- Update 4.1: Fixed Leaderboard and Crash Bug - 24 September 2016
As some of you may have noticed, leaderboard scores strangely weren't uploading for anyone except me, the developer. With a little help from a few people sharing their seemingly unrelated crash logs, I've been able to fix both the crash issue and the missing leaderboard scores, which turned out to be related. I've had a lot of fun playing multiplayer this week and a handful of people have already gotten the achievement for beating me. I hope I can get a team of 4 together to try pushing back the undead on Migration so we can all unlock the Alliance of the Living achievement too. Time to start filling up the leaderboards with your high scores. If you don't see anyone else online when you're playing, you can try scheduling matches with other players in the Multiplayer forum or you can challenge me by tweeting at @Nonadecimal.
- Update 4.1: Fixed Leaderboard and Crash Bug - 24 September 2016
As some of you may have noticed, leaderboard scores strangely weren't uploading for anyone except me, the developer. With a little help from a few people sharing their seemingly unrelated crash logs, I've been able to fix both the crash issue and the missing leaderboard scores, which turned out to be related. I've had a lot of fun playing multiplayer this week and a handful of people have already gotten the achievement for beating me. I hope I can get a team of 4 together to try pushing back the undead on Migration so we can all unlock the Alliance of the Living achievement too. Time to start filling up the leaderboards with your high scores. If you don't see anyone else online when you're playing, you can try scheduling matches with other players in the Multiplayer forum or you can challenge me by tweeting at @Nonadecimal.
- Update #4: Multiplayer, Stats, and Leaderboards - 19 September 2016
Automata Empire's online multiplayer is here! You can now play 2-4 player matches against your friends around the world, proving yourself a master strategist. Or form an alliance to drive back the undead hordes on Migration and unlock a rare cooperative achievement. Show off your skills on Steam's global leaderboards. Plus the newly added stats page tracks your progress and reveals the state of the ongoing rivalry between the Red and Purple factions (sorry Orange). It took a little longer than originally planned but multiplayer wouldn't have been possible without all the extra features, performance improvements, and bug fixes released in updates 1-3 over the last few months. I challenged myself to achieve a lot of new things with this game: gamified cellular automata, AI that can play an RTS competitively, online multiplayer and leaderboards. I'm proud of what we've been able to accompl…
- Update #4: Multiplayer, Stats, and Leaderboards - 19 September 2016
Automata Empire's online multiplayer is here! You can now play 2-4 player matches against your friends around the world, proving yourself a master strategist. Or form an alliance to drive back the undead hordes on Migration and unlock a rare cooperative achievement. Show off your skills on Steam's global leaderboards. Plus the newly added stats page tracks your progress and reveals the state of the ongoing rivalry between the Red and Purple factions (sorry Orange). It took a little longer than originally planned but multiplayer wouldn't have been possible without all the extra features, performance improvements, and bug fixes released in updates 1-3 over the last few months. I challenged myself to achieve a lot of new things with this game: gamified cellular automata, AI that can play an RTS competitively, online multiplayer and leaderboards. I'm proud of what we've been able to accompl…
- Multiplayer Beta - 9 September 2016
The multiplayer beta is here! Now you can play 2-4 player games against your Steam friends around the world with online multiplayer. Since this was my first time adding multiplayer to a game, it's taken some time to thoroughly test everything and fix all the bugs. For that reason, I'm doing a brief beta period to stress test the system and make sure nobody encounters any bugs or connection problems that I didn't encounter in my own testing. To opt in to the beta, follow these steps: To participate, right-click on Automata Empire in your steam library. Go to Properties. In Properties, click the Betas tab. From the dropdown menu, select "multiplayer - multiplayer beta". No code is required. In your Steam library, the game's name should now display as "Automata Empire ". After the game updates on Steam, you will now be able to enter the multiplayer lobby on the main menu. The online multip…
- Multiplayer Beta - 9 September 2016
The multiplayer beta is here! Now you can play 2-4 player games against your Steam friends around the world with online multiplayer. Since this was my first time adding multiplayer to a game, it's taken some time to thoroughly test everything and fix all the bugs. For that reason, I'm doing a brief beta period to stress test the system and make sure nobody encounters any bugs or connection problems that I didn't encounter in my own testing. To opt in to the beta, follow these steps: To participate, right-click on Automata Empire in your steam library. Go to Properties. In Properties, click the Betas tab. From the dropdown menu, select "multiplayer - multiplayer beta". No code is required. In your Steam library, the game's name should now display as "Automata Empire ". After the game updates on Steam, you will now be able to enter the multiplayer lobby on the main menu. The online multip…
- Update #3: Patches and Performance - 4 August 2016
In the past few weeks, I quietly patched Automata Empire several times so that everyone could benefit from things I've fixed while working on multiplayer. Many of these changes make multiplayer more fair by eliminating slowdowns and timing issues for people with slower computers, but it also reduces lag in singleplayer. I still have to tackle the Steam friends matchmaking functionality, but multiplayer should be live in Update #4 this month. Here's what's changed: fixed several bugs that caused game to freeze fixed building construction/destruction timer bugs clicking a sidebar button no longer constructs a building underneath when your monsters are present remade Game Over menus to prevent bugs when spectating after a multiplayer loss fixed bug that occasionally prevented player from building on valid locations significant improvements to FPS again! (~60FPS) adjusted overpopulation thr…
- Update #3: Patches and Performance - 4 August 2016
In the past few weeks, I quietly patched Automata Empire several times so that everyone could benefit from things I've fixed while working on multiplayer. Many of these changes make multiplayer more fair by eliminating slowdowns and timing issues for people with slower computers, but it also reduces lag in singleplayer. I still have to tackle the Steam friends matchmaking functionality, but multiplayer should be live in Update #4 this month. Here's what's changed: fixed several bugs that caused game to freeze fixed building construction/destruction timer bugs clicking a sidebar button no longer constructs a building underneath when your monsters are present remade Game Over menus to prevent bugs when spectating after a multiplayer loss fixed bug that occasionally prevented player from building on valid locations significant improvements to FPS again! (~60FPS) adjusted overpopulation thr…
- Update #2: Challenging AI and Speed Boosts! - 1 July 2016
I'm happy to finally announce that the second major update to Automata Empire is live! While I originally intended to complete this update within a few weeks, it took 2 months. The update ended up being particularly large because of the scope of the changes I made to the enemy's AI, making it much more strategic while also making Hard difficulty harder and Easy difficulty easier. It took 2 complete rewrites of the AI code to get it right. I'll explain in more detail at the bottom of this post. I also spent the last several weeks doing major performance overhauls to eliminate lag when there are thousands of monsters moving around the screen, which will be especially important for multiplayer. Here's what's new in this update: added a fourth "Challenging" difficulty option improved difficulty scaling so Easy is easier and Hard is harder AI is more strategic about achieving primary objecti…
- Update #2: Challenging AI and Speed Boosts! - 1 July 2016
I'm happy to finally announce that the second major update to Automata Empire is live! While I originally intended to complete this update within a few weeks, it took 2 months. The update ended up being particularly large because of the scope of the changes I made to the enemy's AI, making it much more strategic while also making Hard difficulty harder and Easy difficulty easier. It took 2 complete rewrites of the AI code to get it right. I'll explain in more detail at the bottom of this post. I also spent the last several weeks doing major performance overhauls to eliminate lag when there are thousands of monsters moving around the screen, which will be especially important for multiplayer. Here's what's new in this update: added a fourth "Challenging" difficulty option improved difficulty scaling so Easy is easier and Hard is harder AI is more strategic about achieving primary objecti…
- Thank You All! Game Updated - 12 April 2016
First of all, I want to thank everybody for playing Automata Empire. While I was certain there would be a community for an objective-based cellular automata game, I didn't anticipate how many people would be so excited by the idea. It was especially uplifting seeing Automata Empire just below Dark Souls III on the Popular New Releases list. Because there are so many people playing the game right now, I spent an extra couple days testing the new update. I don't want to break the game for anybody! Since a few people seem to be having trouble finding the tutorial, I've added a one-time welcome screen with some background info about cellular automata and a link to the How To Play section. Also in this update: the post-game awards now permanently unlock more names for your rulers fixed your ability to pave over enemy roads fixed the 1-7 building hotkeys so they'll properly toggle the sidebar…
- Thank You All! Game Updated - 12 April 2016
First of all, I want to thank everybody for playing Automata Empire. While I was certain there would be a community for an objective-based cellular automata game, I didn't anticipate how many people would be so excited by the idea. It was especially uplifting seeing Automata Empire just below Dark Souls III on the Popular New Releases list. Because there are so many people playing the game right now, I spent an extra couple days testing the new update. I don't want to break the game for anybody! Since a few people seem to be having trouble finding the tutorial, I've added a one-time welcome screen with some background info about cellular automata and a link to the How To Play section. Also in this update: the post-game awards now permanently unlock more names for your rulers fixed your ability to pave over enemy roads fixed the 1-7 building hotkeys so they'll properly toggle the sidebar…
- Launch Day Tomorrow! Multiplayer Delayed Due To Fire - 7 April 2016
I'm glad everyone's so excited about Automata Empire. I'm excited too! Making this game has been a fun challenge and I can't wait to see what strange systems people engineer within the cellular automata mechanics. Unfortunately, there was a bizarre accident a few weeks ago in which my dev computer's USB port and motherboard were briefly ON FIRE. I guess I should have known better than to listen to Dethklok while coding the game. Luckily, the game's code backed up before it went up in flames and Automata Empire was saved! But sadly, this means the game will not have online multiplayer available at launch. I will order new desktop components and arrange a solution to finish testing multiplayer so I can make that feature available as soon as possible. I'll make an announcement when multiplayer is back online. Since it's unusual that an indie cellular automata RTS has multiplayer at all, I…
- Launch Day Tomorrow! Multiplayer Delayed Due To Fire - 7 April 2016
I'm glad everyone's so excited about Automata Empire. I'm excited too! Making this game has been a fun challenge and I can't wait to see what strange systems people engineer within the cellular automata mechanics. Unfortunately, there was a bizarre accident a few weeks ago in which my dev computer's USB port and motherboard were briefly ON FIRE. I guess I should have known better than to listen to Dethklok while coding the game. Luckily, the game's code backed up before it went up in flames and Automata Empire was saved! But sadly, this means the game will not have online multiplayer available at launch. I will order new desktop components and arrange a solution to finish testing multiplayer so I can make that feature available as soon as possible. I'll make an announcement when multiplayer is back online. Since it's unusual that an indie cellular automata RTS has multiplayer at all, I…
