Hey everyone, v0.2.8 is here! There is a new UI, as well as a bunch of improvements and new features. While some of the newest features and cell types are still WIP, there are plenty of improvements that enable more selective evolution and creative lab shenanigans. The tutorial format has also been reworked, so I am especially looking for feedback on ways to improve the tutorial's content to be easier to understand and navigate. v0.3.0 will be the next major feature update. Until then, I'll be working on polishing and finishing the existing features. Here is the full changelog: v0.2.8:
* Added crystal system: persistent environmental generators
* Balance tweaks:
- Reduced organelle maintenance cost
- Reduced movement cost by 10x (was previously 5x+ base maintenance cost)
- Increased collector attraction speed
- Plasmodium branches take damage from enzymes
- All cells now have some basal absorption. Higher basal absorption requires increased membrane permeability, resulting in increased vulnerability to damage
- Increased energy:cytosol base conversion ratio from 1:36 -> 1:48
- Increased particle sizes from ambient diffusion
* Added more environment sliders on culture creation:
- Ambient temperature slider
- Crystal options
- Basal substrate generation floor slider
* Contract system:
- Board no longer auto refills, refresh functions as a mulligan system (clear board and draw 4 fresh contracts)
- Active contracts can be abandoned (grants incur penalty)
- HUD shows tracked contracts instead of just the first active contract. Tracking can be enabled/disabled per active contract
* Rebuilt UI with a more consistent style:
- Replaced intro pop-ups with non-invasive hint cards
- Added playtest welcome panels
- Added copy diagnostics button under advanced settings panel
* Added new organelle: Endoplasmic reticulum. Secretes particles. Found in trophocytes
* Reworks:
- Lysocysts now fire packages of enzymes (previously called blastocysts)
- Reenabled amoeba with improved body shapes. Renamed amoeba -> Heterokaryon
- Improved pseudopodia, with the goal of bridging motile cell -> plasmodium evolutionary pathway
* Bug fixes:
- Improved strain classifier and collection consistency
- Removed plasmodia basal -> cytosol direct conversion path
- Fixed bug causing generalist cells to have no behavior outputs (ciliates, flagellates, etc)
- Other various bug fixes
* Renamed theoretical lab -> creative lab
* Added WIP autopopulate feature. Automatically adds cell to culture to maintain population floor
* Began reworking tutorial. Replaced most objectives with reactive hints
* Began highly WIP new rogue-like game mode "Lineage Control"