May 12, 2023

Sea of Thieves: 2025 Edition - a-faddison

Greetings! It has, in fact, been an entire month since we last dropped by to fill you in on all the latest happenings on the Sea of Thieves, which means it’s once again time to dive into our recent history for the latest round-up. Even without a full-blown new Season update, the month just gone by still had plenty going on that you might have missed, so sit back and enjoy this jaunt through the excitements of April. See you on the other side!

Content Update

If you were able to join us at various points throughout April, you’ll have noticed a couple of Season Nine Voyages usually reserved for Pirate Legends landing in your inventory. These free login bonuses treated all pirates to a Search for the Skull of Destiny Voyage and a Black Powder Stash Voyage to be enjoyed at leisure. Did you get the chance to dig up a disco skull of your own? Or, less profitably, maybe you ended up blowing your pirate sky high with a misplaced keg? It’s alright, we’ve all been there.

After Season Nine introduced substantial changes to the sandbox in March, April’s update gave us a chance to make some more focused tweaks and additions while improving a few systems to reduce friction for players. It was also a prime opportunity to release some dashing Order of Souls cosmetics for anyone seeking Madame Olivia’s approval. Sift through it all in the April release notes!

Alongside those new additions to the Outpost shops, the Pirate Emporium also restocked its shelves! With the Sawbones ship, weapon and clothing cosmetics, you’re now able to take up the mantle of these slightly sinister scientifically minded sailors and don your own distinctive beaked mask. Or, if you’re more of the ‘tackle your problems head-on with a weapon’ sort, the Quick Draw Weapon Pose Emote should suit your duelling needs. Whatever you’re setting out to do while Season Nine is live, remember to stick to the plan…

News and Features

After we closed out March with our first ever 48-hour Community Weekend, it seemed only fitting to start April with a fond look back on everything achieved throughout the event. From a lucrative Ancient Skelly surge to selfies at the fifth anniversary Picture Wall, the weekend was a delight to reflect on and celebrate.

We also seized an opportunity to add another entry to our From Concept to Cosmetic series, this time diving into the surprisingly complex world of Ship’s Crests. Introduced with Season Seven, these nameplates enable Captains to personalise how they present their vessel to the wider Sea of Thieves, so we spoke to the devs to find out how they perfected, built and shipped these Crests in a multitude of designs.

Elsewhere, Sea of Thieves’ streamable soundtrack got another addition in the form of ‘Merrick’s Farewell’ and the upcoming Voyage of Legends board game went up for preorder, while the Community Hub got two more updates highlighting some of your fantastic creations. We also welcomed two big names to the Spotlight pantheon: a recent addition to the Partner Programme, LadyHaradaNiwa, and a serious #SoTShot aficionado, zNiinjaaa. Head on over and have a read!

Videos and Streams

April was a busy month for our Video team, bringing you not one but two new instalments of Sea of Thieves News, catching you up on all the latest gossip and sharing some of the phenomenal creations our community members have sent our way. We even played around with a football in the Tavern! It… didn’t go well.

And for even more sneak peeks behind the scenes – with substantially less physical injury – we decided to throw in a new episode of the Official Podcast. Check it out for some cheeky previews of upcoming content and to learn why we can’t stop talking about eras all of a sudden.

Coming to the end of April, we turned our attention to a worthy cause and fielded Sea of Thieves staff members alongside other bold souls from across the UK game development scene for One Big Game. Lasting a full 24 hours, this cross-studio football tournament helped to raise an outstanding £30,000 for gaming charity SpecialEffect. Thank you so much to everyone who took part, tuned in and donated!

Social Channels

The month started off strong on Twitter, with pirates sharing their favourite stories from the Season Nine update, but rapidly descended into disappointment when our followers let us down twice in a row. Even when we left clear instructions, we found ourselves beset with selfies. Outrageous.

Fortunately things picked up again as we revealed our latest #SoTShot champions for their Catch of the Day entries, not to mention their masterpieces on a Moonlight theme, and celebrated the completion of the mighty Port Merrick. After a bit of self-affirmation, we also shared some searching confessions about our time on the tides, told stories with emotes and reflected on the changing seas.

There were rewards to be had too: avid Twitch viewers were able to add four more items to their Eastern Winds Sapphire set by tuning into Sea of Thieves Partner streams, while those of you who joined us for One Big Game for 90 minutes or more were able to take home your very own Keepy-Uppy Emote. Just make sure you’re wearing boots when you use it – those coconuts are hard.

All of which brings us to the end of the month! And that sporting exertion has really worn us out. As always, there’ll be so much more to cover when we reconvene at the end of May, so we won’t outstay our welcome now no matter what our inner instinct says. Until then, keep up with all the latest Sea of Thieves updates as they happen via Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube or Twitch, or join the official Forums or Discord. Otherwise, we’ll see you next month for our May round-up. So long!

Previously in 2023:

Sea of Thieves Round-Up: March 2023
Sea of Thieves Round-Up: February 2023
Sea of Thieves Round-Up: January 2023

May 12, 2023

Lost Legends Expansion - May Dev Log

Odd Realm - Sleipnir

Hello friends!

First off, thank you all for being super patient waiting for these updates. I had intended to put the new content out into beta in March, and I was very close to doing this. In my last log, I had said it was two weeks out, and, at the time, that was true. The new Gwdir race was just about there. However, there were some things I needed to address first. While I've been working on these updates, I've received quite a few messages that talk about several issues with the UI. These are issues I've encountered myself, and they were bugging the heck out of me too. The last thing I want is for the core of the game to be worsened by annoying and unpolished UI. I couldn't just ignore the feedback I was getting. Since the last dev log, I've meticulously worked on those issues. Let's take a look!

Window Improvements

Job and Room Toolbar

This one was a huge annoyance for myself, and I'm sure a lot of you found it to be not great as well. It was implemented when there were only a handful of blueprints and rooms to choose from. So, it wasn't terrible back then. Now, there are just way too many entries to have to search through for the old UI to work. I've done a bunch of work on the layout, functionality, but you also won't have to open a separate window to see placed rooms/jobs now. Everything can be done from the newly updated selection window.

First thing you'll notice is that the jobs and rooms are now listed vertically. It shows the names of the jobs/rooms, and what requirements they may have. Rooms will show previously designated rooms, which you can select to add to, as well as what entities do not have the room. This is to help players understand who is missing, say, a Home when playing as the humans.

As well, along the top, I've added filters for job categories, and special rooms for races. You can see in the gif below that I'm using the arrow keys to navigate selections. This is something I've added to windows the selectable lists and tabs.

Settlers Window

This is another window which desperately needed some love. One common piece of feedback I got was that players hated having to scroll, especially on this window. So, I've gone through all the windows and done my best to make everything fit. As you can see on this screen below, you no longer need to scroll horizontally to see all your skills. And, I did some work to the visuals of skills. I've made it so they are easier to read, and toggle. It's much easier to toggle all skills off/on, as well as reset them.

Entity Window

Here's another window which suffered from scrolling. I've done a pass on it to fit everything into one screen. And, hopefully, the overall layout is clearer.

Production Window

This window is the king of complexity and I did soooooo much work to make every part of it easier to read and use. I've added tons of functionality to be able to edit permissions for everything involved in a job. What items are used, what entities, as well as props if any are required. Don't want items stored in water blocks in your stockpile? You can now edit that level of detail if you wish. There's a million little polish items which went into this screen.

Inventory Window

I've added a ton of new categories to help distinguish items in game. As a result, I've also added some functionality to the inventory window to help organize things.

Bees

This post mostly focuses on the window improvements, but I have also been working on content. One of the new additions is the Honeybee. You'll be able to place an Apiary and farm Honey.

Livelier Marine Life

I've added some new plants that grow only in bodies of water. Also, I've added to color to all the fish to help distinguish them.

Conclusion

There's an absolute ton of work left to do. I'm going to hold off saying when this one will come out because I honestly don't know. Most of the stuff I'm working at the moment is very small details which is tedious. I am so thankful for all of you following the game's progress and providing feedback. This community is amazing. I'll do my best to get this update done asap. Just know that I'm still extremely passionate about this game, and I work every day on it. I hope you don't worry that I've dropped off or anything. I'm in the final home stretch and it is quite the challenge, but we are getting there! Thanks so much for going on the journey with me. :)

Waylon

May 12, 2023

Tacticon 2023 - Development Update

Fragile Existence - Fragile Continuum

Hi, Fragile Existence developer Lee Harris here! To mark being part of the Steam Festival celebrating strategy games (go check it out afterwards!), we figured it might be nice to give a throwback to the days when I actually got around to making regular video development diaries-- with a special edition featuring yours truly narrating his way through a slice of gameplay, highlighting what we've been working on since we last checked in. The video is linked below, but I've attached an abridged text update below that covers the main developments too, so take your pick :)

Volumetric effects & the Warp Sequence

Straight off the bat, the revised main menu showcases the new system-wide lighting effects, which use the local star position to direct shafts of light around (space-based) objects in the foreground. It's a subtle touch, and not necessarily a very realistic one, but it's one of those atmosphere-building effects that's hard to let go of once you try it out. Practically, and like many things in game development, this one features a bit of cloak and daggers: rather than fill the entire solar system with a fog-like substance, we just populate a small region that follows the main camera around instead!

We also see its use applied to the warp corridor, where ships within the fleet are also buffeted and knocked around somewhat during the often perilous transfer. Pay particular attention and you might notice how ships have to cut power prior to emerging into normal space again, with power being restored in stages, which is chiefly shown by the window lights flickering off, then later coming back online post-transfer. Ships also can't be moved until power is restored, so you're always vulnerable for a short while after a warp sequence completes.

Planetary cloud layers

This one is little more experimental-- it uses a GPU-based raymarching algorithm to produce cloud formations on planets that need them (i.e. Earth-like), rotating around the planet's main axis. There were some considerable hurdles to getting this looking decent enough whilst not overwhelming everyone's hardware, as well as more subtle challenges like making sure clouds didn't show up as brightly on the dark side of planets and the like (the dark side is genuinely dark, btw, you need to use unit lights and such to navigate!). We're still playing with this one, especially since they need to be volumetric enough for the camera to pass through whilst following a selected target, and also adaptable enough to offer customisation in the planet editor window (because why shouldn't you be able to have towering green clouds if that's what you want?!). Weather isn't here yet, but we do want planets to feel like they can be enough of an adversary to your fleet even without more objective threats. Units can be stored inside buildings, and part of that was so that you could hide units away when a dust storm or the like settles in. So that's the ultimate goal there!

Sensor bubbles

So, perhaps controversially, Fragile Existence doesn't feature a 'fog of war' to limit what you as a player can observe. I didn't really fancy hiding planetary terrain behind a grey smudge, and when you're playing in both space and planet layers, it's harder to define how that fog of war would even really operate. Instead, what we've gone for is an active 3D scanner bubble that 'pings' objects inside its projected radius, flashing briefly to highlight the new contact. When targets move outside of a ship/units sensor range, they shortly thereafter become invisible again, since you no longer have knowledge of what that target is doing. Also, overlapping sensor bubbles results in an increased search bandwidth across that region, and the same system is used across both space and planetary layers for design consistency throughout. Mineable nodes on the surface are something that also needs to be 'pinged' before they become visible, though static objects like this don't require units to maintain the sensor lock (they can move away and located resources won't disappear). Note that everything in Fragile Existence requires power in order to work (yes, engines too!), so this is a system you could divert power away from (or lose power through damage), for example, and such units would then not be able to detect other units nearby. Gulp!

Constructing ground bases with orbital/fleet support

Whilst ground installations were previously placeholder objects to suggest how things were going to pan out, they are now very much fleshed-out parts of the game-- deployed engineer units must place foundations, before a helper drone levels the ground at the indicated plot (with planet terrain adjusting accordingly). Once this is complete, those same engineers can construct the buildings themselves, but not without having access to the required materials. With 8 surface resources, and ultimately dozens of materials made through combinations of these, you need to source building materials before things can move forward. When establishing a base on a new world for the first time, you're likely going to need to send down a Stockpile (it's a cargo container, basically) which has been filled with relevant items beforehand. Drop ships ferry these and units back and forth between the fleet in orbit and the ground layer itself, and once deployed everything smartly organises itself into groups that automatically work together. A ground base can then add a newly-deployed Stockpile to it's respective group, and item transfers can commence between nearby buildings or constructions through the use of Mover drones (Amazon finally did it guys, we have industrial delivery drones!).

Of course, base buildings all have a target function, from providing living space to producing power, and others that build units or fashion materials. The refinery, for example, produces Iron bars from iron and coal ore, or Steel bars from iron and oxygen (yes, you can also collect gases!), whilst the Ore Depot exemplifies the more traditional harvester-related building that sends out a collection vehicle to selected discovered ore deposits. The Starport is a warehouse that can store base productions as it grows beyond the limited flexibility of deployed Stockpiles.

Build in orbit too!

Yep, you can engineer constructions in orbit too. These will often be defensive platforms of some variety, but there are also several key orbital platforms that give you access to research and materials that can't be duplicated through ground-based installations. Handy, for example, for processing gas 'mined' from skimming gas giants.

It's all about the people..

We mentioned Living Space at some point above, and we shouldn't gloss over that one-- people are very much a dynamic resource across your fleet. You start with a certain population count, most of which will be (vaguely unskilled) civilians. From that pool you must train people to become engineers, scientists, doctors, pilots, marines or naval officers, then allocate relevant personnel to modules across the fleet, both in space and across your established ground bases. Modules provide utility to all of your capital ships, units and buildings, yet can do very little without personnel assigned (the efficiency of a module is proportional to the number of people assigned, with each having it's own cap). Moving people to ground bases through the use of drop ships is important because personnel can only be distributed across their current grouping (so, capital ships in the same group can share personnel locally). When a building or unit is destroyed, any personnel inside are also lost, so you've got to be sure to evacuate a particular hotspot if things start looking rough!

As I was saying on the Discord only the other day, you can think of personnel a little like a fluid talent point distribution. The more people you have, the more people you can assign to tasks across the fleet. As you lose people, you'll have to start making some difficult choices-- assigning people to only the most vital systems and the like.

So what's next..?

This update was actually recorded a little while ago, and I've been hard at work on several new systems since then. The primary focus at present is fleshing out the in-game visual scripting system, ultimately designed to allow players to create their own experiences and adventures (there's already a solar system and planet editor, and we want all of this to work really intuitively together)-- but this is also how the game's own campaign and scenarios are being constructed too, so we're killing two birds with one asteroid there. AI development is also a principle focus this year, and it often ties into the scripting system, so there's some considerable overlap there. Not very flashy stuff, but pretty crucial!

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So, thanks for taking the time to check in-- and hopefully these sort of updates will become more regular again at some point :)