• dupes should no longer fall through the floor
  
• capped max profession decor expectation
  
• things marked for deconstruct should still be marked for deconstruct after save/load
  
• fixed a bug where mass was being lost in pipes
  
• fixed a bug where your save files were being marked as corrupt if your base name used unicode characters
  
• fixed a crash when certain objects were loaded in the entombed state
  
• fixed audio crash when an object that just hit the ground got destroyed

• fixed some crashes that could occur when dealing with extreme/impossible temperatures

Join us in Alpha
Or just hang out and watch our progress on the official forums!

• dupes should no longer fall through the floor
  
• capped max profession decor expectation
  
• things marked for deconstruct should still be marked for deconstruct after save/load
  
• fixed a bug where mass was being lost in pipes
  
• fixed a bug where your save files were being marked as corrupt if your base name used unicode characters
  
• fixed a crash when certain objects were loaded in the entombed state
  
• fixed audio crash when an object that just hit the ground got destroyed

• fixed some crashes that could occur when dealing with extreme/impossible temperatures

Join us in Alpha
Or just hang out and watch our progress on the official forums!

Anomalies remember stalkers. Dying mutants tell the tales of their hunters to other monsters. The Zone itself keeps the images of all who visited Lubetch's streets... That's why it so interested in every new stalker. Unfamiliar names woven into the structure of anomalous fields, and each one adds a new touch to the mysterious melody of the Zone.
Anomalous Zone is proud to welcome all new arrivals!
Each new stalker which arrived in the Zone will receive gifts from the anomalies.

Each account created from 00:00 (msk) 9 of February to 23:59 (msk) 28 of February will be rewarded with:

Khurta (30 days)
Hammer Shotgun
Shotgun ammo
Old Stalker's Journal (14 days)

Good game to you, young stalkers!

Thank you all for your patience. We had to temporarily cut a few features to make our planned release date, leaderboards among them. Now they're in! You'll be able to race for the top position on each level's leaderboard!

Additionally we finally put most of our sounds in. Some more to come soon, but for now this will do. We also tinkered with our lighting so let us know how you feel about that.

Some major bug fixes are also included this update! We fiddled with a bug that cuased players to teleport out into nothingness when their head remained inside a physical object for too long, so let us know if any of you find that happening to you still. We made some tweaks to our towers to make them look nicer, and also fixed a bug with the next level buttons. Another major bug was with our guard not doing his job. We put some work into him, so he should be working fine now.

We have an asymmetrical co-op mode in the works! Stay tuned for that update soonish. We're aiming for 1-3 weeks from now, depending on how much trouble we run into in the mean time.

We appreciate all of you who have given our game a chance and we will be trying to update fairly regularly until we feel the game is ready to get out of early access. We may even do a few level packs after that. Stay tuned for more news and updates and get climbing!


CHANGE LOG

Features added:
- Change log in the main menu
- New Skybox/Lighting
- Leaderboards
- Ambient/BG music

Bugs fixed:
- Tower seperation
- Guard mechanics
- Next level buttons
- Texture modifications on towers
- Head in wall glitch (hopefully)

Thank you all for your patience. We had to temporarily cut a few features to make our planned release date, leaderboards among them. Now they're in! You'll be able to race for the top position on each level's leaderboard!

Additionally we finally put most of our sounds in. Some more to come soon, but for now this will do. We also tinkered with our lighting so let us know how you feel about that.

Some major bug fixes are also included this update! We fiddled with a bug that cuased players to teleport out into nothingness when their head remained inside a physical object for too long, so let us know if any of you find that happening to you still. We made some tweaks to our towers to make them look nicer, and also fixed a bug with the next level buttons. Another major bug was with our guard not doing his job. We put some work into him, so he should be working fine now.

We have an asymmetrical co-op mode in the works! Stay tuned for that update soonish. We're aiming for 1-3 weeks from now, depending on how much trouble we run into in the mean time.

We appreciate all of you who have given our game a chance and we will be trying to update fairly regularly until we feel the game is ready to get out of early access. We may even do a few level packs after that. Stay tuned for more news and updates and get climbing!


CHANGE LOG

Features added:
- Change log in the main menu
- New Skybox/Lighting
- Leaderboards
- Ambient/BG music

Bugs fixed:
- Tower seperation
- Guard mechanics
- Next level buttons
- Texture modifications on towers
- Head in wall glitch (hopefully)

This is a look at Convoy, one of our upcoming new modes. It's still definitely a work in progress, but this video will show you the basic idea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2U2Pc6y_41w

As you can see, convoy places you on a moving platform. Enemies will appear on either side of you, underneath you, and in the case of flying enemies, fly right through your convoy.

It's still in development, but we'll be posting more updates as we get closer to pushing it live.
Let us know what you think!

This is a look at Convoy, one of our upcoming new modes. It's still definitely a work in progress, but this video will show you the basic idea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2U2Pc6y_41w

As you can see, convoy places you on a moving platform. Enemies will appear on either side of you, underneath you, and in the case of flying enemies, fly right through your convoy.

It's still in development, but we'll be posting more updates as we get closer to pushing it live.
Let us know what you think!

This week we updated the game to include slightly smarter creatures and displaying location markers on remote planets in the HUD.



We have finished working on allowing players to build their own portals. The code is in the current release but we have yet to enable it as we did not have the time to do sufficient internal testing. We need to choose the recipe for Oort Shards that powers the portal.

Next this week, we hope to release the following:

• Warping to friends.
  
• Updated creature presentation in compass.
  
• Updated character animation for some of the tools. E.g. the shovel.
  
• Further improvements to the HUD.
  
• Additional moves and AI for the Cuttletrunk.
  
• Possibly additional VFX and SFX added.

We have started to reskin the User Interface to reflect our final design. You will start to see changes to UI such as the inventory screen by mid March.

Code
The portal code is now in and being tested so, all being well, will be in the next release.
The new creature drop system was completed. The creatures pathing have been improved again, now able to get through one block wide gaps. We have also resolved why some creature audio was not playing so there will be more SFX in the next version.

The GUI skinning is being worked through, with the inventory being updated. The additional planet HUD information is being implemented. The user can now see which planet friends are on and where to allow them to warp to them.

The damage system is being overhauled to use attribute system, so flaming or corrupted hammers etc will deal different kinds of damage.

We’ve also worked on an demo version of the game for an upcoming event and resolving a number of bugs that showed up.

Further work on was done on the Sony TRCs, such as the Trophies back end. The database testing continued and ironed out a few back end issues.

Design
Ollie has been working on an idea to score builds based on the resources used. It wouldn’t be able to judge how awesome things look, but providing some sense of progression based on how much time, energy and / or Coin has gone into the blocks and props will give builders a sense of satisfaction. He’s also looked into how villages, towns and cities are identified and marked on the worlds. Around that there’s been lots more work to do on attributes data for characters, creatures and items.

Rob has been working on the character information and skill tree GUI.

Luke Has been working on an expanded Sanctum to include character creation, account creation and teach new players the basics of Boundless.

Art
The art team has been busy on the first character race modelling, VFX and 3rd person animations.

We’ve also been working on a list of earth-like prefabs for our worlds for V1.0.

Jess rebuilt a new head template in preparation of new face designs and new head shapes. Here she’s matching our current head shapes to the new template:



This image shows the two body sizes and shapes available for our race.



The more slender character body mesh. The slender character is also scaled smaller in game:




Last but not least, here’s the first of our new faces.
We’re very excited to be working on these.
This is an ‘elf’ face sculpt:



Gerry has been working on the 3rd person tool animations. The shovel animation should be in next this week’s release.

Code (Michael and Luca) have also provided us with a neat system that scales the 1st person tools and weapons to compensate for changes in screen aspect ratio. This means the tools/weapons are now centralised so we can go ahead and author the final 1st person animations and prototype the lance.

Dom has completed all the elemental point effects for impacts. Here’s a sneak peek of the corrosion version:



Cross posted from devlog forum

This week we updated the game to include slightly smarter creatures and displaying location markers on remote planets in the HUD.



We have finished working on allowing players to build their own portals. The code is in the current release but we have yet to enable it as we did not have the time to do sufficient internal testing. We need to choose the recipe for Oort Shards that powers the portal.

Next this week, we hope to release the following:

• Warping to friends.
  
• Updated creature presentation in compass.
  
• Updated character animation for some of the tools. E.g. the shovel.
  
• Further improvements to the HUD.
  
• Additional moves and AI for the Cuttletrunk.
  
• Possibly additional VFX and SFX added.

We have started to reskin the User Interface to reflect our final design. You will start to see changes to UI such as the inventory screen by mid March.

Code
The portal code is now in and being tested so, all being well, will be in the next release.
The new creature drop system was completed. The creatures pathing have been improved again, now able to get through one block wide gaps. We have also resolved why some creature audio was not playing so there will be more SFX in the next version.

The GUI skinning is being worked through, with the inventory being updated. The additional planet HUD information is being implemented. The user can now see which planet friends are on and where to allow them to warp to them.

The damage system is being overhauled to use attribute system, so flaming or corrupted hammers etc will deal different kinds of damage.

We’ve also worked on an demo version of the game for an upcoming event and resolving a number of bugs that showed up.

Further work on was done on the Sony TRCs, such as the Trophies back end. The database testing continued and ironed out a few back end issues.

Design
Ollie has been working on an idea to score builds based on the resources used. It wouldn’t be able to judge how awesome things look, but providing some sense of progression based on how much time, energy and / or Coin has gone into the blocks and props will give builders a sense of satisfaction. He’s also looked into how villages, towns and cities are identified and marked on the worlds. Around that there’s been lots more work to do on attributes data for characters, creatures and items.

Rob has been working on the character information and skill tree GUI.

Luke Has been working on an expanded Sanctum to include character creation, account creation and teach new players the basics of Boundless.

Art
The art team has been busy on the first character race modelling, VFX and 3rd person animations.

We’ve also been working on a list of earth-like prefabs for our worlds for V1.0.

Jess rebuilt a new head template in preparation of new face designs and new head shapes. Here she’s matching our current head shapes to the new template:



This image shows the two body sizes and shapes available for our race.



The more slender character body mesh. The slender character is also scaled smaller in game:




Last but not least, here’s the first of our new faces.
We’re very excited to be working on these.
This is an ‘elf’ face sculpt:



Gerry has been working on the 3rd person tool animations. The shovel animation should be in next this week’s release.

Code (Michael and Luca) have also provided us with a neat system that scales the 1st person tools and weapons to compensate for changes in screen aspect ratio. This means the tools/weapons are now centralised so we can go ahead and author the final 1st person animations and prototype the lance.

Dom has completed all the elemental point effects for impacts. Here’s a sneak peek of the corrosion version:



Cross posted from devlog forum

Hello everyone! Welcome to this week’s Mondoid. It’ll be a relatively short one this week, yet we got some cool things in the pipe to show non-the-less.

A big milestone today as vehicles officially went into closed testing, which is a big step toward getting them out there to you all. They aren’t completely finished yet–There will undoubtedly be bugs to fix reported by our testers, and at the moment there is only a test model, a blue pickup-truck with an oddly placed wheel on the bumper, in the game. The cool vehicle models Martin has been pumping out still need to be implemented, and on a cosmetic level some additional work needs doing on the lighting to make them appear less uniformly lit and a bit more metallic in appearance, we may bump up their size a little too, but they are getting close and all the heavy lifting has been done.

Feedback so far shows that the streaming seems to work extremely well, and the vehicles controls and handles surprisingly well considering the isometric perspective. You use a radial menu to start the car, rolling down windows, turn on the heater, change seats, or play with the car radio.  It’s also extremely fun running over zombies–as you can imagine!

We’ll save on the videos until we get more cars implemented and feel an IWBUMS is more imminent (also, as cool as it looks already it’s a bit odd to see neighbourhoods of blue pickup trucks!) but here are a few pics to whet your appetite.







Thanks again to General Arcade for their amazing and tireless work getting the system working over the net, and getting through the remaining technical roadblocks that complicated and delayed their completion, and of course to EasyPickins who put a monumental amount of work into the vehicles prior to that, alongside his day to day work on PZ updates.


That’s right, always a productive one, our very own Romain has gone and co-created a tiny person, whom he has dubbed Victor, who was born literally yesterday. He is very cute, and as per his contract with TIS we have given RJ two weeks to get him up to speed on java so he can be put to work in the TIS code mines. Here is a picture of him alongside the Eternal Leader Spiffo:



Will, usual Mondoid writer, father and sentimental one of the bunch is away at GDC advancing the cause of The Indie Stone in the U.S, but if he was here I’m sure it’d he’d say much more eloquently that we’re ecstatically happy for RJ, Celine and their new son, it’s wonderful to see the Zomboid family grow, and we wish Victor every future success against the zombie hordes.

That’ll be all for this week, see you all next week after we see how the closed testing goes!

This week’s image is by us. The Block of Italicised Text would like to direct your attention to the PZ Wiki should you feel like editing or amending something, and the PZ Mailing List that can send blogs like this and patch notes direct to your mailbox. We also live on Twitter right here! Our Discord is now open for chat and hijinks too. A general overview of the content of PZ builds past, in testing and upcoming can be found here.