Status Report Q2/2019 (Apr-Jun)

The second quarter of 2019 has seen a host of enhancements for our game features. Feedback and messaging have been optimized with the new pop-up feature. We continued to bring more elements into full-screen mode, and introduced the Archive 2.0. Side Jobs, Career Tasks, and Discreet work have been polished, adding new UI, branching choices, and NPC pictures. There are also new university courses, 2 new missions, vendor logos, new item artwork, technical improvements and the new “/me” command for chat, as well as a number of important changes for Syndicates. Read on for all the details about what is new in Q2/2019!

The recent updates contained a lot of improvements that we are summarizing for you below! Please check the corresponding changelogs for a full list of details which also contain all textual improvements. You will find all the links at the end of this article.

Archive 2.0

As a first big step of the review and polishing work, the Archive in your CORETECHS has been reworked.

  • Content – Content improvements and additions (text and pictures)
  • Layout – Brand new layout of the Archive (full page design)
  • Structure – Updated, more comfortable structure

Side Jobs Revamp

The blog “Side Job Revamp” previewed the many feature changes which are now in place. Below are some major changes. For the detailed list, please check the changelogs (listed at the bottom).

  • Avatars (NPCs) – On Tau Station, all employer NPCs have a unique look.
  • Narrative Review & Occasional Choices – The narrative team has already rewritten most of all Side Jobs, improved the texts, but also reviewed the difficulty. Sometimes you will experience narrative choices, similar to what you know from missions.
  • New Side Job – ‘Encyclopedia Editor’ has been added on Tau Station as a special Community Spotlight reward for the Wiki team.
  • UI Updates – Side Job Tasks have a new and more convenient layout. It is closer to what you know from missions, including environment art. The layout for scenarios when talking to NPCs has been improved as well, and the final reward gets displayed in more prominent way.

Career Changes

  • Credits (success) – You earn more credits than before.
  • Living World (tasks) – The list of available tasks now reflects the current situation at your local station, following the dynamics of a living world (see blog post), including changes in payment. You now see all tasks you can currently perform. In case you run out of focus, the page informs you accordingly.
  • Messages (clean-up) – Messages have been streamlined.
  • Pages (structure) – Career tasks and career ranks for current career have been split into separate pages for a better overview with links from the Employment Center.
  • Payment (illegal) – As requested from the Community, illegal actions now pay into the wallet instead of your bank account.
  • Tasks (amount) – There are up to 7 tasks presented in each area with improved balancing regarding your chance to succeed. Several new tasks have been added as well.
  • Tasks (difficulty) – The tasks page now groups by current difficulty.

Discreet Work

  • Active Work (NPC) – Having an active task is better reflected by the discreet work page now: there is no longer any speech bubble shown.
  • Local Task (location) – The location information is shown when it’s relevant.
  • Messages (various) – Feedback texts have been checked and optimized.
  • No Work (NPC) – The ‘aborted’ cooldown is now shown in the speech bubble.

2 New Missions in system L 726-8

  • ‘Family Matters’ (level 13) at the Jump Gate.
  • ‘The Curious Incident’ (level 13) at the Market on Orwell Stronghold.

Syndicates

  • Campaigns (blueprints, VIP) – Drop chances have been increased. Furthermore, the system now ensures your team will be rewarded should you complete a number of campaigns which result in zero drops.
  • Campaigns (bonds) – Due to some technical issues, campaigns no longer drop bond certificates. All bond items have been converted (ensuring that nobody loses anything). We will revisit this point in the future.
  • Campaigns (epic items) – Epic items can now drop in all difficulty levels, including easy ones with (much) smaller chances, though still only when a campaign includes the max tier of syndicate members.
  • Campaigns (extreme difficulty) – Rewards for finishing extreme campaigns are now significantly better than those for hard campaigns.
  • Responsiveness (faster) – Syndicate actions should be faster now.

New Artwork

Feedback Improvements & Messaging Rework

  • New Feedback Pop-Ups – More than 30 (important) actions and events now result in a prominent pop-up message. They can be dismissed by using the close button in the popup, the escape key, or by clicking on the background.
  • New Status Icons – The information panel has been expanded with icons that indicate your VIP status, being well-fed, having a valid VISA, or active Bodyguard protection.
  • Bank (withdrawals) – Withdrawal fees are displayed at the bank and differ for non-Consortium affiliations. The messages are shorter now.
  • Gym (bonus) – We tweaked the feedback messages when you hired a personal trainer to better explain the bonuses you receive.
  • Gym (requirements) – The texts about potential training injury risks have been improved to better address stats which are close to the minimum requirements of the local station.
  • Market (selling price) – The final price and all price modifiers are now shown before you sell items to Vendors, similar to what you already know when buying from NPCs.
  • Career Salary (silenced) – Event notifications and text messages about career salary have been silenced as it has become part of the credit (and bond) logs.
  • Messages have generally become more compact and more precise, e.g. the destination name is shown via the shuttle ticket countdown timer. Additionally, obvious or redundant information has been dropped.

Chat

  • AV Software – Some technical changes now avoid false-alarm issues with certain anti-virus software that previously blocking chat.
  • Command (/me) – The new command “/me” has been added to the chat.
  • Connection – It stays alive much longer in case you are inactive for an extended period.
  • Performance – The technical changes lead to a better performance, as browsers can process requests faster now.

New Features

  • University Courses – A “Manufacturing” degree program has been added.
  • Local Shuttles (tickets) – You can now purchase a ticket when you’ve already purchased a ticket. The previous ticket can be discarded in a feedback message with a dialogue that will pop up.
  • Public Travel (tickets) – If you purchase an Express Shuttle ticket after you bought a Local Shuttle ticket, you will keep your Local Shuttle ticket. You can still get on the appropriate vessel if you make it back in time for lift-off.

Further Improvements & Changes

  • Character Page (ordering) – The ordering of skills and ships in your character details page has been optimized.
  • Cinema (UI) – The cinema moved to the CORETECHS (full screen mode) and a new design has been applied.
  • Citizen Council (various) -The CORETECHS page shows the Council board with a new layout and options for getting in touch. There is a new dedicated forum.
  • Clone Respawn (layout) – The layout of respawning has been improved to use all space, also adding a new image.
  • Forum (latest post) – The forum post page now shows GCT of recent activity (reply).
  • Forum (replies) – Quotation marks in the subject are not an issue for your answer’s title anymore.
  • Help Page (discord) – The Community Discord channel is now part of “list of useful fan sites“.
  • Logs (various) – The bond log properly refers to “tier-up” bonds, the credit logs list credits lost by dying, and level-up credits are now listed.
  • Private Ships (deportation) – If your Visa expires while you’re on ship and have no fuel, you now get deported as intended which resolves the risk of getting stuck.
  • Stats (rounding) – The stat percentage values in the sidebar are now always rounded down instead of to the nearest percent. This resolves some threshold irritations, ensuring that you have at least the stat value which is displayed.
  • Stim Packs (toxicity) – The toxicity value of stims now always displays in percentages as in your information panel.

Some Update Impressions

New full-screen UI of the Archive. Big selection cards on the main page grant access to several topics. In each line there are 3 cards including artwork reflecting the content. The topics are: Affiliations, Clones, Corporations, Genotypes, History, Space, Stims, Survival, Technology, Travel, and Universities.
Top menu of the new archive.
An exemplary detail page of the archive: The main topics are listed in the navigation on the left, the first one is highlighted as being selected: Affiliations. The articles of each topic are listed on top, above the main content. In our case: Affiliations, Consortium, Freeboter, Gaule, and Independent which is selected. Artwork with an NPC and the green Independent logo are on the left, the description text is next to it.
An article of the archive in detail view.
A further archive UI example. This time, the main topic Corporations is selected with it's article about Hephaestus. The company's logo "HWT" with a flash symbol in the background and with 2 rifles, and the background story about this weapon company is written next to it.
Another source of background information in the archive.
The Cinema shows a glowing video container. Every day a new video of Isaac Arthur is shown, in this case "Habitable Planets 06: Water Worlds & Ocean Planets".
New UI of the cinema, part of the new CORETECHS full-screen UI.
The Citizen Council UI is also in full-screen mode. There is a button to access the Council forums, and all members are listed, exposing their avatars. You can get in touch with every single member by using the "contact" button to send a private mail.
The new Citizen Council page.

New 3D artwork for beer bottles: 4 glass bottles with crown caps and some greenish liquid inside, the bottle labels are empty.Biohazard is a short barrel rifle. It's eye catching due to its yellow color and big biohazard warning sign on the front.

The Crude Charge Mail is short club made of metal with a two-faced head. Some small pipes indicate something like a heating mechanism inside and at least one head seems to glow.The Starfish Kris is a short blade: a dark twisted dagger with a star on the hilt.

Worn Diffusion Armor. This thick, non-conductive plastic shell chafes in uncomfortable places. The back piece is cracked and the buckles are rusted, but it's still mostly serviceable.Patchwork Thermoplastic Suit: Heavy scraps of worn leather sewn onto flexible sheets of thermoplastic lend some protection while sacrificing aesthetic and ease of movement.

NPC profile of the female Professor Octavia with a big picture and information on top. Instead of the NPC's character description, the new Side Job layout is displayed in the lower part, similar to what you know from missions. The headline states "Side Job: Encyclopedia Editor", followed by narrative text, a speech bubble of the Asian lady and a new goal which informs you of editing 4 encyclopedia articles.
A Side Job which is conducted in connection with an NPC.
A Side Job UI, performed via Tasks and not with an NPC shown. The headline: "Side Job: Medical Waste Disposal" is reflected by Sick Bay artwork. Below a paragraph describing your success, your reward is exposed in a prominent blue result box.
The new display of your rewards; in this case in the task (not NPC) UI.
More and more vendors get artwork, sometimes NPCs are shown, sometimes it's a logo of the according company.
Collage of several new vendor logos at the market.
Snippet of the avatar information panel. A woman with a black ponytail. With the re-arranged icons, we have now up to 4 icon, showing your status about VIP, bodyguard protection, a valid VISA and the new icon in case you're well-fed. All further icons have been moved below the avatar into 1 row: mails, events, friends & foes list, settings, help and logout button.
The status display with the new well-fed icon.
A collage contrasting the feedback message and credit log of a legal and one illegal task. The differences are highlighted: payment for legal tasks go to your bank account while illegal task money is put to your wallet.
Better indication of legal and illegal tasks while illegal payment now goes to your wallet.
Snippet of 3 career tasks offered in an area. "Embezzle from the clone center" is a normal task that requires intelligence, giving a credit reward of 135. "Process the clone center's payroll" needs stamina and pays 114 at normal difficulty. "Help new clones with motor skills" is a hard agility task that pays 129 credits.
Career Tasks are offered in a more dynamic way now.
Snippet of the chat with an example of the /me command. The text is written in italic and posted like a status statement. In our case it's about a Citizen names IwantSynd: "IwantSynd thinks it is a nice feature."
Faster chat and the new /me command.
The Pop-Up's topic states "All aboard! Emergency Shuttle to Tau Station.", the description below explains "You have boarded an emergency shuttle to Tau Station. You were charged 1.740,00 credits". The confirmation button states "Buckle up" and a massive brown ship with a red warning sign is passing a planet.
Pop-Up when you need to take an emergency shuttle.
The Pop-Up's headline: "You're wasted! Taken to Sick Bay.", the description explains "You can't leave Sick Bay without a doctor's persmission", the confirmation button states "Await recovery". The artwork shows the very clean Sick Bay, 2 modern treatment tables with monitors attached.
Pop-Up about being taken to the Sick Bay.
A security person at arms stands on the floor between 2 lines of passenger seats; there's indirect yellow light on the floor. The title states "All aboard! Shuttle to Deadalus." with a confirmation button "Buckle up" below.
Pop-Up when taking a Shuttle.
Snippet of the "sell to vendors" screen. Sell Snub Laser has an initial price of 27.70 credits, but you gain a 6% bonus due to good social skills = +1,60 credits. On the down side you have a 15% malus here due to low reputation, lowering your price by 4 credit. At the bottom is the result, your final price with 24.30 credits and the sell button next to it.
Selling items to vendors now shows all modifiers to explain how your final price gets calculated.
Feedback message text: "As you reracked your weights, another gym member eyed your muscles with wide-eyes. Strenght +0.072 (= 0.048 +50% trainer bonus).
Training results at the gym, showing the bonus you gain by trainers.
A male person, wearing a heavy metallic suit with the emblem of the Consortium. He is around mid-40, has nearly a bald head, but massive eye brows and an impressive brown handlebar mustache.
One of the new male NPC pictures.
A thin female, around 30 years old with red curly hair and a lot of frackles in her face. She has green eyes and full red lips, wearing a white doctor's coat and a beige shirt.
One of the new female NPC pictures.

Changelogs

You can find a short, precise summary of every single update in the corresponding changelog. Here are all of the single update details for Q2/2019:

About status reports

The status reports contain major aspects of the recent work done on Tau Station. We also provide changelogs for every game update where you can find a more comprehensive list of details, including all smaller changes. Links to all updates/changelogs that were implemented during the quarter of this status report are listed above.