Jump to content

Xenonauts-2 Closed Beta Build V17 Released (Experimental Branch)


Recommended Posts

Closed Beta Build V17 has now been released on Steam and GOG. Note that this build is only available on our Experimental branch so you'll need to switch over to get this update (instructions on how to do that here).

This is a relatively small build we've been forced into making instead of a hotfix because we've cleaned up a load of unused assets in the game files, so switching back to the V16 branches to make another hotfix involves spending half an hour watching Unity import game assets we've deleted from future versions. We therefore made a new build instead - but as a result there's fewer new systems than in a normal build.

Key Highlights:

  • Base Structure Adjacency Bonus: most structures that can be built at your base now gain adjacency bonuses if constructed next to other buildings of the same type, which generally provides more of what the building already provides (e.g. Generators provide more power, labs provide more scientist workspace, stores provide additional storage space, etc). However, some types of building do not gain adjacency bonuses (e.g. Access Lift, Hangar, Medical Room, Alloy Forge, etc). Hopefully this system will make constructing new structures in your base a rather more interesting process than it was before!
  • MARS Visual Updates: the MARS and ARES vehicles now update their strategy artwork when equipped with a new weapon type.
  • New Fire Effect: there's a new fire particle effect in the game that I think looks much better than the old one.
  • Asset Removal: we've removed a lot of old unused files from the game. This has reduced the install size of the game from 5.3gb to 4.1gb and perhaps slightly speed up load times, but keep an eye out for any pink error textures that suggest I've deleted something I shouldn't have deleted and let me know about any you see! Also, let me know if something has changed its appearance in a way that looks incorrect because that also probably means I accidentally deleted something that was actually required.

Gameplay Changes - Strategy:

  • There is now a Geoscape pop-up when soldiers arrive at a base, either when newly recruited or when transferred to a new base.
  • There is now a Geoscape pop-up when an aircraft arrives at a base after being transferred from another base.
  • Valkyrie dropship is now limited to carrying just three vehicles into combat.
  • The player now starts with $3m funding.
  • Some updates to the base structure balancing and the starting base:
    • The starting Missile Turret has been removed.
    • The Access Lift now generates 100 Power, and the starting Generator has been removed.
    • Generators now generate 50 Power instead of 100 Power.
    • Alenium Reactor generates 150 Power instead of 250 Power.
    • Lab, Workshop and Radar now all require 25 Power instead of 20 Power.
    • Advanced Radar requires 75 Power instead of 100 Power.

Gameplay Changes - Tactical Combat:

  • The game no longer crashes if you damage an object that can explode - e.g. a car, or one of the alien bombs on an alien Raid.
  • Fixed an issue where the game was incorrectly spawning multiple instances of smoke / fire from an explosion or grenade, and not correctly overwriting existing fire / smoke in that tile. This also means fire / smoke will dissipate correctly.
  • Fixed slowdown that could occur on a "miss" shot, particularly when using burst fire.
  • Reaper cocoons no longer spawn a Reaper every single turn, even after being destroyed.
  • Alien teleporters are no longer destructible.
  • Fire now does 10 damge per turn, and damage triggers at turn end instead of turn start.
  • Smoke no longer reduces hit chance to zero after a single tile, it reduces the shot accuracy by between 10% to 20% per tile depending how dense the smoke is.
  • Smoke / stun gas now does a small amount of stun damage if you move into or through a tile containing it, but does a large amount of stun damage if you end the turn in the gas.
  • Flares now have a limited throw range.
  • Added a shadow to the standard ballistic weapon bullet to make it easier to see where the bullet is going.
  • All MARS primary weapons are now compatible with all MARS secondary weapons.
  • Combat shields are now limited to human-only use (i.e. vehicles can no longer use them).
  • Robotic units are now immune to stun damage.
  • A number of fixes to Alien Base maps:
    • Fixed a door that was embedded in a wall and would not open properly on one of the Alien Base maps.
    • Fixed a broken teleporter pair in the Alien Base.
    • Fixed a pink error texture displaying in the Alien Base command room.
  • The night vision radius around your soldiers now has a nicer fade-out on it.
  • The red sawmill building on the Boreal maps has been updated visually so the outer texture is a bit better and doorways are the appropriate height.

UI Updates - Strategy:

  • Soldier Overview and Xenopedia screens now display correctly on 16:10 and 4:3 aspect ratio screens.
  • There's proper letterboxing on 4:3 aspect ratio screens, so you now don't see random parts of the background of other screens.
  • Fixed the Base Stores capacity numbers not showing if you went over capacity.
  • Melee weapons now have their range set to 1 so tooltips are less confusing.
  • The "New Projects Unlocked" panel now correctly orders the unlocked projects in priority order.
  • Main Menu screen now uses the same font as the rest of the game, which makes things slightly more readable.
  • Access Lift now has a basic description.
  • Fixed a typo in vehicle "Smoke Launcher" name.
  • The loading bar % fill now properly matches the % number displayed.

As always, please let us know if you encounter any bugs by posting them up on the Bug Reporting subforums, as we'll release a hotfix if necessary.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

41 minutes ago, Alienkiller said:

Thanks for the new Game-Version Chris. You said old unused Files get deleted from the Game. Where they planed to use in an refited Version or such or get we new specials, R & D etc. instead?

The old files didn't contain anything relevant to gameplay, it was just things like old maps and duplicate textures and fragments of the UI from years ago. Junk that needed to be removed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sounds good. Hopfully that makes the Maps better playable now after the old junk of Maps [before V.14 when i remember correctly], duplicate Textures, Fragments etc. get deleted.

Are there any other things implemented it like missing Pictures and Texts for R & D, Storyline or such which isn´t announced in the Infotext?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/21/2021 at 11:57 AM, Chris said:

The old files didn't contain anything relevant to gameplay, it was just things like old maps and duplicate textures and fragments of the UI from years ago. Junk that needed to be removed.

I didn't want to make a new thread, but I still have that issue where soldiers turns to the pointer when I select a fire mode. I also noticed that the crouch icon is missing, it's a white square when your soldier is crouching. I think I said this before, but missed shots with a grenade launcher don't always impact on the map.

On a side note the load times aren't as long as in the last builds, thanks for that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes but it flashes only for a fraction of a second so I can't help the devs fix it by reporting the error to them. I have had frequent red-texts and lag, so it seems like there is something important/significant/unusual to debug.

Edited by Bobit
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Bobit, it´s not for you to read. It´s for the Devs to find Bugs, Failures etc. easyer in the Version we Test (like V17). The Red Text get saved automatically in every Save / Autosave. In the finished Versions it´s turned off, so it´s harder in final Games to find und fix Bugs etc.

That´s was explained longer ago, but don´t ask me where.

 

Edited by Alienkiller
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Bobit said:

Yes but it flashes only for a fraction of a second so I can't help the devs fix it by reporting the error to them. I have had frequent red-texts and lag, so it seems like there is something important/significant/unusual to debug.

What's happening there is that the game is logging an error and Unity forces that to be displayed on the screen, but it's not useful info to the player so we hide it after a split second. What it actually indicates is something is going wrong at that specific point (and all that logging will probably cause the game to slow down too) so if there's a reproducible case where the red text flashes up then do let us know about it.

The Stable build though (the one not on the Experimental branch) should be much faster, though. It doesn't have the logging in it in the same way that the final game won't, so it runs quite a bit faster. But even that hasn't been properly optimised yet, so there will be further performance improvements as development continues.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/22/2021 at 7:01 PM, geno said:

I didn't want to make a new thread, but I still have that issue where soldiers turns to the pointer when I select a fire mode. I also noticed that the crouch icon is missing, it's a white square when your soldier is crouching. I think I said this before, but missed shots with a grenade launcher don't always impact on the map.

On a side note the load times aren't as long as in the last builds, thanks for that.

Thanks. We're aware of the soldier turning issue but we've not got around to fixing it. The grenade launcher miss issues are something we'll look at in the medium term. I'll take a look at the crouch icon to see what's up with that though,

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 hours ago, Chris said:

I'll take a look at the crouch icon to see what's up with that though,

I had no problems with that. Although I'm worried about reports of a miss if a soldier is crouching in front of the shooter. It seems that such shooting can lead to friendly fire, although is not. The problem was first noticed in version 16.1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, MrAlex said:

I had no problems with that. Although I'm worried about reports of a miss if a soldier is crouching in front of the shooter. It seems that such shooting can lead to friendly fire, although is not. The problem was first noticed in version 16.1

A crouching friendly soldier shouldn't interfere with the hit chance and should be impossible to hit as long as the shooter is stood up and is in an adjacent tile. In any other situation they will interfere with a shot as normal.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 hours ago, Chris said:

A crouching friendly soldier shouldn't interfere with the hit chance and should be impossible to hit as long as the shooter is stood up and is in an adjacent tile. In any other situation they will interfere with a shot as normal.

I understand that. I'm talking about a situation where I shoot through crouching friendly soldier next to me, the message about the miss is still displayed. This was not the case before patch 16.1, since 16.1 we have it, including patch 17.

I reported this at the same time as the additional damage in the alien base mission. You have repaired additional damage, but there are still miss reports during shot.

 

Miss.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, MrAlex said:

I understand that. I'm talking about a situation where I shoot through crouching friendly soldier next to me, the message about the miss is still displayed. This was not the case before patch 16.1, since 16.1 we have it, including patch 17.

I reported this at the same time as the additional damage in the alien base mission. You have repaired additional damage, but there are still miss reports during shot.

Base_Mission_2.avi

Alright, I'll take a look. My suspicion is that it's displaying the "miss" text even though there's a 0% chance of hitting the target and so it's just a UI error. 

EDIT - yeah, it's not possible to hit the soldier. I'll chat to the coders about how easy it is to remove the MISS label in this specific instance (although it's interesting to hear it wasn't in V16 and before) and we'll remove it if it's simple, but if it's going to take a while I don't consider it too high priority a fix.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...