If you remember, we had facial and body shapes working all the way back in a0.3. Then we took it out. The reason for that was the old system was using bones to change the skin shapes, while it worked great, it also took a lot of memory. So, after a year and half, we have a new system in place for this to work, through morph targets:

This might end up going in around a0.86 instead of a0.85 though, as we’re going through all the player wearable assets and changing their morph targets, and there are quite a bit.

We’ve been working on a bunch of new assets for A0.85, here are some concept art for the swamp biome for you to enjoy. The swamp biome is to the east of the southern grasslands, across the bay. It’s a flat area extending from the ocean to the south until it hits the high cliffs of the crater rim to the north. It’s a mix of wetlands and sink pits, populated by animals large and small, many of which poisonous and hunt by surprise.

Sorry for the slight delay, as we had some connection issues with our server. Here are the stand alone version links for a0.831:

PC Download
Mac Download
Linux Download

A0.831 has been released on Steam. Here are the changes for A0.831:

Fixed factory using multiple resources to make just one item
Fixed several Adventure map generation bugs
Made turrets weightless so that they won’t fall through blocks anymore (temp measure)
Added more shade weed to Adventure mode
Increased wooden bow’s attack power
Tweaked wet in Adventure so that there are less chances of a middle-of-the-ocean spawn
Added proxy server option for people who cannot or don’t know how to port forward (we still recommend port forwarding for the best speed, proxy server can be quite slow depending on location)
Players no longer get hurt from above ground area attacks far underground

We’re packing the stand alone versions right now and will release them before the weekend here.

Going forward for a0.85, we are now pretty far into implementing colony elements for multiplayer. A0.85 will also open up the swamp and mountain biomes with additions to the story.

Most of the team are working on elements for a0.9, including a complete redo of the UI. Our old UI wasn’t too bad from the player point of view other than that it was hard to read at higher resolutions and a bit cluttered. But from a code point of view, it was a mess. So a streamlining of its logic was needed. At the same time, we also wanted to make the UI graphics a bit more futuristic with shader effects and such. So, we went about designing a system that took elements from Windows, Photoshop, Civilization, and what we had before. Below is a WIP preview:

Planet Explorers alpha 0.83 has been released on Steam. We’ll release the stand alone versions next week once we know for sure the builds are pretty stable.

Changelist

New costumes/armor
Continent generation in adventure
River generation in adventure
Lakes generation in adventure
Biome borders in adventure no longer a straight line
NPC houses are now models for smoother experience
Added F1 and F2 for camera modes (with tweaks)
Redid parts of the storyline from a0.82, more streamlined
Much easier to place monorail parts
Able to edit a monorail line after completion
Changed the way multiplayer loads, no more waiting forever for everything to load
Changed multiplayer auto saving to 30 minutes
Added multiple new Puja/Paja types
Falling AI will now play effect when hitting the ground
NPCs in adventure mode will come after people for hitting them or other players in towns (in PVP)
Fixed multiple bugs from multiplayer
Added glowing flora at night in the forest
Added 5 new animal species in the rainforest biome
Toughened the robot bosses in multiplayer
Added new animal animations
Added portable water pump
Added in procedural map caching as an option
Colony shielding will now drive away animals or deduct health when upgraded

If we run into problems with a0.83, we’ll be pushing smaller patches right away. Our next big build should be a0.85, sometimes in September.

Sorry for the delay, but here are the stand alone versions of a0.82. Also included are 3 save locations.

PC Download
MAC Download
LINUX Download

Save 1 (before meeting Ataro)
Save 2 (before the desert)
Save 3 (at the end of a0.72 missions)

We’re currently working hard on a0.83, which should be out before the end of the month.

A0.82 has just been released on Steam, here’s the changelist:

Fast travel no longer takes up time
Fixed unclickable host button for some players
Fixed hands not holding on to sword weapons
Fixed turrets fighting NPCs and followers
Fixed scrolling items offscreen when picking up items from bodies
UI locations in game are now saved
Fixed colony attack timing error
Added full body animation for aliens
Changed where players spawn in Survival, no more camping
Changed multiplayer NPC shop currency initialization
Fixed Build mode item decrease bug
Able to harvest planted crops by pressing “e”
Fixed the way items are organized in the replicator
Fixed physics movement for player on small inclines, no more sliding
Increased body decay time to 90 seconds

We might release an additional build next week that mostly focuses on server stability. We’ll see though, it might end up getting merged into the a0.83 build that’s coming at the end of July.

Saves will come before the weekend. Sorry for the long wait for the standalones, they’re so big now (4GB) that we have to make sure that everything’s working mostly correct before we upload them.

We just uploaded our a0.81 build to Steam. This one is mostly a bug fixing build. We’ll wait until Monday to see if there are any more major bugs, if there aren’t, we’ll release a few save files to help people who want to progress directly from a0.75’s storyline. If there are, we’ll release a a0.82.

The one major change in this build is that in Story mode, the player will no longer start with all minerals available for scan in the mineral scanner, you’ll need to get the app updates from other colonists (start with Chen). If you’re playing on a 0.8 save, just go buy the upgrades from Chen, Lao, and Hitomi.

0.81 changelist

Fixed getting water in multiplayer
Fixed colony attacks spawning too much and too frequent
Fixed NPCs sometimes disappearing
Fixed not being able to plant on flat ground
Fixed NPC sometimes not working on farm
Fixed NPCs using too much food
Fixed power plants using too much coal
Made UI for used and abandoned colony parts
Fixed animals running to fast
Fixed unspecified items in multiplayer
Fixed items/meat counting wrong from a vender
Added tier upgrades to mineral scanner
Fixed sleeping draining stamina
Fixed dark voxel chuncks appearing in midair in multiplayer
Fixed player losing items after fast travel or loading
Fixed icon marks on NPCs’ heads not corresponding with missions
Fixed multiple signal towers appearing in one alien camp
Fixed cutting trees once and watching them disappear in multiplayer desert biome
Fixed mining not updating the inventory in multiplayer
Able to see alien camps and NPC towns on large map from the start as an option
Disabled joystick support so no more camera pointing at the sky problem
Fixed NPC followers not helping the player fight
Fixed water gather animation
Fixed Workshop uploading error
Fixed NPC disappearing body in adventure mode
Upped the speed of cutting trees in multiplayer
Fixed not having pitcher in multiplayer
Fixed mission names turning into numbers in multiplayer
Allow for scrolling with middle mouse button in the replication menu
Able to move the Workshop window ui for smaller resolution monitors

Also, Planet Explorers will be going for $20 during the Steam Summer Sale.

First, I do want to apologize for the lack of updates for the last few weeks, we’ve been busy. Just know that if we’re not talking here, we’re probably working really hard on the game. We just released a0.8 )on Steam, so grab it while it’s hot! The stand along versions should be released on Monday (depends on how many bugs players find this weekend).

Here’s the changelist:

Adventure map now has LOD option, can extend out to 512m
Workshop UI interface in (upload when in a multiplayer game)
Server caching ISOs in, as a backup to Workshop (if things on there get deleted)
Multiplayer lobby UI and functions changed
New multiplayer server creation UI
New character selection option for multiplayer (able to delete)
Survival mode in multiplayer in (free for all)
When a player die, things will be dropped on a random basis
Tweaked formulas so that key items can be made in any biome
Alien camps in multiplayer/adventure
Randomized boss points in adventure mode
Towns and NPCs now exist in every multiplayer play mode
Animal herds in multiplayer
Only one monster beacon can be pulled out on a server at a time
Added in some missions to Adventure mode
Added in NPC who can store your items
“Wet” in multiplayer will give you oceans and islands
No more general shop interface in multiplayer, will need to buy/sell for NPCs
NPCs have limited amount of cash
Resources can no longer be sold for meat in adventure mode
Resource distribution in multiplayer updated
Players can ride other player’s vehicles
Ship ISO and associated parts
Lage airship parts
New battery for vehicles
Air and land vehicles will lose energy when in water
More storyline missions for Story mode
More mainline NPCs for Story mode
A bigger area of the map to explore in Story mode
More effects added
More sound effects added
Added monorail
Added animal feces
Updated some animal behavior
Added more fish
Can now assign NPC jobs in colony
Can now recruit mainline NPCs as followers
Can now give mainline NPCs weapons
“Soldier” type NPCs will patrol colony
NPCs will now need to eat
NPCs will take food directly from the colony supplies storage
Redid the replication UI, now with branches and search
Redid the building UI, now with its own quick bar
Buildings in the field can now be saved as an ISO
Extend the treeline LOD in the forests
New terrain changes in Story mode
LOD seams are better hidden
Reprogrammed the main game camera
Camera now have field of view option
Pressing “E” will pick things up now
Distance will decrease a projectiles attack numbers
Added in lock on function for vertical launched missiles
Tweaked camera movement for glider
Colony will come under attack, if not defended, there will be damages
Can now recruit mainline NPCs to colony
Added in more item types
Earth plants now give seeds
Interactive objects will now highlight during mouse over
NPC name displays changed
NPC behavior changed
Player will get up when attacked while in bed
And of course, bug fixes, lots and lots of bug fixes
And new bugs too

We will be releasing an a0.81 next week to fix any bugs found in this build. For the duration from a0.8 to a0.9, we’ll be trying to add these:

Building LOD
More story missions
Rivers in adventure mode
More terrain generation types in adventure mode
Map size definition for adventure mode
Continent generation for adventure map
Sailboat
Sky islands for adventure mode
More animal behavior
The feces face smasher gun
Fishing
Large replicator in colony
Colony in multiplayer

Our aim for a0.9 is:

Story editor
Terrain editor
World editor
AI pathfinding overhaul?
UI overhaul?

Do not expect a0.9 until probably October, the whole editors thing will take a while. Also, the spam filter for WordPress is terribad, so we have to wade through 40,000 and counting spam posts to get to the real posts. So if you’re trying to post on here and not being able to, we’re trying to solve the problem.

Just a quick update showing off two new features in the upcoming a0.8. We’re still about 2-3 weeks out, depending on how fast we can get all the new features we want into multiplayer.

First, we have multiple players on the same vehicle. We’re working on letting the second player shoot while in a vehicle, not sure if it will make it into this build though.

Next we have boats. The tech is pretty much in place now, we’re just trying to figure out what the limits are and how to go about on the balancing. The boats will come with main gun and vertical launched missile components. Battleship size ships won’t make it into this build.