[Game Update] - 565965

Update Information:

Hi everyone!

It's time to start public testing for our Song of the Moo update!

Both the base game and Spaced Out! DLC are getting big improvements to the Gassy Moo's utility for this update, as well as new elements, buildings, cosmetic skins and food recipes.

The Gassy Moo now has the ability to summon new Gassy Moos to the asteroid, once they've consumed enough Gas Grass. They also produce a new liquid element called Brackene, which can be extracted at the new Milking Station building. Colonies that don't have Gassy Moos can produce Brackene using the new Plant Pulverizer.

Duplicants can drink Brackene at the Water Cooler, while critters get it from the new Critter Fountain. In both cases, it's a mood booster.

Brackene can be converted into Brackwax (solid) at the new Brackwax Gleaner and applied to Transit Tubes—or to Dupes themselves—to speed up tube travel. Brackwax can also be used to make Plastium (solid), a new plastic-like material with much higher heat resistance. 

We've also added a new Bleach Stone Hopper that converts Salt and Gold into Bleach Stone, reworked all of the Critter Traps, made Raw Egg edible, added two new egg-based recipes, added subcategories to the Supply Closet, and more.

Thank you for helping us with the testing process! Please share your feedback here and report bugs here. We read it all! 

Here’s what you’ll find in the update so far: 

Features

• All versions
  • Gassy Moos can now call friends from space when well fed.
  • Added new elements Brackene, Frozen Brackene, Brackwax, Plastium.
  • Added Milking Station building.
  • Added Brackwax Gleaner building
  • Added Bleach Stone Hopper building
  • Added Plant Pulverizer building
  • Added Critter Fountain building
  • Added recipe for Soufflé Pancakes to Electric Grill.
  • Added recipe for Mushroom Quiche to Gas Range.
  • Added recipe for Plastium to the Molecular Forge.

Changes and Improvements

• All versions
  • Traps
    • Newly constructed Critter Traps, Fish Traps, and Airborne Critter Traps are now rearmable and have new artwork.
    • Existing traps in saves have been deprecated but still function.
    • Critter Trap can now also catch Pacus flopping on the ground.
    • Critter Trap is now 2 tiles tall.
    • Traps are now built from raw metal instead of plastic.
  • Gas Grass 
    • No longer requires an atmosphere to grow.
    • Now requires 10,000 lux to grow, instead of 20,000 lux. 
    • Gas Grass now wilts instead of sleeps when its illumination requirement isn’t met.
    • Gas Grass now requires 25 kg dirt per cycle in addition to its liquid chlorine requirement.
  • Gassy Moos
    • Will call a new Gassy Moo to join them on the asteroid when they reach 100% “Accu-moo-lation.”
    • Produce Brackene when fed.
  • Improved the responsiveness of critters being called for grooming. 
  • Improved the responsiveness of critters to all tasks by increasing the frequency of brain updates.
  • Flying critters now avoid idling on space exposed locations that are significantly elevated above the asteroid’s surface.
  • Raw Egg is now edible.
  • Egg Cracker building now has an input logic port to disable the building
  • The overcrowded effect on critter happiness now scales with the number of excess critters in the space.
  • Water Coolers can be configured to dispense Brackene instead of plain water, providing an additional +2 Morale boost and -15%/cycle stress reduction effect.
  • Transit Tube Access can now be configured to use Brackwax to boost Duplicant travel speed in tubes.
  • Puftlet Prince now affects egg chances of other critters in the same room in the same way the adult Puft Prince already did.
  • Increased the length of the Ate From Feeder effect to 2 cycles to improve the rate at which Pacu are tamed when fed seeds. 
  • Logic Bridges and Logic Gates can overlap where there are no overlapping ports.
  • The lesser morale "Park" effect no longer stomps the "Nature Reserve" effect when a Duplicant passes through a Park.
  • Meteors
    • Added Meteor Shower diagnostic for active bombardment.
    • Meteors are now spawned higher above the buildable area, which allows meteor blasters to target them earlier. 
    • It is now possible to configure the types of meteors that the Meteor Blaster targets.
    • Improved meteor shower sound mixing.
    • Meteors destroyed by Blast Shots now return 25% of the resources they would have dropped on collision with a tile.
  • Supply Closet
    • Default clothing and atmosuit outfit items now have icons representing what they will look like.
    • Default outfits for Duplicants should now show a mannequin wearing that outfit in the Wardrobe screen.
    • Adjusted Supply Closet item categorization for better organization.
    • Improved UI feedback in the item drop screen when the app is having difficulty communicating with the item server.
• Base game only
  • Added turning sounds to the Telescope animation.
  • Organic Mass space destination now yields more Gas Grass and Gassy Moos.
• Spaced Out! only
  • Added Mellow Mallow and Bliss Burst to care packages.
  • Adjusted Telescope animation.
  • Added turning sounds to both Telescopes.
  • Added Grubfruit Plant Seed care package.
  • Care packages for seeds, food, critters, and eggs which require you to first discover them are now available after cycle 500.

Fixes

• All versions
  • Improved Conduction Panel heat transfer algorithm for stronger and more consistent conductivity
  • When a Space Scanner detects an object or meteor shower in advance, it will stay green until the object has arrived or the meteor shower ends.
  • Fixed issue causing Space Scanners to briefly output the wrong automation signal when a save is loaded.
  • Critter animations no longer freeze after eating or pooping.
  • Plant illumination requirement no longer fails if it's an exact lux match.
  • Added option to forbid mutant seeds on the Spice Grinder.
  • Fixed a bug where the Pitcher Pump straw visual was left behind in place when moving the cursor while trying to place it.
  • Fixed diagnostics tooltips sometimes missing information.
  • Fixed Super Focused icon layering issue.
  • Fixed outfit item tooltips sometimes incorrectly saying "My colony doesn't have any of these yet."
  • Fixed door on the Telescope shifting over in the rotation animation.
  • Fixed missing Duplicant mouths in ladder and Firepole sleeping animations.
  • Fixed missing Duplicant mouth in Atmosuit Dock’s equip suit animation.
  • Skill Scrubber animation handles Duplicants wearing suits better, so they don’t stick out when being scrubbed.
  • Fixed missing hair when a Duplicant is triggering a Banshee Wail stress response.
  • Fixed a hair issue when a Duplicant wearing a hat wakes up while sleeping on the floor.
  • Fixed an issue where food could briefly appear on a Duplicant's back after they finished eating.
  • Fixed issues with the Ancient Specimen story trait popups.
  • Fixed issue where Duplicants working the Fossil Quarry were missing some parts of the chisel.
  • Added art for 2 hats that had missing upward angled hat view.
  • A Duplicant using the Virtual Planetarium now displays their name label in the correct location.
  • Fixed a crash on startup that can happen if a custom outfit is made with the same name as a predefined outfit.
• Base game only
  • Critters now stay wrangled when leaving the Biological Cargo Bay.
• Spaced Out! only
  • Fixed issue causing radiation intensity to increase after being blocked by radiation shielding materials
  • Fixed crash that could occur when a Rover attempted to rescue incapacitated Duplicants or Sweepys.
  • Fixed planter sidescreen button sometimes being grayed out erroneously .
  • Fixed an issue where a Duplicant’s eyes disappeared while using the Telescope.
  • Buckets of Conveyor Rails are no longer sometimes visible in the red zone above the buildable area.
  • Supply Teleporter Input can no longer be damaged by meteors like the other teleporters.
  • Fixed issue causing Duplicant name labels to occasionally appear across the boundaries of an asteroid or rocket interior.
  • Fixed rare crash when an interplanetary payload gets into a bad state when saving the game.
     

What is public testing?

"Public testing" means players get to test-drive new content early and give us feedback and suggestions before it goes live. Because this is an unfinished and in active development version of the game, it's pretty likely you'll encounter bugs, crashes or balance issues while playing these builds. We'll try to fix any problems that crop up as quickly as we can, but it's possible you'll lose progress in your games while playing on the Testing branch.

Regarding performance, the Testing branch has additional debugging tools enabled to help us track down crashes. This makes the game run more slowly than the live version of the game.

Please also be aware that once a save is loaded in the Testing branch, it cannot be reopened again in the previous Live branch or previous builds.

What do I do if I find a crash or a bug?

Post it up on the Bug Tracker and we'll fix it as soon as we can. If you can attach a copy of your save file to your report, that helps us even more as we can pinpoint the source of problem more quickly.

Do I have to play the public testing build?

Nope! If you'd prefer to only play a stable build, you can continue to play in the current Default branch until the game launches in full. Playing the Open Testing build isn't necessary, but it helps us a lot to receive your feedback and reports - if you're interested, try it out!

How do I become a public tester?

There's no sign up or registration for becoming an open tester. If you own Oxygen Not Included and want to join the Testing Branch, all you have to do is play the Open Testing build on Steam.

How do I play the public testing build?

You can switch your branch on Steam using the instructions below: