So as it turns out it’s already been a month since the last update, which means it’s probably time for the next one? Well, I guess it’s just as well I brought one with me then…

What’s New?

As always I’ll start with the most important question. That being, what’s new in this update compared to the last one? Well in the case of 0.24.0 this means content, and a decent amount of it if the changelog is anything to go by. Firstly as stated in the title of this devlog update 0.24.0 brings with it a new faction tentatively called the Pirate faction. With the purpose of filling out the roster of this new faction this update also introduces a selection of new units. Including the pirate starfighter, the pirate corvette, the pirate frigate, the pirate battleship, the pirate carrier and finally the pirate saboteur. When it comes to the campaign map the pirate faction, unlike previous ones, cannot be played. Though this means that they cannot be selected from the campaign setup screen they can still be found in game and on the campaign map itself. This is thanks to all previously unowned planets now being owned by said pirate faction who, in addition to not being playable and unlike other factions, will not try and expand the territory they own but will instead build up and defend the locations they already have.

As mentioned above one of the new units added for the pirate faction is the saboteur which as I'm sure you can guess from the name, has the ability to sabotage the subsystems of enemy units for a short amount of time, preventing them from working. While I was implementing this new ability it came to my attention that while you could disable a unit's engines, weapons or shields you didn’t really have a way of disabling said units abilities outside of using this newly added one. In this update however, this is now no longer the case as several new subsystems have been added with each one being linked to a specific type of unit ability. This in effect means that there are now subsystems which you can target and destroy to deny the use of a unit's abilities for the remainder of the battle.

A final area of note I’ll go over is the research on the campaign map which as previously promised has had a small overhaul. Not only is the tree now split into economy and military branches. But there is now also an alternative view in the form of the list view which can be used instead of the tree view for looking at all the available research options. In addition to making visual changes to the research GUI a number of new research options were also added including but not limited to; a bonus to trade income, a bonus to starfighter damage, a bonus to tax income and a bonus to research speed.

Update 0.25.0

With 0.24.0 complete my attention is now turned towards the next update, 0.25.0 which will unsurprisingly be focused on refining and improving much of the new content I added in this update. More specifically though, my current plan for 0.25.0 is to focus on two main areas with the first of these being something which I’ve all but neglected up to this point, that being sound.

While there are some sound effects already in use, as I’m sure you could have guessed all of these are nothing more than placeholders. So my first aim for 0.25.0 will be to update these to be both more impactful and to better fit the actions they are attached to. In addition to improving the existing sound effects I’m also going to be adding a whole host of new ones to areas such as weapon impacts, unit movement, unit and upgrade completion on battlemaps and interaction with the GUI. And though I can’t promise that I’ll be able to do so, I’d also like to add some kind of music or at the very least ambient sound effects so both the battle map and the campaign map don’t sound so lifeless.

Apart from sound 0.25.0 will also be the first time I’m planning on dedicating a portion of an update to working on shaders. Despite how much time I’ve now spent developing Stelestial Contact: Solar Storm. One of the areas -among many. Which I’ve still not done much with, is shaders. If done well they can add a lot to a game and as such for 0.25.0 I’m hoping to spend some time getting a better understanding of what I can and can’t do with them while also adding some much needed visual flair to the rather mundane graphics I currently have. In particular I’m hoping to improve the visuals for when a unit warps into the map, the targeting lines for when a turret is being manually aimed and the impact effects for both kinetic ammo and missiles.

As is the case with most of my updates the above two points are just the areas of primary focus and beyond these I already have a pretty decent list of other changes and alterations I want to make. So though it may seem like 0.25.0 will only be a polishing update- one which is sorely needed I might add. There will still be other changes and additions in the update which more directly affect gameplay as was the case with the 0.24.0 update.

Closing Thoughts

With all that said we’ve once again come to the end of yet another devlog. Having now written this devlog to completion and in doing so taken the chance to look back on what I achieved with this update, I have to say that I’m quite pleased with it. Is it as polished as I would have liked? No. Does it include all the features I would have liked to have implemented before its release? Also no. But that’s what the next update and the ones beyond it aim to continually work towards.

Now then, for all my talk of adding polish and visual flair I have a feeling it’s going to prove somewhat more difficult than simply adding new content in the form of new factions and new units and so with that in mind. I should probably get to work on it. As is my current routine I’ll end the devlog here and return in around a month's time with the 0.25.0 update.

As always if you have any questions or queries then don’t hesitate to ask and similarly if you have any feedback for existing systems. Or indeed if you have any ideas, features or changes you would like to see implemented then also don’t hesitate to let me know.

As with all of my updates a full list of the changes made can be found in game, with the changes and additions pertaining to this update listed below:

• Added a new faction called the pirate faction which uses a mixture of their own units and units captures from other factions
• Added a new diplomacy option allowing you to gift UC to a faction, temporarily boosting that factions opinion of you
• Added a new timed faction opinion modifier for when a faction has been given a gift
• Added a new button to the faction information GUI to focus the camera on the factions capital planet
• Added a new space station for use by the new pirate faction
• Added a new unit for use by the new pirate faction, the pirate starfighter
• Added a new unit for use by the new pirate faction, the pirate corvette
• Added a new unit for use by the new pirate faction, the pirate frigate
• Added a new unit for use by the new pirate faction, the pirate battleship
• Added a new unit for use by the new pirate faction, the pirate carrier
• Added a new unit for use by the new pirate faction, the pirate saboteur ship
• Added a new unit for use by the new pirate faction, the pirate transport
• Added a new unit ability where a chosen subsystem can be sabotaged for fifteen seconds, preventing that subsystem from functioning
• Added a new engine booster subsystem which grants the boost unit speed ability
• Added a new weapon burster subsystem which grants the burst weapon fire unit ability
• Added a new cloak generator subsystem which grants the cloak unit ability
• Added a new cloud generator subsystem which grants the deploy cloud unit ability
• Added a new weapons targeting subsystem which grants the fire weapon unit ability
• Added a new shield overcharger subsystem which grants the overcharge shield unit ability
• Added a new weapons overcharger subsystem which grants the overcharge weapons unit ability
• Added a new sabotager subsystem which grants the sabotage subsystem unit ability
• Added a new hanger subsystem which grants the spawn units unit ability
• Added a new list view to the campaign map research GUI as an alternate way of seeing all currently available research options
• Added a new research option to boost the amount of income from trade agreements from 5% to 10%
• Added a new research option to boost the amount of damage dealt by starfighters on the battlemap
• Added a new research option to boost the current tax rate on planets by 2%
• Added a new research option to boost the current research speed
• Added a new research option to unlock the ability to build space station modules
• Updated the Alien faction to be called the Astel
• Updated the freeplay campaign map so that all currently unowned planets are now owned by the new pirate faction
• Updated the freeplay campaign map so that all pirate owned planets have at least one fleet stationed on them
• Updated the trade agreement diplomacy option to display how much UC would be earned from the agreement or how much would be lost if it was revoked
• Updated the campaign map popup GUI's to support being resized and to have smoother movement
• Updated the campaign map popup GUI's to remember their size after being closed and reopened
• Updated the campaign map fleet and army manager to correctly scale when the size of the GUI is changed
• Updated the campaign map search GUI to only include locations with at least 1 level of intel
• Updated the campaign map research GUI to split the research tree into economy and military research options
• Updated the campaign map location information GUI to include a list of any trade routes the location is a part of
• Updated the campaign map AI to support passive factions like those who do not expand or take part in diplomacy
• Updated the campaign map research options to support individual research times
• Updated the subsystem tooltip on the battle map to show when a subsystem has been sabotaged
• Updated the unit abilities which require input to all make use of the same targeting mesh as the fire weapon ability
• Updated the spawn unit ability to make use of a 3D path instead of just a start and end point
• Updated the guide screen to have a button for toggling the visibility of the shield on the currently selected unit or building
• Updated the guide screen to have a button for toggling the visibility of the engines on the currently selected unit
• Updated the buildings on battle maps to pull their information from a file instead of from the editor
• Updated the buildings on campaign maps to pull their information from a file instead of from the editor
• Updated unit abilities for small, medium and large units to be tied to a subsystem instead of to the unit
• Fixed a bug where the freeplay campaign map previews were missing the connection between the planets Coelif and Dask
• Fixed a bug where the game over screen wouldn't display the correct faction name if the space battle was a custom one
• Fixed a bug where the battle map GUI displayed two battle timers
• Fixed a bug where the battle results screen displayed after completing a custom battle still referred to the losing team by their team number
• Fixed a bug where the screen section of the settings GUI didn't expand to fill the entire width of the container
• Fixed a bug where the active ability wouldn't be cancelled if a new unit or building was selected
• Fixed a bug where the start and middle mesh used for the laser beam ammo type didn't line up correctly
• Fixed a bug where the spawn unit ability resulted in units having the incorrect orientation when they reached the end of their path
• Fixed a bug where the disable intel button set the intel level of locations to high intel instead of full intel
• Fixed a bug where the income of planets was being calculated before the planets population had been set to the correct amount
• Fixed a bug where the campaign map location information GUI didn't correctly wrap the location description text
• Fixed a bug where the campaign map location labels didn't render correctly when the camera was moved further away
• Fixed a bug where the horizontal scrollbar used in GUI's didn't match the theme of the vertical scrollbar
• Fixed a bug where the subsystem icon didn't properly render in front of transparent materials
• Fixed a bug where the changes resulting from completed research options weren't applied when loading a saved game
• Fixed a bug where the replace current research option on the campaign map research GUI didn't work