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For the supporter packs to be cheaper than the now complete founder packs would kind of be a big middle finger to us all. I'm not sure what you expect. This isn't battlefield where you hop into the alpha/beta just to play a fun free game for a while. This is a game where you can be a part of it's development, and actually help the developers make and shape the game. NQ wants dedicated people in their alpha, not trolls who are going to play it so they can trash it on YouTube for hits from their drama hungry subscribers. Everything is worth what people will pay. I bought silver and am satisfied. Yama bought kyrium, he is satisfied. We all pledged what we did because we can, because it's worth it to us, and because we want to be a part of the game as it grows. If you can afford it but don't want to pay that much... Well that is exactly the reason NQ set things the way they did, they want people that do think it's worth it. And if you literally cannot afford it, that is unfortunate, and I'm sorry. But as a great scientist will one day say, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Alright so, lot of questions here. I don't know all the answers and I don't think all the answers are out there yet. I'll do the best that I can. * How many scripts can a player run in parallel? * Will there be a limit at all? If you mean on a single grid, then a bunch. Control units can have multiple scripts on them that run when and event is met, or just continuously. There will probably be limits, but they are not yet known. * Will scripts on different grids be able to communicate through some sort of wifi potentially over long distances? This isn't known yet either. There are a lot of potential elements for communication, like radar and sensors, but not a lot has been revealed about their function. * Can scripts be part of a blueprint? Yes, scripts are included when a blueprint is created. * Can scripts be part of a blueprint? Lot of sub questions here but I can tell you the current limitations. Mining cannot be automated. Weapons will probably be limited if used by scripts. Anything else hasn't been revealed. Each element will get its own set of available actions, and I imagine those will change and adapt over time. I imagine the some of the things you are asking about will be possible, at least eventually. * Will it be possible to solo the game? Dual Universe will be pretty much the same as EVE in that respect. Can you solo real life? You can try... But working together will almost always yield better results.

I have to point out it is Lua, a name, not LUA an acronym. That being said, I look forward a lot to scripting. I know it'll be able to get pretty in depth, but as far as simple element to element interactions go it will be very simple and fun, a lot more so than I think people realize. That, and interactive elements, will be tons of fun to mess around with and make fun little contraptions with!

So you've heard lots of good, and you want to know all the bad? I can respect that. The game is meant to be a huge scale sci fi single shard mmo. This means the game will be running constantly, and everyone is playing in the same game. Since nothing is perfect, this will obviously have limitations. You're right about limtations on automated weapons, and mining can only be done manually by the players. There are some other drawbacks too. Planets will most likely never move from their point in space (though they may rotate about their own axis), at least not for a while. Certainly not in the alpha. Constructs do not deform and destroy each other in spectacular fashion like they do in games like space engineers. And constructs themselves cannot be broken in two; if I make the Enterprise, and you completely destroy the parts connecting the main body to the saucer and two nacelles, the ship will still fly as a single entitiy as though there is a rigid connection, when none exists. And it is pure speculation, but the graphics will likely never compare to a game like star citizen, at least not for years. It's just not the focus. That being said, I can tell you though that the fun potential far outweighs the drawbacks. The game will have tons of features and so many ways to do so many things to adapt to so many playstyles. Just watch the devdiaries, these developers are transparent, pasionate, driven, and most importantly... They are capable. They don't try and sell you concepts or ideas. They show you what they have and even let you play it, if you can make it to one of their meetups. I can tell you another drawback about this game: starting later. The game will be huge, and difficult to get into and understand. Right now, we're all on the same page. A year from now, it won't be out still, but any newcomers will be at a disadvantage. And a year after release... Well. All I can say is I hope I can be a part of shaping the game around the Arkship, and being a part of a start of the new civilzation. Those who join late will find that much harder to be a part of. So as for the intial drawbacks I mentioned, yes they are unfortunate, but I feel that the features and mechanics taking their place far outweigh them. And as for that last drawback I mentioned... Well, there's a solution to that one, and I think you know what that solution is.

Sounds like you got the same ideas as me! I'm looking forward most to scripting, and building stuff that utilizes the scripts. Also, regarding that tweet, that's for the alpha. Technically, what is coming out on September 30th is the pre-alpha, so that tweet no longer applies. The alpha was delayed to a later date, but NQ still wanted to give us a game to play because they're awesome.

Cool to see you here! Like Lethys said, watch for an NDA. Is there a particular area that interests you? It seems you've created an organization but it doesn't have any sort of focus yet.

Hm... Do you mean you want to see your work explode in a good way, as in see it become more popular and useful very fast, or you want to literally watch the things that you create for other people detonate? If you're looking for work, you should make that distinction clear...

This is something we're not really sure about. There are dynamic and static constructs; dynamic constructs can move, regardless of any other factors. So an x-wing replica would be just the same as the huge space station seen in lots of promo stuff, if they are both built from dynamic core units. They can both orbit, move, etc. As for static constructs, it's not really known yet exactly how building with those will work; can you place one in space, and have whatever you built there just stay? Only time will tell... Or Novaquark. (but the way things are looking, probably time!)

This is all pretty gruesome. But it's a game, nothing wrong with that! These are neat ideas, and would add depth and interest; I always wanted to do this in Spore. However, there are multiple fundamentals about this game that conflict with these ideas, so I feel they will never implement something like what you're saying. There won't be NPCs, due to the fact that the game is supposed to be based around player interactions. There also aren't supposed to be automated ways of doing certain things... Pretty much anything you could use primitive NPC slaves for is stuff that is supposed to be done manually by players. On top of that, programming NPC AI, actions, and infrastructure would take up a bunch of development time.

Ha I thought the same thing! I was like, it would be awesome for there to be a practical use for searchlights in the forest. I was imaging scenarios. I'm curious about the material textures; does each material have its own texture, or can you apply a set of given textures to any material? And also, 20m screen... Billboards, just like everyone wanted!

This one has me more excited than the others. It's like... All of the little things from all the other dev diaries, combined into one big video showing them all working together, coupled with the news that we get to play it in less than a month.

It's also not just about taking the good from the good games, but also leaving the bad. I made a topic about this a long time ago; survivorship bias can be dangerous. I know JC and his team are smart, and I trust they'll do what's best. Their development is proceeding well, and since we'll be playing the alpha we can help to shape the mechanics. This is something I think the developers really want to do, which is a fantastic way to make a game. I too applaud Novaquark!

While out of context this statement is a good one, we're talking about trolling and I think it's a bad idea to make that a bannable offense. The game is shaped and built by the players. Players that want to destroy for fun can do that, it shouldn't be against the rules; it should be up us, the players, to police that. If you build a house on a hill then log off for a week, it's should be a no brainer that when you get back your house will have been ransacked. I can see though how there might be some doubts though, like how civilization will work around the Arkship when no one has a TCU yet. That, I don't know...

Welcome to the community! I see you're a ruby founder, that is awesome. You'll be joining us in the alpha then! Since you're talking about piloting, I imagine you're looking to fly constructs a lot? Perhaps military?

TFW you realize you're backing the wrong game (no offense meant to this guy, actually super jealous of him right now!)

Yeah I mean that's one of the reason ls I wouldnt take time off even if I did have a few spare vacation days; we just don't know when we'll be able to play, or what the experience will be like. It's like the eclipse. People took time off of work to travel across the country, for a two minute event that can be ruined by partial cloud cover. Some people don't think of that; some people do, and take the risk anyway. Myself, a decision like that goes against my principles; I can't use something valuable, like time off, on the off chance it wont be cloudy. Too much risk, too little gain. This alpha, how do we know it'll be up a lot? How do I know my PC will really even be able to handle it? It's borderline on the specs. How do we know the game will even be stable in it's pre-alpha? It might be literally unplayable in that time. I waited years for NMS, and that was set to come out in June, and people took off work for that... Delayed. Then people took off work for it's later release... And well yeah. People took off work to play NMS. Let that sink in. Not saying DU is going to be any sort of disaster like NMS, but the unpredictableness of the game in pre-alpha, so much we don't know, just makes it something I would never take off work for unless I had like 6 weeks of vacation days. I love NQ, I love this game, I love JC and Nyzaltar and Nomad. I thank them for this awesome game, and I look forward to playing it when I get the chance, because I WILL get the chance.

I am worried about timing too; while weekends always work for everyone, the earliest I'll be able to play Monday through Friday is 11 pm NQ time. I hope they keep the servers up overnight! Because I started my job in the middle of the year, I was only given a few vacation days, and they've been stretched thin; I had to cut my time at my family vacation in half in order to have enough days for the time before my wedding, plus some other obligations and special days. So extra time for the game is not going to be an option... And if I did have extra vacation days, they would have been spent elsewhere (I only get a max of 10). I am very excited to play the game, and I've been looking forward to it for a long time... Unfortunately for that though, all other life obligations are prioritized above DU.

While we of course don't know details of things like lighting and shadows in the game, its probably inherent that an object in front of a planets light source would cast a shadow on the planet. So I would think it would cast shadows, yes.. Now, it may not work perfectly like this; some flaws could be shadows having a max distance, texture errors, or the world just doesn't really get any darker, i.e. the sun isn't really creating all the light but rather the game renders the world light when there is a sun in the sky. Also, the concept youre talking about, building an object at the L1 point between a planet and it's star, would in real life be a quite efficient way to wipe out most life on Earth, one way I thought of after watching yet another movie where an advanced alien race feels that the best way to kill everyone is to resort to WWII dog fights.

Here where I was, I only got a picture with my phone but the cloud cover actually allowed pictures. Having the lens focus on nearby clouds was what allowed the eclipse to be seen, for a lot of people. (Tried to upload but its too large... Wasn't anything special anyway)

The version will be 5.3, as per this tweet: https://twitter.com/dualuniverse/status/817074404169515008

It would have to be at least 6. I don't know much about Star Trek Online, but lots of games simplify space combat by orientating everything with a fixed up and down. Dual Universe is a sandbox with a full 3D environment, so you'd need at least 6 "zones", one for each direction of a 3D axis. But again, ships in DU can be any shape. What happens when I make my ship a perfect cylinder, 2 meters in diameter and 100 meters long. Does it still get a spherical bubble shield? If so, that is an enormous area of shielded empty space; essentially a full empty sphere, 100 meters in diameter, with a line going through it. And if not, how does it work? Does it get a cylindrical shield that is present a small distance away from it's body along it's entire surface area? If that's the case, how do you define shield zones for that?

I don't think shield mechanics are really even on the horizon yet, at least I haven't heard anything about them. All the more reason to talk about them now I guess, right? The issue between the DU and STO here is that the ships in Star Trek are models with a set "front", "top", etc., whereas in Dual Universe the ships can be any shape with any orientation. I could make a ship shaped like a banana, with a cross coming out the side and three cockpits. Where would you put the shield "zones" then? One way I suppose would be to have shield bubbles that you put on the ship to protect, each bubble operating the way you described from STO, but I can already think of ways to abuse that.

Glad to see you got a gold pledge, that's awesome! While trading and building are some of the fundamentals of the game, farming will not be in (if at all) for quite some time. You may already know that, but I'm telling you just to be sure! Welcome!

I'm not certain of how it all works, but up to 16 players can see orba representing each other at the same time, and you can see their names. Interacting with them allows you to create a monument at that location and communicate with text? Also, local voice chat is in the game as well.

I completely agree. I was angry and hurt as well and certainly was not a fan of the developers, especially Sean Murray. I still don't like that they haven't apologized, the closest thing we got was "actions speak louder than words" from them. However, I am sure they did not take glee in scamming the players out of their money because they have clearly worked very hard on releasing the game they promised, despite people like us hating them, and that shows their intent was not to make off with our money. They wanted to release this or they wouldn't have. They didn't have to. I still want an apology, I'm still upset about the lies, but the fact for me at least is that all of that previous salt revolves around a game that was promised, which has now essentially been released, and it would be illogical for me to not play the game now. I'm sorry you were probably hurt just as much as I was. But that game you might have been anxiously waiting for... It's out now.