Tiny Bit Adventures

Devlog,

Star Circuit 0.4.0 is out.

Star Circuit 0.4.0 is out. Download it now. See the game page for everything else.

The combat release. Every world type gets a signature enemy with a trick to learn, Titans sleep in stone rings on dangerous worlds, three new loadouts grow out of what you hunt, and burn, chill and shock work both ways. Friends now fight side by side properly, find each other on the maps and on the local network, and the game keeps itself up to date from here on. Saves from v0.3.0 carry over; multiplayer needs server v0.2.0.

Combat

  • Every world type now has a signature enemy with a trick to learn:
  • Thornback (Verdant worlds) paints a lane on the ground, then charges down it. Step aside: a miss leaves it stunned and taking 60% more damage.
  • Dune Lurker (Arid worlds) dives into the sand, tunnels toward you under a dust trail and bursts up beneath you from a glowing ring. It can't be hit while it's underground.
  • Frost Warden (Glacial worlds) hides behind a shield that blocks everything from the front and turns slowly, so circle behind it (back hits do 25% more). Rail slugs and fire go straight through. Its bolts chill you, and up close it pulses a frost nova.
  • Cinder Mites (Volcanic worlds) come in packs of three, scuttle straight at you and burst into flame, leaving the ground burning. Shooting one pops it too, so thin them out at range.
  • Smelter (Machine worlds) keeps its distance and lobs molten shells where you're heading. Its plating shrugs off most damage until it vents steam after every third shot: that's your window.
  • Storm Kite (Tempest worlds) circles overhead calling down lightning on warning rings. Every third call is a triple strike, and a hit shocks you.
  • Refractor (Crystalline worlds) throws your shots straight back while its facets glow, blinks to new spots and fires fans of crystal shards.
  • Void Stalker (Abyssal worlds) is nearly invisible until it's close. Scan (Q) to reveal it and leave it exposed for extra damage, then sidestep the pounce.
  • Spore Hive (Fungal worlds) is rooted in place, breeds Sporelings and puffs out a sticky cloud that slows you. Kill the hive and its brood withers. Fire does double damage.
  • Signature enemies lead about half the camps on their own worlds (never on the Cradle) and drop their own parts (Thorn Barbs, Sand Fangs, Rime Cores, Cinder Glands, Slag Hearts, Storm Vanes, Prism Lenses, Void Veils and Spore Hearts).
  • The Smelter, Storm Kite and Void Stalker no longer live only at the galaxy's edge. They also roam two common world types each (Smelters on Volcanic and Arid worlds, Storm Kites on Glacial and Verdant, Void Stalkers on Crystalline and Fungal), turning up in about one camp in six once a world is dangerous enough. Their parts, and the Arc, Cinder and Cryo upgrades that need them, are now reachable long before the endgame. Hunt Contracts and the Bestiary list every world type each enemy roams.
  • Status effects: burn (damage over time), chill (slows you; a fourth stack freezes solid) and shock (takes 25% more damage). They work on enemies and on you, show on your HUD and the target frame, and tint whatever they're on. Robots shake off a freeze faster than drones do.
  • Enemies can be weak or resistant to kinds of damage (fire, frost, shock).
  • Three new weapon loadouts, crafted from biome enemy parts at the Fabricator and swapped with X like the others:
  • Arc (Arc Coil: Storm Vanes): a bolt that leaps to up to three more targets nearby, shocking each so they take 25% more damage.
  • Cinder (Cinder Launcher: Cinder Glands and a Slag Heart): lobs a grenade that bursts into flame and sets everything in the blast burning.
  • Cryo (Cryo Projector: Rime Cores): hold fire for a freezing beam; every half second adds a chill stack until the target freezes solid.
  • Mk II retunes for all six loadouts (+35% damage), crafted from biome enemy parts. The Outfitter shows each loadout's tier and what makes it special.
  • Mk II and Mk III retunes now count in space too (your cannons hit 35% or 75% harder), and the HUD names your loadout's tier ("LMB Cryo Mk II").
  • Titans: world bosses sleep in stone rings (a Titan's Rest) on about two dozen dangerous worlds, one per system at most. Three kinds:
  • Colossus (green, arid, crystal and fungal worlds) stomps out warning rings, hurls boulder barrages and splits the ground along glowing lanes.
  • Pyre Wyrm (volcanic and machine worlds) tunnels out of reach, erupts under you from a burning ring and spits molten shells. Frost hurts it.
  • Storm Sentinel (glacial, tempest and abyssal worlds) floats high above the arena calling lightning storms and chilling fans of bolts. Rail hits it hardest.
  • Their armour turns aside most damage until they kneel with the core exposed. At half health they enrage and call the world's signature enemies to help. A boss health bar and a new heavy battle theme come in when one wakes.
  • A felled Titan stays down and drops a Titan Core, which retunes any loadout to Mk III (+75% damage).
  • A new quest, Titanfall, after Primordial Soup, points you at the nearest Titan, and Titan Slayer (fell 3) is worth +40 hull. In multiplayer everyone fighting shares the kill.
  • Hunt Contracts on bounty boards name one signature enemy to put down (usually the board's own world's), and pay well for it.
  • The Field Manual (H) covers everything new: statuses, the six loadouts and their Mk II and Mk III retunes, signature enemies, Titans, the Bestiary, Hunt Contracts and playing together. It scrolls, and names your own key bindings instead of the defaults. New first-time tips explain statuses, signature enemies and Hunt Contracts.
  • Bestiary: a new tab in the Quest Log (J). Every enemy you meet is listed with how many you've destroyed; scan one (Q) to log how it fights and what it's weak or immune to. Scanning the signature enemy of all nine world types earns the Monster Hunter milestone (+25 hull).

Multiplayer

  • Enemies now go after whichever robot is closest, yours or a friend's, so a drone your friend is fighting turns on them on your screen too instead of standing idle. A swing at your friend never hurts you.
  • Shared enemies agree on their health: every second, each of you reports the ones you're hitting and everyone takes the lowest. An enemy a friend is fighting no longer heals while it walks home.
  • You can see friends shoot: their pulse shots, scatter, rail slugs, arc bolts, cryo beams and cinder grenades now fire from their robot on your screen (with the sound), and their robot raises its arm to aim. In space, you see their cannon fire. A friend's grenade only bursts for show; their own game deals the damage.
  • Find your friends: they show on your compass in blue when they're on the same world, on the system map (flying, or beside the planet they're on) and on the galaxy map (a blue ring round their star, with names). Plot course in the player list sets a waypoint that follows them round the system, or opens the galaxy map on their star when they're further away.
  • Servers on your network show up by themselves in the Multiplayer window under "On your network", with how many are playing and whether there's a password. Click Join, no address needed. "Scan again" looks once more. (Needs the matching server release.)
  • If the connection drops, the game gets you back on by itself, trying again after 2, 4, 8, 15 and then every 30 seconds (up to 12 tries). It doesn't retry when the server turned you away (wrong password, a different version, full) or when you left. The Multiplayer window shows the attempts and has a Stop button.
  • Join this server whenever I play: tick it on the join screen and starting or loading a game connects you straight away.
  • Multiplayer protocol 4: this version plays with server v0.2.0 and not with v0.3.0 players, whose worlds no longer line up. When a server and your game don't match, the game now says which one is behind, and if it's your game and an update is out, offers it right there.
  • A Titan felled by a friend only gives you its Titan Core and the reward if you were in the fight (within 120 m). Otherwise you're told who got it, and it's still there to fight next time.

Updates

  • The game now updates itself. When a new version is out, the title screen shows Update to x.y.z and the pause menu gains Save & Update. It saves your game, downloads the new version from GitHub, swaps it in, and restarts where you left off. Saves carry over.
  • The update dialog shows what's new, the download size and a progress bar. If the game can't replace itself (on macOS, when it's still running from Downloads or another read-only spot), it tells you why and opens the release page instead.
  • It checks once each time the game starts. Turn that off in Settings; "Check now" is there too, next to your version number. The title screen now shows the version you're running.
  • This version is the last one you need to download by hand.

Fixes

  • Saves can't be lost to a crash any more. The game writes a new save beside the old one and only swaps it in once it's complete, keeping the last good save as a backup. If a save is ever damaged, loading it restores the last good copy (and says so) instead of showing an empty slot a new game could overwrite. Closing the window now saves too, instead of losing up to a minute.
  • Planets seen close up from orbit could show a hard, stair-stepped shadow across them. They now light themselves from their star, with a smooth banded day and night like the title screen.
  • Oceans are much deeper: about half of every ocean is now deep enough to dive into the Deep Sea (it used to be a few percent, and none at all on small worlds). Beaches and coastlines are unchanged; the floor just falls away faster past the shallows, to around 45 m.