Hey everyone!

While it’s a day later than I wanted, I think everyone will be pleased with the stability improvements, bug fixes, added functionality, and especially the UI. While I strongly recommend playing on at least a 1280 x 1024 screen, it will work for any resolution. The game looks especially good on moderate widescreen resolutions like 1440 X 980. Give it a try! I think you’ll be pleased…

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. If this build runs well, then I will close the book on .2 and proceed to .3 – Science Labs will now have meaning, and characters will start to interact with what their peers are doing, as well as you!

As always, you can get the latest build at the Sourceforge site using the links to the left. Please uninstall any previous build you have of Imperia before installing a new version. Thanks!

Imperia V.226 Change Log

5.20.14

Fixes

* Fixed bug where deleting a system edict caused crash

* Fixed ‘rounding’ bug when adding Influence to an Edict

* Fixed rare bug where planets had identical populations and the Intel screen was accessed

* Fixed bug where crash occurs if you abandon a planet or system with active Edicts that are not completed that turn

* Fixed bug where viceroy would refuse to expand a sector based on the fact that the planet was losing money when it fact it was not

* Fixed bug where expanding a planet economy could cause the development level to go above the maximum

* Fixed bug where Edict ADM values in selection lists would not always match up with Edict Creation screen ADM values

* Fixed bug where if the system capital was abandoned and no other planet was in the sector, the sector would still remain active, even though there was no population, and the governors would still be assigned to an empty sector/system. Now all governors are removed from office, the sector is made inactive, and any money in the sector treasury goes into the Empire treasury.

* Fixed a few bugs relating to assassinations.

 

Changes/Additions

* Added full resolution support across all screens, including the planet screen

* Improved look of most resolutions by scaling all viewports and graphics more precisely – continued work on this will be ongoing

* Added some of Nadia’s awesome planets, especially gas giants

* Dimmed out buttons on button bar which don’t function yet to minimize confusion

* Changed economic model to now take planetary subsidies if needed from sector treasuries first before the Imperial treasury. This will promote developing stronger sectors while penalizing weak economic sectors in assisting their system’s projects, since if they go broke the sector will now receive a subsidy from the Empire with a small efficiency penalty depending on distance

* With this change, added AI for sector governors to adjust the sector tax as needed, depending on their intelligence, greed, and other traits

* Added right-click on system will center functionality on the quadrant map. This is experimental and may be removed or optioned depending on feedback.

* Added assigning system to new sector edict, and added UI functionality to allow other edicts with secondary choices (such as designations)

* Added new planetary edict – change primary designation

* Added 2 new designations – government nexus and material production world

* Added more system and planet names, and eliminated duplicate planet/system names – may have fixed a bug related to duplicate names

* Added basic designation effects – i.e. heavy production worlds now have negative terraforming modifiers, but greater wages, etc.

* Added attempt to assassinate character action – must have active informer network and costs 5 Tyrannical Influence. More informers improves chance; a high character Power and Intelligence lowers it. May take several turns to resolve.

* Some small calculating efficiency gains, especially between turns

* Added check to potentially add ADM for emperor every year

* Added more reactions to events and emperor Edicts that affect governors and viceroys, especially changing system assignments

* Some small graphics improvements/changes

 

Balance

* Some cost/edict balances; some items cost less ADM, some more (a few were 1 ADM for testing, those have been changed)

* Material production is now considerably more profitable per mTon (to counterbalance increased costs for setting up and maintaining manufacturing) ($10 vs. $4)

* Science production is more costly due to impending Science system addition, prepare for costs!

* Planet ADM has been tweaked upward for sectors and the Imperial capital

* ADM efficiency has been increased from 6:1 to 5:1 for Empire ADM used for planetary Edicts

* Increased empire possible minimum Base Engine Range so that missions are easier (will probably change once science is available, as this will be available to improve)

* Significantly increased effect of Loyalty on Edict completion. Now you will absolutely have to get your leaders into line somehow if you want your more advanced Edicts to be completed this decade. J

* Lowered cost of surveying and exploring to encourage it.

Hey all,

So I wanted to update everyone on the release of the .225 alpha. The good news it that it will end up being more feature-filled than I had first planned due to some elements being easier to do than I had planned. The less-good news is that it’s not *quite* ready for initial release.

The challenge has been this week in adding and testing the system-level edicts and integrating them into the edict UI. That has pretty much been done. All that is really left to do is to hook up the early ‘win/lose’ statuses (basically, if you survive 60 years, you ‘win’, and if your popular support drops below 30%, you have a chance each turn you remain below 30% to trigger a coup, ending your game; dropping below 10% ends the game automatically) and to finish up adding the last few edicts. The resolutions scaling is done except for the planet screen, and I am working on that as well. In addition (and I had forgotten about this until I was writing out the last things I wanted in this first public build) I need to write an instruction guide for how to play – oops!

While I’m talking about the alpha, I want to make clear what is and is not in this build.

WHAT IS IN: You can create planet level and system level edicts, explore systems and planets, colonize planets and set up outposts, conduct planet-level espionage, create and maintain your trade networks, interact extensively with your viceroys and governors, terraform planets, abandon planets and sectors, and most of the information-level UI and music is now in, including empire-level alerts that will popup as a list on the right-hand side of the quadrant-level view.

WHAT IS NOT (YET) IN: You can not access the science, war, finance, diplomacy and emperor info screens, the sector level screen is not yet functional in system view (though the system view is updated as shown above), the scaling functions will be functional (but I STRONGLY recommend that you play with at least a 1400 width monitor), and the ‘secondary selection’ UI for creating edicts needs some major work (currently the only way to assign a system to a sector is to click it from a list, and with no visual frame of reference if you don’t remember which sector you wanted to attach the system to you’ll have to go back to the quadrant screen and get the name). Also, the game is probably not balanced in any fantastic way – the economy works pretty well but I would like a lot of feedback on how the game ‘feels’ as far as how your empire evolves.

What this all means is while I can certainly release ‘a’ build of Imperia today, and it would run just fine (for the most part), the fact that I don’t have the planet screen scaling done yet means that only 1080p monitors would be able to play the game fully at this point. Plus, you’d have no idea how to play beyond maybe reading some of these posts, and I don’t want to release an undocumented game! Even though it’s just an early alpha, I still want it to make a good impression, especially given the number of people that are checking this blog *gulp* 😉 so while I hate to ‘let you down’ today, I hope to have the alpha released ‘very very soon’ as in no more than a few days at most. I work a regular job and I have a family, so I don’t always have a lot of time to devote, but I hope you’ll agree that .225 will be the start of an amazing journey into what I hope will someday become the most innovative space 4X game ever made.

Thank you for your support, and check back very soon!

Steve