Beta #2

Discussion of the new series of beta test releases of this game.
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Steve
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Beta #2

Post by Steve »

Beta #2 was released for public review on October 16, 2009. (86 megabytes)

Download: http://www.starflt.com/tlcbeta2.zip

Torrent: http://www.mininova.org/tor/3092118

Quite a few new features have been added including even more training missions, encounters and alien communication, ship upgrades and rewards, artifacts and ruins on planet surfaces and much more. The plot is functional up to the end of the initial stage. This includes 25 training missions and 30 class specific missions.

Please report any bugs to the issue tracker. Before reporting a bug please read the current list of known bugs and make sure that your issue has not been reported already. The developers would greatly appreciate it if you would test each issue as thoroughly as you can and provide as much detail as you can.

Issue Tracker
http://code.google.com/p/starflighttlc/issues/list

Google Groups Home
http://groups.google.com/group/starflighttlc

The current aim of the developers is to finish the game as smoothly and as quickly as possible without adding significant new complexity or delay. There are a number of minor new features planned before the final release, but please keep feature requests out of the issue tracker and simply post a message to the mailing list if you have ideas for the game as opposed to bug reports.

When Beta 2 was first released on 10/16 it contained a test mission "Test Planet Land" with a description of "blah blah blah blah blah"

Anyone who has downloaded Beta 2 before 10/17 at 8pm PST (GMT-8) will either have to download the entire 86 MB zip file over again, or they can download and extract the following file into their <Lost Colony>\data directory: http://www.starflt.com/tlc2quests.zip

As of now Beta 2 contains the corrected file. If you have not downloaded the beta yet, you will not need this patch.

Hyperspace encounter hotkeys

F1 - PIRATE
F2 - ELOWAN
F3 - SPEMIN
F4 - THRYNN
F5 - BARZHON
F6 - NYSSIAN
F7 - TAFEL
F8 - MINEX
F9 - COALITION
hansolo0

questions/comments about game?

Post by hansolo0 »

Hi, I'm not sure this is a bug or not, I searched thru the issue tracker and didn't see it there, or if this is deliberate to stretch the game out longer...but... I can't collect hardly any items on planets without getting a 'you can't collect any new item types!' error. During the mission to collect antimony in freelance it allowed that to be collected but only that, then after the mission you couldn't collect it any more. Same thing for a life form I had to collect. At one point it allowed me to collect endurium I found on one planet, then it just randomly quit allowing it. At one point I almost couldn't finish a mission to record an artifact saying the same error, then I restarted the game and it was fine, almost seemed like I confused it somehow by trying to pick up minerals first even though I wasn't allowed to. The game will let me collect harmless stationary lifeforms in general but nothing else it seems unless mission specific.

I'm not sure I like all the mundane training missions, some are a little annoying doing menial tasks. Like 'go to planet A and scan and come back' , then you do that and go back to starport then the next mission is , 'now go back to planet A and land!' Or 'go to the bank and come back', etc, you get the idea. Most of the fans of this game already know how to launch and land on a planet etc, or it is very easy to figure out without having to do 5 or 6 missions that are very simple and just waste time if you already no how to do it. I was pleased to see that if you happened to for example complete those 2 tasks at the same time deliberate or not that the mission computer knew they both were completed. Is freelance supposed to be more of 'training' missions than the other careers?

Music or doesn't seem to work anymore, is that deliberate? I noticed in the previous betas it seemed to cause crashes. How come some of the old music isn't included from the last beta? I had to grab the 'planetsurface' track from the last beta and play it and the new tracks on random repeat on winamp while the game runs so I have music. I like most of the new music btw , especially Guardian Mind Mix. Kudos to whoever is making them. Glad to see some progress in the game again after the long lull.
hansolo0

questions/comments about game?

Post by hansolo0 »

I should have added to the last post to make the training missions optional if you didn't intend for the freelance career to have training missions. I don't know if the other careers have them, haven't tried them yet (assuming they're setup).
hansolo0

questions/comments about game?

Post by hansolo0 »

Sorry, that should have read "make the training missions optional , unless freelance at least to start with is designed to be an optional career path that is the only one that has them".
MrCatburt
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Joined: Mon Oct 26, 2009 8:53 pm

About the game

Post by MrCatburt »

When in the science vessel missions, the Tafel give you the level 7 engine upgrade it doesn't appear to be anything more than a level 1 or 2 engine. Also at starport it doesn't display correctly. There is no way to tell for the search for O class stars mission which ones they are. Otherwise it's a great game and i look forward to it being finished
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Steve
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questions/comments about game

Post by Steve »

First thanks for the comments. Since there are only three of us, the less time we have to spend testing and more time working on fixing bugs and making improvements the faster this thing will be done.
hansolo0 wrote:Hi, I'm not sure this is a bug or not, I searched thru the issue tracker and didn't see it there, or if this is deliberate to stretch the game out longer...but... I can't collect hardly any items on planets without getting a 'you can't collect any new item types!' error.
This is a major structural problem with the cargo storage handling code and will take significant efforts to rewrite. Basically purchasing a full loadout of cargo pods will make this problem far less obvious once you get the money together. Jonathan did add a issue for this which might help explain the limitations:

http://code.google.com/p/starflighttlc/ ... ail?id=115
"The cargo is currently based on number of stacks, which is flawed but works for the time being. The ship has 5 default slots, and each new cargo pod adds 1 more slot, which can hold any number of a single item type (like 40 Endurium for instance). This is flawed because the ship can't hold any cargo without at least 1 cargo pod, in the game logic. I want to switch from slots to actual cargo space, and allow the player to add an unlimited number of cargo item types to the cargo as long as there's enough space."
hansolo0 wrote:
Music or doesn't seem to work anymore, is that deliberate?
Already fixed in Beta #3 which is due out hopefully in a few days.
hansolo0 wrote:I should have added to the last post to make the training missions optional if you didn't intend for the freelance career to have training missions. I don't know if the other careers have them, haven't tried them yet (assuming they're setup).
Actually already implemented but we have not publicized this yet. Once you complete the 25 training missions once, you can go and pick up the hypercube directly in future games and instantly jump to the end of the training missions at any time.
MrCatburt wrote:When in the science vessel missions, the Tafel give you the level 7 engine upgrade it doesn't appear to be anything more than a level 1 or 2 engine. Also at starport it doesn't display correctly. There is no way to tell for the search for O class stars mission which ones they are. Otherwise it's a great game and i look forward to it being finished
Engine upgrades will be capped because the benefits of higher number engine classes do not actually increase after a certain point. On our todo list:

http://code.google.com/p/starflighttlc/ ... ail?id=142

"3. Use conditional statements to check the current level of ship equipment
the player has and if the player already has the maximum level for their
profession, offer them an alternative reward."

As for the class O stars, thanks for bringing this to our attention. I've added a new issue:

http://code.google.com/p/starflighttlc/ ... ail?id=146

The galaxy editor, used for the development of the quests, shows the different shaded colors correctly so I did not notice this before.
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Steve
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Further Observations

Post by Steve »

hansolo0 wrote:
I was pleased to see that if you happened to for example complete those 2 tasks at the same time deliberate or not that the mission computer knew they both were completed. Is freelance supposed to be more of 'training' missions than the other careers?
Actually most of the plot was put together in reverse order. The dialogue and the main plot was finished so long ago I'm having to reread it now. The quests were done near the beginning of this year and the concept behind the freelance missions was intended to be somewhat mercenary: find a viable object in any way possible and then sell it to the highest bidder.

With the training missions designed only a month ago with the new ruins and messages, they have unavoidably taken on the same flavor of "find and retrieve the artifact."

Beta #3 should be released by tomorrow. Maybe for the next and probably last beta I'll try to spend some time making the freelance missions offer more branches and alternative solutions.
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