Alpha 21 Dev Diary

[Fanatical_Meat]

1 hour ago, Roland said:

 

Well....if they were to do a money grab and successfully grabbed some money that would benefit the actual game development. Money is money.

 

However, they don't need to to do this. They aren't exponentially increasing their scope to fulfill the whims of every member of the community because they don't have enough funds. They aren't doing it because they are sticking to their own plan.

Hasn’t madmole stated there will be no DLC and said something about not liking most DLC.

Personally I’m fine with it provided I can still play on a server and use whatever extra DLC on that server or I can still use that DLC and play with a friend that doesn’t own that DLC.

[Prydonian]

Hey, Star Citizen’s new alpha just dropped.  You guys gonna let them win?!

[meganoth]

A few alphas ago when madmole was still posting frequently I think he often said that they don't want business advice from us. They surely have heard of DLCs before. They surely know their options, including this one.

 

I also agree with Riamus that should they ever think about producing DLCs, they should produce DLCs with real content instead of cosmetic DLC, because even cheap cosmetic DLCs cost money to produce and that money is essentially thrown out of the window and generate discontent among part of the player base. Better to produce a sensible DLC to get the money to produce that same sensible DLC.

 

If you are asking whether they have the money to produce the DLC before getting the money for the DLC, then the answer is almost surely yes. They just hired another team to make a second game, they don't show any signs of scraping banana peels out of garbage cans. This also falls unter the topic: "Not our business"

 

 

[Fanatical_Meat]

Spring sale starts like next week. Unless the streamer events will be skipped I think we’ll be waiting longer.

[STiM_Desario]

6 hours ago, Fanatical_Meat said:

Hasn’t madmole stated there will be no DLC and said something about not liking most DLC.

Personally I’m fine with it provided I can still play on a server and use whatever extra DLC on that server or I can still use that DLC and play with a friend that doesn’t own that DLC.

@ 25:23 Richard mentions DLC 

[Annihilatorza]

Good Morning @madmole @faatal @Roland 

 

I hope you are all well?

Could you maybe share some news with us if possible, either what you are working on or a new clue game.

 

Something it's been kinda dry out here, kinda like the Kalahari desert.

[Code6]

On 3/10/2023 at 10:22 AM, KOLAND said:

       And so I had a question: if the studio does not have enough funds for the development of the game, can it add donations to the development of this great game? Just like they were collecting donations for the kickstarter in 2013 at the beginning (sorry, maybe I spelled it wrong) I think it's a great idea to breathe more life into the project. Personally, I have about 10 friends and acquaintances ready to donate their money for the development of the game.

 

 

If you love the game and wish to provide further monetary compensation to TFP, then simply purchase additional copies of the game.  Then you can give them away to friends or even strangers.

[Rabbitslovecactus]

1 hour ago, Code6 said:

 

If you love the game and wish to provide further monetary compensation to TFP, then simply purchase additional copies of the game.  Then you can give them away to friends or even strangers.

The best way to support them. This way you support and spread the word. 7 days to Preach. 

[Jost Amman]

14 hours ago, Code6 said:

If you love the game and wish to provide further monetary compensation to TFP, then simply purchase additional copies of the game.  Then you can give them away to friends or even strangers.

Well, to be completely honest... that way you'll also very much be supporting Steam too, since they always take their cut. 

[DanLW]

On 3/10/2023 at 5:05 PM, Prydonian said:

Hey, Star Citizen’s new alpha just dropped.  You guys gonna let them win?!

 

They made the mistake of releasing on Friday.  This is why TFP alphas are generally released on Monday so that unexpected game breaking bugs can be worked during the work week.

 

(Star Citizen is currently experiencing massive.outages)

 

7 days will go gold long before Star Citizen or Squadron 42.

[faatal]

On 3/11/2023 at 3:58 AM, Annihilatorza said:

Good Morning @madmole @faatal @Roland 

 

I hope you are all well?

 

Could you maybe share some news with us if possible, either what you are working on or a new clue game.

 

Something it's been kinda dry out here, kinda like the Kalahari desert.

Last week we made some graphics improvements to fix two old issues. Ambient occlusion did not render on certain plants properly, so that was fixed by switching to a new mode. Unity's screen space reflections were disabled because they barely did anything, so we switched SSR systems, which now definitely shows reflections and has more features than Unity's and complements the reflection probe system.

[khzmusik]

@faatal Apologies, I looked back through the thread and didn't find it, but I believe you said you were working on some kind of "decal" system for things like bullet holes? Or am I imagining things?

 

If you are - is there any chance this same technology could be used to make footprints in snow? (I've been watching playthroughs of Sons of the Forest and really like how that game does it.)

[Blake_]

9 hours ago, faatal said:

Last week we made some graphics improvements to fix two old issues. Ambient occlusion did not render on certain plants properly, so that was fixed by switching to a new mode. Unity's screen space reflections were disabled because they barely did anything, so we switched SSR systems, which now definitely shows reflections and has more features than Unity's and complements the reflection probe system.

Nor does (AO) render workstations nor trees properly. Sometimes they disappear when the area has a bunch of them. It has been reported ages ago but maybe what you did to plants could fix the issue. Or it might be related to failing raycasts that cannot reset|update themselves properly upon any kind of memory or CPU overstressing.

Edited March 13, 2023 by Blake_ (see edit history)

[Riamus]

8 hours ago, khzmusik said:

@faatal Apologies, I looked back through the thread and didn't find it, but I believe you said you were working on some kind of "decal" system for things like bullet holes? Or am I imagining things?

 

If you are - is there any chance this same technology could be used to make footprints in snow? (I've been watching playthroughs of Sons of the Forest and really like how that game does it.)

Interestingly, animals in the snow biome will leave footprints/trails for a short time.  So something is there, but it's limited in scope atm.  Should be possible to get more time on the tracks before they disappear and add in tracks for players and vehicles.  Would be a nice improvement.  Right now the animal tracks are so minimal that it took a long time before I ever even noticed them.

[faatal]

9 hours ago, khzmusik said:

@faatal Apologies, I looked back through the thread and didn't find it, but I believe you said you were working on some kind of "decal" system for things like bullet holes? Or am I imagining things?

 

If you are - is there any chance this same technology could be used to make footprints in snow? (I've been watching playthroughs of Sons of the Forest and really like how that game does it.)

I don't remember, but I was and am working on the decal shader, which is not a systems change. Just a change to rendering the decals we have on roads.

1 hour ago, Blake_ said:

Nor does (AO) render workstations nor trees properly. Sometimes they disappear when the area has a bunch of them. It has been reported ages ago but maybe what you did to plants could fix the issue. Or it might be related to failing raycasts that cannot reset|update themselves properly upon any kind of memory or CPU overstressing.

AO draws shadows where inside edges are. It does not make things disappear. Those bugs are normally with the occlusion manager, which has some fixes in A21.

[Cr0wst0rm]

11 hours ago, Blake_ said:

Nor does (AO) render workstations nor trees properly. Sometimes they disappear when the area has a bunch of them. It has been reported ages ago but maybe what you did to plants could fix the issue. Or it might be related to failing raycasts that cannot reset|update themselves properly upon any kind of memory or CPU overstressing.

AO stands for ambient occlusion (graphics rendering). Occlusion culling means engine won't render things that are not visible.

Edited March 13, 2023 by Cr0wst0rm (see edit history)

[Sarakatunga]

21 hours ago, faatal said:

Last week we made some graphics improvements to fix two old issues. Ambient occlusion did not render on certain plants properly, so that was fixed by switching to a new mode. Unity's screen space reflections were disabled because they barely did anything, so we switched SSR systems, which now definitely shows reflections and has more features than Unity's and complements the reflection probe system.

hi. very good. They also need to check and optimize several trees that were left in old alphas and consume quite a lot of fps even with low details. Could get more fps

[Sir Negan]

Would actually love to see a UI update maybe? Something that looks a bit more fresh and what not. Menu's, text style etc. all looks straight out of 2010 or something, I feel it could be a bit cleaner maybe ? Might be just me.. however, would love to see a reply with thoughts on the matter

Besides that, great updates for A21! Looking forward to it.

[HB_H4wk]

Hope the DEV's can fix this issue. In the editor I created a Ore rail car and filled it with Coal, but when I play it on a single player map there is no Coal only the ground terrain below the Gravel.

[Callum123456789]

out of curiosity in alpha 21 do cities/towns generate cross biome again? ever since the new tile system with a20 i have noticed that not a single town/city would generate cross biome unlike alpha 19 and below was it a decision made in support of the biome lootstage modifiers so every city has a unique area for lootstage so if one part has waste and one part has forest it could be abused? im not really sure if it is a bug or not but from my testing it looks to be intentional as they can generate right before the biome ends and that also marks the end of the city without crossing into another biome.

[Blake_]

On 3/13/2023 at 7:43 AM, faatal said:

I don't remember, but I was and am working on the decal shader, which is not a systems change. Just a change to rendering the decals we have on roads.

AO draws shadows where inside edges are. It does not make things disappear. Those bugs are normally with the occlusion manager, which has some fixes in A21.

You are right, two different occluders. I wasn't paying attention to the A from the 'Ambient' thingy. Thank you very much for the other occluder fixes though , carry on sir. 

 

Any word on those MF? 

[Scythe-Messiah]

I just read through the chunk reset option and related and I really like the concept of it and very very greatly appreciate it's upcoming addition. While I currently use loot respawn, chunk resetting is far superior since terrain, blocks, and challenge get restored rather than say loot rooms made accessible via previously activated shortcuts. I know in an MP environment I'll want the setting enabled so that everyone can experience everything in a shorter playtime window and help keep longevity/replayability/accessibility on the server. 

 

Ideally, I'd love for the chunk reset to be tied to horde nights. Sort of like how in STALKER games, some degree of resetting/variability occurs in the zone after emissions. This would also potentially allow for high traffic areas to get chunk resets as well (assuming you're okay with that).

 

Question: Would it be possible to add an option toggle to reset chunks to the day after horde night vs static day amount? (specifically, I'd want to have compatibility with horde day dynamic ranges).

 

Two options I was thinking of was either reset ALL chunks (save the bedrolls/landclaims) after horde days or just chunks that weren't visited before previous horde day ranges (e.g assuming 7 day hordes, if it's day 15, anything that was visited day 1 through day 7 gets reset -- but anything visited between 8-14 stays. Next horde night on day 21, those areas 8-14 gets reset, but 15-21 is good until day 28). 

 

Syncing chunk resets to the day after horde nights is an interesting immersive option (imagine survivors re-barricading a building we cleared before horde night but still turned into zombies afterwards when we checked) -- But also has the concrete benefit of "I better grab the stuff I stashed before horde day hits" vs. guessing at when a chunk may reset when I can't remember the last time I visited it. In my playgroup, we'd spend the days before horde night preparing, and exploring afterwards -- so a fresh world after horde nights makes sense with an MP playgroup IMHO. Thanks!

[Rabbitslovecactus]

@faatalQuestion for the game when it goes gold. Will the sandbox mode have a setting to disable bandits if we'd like to? 

[playlessNamer]

Will the ugly gap between sand/gravel and stone/concrete/wood blocks be fixed in the next patch?

[Trankitas]

Tomorrow is this thread's birthday, any info on A21 to celebrate? @faatal