Release 186: Surface Resources and Places!

This update is accessible via the “Live” release of Boundless on Steam.

Please report all issues discovered with the update to this support thread.

Please restart Steam to make sure you get the latest version of Boundless. If the update happens whilst Steam is open it’s unlikely you’ll get the latest version.

Overview:

(Thanks @Jiivita!)

Important:

Please be aware that Boundless has switched to a new local cache technology with this release. World loading may feel a little slower whilst your cache is repopulated.

Release Notes:

  • Art + Animation + Assets:
    • Added eating and drinking brew animations for both 1st and 3rd person.
    • Added bigger weapon break VFX so it’s more obvious.
    • Balanced the eclipse lighting to be brighter than night time.
    • Added some more effects for Spitter attacks.
    • Added an occasional small spark particle effect to machines that are close to worn out.
    • Added an occasional big spark particle effect to machines that have completely worn out.
  • Crafting + Resources + Equipment:
    • Surface-resource generation added, with migrations for existing worlds. The surface resources are a set of existing (and many new) blocks that generate on top of the ground that will be used in various crafting recipes in the near future. Like with the embedded ore-generation, these resources are not perfectly fixed in the world, and will to an extent, redistribute when the chunks regenerate, and in such a way that we can continue to tweak the distributions in future too. Any existing versions of the blocks found in the world (storage is not modified) will be stripped in the migration before reseeding from scratch in a full-regeneration of the worlds outside of beacons.
    • Surface resources are currently set up to drop placeholder items. These are not the final items they will drop.
    • Balance pass on the new surface resources.
    • Fix for light cube sometimes already being on when switched too.
    • Fix for light cube blinking out briefly when shaken.
  • Creatures + Combat + Characters:
    • Fixed ribbons missing on some creature projectiles.
    • Stop Spitters from predictively turning more than 90 degrees to shoot at where their target will be.
    • Fix for creatures spawning inside beacons in some very rare cases.
    • Fix for creatures sometimes spawning right next to players.
    • Some creatures (Hoppers, Spitters and Cuttletrunks) can now spawn in caves.
    • Drops from creatures and completed meteorites can now only be collected by characters nearby at the time it was killed. This includes any characters with portals or warps nearby (so you can still get drops if you die).
    • Meteorites:
      • Players cannot place beacons in a meteorite landing area during the event (stops players griefing by beaconing the meteorite so nobody can claim the reward).
      • Fix for long pause in meteorite event creature spawning if they are killed faster than they spawn.
      • Meteorite event portals are now always within 25m of the meteorite.
      • Fix for no sound when hitting a meteorite core.
      • Added a 30% chance that a meteorite will be 1 level higher than the group of players would normally get.
      • Added triggered meteorites. These meteorites can be spawned by going to regions that have not been visited by any players recently.
      • Lowered ambient meteorite frequency since players can now force meteorites to spawn.
      • Meteorites have been disabled on home worlds.
    • Increased the time since last action to a creature to fix the issue where player’s were not receiving XP when they were involved in combat.
    • Slightly increased the blast radius of creature bombs.
    • Adjustments made to aggro generation. The amount of time a creature targets the instigator has been vastly reduced.
    • Creatures now take longer to reselect their targets due to the previous change.
    • Fixed a bug where the creature would be locked to a target for too long.
  • Sanctum + Tutorial + Objectives + Progression:
    • Adding an objective to explain how Master Beacon Controls should be used.
  • GUI + HUD:
    • Home Locations have been removed, and replaced with Home Beacons. Everyone will start out with a “temporary-home” the way they already did, but will be classed as a beacon and replaced with the first beacon you set as your home (placing a campfire or fuelling a new beacon will set that as the home automatically if you have none still). For migrations, users will have their current “home location” converted into “temporary-home” beacon.
    • You can now warp to beacons/campfires even after they have been expired or deleted, or even if you no longer have permissions (will still warp outside the beacon in this case if not public).
    • Fixed bug where interacting with beacons/worlds/settlements whilst filtering the lists would cause entirely different entries to be deleted etc in some cases…
    • Next/Previous UI tab key bindings exposed (with TAB bound to next by default)
    • Floating damage text displayed when hitting a block
    • Floating repair value displayed when repairing a machine
    • Added option in friends menu to track players in the compass.
    • Adding modifications to the Places screens:
      • Changed the beacon/worlds/settlements dropdown information.
      • Added permissions visualisation for the beacons shared with other users.
      • Added option to set beacons/settlements as destinations for the compass.
      • Added option to set custom destinations (specifying coordinates directly) for the compass in the locations tab.
      • Added option to craft location markers for beacons/settlements positions.
      • Changed beacon information menu to emphasise expired and expiring beacons.
      • Added option to register and delete worlds in the worlds menu.
    • Journal:
      • Adding new crafter objectives to highlight to the player they can build a compactor, refinery and an extractor.
      • Adding new explorer feats for sprinting and adding a 4th achievement for creeping and swimming feats.
      • The distanced travelled while on foot feats have been changed to all distance travelled instead.
      • Rewards for certain Trader feats have been reduced or removed to prevent exploits.
  • Sign-in:
    • The game loader (a standalone exe on PC, menus integrated into the main game on Mac) has been replaced by new game GUI menus. This consists of a login menu to use for new players who already have a Boundless account, or a “create account” menu for new Boundless users. If you’ve played the game before you won’t see these menus as your SteamID was linked to your Boundless account the first time you played. There is improved error reporting and handling associated with these new menus.
    • There’s a new splash screen shown after assets are loaded.
  • SFX + Music:
    • Fix for server audio state system never setting inCave or underground fields.
    • New cuttletrunk attack sounds.
    • Update some Spitter attack sounds.
  • Engine:
    • The planets closer than the sun will correctly block out the suns effects now, including darkening the world into an eclipse if the sun becomes largely or completely occluded by a planet.
    • Removed options for disabling godrays and lensflare, these effects massively change the way the sun appears and with new lighting configs to come, the sun and sky can just look broken without them.
    • Added options for controlling the resolution scaling of reflections/portals and whether reflections/portals have as full as possible sets of effects (per-pixel lighting, weather rendered etc).
    • Added options to control number of portal connections that the client will make, and how many portals the client will try to render at the same time, as well as a perhaps harder to understand config value relating to terrain detail through portals which has a strong impact on RAM usage (if the scale value is 200% of the main world, and there are 2 connected portals, then both portals will render with the same terrain detail as the main world, but if there were 4 connected portals, then the terrain detail would be dropped in the portals such that across all 4 portal views, there is at most 200% the amount of chunks downloaded/meshed that there are for the main world, with each of the 4 portals having 70% terrain detail).
    • Added more resolution scale options, now being decrements of 10% from 100% to 30% of the screen size.
    • Fixed some misprediction behaviour when using grapples.
    • Re-enabled the player-player grappling for friends. Player-player grappling will still causes mispredictions however.
    • Fixed some physics issues on certain diagonally bevelled block shapes that would cause the player to get stuck.
    • Faster terrain generation on processor with more than four cores.
    • Significantly reduce the cost of reflections in complex scenes.
    • Client chunk-cache will use heuristics to help ensure when you configure the cache to use 8GiB, that it will not use (at least much more, generally less) than 8GiB of disk space. Previously it may have actually used upwards of 11GiB on disk.
    • Reduce VRAM usage of visual effects, which should with performance of older graphics cards.
    • A new DUI (devs only) command allows disassociation of your SteamID and Boundless account.
    • It’s possible now to connect a development client build to a deployed game (staging/testing/live) for debugging.
  • Server:
    • Fixed an issue where servers could sometimes start to create server wide lag spikes every minute or so.
  • Bug fixes:
    • Fix crash approaching a meteorite.
    • Fix crash displaying information near meteorites.
    • Fix crash opening the Journal.
    • Fix day/night cycle out of sync.
    • Fix for client crash when approaching a falling meteorite just after it impacts.
    • Fix rare case users were not saved correctly.
    • Fixed an issue where in very rare cases it was possible for a user to lose progress in their save.

Resolved Known Issues:

The following items were known issues in previous releases and have now been resolved.

  • Current world filter on Locations Tab includes other world locations.
  • Drop shadow appears to be broken in places.
  • Explorer Feats ‘No Going Back’, ‘Collaborative Travel’ and ‘No Warp Too Far’ are not working.
  • Sun effects are visible through planets.
  • The message ‘You have been defeated’ can sometimes remain on screen after returning to a world from the sanctum.
  • When expanding a smart stack offered by another player during trading, it will be empty.

Known Issues:

The following items are known issues in this release.

  • (new) Capital icon on compass can sometimes be hidden behind portal icons.
  • (new) Friends list is not sorted into alphabetical order.
  • (new) Meteorites pass through floating islands.
  • (new) Pressing Escape key during chat will close and send message instead of closing and cancelling message.
  • (new) Request Baskets may indicate that there is not enough coin when the total value of sale is just less then the Request Basket Budget due to tax.
  • (new) Some old beacon information already stored before the places screen update can look inconsistent. But pressing the beacon buttton to get extra beacon information will correct it.
  • (new) Some weather effects have particles that are way too large and will leak into closed buildings/caves.
  • Breaking any machine during crafting will destroy the ingredients in use.
  • Camera is sometimes stuck after exiting GUI menus.
  • Cannot mine blocks when standing in the same position as a torch.
  • Creeping on top of chiselled blocks does not prevent characters from falling off.
  • Distance climbed feats (Mountain Climber I, Mountain Climber II, Ain’t No Mountain High Enough) are not working.
  • Entity rendering will not always work correctly when there are multiple warps very close together, or where a warp opens up to a location very near where the entrance is.
  • Grapple tools not working correctly when winding grapple up or down after grappling block drops.
  • GUI rendered incorrectly on Intel HD graphics (and some AMD / GTX laptop GPUs) on Windows.
  • Hitting blades of grass after hitting soil blocks resets block damage.
  • If the game (loader) fails to start on Windows 7 and 8 you may need to install https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/2999226/update-for-universal-c-runtime-in-windows
  • It’s possible to get stuck between two walls of blocks when using a grapple tool to swing through a portal.
  • Item placed into Request Basket will disappear when placing the same item into storage.
  • Item wanted is completely different to what was placed there before on the Request Basket.
  • Items may unequip themselves after adding a stack of items to a smart stack.
  • Items will occasionally be unable to smart stack with other items that belong in the same smart stack category.
  • Left hand sometimes constantly triggers input when inside the sanctum.
  • Machines sometimes stop crafting after reaching 0s from the Currently Crafting list.
  • Menus may constantly reappear on screen after closing them.
  • Minus/negative XP may sometimes appear on screen.
  • Natural crystal base doesn’t have a mesh and can stick out from storage.
  • Opening or closing doors and trapdoors when standing too close to them will restrict player movement. To get out of the situation, interact with the door or trapdoor again.
  • Other players sometimes appear to not be have any items in their hands.
  • Region names may not be displayed correctly after discovering one.
  • Request Baskets (previously Buying plinths) that had wanted items set before v151 have unset them. Sorry. Going forward they will be fine.
  • Shift-clicking any inventory item on the Furnace GUI when ingredient slots are full will cause that item to disappear. To retrieve that item, break the Furnace.
  • Signs float after destroying blocks they have been placed on.
  • Skill descriptions are not final.
  • Some interactive blocks (crafting table, machine, and beacon control) have become corrupted during the migration. This will result in at best those blocks not being able to be interacted with, at worst the game crashing when interacting with those blocks. To fix the issue the block(s) in question need to be re-placed. In the case of anything other than a beacon control the block can simply be broken, picked up, and then re-placed. In the case of a beacon control this will work, although it would result in all the plots having to be re-placed one at a time and during that process the contents being unprotected. A better workaround for a beacon control is to craft a new beacon control, place that, and then break the old one, which will keep the beacon’s plots placed throughout the process.
  • Sometimes it’s not possible to return to the sanctum after losing all health.
  • Speech bubbles may still be displayed above players after going through portals.
  • ‘Supply & Demand’ Trader feats are not working.
  • Terrain Detail on lava is inconsistent depending on the setting used.
  • Text cursor goes off screen on signs after pressing the Up key when there is more than 4 lines of text.
  • The recipes are not final.
  • Torches on sloped blocks have the wrong hitbox.

Release 186.1:

  • Fix server crash on skill reset
  • Fix server crash interacting with plinths.
  • Fix portal sounds not stopping causing build up of noise.
  • Fixed server crash in AddInventory when selling something to a shop

Release 186.2:

  • Fix crash joining the game for user with no home location.
  • Fix warping to home not working.
  • Fix incorrect warp close effect.
  • Fix rare crash in the crafting screen.
  • Fix rare server crash when users exit.
  • Fix renaming settlements not working.

Release 186.3:

  • Fix crash placing machines at the top if the world (y=255)
  • Fix crash with bomb fuses.

Release 186.4:

  • Improve robustness of chunk cache.
20 Likes

Nice :+1::+1::+1::+1::+1::+1::+1::+1:

2 Likes

Ha, was about to take a break for lunch :smiley: Nice timing hehehe

And I was about to get more sleep…

1 Like

Aw, man. :sob:

Great stuff, as always. Also, wanted to reassure you guys that THIS is how you do Early Access. I’ve been part of quite a few EA games and Boundless is by far the best for me in terms of dev involvement with the community, cadence of releases, size of updates, and more. Keep up the great work!

9 Likes

Yeah, meteor prospecting was my main job.

Yikes. I saw this coming but I’m glad I know now before heading down again. Maybe we can one day get cave only specific mobs? I love added danger :smiley:

2 Likes

@James @vdragon

So Iv just tried out the latest update on my iMac, and am delighted to say its massively improved. had no lag at my own build or while running around Therka Market with all settings up high, excluding “per pixel lighting” <-- that one still throws a spanner in the works

So big smiles from me :smile:

haven’t had a chance to test my other Macs yet, will update once I do.

4 Likes

These will be in caves muahahaha

2 Likes

Wow, I’ve been enjoying this update very much today. Hits damage text also showing crit hits is awesome, very nice.
Also lots of surface resources, and didn’t expect those to spawn in caves also, it adds lots of nice detail that fills in the spot that was missing i.e. game feeling a bit blunt in caves (my favorite place to hang out).

Mobs in caves are spawning, didn’t have much trouble though, shot a few spitters and hoppers on vulpto. Heard a cuttletrunk but didn’t saw it. Widescan helps a lot with this.

Also like the small touch ups to the UI, nicer looking overall!

Great job devs!

It would be awesome if surface resources were craftable from drops, I’d like to use those for decoration very much!

10 Likes

Hopefully them plants will drop seeds or sth so we can bring them home and place around.

1 Like

Saw some mushrooms, glowing mushrooms, rock formations in caves and ice formations on surface Vulpto and Epsilo, sweet sweet stuff :heart_eyes: not sure what they’ll drop but it’s gonna be good :thinking:

2 Likes

Updated OP with details of 186.1

6 Likes

Awesome, thank you!

1 Like

Thanks you very much :smiley: I thought I’m imagining things haha

I really like the new spawns in caves. I’ll like them even more when they drop new stuff.

Sounds strange, but I like having the mobs spawn underground. My first run-in with a Mighty Explosive Spitter was exciting. The only down side is that I can’t leave the volume up loud enough to hear them when I’m mining during long conference calls :slight_smile:

1 Like

Maybe invest in widescan skill, comes handy for silent mining :smiley:

My new pet:

3 Likes

Chat open + inventory-> have to close program to get out of inventory/ menu