The team continued work on our autonomous eyes-in-the-skies this week, and made some great progress. The drones now have fuel and refueling logic. Sometime soon they will occasionally need to make trips to a refueling area, giving players brief windows of anonymity. We added Kantan Charts so they will be able to display graphs in the HUD, and cleaned up the drone restarter code to ensure that their coverage of game action is maximized. We also found and fixed a number of bugs including: the drone getting stuck in the tops of trees, problems with moving to new areas properly, a bug where the drone could get confused on which state to be in when too high off the ground, and becoming stuck in place when reaching an interest level of 0, while searching for targets. We had one incidence when the drone ended up stuck in the comm tower base area like a bird in a mall. It wasn’t compelling viewing.
We completed the first pass at a new drone HUD as well. We want the HUD to display useful information for players, but not cram the view with so much that it distracts from the quality and detail of the camera itself. The new HUD contains: a compass, altimeter, various stat tracking widgets, CPU/GPU stats, information about the drone state, and an area for various messages. You can check out all of the various improvements and the new HUD on our YouTube page.
As we fill out the map around the social hub of the game, the Thorcon Power Plant, we’ll soon be working on some of our most densely packed neighborhoods. The team is making sure the parks are sufficiently foreboding, giving them just the right amount of half-working street lights and dilapidated trappings of society. We’re making a materials pass over everything too. Soon metal objects will spark and wood will chip when you hit it because you’re a bad shot, or just like shooting everything.
We’re working on torches and campfires to make sure that the light is visible from a distance at night and the fire gives off smoke. We looked at a few more concept designs for decals, signs, and decorations. We finalized a look for a few crafting items, some new weapons, and the player bank. The team has also made good progress on a procedural foliage tool. Along with our building and road system, we can fill out areas quickly and efficiently with great looking places to explore, and lush environments. Here’s a look at a few areas filled in with the foliage system.
Finally, don’t forget that we’re giving away a XFX AMD Radeon RX 570 RS 8GB. The contest lasts for another 13 days, ending on February 13th. There are multiple ways to enter including joining the Fractured Veil discord server, and reserving your player name.
