Today, we're proud to share our second and biggest update yet for Dawn Apart. Over the past five months, we've worked incredibly hard to add new features and systems that bring the game closer to our original vision: a challenging yet rewarding blend of colony and automation sim, built around deep, interconnected systems and set in a dynamic, increasingly hostile world. Buckle up, Prospectors, because we stand today on the edge of a new violent frontier.
Let's dive right into the four cornerstones of this massive update: Combat, Loyalty, Weather, and Structural Integrity.
Starting with the second night, the It'ak - the native species of Sirius B 3 - will begin raiding your compound daily, attempting to steal your hard-earned Lucrum. To survive these escalating attacks, you'll need to fortify your colony with sandbags, palisades, and barbed-wire fences, and equip your colonists with the best weapons available through space trade.
When the It'ak arrive, you'll face a difficult choice: stand your ground and engage in firefights with the risk of casualties, or sound the alarm and send everyone to a designated safe zone, sacrificing resources in the process.
Prefer to build in peace? That's fine too. Simply disable combat in the game settings and expand your colony without hostile interference.
As outlined in our previous Steam post, keeping your colonists loyal now requires providing proper working and living conditions. If loyalty drops too low, workers may abandon your mining operation altogether. You'll need to monitor a variety of factors that affect wellbeing, including temperature, room quality, lighting, and pollution.
Depending on the season (more on that below), rooms must be kept at comfortable temperatures using AC units, bonfires, or stoves. They should also be well lit through artificial lighting or windows and protected from pollution by venting CO2 from furnaces through air vents and chimneys.
These systems aren't purely punitive and work both ways. Clean, bright, and comfortable rooms provide stat boosts that improve colonist productivity. Beyond that, dozens of additional perks and penalties interact with each other. A private bedroom might boost morale, while witnessing a coworker's tragic death can have the opposite effect. Discovering, balancing, and exploiting these systems is now a core part of running a successful colony.
We've finally added four distinct seasons to Sirius B 3, each lasting three in-game days.
Every playthrough begins during the Hotdry season, where you'll need to cool living quarters to protect your colonists from the intense heat outside. This is followed by Colddry weather, requiring you to replace AC units with bonfires or ovens to keep everyone warm.
The real challenge arrives during the Coldwet and Hotwet seasons. Rain can now damage exposed machinery and flood furnaces, disrupting your production chain. The solution? Move critical infrastructure indoors. To support this, we've added a variety of new room utilities, including conveyor-belt inlets, vents, and chimneys, allowing you to safely operate production lines inside enclosed structures during the rainy months.
The days of floating walls, suspended machinery, and gravity-defying structures are over. Buildings now require proper structural integrity or they will collapse. Construction follows a simple rule of thumb: start with floors, add walls, and finish with a roof. Walls can no longer be placed without floor support, and roofs require walls beneath them.
This creates a more realistic and deliberate building process while also introducing new vulnerabilities. During combat, destroying a single critical support wall may be enough to bring an entire structure crashing down.
We can't wait for all of you to make planetfall once again and experience this radically evolved version of Dawn Apart. The stakes have never been higher.
The Violent Frontier awaits!
The IT&W Team
Rooms:
Rooms can now be built by enclosing a space with walls, a floor, and a roof
Rooms have a temperature, illumination values, and air quality which must be controlled
Rooms stats have a direct impact on agents that are working in them. EX: In dark rooms they are slower at crafting, but sleep better. They will complain if the room is too hot or cold which affects their loyalty.
Added Room Type designations based on what is placed within a room
Added wall and roof plugs that are placed on top of existing walls and roofs
Added vents which allow for transfer of temperature, air quality, and a little bit of illumination, between two adjacent rooms
Added Air Conditioner which cools one room and heats up
Added Campfire which heats an area, but can catch things on fire
Added Stove which heats an area, but emits CO2
Added Water Cooler which cools a room and requires water
Added the ability to gather water from rivers for agents
Added logic to heat, illuminate, and pollute rooms when converters are working in an enclosed room
Pollution of combustion now based on sqrt(MJ) of fuel used
Non combustion machines have a flat pollution amount (equivalent to 1 MJ)
Added logic for burning voxels to heat a room
Added small craft speed buff to workbenches that are placed inside a room
Added bonus list controller which gathers and displays entity bonuses (Only workstations at the moment are implemented)
Added Conveyor Inlet half-wall which allows for conveyors to move items into an enclosed room
Added logic for open doors to transfer temperature, air quality, and illumination
Agents prefer to hang out in rooms while idle
Agents will take damage in extremely hot rooms, or rooms with extreme levels of CO2
Added help menu entries for loyalty, rooms, room lighting, room air quality, and room temperature
Added quest step for building a room to the tutorial
Loyalty:
Added Loyalty to agents which trends over time based on their current modifiers
There are lots of things that impact agent loyalty, bad working conditions have negative effects, while living in warm rooms, and doing things they are passionate about will have positive effects
Added various loyalty modifiers. Here are some examples:
ːsteamthumbsdownː Eating standing / ːsteamthumbsupː Eating Sitting
Agents will look for chair to sit while eating
Fallback to eating standing if no chair available
Agents like eating in a chair near a table
Tables and chairs are now re-enabled in prod builds
ːsteamthumbsupː Having their needs met
ːsteamthumbsdownː Poor Hygiene
ːsteamthumbsdownː Hungry
ːsteamthumbsupː Working on their passion
ːsteamthumbsupː Sleeping in a private room
ːsteamthumbsupː Sleeping in the dark
ːsteamthumbsdownː Living in a freezing room
ːsteamthumbsupː Living in a comfortable room
ːsteamthumbsdownː Passing out on the ground
ːsteamthumbsdownː Being Hurt
ːsteamthumbsdownːːsteamthumbsdownːːsteamthumbsdownː Another agent is killed
Added loyalty tooltip which shows trend and loyalty modifiers
Added loyalty modifier to pioneer modal
Agents which reach 0 loyalty have a chance to resigning after some time
Disloyal agents also can't be interacted with or given orders
Added various speech bubbles which show display when agents get new loyalty modifiers applied
Structural Integrity:
Added new logic for wall and floor placement (Walls can only be built on floors, floors can only be built in the air if they are supported by a wall or adjacent floor)
Certain walls, like the palisades and sandbags, can be placed off a wall, but still require to be supported by either the ground or the floor
Added system which calculates structural support amounts based on distance from a support anchor
Added logic to collapse walls/floors if they are not properly support
Added sensor system which checks for structural support before building a blueprint. All non-mounted blueprints now require to be on the ground or supported in some way
Fixed a number of half walls having incorrect padding in the vox files
Combat:
Enemies are now enabled by default
Spawn first wave on night of day 2, following waves every night
Added event message when enemy waves are spawned
Added toast message when enemy waves retreat
Improved shooting accuracy
Added minimum distance for shooting reposition (prevent units from getting too close to target)
Enlisted agent show "Enlisted" in PioneerFace when Idle or None goal
Added Gun icon under PioneerFace if drafted
Added Gun icon under name of drafted agent in world space gui
It`ak move slower when carrying stolen items
Added permanent red outline to enemies
Added new It`ak models depending on their weapon type
Added new Weapons Display Category and added all weapons to it
Added FearForLifeFleeThreshold for agents which are taking damage
Slightly increased flee distance
Adjusted movement and productivity modifiers from health
Min move speed 40% -> 60%
Reduction is on a curve instead of being linear based on current health percent
Reduced the size of enemy health bars
Updated logic of displaying non-unit health bars to only show if below the repair threshold
Fixed attack start range when chasing to properly consider target speed
Fixed FSM targeting own head
Fixed enlisted agents fleeing when they take damage
Fixed stationary drafted agents not shooting at target if not close enough
Fixed nearby danger fleeing direction not being normalized
Fixed units causing suppression on themselves or their faction
Fixed auto deny being applied during alarm
Fixed fear not degrading if agent stats degredation was disabled
Weather:
Added ambient temperature to the world
Added ambient lighting values to the world
Added seasons to the world which affect temperature and weather events
Updated the world clock to display the current season and year
Added light and heavy rain weather events
Agents slightly dislike being out in the rain
Agents hygiene level is increased in the rain
Buildings using combustion power sources will flood if left in the rain for a period of time
Added temperature scale options (Celsius, Fahrenheit, Kelvin) to settings menu (Default is Celsius)
Changes:
Block interaction with SmartObjects through Walls/Floors
Reduced interaction positions distance by half. 1 Tile -> .5f Tiles
Added structure demolishing
No longer force send all agents to do Haul To orders
Number of agents assigned depend on amount to haul
Only consider idle agents (non-idle agents can still help later once they finish the current task)
Agents no longer flee when firefighting
Added timed FleeImmunity during which agents won't flee
Added AgentOwnershipUtility.IsSelfOwnedTarget which checks current agent target is part of their body or held to their body
Added logic to visually repair voxels while repairing a damaged object
Added a system to retry building connections from time to time (fix conveyor connections)
Added logic to fix feeder issues
Reduced wood cost for many walls
Added skill based chance to get extra wood from chopping
Added additional backer names to credits
Optimized PioneerFaceController to not redraw text if their goal doesn't change
Optimized AmbientZone logic with new AmbientZoneManager
Optimized Tooltip update logic
Added throttle to stat saving to avoid writing to a file every time an item is crafted/mined
Updated look at logic to only look at a target if they are within 2 tiles
Wood and Mined Items now get a base haul interaction
Added SFX for all command buttons on engage/disengage
Added SFX for deleting blueprints
Added SFX for hauling in context menus
General Fixes:
Added system which watches for nan values in dynamic physics object transforms and fixes them
Fixed issue where disableing pioneer faces would cause them to be completely rebuilt when the next one is created
Fixed potential infinite loop when placing walls/floors when building rooms
Fixed room tiles connections being frame rate dependent
Fixed debug terraforming modes being available in prod builds
Added check to launch steam if it's not running (fixes black screen on load)
Fixed resources not properly lining up with chunk world boundaries
Added new world regions and fixed various issues within them
Fixed premade spawning errors when chunked objects share names
Fixed physics velocity not getting reset for dynamic objects which have invalid transforms
Fixed issue where disabled pioneer faces were causing issues when re-enabled
Fixed interaction position being based on Translation which causes issues with interactions with child entities
Fixed fire extinguishing on child entities that may not have a collider
Fixed BurningVoxels being duplicated in certain cases
Fixed BurningVoxels burn timers not updating in certain cases
Fixed some cases of extinguish not causing a VoxelObjectChanged action to be applied
Fixed GroundFlora not properly being deserialized on load
Fixed UI sometimes showing on new game landing animation
Fixed some trees missing interaction nodes
Fixed first item progression trade using 5x5 ship
Fixed trader landing/departing animation timings
Fixed pioneer detail view enlist button not being sticky
Fixed tooltip not blocking raycasts
Fixed pinned tooltips potentially being hidden while hovering entities in the world
Fixed base building detail view locate button not having the correct on click action
Fixed multi entity select not hiding main controls
Fixed update timing causing walls to not block conveyors
Fixed thin walls (wood walls) not blocking conveyor
Fixed SolveConveyorTypeAction being added to non conveyor (ie. when wall gets placed on a conveyor already moving items)
Fixed PioneerAvatarManager camera not properly being disabled in certain cases
Fixed Magpie lights being sunken into walls
Fixed agents moving 1 by 1 during Alarm
Fixed ObjectWorldSpaceController potentially getting destroyed when going back to the main menu or loading the game
Fixed blood decal pool not being fully released when going back to the main menu or loading
Fixed Flora Palette Data compute buffer not being released
PS If you made it this far and went through all the patch notes: these diary entries were found in the ruins of a factory of Sirius B 3 and will give you a vivid impression how the update affected the colonists;)
Last night our colony was raided by a bunch of green-skinned bastards armed with crude spheres and sling stones. These It’aks as they call themselves came straight for the stockpiles, packed with the supplies we need to survive and prosper on Sirius B 3 Me and a couple of the other prospectors grabbed our basic pistols and tried to scare them off, but they couldn’t have cared less. They charged us immediately, and my pal Taro had his skull crushed by a rock.
Still, we managed to put one of the bastards down, and that finally broke their nerves. The rest turned and fled into the darkness.
I rushed over to Taro, hoping to drag him into a regeneration pod, but his soul had already left this godforsaken plane for good. Standing there beside him, I swore to myself that I would never let that happen again.
That very night we built palisades, strung up barbed wire, and stacked sandbags around the colony. We traded some of our resources with a passing space trader for MPs and shotguns. Next time we'll be ready. Let them come.
Ok, I’m not gonna sugarcoat it - colony life is slowly taking a toll on me, and I don’t know how many days I’ve got left in this brutal environment. Sure, we quickly made sure to get a roof over our heads and the basic necessities in place. But the honeymoon phase ended just as fast.
First and foremost, these extreme temperatures are killing me. At first it was unbearably hot. We tried to cool our living quarters as best we could with wet towels, but crafting on the workbench in that heat was rough. A few days later it suddenly turned freezing cold, so we had no choice than to heat things indoors with a makeshift bonfire. That, in turn, filled our rooms with smoke, so we had to install chimneys just to stop ourselves from passing out on the job.
We also barely had any daylight coming into the workshop. It was only after we installed lights and put in a few windows that things finally got better.
These pencil-pushers from the Kobayashi Schwarz Corporation better make sure our living and working conditions improve fast - or I swear I’m taking the next trade ship out of here.
Will this rain ever stop? After a hot, dry season and a subsequent cold, dry one, it started pouring yesterday. You step one foot outside and you’re soaked instantly, the day ruined before it even begins.
Worse, the furnaces we placed outside are slowly getting flooded, endangering the whole mining operation. The good news is we’ve already come up with a fix: set up machine shops indoors and put a roof over all smelters. This will cause a massive CO₂ buildup, but that won’t be too bad once we install chimneys in the roofs.
We can also craft inlets that let conveyor belts pass through the walls, so ore drilled outside can still find its way into the smelters. If there is one lesson I’ve learned, adapt fast. I’ll be damned if we can’t make it through the rainy season.
Let me tell you, unlike other planets with their weird sense of gravity, Sirius B 3 actually adheres to basic principles of physics - and today we found that out the hard way.
When building a new canteen, we forgot to place the floor tiles first, and after trying to erect the walls and roof, the whole edifice came down like a house of cards. That’s when we realized that everything we construct here must be structurally integral - and built to last.
Because when we get another visit from those damn It’aks, just one destroyed wall could become a liability, and everything would come crashing down.
Overall, however, I’m feeling more confident with each day of turning this Lucrum mining operation into a success. Whatever this planet throws at us, there’s always a solution. Life on the Violent Frontier changes without warning, and so must we - swiftly, relentlessly, and without hesitation.