First off, I would like to start this news post off with some big news. Yesterday, GGLucas officially announced Star Ruler 2's first expansion (let's hope it's not the last, right?) and even dropped a screenshot to tease everyone! (Technically speaking, the expansion was announced back in April - but at that point it was just a 'what we plan to do before we close down'. Now it's confirmed! :D)
Details are still few and far between, but here's what we do know:
- Blind Mind Studios is still going down, as previously announced, but if the expansion is successful enough, they'll still be able to support SR2.
- In multiplayer, if the host has the expansion enabled (whether it can be disabled is unknown), everyone will automatically have it enabled, regardless of whether they bought it or not. No community fracturing here.
- Any new capabilities introduced by the expansion will be open to modders regardless of whether they have the expansion. How mods will handle the base-expansion divide, if at all, has not yet been disclosed. (Personally, I hope/expect that there won't be any need for ABEM to have separate downloads, but that could just be wishful thinking on my part.)
The original announcement can be found here.
Now, on to the ABEM stuff:
After months of a tiresome quasi-beta, ABEM got another major patch. I'll only outline the major differences here, because I don't have full patch notes yet. (Even if I did, I won't forcibly subject you to reading/scrolling through what has got to be at least two pages of content, and will be posting them up in the dedicated Steam thread instead. [EDIT: Patch notes are here! Took two posts to upload them, too.])
- Reclusive Ringworlders changed to Vanguard (Ringworlder) and revamped with new game mechanics such as planet harvesting and a preset called the 'Bluuhbi'.
- Vanguard Victory introduced for all Vanguard races. (Currently, only the Ringworlder variant is available, but more are intended to arrive later - they're the Vanguard's vanguard. :P)
- Sensors added; place sensors on your ships to see into the void of space. (This is a critical component, as your base sight range is pretty low.)
- Remnant Guardians now protect a powerful 'Guardian Facility' in addition to a Hubworld.
- Exposed various game configuration options and added a few new ones.
The download is currently functional on the ModDB side of things and on the Steam Workshop. GitHub's acting up a little, so that download isn't ready yet. (Not that I expect it particularly matters.)
Users of the 'experimental build' on Steam should switch to Alarcarr's stable upload at their earliest convenience; the game won't understand that they are supposed to be the exact same mod when you're trying to play multiplayer.
