S
Sayyadin
Dear Space Pirates,
as quite a lot of players complain about some of the changes, we want to give you a little insight why we did them.
- New camera control system
Why did we even implement that?
When we implemented the feature that the ship is able to stand still and hold its positon, we found out that the old control system is not compatible to that change.
Furthermore we found out, that a lot of new players did not get along with the old control system very well and left the game because of that. The system was not intuative and felt weird to play with.
Player that played MMORPGs before are often used to a control system like the one we implemented.
We also noticed during the testing phase, that the old system was causing a lot of trouble for testers.
Due to these reasons we implemented the new control system which does not have these problems.
We know that it is a big change for players that are used to the old controls but after we played the game for several days we got so used to it that we could not play with the old controls anymore.
As we got the feedback of some testers that they do not want to use the new controls, we tried to rebuild the old system while making it faster and better compared to the old version
but some things are just not possible on the new "old" steering system as that would have cost too much ressources.
Check out the new controls for yourself, maybe with one of your higherlevel ships by flying in some lower level system until you are used to it. This way you won't die trying to figure out the new controls for yourself.
After speaking with some players about the new "old" steering we noticed that what they were missing was the following way to fly:
Fly with w all the way while rotating the camera with the mouse to look around. At a certain point you want to move the ship into the direction the camera is set to. Before the update you did achieve this by releasing w and pressing it again, this does not work with the new "old" steering system. With the new "old" system instead of releasing and pressing w just press a or d.
Beside of that other things are also possible or changed if you find yourself to not be able to do it the way you are used to try it another way.
- The new Loot System
During research of what is most annoying for users, the biggest problem was the farming for blueprints and cryonite.
A lot of players complained about the system that they were grinding for a blueprint for months without finding it.
This is not possible with the new system anymore. The biggest question for all of them was:
How much longer do I have to farm until I find the blueprint and why does it not drop while my friend found it after 2 kills?
The answer to this question is, that the old system was mainly based on luck.
So if you were unlucky the blueprint won't drop for months, whereas other more lucky players got it after a few hours or even minutes.
Why is the amount of needed blueprints parts to build a rare item so high?
The drop rate of rare blueprints was increased drastically and thereforee the amount of parts had to be increased too, to keep the game balanced.
The amount of dropped blueprints(blue) is calculated in the same way as always, the drop-chance was increased while the amount of parts was increased by the same factor.
In average the effort to build the item is the same as before, but the chance that the player does not finish the blueprint after the average time is much lower.
So the amount of time you need to invest to complete a blueprint is now much closer to the average amount of time that was needed before.
- Cryonite Penalty
Many players reported, that it is very hard to farm for players in lower level planets, because higher level players used the same planets for farming and thus occupied their farming spots.
This made the game quite annoying for lower level players. Therefore we increased the cryonite dropchance on planets close to your equipment level and reduced it the more your equipment level differs from average level on that planet.
In short, it now makes more sense to farm on planets close to your equipment level then on lower level planets.
The closer your equipment level to the level of the planet, the better the dropchance of cryonite.
Splitscreen Studios
as quite a lot of players complain about some of the changes, we want to give you a little insight why we did them.
- New camera control system
Why did we even implement that?
When we implemented the feature that the ship is able to stand still and hold its positon, we found out that the old control system is not compatible to that change.
Furthermore we found out, that a lot of new players did not get along with the old control system very well and left the game because of that. The system was not intuative and felt weird to play with.
Player that played MMORPGs before are often used to a control system like the one we implemented.
We also noticed during the testing phase, that the old system was causing a lot of trouble for testers.
Due to these reasons we implemented the new control system which does not have these problems.
We know that it is a big change for players that are used to the old controls but after we played the game for several days we got so used to it that we could not play with the old controls anymore.
As we got the feedback of some testers that they do not want to use the new controls, we tried to rebuild the old system while making it faster and better compared to the old version
but some things are just not possible on the new "old" steering system as that would have cost too much ressources.
Check out the new controls for yourself, maybe with one of your higherlevel ships by flying in some lower level system until you are used to it. This way you won't die trying to figure out the new controls for yourself.
After speaking with some players about the new "old" steering we noticed that what they were missing was the following way to fly:
Fly with w all the way while rotating the camera with the mouse to look around. At a certain point you want to move the ship into the direction the camera is set to. Before the update you did achieve this by releasing w and pressing it again, this does not work with the new "old" steering system. With the new "old" system instead of releasing and pressing w just press a or d.
Beside of that other things are also possible or changed if you find yourself to not be able to do it the way you are used to try it another way.
- The new Loot System
During research of what is most annoying for users, the biggest problem was the farming for blueprints and cryonite.
A lot of players complained about the system that they were grinding for a blueprint for months without finding it.
This is not possible with the new system anymore. The biggest question for all of them was:
How much longer do I have to farm until I find the blueprint and why does it not drop while my friend found it after 2 kills?
The answer to this question is, that the old system was mainly based on luck.
So if you were unlucky the blueprint won't drop for months, whereas other more lucky players got it after a few hours or even minutes.
Why is the amount of needed blueprints parts to build a rare item so high?
The drop rate of rare blueprints was increased drastically and thereforee the amount of parts had to be increased too, to keep the game balanced.
The amount of dropped blueprints(blue) is calculated in the same way as always, the drop-chance was increased while the amount of parts was increased by the same factor.
In average the effort to build the item is the same as before, but the chance that the player does not finish the blueprint after the average time is much lower.
So the amount of time you need to invest to complete a blueprint is now much closer to the average amount of time that was needed before.
- Cryonite Penalty
Many players reported, that it is very hard to farm for players in lower level planets, because higher level players used the same planets for farming and thus occupied their farming spots.
This made the game quite annoying for lower level players. Therefore we increased the cryonite dropchance on planets close to your equipment level and reduced it the more your equipment level differs from average level on that planet.
In short, it now makes more sense to farm on planets close to your equipment level then on lower level planets.
The closer your equipment level to the level of the planet, the better the dropchance of cryonite.
Splitscreen Studios