Thanks to y'all who have bought and played, it means a lot <3
Here is a list of expected additions:
A new layer of content, unlocked in Shrinkenator. There will be 4 new pieces of content in this layer, I don't want to get too much into the details so stay tuned!
Some QoL features.
Here is a list of expected changes:
Shrinkenator will be more balanced.
Autos in Shrinkenator will much much cheaper.
Shrinkentor upgrades that aren't autos will be more expensive.
Most Shrinkenator upgrades will be capped.
Infuse will be weaker.
You will always start with 4 XP on Infusion.
UI Improvements
And More!
Stay tuned, I am working pretty fast at the moment. Hopefully I can get this next update out in less than a month!
Today’s update finally extends the explorable boundaries beyond Earth and Moon. It also brings a lot of loading time and performance improvements, new Navball and several new rocket parts you've been waiting for. Let’s get started.
Martian system
Implementing this one was not that easy. I needed to add a new atmospheric physics for Mars, and also develop a new visual model for it. Procedural texturing was challenging too, because you have a lot less visual references compared to Earth. I am not completely satisfied with the result, but it is good for the first iteration. As for Phobos and Deimos it turns out that they have non-spherical shapes so adding support for non-spherical shapes for the Solar system map took a while too. In the end, the red planet and its two tiny moons are waiting for brave explorers!
Elon Musk's dream
Phobos
Deimos
Night on the surface of Phobos
Navball
Navball not only includes visuals rework but also provides more information such as a fuel indicator and heading angle. Every part of navball now has a tooltip where you can also find numerical values of current throttle and fuel amount. You can also switch between stage and rocket fuel using a new button at the top of navball.
As a bonus I’ve added a new Navball mod type where you can customize its appearance. I will update the mod guide later this week, but you can already try a KSP-like navball from the workshop! (Just don’t forget to select it in the game settings after subscribing to the mod).
New space context menu will make your life easier! You can left click on a spacecraft or celestial body and get context-dependent options, like “Switch to” or “Focus”.
The “Set as target” option from the context menu will show ascending/descending nodes on your orbit and will add “Target” and “Anti-target” autocorrection modes to Navball.
Last but not least, the maneuver raycast handle will automatically snap to orbit nodes, so the maneuver can finally be placed exactly on periapsis or ascending node! You can hold the ALT key to switch to the old behaviour.
New parts
Rocket parts from this update include two new engines! Since every engine in the game is based on real analogue from the USSR or Russia, it requires a lot of research to create and add it to the game. That’s why all previous updates didn’t include them. But this time everything came together and you can try the most powerful single-chamber liquid fuel engine ever created in the USSR for the lunar program (sadly, it wasn't used in real flights because its development was stopped in 1970).
The second engine added to the game has the highest specific impulse in vacuum in the game (but lowest thrust). You can try to guess on which real engine it is based.
***
There are a lot of changes and fixes in this update too. Most important are loading times and performance improvements and a bunch of flight fixes. You can find a full changelog below. I am planning to release one more big sandbox update in the future (which will include a rocket instruments feature I talked about in the previous dev update) and then switch to spaceport building.
I hope you will enjoy this update. If you encounter any bugs or problems with it, don’t hesitate and leave it on the forums or in the official Discord channel. Thank you and see you in the next update.
Release notes v0.12.5
Features:
added Mars, Phobos and Deimos to the game;
added atmospheric pressure models for Mars and Venus;
added space context menu with contextual Switch To, Focus and Set Target options;
you can set target for spacecraft, two new autocorrection modes will appear (Target and Anti-target);
ascending/descending nodes for spacecraft orbits with target set;
redisigned navball UI + added tons of tooltips to it;
new mod type: navball, new celestial bodies were also added to the surface mod;
orbit raycast is now snapping to the closest orbit node (you can hold Alt key to disable this behaviour);
significanly reduced game launch time, especially on old GPUs;
imroved perfomance of spacecraft gravity, engines and drag calculations (again);
flight loading time reduced by 3-5 seconds; when spacecraft is in a deep space it is almost instant now;
max possible planet quadtree level now equals 30 (previously was 17), this means that the same LOD could be achieved on the planets with pretty much any radius;
new engine parameter "Throttle limits" (for now it was only added to engine 4)
New rocket parts:
"Vega-072" Liquid Fuel Engine
"Yuzhniy-348" Liquid Fuel Engine"
"Dvutavr" Stroage Bay
Storage Fairing 1.4m
Adapter 4c-7s
Changes:
focused body no longer reset when closing and opening solar system map;
real planet surface now loaded instead of the fake surface in the spaceport and assembly shop;
perfomance settings now affect planet surface in the spaceport and assembly shop;
unified sun look on map and during the flight;
Sun disk has proper size now and depends on distance to the Sun;
earth atmosphere on solar system map and startup system uses proper exposure and color correction;
fixed exposure is used on the solar system map until different exposure modes will be implemented (back planet side will be a bit dark becuase of that);
water quads under the planet surface will no longer render (perfomance improvement);
changed planet's surface triangulation, it is less stretched along one axes right now;
greatly decreased amount of geometry rendered during the flight (moderate perfomance improvement);
changed how rocket part impact is calculated: now it is using force, applied to part to resolve collision and not just a relative velocity;
added mod type icon to mods in the mods list;
for some very small sattelites with no its mass data available set a minimum mass;
for some very small sattelites with SOI less than radius set minimum SOI size equals 1.75 x radius.
Settings:
added navball selector to the game settings;
added hotkey: ` - reset focus on map;
added hotkey: Alt + Shift - step increase throttle;
added hotkey: Alt + Ctrl - step decrease throttle;
changed hotkey: from ` to Alt + ` - pause/resume time;
hold ALT key to disable maneuver snapping.
Fixes:
encounter prediction doesn't work outside of Earth's SOI;
distant celestial bodies dissappear when turning on any light during the flight;
rectangle connector not attaching to heptahedron socket if it already have hexdual connector attached;
planet's atmosphere disappeared when switching from spacecraft orbiting the Moon to spacecraft orbiting Earth;
rocket parts exploded when decoupling them in the atmosphere at the speed over 5000 m/s;
reattaching rocket part with symmetry turned on not creating symmetry parts;
spacecraft fly into abyss if engine is working and spacecraft changes SOI;
grounded spacecraft explode when starting engines;
collisions between grounded spacecraft and active not work or work incorrectly;
impact node sometimes displayed when shouldn't
impact node not showing after closing and opening map;
orbit nodes sometimes placed incorrectly during encounter prediction;
stars are too bright at night in the spaceport;
predicted orbits are incorrectly scaled, if map scale was changed, when orbit was not active;
camera keep high rotational damping, when changing camera mode and then switching to map and back;
save panel is not showing in the surface mod constructor;
Introducing our most recent custom episode, here just in time to celebrate the Fourth of July! This custom episode features a range of questions from The US of A. This custom episode for Quiplash 3 is also available to our international friends, so test your knowledge today by updating your copy of The Jackbox Party Pack 7 look for “Fourth Laughter” in the Featured Content submenu.
If you have an idea for a custom episode that you want to share, create your own by clicking the Make Your Own menu. If you have one that you’re proud of, Tweet it out to share with the world!
Learn all about making your own custom episode here!
-Added 14th element, 5 new characters and 8 "other" transformations accordingly. -Other small changes to existing characters. -Added character swap functionality during sex scenes.
Characters that can be swapped during their sex scene (for now): Ada Lonely adventurer Bunny Police
Updated characters: Secretary
New sex scenes: Secretary General (new) Queen (new) Wizard (new)
In addition to our regular Metro Marathon on Tuesdays we’ll be playing Metro Exodus PC Enhanced Edition on Monday. Come watch us traverse the vast Taiga landscape in its full 4K glory and with RTX on. We’ll be using Nvidia 3080 with graphics set to Ultra.
Set your reminders for Monday, July 5 at 5pm BST | 9am PT | 8pm CEST PC Enhanced Edition is available to all owners of the original Metro Exodus. If you have not taken your journey through the surface yet, now is a perfect time to pick it up with up to 75% off during the Summer Sale.
Small-ish patch today but filled with some good content! As said in the last post, this week was scheduled for a more stable game along with some quality of life things that will make your life easier.
Patch notes: - Fixed a bug where you couldn't select marbles after deleting one - Improved game stability regarding crashes when deleting marbles & going to the main menu - Pressing escape now closes the bottom menu bar - Fixed a bug where scrolling inside the UI affected movespeed - Fixed some notification issue's where it wouldn't go away (once again) - Updated the ivy models to have a bit more detail - Added a small notification when changing camera move speed - Toggling UI (F1) now also affects all windows - Improved draw distance for the small round bush - Improved input detection stability, especially when the game went out of focus - Fixed a bug where you could still override marble spawner tracks when selecting multiple - Added ability to mass paint all selected objects - Added ability to continously hold LMB to paint underneath the cursor - Added a toggle + hotkey (default: i) for showing invisible painted materials - Added shadow distance options - Changed the hover for grid and snapping to be in one menu (which appears when clicking on the new button at the top bar) - Added a new 3rd world, the flat world! (As requested) - Edit tools will now also snap to grid when the snapping to grid option is turned on - Added ability to use the normal selection controls whilst painting when holding control (the normal hotkey) - Updated new world menu - Improved the new special paints introduced in 0.1.5 on certain objects, expect more improvements in the future - Tooltips will now show up faster
Thanks everyone for the support so far! All suggestions & bug reports are appreciated. Next patch will be a more special one, stay tuned!
