Sector 452 News

Hello everyone,
I am back once again to show what has happened in the last 2 weeks. So within these two weeks I mainly focused on bug/stabilization fixes. This is because before I push the update, I wanna ensure that everything runs smoothly. Currently the build should be out sometime late Sunday night! This update will have singleplayer/multiplayer improvements and will be the stepping stone for modding. Once the documentation is ready I will post how to mod the game. That being said, there will most likely be bugs in Sunday's update, but I will make hotfixes as quick as I can. As it stands right now, the singleplayer saving is still not locked down, so that means there maybe a chance that saves in this update will not work in future updates. I will try to ensure that doesn't happen, but there are still some things I have to add to the saves. If I can get them all in before sunday, then disregard this little note. I have also been trying to get controller support working in the menus with some mixed results. It's very spotty, still have to stabilize that before sunday.
Now sadly I don't really have any screenshots for this dev log because of it being mostly just code changes. I can provide a screenshot of the new intro map as that did get some work, but the lighting is still kinda broken to say the least. I plan on finishing/polishing the actual gameplay portion of it as well as fix the lighting tomorrow. The textures shown in the screenshot are also subject to change. The intro is longer and will actually show you how to play the game.

This update will be called Beta 1.10 (it was originally gonna be a pre-release, however I feel that it needs more time before the game can even get into pre-release). I have no plans of rushing getting the game into full release, I am taking my time with it to ensure the game is actually good once it does come out. I hope you all understand and I hope you are all ready for the wall of text for the changelog in the next update. Next week begins the holiday season, as such I will try to make some event stuff probably on the 23rd, if I get enough time to squeeze that into the next update after Sunday's update.
Take care, stay safe, and have a wonderful weekend!
~Joseph

Hello everyone,
I just wanted to post a little update regarding the dev logs. So as I was making todays dev log, I noticed that once a week might be pushing it too much as I can't get as much done within a week as I can in about 2 weeks/month. So I just wanted to post a little update that the new plan for dev logs will be every 2 weeks (that is if any holidays or anything else does not fall under that time). The being said, this will not affect next week's dev log. I am merely combining this week's dev log with next weeks due to not much progress being made this week. I hope you all understand and any future changes to the dev logs will be notified in advance. I still may try doing something on the weeks where there are no dev logs just to keep the community active. The next update, is currently on the roadmap for sometime next week or the week after. That's not to say that it is confirmed within that timeframe, just that if all goes well, that will be the preferred release for the update. All changes shown thus far in previous dev logs will be in said update. I hope to see you all next friday on December 18th, please stay safe and have a wonderful weekend!
~Joseph

Hello everyone,
I am back to show this weeks round of changes. Technically it has only been 4 days of work so as such, this time its a mini dev log. Anywho, let's get into the changes:
[h2]Physics and Movement are no longer tied to frame rate[/h2]
Yep, you heard that right. I finally got around to fixing that so now no matter how high or low your frame rate is, the movement should still run with no issues. I know this is pretty big and is a must for all games, so I am glad that I managed to fix it!
[h2]Weapon Improvements[/h2]
So some improvements I have done is that now the weapon rotates based on the direction your player moves in. Along with that, I added in the ability to zoom certain weapons. Here is a gif showing both features in action:

I should also mention that the weapon zoom can be controlled on a per weapon basis and will allow modders to change the amount of zoom as well as show an overlay when zoomed in.
[h2]Main Menu Improvements[/h2]
Another thing that has been worked on is the main menu. As stated in the last dev log, I wanted to make a stable system for menus and I think this system is pretty stable. Here is a gif showing the new main menu as well as the new cursor I created:

Now it may look like the same main menu with just a highlight feature over the buttons, but it's the backend that was focused on with this change. This may be useful in the future for modders who wanna make custom menus as this system works with controllers out of the box. There is still some tinkering needed before it is finished however. The controller still has issues with focusing when a mouse clicks around but that is one of the few bugs left with this new system!
[h2]Closing thoughts[/h2]
So that is all that has been worked on this week. For the rest of the week as well as next week I will tinker with bug fixes, finish weapon projectiles, and try to finish the intro redesign. An ETA on the next game update is sometime this month, I will keep you all informed as more tasks get completed on the game. The next dev log will be on December 11th. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Take care and stay safe!
~Joseph

Hey there everyone,
Joseph here to provide a lot of info as well as a lot of things that have happened this year and beyond.
So lets start with the elephant in the room. Where is the game, when is it coming out, and what happened? The game was slated for early 2020, but with "current world events" and personal events, that could not be done. That is to say that I cannot put the full blame on those things. It boiled down to me and my development process. I was not upfront, nor was I keeping the community as a whole updated in the game's development. I take full responsibility for the lack of communication and no matter what I say, I cannot make up for that. It sounds like a broken record, and it kind of is because I did this before. Needless to say though, I have been working on the project constantly and the biggest downside was that I kept remaking things. The game has gone through numerous iterations through it's initial conception in november of 2015. So I will "try" to post dev logs to keep everyone in the know. The hardest part of that is keeping everyone in the loop if I work on singleplayer stuff. I wanna try and surprise everyone with that, but at the same time if I don't inform everyone, it will be assumed that development has halted. That is where the game currently is and what happened, now the biggest question of them all. When is Sector 452 coming out? At the current moment, I really don't know. I wanna get this game done in a timely manner while also delivering a game with good gameplay and polish. As it stands, the game plays a lot better than the current version that is out. That being said, I think it is time to present the dev log as well as the next steps for the game.
[h2]Dev Log[/h2]
[h3]Mod Support[/h3]
So in the last few months I have added in FULL mod support. Everything from custom maps, to models, to weapons all work as intended in the game. The only thing needed to mark it as complete is workshop support. That is currently in development and all that is needed for that is the ability to download mods from the workshop while loading a custom map and the ability to read workshop mods.
[h3]Singleplayer[/h3]
Oh boy, this section. There was massive changes to singelplayer over the last 11 months. The game's intro is in the process of being overhauled. I felt that the game's intro was too small, didn't convey the story as much as it could have, and didn't really teach the player how to play the game. Here is some early development screenshots from the new intro. I have redesigned the space station to match what it should actually look like.

I have also begun work on overhauling the NPC models. Looking back at the original models, I felt that they didn't look as good as they should've been. Here is a comparison of the two (left is the new one, right is the original npc model):

There has also been changes to the space map as a whole. Things such as asteroids, improved lighting, and space stations have been added to the overall map.

A majority of the singeplayer maps have also been finished with improved lighting and detail.

There was also changes to the dialogue system, ability system, added terminals to read lore/backstories in the game, and some other minor things.
[h3]Multiplayer[/h3]
So, with this section, all of the multiplayer maps are now labelled as complete. All the lighting has been improved across all maps, and I have also fixed all of the spawn points. There was some issues with spawn points in teams, but I managed to "hopefully" resolve it.
Here are some highlight pictures of the new multiplayer maps:

I have also went back and recoded all of the multiplayer backend. There is now improved weapon systems, netcode, and gameplay. I wanted to ensure that there were near to no replication bugs in the code and I feel that the game is in a state where that is the case. At the current moment, the things left to complete in multiplayer is the Round End Screen, overhaul the Lobby UI, overhaul the Map Voting UI, and read the steam inventory system. Once those things are finished, multiplayer will be 100% complete.
[h3]Other[/h3]
This section covers anything not related to the big changes. I have been fixing up controller support for the menus. I would say that the new system for controllers is pretty stable at the current moment in time. I have also been working on a new main menu system to incorporate this change. You won't notice much of a change with the main menu but these changes are welcomed. I have also improved player animation and npc animations. The options menu also got an overhaul and it should work as intended now.

[h3]The future[/h3]
Though I do not know what is in store for the future, A release date for the game will not be said until I feel 100% confortable with that release window. I can say that I want people to be able to play this build of the game soon. I feel that once the intro has been overhauled and the main menu is finished being overhauled as well, I plan on dropping a new build in the public branch. I should've done this a whole lot earlier, and there was not excuse for me not to. I hope to earn back everyone's trust with what I do with the game, but I do not expect to because I will understand if you all do not like the lack of communication. Also, this week I will be taking a break from the game for my own health. I have been overworking myself too much but I will be working back on the game on december 1st. The next dev log should hopefully be on december 4th. If you have any questions, comments, concerns, suggestions, etc. Please do not hesitate to message in the comments section of this post. I will reply as quick as I can and I hope to see you all in the next dev log. Please take care and stay safe everyone!
~Joseph

Hello everyone, I just wanted to quickly make a post on when the release date for release 1.0 is. So firstly I want apologize for the 4 month radio silence, that was a mistake on my part as I kind of didn't know that 4 months had already flown by. Secondly the game's release is expected to be in January! One thing to note, if you would like to see progress on Release 1.0, be sure to check the trello as that is the best place to keep up to date with the game's progress.
Now I do have some pictures that I would like to show of the progress within the game:

Anyways, I got some more programming as well as polishing to do, I hope you all have a happy new year and see you all in 2020!