Recent release of stable version of Godot Engine 3.1 removed an important roadblock for release ΔV. As of 0.57.1 the game no-longer uses a bleeding-edge unstable game engine!
Having a stable game engine is an important step. While my own custom-compiled version of Godot Engine 3.1 that powered previous releases was pretty stable, but I could properly test it only on Windows platform – I had to relay on unofficial builds for both Linux and Mac.
These times are gone now and ΔV uses stable and proven engine across all platforms.
List of changes since 0.34.1 is quite long:
- OMS now appears instantly after keypress.
- Jury-rig menu can be fully operated with gamepad.
- Fine-tuned lighting effects bit more.
- Game has a clock now.
- Company funds counter at Enceladus Prime station.
- Adds dive summary/sell screen at Enceladus Prime.
- Added more detailed graphics for minerals.
- Added shaders to minerals to make pure metals look reflective.
- New music track.
- Fixes clicking sound when ship is out of propellant.
- Improved compatibility with Radeon cards.
- Generally improved framerate for Enceladus Prime screen.
- Fixed ship boot / launch sequence.
- Fine-tuned the new soundtrack.
- Thrusters can now be chocked by well-aimed impact.
- Overheating reactor might now cause turbine galling.
- On-board computer can now have damaged sensor connections, can overheat or short-circuit.
- Fixed clicking sound when ship is out of fuel.
- You can no-longer enter OMS mode in cutscene.
- There is now a fully functional Mineral Market at Enceladus Prime station. You can buy and sell various minerals.
- Added basic market simulation – prices of minerals change over time.
- Polished appearance of certain anomalies.
- Adjusted lighting settings (again).
- Damage and wear is now directly visible on the ship.
- Added pre-flight inspections on Enceladus Prime.
- Launch sequence will no longer crash ship into the station when some of the thrusters are broken.
- Fixed mineral market hiding out of the screen on vertical-oriented displays.
- Added ship repair menu in Enceladus Prime station.
- Improved camera movement inside Enceladus Prime station.
- Visual and performance fixes.
- You can now own more than 100 tons of H2O.
- Fixed weird focus behaviour when navigating the Enceladus menu with gamepad.
- Weapons are now visible in-game.
- Improved performance of large, high-speed asteroid impacts.
- Adjusted mass driver mountpoint for K37.
- Reactor radiators light now correctly affect the damaged parts of the ship.
- You can no longer crash into asteroids during cutscene.
- Repairing your ship now resets jury-rig levels.
- Propellant mist on Enceladus now appears correctly around the ship when disconnecting fuel lines during launch sequence.
- Added a storytelling system.
- Added 4 new story elements.
- Fine-tuned HUD display of LIDAR.
- High-energy impacts now can cause explosion.
- Microwave Emitter weapon is now visible on ships equipped with it.
- Ionized ringdust plasma from Microwave Emitter is now (barely) visible to naked eye.
- Updated the engine to latest version.
- Game will no longer crash when target of AI leaves detailed simulation zone around the player.
- Damage from energy weapons is now considered an hostile act.
- Taught AI how to catch mineral asteroids.
- AI now is aware of value of minerals.
- Fixed bug in AI that caused it to loose orientation if there were no asteroids nearby.
- When AI is flying towards an object it wants to observe or catch, it will now take it’s velocity into account.
- Re-modeled physical model for excavator to allow AI to accurately assess it’s position.
- AI ships can now dig up the minerals themselves.
- Ships will now value their life more, abandoning output in grave danger.
- Fixed amount of propellant in AI controlled ships, so they don’t run dry so quickly.
- Ships will now return to the station when they are low on propellant.
- AI will no longer use all the power just for defense, leaving them drifting helplessly.
- Player-controlled ship can now leave lifepod behind.
- You can find lifepods in the rings and rescue them.
- Fine-tuned excavation AI.
- Added Machines Astro-Dynamiques Cerunnos Modèle II (aka “CERF”) ring rescue ship.
- AI can now find broken ships, pilot a rescue ship to them and drive them out of the rings safely.
- When you end up helpless in the ring (with no power, propellant or critically damaged ship), an AI ship will show up to pick you up and tow you to safety.
- You now have a chance to encounter rescue operation within the Ring.
- Lifepods are now equipped with emergency radio beacon.
- AI Pirates can now use lifepods to lure victims into traps.
- You will now automatically sell anomalies that have no other function upon returning to Enceladus Prime station.
- Fixed auto-exposure settings so bright flashes from emergency lights of lifepods won’t blind the camera for too long any more.
- Fixed lighting settings for Enceladus Prime station.
- Reduced number random encounters on the edge of the ring.
- AI Pirates are now better at making traps.
- Performance improvements in bigger battles.
- AI can no-longer become hostile to it’s own faction due to friendly fire.
- Big ships will no longer be paralyzed in presence of multiple small rocks.
- Rescue ships will now perform rescue even in presence of small asteroids.
- Adjusted docking clamps for MAD CERF to allow full rotation of the docking ships.
- Adjusted autopilot settings for MAD CERF so it will no longer spin out of control when it has damaged thrusters.
- Polished up the lifepods.
- Added setting to turn off the bloom/glow.
- Added 4 additional story events.
- Changed the way the storytelling module chains story episodes to avoid clustering of similar events. This should make the dynamic story more interesting.
- Fixed a bug that could cause crash to desktop if AI shoot a helpless ship by accident.
- New autopilot software mk2 is aware ot the thruster placement and alignements and will avoid firing thrusters that cancel each-other out. This causes significantly better propellant efficiency when flying autopilot.
- Machines Astro-Dynamiques Cerunnos Modèle II got an variable thrust engines, which in conjunction with new autopilot allows faster and more precise docking/rescue maneuvers.
- You can no longer break thrusters/CPU due to collision with your own cargo in cargo hold.
- Removes audible clicks from Morse code transmissions.
- Updated German translation.
- Improved performance of collision detection.
- System damage is more forgiving. No system should be damaged completely beyond scope of jury-rigging on the first hit.
- Fixed a nasty bug that caused no damage being dealt from kinetic impacts to ships.
- You cannot damage the ship beyond 100% now.
- Added ability to branch storyline.
- Stories can now have long-lasting events, as long as there is a player to observe it.
- Lifepod will no-longer blind the ships camera.
- Made sure that ships going on rescue missions have sufficient propellant to preform the rescue.
- Upgraded game engine to latest, stable version of Godot 3.1
- Enabled new rendering feature that should improve performance on Radeon GPUs.
- Adjusted ship lighting.
- Added additional elements to title screen to prevent boredom should you like to hear title theme to the end.
- Fixed a bug that caused game to crash-to-desktop when your ship was destroyed.
- Added additional story elements.