Repeated intro
Hey everyone, thanks for checking out the Next Fest demo so far. Stats look pretty good, glad to hear from everyone and all of your great feedback. I have a patch today to update a few things that were brought up during the last couple days, and another patch potentially later tonight to expand on ways to use the energy resource.
What changed
1 fix3 additions1 change0 removals
fixedBalanceTrading wasn't being used very often and is a little too expensive to be effective. Before Next Fest, trading for research points was far too powerful and eventually was moved to be behind a required tech and have the cost of it doubled. Before that though, trading was reduced in effectiveness to help avoid the early research trade effects. When research trading was rebalanced, the trade rates weren't fixed to compensate.
changedBalanceBase line trade is now 2:1 with improved rates changing this to 1:1 trading. This should help utilize resources better and give more incentive to interact with the trade system. The full game has more trading options, so it's important that the baseline for this feature becomes usable such that the improved options later also feel impactful and become a part of the play experience.
addedBalanceAdditionally, because trading is more effective, I've reduced the pace of the game slightly (about 5% to resource rates, some a little more than others). This gives new players a little more time before maxing out resources, and the change in rates makes room for more effective trade strategies.
addedBugsThere was an issue where planets could have duplicate names, and while rare it also had an issue where subsequent plays would significantly increase the occurrence of this due to some caching bugs. Planet naming has been rebuilt, some new suffixes have been added, and duplicate names are now completely eliminated. With the bonus of also fixing subsequent plays as well.
addedUpcomingWhen the energy resource is unlocked, there's potential you have not explored any asteroid fields to use the energy on. Asteroid fields tend to clump together so if you have found one you can explore around it to find more, but if you haven't found any it significantly reduces the impact of this resource when it's introduced (significantly... to zero...). I'm working on a new feature that gives some options for spending energy outside of asteroids and nebulas to help keep pace with the escalating game options, and to not require the existence of close asteroids to use the new features. This update will hopefully be out tonight.
Galactic Overthrow changes
fixedTrading wasn't being used very often and is a little too expensive to be effective. Before Next Fest, trading for research points was far too powerful and eventually was moved to be behind a required tech and have the cost of it doubled. Before that though, trading was reduced in effectiveness to help avoid the early research trade effects. When research trading was rebalanced, the trade rates weren't fixed to compensate.
changedBase line trade is now 2:1 with improved rates changing this to 1:1 trading. This should help utilize resources better and give more incentive to interact with the trade system. The full game has more trading options, so it's important that the baseline for this feature becomes usable such that the improved options later also feel impactful and become a part of the play experience.
addedAdditionally, because trading is more effective, I've reduced the pace of the game slightly (about 5% to resource rates, some a little more than others). This gives new players a little more time before maxing out resources, and the change in rates makes room for more effective trade strategies.
addedThere was an issue where planets could have duplicate names, and while rare it also had an issue where subsequent plays would significantly increase the occurrence of this due to some caching bugs. Planet naming has been rebuilt, some new suffixes have been added, and duplicate names are now completely eliminated. With the bonus of also fixing subsequent plays as well.
addedWhen the energy resource is unlocked, there's potential you have not explored any asteroid fields to use the energy on. Asteroid fields tend to clump together so if you have found one you can explore around it to find more, but if you haven't found any it significantly reduces the impact of this resource when it's introduced (significantly... to zero...). I'm working on a new feature that gives some options for spending energy outside of asteroids and nebulas to help keep pace with the escalating game options, and to not require the existence of close asteroids to use the new features. This update will hopefully be out tonight.
Quality of Life Updates
Right click pan was great, but depending on a wide variety of UX experiences you're used to, you may have expected middle click to pan instead (many 3d editors use middle click to rotate, and right click to pan or vice versa). Quick update includes allowing middle click to pan as well, so it'll feel more intuitive if you're more used to that type of control. This one was mentioned a few times so I made it my highest priority.
Balance
Trading wasn't being used very often and is a little too expensive to be effective. Before Next Fest, trading for research points was far too powerful and eventually was moved to be behind a required tech and have the cost of it doubled. Before that though, trading was reduced in effectiveness to help avoid the early research trade effects. When research trading was rebalanced, the trade rates weren't fixed to compensate.
Base line trade is now 2:1 with improved rates changing this to 1:1 trading. This should help utilize resources better and give more incentive to interact with the trade system. The full game has more trading options, so it's important that the baseline for this feature becomes usable such that the improved options later also feel impactful and become a part of the play experience.
Additionally, because trading is more effective, I've reduced the pace of the game slightly (about 5% to resource rates, some a little more than others). This gives new players a little more time before maxing out resources, and the change in rates makes room for more effective trade strategies.
Bugs
There was an issue where planets could have duplicate names, and while rare it also had an issue where subsequent plays would significantly increase the occurrence of this due to some caching bugs. Planet naming has been rebuilt, some new suffixes have been added, and duplicate names are now completely eliminated. With the bonus of also fixing subsequent plays as well.
Upcoming
When the energy resource is unlocked, there's potential you have not explored any asteroid fields to use the energy on. Asteroid fields tend to clump together so if you have found one you can explore around it to find more, but if you haven't found any it significantly reduces the impact of this resource when it's introduced (significantly... to zero...). I'm working on a new feature that gives some options for spending energy outside of asteroids and nebulas to help keep pace with the escalating game options, and to not require the existence of close asteroids to use the new features. This update will hopefully be out tonight.
Thanks again everyone for playing so far!
