Beta is launching Wednesday March 31st for Windows, Mac, and Linux!

Once Beta launches, we’ll be removing it from the pre-order store, so if you want Beta access, you’ll have to buy it before then. Please don’t view this as a “fear-of-missing-out” tactic. If you want to wait until release, that’s totally fine.

Here is a long link to the pre-order page

On Wednesday, you’ll receive an email with a Steam code. It will be sent to the email you provided during the Kickstarter or through pre-order. If you need to change the email, contact us right away. You can send a Discord private message or email us at ominuxgames@gmail.com

If you want to upgrade your pre-order to Beta, contact us

Videos

Here’s a video where I talk about Beta (the content is pretty much the same as this post):

And here’s 90 minutes of raw gameplay footage:

Beta Purpose

Beta will last from now until release, so if you have Beta it’s sort of like the game is releasing, but in a less fun state.

During Beta we’re going to fix bugs and do a lot of balance changes. Things like: how frequently fire spawns, sell price of ice, morale penalties, hunger drain rate.

We might add some new content, but primarily we want to take what already exists, and make it more fun—improving the sandbox. Quality of life is also very important to us at this stage.

We’re a 2 person team, it’s hard to do QA, playtests, community management, and add new stuff at the same time.

Discord

Here is a link to our Discord server. @Tyler with whatever you want, and I’ll go into unnecessary detail about the atmosphere system and colonist limbs.

In-Game Feedback

You can submit feedback directly in-game, by opening the escape menu.

You can also write feedback directly on the Discord.

Both are about the same to us, so do whatever is easier for you.

If your game crashes, it will automatically be sent to us, so no further action required on your part (except for uninstalling)

New Stuff

That’s the meats of Beta. Now here’s some new stuff that we’ve added since the Steam demo, in no particular order.

You may already know some of it.

I’m skipping minor things, bug fixes, quality of life, etc.

New UI

We completely overhauled the UI in Starmancer. The new UI is a bit less obtrusive and allows for way more information

Build Menu

The Build Menu now looks like this:

Categories that haven’t been unlocked are now hidden (health is a category, for example, and includes the Incubation Tank).

You can right click objects to view aesthetic variations, this removes a tremendous amount of redundant entries

Object Windows

Object windows are now docked to the lower left corner of the screen, with hideable tabs.

This means you can only select 1 thing at a time, but playtesters almost never deliberately selected multiple things—the old UI was a pop-up nightmare

The previously selected tab is remembered for the next time you open a window for the same object. So if the health tab is selected, it will be the default tab for all colonists (until you select something else)

You can also rename colonists and rooms now.

Flavor Stats

We added some fun things to the hud, like a death tracker and day counter

Production Order UI

The production order UI was improved a bit. The amount of information displayed was reduced, and you can now view all assigned colonists, and their respective success chances

You can assign and unassign colonists directly from this menu. Clicking a colonist will open their object window.

Moving Objects

Objects can now be moved after they’re built (I talked about this in more depth in a previous post).

Movement is free and instant, and could definitely be cheesed to trap colonists

Tech Tree

We completely removed the old unlock system and added a Tech Tree. Most people didn’t like the arbitrary nature of the previous system. In this new tech tree, you can focus on whatever you want in whatever order you want

Research has no requirements, except for Colonist Ego level (explained below)

Colonists perform research as a job task, at the Research Station

Colonist Changes

Probably we did other UI stuff, but there’s more to cover

Colonists received many changes. To the point that they’re hardly even the same thing that that they used to be

Ego Level

Colonists now have an ego level—basically their overall “intelligence”. This can be upgraded by spending DNA Fragments. I’ve covered this before, but the system has now been simplified into:

Drones
Autonomous
Supreme

Drones receive almost no morale penalties, but they never socialize, have low competence, are incapable of most free-time activities, and their skills are capped at level 3. Drones will eat the same food every day and never complain, but it might take them a few tries to do basic tasks.

Autonomous colonists can be thought of as “normal” humans. They’re neither good or bad at anything, but they get upset if they eat Biowaste. They’re also creeped out by Drones, because Drones are creepy. Autonomous colonists can socialize and form friendships and enemies.

Supreme colonists are the best. They have a boost to both research time and skill experience gained. Their success chance at everything is much higher. But they will not stand for any sub-standard station conditions. They also despise all lower Egos and will never positively interact with anyone beneath them.

Buying Colonists (and selling)

Colonists can now be directly bought. The player can buy as many as they want, but the active colonist count is limited based on Player Level. At the start, the player can have 3 active colonists.

Every colonist has a unique cost, based on their perks and task preferences.

You can reroll the colonists as many times as you want, but you only get 1 free roll per day. After that, the cost is 10 DNA Fragments. All rerolls are free before you buy your first 3 colonists.

Colonists can be sold at any time for a 100% refund. You’ll receive extra DNA Fragments and Credits if the colonist has earned any skills.

Job Tasks (and preferences)

The old job system is gone. Colonists are now assigned tasks. Each task can be prioritized for every colonist.

Certain colonists love, hate, or outright refuse specific tasks

We decided to do this style instead of the grid layout that many similar games use (where all workers have numbers for priorities and you can see all of them at the same time). I always get super overwhelmed by that style.

You lose the ability to get a broad overview of all task priorities, though

Job Schedule

You can now create custom job schedules and assign colonists to whatever shift you want.

Internally, this removes some burden from us. If your colonists aren’t spending enough time eating or if they need more free time, it’s now more of your fault (although still mostly our fault)

Go To Floor (and return to source)

Once colonists are Autonomous, you can order them to walk to any floor. Use this to keep colonists away from fire or to force them to fight a monster. It’s also very useful for the times that your colonists get stuck doing something, because you can rescue them (technically you could always rescue them by venting atmosphere and regrowing them)

This is not a “draft” mode (but we’re not opposed to adding draft mode)

We also added a “Return to Source” button, which is handy for when you want to grow a different colonist.

Colonists must have positive morale for both orders to work

Uniforms

You can now change the uniform color of colonists.

Use whatever color convention you want. Maybe you change uniform based on assigned tasks, ego level, or how much you like each colonist.

New Perks

Since the player can now buy colonists, they consent to whatever weird traits everyone has. This gives us way more perk freedom (previously, it wasn’t fun if your random colonists had really bad perks).

Here are some of the new perks:

Average Joe — This is their only perk
Blue Skin — Skin is blue
Faint Hearted — Extra morale penalties from seeing blood
Germaphobe — Extra morale penalties from Biowaste. Refuses to sleep on floor
Incontinent — Randomly poops, even in space
Potty Mouth — Randomly swears
Multiple Personality — Acquires a random perk each day
Nyctophobia — Sleeps with the lights on

New Systems

There are a few new “systems” in the game. We think of Starmancer (and games like it) as more of “sandboxes in which interesting things happen” and less as games. The sandbox should have enough interesting systems in it that the player can do whatever weird things they want to do.

Hygiene

Biowaste now creates germs. Colonists track germs around the station. The sanitizer removes germs, but must be stocked with Cleaning Solution, created at the Chemistry Table.

If colonists are on a dirty floor they can get sick. The current diseases are:

The Runs — It’s gonna get messy
Fever — Colonist is very hot, and must be put into a cold room
The Chills — Colonist is very cold, and must be put into a warm room

Food will decay faster in the presence of germs. Rotten food also creates germs.

Colonists have a chance to get sick if they eat either rotten food or Biowaste

Germs won’t spread in cold rooms, and they’ll be completely destroyed if you heat up a room.

Noise

Machines now emit noise while production is occurring. Colonists have reduced morale in noisy rooms.

Sleep is also less effective in noisy areas.

Noise doesn’t spread to separate rooms (unless they share the same atmosphere), so place machinery away from bedrooms and common areas.

If colonists are in a loud room for too long, they’ll go deaf. Deaf colonists don’t hear anything, so they’re actually pretty good for operating machinery.

Beauty

Objects now have a beauty rating. Some are ugly, like Bedrolls and Fungus Collectors. Others, like posters and toilets are pretty.

Colonist morale and competence is affected by area beauty. Decorate your station to keep everyone happy.

Most cosmetics have the same rating, so place whatever you like best.

Floor Storage

Items are now stored on floors, and item filters are room-wide. So once you set the items that are stored in a room, all shelves and floors placed in that room will automatically store whatever you specify.

Shelves have a higher item density, so they’re technically better

New Objects

We added a bunch of new objects too

Gun Range — Free-Time object right now
Target Dummy — Reduces aggression
Jukebox — Free-Time
Arcade Machine — Free-Time
Casino Table — Free-Time
TV — Free-Time
Cryptominer — Passively generates credits
Sanitizer — Removes germs
Water Purifier — Converts Dirty Water into Clean Water

Here’s the movie that plays on the TV, because it’s pretty neat:

Visitors

The world felt a bit empty, so we added some visitors. We’re still finishing up the art for some of them (so enjoy the placeholder art during Beta).

Most visitors drop DNA Fragments, Upgrade Modules, or Recipe Caches if you kill them. Most visitors can be farmed for items.

Zombie — Infects colonists. Eats dead colonists. Will die in high heat
Power Moth (this name is tentative) — Seeks an active wire. Drains a lot of power. Once the drain is finished, it drops loots and vanishes
Cuddler — Infects colonists. A mysterious egg erupts from their chest, killing them. Repeat. Mysterious eggs now have a chance to randomly hatch. Warm rooms greatly increase the hatch chance
Malfunctioning Robot — Overheating. Moves to any room that’s cold. Is harmless if in a cold room. Otherwise very hostile. Will fight zombies. Drops silicon randomly while alive. Drops moonshine on death
Slime — Aggressive while hungry. If fed anything it will be passive until it gets hungry again. Drops Goolerium randomly (this is a new item that is used at the Chemistry Table. Also added a Goolerium asteroid)
Shambler — Colonists turn into this if they’re outside during a system warp. It’s some sort of aggressive monster.

Visitors spawn on external floors, and prefer floors near Trade Pods (to prevent cheesing)

Right now the spawns are completely random. A visitor spawns every 5 to 10 days.

We’re looking for ways to make this less random, but it’s not super easy, because there’s no terrain/floor around the outside of the station. The player also shouldn’t have to do something to make visitors spawn. The gameplay intent is something like, “Oh no, there are zombies at the front door. I better keep everyone inside or send out some colonists to fight the monsters”. So in that sense it should be randomish, and definitely not an “opt-in” system.

We’re fine with the player increasing spawn chance by placing lots of raw meat outside or something.

Rules of Engagement

We added a Rules of Engagement (RoE) UI. Use it to set creatures to either kill-on-sight or ignore.

Monster combat follows the same rules as colonist combat. Pacifists will never fight monsters. Upset colonists will attack creatures regardless of RoE settings

We also implemented the turret. It requires bullets crafted at the workbench. Turrets have low accuracy, and have a chance of damaging anything in the vicinity of the target—machines or colonists.

Contracts

We made a first pass at a “Quest” system, called “Contracts”.

Every system has a random amount of contracts. Contracts award Upgrade Modules, Money, DNA Fragements, Recipe Caches, and Player Experience (as you level up you can have more colonists active at the same time)

The required item is totally random, but it’s gated based on highest skill level of your colonists. So if you have a high level chemist, you’ll start to see high level chemistry items. The intent is to provide variety, and to occasionally encourage the player to try something new.

If you don’t like the contracts, just go to a new system

Warp Drive

We simplified the warp system into a “pick 1 of 3” systems, with no going back.

There’s really no reason for the player to ever return to a system and there’s a performance hit from never despawning systems. Right now everything is saved into 1 big folder, and then loaded indiscriminately. Fixing it would take time, but we only have 1 programmer (me).

Systems have random conditions, like cold and radioactive.

They also have a “dominant faction”. The dominant faction increases the sell price of certain items. Eventually this might influence visitor spawn rates or something.

If we have time, we want to convert this into an FTL style selection, where you get a simple map and can see 1 or 2 choices into the future

FTL map, where you can see where your destination will eventually lead to

Thanks for all the fish

Everything has an opportunity cost. Do we delay release, cut this content, or cut some other content. There’s no end to what we want to add to the game. The hard part is prioritizing and working on whatever makes the game the most fun. It’s not easy. We don’t always choose correctly. Sometimes you try something and it’s just not fun.

But we always try. I don’t know what other devs do. We’re human, doing our best. We don’t delay for insidious reasons or marketing reasons (we’re 2 people, it barely needs to sell for us to keep working).

Thanks for sticking through with us. We don’t always communicate but we’ve never stopped working.

Beta starts next week, which is March 31st, and will continue forever (you won’t lose access before or after release). So if you have Beta it’s sort of like the game is releasing, but in a less fun state.

Beta March 31st but also other stuff too