2009 was a long year in the development of TA:ESC, but we made significant strides in improving gameplay and balance, added new units and features, and also grew the community. We started the year wrapping up the 1.x Betas and after a long delay worked our way through the Beta 3.x series. With Beta 4.0, we’re finally nearing the end of major Arm and Core development and can begin in earnest for 2010 the addition of the Talon race.
No doubt over the next month or two we’ll need to make some modifications (and possibly add a few units) to Beta 4.x, but overall we’re quite pleased with how things have progressed and hope y'all are as well. We we're hoping to release all of our planned units with 4.x, but a couple of last minute problems surfaced and we'd rather wait and get the last batch right (even for a beta release) before releasing. Regardless there are, of course, a multitude of tweaks and fixes listed below, but the major features for 4.0 include the new fully automatic teleporting gates, the Arm Olympus, as well as the inclusion of all new floating hover-plants which along with classic hover-plants can now be built by the commander again.
2010 is here at last so don’t hesitate to download and get those games started ASAP. As always, don’t be shy about posting your thoughts as well as feedback!
New Units
- Arm Classified Fabricator – Builds Arm Olympus
- Arm Olympus – Mobile Nuclear LOS cannon
- Arm Floating Hover Plant
- Core Floating Hover Plant
Bugs/Issues
- Shields may not work properly in FFA games or with saved games
- Fixed undetectable crawling bombs when underwater - now detectable via sonar
- Added missing corpses to various units
- Fixed missing reclaim on Core MLV
- Fixed temporary free Energy boost when upgrading Fusion and Super Fusion Reactors
Corrections
Changes
- Removed option to build fully upgraded units (Viper, Ambusher, Buzzsaw, etc)
- Moved Resource Generators to Level 1, doubled Energy output to 200 (Metal output is still 1)
- Reduced all transport costs by 25%
- Added automatic loading/unloading to teleporting Galactic Gates
- Increased Shield Generator costs
- Moved Core Immolator back to Level 2, improved armor and firepower
- Reduced Level 3 main battle tanks and Raptor / Krogoth about 5%
- Increased Wind Generator Metal costs slightly
- Increased Moho and Mantle Extractor output (to 8 and 32 respectively)
- Increased Metal Maker Energy use back to 100 (from 80)
- Increased Metal Extractor Energy use to 10 (from 5)
- Reduced Moho Metal Maker Metal output to 12 (from 15), reduced death explosion
- Reduced Fusion adjacency Energy bonus from +1500 to +1000
- Lowered Fusion Energy build costs
- Lowered Geothermal armor
- Removed cloaking from Aurora and Manticore due to 'blocking' bugs, both units are now stealth instead
- Removed stealth from advanced bombers, improved armor
- Decreased Arm and Core Destroyer health
- Removed stealth from Arm Panther
- Lowered Energy cost and build time for the Arm Gorgon
- Increased Core Immolator armor and firepower, removed cloaking
- Simplified mines to Large Area, Light Damage / Small Area, High Damage / Medium Area, Medium Damage / Nuclear
- Moved Core Hammerhead to Capital Shipyard (Level 3)
- Moved Level 4 Factories to Level 3 construction vehicle build menu
- Added Level 2 factory build options to Level 3 construction vehicle build menu (2nd page)