Hi everyone,

The beta test for the CQC update continued this week with two new beta builds. Beta 3 was released on Monday and Beta 4 is expected to go out today. As always a big thank you to everyone taking part and for providing your feedback – as well as identifying serious issues that we address immediately there are also minor issues which are being batched up for the next major release. We’re pleased to see so many people enjoying CQC – it is a blast even if I am a bit rubbish at it!

The next phase is the stress test which will be open to all players. All being well we plan to start this phase next week and when it starts we want as many people as possible to pile into the game (CQC and the main game) to see what shakes out.

As mentioned in last week’s dev update we have been working on a new GPP build and that will be released today. The change log will be posted to provide the list of specific fixes. There have been some changes to matchmaking for CQC which should make the process smoother, so this is something we would like you guys to test. To help this CQC is now part of the demo so you can give it a try and the demo time has been extended to 2 hours. Unfortunately if you’ve already played the demo then the time isn’t extended for you.

We’re aware of some networking issues once you’re in the CQC matches (and in the main game) and we need your help in tracking these down, so we’ll analyse the telemetry from people playing to help us isolate the issues. As with the PC/Mac betas it’s this valuable feedback that helps make the game stronger – for all platforms.

During the stress test phase we will also migrate the Xbox GPP players onto the same test servers as the PC/Mac CQC. Note that when this happens the reduced ship and outfitting prices will be removed. For the Xbox One players the same details that persisted with previous GPP releases will repeat.

The first batch of player sponsored minor factions has been processed and will be available in the beta build soon. When the CQC update goes live they will migrate onto the live servers. The aim is to release this at the same time as the Xbox One release, so on October 6th. For the minor factions that have been approved we’ve added descriptions to the relevant systems. The few that haven’t been approved will be communicated directly through the community team and we’ll take another look at them when they’re resubmitted. Note that while we can add new minor factions through the server, the text descriptions are client based so will only be updated when there is a client release.

Finally a shout out for the Hutton Mug crew – the organisation and response from players who really want a mug from Hutton Orbital was quite impressive – even when encountering opposition!

Thanks,

Michael

Discuss the update here.