Greetings Pioneers!

We have a chunky update to the Experimental branch today with lots of shiny new gameplay options. For those of you who have been asking for a free-build or creative mode, we now have many tick boxes and sliders to cater for this. You can also change many of these options in the pause menu, allowing for more experimentation with reduced risk. You might decide to build up a huge base without AI then turn the AI back on once the base is complete and watch the carnage.

There has been a material and crafting overhaul with many changes to both the materials harvested in the world, items crafted in the fabricator and found in loot boxes. We recommend starting a new game to experience this fully (loot boxes and structures will be unchanged if loaded from a save).

We’ve also added 5 new outpost bases for you to find and explore, along with a rather lovely new scanner for all your scanning needs! It also goes without saying this update comes with a bunch of fixes and tweaks too, including a full pass over the modular weapons.

This branch will still be single player only for now, we’re making good progress on a similar options for game server setup from within the game along with network optimisations to make the launch as smooth as possible, bear with us! For now, have a good play around with these options and new materials in single player and let us know what you think! The intro/tutorial is also coming along nicely and will be with you in a future update.

Please read the full changelist below for all the juicy information:

New game customization options! Before you launch a new game and by the use of the pause menu, you now have the ability to adjust various setting of the game to cater to how you want to play. Example options are: Day cycle length – you can change how much time does it take for the sun to make its full journey around the sky. Day/Night Ratio – Longer nights, shorter days, it’s now up to you. Harvest Yield – This allows you to get more materials out of resources you pick up. Mining speed – That should self-explanatory Free Build Mode! Building, Crafting and Upgrading costs 0. Sustenance/Hydration Depletion multipliers – You can decide how much focus you want to have on food and water. Shielded/Unshielded Player Damage (AI) – Amount of damage you take from AI while inside/outside your Eden Kit shield. Shielded/In World Structure Decay – You can adjust the amount of decay of the structures both inside and outside of the Eden Kit shields. Shielded/Unshielded Structure Damage (Player)/(AI) – How much damage structures take from players and AI both inside and outside the Eden Kit shield. Block Durability Factor – you can adjust the amount of Hit Points Structures have across the game. Damage Taken by AI – Very straightforward difficulty setting. Do Not Spawn Enemies – A checkbox for disabling enemy AI entirely. Do Not Spawn Aggressive Fauna – As above, but for aggressive fauna.

All new materials! We have reworked the entire set of materials and items you can find and craft in the game. Our focus was on making the game world a bit more believable as well as simplifying the building experience at earlier stages of the game. Ironite, Tennal, Cerulium – have been removed from the game. They may still persist in saved game, but you have the ability to convert them to new materials in your fabricator. Aluminium, Titanium, Copper, Silver, Gold, Sulphur and other raw elements have been added. Oil, Resin, Acid and other items have been added. Bridgmanite, Protonite, Illumium and Teslinium, and most of food and water items have been kept. Computer Chip, Mesh, Carbon Nanotubes, Glass, Synthetic Rubber and many other craftable components have been added.

All new abandoned bases to discover! These replace any bases that were placeholder previously: Added ‘HydroPlant’ base. A sprawling complex straddling a river, featuring a collapsed crossing and plenty of hidden loot… Added ‘CorporationHQ’ base. A mountaintop base with lots of vertical playspace and collapsed elevator shaft to traverse. Nice views from the top though! Added ‘UndergroundLab’ base. I think you can guess what this one is. The question is, can you find it? Added ‘WeaponTest’ base. In a nice, defensible position this base is a good bet for finding weapon components and ammunition. Beware the automated defenses! Added ‘Pipeline’ base. Once a small outpost for resource extraction.

New Scanner visuals for world items and structures.

New Power System Eden Kits no longer supply power themselves, they now act as a distributor of power. You will need generators under the shield to provide power to your structures.

You can now place consumables in the consumables bar and use them by pressing the relevant number key.

Huge weapon balancing pass for modular weapons. The damage is no longer placeholder and we have made a lot of tweaks. Let us know what you think!

You can now smash AI into trees again! Woohoo!

Improved art for roads.

The crafting queue is now no longer a queue. Up to 5 things can be crafted simultaneously.

Eden Kits drops are now more frequent and spread out across a wider portion of the map.

Complete re-balancing of all Loot Crates in the abandoned bases. No more empty crates! All the new items have been placed in and distributed. Added ‘Engineering’ class of Loot Crate.

Fauna tweaks: Cerberus (Wolves!) no longer spawn in Grassland Biomes. Reduced maximum number of Cerberus in Forest and Swamp Biomes from 5 to 3.

Material list in build mode now only displays 1 material if only 1 is available.

Added key prompts for Loadout bar on the HUD.

The HUD shield damage effect has been toned down.

Added MiningCrate Art to Mining Base.

Art improvements to modular weapons and muzzle flashes.

Fixed a crash caused by old Arch Primitives being removed from the game. You still can’t build them but old saves that were previously crashing should now work.

Fixed a crash with smashing a Nahmar while it was absorbing.

Fixed Low Texture quality setting making the Landscape inaccurate.

Fixed an issue causing inaccurate navigation around some trees.

Fixed several hives spawning inside geometry.

Fixed several road visual issues.

Fixed debug line in water.

Fixed Swamp Snakes crawling around on the ground in one part of the map.

Fixed AI attacking the player during deployment screen.

Fixed issue where thousands of rounds of Small ammo would occasionally spawn in Loot Crates.

Fixed various visual issues on first person modular weapons.

Fixed an issue where Nahmar could get stuck.

Fixed an issue with Cerberus not running towards the player.

You can also read our known issues list here.

Note: Eden Kits only distribute power at the moment, you MUST build a generator to supply power to utilities.

Have fun!

-Team Flix