- DEV DIARY | September 24 - 3 September 2024
Dear Pioneers, You may have noticed a slower pace of updates for the game lately, so we wanted to share some news from the team and provide an update on the development of The Pioneers. As we’ve mentioned before, our team’s situation is challenging. Despite the moderate success we enjoyed on Steam when we launched in Early Access last year, we’ve struggled to secure enough financial resources to hire the full team necessary to develop a game as ambitious as The Pioneers. Nonetheless, we’ve chosen to keep going, driven by hard work and determination. This decision, however, means we’re working with a small team and juggling multiple activities both within and outside the gaming industry—simply to make ends meet. We hope that one day we’ll be able to dedicate ourselves 100% to our passion, and we’re not giving up! But for now, we must accept that the game’s development is progressing more…
- Patch notes 0.52 | Localization & fixes - 13 May 2024
Dear Pioneers, In celebration of our participation in the Steam Endless Replayability Fest, we are happy to release a new regular update. Here's what you can look forward to in Version 0.52. Have a nice fest! LOCALIZATION To enhance the accessibility of our game for our international audience, we have decided to implement 23 new localizations, in addition to the 8 already available. These new languages are generated using "LocalAIze," our in-house tool built on a Large Language Model (LLM) architecture. As such, these translations may be imperfect. If you prefer to avoid encountering errors in the game's text, we recommend using English or one of the other seven languages directly managed by our development team. While not flawless, our automated translation tool is considered over 95% reliable and allows us significant development agility during this early access phase. If you have sug…
- Patch notes 0.51 | Polish, data & fixes - 30 April 2024
Dear Pioneers, Before we delve into more details about the upcoming roadmap and the major updates the game will receive before it exits early access, we continue our commitment to enhancing the overall gaming experience. In this update and subsequent ones, you will primarily find bug fixes, visual enhancements, usability improvements, and quality of life features. Stay tuned for more! Here are the patch notes for 0.51 GAMEPLAY Added functionality for pioneers carrying an unconscious teammate on their back. It is now possible to reload their oxygen or remove their suit in the EVA cabin. Enhanced rover handling, which can now safely navigate more pathways. GAME DATA RECORDING We have implemented a game session recorder to assist in game improvement and balancing. This tracker does not transmit any private data. You can disable this option in the settings menu. GRAPHICS Added multiple miss…
- Patch notes 0.50.10 | Small update - 5 April 2024
Dear Pioneers, Thank you all for the warm reception of our latest major update, "Decisions." Your feedback suggests that we are continuing in the right direction and that our efforts are starting to pay off. Following this update, here's a set of fixes addressing the latest features or minor issues that existed prior to "Decisions". Fixed several non-functional buffs and events. Fixed some pathing issues related to the rover. Improved inventory management to make double-clicks more reliable. Fixed a bug in the magnetic storm loading gauge. Fixed several loading bugs in the new station module. Fixed a bug preventing some machines from being recycled properly. Fixed a bug that made some equipment crates invisible. Corrected the display of certain fonts (type and size). Fixed issues related to daily meetings events. Fixed several missing or incorrect translations. Improved the readability…
- MAJOR UPDATE #3 | DECISIONS - 1 April 2024
Dear Pioneers, The entire team is incredibly proud of the work done on "Decisions," the 3rd major update for TPSD. You can check out all the update notes here, and please see the end of the post for a more personal and heartfelt message. GAMEPLAY This 3rd major update brings tons of new gameplay features. As outlined in the roadmap, it focuses on decision-making: choose one type of victory over another, establish the strategy of the day and forego certain bonuses, make the best choice when an event occurs... Whether strategic or tactical, we hope all these decisions will make your games more intense and more unique. Main additions: Introduced a new character, Dinesh Khan, the Life Support Engineer. Added a new skill, "Telecommunication," strongly tied to machine use in the command center. This skill reflects your pioneers' proficiency with remote communication tools. Added a new station…
- #3 MAJOR UPDATE | BETA IS OPEN - 2 March 2024
Dear Pioneers, We're thrilled to announce that the third major update for TPSD is on the horizon. This massive update brings a host of new features, including a new character (the life support engineer), a new station module (the Command Center), and all the associated gameplay. Additionally, you'll find an expanded map with sulfur lake biome, over a hundred narrative events, and a slew of other enhancements (volcanic eruptions, HUD rework, localization in fifty new languages, and more). We're eager to dive into all the details of these game-changing updates, which have been a herculean effort for the entire team. However, to ensure we deliver the best possible experience, we're taking a bit more time to incorporate player feedback and iron out the last few bugs. In the meantime, you can join the open beta phase by activating the beta branch on Steam. Just navigate to your Steam library…
- Patch notes 0.41 | Polish & Polish - 11 September 2023
Dear Pioneers, After a summer where our entire team had the chance to enjoy a well-deserved break, we are now back with this first patch, which fine-tunes the work carried out during the last major update. We will continue to enhance the recently introduced features while also working on new content! Be prepared for even more exciting additions in the upcoming weeks! To celebrate the back-to-school season, we are pleased to offer you a special deal ! Have a great time exploring Io, and we'll be in touch very soon! https://store.steampowered.com/app/1734390/The_Pioneers_Surviving_Desolation/ Patch notes 0.41 New languages available • Added a new community localization: Hungarian • Added a new community localization: Polish Thanks to the community members who have been with us on this important work since The The Pioneers launch! You're awesome! Gameplay • Reworked the climbing system to…
- MAJOR UPDATE #2 | ROAD TRIP - 24 July 2023
Dear Pioneers, With this major update, the rover "The Bear" makes its debut in the game. This first vehicle marks a turning point in the way you approach your adventures on Io. Explore further and longer, protect yourselves from the main threats, carry more equipment, and unlock new unique actions... The rover comes with a plethora of new features and numerous contents added to existing systems. It lays the foundations for a new way of exploring and prepares for future game map overhauls. This update has also been an opportunity for us to deliver an overall more enjoyable game to you. The road is still long, but we have taken your feedback into account to continue improving ergonomics and balancing in the game. Significant work has also been done to correct as many bugs as possible. To be completely transparent with you, maintaining the stability of a game like The Pioneers is a giganti…
- The Bear is coming soon... - 7 July 2023
Greetings, fellow Pioneers! Be prepared to welcome the first playable vehicle of The Pioneers, aka the exploration rover, aka... THE BEAR!!!!!!! It will be introduced in the 2nd major update of our EA roadmap, along with a new character, new equipment, threats, and exploration content. The Bear is massive, modular, and incredibly useful during your journey on Io. Our last release was somewhat rushed, resulting in numerous bugs and an overall unsatisfactory experience for some players. To avoid repeating our mistakes, we have commenced an intensive internal Q/A testing phase, followed by a playable release on the beta branch of the game. If you are willing to assist us, please don't hesitate to join us on Discord and obtain the necessary information to access the pre-release build: https://discord.gg/thepioneersgame Stay tuned to be among the first to embark on the rover! https://store.s…
- Patch notes 0.37.03 | Storms - 9 June 2023
Dear Pioneers, As we had announced in our roadmap, the next major patch "Road Trip" will introduce the game's first vehicle, as well as a new dedicated station module, new equipment, a new character, and above all, much more exploration gameplay. We had planned to release it at the end of the second quarter of this year, but to avoid clashing with the Steam summer sales, we decided to postpone its release until mid-July. This is good news, as it will also allow us to finalize the implementation of our new character production method, which will ultimately allow us to offer you visuals, narrative, and cutscenes featuring the pioneers' faces. To give you a taste of what awaits you, here's a little teaser. There's not much longer to wait, and to help you cope, here are this week's patch notes. See you on Io! Patch notes 0.37.03 GAMEPLAY New version of the storm system In preparation for th…
- Patch notes 0.37.02 | Small update - 8 May 2023
Dear Pioneers, Please find a small update that fixes many small bugs and add a first version of the ship construction site. Enjoy the game ! Patch notes 0.37.02 Graphics Added a construction site when you start to repair a ship part. More polish to come on this feature Improved dust VFX Sound Added zipline SFX Bug prevention Improved climbing to prevent some bugs if the arrival point has no navmesh Bug fixes Fixed diamond and battery processing that was not working properly since the last patch Fixed crates 3D models display Fixed processing timer calculation Fixed pathfinding around the medical bed Fixed zipline speed. It no longer depends on the distance between 2 posts Fixed ascensumophobia trait Fixed idle item Fixed storm bolt that was not applying the correct debuff effect Fixed various sound volumes Fixed various save issues
- Patch notes 0.37.01 | Automation - 1 May 2023
Dear Pioneers, Releasing a game is not an easy task. You have to manage the influx of new bugs, work on fixes, prepare major updates, take care of your growing community... After more than 3 months of intensive work, the whole team needed to take a moment to rest. That's why we took a little more time than usual to bring you this new patch. We still took advantage of this low intensity period to set up our new offices. It's really quite new. As you can see on the picture, the computers are not even plugged in yet, but we are happy to finally have a proper place to work! This week's patch brings you a new batch of all kinds of fixes, as well as a much-awaited feature for the community: production automation on all processing machines. More details below. Enjoy! Patch notes 0.37.01 Gameplay Automation's upgrades are now available on processing machines. You can use them to batch the desir…
- Patch notes 0.36.03 | Small update - 7 April 2023
Dear Pioneers, Following our latest batch of updates, please find here a few additional fixes and changes. Patch notes 0.36.03 Bug fixes Fixed difficulty presets layout that was not updating properly Fixed game score screen. Level and score should now be correctly displayed Fixed resources cost in the victory conditions UI panel Fixed recycling feature. You should now recover the right amount of resources Fixed a main airlock / elevator bug that could occur if you saved a game when a character was in the airlock Fixed heavy injuries that were not triggering death properly Fixed various localization strings Bug prevention Refactored quest and buff game systems to make them more resilient and ready to welcome more content (Q2 update preparation) Thank you for playing! If you like the game, do not hesitate to demonstrate your support by posting a Steam review! It helps a lot! Cheers! PS: 2…
- Patch notes 0.36.02 | Recycling - 3 April 2023
Dear Pioneers, Thank you for playing the latest build. We know it's far from perfect, but we'll be improving the player XP and trait systems as we work on the next update. In this week's push, expect some interesting changes, fixes and new features. Please read this note for more details. Patch notes 0.36.02 Gameplay Added new feature: Recycle. You can now dismantle existing machines and modules. Use the construction terminals to start the recycling process and recover half of the invested resources. This feature has been requested by many of you. We hope it will help! At start of each day, average temperature increase is now displayed Graphics New VFX: Camera particles before storms New VFX Cascade before storms New VFX: Psschhhhhhh psschhhhhhh when you open a life pod New VFX: Foot steps dust New shader: Liquid/solid sulfur lakes New camera shot at game launch UI Improved traits selec…
- MAJOR UPDATE #1 | Player XP, traits, game modes, Twitch Extension and more... - 16 March 2023
Dear Pioneers, We hope all has been well for you. At Supercube, we are super proud to release the first major update for The Pioneers. According to the roadmap announcement, this is the first game changing patch from a serie of six that will lead us to the 1.0 release Let's have a quick overview of what is new here Difficulty settings Game setup now has options to adjust the mission's difficulty. Play with different parameters or use a preset to fit your skills and overall challenge. Just note that harder games lead to higher scores Player XP The end-game score has been changed to include the missions difficulty. You should now see a larger spread of scores between different players and runs. The score is also converted into player XP, to progress through player levels. For each level you gain, you unlock a unique reward that will offer you to replay the game in a different setting Game…
- Patch notes 0.35.05 | Language pack - 22 February 2023
Dear Pioneers, As promised, we have started to expand the localization of the game. In this first batch, we added German, Russian and Swedish languages. They can be selected in the settings menu. We also worked with 2 amazing American translators to rework/polish the existing English localization. Since the previous version had many translation flaws, this new one should improve your overall experience of the game, especially if you are a native English speaker. People involved have joined us in the game credits. A big thank you to the whole localization team! We hope you will enjoy this patch! Patch notes 0.35.05 Localization Added new localization: German Added new localization: Russian Added new localization: Swedish Revamped English localization (USA) Gameplay Added new spawn locations for crew life pods Added new action on crew life pods: steal oxygen Bug fixes Fixed various missin…
- Patch notes 0.35.04 | Carry your mates - 16 February 2023
We've all experienced that strange feeling, somewhere between disappointment and anger, of watching your friend choke a metre away from the station because he forgot his EVA suit. That is finally over. Download the 0.35.04 update and help him out! Patch notes 0.35.04 Gameplay New feature: carry a crew member. This is a very rough first version of the feature that the whole community has been waiting for. This one will certainly save many lives! Characters now start a mission with a personal item New way to interact with lost life pods New zipline positioning system Storm alert is now triggered when the electric charge VFX appears Balancing We tried to give you more breathing room between two earthquakes without reducing the overall difficulty curve of the current game by balancing two values: - average time between seismic period slightly increased - average speed of magnitude rise slig…
- Patch notes 0.35.03 - 9 February 2023
Dear Pioneers, Once again, this regular update focuses on improving the overall playing experience: new video and accessibility settings, bug fixes and UI improvements have been implemented to make the game run more smoothly to everyone. In parallel, we have started working on the major gameplay update that will arrive in March. Enjoy the game and see you soon! Patch notes v0.35.03 Gameplay Jetboots now improve move speed Balancing Decreased oxygen leakage on large breaches (10/sec -> 5/sec) Reversed last change on starting food rations (7 -> 9) Other additions Updated building UI for better understanding of what what can be built Improved game settings: temperature units. Default unit for US/UK configurations is set to °F Improved accessibility settings: UI rescaling Improved accessibility settings: zoom with keyboard instead of mouse Improved video settings: gamma adjustement Improved…
- Patch 0.35.02 | Welcome Akiko! - 3 February 2023
Dear Pioneers, Big news are coming in these patch notes. Please read the following announcement, try or retry the game and join us on Discord to share your feedback. https://discord.gg/thepioneersgame Akiko Takada has joined the crew. Class: Scientist Role: Exogeologist Speciality: Harvesting Background: Environmental activist Flight time: 60 days Crew ID: 141 Age: 40 Nat: JAP Rnk: n/a Akiko is a 40 years old exogeologist, daughter of Japan industry Minister Nobuo Takada. Her mother Yumi Takada is also well-known for being one of the leaders of The Great Gaïa Church. She studied geological risks at the University of Kyoto and graduated with two PhD in mineral analysis and exogeology. During her studies, she became involved in politics and joined an environmentalist NGO as a spokesperson. Her wisdom and charisma, in addition to her exceptional scientific capabilities, allowed her to take…
- Patch notes 0.35.01 - 30 January 2023
Tired of searching the last shuttle part? Fortunately, they now have flashing lights! Patch notes v0.35.01 Additions Shuttle parts are now more visible (scale & lights) Reworked pathfinding system to be more efficient at long range Added notifications on crafting actions Improved video settings: vsync (WIP) Improved video settings: quality presets now change texture resolution Bug prevention Added a safety feature to prevent character location errors Fixed station inventory reservation system to prevent conflicts between characters Bug fixes Fixed pathfinding issues when machines are installed in a module Fixed a visual bug that appeared when a character was repairing a breach Fixed medipod reservation system Fixed a bug that could make it impossible to store the EVA suit Fixed energy gauge not being displayed correctly after a character left the medipod Fixed continue button that were…
