Hello everyone!
A new experimental patch is now available for testing! You can access it on the experimental branch by following the instructions below if you wish to get access to the changes and fixes now.
How to opt into experimental:
Locate Vectorio in your Steam library
Right click and go to "properties"
Find the "betas" branch
Using the dropdown, select "Experimental"
Experimental Info:
Testing Cycle: ~2 weeks
Experimental Saves: Disabled
Backwards Compatible: Up to v0.3.0-beta.5 (however, recommend starting a new save)
Update Type: Experimental Patch
Contains Spoilers: Yes
Questions? Comments? Concerns? Let me know below or on our Discord server:
Patch Notes
The following is a list of changes pushed to the experimental branch. While changes are usually tested beforehand, please note that some may require further testing to validate.
NEW CONTENT:
Added a new painting tool, enabling the ability to paint buildings & tiles
Added a new world feature, Boosters
Requires a steady input of resources to activate the Booster
When activated, will boost a specific stat for all nearby buildings
Added a new mid-game unit to The Abyss, Bomber
Starts a detonation sequence when getting close to buildings
If it manages to finsh the countdown, it will explode dealing huge area damage
BALANCE CHANGES:
Increased Hub starting power from 100w to 250w
Replaced Repeater Tier V upgrade "Multi-feed (+1 bullet)" with "Plasma Infusion II (+10% damage)"
Reduced Repeater engineering slots from 2 to 1
OTHER CHANGES:
Disabled the 2-way channels for Gateways, instead defaulting to sending resources to the Hub.
This is being done to simplify cross-region resource transport in the early-game.
2-way channels will be re-enabled for Interstellar Freighters in a later update.
Added new fog-of-war mechanic for expansion, which will play into scanning down the line.
Removed quest Return Trip, instead unlocking the ALTAR Gateway by default upon entering Abyss.
BUG FIXES:
Potential fix for Drone's entering a limbo state until being manually kicked out of it.
Fixed selection context not being used correctly; will no longer select entities when unapplicable.
CORE TECH:
Refactored all shaders to use a central shader pipeline. This is purely for maintainability, and shouldn't make much difference in regards to performance.
Updated the tile manager, providing a far more robust API. This is used heavily by the new tile painter tool, but again shouldn't make much difference in regards to performance.
KNOWN ISSUES:
Turrets will sometimes refuse to shoot at enemies after reloading a save
The painting tool interactions can be a bit finnicky especially when selecting the default swatch
Resources tiles sometimes do not reset across region changes; this is purely visual
Development Updates
This is just a few updates from my end, just so everyone over here on Steam is up-to-date with what's going on in the first quarter of 2026! I posted this over on our Discord, which for those interested in the game is the best place to follow along with development.
Development was halted for the last week of January, as I was quite busy with some IRL stuff. I did get back on track at the start of February though, and pushed forward to get this update out
HOWEVER, development will be pausing again tomorrow (Februrary 14th) to next Sunday (Februrary 22nd) as I will be travelling during this time.
When I return, the plan is to push forward with Phantom Plains and Multiplayer, with the hope of getting them out before the end of February (though that may be a tad optimistic)
The hard deadline for the update to go to live is March 9th, which is the start of the Tower Defense Festival. Of course, this is absolutely not the end of development on v0.3, there'll still be much to do once it's live.
To stay up-to-date, I recommend joining our Discord!