Virtuverse Patch Notes: EA5 (v0.7.0b)

EARLY ACCESS 5 has finally arrived. Over the months, we have worked hard to bring our goals to life and Virtuverse closer to Beta.

Unlike EA4 where the main focus was more new content, Early Access 5 focuses on further developing features, establishing a solid back-end foundation of the in-game mechanics and inner workings, as well as setting up tools that will allow us to more efficiently bring new content in the future.

Some of the most crucial changes coming in EA5 include a dedicated economy server, which enables dynamic changes to loot, crafting, gathering, and Aurum returns. While the change will be hard to notice in the small scale economy of Early Access, it is an essential foundation of the economy and a huge leap forward towards bringing RCE to the game.

Other major changes include Mining 2.0; not unlike in EA4 where the crafting system was built from the ground up, the new mining system aims to bring innovation to the otherwise stale mining mechanics of other games in the genre. Players will now be a lot more involved in the profession, being able to aim for more consistent yields or take their chances for a bigger return, focus on specific resources or more effectively diversify their ore assortment. Along with this, the skills will play a larger and more important role in mining, allowing for several new paths towards mastery.

From the inside of the mercenary outpost…

Lastly, The Temrance island has seen its last expansion in the form of a new enemy compound and a harbour. While there will still be loads of new quests and lore coming in future updates, there will be no new locations on the island itself. Temrance is an arrival point for new colonists in the vastness of Virtuverse, so the only question that now remains: where will the colonists go next?

And now, onto the full list of changes since the Early Access 5 Backer Preview Test from last month:

Features:

Environmental Changes:

• VOC engineers have been to the Harbor and made some improvements. Also content on the harbour is now 90% less floaty.
• Colonists should take care of the perilous waters around Temrance Island, a number of incidents have occurred and they should stay vigilant when leaving the safety of the island.
• Installation of defensive turrets has been completed around the VOC, no more deaths while crafting!

Quests:

• A number of new quests and quest lines have been added or enabled.
• Colonists may now find a way to decipher some interesting information.
• Daily quests have arrived: They will be marked by the [Daily] tag in the dialogue options. These quests reset at midnight UTC daily.

Crafting Developments:

• The protest of a Princess has been heard! Leather Pants have arrived!
• Researching on crafting is now enabled by default. (You can still disable it by unchecking the “Research” box)
• Added a button to opt for automatic log out when colonist crafting combine attempts are finished for AFK crafting enthusiasts. Be sure to leave this alone if you are actively crafting!

Misc. Developments:

• Through the wonders of science, you can now make your helmet invisible so your face and hair are viewable, but still retain the protection of having it equipped! To activate this scientific wonder, please check your “Options” menu! (Note: This currently only applies to your own representation of yourself)
• Added logging for crafting results to the looting.csv file for spreadsheet enthusiasts.

Bug Fixes:

World Bug Fixes:

• Fixed mining finds from appearing under the ocean sea level that rendered them un-minable.
• Enemy land-based creatures no longer walk on the ocean floor.
• NPC’s should now display appropriate symbols (“?” and “!”) over their head(s) in correlation with missive progressions/startings/endings.
• The AI that manages the doors in the starting area has been reprimanded and its humour protocols reduced by 30% so the doors should open properly for the colonists now.
• Some minor fixes for the dungeon elements.
• Fixed an issue where a dead mob that wasn’t killed or damaged by players could be looted.

Gameplay Bug Fixes:

• Missives should once again reward appropriate skills for completion.
• More fixes to PVP Quest progression.
• Turrets should now respect colonist reputation levels.
• The world mining event “Enriched Crystals” should now work properly again.
• Fixed the issue of mining surveys sometimes being stuck in an infinite loop.
• Fixed issue with colonists not being able to trade stackable items.
• Fixed an issue where selecting “Display as %” in the market window would crash the game.
• Fixed the issue of crashing while selling large quantities of individual items at once in the vendor sell screen.
• Fixed issue with not being able to shoot through dead creatures.
• Booth owners should now receive the proper aurum proceeds from selling items in their booths.

UI Bug Fixes:

• Menu Tab open/close should work a little better.
• Fixed an issue that could cause dragging an item to the hotbar to stop working.
• Fixed resolution confirmation window from opening when it shouldn’t.
• Typing “E” in the vendor search bar should no longer close the vendor window.
• Other minor “typoo” fixes….

Audio Bug Fixes:

• The river on the login screen now sounds like a river.
• The UI volume has been balanced a little better; it should also preserve user settings a bit better now.
• Fixed a minor bug with the sounds when equipping mining devices.
• Fixed door sound calibration.
• The Raider’s Outpost successfully repaired their stereo equipment and is no longer a cone of silence!

Balancing and Other Adjustments:

Crafting Adjustments:

• Reduced Crafting level requirements for Colonist Top and Trousers to Level 0.

Vendor Adjustments:

• Removed Synthetic Cloth from Vendor.
• Added Incineration Bracker Mk.I back to the Vendor.

Audio Adjustments:

• Planet Selection UI Screen sounds have been added.
• Matter Manipulator sounds have been added.
• Ambient and Background sounds have been recalibrated.
• Pistol related sound effects are under review/testing.

Gameplay Adjustments:

• The looting range has been reduced to an appropriate distance, and AOE looting abilities have been added!
• Creature corpses will now despawn 5 minutes after death to discourage serial killer corpse hiding tendencies.
• Reputation should now correctly persist itself.
• Achievements and Titles should now both award and persist correctly.

Misc. Adjustments:

• Background code improvements to Mining Extractor
• Fixed an issue causing Oculus software to start on game play if an oculus was connected.

Thank you @everyone for your diligence in reporting bugs in the #🐛bug-reports channel! We were able to fix a LOT of things this time around, and we couldn’t have done it without your help!

As always, if you find a bug, please report it in the Discord channel, or use the ingame Bug reporting tool by pressing the “Esc” button and selecting “Report A Bug” from the menu!

We look forward to seeing you in game for the public test, which is opening very soon!