Rewrite Devlog #9

It's been September for quite some time now, so it's high time for another devlog for the rewrite - the new improved version of Alien Horizon that's rewritten completely from scratch. So far scheduled to release in January, but to be honest, this release date is starting to look unrealistic...

Visible resources

Anyway, today we're taking a look at construction and maintenance. So, let's plan a structure and wait for logistics vehicles to deliver resources:

As you can see, when there are resources present at a construction site, they are represented by cargo containers. Their number scales with the amount, so you can see at a glance how many materials have already been delivered. The only exceptions are construction sites with less than 10 resources, like power lines or utility lines, where the containers would clutter the area too much.

Construction progress

Once resources are delivered, the next step is up to construction workers:

A big change to construction is that now it doesn't progress only when the hour ticks over, but rather continuously. Gone are the times of being sad that a worker arrived at construction site a minute after an hour ticked over, instead of before, wasting an entire hour.

Construction materials also contribute to construction difficulty by different amounts. For example, each unit of steel only adds 0.5 points, while industrial robots contribute 5. This should make more complicated structures, such as factories, more difficult to construct than simpler structures, like housing.

It's also possible to separately pause material delivery and construction work.

Maintenance and repair

You can also see some new features in the structure construction/maintenance window. For example, you can check whether you want the structure to be repaired when it malfunctions, or make it maintained less often to save resources. Of course, this increases the malfunction chance when the proper maintenance time is exceeded.

Another big change is that malfunction chance for all structures is 0% by default, and is only increased by factors that can be prevented, and that a minor malfunction no longer shuts down a structure, but rather limits its efficiency to 50%.

Relocation

All structure can now be relocated. This demolishes the original structure and builds it at a new location. While it may seem like only a small convenience that both these tasks are made with one command, the main advantage is that the newly constructed structure already starts 50% finished, to represent the fact that the same building parts are being reused.

Replacement

Replacing a structure got more convenient too - the replaced structure continues to function during the replacement. For example, if you want to upgrade your power lines to utility lines, you can do so without cutting power to any connected structures.

Deconstruction

When a structure is demolished, its "ghost" is no longer present on the map until the resources created from its deconstruction are removed, like in preview alpha. Instead, the resources are dropped on the ground in the exact same containers like when delivered and these are hauled away when convenient. Not only can you instantly place a new structure on the same spot, but the containers are automatically transferred to it and resources that are needed as materials are used, saving logistics time.

Next time we'll take a look at mining and production. Make sure to visit the official Discord server to see any sneak peeks. I hope you've enjoyed this devlog and see you in October!