
  
• Explorer ~~ Visit 10 branch areas.
  
• Great Explorer ~~ Visit 35 areas.
  
• Serviceable Loadout ~~ Reach a peak rating of 50.
  
• Respectable Loadout ~~ Reach a peak rating of 100.
  
• Rockin' Loadout ~~ Reach a peak rating of 150.
  
• Ultimate Loadout ~~ Reach a peak rating of 200.
  
• Achiever ~~ Earn 25% of achievements.
  
• Overachiever ~~ Earn 50% of achievements.
  
• Superachiever ~~ Earn 75% of achievements.
  
• Perfect Achiever ~~ Earn all other achievements.

Challenges:

• Exterminator ~~ Destroy 15 Assembled in the Mines.
  
• Killing Spree ~~ Achieve a kill streak of 20 hostiles.
  
• Preemptive Strike ~~ Destroy a visible ARC before it deploys.
  
• Left-hand Path ~~ Destroy all Cetus Guards without any help from allies.
  
• Below ~~ Visit and survive 2 Waste areas.
  
• Streaker ~~ Enter a main complex map at -5 or above as a naked core, and find an exit (do not have to remain naked).
  
• Rincewind ~~ Teleport 10 times.
  
• Leap Before You Look ~~ Enter 10 unidentified exits.
  
• Boltbath ~~ Achieve a kill streak of 35 hostiles.
  
• Torch ~~ Inflict 30,000 thermal damage across an entire run.
  
• Magneto ~~ Inflict 30,000 electromagnetic damage across an entire run.
  
• Punisher ~~ Inflict 30,000 kinetic damage across an entire run.
  
• Gladiator ~~ Destroy 200 hostiles via melee.
  
• Infiltrator ~~ Enter and survive 2 Garrisons on a single floor.
  
• Desperate Times ~~ Enter a main complex map at -3 or above as a naked core with no inventory items, and find an exit (do not have to remain naked).
  
• Monster ~~ Kill at least 20 inhabitants of Zion.
  
• Equal Opportunity Bot ~~ Destroy 25 different classes of robot.
  
• Giant Slayer ~~ Destroy 5 Behemoths.
  
• Artifact Hunter ~~ ???
  
• Fearless ~~ Enter a Garrison with below 10% core integrity and survive it.
  
• Shutout ~~ Seal, jam, or destroy all Garrison Access machines in Access.
  
• WMD ~~ Destroy 100 robots in a single turn.
  
• Rambo ~~ Earn 10,000 bonus points for high alert combat kills.
  
• Most Wanted ~~ Trigger high security 4 times.
  
• 404 ~~ Destroy 4 Network Hubs and escape to the next floor.
  
• Full Golem ~~ ???
  
• Traitor ~~ Kill Warlord in his base and escape.

Events:

• Curiosity Killed The Cat ~~ ???
  
• I Survived The Infestation ~~ ???
  
• Woof! ~~ ???
  
• Help From High Places ~~ ???
  
• Nope ~~ ???
  
• Origins ~~ Discover what you really are.
  
• The Oracle ~~ ???
  
• Robot Respite ~~ ???
  
• Signs Are For Wimps ~~ ???
  
• That's One Door That Should Stay Closed ~~ ???
  
• The Science Guy ~~ ???
  
• Exposed ~~ ???
  
• A Powerful Ally? ~~ ???
  
• Reappropriation ~~ ???
  
• Prison Break ~~ ???
  
• Project G-00 ~~ ???
  
• Main Advantage ~~ ???
  
• Alien Roots ~~ ???
  
• Signature Confirmed ~~ ???
  
• Rampage ~~ ???
  
• False Reunion ~~ ???
  
• Big Bang ~~ ???
  
• Meet Your Maker ~~ ???
  
• Poison In The Code ~~ ???
  
• Unlimited Data ~~ ???
  
• The One ~~ ???
  
• Are We The Baddies? ~~ ???
  
• Charge!!! ~~ ???
  
• Revising The Future ~~ ???
  
• Anyone Home? ~~ ???
  
• Decrypted! ~~ ???
  
• Revolutionary Research ~~ ???
  
• All-out Warlord ~~ ???
  
• Godhack ~~ ???
  
• Everyone Must Die ~~ ???
  
• Special Delivery ~~ ???
  
• Corridor Of Doom ~~ ???
  
• void main() ~~ ???
  
• Sorry Old Pal ~~ ???
  
• Behind The Curtain ~~ ???
  
• The Bigger They Are ~~ ???

Wins:

• Epsilon Run ~~ ???
  
• Commander 0b11 ~~ ???
  
• Home At Last? ~~ ???
  
• Payload Armed ~~ ???
  
• MAIN.CPP ~~ ???
  
• Stardust ~~ ???
  
• Planet Killer ~~ ???
  
• Derelict Escape ~~ Win while imprinted.
  
• Winner's Signature ~~ Win after being scanned by a Researcher.
  
• Data Run ~~ ???
  
• Inspector Gadget ~~ Win while only evolving utility slots.
  
• Straight Shot ~~ Win without visiting any branches.
  
• Pacifist ~~ Win without destroying a single robot.
  
• Speedrunner ~~ Win in less than 2,000 turns.
  
• Expert Speedrunner ~~ Win in less than 1,000 turns.
  
• By A Hair ~~ ???
  
• True Flier ~~ Win without attaching any propulsion except flight.
  
• Mad Max ~~ Win with 200 hostiles destroyed and without attaching any propulsion except wheels.
  
• Victory By Combat ~~ Win with 400 hostiles destroyed.
  
• Hardcore ~~ Win with 400 hostiles destroyed but no more than 4 utility slots.
  
• Death Machine ~~ Win with 600 hostiles destroyed.
  
• Partners In Destruction ~~ Win fighting alongside the Warrior.
  
• One Last FU ~~ Win after entering an Access garrison.
  
• The Little Core That Could ~~ Win without attaching any propulsion.
  
• True Cogmind ~~ Win 25 times.
  
• Grand Amoeba ~~ Win the Devolution challenge mode.
  
• Look Ma, No Swapping! ~~ Win the Fragile Parts challenge mode.
  
• Unstoppable ~~ Win the Gauntlet challenge mode.
  
• Stunt Win ~~ Win the Inhibited Evolution challenge mode.
  
• I Don't Need Leftovers ~~ Win the No Salvage challenge mode.
  
• Light Traveler ~~ Win the Pure Core challenge mode.
  
• This Only Looks Like Junk ~~ Win the Scavenger challenge mode.
  
• Terminals Are For Geeks ~~ Win the Simple Hacker challenge mode.
  
• Attach With Care ~~ Win the Sticky Parts challenge mode.
  
• Best of the Best ~~ Win the Super Gauntlet challenge mode.
  
• Master Trapper ~~ Win the Trapped challenge mode.
  
• Super Mutant ~~ Win the Unstable Evolution challenge mode.

Again the selection, categorization, and more are discussed on the blog here.


Although this week has mostly been about testing, tweaking, and writing that mega-article, I did slip in a few last quick features before the Beta 6 feature freeze had to set in.

Melee Analysis Suites increase minimum weapon damage, yet another buff that'll help make synergistic melee builds more effective but not OP.



By indirect request, the message log now reports what items were crushed by a cave-in. Aw...



And my personal favorite to finally slip in there: Drones can be released from bays without even attaching them!



Less tedium, more OMG DRONE SWARM STOP ATTRACTING EVERY DAMN PATROL ON THE MAP.

(But seriously, sometimes it's still good to equip the bays, be it for makeshift armor if you've got no real protection, or to recall drones for repair and storage.)

I also noticed Cogmind dev recently passed the 9,000-hour mark. Onwards to 10k!




There'll be a 10% discount next week to coincide with the new release. As a heads up, this is the largest discount Cogmind will have during Early Access unless at some point Valve decides to again offer exposure for a larger discount like they did in December, in which case I might take them up. (But I wouldn't count on them doing that again, there being so many games out there these days :P)

There won't be a SITREP next week because it's a major release week and we'll have Beta 6 and its release notes instead. We'll be back to sitrepping the week after with Beta 5 scoring and analysis, and before that I'll mostly likely be doing some streaming! (As usual the results will later appear with my other recent runs on YouTube.)

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

Thanks for all the reviews lately! We're well on our way to that goal, and I'm well on the way to delivering Beta 6 :D

With achievements completely out of the way it's mostly done, just needs another 2-3 days of polishing. With a normal release at this stage I'd be okay to put it out next week, but this one's particularly big with a lot of new moving parts so I'm going to hold it in pre-release testing longer than usual to ensure no easily avoidable bugs are passed along to you all.

Unless something goes horribly wrong it'll be out the week after next and you can achieve all you want ;)


As usual when approaching a new major release, the top priority is to take care of any new bugs/issues/minor tweak requests that have popped up since last time. But first, because it's nice to have something exciting to show for the week, check this out:



Yep, manually activated object labels (hostiles/allies/parts) will continue appearing automatically as you pan the map. These additional labels will also obey the item filters added in Beta 5.

While adding and testing that feature I discovered that robot labels for those not in view have been completely broken for the past couple versions (no one reported this because I guess they're not needed as frequently?), so I fixed that:



Impact weapons display damage values properly modified by current momentum. Other melee weapons were doing it right, but a typo left out the impact category...



AOE traps give their salvage modifier in their description.



Items with description info (e.g. traps) will still show it even when the Show Supporter Items option is on.



Removing an active Particle Charger, or having it destroyed, immediately updates damage for the weapon(s) it was affecting.



Explicit Arc stat for forced spread weapons and clearer multi-explosive indicator



Added Disruption stat to melee weapon info, for the couple of late-game impact weapons that use it.




Cogmind already includes a couple of autosave mechanisms, the first which automatically saves your current run's progress at an adjustable interval, and another which makes a backup copy of the current save and all settings once per day. But this doesn't quite cover all the possibilities--what if something bad happens to your computer at precisely the wrong time and your save file is corrupted? If you have a long run in progress you'll still be able to restore it to wherever it was on the previous day, but any progress on the current day would be lost. Not anymore come Beta 6!

The autosave system has been expanded to also save an adjustable number of sequential backups at a designated interval, so even if the current save doesn't work, there's a backup not long before that :)



Note that this system is not accessible in game--you'll still have to manually copy and rename an old file if you really need it, but it should be extremely rare that this is necessary anyway. Just a precaution. That and probably one of its more useful benefits is making it much easier to track down a subtype of bug which can otherwise be elusive if the issue already happened before the current save. Most bugs can be solved fairly easily given existing tools, but there are a few that are extremely difficult to track without knowing the game state prior to where something went wrong.


One of Cogmind's new players, Ape, has put together a great python script for analyzing all your score sheets produced by the game across multiple runs.

There are lots of interesting insights that can be derived from the graphs we've been looking at on Discord.

Ape posted their own first batch here and I've collected some examples on the forums. Some excerpts:















GJ is the only player to have collected absolutely everything in the game, and specific to this graph you can see where I was still adding new lore in late Alpha :)



Score sheet collections submitted by other players can be browsed here for tons more types of data.


Cogmind expert Valguris has written up a quick spoiler-free guide to the early game. Kind of a supplementary follow-up to the Survival Tips in the manual. As he puts it:

Play a few games first. Then read the Survival Tips section of the manual. Then play a few more games. Only then I grant you permission to read this guide (:P), so that you have an idea of what I'm talking about and why is it that good to know/use.

Check it out if you need to up your game!

Over on the Discord, SeanMirrsen shared some cool impressions of Cogmind in various forms:





We also have a Let's Player who's just picked up Cogmind, Joselillo PDL, if you'd like to tune in to some Cogmind discussion in Spanish. Good luck to Joselillo :D


This week I also finally released what might be the final update for POLYBOT-7, the free Cogmind de/remake-spinoff-thing. You can check out what the update's all about here.

Explodey P7 gif for fun:



As usual, even just the little time spent working on that also ended up benefiting Cogmind (via the engine): As of Beta 6 if you have any letterboxing in your Cogmind display setup, the screenshot system will trim it out. This isn't usually much of an issue with Cogmind since it will never have more than a few pixels of letterboxing, and only on some displays, but with P7 it was a more important feature because the latter intentionally uses significant horizontal letterboxing by design.

Man I can't wait until Cogmind Beta 6 is done so I can start working on Beta 7 :P

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

With all 256 achievements implemented and tested last week, it was time to finalize the main achievements UI functionality.

The first subwindow I got working was the category filters.



Then onto the other filter and sorting options... All settings are remembered from when you last accessed the page so that you don't have to keep resetting them to your desired preferences, only making changes if you want to look at them in a different way.



And here's the entire thing working together!



So pretty soon you'll be able to browse your achievements in style.

All achievement data and images have actually been uploaded to Steam, but they're not published yet since I haven't released the build that allows access to them. However, because I had to test the Steam integration I did make the first couple public already,
meaning that from the store page it looks like Cogmind only has two achievements xD



Way to go, Valve... I haven't even marked "achievements" on the list of supported features but they don't care. You can't even earn those two, yet, although they do appear on the global achievements page because while testing I "earned" them :P

Anyway, the tests went smoothly and the data properly syncs back and forth between Cogmind and Steam, always making sure both sides have the latest data (in case you install Cogmind again elsewhere and it needs your records, or you migrate a DRM-free version over to a Steam-linked install of Cogmind). Here are Cogmind achievements successfully appearing in Steam for the first time!




As with other collectible data in Cogmind (lore and gallery), achievements can also be exported to various formats. I've provided the same three formats, which you may want for different purposes.

Basic TXT, because TXT.



HTML includes some styling, plus a table of contents with links if you export a category-wise list.



CSV adds extra data like the highest difficulty mode on which each achievement was earned, and in which game number.



All exports load the same achievements listed in the UI, i.e. based on your currently set filters and sorting, giving you extra control over what is export and how.


Next up is other non-achievement work for Beta 6. Considering that the changelog for this release has already grown quite fat I may push back some other features in order to get this one out sooner, but first things first, gotta fix all known bugs as per usual!

Oh yeah, my wife will be in surgery next week so I dunno that could slow things down, but by pushing some features to Beta 7 (don't worry, it's stuff you don't even know about yet ;)) the next release will be out on schedule.

I've also started writing the first of two blog posts about achievements, which will go into much greater depth about working on this aspect of a game.

If you're reading this now it's likely you already saw the previous announcement, but just in case here's a reminder: Check out the notice from a few days ago about the future of Cogmind.

There may be other relevant discussion of this SITREP on the GSG forums.

Good news! Half a year ago I said I'd be expanding Cogmind for at least another six months, and here I am to say it again :)

Remember that as of last year's move to Beta, the world and storyline are complete, and all that's left are some finishing touches and possible optional content and meta features. Everything on the public roadmap (and technically more) are guaranteed to happen, but I have a ton more concepts for great optional stuff that I'd like to work in if possible. Some of this stuff is rather major, which together with the many other little features I'd like to add reaches the kind of level one might expect to see the the form of "DLC." But I don't like DLC, nor do I think it's appropriate for Cogmind, which benefits significantly from its many mechanics, systems, and plot all being tightly intertwined at numerous points.



This presents a bit of a conundrum because I still need to be able to pay for them with revenue, which will get more difficult as we near the tail end of Cogmind development. Devs of widely popular games can afford to keep adding features and content nearly indefinitely, even without selling it as DLC, while Cogmind is pretty niche and if I did that I wouldn't be left with enough savings to fund the next project, so I've come up with a pretty simple alternative!


It so happens that having an "Overwhelmingly Positive" review rating on Steam really helps with sales, and we obviously have an attractive ratio already with so many people enjoying the game, just not enough total reviews to reach that threshold. We need 500 reviews before that can happen. But at the current rate (we've gone an entire month without a single review before xD) I don't think it's likely we'll hit that threshold before the 1.0 release, at which point I'll likely be starting to shift resource to my next project and therefore less able to take on major new features for Cogmind.

I realize that the current rate of reviews is probably lower than it would be if Cogmind were 1.0, mainly because some people prefer to wait until it's "done" to dive in, but hopefully with the variety of achievements soon to be added we'll see more players getting into it now, especially seeing as the content is essentially full release material.



So there it is, the goal being to get more players leaving reviews in the hopes that we can hit that target.

But wait, there's more!


I could leave this as a vague promise since any of you following my progress over the years know my reputation for adding good content (and as we often discuss on Discord there's so much potential to work with in Cogmind's world!), but rather than leave it an unknown, I'll let you in on what I've been planning out for a long while as a suitable incentive: A NEW FACTION.

And of course a new faction has many implications, requiring...

• at least one new map (probably more than one)
  
• new NPCs
  
• new robots
  
• new tech and parts
  
• new mechanics and systems
  
• and of course more lore

What is this faction, you might ask? The working name I have peppered throughout my design doc is the Merchant's Guild :D


Anyway, this threshold is obviously not going to be hit any time soon, but is more of a medium-term goal with potential long-term upside! And if we can hit it it means 1) potentially more sales to fund features and 2) enough love for Cogmind that I don't care whether there are enough continued sales I'll fund this expansion myself anyway :P

Again there are still a fair number of guaranteed features prior to 1.0, including a much expanded robot hacking system, yet more UI/QoL stuff, and ambient audio, so don't worry all that's all going to happen. I'm just thinking further into the future here...

Many thanks to all of you who've over the years helped Cogmind become what it is today--couldn't have done it without your support!

TL;DR: There are still guaranteed features to go, but if we hit 500 reviews and get that "Overwhelmingly Positive" rating on Steam before 1.0 I'll further expand the world with a new faction and a bunch of related content.