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Xenonauts 2 - Public Build Date Set


Chris

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The first Xenonauts public build will be arriving on Monday 24th October and will be completely free to anyone that wants to try it. The game is still too incomplete for us to consider a paid release, but we want as many people generating ideas / feedback and reporting bugs as possible. We'll therefore be making the first few builds free.

However, we will also make optional pre-orders for Xenonauts 2 available at the same time. This is purely for people who know they want to support the project, as they won't initially confer any extra benefit - but they will automatically convert into a Steam or GOG key for the game when we transition into paid Early Access later in development. We're planning to charge $24.99 for the game during development and then $29.99 once the game is finished and released.

The first build will be a simple test build - a combat mission between eight Xenonauts with basic armour and the starting weapons from X1 (shotguns, rifles, sniper rifle, LMG) and roughly six Psyons (formerly Caesans). The battle map will be an outdoor forest map with no UFO; it'll just be a straightforward deathmatch between the two sides. There will be strong similarities with Xenonauts 1 in the first build, which is intentional - we want to reassure people that we're not planning to dumb things down for X2 despite moving to 3D, and because assets from X1 make excellent placeholders until we create the new X2 assets to replace them. That said, the sequel is not simply a remake of Xenonauts 1 in 3D ... we just want to make a fun and playable foundation for the game based on the first game before we start changing things up. After all, it's much easier to test a new or altered mechanic if it is embedded in a working game and you are able give it a proper playtest.

The build that comes out on the 24th is going to be a "soft" launch for us. We'll be releasing the first Xenonauts 2 build and unveiling a new website for the game, but we're not actively promoting it via Twitter or by contacting journalists or by messaging our mailing list / Kickstarter backers. This is because the initial release of any piece of software almost invariably reveals huge numbers of bugs and issues that the developers were completely unaware of, and we'd like to do a small release to our existing community to identify and fix the biggest issues before we then announce things more widely and try and expand the community.

We have the first week after the build releases set aside for bugfixes, so we're planning to release updates until the 31st that are just bugfix patches and then do our wider announcement on the game on that date. If you've found this information organically by reading our forums / from the Xenonauts 1 launcher RSS panel / from friends / whatever then please help us out by being part of the first wave of testers (and if you're a game journalist, please hold your coverage until the 31st). Similarly, if you encounter any issues with the new website when we unveil it then please report it to us.

If all goes well, we're planning to release a decent chunk of new content for the project every two weeks - we're intentionally holding some back from the initial builds for this reason. This means that in theory there should be a second build of the game with new content available to play on the 7th November (although we may find a fortnightly release schedule a bit of a struggle over the long term), a week after the large-scale public release. We'll continue this pattern of public iteration until we feel that we have a project developed enough for an Early Access launch, at which point we'll likely do a quick Kickstarter and then launch on Steam as a paid-only project.

I'm personally very keen to get the game out into the hands of the community, even if it is still quite rough at this stage. I'll release more on this forum as details firm up, so stay tuned for updates and make sure you come back and visit on the 24th! :)

P.S. - As always, if you want to stay informed about our plans, please sign up to the Goldhawk Mailing List here. We're going to start using it very soon!

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Sounds great Chris! If we pre order right away on October 24th before the kick starter is live will that count towards reaching a tier in the kick starter? For example in your post you said the game would go for 24.99$ during development. So if I pre order for 24.99$ on the 24th and there is a kick starter tier I want (say having my own soldier in the game) that costs 50$. Would my 24.99 be applied towards reaching that tier? 

 

Thanks!

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hi ccrunner, i think he was trying to say that the final cost of the game will be 29.99$....but if you "buy it" before, then you'll recieve the same game by 24.99$ ,that mean you are helping the production of the game, recieving the right to play the early access when it becomes aviable and also an 5 dollars discount for being an early bird...all in the same time!, and i guess this also applies for all the versions planned, like collectors edition or something like that (correct me if im wrong chris please xD).

PS: i keep throwing money into my monitor, but anything happen!!...help me please :p .

Edited by blackwolf
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11 hours ago, ccrunner1756 said:

Sounds great Chris! If we pre order right away on October 24th before the kick starter is live will that count towards reaching a tier in the kick starter? For example in your post you said the game would go for 24.99$ during development. So if I pre order for 24.99$ on the 24th and there is a kick starter tier I want (say having my own soldier in the game) that costs 50$. Would my 24.99 be applied towards reaching that tier? 

 

Thanks!

So we'll most likely handle that by having Kickstarter tiers that don't include the game and are $25 cheaper. You won't be penalised for supporting us early.

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It's a miracle I noticed the launcher new, but I'm really happy to hear this. I purchased the first version twice because I loved it. The only problems I find in the original game are the poor soldier management in base (solved in Community Edition, where you can pick their roles in both screens) and the boring music (solved changing the .ogg). It has been one of the best purchases of my life togheter with FTL and I will support the second version for sure! You make my day! :)

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Great news , really looking forward to see what you've all been working on behind the curtains. Loved the first one and it seems you know exactly where to take the second Xenonauts title.

Thank you for not dumbing it down - there is enough of that going on already.

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On 30/09/2016 at 3:12 AM, Chris said:

The first build will be a simple test build - a combat mission between eight Xenonauts with basic armour and the starting weapons from X1 (shotguns, rifles, sniper rifle, LMG) and roughly six Psyons (formerly Caesans). The battle map will be an outdoor forest map with no UFO; it'll just be a straightforward deathmatch between the two sides. There will be strong similarities with Xenonauts 1 in the first build, which is intentional - we want to reassure people that we're not planning to dumb things down for X2 despite moving to 3D, and because assets from X1 make excellent placeholders until we create the new X2 assets to replace them. That said, the sequel is not simply a remake of Xenonauts 1 in 3D ... we just want to make a fun and playable foundation for the game based on the first game before we start changing things up. After all, it's much easier to test a new or altered mechanic if it is embedded in a working game and you are able give it a proper playtest.

I think an Evil Alien Shed is in order.

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The public build will initially be Windows only. However as Unity natively supports Mac and Linux we'll probably try releasing free versions on those platforms before we commercialise the project to see how well they work and how much extra work would be required in supporting them during the paid development / release stage. We've built enough stuff on top of vanilla Unity that I don't expect them to work immediately, but right now we just don't know how much work will be involved in making everything fully cross-platform.

You won't be able to get your faces drawn as a Kickstarter reward, but we want to build a soldier creator for the Kickstarter that will let you create the 3D face for your soldier if you pay to put yourself in the game. It's really not cost-effective or time-effective to pay an artist to draw faces from photos, and additionally the backer won't know whether the final result will be worth the money until after the artist has finished his work ... with a character creator you can see if it's possible to create something you like before you pledge money to put it in the game. Fairer and easier (and cheaper) all round, really.

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On 10/12/2016 at 8:18 AM, juanval said:

Rather than watching our own faces in the game, I think is more interesting to use a soldier face generator in order to create lots of defferent faces and avoiding to have in a mission 2 soldiers with the same face. That was unrealistic in Xenonauts

They were twins. Immersion reestablished , you're welcome. ;)

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11 hours ago, Gijs-Jan said:

Just so you guys know; I'm not even installing Civ 6 until after the release date so we can make it.

What kind of AI / quality are we getting?  I know there were some things in the old game that you didn't have time for.  Is it going to be brutal without "cheating"?

 

CIV 6???  There's a CIV 6?!?!?  Oh man!

Edited by StellarRat
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The AI in the first build is gonna be relatively primitive ... however the AI in the finished game should be significantly better than that in Xenonauts 1.

And to whet your appetite, here's a preview of how the new main menu screen background looks. Still early days but I think 3D has a lot of promise!

command_room_1080.png

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2 minutes ago, Chris said:

The AI in the first build is gonna be relatively primitive ... however the AI in the finished game should be significantly better than that in Xenonauts 1.

And to whet your appetite, here's a preview of how the new main menu screen background looks. Still early days but I think 3D has a lot of promise!

command_room_1080.png

@drages Thats what i want too !

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8 hours ago, Chris said:

The AI in the first build is gonna be relatively primitive ... however the AI in the finished game should be significantly better than that in Xenonauts 1.

And to whet your appetite, here's a preview of how the new main menu screen background looks. Still early days but I think 3D has a lot of promise!

command_room_1080.png

That's in 3d?! Nice!

I'll be here on monday... it's good to be back! :)

Edited by Skitso
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12 hours ago, StellarRat said:

What kind of AI / quality are we getting?  I know there were some things in the old game that you didn't have time for.  Is it going to be brutal without "cheating"?

 

CIV 6???  There's a CIV 6?!?!?  Oh man!

Monday's release is really just a sneak preview; the AI is rudimentary at best.
This time around I've planned quite some things, some of which I'll need the help of the community to succeed in. :-)

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15 hours ago, Chris said:

The AI in the first build is gonna be relatively primitive ... however the AI in the finished game should be significantly better than that in Xenonauts 1.

And to whet your appetite, here's a preview of how the new main menu screen background looks. Still early days but I think 3D has a lot of promise!

command_room_1080.png

That's gorgeous.  Really nice recreation of the original Xenonauts menu screen.

Just so you guys know; I'm not even installing Civ 6 until after the release date so we can make it.

That is wise.  I have loads of work to do over the weekend and pretty much had to drag myself out of the house this morning rather than play it.

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I think main map is feels  squashed. It represent screen fom X1, I understand. But usually such maps are wider.

I think it feels squashed after staring for long at in game geoscape

Edited by Z01
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