The Beta is coming news

This means all core features and content will be in the game and we can finally focus entirely on stability, bug-fixing and polish. (Features and content may still be added in the future, but not until after a full stable 1.0 release)

I won't give an exact date for the beta release because it will depend on how smoothly things go, but it will be in a few weeks from now, probably early February. Here are the details:

NEW WORLD (0.80.0)
Due to the sheer size of the new map the first release will be restricted to a certain area only. This area will gradually expand with more updates, but the main focus now is going to be on stability and polish.

Content:

• Entirely new world map. More detailed and polished, new factions, new content, things to explore. Its' like Kenshi 2. Crazy. I should have called it Kenshi 2 and charged for it again, but I didn't. Damn.
• Entirely revamped research tech-tree, new technologies and balance.
• Totally new buildings. Multiple floors, and you can mount turrets on the rooftops.
• New power system. Generators require fuel, wind power fluctuates with the wind strength, batteries compensate for fluctuations.
• Revamped farming system and different crops.
• New animals, and new races with own strengths and weaknesses.
• There's water now. Rivers to cross and oceans to drown in.
• Camping- You can build easy camp beds and fires for survival when travelling
• Bandit camps, somewhere for them to retreat to and stage assaults.

Gameplay:

• Buildings are now made with multiple materials. Machinery requires iron and sometimes copper.
• Thievery is improved, buildings have things to steal, guards are more alert.
• NPCs use the stuff in their homes, guards train, people sit etc
• Guards in buildings and shops now descreetly sort of follow you about, keeping an eye on you
• Fixed getting busted for stealing from accidental clicks. You can look inside unlocked containers, and lock picking has to be chosen through the right-click menu.
• Reduced labour/engineering speed penalty at level 1 from 0.25x to 0.5x. This will speed things up slightly at the lower levels when starting out
• Stealth skill is easier to train in non-hostile environments.
• Increased trade profitability by 50%, this combined with thievery should provide decent alternatives to looting as a profession in the early game stage.
• Leather crafting now requires you to hunt for animal skins
• Tons of bugfixes.

Engine:

• New fancy shadow system, looks nicer and more importantly runs faster.
• New terrain engine. Runs faster, looks nicer and shows more detail for distant mountains
• A lot of fundamental engine optimisations have been done, this may temporarily cause new bugs, but hopefully speed things up
• Overhauled with a new PBR & HDR global lighting system, should make a great improvement to the visual quality -(Credit for this goes to Linda MacGill and Igor Frolov of Bug Zen!)