Eight new engine types, seven new nozzles, and six new fuel types are available which allows for hundreds of possible rocket engine configurations. They also have slider options for size, nozzle length, throat radius, and chamber pressure so really there are infinite possible configurations.



The new Performance Analyzer window in the designer will give you immediate feedback. You can see how their performance characteristics change with altitude as you tweak the rocket engine's parameters.



This update also brings a lot of improvements and bug fixes for building airplanes. There is now a plane/rocket building mode option available on the command pod and a new visualization tool to help visualize your craft's direction of travel.

• Added procedural rocket engines
  
  • Several new types of engines: Pressure Fed, Electric Pump, Gas Generator, Staged, Solid, and Nuclear Thermal
    
  • Adjustable nozzle parameters such as Nozzle Length and Nozzle Throat Radius
    
  • Several nozzle options: Resizable Bell, Resizable Cone, Aerospike, Alpha, Bravo, Delta, and Omega
• New Fuel Types: Hydrolox, Methalox, Kerolox, Liquid Hydrogen, Water, and Solid rocket fuel.
  
• Engine exhaust plume now supports under-expansion and over-expansion.
  
• Added new Performance Analysis window to designer for jet engines and new rocket engines.
  
• Added build mode so you can now switch between rocket building and plane building. You can find this under your command pod's part properties.
  
• Added pilot orientation gizmo to help player visualize the intended direction of travel of the craft
  
• Added ability to invert the airfoil of wings.
  
• Display which input a control surface is assigned to when it uses Auto.
  
• Added ability to restrict a auto-configured control surface to a single axis.
  
• Added button in designer to show wing lift vectors.
  
• Added option to show wing lift vectors during flight
  
• Activation Group Replication - When you have a craft with multiple command pods you can enable this option on a command pod to replicate the primary command pod's activation group states.
  
• Docking ports can be disabled to prevent docking. Disabling while docked will undock the ports.
  
• Added flight scene camera speed and sensitivity settings.
  
• Upgraded to Unity 2018.3

• New engines are not yet textured and they don't have new sound effects yet. We are working on it.
  
• We are looking for feedback on the new rocket engines. We've spent a lot of time trying to make them as accurate as possible. Let us know if you have any feedback on their performance or visuals.

• Open the Steam client and go to your Library
  
• Right click SimpleRockets 2 and click Properties
  
• Go to the BETAS tab
  
• Select beta - Public Beta Testing from the beta dropdown

Results from today's test fire of the new procedural rocket engine.

• Type: Liquid
  
• Power Cycle: Gas Generator
  
• Fuel: Kerolox
  
• Chamber Pressure: 10.0 MPa
  
• Nozzle Throat Radius: 0.1440 m
  
• Nozzle Exit Radius: 0.5400 m
  
• Nozzle Ratio: 14.06x

• Total Thrust: 1,067 kN
  
• Isp (sea level): 298s
  
• Isp (vacuum): 324s
  
• Mass Flow: 364.79 kg/s
  
• Exit Mach Number: 3.59
  
• Exhaust Velocity: 3,071.80m/s

You may have noticed that things are quieter around here lately. We have shifted our focus over to SimplePlanes so we can finish the 1.8 update. We hope to finish it next month and then we'll return our focus to SR2 development.

Before jumping over to SimplePlanes, Kevin and I made a lot of progress on the new procedural rocket engines. I'm really excited about them and I can't wait to start working on them again. We're trying to make them as flexible as possible to accommodate as much player feedback as we can. Here are some of the options we currently have:

* Engine Type: Liquid, Solid, Nuclear (thermal), Ion
* Power Cycles (Liquid only): Gas Generator, Staged, Pressure-Fed, Electric
* Fuel Types: Kerolox, Hydrolox, Methalox, Solid, Liquid Hydrogen (nuclear thermal engine), Xenon (ion engine)



There are also several nozzle options available. Most of them are fixed geometry, but there is a procedural cone style and a procedural bell style you can adjust to get the exact nozzle area ratio you want. This will allow you to optimize your engine for sea level, vacuum, or anywhere in between. We will also include an altitude-compensating toroidal aerospike nozzle.

Also, Philip did a lot of work to improve support for building airplanes in SR2, including a new option to specify if you are building a rocket or an airplane. Parts will adjust to a more convenient orientation when added and you can also adjust the direction of travel using this new handy gizmo:



In the same aim of improving support for building airplanes, William has been working on adding resizable landing gear. They are still in the early stages of development, but they already show a lot of potential.



We're hoping to get most of this out next month as well, but that will be a tall order! We will do our best!

Come melt your face off with our latest jet engine addition to SimpleRockets 2. Put the throttle lever to the metal, and fulfill your need for speed. Full release notes can be found here.

Here's a new trailer showing them off:


We really went all out on these. I hit the textbooks and learned about the thermodynamics of jet engines, (which are fascinating, btw) and Kevin created detailed, modular jet engine models. In the end, we have a highly procedural jet engine part that can be used to create anything from old-style turbojets to new low-bypass military turbofans to high-bypass civilian airliner engines.



You can also tweak several visual aspects of the engine, including the shroud style, length, and curvature. Cycle through the available nozzle styles, fan styles, and inlet cones. Here's a quick GIF showing some of the features:



You can tweak the size, bypass ratio, compression ratio, and afterburner and see how it affects the performance. The designer has some extra tools to help analyze performance at different altitudes and airspeeds:



Jet engines need air to breathe, so the new inlet part helps to make sure your jet engines are getting enough air. If you connect an inlet directly to a jet engine, it will only provide air to that engine. If you connect an inlet somewhere else on your craft, it will provide air to any jet engines that don't have sufficient airflow. If you're curious about how your engines are doing, you can click on them during flight and check their Inlet Efficiency to ensure they are getting enough air.



Of course, the fun doesn't stop there. Kevin built two new stock airplanes to show off the new jet engines.


They are a blast to fly and it's fun to watch the new jet engines in action. Don't forget to turn on the new heat distortion particle effects for maximum enjoyment.

Jet Engines are ready for testing! Realistic thermodynamic simulation allows you to tweak their size, bypass ratio, compression ratio and afterburner and see how it affects performance. Cycle through the different visual styles for nozzles, fans, inlet cones, and shrouds (or remove their shroud and see their naked core). You can easily create high bypass turbofan engines or low bypass military afterburning engines and anything in between.





Read the release notes here.

• Open the Steam client and go to your Library
  
• Right click SimpleRockets 2 and click Properties
  
• Go to the BETAS tab
  
• Select beta - Public Beta Testing from the beta dropdown

The Steam Winter Sale is here and you all know what that means! Our games are on sale and we also put together a special bundle for all of you aerospace enthusiasts with an extra 15% discount.

For those of you who already own SimpleRockets 2 on Steam, this bundle is a great way to get SimplePlanes at a nearly 60% discount during this Winter Sale.

That's a great deal and I hope you check it out! Thanks for playing!

If you want to help us beta test you can grab the beta branch and start testing. You can look at the Roadmap to see the items that we have claimed to have fixed in this release, so those would be great things to test. Thanks!

• Several improvements to Map View
  
• Improved auto-burn accuracy, throttle application, and tendency to stop early.
  
• Allow re-launching from different launch locations in the flight scene.
  
• Launch locations can now be deleted.
  
• Added setting to adjust fast-forward speed.
  
• Added a textbox to the paint panel to allow entering custom colors using hex codes in the form of #RRGGBB
  
• So many bug fixes

• Open the Steam client and go to your Library
  
• Right click SimpleRockets 2 and click Properties
  
• Go to the BETAS tab
  
• Select beta - Public Beta Testing from the beta dropdown

• Auto Burn doesn't work when Map View is not open
  
• Player can launch from different Launch Locations during a Build Challenge

We just released version 0.6.7.2 on Steam and it includes a few new toys and ton of bug fixes. Here's the new features:

• Added Electric Motor. I'm honestly shocked by how fun it is. You can tweak its RPM, torque, and input settings. The first thing I did was build a quadcopter by connecting wing sections to it.
  
• Added Flight View Inspector so now you can see a lot more data about your craft in flight, including the highly requested in-flight TWR.

• Added new Landing Gear style for wheels
  
• Added CTRL+RightClick to clone a group of parts. We should have added this a long time ago! It's so handy!
  
• Added keyboard shortcuts for switching to nearby command pods / crafts (defaults to '[' and ']')
  
• Improved parachute model and textures and reduced cord size.
  
• Improved performance of switching to nearby craft
  
• The game is no longer minimized when losing focus. If you don't want the game to pause when losing focus, be sure to enable 'Run in Background' in the game settings.
  
• Engines now start even if they're in the same stage as an interstage. Now you can launch your missiles.
  
• Allow batteries to work with fuel transfer during flight.
  
• Nav sphere now ignores middle mouse button and right mouse button
  
• In the designer, a single part can now be separated from a cluster/group with CTRL+LeftClick and drag. Note: This means that CTRL+LeftClick no longer prevents part interaction. You can do that with middle-mouse button click now.
  
• Changed middle mouse button to allow rotating view in the designer without interacting with parts.

• Big improvements to performance and encounter prediction. Should be much easier to get encounters now and this will be especially noticeable with Cylero.
  
• Closest encounter icons turn green when capture is predicted.

You can read about the rest of the enhancements and bug fixes on the Release Post here. Also, don't forget to check out the Roadmap and vote on what you want to see next! The Electric Motor and Flight Data were both player submitted ideas!

Key new features:

• Electric Motor - I'm honestly shocked by how fun it is to play with.
  
• Flight View Inspector - Now you can see a lot more data about your craft in flight.
  
• Map View Improvements - Big performance improvements and big improvements to encounter prediction and stability.

If you want to help us beta test you can grab the beta branch and start testing. You can look at the Roadmap to see the items that we have claimed to have fixed in this release, so those would be great things to test. Thanks!

• Open the Steam client and go to your Library
  
• Right click SimpleRockets 2 and click Properties
  
• Go to the BETAS tab
  
• Select beta - Public Beta Testing from the beta dropdown

This is our second update since we entered Early Access. We are still focusing on bug fixes, but we did add the Delta-V display in the designer, which has been very highly requested. If you want to help us decide on what to do next, make sure you vote on the stuff on the Roadmap!

• Added Delta-V, TWR, and Burn Time information to the designer. It can be toggled on/off with the button in the top right of the Staging Editor.
  
• Improved craft switching in the Map View to not require the flight scene to reload when the craft is nearby.
  
• Upgrading to 2018.2.15f1
  
• Photo library now automatically selects the Camera Roll album when opened.
  
• Smoothly transition camera back to craft when clicking RECENTER button in flight.

• Increased the buoyancy of the command pod
  
• Fixed a bug that would cause docked crafts to spin.
  
• Fixed a bug that could cause crafts to appear to randomly disappear during flight.
  
• Fixed a bug where RCS would stop working when the center of mass became very close to the nozzles.
  
• Fixed bug occasionally teleporting crafts with wheels when tire tracks are disabled.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused planets to look jittery during warp.
  
• Fixed a bug with symmetry that could lead to errors in the designer.
  
• Fixed a bug that could make a sandbox unplayable if it was unable to load a single craft from file.
  
• Fixed a bug that could cause errors when undoing or redoing a step in the designer.
  
• Fixed the texturing on the checkered parachute
  
• Reset the Enable Auto Rotation flag to true every time the player enters the designer in case they accidentally disabled it and don't understand why they can't connect parts anymore.
  
• Fixed a bug that prevented time-warp when the craft was stationary on the ground.
  
• Fixed bug where target information can become incorrect for burn nodes far into the future.
  
• Fixed a bug that broke reentry effect visuals when a part has been mass scaled to zero.
  
• Fixed a bug where the altitude would become too big to display at very high altitudes.
  
• Fixed a bug where the rotation direction became backwards when the camera was looking at the craft upside down.
  
• Fixed a bug where the center of thrust was not updated when changing an engine's Fuel Consumption.
  
• Fixed a bug where the fuselage gizmos would not show up after cloning a fuel tank.
  
• Fixed a bug that could cause the UI to disappear after taking a photo.
  
• Fixed a bug that was causing bug reports generated during challenges to not reflect the true state of the player's sandbox.
  
• Fixed a bug that would allow parts of a craft to hover in the air after the craft was destroyed.
  
• Fixed a bug where the the Upload Craft would fail if the player had changed the stage activation type of a non-engine to Engine. Not sure why a player would do that, but Kevin did.
  
• Reduced wing area threshold when determining if the wing should have physics enabled or not from 0.25m^2 to 0.15m^2.