Jasper_1

Dear Noveans,

With the launch behind us, it’s time we give you better insight into our direction of development for Dual Universe.

Before the release, our Creative Director gave an overview of many upcoming game features, and we want to expand on his letter by giving you a more precise look at what we’re working on specifically in our upcoming updates.

We are currently continuing to focus our work on the initial stabilization and resolution of issues following the launch, and we are also working on update 1.1 which we are aiming to release in December.
 
What’s Coming in Update 1.1?
 
Kickstarter Rewards: Part Two

We want to take this opportunity to thank you once again for your incredible support and patience. Kickstarter backers are the supporters that helped start Dual Universe. We’re working hard to deliver your rewards.
 
In update 1.1, you can look forward to the following:

- Two versions of pets, with a total of eight variations.
 
Automata Tier 1: Automata Nora-SP pet_agnes_tier1.mp4
 
Follow us on our social media to see the others in the coming days!
 
Automata Tier 2: Automata Nieve Automata Tier 3: Automata Spud-7 Automata Tier 4: Automata Max-E  Automata Tier 5: Automata Elite  
Anicham Tier 1: Anicham Scrap pet_alex_tier1.mp4
Follow us on our social media to see the others in the coming days!
 
Anicham Tier 2: Anicham Comp Anicham Tier 3: Anicham Max 
- Avatar skins for both body types:
 
(Gold/Sapphire/Ruby/Emerald/Diamond/Kyrium Kickstarter and Founder packs)
Alpha Team outfit
 
Follow us on our social media to see the others in the coming days!

(Silver+ / Contributors / Sponsors / Patrons)
Arkship Passenger outfit (Bronze) Military outfit (Gold+ / Sponsors / Patrons)
Arkship Passenger outfit (Silver) Earth Legacy outfit (Silver)     (Ruby+ / Patrons)
Arkship Passenger outfit (Black) Earth Legacy outfit (Black)
- New emotes:
(Gold+ / Sponsors / Patrons)
Dance
Cry
Thumbs down
 
Follow us on our social media to see the others in the coming days!
 
Thumbs up Just DU it  
(Ruby+ / Patrons)
Victory Threat Facepalm Silly dance Salute  
- In-game titles
 
Features
 
- Grid Snapping: with this feature, when deploying a blueprint, you can snap to the grid of another already placed core, like when placing a Space Core Unit. This feature will help you to align cores perfectly with one another while deploying blueprints.

- Steam Achievements

- Element recycling : dismantling elements back into a portion of their components.

- Eight new talents linked with schematic creation.
 
Looking further into the future, What’s in the 1.2 Update?

- Tactical Map: a visual display providing a tactical view of surrounding constructs detected by your active radar.

- New tools for finding wrecks and a minor revamp of the radar system.
 
- Changes to the Deep Space Asteroid Tracker and the asteroid system.
 
- Adding the ability for repair units to use scrap.
 
- New Orbital Delivery Challenge.
 
----------------------------------------------------------
 
We still have a lot of development planned in the longer term which you can read more about in the letter from our Creative Director, and we hope that we’ve given you a clearer picture of our immediate direction for Dual Universe. We will update you should this planning change significantly, and look forward to hearing your thoughts and feedback in this forum thread.

It’s been an incredible month since launching Dual Universe. We’ve worked hard to address issues, and though we always want to do better, we hope you’ve enjoyed the game so far. All across Helios, wonders are already taking shape as you bring the game to life. We can’t wait to see what you’ll build in the coming months and years. From all of us here at Novaquark, thank you for being a part of our game.

Dear Noveans,
 
We’re going to launch Dual Universe! If you missed our launch announcement live stream, you can watch the replay here, and you can also read on for all the details below.
 
Dual Universe has spent eight years in development, with the past two of those in beta. Our team has delivered industry-leading voxel technology, enabling players to build amazing worlds in a single-shard MMO like no other. We’ve advanced by leaps and bounds, adding systems like asteroid and territory mining, missions, new PvP mechanics, and more reasons to fight, as well as creation systems like the Vertex Precision Tool, new Lua API, and the Exchange for our creators to exhibit their works.
 
In short, we’re proud of what we’ve accomplished and are excited for what is yet to come.

Thank you for walking this road with us so far, and it is with great pleasure that we can finally release the details of the launch with you here today:
Dual Universe is launching on September 27, 2022. To enable the launch, we will close all servers on September 22, 2022, and keep them closed until the launch. All active subscriptions (excluding beta keys and full beta access) will receive 6 days of subscription at launch to compensate for this downtime.
 
Here’s a message from Novaquark’s CEO, Nouredine Abboud, on the launch:
 
STEAM
 

 
We’re launching Dual Universe on Steam! It’s an exciting time for us at NQ as we bring our game to as many players who may enjoy it as possible and give those who prefer it the option to purchase the game on Steam.
 
Our Steam page is already live! You can support us by wishlisting Dual Universe on steam and recommending it to your friends, even if you already have the game!
 
The game will also continue to be available to buy on our website, as well as from our official reseller. And of course, you can still play it on almost any computer via the NVIDIA cloud-based platform, Geforce NOW.
 
FREE TRIAL
 
We will implement a free trial of Dual Universe with the game’s launch, which will be available exclusively on Steam. We’ll have more details on this in future communications, but for those who want to try the game's mechanics without committing to a subscription, we’ve got you covered!
We will be opening a separate server for the free trial to allow anyone the chance to try the game for free without impacting the persistent server. This separate server will be regularly reset.
 

 
The game has come a long way during these two years of beta. We want to give every player, including those of you who stopped playing before the game’s new systems and gameplay loops were introduced, a chance to try them.
 
If you were subscribed to the game at any point during the beta, and your subscription has lapsed, we’re adding two weeks of game time on your account from the 27th of September. These two weeks will give you full access to the main universe. Come see what the game has to offer at launch; it’s on us! 
 
A NEW HELIOS
 
The launch will come with some welcome additions to the game. A major one is that we’re upgrading planets. The launch is a great chance for us to bring the game's worlds to life more and to breathe more identity into them. As NQ-Sirg has described before in Ask Aphelia, we had built the Helios system for the launch of Beta and didn’t have as much time as we would have liked to make fleshed-out, living worlds. 
 
If you want a sneak peek at some of these changes, you can see them in the replay of our launch announcement live stream. 
 
This upgrade means you will see new biomes that feel more vibrant and alive. Players will initially have access to:
 
Alioth + Sanctuary + Haven (+ Moon 1 + Moon 4) Jago Teoma Madis (+ Moons 1, 2, and 3)
 
Thades (+ Moons 1 and 2)  

 
 
We’ll add more improved worlds back into the game in several phases. Please note that the release order below is still subject to change.
 

 
We are also adding more planetary body types into the game! The asteroid belts of Thades will be replaced with new, bigger asteroids which can now be claimed by players. We hope to introduce more claimable rocks around Helios after the launch.

BLUEPRINTS
 
Whether you’ve got a small holding or a sprawling, multi-core space station, rebuilding after the reset will be easier with better blueprint deployment tools. As a reminder, you will keep your core blueprints after the reset, so we wanted to make your life easier when deploying them at launch. We have already added pre-visualization to blueprints with the ability to finely move their placement using keyboard controls. We’re also adding three new features at launch and in the first patch after the launch:
 
 
SNAPPING - When deploying a blueprint, you can snap to the grid of another, already placed core, like when placing a Space Core Unit. Along with pre-visualization and keyboard controls, this will allow you to perfectly align cores with one another while deploying blueprints. HONEYCOMB SWAPS - You can now change any honeycomb type inside of a blueprint with any other of your choosing. ELEMENT OMISSION - You can now opt to deploy blueprints with elements missing should you lack them or to simply choose different elements to omit from deployment by choice.  
COSMETICS
 
Another addition to the launch is better cosmetics. We’re adding the much-requested purple plastic and colored luminescent honeycomb. Our newly announced Pioneer Packs will reward beta players and backers with collectible items only available to them as a thank you for helping to bring the game to life. We’re also building on the NOVEAN OVERVIEW to help players better manage their customizations and skins, with much more cosmetic and quality of life improvements to come!
 
KICKSTARTER REWARDS
 
In-game Kickstarter rewards will start being rolled out at launch, and we will share details about them in a dedicated communication. It will include topics such as how to update your physical-reward delivery address and how to claim your in-game rewards.
 
However, there is one piece of news that we want to share with you here. It’s an exciting time for any game developer when the project you have devoted years of your life to comes to fruition. We can already confirm that our Crowdfunding backers will be able to finally see their names in the credits at launch. 
 
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Launching Dual Universe is the start of a new chapter in the game’s story, a story that we as developers and you, our community, are writing together. We still have much to do, and we’re more excited now than ever to deliver a game that can live up to Dual Universe’s incredible potential.
 
If you have questions about the launch, please send them to us here so that we can answer them in a dedicated episode of Ask Aphelia.
You can also share your thoughts and feedback with us in this dedicated forum thread.
 
Thanks again to our players for an incredible journey so far. We can't wait to continue it with you.

The core explosion is cute and all, but I feel you guys should make the effect so large that it can be seen from far, far away - up to 2su. It would be cool if you could see someone's core explode after you kill them in pvp. As it is, no one is going to see that effect - not the aggressor, and of course not the person who got destroyed.
 
If NQ wants to really improve the visuals of a battle, you guys need to render all weapon effects for everyone on the battlefield. It would make things so much cooler and interactive if we could see crisscrossing lasers and railguns everywhere.
 
I'm looking forward to the SSGI/SSAO. Ship interiors have long been too dark, even with many lights placed. Hopefully it works as advertised in those infographics. It didn't seem to do much on the PTS.

Are you ready for some PTS fun? Then join us on April 1st for our Fool’s Defense event!
 
Think you have what it takes to take down our Novaquark space station? Will you dare to be so bold as to attempt to try and destroy a station that has a Novaquark crew commanding it? We dare you, in fact we triple dare all of you to try your best shots!
 
When: Friday, April 1st 14:00 UTC Where: PTS Server  Who: All Noveans are welcome  
HOW THIS EVENT WORKS
 
Come test the Athena update with the devs! Join us on the PTS server at 14:00 UTC on April 1st. (Not a joke)
Upon logging in to the PTS server, players will need to head to one of these locations:
Alioth’s Institute facility (::pos{0,2,28.9207,95.1440,285.7015}) in order to teleport to 
PvP Platform 1 (::pos{0,0,-2064601.9141,-1118885.7306,-120876.5855}) where you will be able to claim a ship, weapons and ammunition there to prepare for the fight to come!
 
From there, you’ll be able to get equipped and meet up with your team members, or create your own groups to organize your plan of attack and prepare for the battle. Alternatively, you can bring your own ships to recruit a team or bring your friends!
 
Be aware and plan for sabotage or traitors, willing to take on the community in defense of NOVAQUARK! Remember, this will be in PvP space, where everyone is fair game. A Resurrection Node will be publicly available to all, at the PvP Platform.

PRIZES, WHAT ABOUT PRIZES?
 
Winner(s) will then have a chance at spinning the Wheel of Foolish Fortune for their chance at some great (and not so great) prizes. The wheel will randomly decide!
The items rewards will be given on the regular beta server.
 

 
Stay foolish, captains!
 
Give us your thoughts on this event here!

With current shields and CCS mechanics it's encouraging playes to fly on different ships, not as a one big crew.
Because you can have big ship with 40 mil CCS and 20 mil shields for two gunners, or you can have two different ships with 20 mil CCS and 20 mil shields each. (Which would result in more total HP)
 
As DU is an MMO it should encourage players to fly together as a crew (at least that's how I see MMOs), but that's not the case currently. Will that be changed?

With demeter weapons balancing this is how DPS from one gunner seat looks like currently. (considering max handling/ops talents).

In changelog you guys said 
 
But as you can see from the graph, that's definitely not the case, railguns are not dominating long-range. They are doing more DPS only on 1.9+su range, and that's not possible to hold that distance in active combat with only 2 su visibility and lock ranges.

This is how DPS graph would look like if you lower the required PvP-Capacity of railguns by only 2.5% so we can fit 4 railguns in one seat. Now you can clearly see that railguns will have most dps on ranges 1.4+su which for me sounds like it should have been.


 
So now to the question:
Will we see proper weapon balancing in near future?

Is there any news on the topic of unlimited org creating?
 
And wil there be in the future something to clean up tiles and ships from player that are non-active for like a couple of months and have no active subscription or beta key?
 
(Solution for this send a mail with warning couple of times. Then abandoned it)
 
When will the auto mine release is that any time soon or will that be over a couple of months.
 
And can the astroids maybe spawn the whole  week and give and timer when they disappear so the same as now but then the whole week fresh astroids.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

We recently announced that an additional update, Ares, was added to our public roadmap. Many of the features and changes for Ares will be available on our public test server (PTS), when it is updated and back online tomorrow, September 15th, at 10.00 UTC. (See the roadmap here.)
 
In that announcement, we promised a devblog that would talk about the big-ticket items we plan to deliver with Ares: the new Core Combat Stress victory condition, more functionality for shields, and PVP-related fixes. (Inside Ares, Part Two will cover warp improvements as well as boarding and docking changes. Watch for it on Thursday.) 
 
Without further ado, let’s dive in! 

CORE COMBAT STRESS 
In a nutshell, core combat stress represents a core's ability to keep functioning under prolonged weapons fire. A core unit that takes too much stress will be destroyed and will be considered a PvP destruction.
 
Core combat stress will be used as a second loss condition on constructs during PvP, working in tandem with generic core unit destruction. It does not matter which one happens first, only that one happens eventually. This will allow us to support larger fights and ensure that everyone's weapons are doing damage, even if it is only against core stress.
 
Stress will be accumulated as the construct takes non-shield weapons hits, taking the form of a gauge that starts at 0% and goes up to 100%. Non-shield hits on a construct will make the gauge go up. The core stress gauge is affected by a weapon's raw damage and is unaffected by the resistances of the element or material the attack hit.
 
Example: A weapon hit does 1,000 thermic damage. It hits an element with 50% thermic resistance doing 500 damage to the element; however, the core stress gauge will count 1,000 damage for that hit.
 
When the core stress gauge hits 100%, the core unit will be destroyed and will be considered a PvP destruction (as if it was destroyed by a weapons hit) and everything that implies.
 
The value of the stress gauge will be defined by the following:
The base of the core stress gauge value will be the health sum of honeycomb materials on your construct. The quality of the material used will provide multipliers to the value. Higher honeycomb tiers will provide better multipliers. The type of material used will provide a different multiplier, with products having a better multiplier than pure materials.   
Finally, the stress gauge will gain health linearly with honeycomb until a cap, at which point additional honeycomb will have diminishing returns.

SHIELDS v2
The fundamentals for shields were unveiled in this devblog and made their initial debut with the Apollo update in August. The time has come to increase their potency and value with some new features. 
 
Shields v2 brings adjustable resistances and venting. 
 
Adjustable resistances Shields have a base resistance value of 10/10/10/10 with an additional resistance pool of 60% that players can assign in 5% increments to any of the four resistances. (Examples: 10/10/10/70 or 25/25/25/25) Once players have locked in their resistance selections, those choices will be active and cannot be changed until the cooldown time of 60 seconds has expired, at which time the resistances will remain as set unless they are recalibrated. Shields UI will display which resistances are taking the most damage on the shield, allowing pilots to make an informed decision regarding the settings. Venting Pilots may vent their shields at any point, the exception being when the venting cooldown is active. Cooldown duration varies per size, with smaller shield variants having lower cooldowns. Venting shields will do two things: Turn off the shields, bearing in mind that they can’t be active during venting.  Begin shield regeneration of a certain percentage per second.  Venting may be deactivated at any time. Deactivation will occur automatically when shields have reached maximum capacity.   
We highly encourage pilots to explore the use of shields and venting while it’s available on PTS. Since there’s a bit of a learning curve involved, the test environment is the perfect place to experiment freely without any real cost to your ship on the Live server. 
 
PVP FIXES
We’re closing the loop on some “unintended” uses of these game mechanics. 
Speed Resume deactivated on construct death: When a core is destroyed, that construct will be incapable of benefitting from speed resume in any way. This will avoid and fix various exploits in regards to “ghost-riding” destroyed ships into safe zones. Offline player deaths on construct death: Offline players on constructs will now be killed on core destruction. This will avoid logging off characters that can then log back in, repair the core unit, and attempt to flee.   
Originally, the plans also included a change that would cause ownership loss on core unit crash destruction. Thanks to our intrepid PTS players who tried it out and promptly let us know the problems such a change could cause, we pulled it from the Ares update. (Read the related post from the Game Design team’s NQ-Entropy.) 
 
This is exactly why we have a test server and why we value those who do reconnaissance there before the updates are released on the Live server. We offer sincere thanks to the players who took the time to give us candid, constructive feedback. 
 
SEE YA THURSDAY
Inside Ares, Part Two will be published on Thursday. While you’re waiting, why not head over to the forum and share your thoughts about Part One? 
 

Sharing with the team!

Last updated July 13th  2022


As reporting a bug usually is a process with no feedback and as picking talents usually means hoping they actually work, here is a public bug list. If you want anything added, please describe them clearly. No need to be salty towards me, I am just the salty guy who wants them fixed or at least known, too.
Do not spread exploits. There are plenty of exploits, I would love to make them all public for a level playing field, but it is against the TOS. So as I want to keep my list, please no exploit talk at all!
 
 
 
Talent related:
 
Crafting

-plenty of text is wrong, like exceptional parts manufacturer claiming to decrease crafting time for functional parts, it works however. 
-[tier] product refining description is for honeycomb, but works . 
 
Piloting
 
-increasing foil lift via piloting talents (not handling) do not change sustentation speed(with full talents your true sust speed is therefore 82% of what is displayed)
 
 
Gameplay related
 
Industry/crafting
 
 
-So many more unknown server errors leading to random machine stops, especially after maintenance
-HC nanocrafter inconsistencies, like galvanized black iron can not be nanocrafted
-t2+ Hovers and Boosters have the schematic price|craft duration|assembler need|materials needed of the of the one bigger version. In other words, while basic verts and hovers L cost as much as an M engine, t2+hovers and boosters L cost as much as an L engine of the same tier. Likely caused by the mixed naming conventions for all elements
 
Ships/piloting
 
-Diagonal (as seen from the front) elements add crosssection based on their max coordinates they cover. As in, the game checks the difference between their highest and lowest X value, highest and lowest Z value, multiplies them, and that is the cross section of the element. In simpler terms: If you place a wing diagonally, in order to get a little lift and a little stabilization, it has as much cross section as an upright, rectangular box that covers it. 
-Elements also have different cross section depending on where exactly they are, a horizontal Wing S does not add to cross section if placed on a z coordinate ending on .5   
-configuring pilot seat resets connections and autoconnects different parts. Sadly never my gyro. 
-When the default configuring has too many possible links, it states it skips autoconnection, but instead just connects as much as it can and then continues. I wish it actually did skip auto connect.
-Airbrakes produce a down (relative to craft) force when active. To repro, just glide down while holding brakes and pitch down about 45° (brakeland, while facing downwards).
-Cruise control can hold retro brake active at close to zero speed, compared to holding breakes manually (test by comparing normal brake holding, 6km over Alioth, vs cruise control set to zero). 
-Collisions with environment are checked client side, same for mass of construct, position etc.
-As long as you are above 3420meter (space engine can activate) and 6270 meters (space engine generally can be active at 100%) your space engines only generate as much power, as your atmo engines facing the same direction have max power. Cruise control does not have the issue. (numbers used for Alioth)
-G-values in build helper do not factor in docked constructs
-the build helper function that shows blind passengers can be bypassed
-Landing with a tilted core craft which has a docked construct often leads to fun explosions.
 
 
Trade/markets
 
-Notifications do not include size of item (can be found in the log though, press "O"). 
-"View market page" only works for items in the market container
 
Other UI

-Setting something as destination while in VR often gives wrong position once out of VR.
-opening a notification log with more than 10k entries freezes the game for seconds, it re-freezes every time a new notifaction pops up while notifications still open, until you finally manage to set it to "last 24h" or similar.
Update, notifications now get auto deleted regulary.
-Bookmarks, pffff. Somebody ping me if they properly work, I will stop checking.
-trying to put something into a full container displays message "not enough space in active container"
 
 
Other
 
-using a LUA parameter with a decimal comma instead of decimal point (damn Germans) will ignore the comma and the numbers behind it, run normal otherwise but the LUA parameter will not be displayed anymore to be edited, as the the whole export part is skipped, too. (LUA issue, not DU specific, DU should still throw an error). 
-canopy windshield triangle M and L have wrong mass and volume. 
-"brick product" is called "brick honeycomb"
-VR Stations, gunner or pilot seats, get stuck on "in use" and can not be used anymore. Ask a GM in the help channel or try this: place a fresh seat, enter it, alt+f4, log in again.
-Not being allowed to board a construct may keep you from coming close enough to rightclick-report it.
-Linked container fluctuates out of range if you have no talents (or in vr), even well within the 250 meters, if you are on the same construct as the container. Workaround: Have a dynamic core with a container to link to, at your base.
-Nanopack volume talent works in VR
-Some ships in the flight challenge have full buffs, not sure if intended.
-Elements deactivated for supposed clipping often re-"clip" after maintencance, or if a copy is made via blueprint.
 
 
Mining
 
-Multiple people mining the same spot causes errors
 
Technical issues
 
Account/Billing
 
-revoked keys and gametime run out show error 106 on log in
 
Performance
 
Game hugs all RAM sooner or later, client has to wait for server info to be allowed to show frames, aka, framerate stutters at idle GPU.
 
Settings

-Borderless can not be stretched to cover a full screen with game resolution set smaller than screen resolution. Workaround: Set screen to reolution you want to run DU at.

23: Use cool ship physics to build a huge hover race track for players to have fun on
24: make friends and trade to get whatever you need in the new industry economy
25: make gliding simulator game with points system that can be played with friends
26: finish beautiful structure....no....it's never quite finished
27: have a brief session mining out a mega node to finance the next 2 weeks of game play...a bit boring but you got to earn somehow
28: open main race stadium to public on VR machines
29: visit friend's mercenary bar on the north pole to see how it is coming along
30: make a deal to have 200,000L of crater soil from Madis delivered to your race track on Alioth to make the 'Madis Hairpin'
31: visit friends parking platform near the market to see how they are getting along
32: spend two hours trying to help a random new guy move his whole base form Sanctuary to Alioth.
33: Come to forums. Shake head. Leave forums.
 
?

Dear Noveans,
 
We would like to address the recent speculations that have arisen in our community, and openly disclose some changes that are happening at Novaquark.
 
First and foremost, Novaquark continues to be supported by its long term investors to allow it to launch Dual Universe in line with its original vision. It also puts us in a position to attract experienced talent to complement the team that’s already in place so that we can continue to improve the game.
 
Next week, we will share with you what we think our priorities should be for Dual Universe and how we hope to approach the development of the game with improved processes going forward.
 
An important change to note is that Jean-Christophe, the founder of Novaquark, has transitioned from the day-to-day management of the team to better focus on his position as a board member. Over the years since the creation of Novaquark, JC designed and set the standards for the structural and conceptual foundation of the game, and he feels now that a solid base is there for him to move forward as a strategic advisor. The recent changes in the administrative presidency of the company only reflect the transition of JC to his new role. We’re excited to have the team he has built deliver on his vision for the game.
 
Rest assured that Novaquark’s future is in good hands, and there is a strong partnership between our long-term investors and our team. We believe that the future is bright for the game and for the company, and we cannot wait to tell you where we want to take Dual Universe.
 
With our warmest regards,
The Novaquark team