Alpha 0.5

A massive update to the game just in time for the Steam Next Fest. Included is the new faction selection screen, a rework of the defense system, T3 buildings, and a bunch of changes/bug fixes to the game.

The faction selection screen shows the different factions you can play as and the systems they have. Each faction has two systems unique to them and then have a couple of the basic systems as well. Only the Terran Remnants is playable in this version, the other factions will be available in the full game once we actually get them ready.

Defense has been reworked to improve how it plays and feels. Before each slot had its own countdown and this led to players not wanting to kill enemies as they would basically just come right back. Now there is a single countdown for the system and a new enemy will just be added to the first open slot. This way you can clear them out and not be punished for it. We have also removed the armor system from the enemy ships. This was a patch to the problem of having to click an enemy a bunch of time times and having to wait for all the laser shots but it just added confusion to the system. Now you can click multiple times or click and hold to add more points to the laser and fire a single larger beam to do the damage all at once.

T3 buildings have been added to the game. These are even more expensive but stronger than the T2s. The costs of several T2s have also been adjusted to make them more interesting and balance things a bit. Wonders are now built on a T3 building and have been adjusted accordingly to make them more powerful and more expensive.

Changes:

• Added T3 Buildings. Wonders are now built on T3s instead of T2s and some T3 unlocks have been added in various places.
• Defense System rework. Changed how the ships come in and how you fight them.
• Added a new boss to the defense system, the command ship, and made changes to the health, arrival times, and effects of the most ships.
•  Random points earned as a reward from a particular system will now always turn into other points instead of points for that same system.
• Change the planet selector panel to be a select then confirm style instead of just clicking on the one you want.
• Removed the text tutorial in favor of more visual guidance on what to do next.
• The exploration 'Open Grid' button now glows and pulses when the player can explore a new tile.
• Reduced how quickly the cost of new exploration missions grows.
• Added a highlight around the wellness containers when you can select a bonus to make it easier to tell.
• Adjusted the change of new planets having extra slots, resources, or points and increased the total value of new planets.
• Increased the chance of a new planet having a special effect from 20% to 33%.
• Space mines have been buffed to start at 6 defense instead of 5 defense.
• Moved the planet displays for the tech researched popup and the exploration event popup to be within the popups themselves instead of above it. Also changed the tech popup to display the planet earned when researching a tech that grants a new planet.
• The new building selection panel has been updated with a new design and now has you select and then confirm which building you want. In addition the selected building's details are now shown right in the panel instead of needing to view the tooltip for it.
• The wonder unlock panel now shows the wonder details right in the panel.
• Buffed the +1 random points tech to now give +2 random points.
• Increased the community storage wellness bonus to give 2 storage instead of 1.
• Added notification messages to exploration tiles to indicate why a tile cant be explored.
• Added indicators to the exploration panel for how many secrets of the universe you have found.

Fixes:

• Fixed an issue where Space Mines would become depleted a turn late
• Fixed an issue where the crisis bar would continue flashing as if you were about to lose even after clearing one of the active crises.
• Fixed an issue that prevented the wellness system panel from glowing when you had a reward to select.
• Fixed an issue with the Community Studies bonus where it was mixed up between the selected tech and the earliest tech. This could result in a tech becoming marked as researched without the following techs being made available.
• Fixed one of the later techs not actually reducing the cost of new missions.
• Fixed an issue when trying to reveal empty exploration nodes when the player got the tech which reveals what all the tiles are. Now it properly reveals empty tiles as being empty.
• Planets in revolt will no longer show the radial selection when mousing over them and will tell the player why they cant build on it.
• Fixed the mercenaries exploration event showing science instead of defense for the second option. (Visual issue only)