SpaceSimCentral

New video update about game options and drones 

Ok as some will no doubt be aware Leafy had a bit of a bungle with their Alpha release yesterday, looks like they have sorted it all out as I just downloaded my copy through Steam, so I am off for a looksee. Hello everyone!Here is a quick update on what happened, what is currently happening, and what will happen in the near future! Due to a slight misunderstanding, a number of the Keys were sent out before we had the chance to update the steam build. (Nobody's fault, that's just life!)We were still planning on those final few hours to fix a lot of the bugs that people have reported (escaping the menu, drone instantly attacks, etc.). Once we found out about the keys being sent out early, our main priority was to then get everyone a build of the game. It didn't seem fair to us that some got to play it and others didn't. The build we sent out and updated steam with was still a few hours young, but we decided it was better than the old version on Steam. Because of this our original plan for the day didn't really work out.Our current goal right now is to get everyone a build of the game and then work on patching it up! We are just finishing the email system. We have the Steam Keys ready to go, and we have a downloadable build for Windows, Mac, and Linux (Mac and Linux are early, but it's good to start the process of tweaking them now too). We have not forgotten you!It is clear that the current build of the game is buggy. There are a number of things that are especially annoying, and we are already beginning an investigation as to why the Multiplayer is busted. We think we found the problem! (Yay!)We have a lot planned in the next few weeks. We’re fired up to kill these bugs and move onto the interesting stuff, like adding / tweaking ship systems and screens, finishing up the ship component screen, and working on cool scenarios.Anyone who backed us from Kickstarter or PayPal should be getting an email with your Keys and download links within two hours (probably less). We can't thank you enough for your patience and understanding. I'm certain that the next few weeks will be really good for the game.Thank you,The Leafy Games Team 

Nuts seems to be all online at the moment will await update for playing with bots.

 Nice like the abandoned ship at the end of the vid.

Kickstarter update. We have also released an new update to the game! Version 0.28c!This one is mainly bug fixes, we've started to dabble into adding some of the awesome music our composers have been making, we think it already begins to add to the experience! The drone should begin to pose more of a challenge, he has a new weapon that you can read about below! List: -We have modified the turret cameras, they should now act according to your video settings (FOV , Bloom, etc.) -We've increased the strength of inertia dampeners, so the ship should rotate more slowly. This should potentially help with motion sickness as well as syncing ship location. - The ship weapons screen should no longer jam. -When players die or disconnect they no longer need to restart the game to continue playing. -It's now slightly easier to align the ship to a new sector. -Tweaked and added to the "ancient wreckage" assets you can explore. - We have begun implementing music into the game. -The ship position updates faster now, this should begin to reduce the "stutter" effect when on the bridge. -Bots have been temporarily removed from the game while we work on their issues. -Players who disconnect while manning a turret or piloting the ship should no longer lock that position from other players. -Offline mode has been implemented. -We have tweaked the spotlight on the ship, this should reduce the crazy bloom effects. -Private servers should now work. (Games are hidden and players join by entering the ship name) NOTE: We have already found a bug in this build, when you create a private server and the name is already taken it will basically just show you a black screen and you need to press escape and disconnect to get out of it. This already being worked on, for now just make sure you name your ship / game something unique! -Tweaked / balanced Drone and overall combat mechanics, let us know what you think! -Drone now has a new weapon, it can pierce through shields to damage hull and systems. That’s it for this update, we have some really interesting features that are so close to being implemented they just need a tad more time!You can expect to see some of them in the next update! You can restart steam to potentially trigger the update. You can also visit the secret access forums for a direct download link (or message us on Kickstarter if you prefer).Thank you everyone for your continued support and enthusiasm! We’ve probably begun working on the next update by the time you read this! Best,The Leafy Games Team Did they say the now have a offline mode, hope that Steams offline mode as I found that I could not play the game when Steams was in it's off line mode.

waiting for your opinion. I give them thumbs up. One they are transparent and the only ks i have faith in from a small developer looking to actually complete a project. Also releasing an alpha is the best way to go. Players should know it isn't complete feature wise and will be buggy and stop whining about bugs and crashes. This will make the final product way more stable. No one forces you to buy the alpha, wait until release. (speaking in general)

It works in Steams offline mode :gamer: Very true about Alpha if you not prepared to put with bugs and crash then you should not buy into any of them. Can't say what the multi player game is like but from just playing around in the new offline mode it's pretty impressive what they have at the moment although their is a not a great deal that can done.(early days still) you can fight the drone and explore the wreck, think you jump to another system but not tried it yet and fiddle around with some of the ships functions.Need to go on the Pulsar forum and find the keyboard keys for what does what, I managed to kill the drone but did not know how to put out the fire in the engine room if it can be done at the moment?. few pics here. Looking the drone from the bridge. Same shot but seen from outside. Looking the rear of the ship from a turret. So that's where the bridge is. Space wreak thing seen from inside the ship.

Just been on Steam and Pulsar been updated. NOTE: This is a mostly feature-focused patch. We expect to find some new bugs involved with the new systems. We are planning a hotfix patch to be released in the next few days in the event there are serious issues found.New Features:Networked Ship Components (The Captain can now buy / sell ship components from the store menu)NEW ENEMY: Security Drone (should provide a bit more of a challenge for full crews)Shield Deflection is now implemented (gives a small chance to negate nearly all damage through shields)Partial HUD redesign, now shows ships statsQ key now directly repairs systems within 5 units (no messy toggle now)E key now puts out fires in front of you (no longer Y key)New particle effects for repairing systems / putting out firesCredits are implemented and syncing (should show in lower right corner) (only the Captain can directly spend crew credits)Changes / Fixes:Tweaked ship damage SFXAdded new music: Ambient Drone 02Added new music: Drone Attack 02Some behind-the-scenes networking changes that should provide increased stabilityFixed bug where players would get stuck on blank screen after starting a private gamePawn texture has been updatedInterior lighting has been tweaked to be more consistentProjectiles and explosions no longer can light the interiorKnown Issues:Reactor screen doesn't update correctly until looked at directlyCan't swap hulls, weapons or turrets (will be unlocked in a patch soon due to technical constraints)Multiplayer syncing seems to be not as fast / effective"Cannot Connect To Photon Cloud" error on starting game for some playersAll stats on Create Game menu are zero for IntrepidSome projectiles can light the interiorUnfortunately hull repair did not make it into this patch. But it should make it in the next one!Remember: This patch is focused on adding features not fixing bugs! We will probably find new bugs with the new features! It's all part of the fun of game development! One thing I hope they do is move the turrets as at the moment any time a drone goes under the ship you have a hard time hitting it as the turrets are all on the top side of the ship also are the turrets more powerful than the main guns?.

Dev diary from leafy about the last update, bug squashing, game controls and a small update to the game adding a couple of new features. 

New update to Pulsar.  Just had a quick look at the video and this is just looking better and better time to turn Steam on again.

Good and bad news from Leafy, bad news is that the Beta been delayed but the really good new is that anyone who back the beta levels in the Kickstarter will now get access to the Alpha. Hello everyone!We’ve been quite busy here at our little studio and we have some interesting news for you all!To start off, those who pledged at the "Early Backer" or "Backer" levels will now be allowed access to the Alpha. We said the beta would be available in April and it’s not looking likely, however we’d still like to invite all of you to join the alpha and help us test the game! Our current estimates look like the beta will arrive sometime in early Summer. This is a pretty loose estimate due to the amount that might change from important feedback and what we learn through testing. We have built a new system for delivering keys to the beta access backers, since the last method we used ended up having some problems we decided to take a different approach as well as invest in more secure services.This took some time away from the update to the game but we believe it’s important to get keys into the hands of our backers as conveniently as possible.  

I think this game is made for Co-op. Walking inside this big ship, I felt quite lonely.

I the game is definitely aimed at co-op players but they have said they will be crew bots added to the game.

New video blog about some major updates which will be coming for the game. 

First of the updates is here .  Hey everyone!We have some big news regarding Pulsar: Lost Colony!We are now in Phase 2 of the Alpha. This is when we focus on preparing the game for Beta. It will mostly consist of 5 major updates, each focused on one of the 5 playable classes in the game. We are excited to be at this stage of development and to share the progress we’ve made so far. To kick off Phase 2, the first major update features the Pilot! The Pilot’s job is an interesting one, and from recent testing we’ve learned a lot about how players fly the ship and interact with enemies. We noticed a few things regarding flight mechanics that we believed could be improved. This update revolves around how the Pilot maneuvers the ship, as well as further developing the Pilot’s role in ship-to-ship combat. This is no doubt the biggest update to the game so far, and we’ve made a ton of changes and additions. Update should be live now as Steam download some thing for Puslar this morning which I assume is the pilots update to the game.

Little update from Leafy but the big news is they have added another ship , have to turn Steam on and go check it out. 

Pic of the new ship. Again for some unknown reason they have put all the guns on the top of the ship. Ship a lot bigger than the first one and could do with some more sign post as it easy to get lost in it and it also a bit on the dark side.

Another update to the game this time it's the scientist turn. Hey everyone!Hope all is well with you guys! We've been hard at work since the last update and have quite a bit to share with you!First off You can check out this video which goes over some of the smaller changes we've made since the last update we posted here:  After working on that patch we started digging deep into the role of the scientist. It's something that we've been playing with since the first day of production, we've gone through tons and tons of screen designs and have scrapped a number of working prototypes all because we wanted the screens to be accessible to everyone, enjoyable to use and versatile enough to adapt to any future additions we plan on making.We've spent a lot of time thinking about this and we are quite happy with what we have so far. Keep in mind we still have a lot more planned for the scientist as well as the other classes. We thank you all for your patience on this matter.Here is a devlog we put together to help illustrate the new systems we have implemented, the full list of patch notes is below! Enjoy!  New Features -The Computer Screen: Gives the scientist the ability to use programs, use the database search feature and get various system info. The programs screen is also where you can re-charge viruses and programs. -The Virus Screen: Shows active viruses that you are broadcasting to enemies and any detected viruses that have infected your ship. -The Engine Switchboard: An early version of the switchboard, allows players to shut down and start up the ship, a key component when eliminating hostile viruses. Ship component syncing now only sends changes to clients to save on bandwidth and packets sent. We’ve done a lot of work on how this system sends data over the network for many improvements and will help us do more things in the future quicker!Adding ship tagging system. Assigns each enemy ship a letter than is persistent across the network for easier communication.Redesigned chat system. Supports much longer messages and word wrap. Check your game settings for some custom options relating to the chat system.Changed how other player names show up in-game. It’s a bit simpler now.W.D. Cruiser now using a new screen atlas themeShip screens have a glitch effect that will occur when you have a hostile virus onboardArt additions / tweaks to the interiors of both the Intrepid and the cruiser, specifically the weapons roomThe first 25 GX ID’s have been implemented, the first few of many to come!Added a new screen tilt option in the game settings menu.Added a new drone type, Tactical support drone, this unit has a relatively weak hull and competent shields, it will try to send viruses to cripple your ship, caution is advised. :)Added Programs: - Emergency Shield Boosting Program (Sh): Increases the charge rate of the shields for a short period.- Instant Warp Charge Program (Wc): Fully recharges the warp drive on execution.- Instant System Self-Healing Program(FH): Fully heals all ship systems on execution. Note: Does not put out fires-Instant Remove All Viruses Program (RV): Instantly removes all hostile viruses from the ship on execution. Added Viruses: - Sitting Duck (SD): Disables enemy ship thrusters- Phalanx (Ph): Disables enemy shield recharge- Backdoor (Ba): Disables enemy ship firewalls. NOTE: This allows other viruses to easily reach enemy vessels. Fixes:Updates to pawn networking to help improve small desync issues Fixed small occlusion error in W.D. CruiserFixed small visual bug with W.D. CruiserShip screen mouse crosshair should correctly render above everything else Upgraded to Unity 4.5 core for better performance while loading objects and a few bug fixesUpdated ship component hashing algorithm to fix an edge case that could cause ship component desyncUpdated some specific networking features to smooth out packet transmission. In some circumstances the server would send out 300 messages in a single frame! Now it happens over a second or two for much better consistent results.Eliminated internal bug related to how the game handles player disconnects. Could cause runtime exception and code failure.Chat bug that prevented the Escape key from exiting the chat. Also now allows mouse and joystick movement while typing.Fixed an internal bug related to warp drive charging and the warp disable virusNano Active Hull now works and will repair the hull when warping to an unvisited sector (The Intrepid-class vessel is now currently equipped with this hull)Enhancements and tweaks to ship combat and Drone AIFixed a problem where players could fall through the floor of the cruiser.Fixed a connection error menu bugDrones are no longer present in the starting sector (SE0), this should give crews time to prepare themselves. Remember to restart steam if you didn't see the update. You can also head on over to our secret access area on our forums for direct link downloads to the latest builds!That's all from us right now! Thank you for your time!Best,The Leafy Games Team Games getting better and better

Hey everyone, got a new update for you today! It’s a general update focused on a variety of improvements and a bit of new content as well. We’ve made some big changes behind the scenes to how a number of systems work, this may cause a few bugs but we’ll do our best to squash them quickly. The biggest visible changes would probably be the addition of the Colonial Hub exterior, the shops and repair depots. We have overhauled the trading screen and systems, they are still quite early but will be improved in future updates!You can check out the devlog here: New Features: Shops and the trading system have been completely overhauled! Repair Depots have been added. They will allow you to repair your hull for a reasonable price! (You can no longer repair your hull at any time. If you’ve taken serious hull damage, we highly recommend flying to the nearest repair depot.) Redesigned ship shield rendering process New stacking menu system for displaying various pieces of information to the player. (I.E. Piloting and turret info, dialogue with shop owners and repair depots) Pilot camera and control modes will use your last used preferences Post Process Antialiasing options added to video settings menu Depending on the speed of the vessel, colliding with objects in space can now cause shield/hull damage to ships. Pilots, be careful out there! Three Unique Rare shops have been added. They are still quite early, but they can sell some very powerful components. The first sector (SE0) Is now the start of the Colonial Hub, we have added the exterior model back into the game, you can also find an automated goods vendor and a repair depot! We added fog back! It’s still early but we are happy with the direction it’s going in.Fixes:We have fixed a few serious bugs related to loading and starting a game. If you had problems in version 0.32 with freezing during or after the loading screen, it should be resolved! Completely overhauled the camera system that eliminates some far clip problems and will give us more flexibility in the future for features such as Oculus Rift support. Game should properly clear network timing dictionaries that caused some bugs Loading screen had some work done, should be more stable! Fixed a bug in galaxy generation that would cause an error when creating a game Networking System has been altered to allow for level object networking to be much easier and changed some network objects to player-owned instead of scene-owned to better comply with standard Photon usage. A rare but serious bug related to Photon threading during the game creation and join process has been resolved. It caused the game to freeze and need to be restarted. The space bar should now disable mouse input for piloting and turret modes as it does while controlling your character. Having a menu open should also disable input. Also disables screen input while in a menu, etc. Warp Drive / Starmap changes and fixes related to drawing the warp drive range in the starmap accurately. You can now swap your ship’s hull with hulls bought from the shop (still can’t swap Hull-plating or turrets, they will come soon!) Reactor screen should respond better to the reactor being equipped / unequipped The Engineering switchboard has been tweaked. The third switch controls the shields, and you can now manually shut them down. This is important since the repair depot can’t do anything until your shields are down. Various minor tweaks for the Intrepid and the Cruiser. The Jump Prep screen now displays the sector the ship is aligned to (when charged). Jumping the ship is now a much smoother process, and syncs a bit better than it did before. We’ve tweaked drone aiming and movement. They should provide much more of a challenge, (although we still have a lot more planned for their AI), so be careful out there! -Projectile turrets are now influenced by relative velocity and will move “with the ship”. This should theoretically provide a more realistic experience. We’ve also decreased the Basic Turret recharge time and increased the speed of its projectiles. It should hopefully be a bit more fun to use them for now! Shields now have a minimum capacity depending on the shield generator component. This means a shield will not be active until it reaches a certain amount of its integrity. When depleting a shield, this will give you a small window of opportunity to deal direct damage to the hull. The shields will appear grey if they are below their minimum capacity or if they are offline. Some of you may have noticed that our starmap is 3D! There was an error where sectors would appear above you when in reality they were below you, this has been resolved!Thank you for your time and feedback!Best,The Leafy Games Team Awesome I am going to fire up steam this weekend and download this update. :nyam:

And Pulsar gets some senors.  Sensors are used to detect and acquire information about ships you encounter in the galaxy. They can provide useful information such as power levels, distance, and ship components. Ships can potentially hide from sensors by keeping a safe distance or lowering their emitted signatures.Your ship sensors provide information about your hull integrity, and the hull and shields of any discovered ships. They continuously update with new information but can be temporarily disabled when you perform a more focused scan. Active Scans find ships previously undiscovered to you. And Targeted Scans provide specific information about a single ship.Currently Quantum (QT) Scans don’t do much since they are affected by teleporters and Atriums, (which are not yet implemented). Lifeform Scans are not fully implemented yet as well. Radiology Scans are also on the way; those will be responsible for detecting things like nuclear devices. Electromagnetic Scans and signatures (EM) are currently the most useful. EM sweeps will detect ships with lower EM signatures or ones that are farther away. Doing a Targeted Component Scan is possible right now; when the scan is complete a results button will appear next to the scan button. ChangesNew sensor system implemented and enemy ships can avoid automatic detection TagID system (A, B, C) changed to allow for dynamic tags based on detection orderEnemy ships are now sorted by distance on-screen Balance changes to thrusters and turrets Added flashlight mesh / effects to pawns Fixes Fixed audio bug that could cause major performance drop when alarms were activeTrading menu cannot be opened multiple times simultaneously anymore Fixed issue where camera mode of a pilot / turret operator would not be reset when it should have been (on galaxy reset / death) Ship interior physics / collision tweaked to help stability / performance Fixed internal bug that could cause sector sync errorsShould not be able to use screens when ship power is off Fixed bug that made it harder (or impossible) to walk up ramps when framerate is very low Previous fixes since last update Warp Alignment IssuesW.D. Cruiser Interior Collision Issue Bug with ship throttle that would allow the throttle to get ‘stuck’ AI won’t go hostile when colliding into an asteroid -Small shield visual bug fixFixed bug that caused invisible fires! Fixed issues with hull repair when the hull component was above level 1 Viruses should now work and show up properly Shields should stop using power when they are disabled Drone Aim should better adapt to the relative velocity projectile changeThank you for your time! Have a great day!Best,The Leafy Games Team