New enemies.
New enemy ships.
Updates to the economy.
Assigned stats will affect space skills.
New devices for your ship – equipped to your hardware mount points. These will let you apply various de-buffs to enemy ships via the security bonuses and security perks in the electronics skill line.
Various bug fixes – as always.
Patrolling enemies are out – To be clear – patrolling enemies are terrible. I wasted almost a month trying to get this to work and really, when it comes down to it, it’s just an annoyance. There is already a chance that wandering into the line of sight of another enemy group could trigger “adds” to the current combat session. Add to this with patrolling enemies and it’s just not sustainable. So, this is scrapped. I wish I could get my time back…but that’s the way game development works – you try something and it just doesn’t work.
I don’t have a release date for BETA at the moment as my schedule is still variable. However, I wanted to let you know that progress is being made.
I hope you all have a great weekend, and thank you for supporting Stellar Tactics!
Updated icons – The new icons are simplified and designed so you can easily visualize object types (weapons, armor etc.) and their quality levels at a glance. These icons are now the default icons for the game. You can revert to the original icons in the options menu in the video panel by selecting “Vivid Icons”. You can do this in-game and open the inventory and then exit to instantiate the changes. I’m still looking into icons for the various perks.
New crew portraits – By default, updated portraits will be assigned to your crew. If you preferred the old portraits, they are still available by entering the inventory or character info screens, selecting the crew member you want to adjust and then clicking the portrait. The portrait/voice UI will be displayed. Scroll past the new portraits, and you will see that the old portraits are available for selection. Note that you can also open the crew manager, select a crew member, select “REVIEW CREW MEMBER” and adjust the portraits. When starting a new game, the old portraits are not available – though they can be assigned once you are in the game.
Custom portraits – You can now add custom portraits to the game. Detailed instructions are provided in the new “PLAYER_PORTRAITS” folder in the install directory. Here are the basic steps.
- Make sure you exit the game.
- Navigate to the game install folder and open the “PLAYER_PORTRAITS” folder.
- Open the “instructions.txt” file in notepad or other text editor.
- You can have a total of 20 portraits for Human Male, Human Female, Fabricant (male/female) and Khor.
- The portraits must be 512×512 Pixels and be perfectly square.
- Portraits must be saved in JPG format with the “*.jpg” extension.
- These portraits must use the naming convention called out in the “instructions.txt” file or they will not be displayed in the game.
- The old portraits are stored in the “PLAYER_PORTRAITS” folder now and you can use them as a template/example.
Once you have added your portraits/illustrations, launch the game and load any save (or create a new game). Open the inventory, select the crew member you want to adjust and select the portrait in the upper left of the screen. The portrait/voice UI will be displayed. Scroll through the portraits and if everything was done according to the instructions, you should be able to select your custom portrait.
Custom portraits must be assigned once you are in the game. Right now, they are not visible during character creation.
Updated NPC portraits – I’ve updated all main story NPC portraits.
If you discover any bugs, out of place icons or issues with the portraits, please post them in the bug forums at the link below:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/465490/discussions/7/
I hope you all have a wonderful Holiday and best wishes to you and your families. Thank you for supporting Stellar Tactics!