Last Starship Alpha13

[@netneo4038]

"12 years ago when we launched prison architect" me when I remember uplink which to this day is still my favourite that you guys have done, there's nothing quite like it. Also I remember how huge darwinia was in the early steam days, it was basically synonymous with steam. You guys are absolute legends, and I'm here for any games you cook up.

[@St4rdog]

I was until they sold to Paradox who failed to transfer over my account losing me access to the game I paid for (also Introversions fault for not sending keys to SendOwl purchasers). They won't be getting a penny from me. I'm quite enjoying watching this game tank badly.

[@sailingsolstice]

I loved Uplink, I'm always telling people about how realistic it felt. Great memories, can it still be played on a modern system? I'd love to experience it again.

[@netneo4038]

@@sailingsolstice I wrote a decent reply explaining some things but apparently youtube's excessive filtering got rid of it I guess. I dont know how base uplink works these days, but there are versions of the game that definitely do.

[@dogsbody416]

“Nothing in the workshop has deflectors” Johnny Struggles: hold my beer

[@GordonWrigley]

For factory style stuff the game seems to encourage a large open space with everything in it together. I wonder what could be done to encourage the use of rooms. Maybe the addition of heat and sound might help, also depressurisation events. Maybe some equipment that works better in vacuum.

[@Koraksis]

Man when I see these guys at it again after 12 years it brings a tear to my eye. Take my money Introversion!

[@johnnystruggles]

Very nice update guys! Merry Christmas!!

[@bwheatley1]

Thanks for all the hard work you and your team is putting into this. I've been here since PA and scanner sombre, keep up the good work gents

[@DrClumber]

Man, this update is awesome. Love where you're pushing things. Keep up the great work!

[@animarain]

This is an awesome update!! Long live the Storage Crate, the ultimate upgrade! And the deflectors are so cool! Thank you! Merry Christmas!

[@wilfordbrimleyful]

You guys are my favourite indie devs, from Darwinia to Prison Architect - in your opinion, will there ever be a development on Subversion? Whilst I know it's a bit of a blind spot development wise, I believe it would be a fantastic evolution of the management formula perfected over the years.

[@evilplantosavetheworld]

Oh man, those storage crates are going to be worlds better for my ships, I hate how these updates come out when I've just started my work day, now I can't wait to get home 🤣

[@spanishoctagon]

Was not expecting another update this year! All of this looks great and some of it solves what I was trying to do with my ships when I was playing earlier today!

[@rhysk5127]

i like how Marks mic is still shit after all these years

[@Gr33nMamba]

The Deflectors kind of remind me of Battlestar Galactica Series with the Pegasus having electronic countermeasures, you saw cylon missles just go of and random journey as a small detail of the larger battle scenes.

[@IVSoftware]

That moment was my exact inspiration! I loved the way they curved around the pegasus

[@jonathanbrier3698]

Good job guys this is exactly what I have been waiting for. More combat upgrades and additions. I can’t wait for real shields and other weapons systems. All of the upgrades in this patch make me really happy. Keep up the great work

[@dfitzy]

Tracks in space still feel a bit unsatisfying and too much like other factory games. I was really hoping that there would have been some changes since we last saw the industry gameplay. My suggestion is Wall-e like robots following glowing lines on the ground, you could do some interesting things where path lines could share tiles, balancing space, throughput and cost (merge paths sacrificing throughput or use expensive faster merged tiles or spread paths out on slower tiles). Programming tiles could control the bots' behaviour as they travel over them Research would allow for more line colours, faster paths, more complex programming tiles, larger bot capacity

[@acid0069]

You will own my heart and wallet via Prison Architect

[@kieransanders2133]

That second ship is definitely a Vogon ship. "The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[@r3dp9]

It's true that expectations of indie games has risen, but so have the tools available, and the examples to draw experience from. Additionally, people's willingness to try, review, and share indie games has risen. Though things have definitely become harder, there's also more means and opportunity. I suspect that trend will continue.

[@mattdanw]

I love watching this game grow and develop, its always exciting to get a new alpha vid! takes me back to my PA days of egally waiting for the next update. QQ: Have you any plans to bring the crew characters to life? Thinking about Rimworld, which is what i moved to after playing PA to death, is the fact that the individual personalities of your colonists really make the emergent story come to life. I realise that this might not work so much with the generic red shirt crew, but with the science officer and weapons officer (and more down the line), there seems to be some scope to have a move developed command crew with personalities (and complex wants/needs?) and the ability to level them up and grow them. Maybe even have a captain or fleet commadore player avatar that needs to be invested in and leveled up. i.e. the science research tree is about the efficiency of the player tech. but to effectively have multiple ships (or even unlock that ability), your captain/commadore needs to train in fleet management. This could open up a lot more personality to key crew members with what they can do and add a new dimension of risk to the game, with having the loss of a critical being meaningful to the effectiveness of a ships function. You don't just need a captain specilised in industry, you need a crew/commander who likewise has that specialty. I'd love to know your thoughts on any of this? Happy Christmas Team!

[@sailingsolstice]

It's really looking great. I haven't purchased yet but I've been following from the beginning. I don't have much time for gaming so I'll play it when it's a little more fleshed out. Can't wait!

[@sailingsolstice]

Just purchased to have a go over Christmas 🎄☺

[@Its-me..]

"Getting destroyed... In a good way!" 😜

[@danielc6034]

Robot arms seem a bit slow/outdated for this future tech. I’m trying to think of a space age tech, flippers/sliders like you see on airports conveyor belts are more efficient, less time rotating. Some other turntable hidden in a box.

[@bwheatley1]

The last star shippppp

[@HeliumFreak]

I never heard someome say metallurgy like that before 😅

[@RFC3514]

You mean _correctly?_

[@Mechator_Rex]

Are we going to see exploding/explosive cargo together with the cargo crates?

[@ASpaceOstrich]

Is there a plan for player directed megaprojects later down the line? Like, at the moment shipbuilding is pretty instant and it basically has to be for the game to work, but maybe theres something else a player might want to build that would require setting up industrial facilities to do it?

[@fukkami6204]

This is a pleasant surprise

[@JRM-VSR]

Any ideas about fixing some of the longevity issues? I'm not going to be building a particularly large and complex space-factory if the minerals in the asteroid belt get mined out (mostly by NPC ships) and there's nothing left to refine. Even the comet gets out of range pretty quickly -- flying from where it was first to where it is now becomes increasingly difficult and eventually impossible. This seems to be a hold-over from the early design where you constantly went to new sectors with new systems, now the default game is in one sector and stays there, it's easy to exhaust all the resources. I have also tried "mining" the encounters for scrap to keep the factory running making stuff. But if you are there for the salvage rather than the fighting, there's not enough time between killing the last opponent and the next ones appearing to salvage everything. The only way to do it is find an enemy that is likely to run out of fuel and intentionally not destroy that one -- then you can salvage in peace. Apparently, while one ship remains not destroyed, new enemies will never appear.

[@jackdapantyrippa]

so when you deflet it can hit an enemy ship? sweet update cheers 🍻🖖👽🖖🍻

[@GordonWrigley]

Thematically research feels a bit weird. Maybe that doesn't matter but it feels worth noting. Like you are just a minor player in a larger galaxy, why are you doing fundamental research in drone control systems? also how are the drones actually getting upgraded, is it just software patching? Some system where you are "buying" or "trading" for this stuff might make more sense. Research and computation points effectively be currencies that you trade for software upgrades. The basic behaviour and UI could stay as is, just change the flavour text so that instead of researching drone speed, you have taken on a contract to do some some remote research work for some company that's going to pay you with drone speed software patches. You could give it some slightly dystopian vibes where you get a deliberately crap version of everything and then have to effectively pay for software patches to make them better. The sub trees could be different organizations so tree progression is a bit about your relationship with that firm. This new theme could be extended, like maybe some of this contract research involves going to a particular place, has to be done near a black hole for example. Also maybe you can advance your relationship with a firm in other ways that then give you a discount on trades with that firm. That idea could be then carried over to the hardware providers as well.

[@netneo4038]

I think the research thematically makes sense as in you're developing new "tech" for your systems similar to how a company in real life would want a custom automation solution in their factory to speed things up. It wouldn't be fundamentally improving that area of science but it improves your factory floor and it may not be the best in the universe but I'm sure everybody keeps their cards close to their chest like in real life. And at some point like "how do the drones get any faster?" you've gotta accept that it is a video game, sure while it sounds like it could be cool to do an entire retrofitting thing where you recall all the old ones and they get physically upgraded, but that just adds a lot of fluff that essentially just bloats. Most players when they play games (like say factorio which is maybe the most beloved game ever made) if you research drone speed drones fly faster. Why? because you researched it with a funny flask made out of furnace and some railroad track taped together and it just happens from one moment to the next. It's not really a problem in the context of the game.

[@GordonWrigley]

@@netneo4038 Factorio you are alone. You have to research everything and so researching upgrades makes sense as it's an extension of having researched the thing in the first place. Here you buy the drones, if you want faster drones the logical extension is to buy better ones. More broadly though, something about do research to make the robot arms 2x as fast feels a bit ick. A part of it is the size of the boost. It makes them so much better I question why I'd ever use the arms without first researching the upgrade. But also it feels a bit unearned. The thing with Factorio is the research is kinda the task. But the kick the thing that makes it great is figuring out builds, first working builds, then better builds. Because that's where the player applies their skills to overcome their problems.

[@netneo4038]

@@GordonWrigley I get where you're coming from, again I think the mental switch to make isn't thinking about it as "you're improving some cutting edge technology that the universe has never seen before" but more a "you're making your own systems operate better with the gear you have" like again you maybe bought the drones but the collection algorithms are your own, and you've just improved that to pick up multiple things instead of wasting a lot of time going back and forth, optimized the path planning. Just buying improvements can feel a little flat, like you're not actually the one improving your own setup you're purely relying on an external unknowable entity providing you with your benefits. While immersion wise it might feel more natural it does take away from the gamey aspect of improving your own operations. Which is actually why I think being able to produce items yourself is valuable in terms of engaging that reward part of our brain. Like setting up your automated belt production in factorio. The arms thing you really shouldn't think about "well why would I use them before the upgrade", mostly because the upgrade is meant to make your existing setup better, maybe at first the slower arms were able to keep up but now you've outgrown the production and thus instead of needing twice the amount of arms along a limited space you can speed them up, keep in mind that the research applies to your existing arms (again you may have to do some justification if you think that doesn't make sense, like maybe the research made it so the computation times of the inverse kinematics got reduced by half, again your own stuff not part of the hardware of the arm you bought). Also keep in mind that in the video he's 'dev cheating' his way through the progress, I suspect in the actual game its a more invested effort that actually makes you feel like you obtained the improvement. Also to the factorio thing, if you haven't played space age, f-ing gleba is fantastic for the feeling of wanting to improve things, and figure out why things aren't working and running into roadblocks and overcoming them. Going on a tangent I know, but man was it a perfect example of supremely frustrating but satisfyingly so at the same time.

[@GordonWrigley]

@@netneo4038 I've done Fulgora and I'm established on Vulcanus, need to get Vulcanus science up and running, but taking a break at the mo to play vintage story with my partner.

[@jj1109]

so who else is mashing keys to find the magic upgrade button lol

[@Gearjerk5]

Looking good. But please, quit using "rocket" and "cannon" interchangeably. Rockets are self-propelled. Cannon shells have all their energy imparted before they leave the barrel.

[@ragincrinz1457]

I really dislike the arms and belts way. I don't really like to play this game and end up like that. My ships would just turn into a big room to make it all fit like your example. I really think this game needs to do it differently to belts. People moving stuff is better for this I think. You can use rooms then.

[@SagaraUrz]

Mining lasers are ugly, it would be nice if they are actually a turret