We have finished harvesting asteroids and are happy to announce that Element v1.3 'Kuiper' is available now!

As always, thanks for all of your feedback and support. This update includes some new content, a few UI and visual changes, improved native input, and updates to sound, effects, Unity, and various bits of plumbing.

There is now debris around each world, including orbital asteroids and incoming meteors of various sizes. They are automatically targeted by defence units and can be manually targeted using attack missiles. Debris collides with everything and inflicts a lot of damage so you'll need to balance your defensive efforts against it.

The enemy also has a shiny new orbital laser unit which it will deploy to remove your units from the face of the world with ruthless efficiency. The orbital laser orbits higher and slower than other air units so you will need to carefully determine how best to take it down. Fair warning, it currently leaves quite a trail of wrecked stuff in its wake.

The player element graph now shows the projected amount of element you will have at the end of each level. The projected element is based on the number of mines you currently have control of and is awarded as a bonus when you defeat the enemy. As you destroy enemy mines and build mines of your own, the graph will show a head-to-head comparison with the enemy so you can better focus your efforts on mining the element you need to stay ahead of the enemy or destroying the enemy base. There are also new warnings to keep you updated on how much element the enemy has mined, and a new screen to inform you when the enemy has mined enough element to control the world and win. You can choose to continue in defeat to take out your frustration of losing on the enemy, or retry immediately.

There are also some changes and a few more visual effects that we think are cool, like bigger and better alert messages, animated water and waterlines, blinking lights on units, soft shadows, world selection rendering being shown under units and decorations, additional path rendering tracking meteors and higher orbits, and improved game controller input handling.

Please let us know what you think - leave reviews, start a thread or leave a comment in the discussion forums, or tweet @flightlessnz.

Enjoy.

cheers,

Greg & John
Flightless

Element v1.3 'Kuiper' Changes

Game/UI

• Added asteroids.
  
• Added meteors.
  
• Added enemy orbital lasers.
  
• Added higher orbit support (for orbital lasers).
  
• Added hud info and targeting UI for asteroids, meteors, and orbital lasers.
  
• Updated defence radars to include asteroids, meteors, and orbital lasers.
  
• Changed element graph to show the projected element based on the number of mines currently owned by the player.
  (No more guessing how much the element bonus at the end of the game will affect the game result.)
  
• Added alerts for enemy element mining progress.
  
• Added screen to inform the player when the enemy has mined enough element to control the world and win.
  (Player can choose to continue in defeat to exact some revenge, or immediately retry the level.)
  
• Added alerts to remind the player that the enemy has control of the element and there is no chance of winning.
  
• Updated elemental dominance for defence weapon -> attack weapon collisions.
  
• Updated hud icons, added icons to various UI buttons.
  
• Updated pause menu layout.
  

Visual Updates

• Updated post-processing effects for antialiasing and bloom.
  
• Added blinking activity lights to larger units.
  
• Increased size of alert messages. Smaller screens will use a smaller size.
  
• Updated world selection renderer to sit under units and decorations rather than over them.
  
• Added subtle water mesh animation.
  
• Added animated waterline to water units and other objects entering the water.
  
• Added soft-shadows.
  
• Optimised shadow resolution.
  
• Increased level-of-detail switching distance/bias.
  
• Optimised sun shader.
  

Input Updates

• Updated input libraries.
  
• Improved native input for game controllers in Windows.
  
• Reduced sensitivity of game controller right analog stick when rolling while zooming.
  

General Updates

• Added skip-intro during logo boot sequence (use any input).
  
• Added VR manager to support virtual reality version of the game (in a future update).
  
• Changed rigging of menu, game, UI, and skybox cameras to support VR.
  
• Updated hud and world searching to support VR.
  
• Optimised game entity. Added support for non-player game entities.
  
• Updated and optimised world ownership and querying to allow for more world content.
  
• Refactored game state management to add flexibility and prepare for upcoming tutorial.
  
• Updated and optimised physics and collision handling.
  

Plumbing

• Updated to Unity v5.4.
  
• Added performance/crash reporter.
  
• Optimisation and bugfixes.
  

Element v1.2 'Corona' Changes

Visual Updates

• New deferred renderer.
  
• Improved batching and multithreaded rendering.
  
• Post-processing effects for antialiasing and bloom.
  
• Enhanced lighting and flare particle effects for explosions.
  
• Added air unit movement trails.
  
• Added damaged base smoke effects.
  
• More efficient trail rendering.
  
• Additional shadows with improved performance.
  
• Optimised menu and epilogue lighting, optimised sun shader.
  
• Improved distortion shader for deferred renderer.
  
• Improved explosion ring effect to avoid visual popup.
  

Input Updates

• Added native input libraries with XInput support where possible.
  
• Added game controller rumble effects with multi-channel rumble mixer.
  
• Added game controller lighting effects.
  
• In-game 'Escape' key now pauses the game from the top-level menu.
  
• Improved game controller support to pause the game.
  

General Updates

• Added antialiasing and bloom options on the settings screen.
  
• Added text reveal effects and sounds on planet, info, and end-game screens.
  
• Added mine bonus sounds on end-game screen.
  
• Cycle graphs on end-game screen to reduce clutter.
  
• Various unit model updates.
  
• Faster intro and menu transitions.
  
• Improved menu navigation.
  

Plumbing

• Updated to Unity v5.3.
  
• Updated Steam library.
  
• Updated sound library.
  
• Optimisation and bugfixes.
  

Element v1.1 'Aurora' Changes

Game Objectives

• You are now mining in direct competition with the enemy. To win, simply mine more element than the enemy and destroy them.
  (No more minimum element requirement for each planet.)
  
• Any element remaining on the planet when you defeat the enemy is now awarded as a bonus based on the number of mines you have.
  (No more waiting around to mine more element for a higher score after essentially defeating the enemy.)
  
• Changed scoring to handle the updated game objectives.
  (Your current scores will be reset but the planets will remain unlocked.)
  
• Removed the existing game tutorial - the game introduction and learning curve will be redesigned and added again in a future update.
  

Refined Game/UI

• Top-level earth/air/water/fire menu has been removed and is replaced with a resource/attack/defence/missile/repair unit type menu.
  (All menu navigation is now only a speedy single depth.)
  
• Fully context-sensitive placement or targeting of units based on the unit type selected.
  (It's awesome. No more slow earth/air/water/fire selection.)
  
• Right-hand game graph display has been redesigned to show energy, better element and mine information, more relevant game balance information, and now contains a dedicated game menu/pause button.
  
• Defence unit ranges increased to make them more useful.
  
• End-game messaging and screens have been updated to reflect the new game objectives.
  
• Additional options to quit or retry the current level in the pause menu and on the end-game screen.
  
• Improved game controller support to pause/quit the game.
  

General Updates

• Main info screens redesigned to describe the updated game objectives and preview all player and enemy units in the game.
  
• Tweaked planet menu design to reflect the updated game objectives.
  
• All player and enemy unit models updated.
  
• All player and enemy world decoration models updated.
  
• Updated mothership.
  
• Additional credits.
  

Plumbing

• Removed old launch dialog. Added new settings screen to manage screen resolutions and window modes.
  
• Optimisation and bugfixes.