Hah the last time I played this was in December 2013, I think, or whenever one of the first pre-alpha builds ever came out. Can’t wait to try it again now!
I’m in the same boat. I look forward to finally playing again and checking out all the new stuff.
One of the non-gameplay additions I like the most is that your friends can join you via the Steam friends list. No more having to set up a server running a separate executable on your machine, forwarding ports, etc. Just start up the game and have your friends click and join.
In any case, Starbound now has a release date: July 22nd
[boggling intensifies]
Oh shit that’s fantastic. I remember the pain of playing with a friend over a year ago and trying to sort out just connecting in the first place.
If I play this latest unstable beta, when It goes to full release, do you think Ill be able to keep my game and world?
I think so, but I think it requires that you copy the character/world files from Starbound - Unstable to Starbound folder. I know it stores them in two different places (so that you can play Unstable without wrecking your Stable game). I know that there are no major additions between now and 1.0, other than Steam Workshop integration.
Accoring to this: http://steamcommunity.com/app/211820/discussions/8/351660338708771509/
There will be a wipe with the release of 1.0. I do not feel like taking chances, so I guess Ill have to wait a few more weeks.
They’re talking about wiping old characters on the Stable build. That is, if you played the game 8 months ago, your save isn’t going to work because the game is completely different. If you played the old release build last week the same holds true.
Nothing wrong with waiting for release though. Two additional weeks of polish and bugfixing never hurts. :)
I don’t want to wait 2 weeks. That’s the thing. I just do not want to play for 2 weeks and then release happens, and then my game is either incompatible or glitchy. Maybe Ill try it though. They do appear as two separate install options on steam.
I thought that the dungeons didn’t reset if you died in them, yet when I wiped in the first dungeon, I had to start over from the beginning.
Picked up the game this weekend, just based on what people in this thread have been saying. Been playing the Unstable version (which, so far, has been mostly stable, other than 1 hard crash and 1 weird error that said “unable to determine state of containers” after which every box in the game stayed highlighted until I restarted). For a $15, it’s dang entertaining.
Have only player about 4 hours so far, mostly messing around with learning the interface (UI could use some improvements). For the first quest, where you need to gather 20 power crystals, I’ve been stuck at 19 of 20, without being able to find a 20th one. Cleared a giant mine, have burrowed all the way down to some funky temple with a door that lead to a “challenge area”, etc. yet still no 20th crystal. Getting slightly annoying.
I still haven’t played it yet since the first ever public release, but I’m curious about how this game progresses now. The original promise was pretty much “Terraria but a huge galaxy to explore” - does that still hold true for the most part?
Does the game still involve mining / exploration / upgrading so you can mine more stuff / upgrading so you can get better equipment for your ship and explore new planets / upgrade more to get further / defeat bosses / etc.?
Just trying to set my expectations right before I start it back up again.
That’s the basic loop, yes. The final version includes also crew members, villagers, etc.
Now, some people say it isn’t as deep as Terraria, so keep that in mind. I have no idea if that’s true, but I certainly enjoyed Starbound a great deal so far.
As I said, I’m still really early. In my limited experience, yes, it’s mine resources, build stuff that leads to other stuff so you can mine better stuff and build better stuff. There is a food mechanic, a death mechanic (you can do no penalty, a “drop your stuff, lose money and rez back on the surface” level, or perma-death choice). Not sure if food and farming existed when you played last. For food you can get meat by hunting, find wild veggies/seeds, and can garden (till the soil, plant seeds, keep the soil watered)
You apparently eventually fix your ship to fly to other places. There are references all over the game about trading posts and such in space, but obviously, since I’m still on the starting planet, I haven’t seen what that is like yet.
The weapon variety that is apparently new to the latest version is pretty fun. I have found a huge variety of weapons in boxes, including a fully-automatic freeze gun, a 2 handed sword with a fast attack which poisons things (great for hit and run), and a super slow attack hammer that sets things on fire and send them flying backwards. Combat is significantly better than it was in Terraria (imo) - better variety of weapons, more kinds of critters with different types of attacks, etc. Still rudimentary, but I find it more fun so far.
Yes, that’s how it works although frankly I found it stilted and a poorer game for the heavily gated progression. It essentially wo rked like this: (1) do story quest (typically also involves killing a boss) (2) get tech upgrade (3) use tech upgrade to explore new environments (4) get next tier of ores from those environments. And you did that 4 times.
This has changed. There will still be story missions, but the progression is going to be more open and I suspect the game will e much better for it. I am looking forward to 1.0.
Unless they changed it with this last update, Core Fragments are found very deep. If you’re having trouble finding them I’d suggest trying a very deep mineshaft, avoiding distractions along the way (just bring plenty of platforms to climb back out). They glow so they’re easy to spot once you’re in the region where they spawn. There’s typically large quantities of them, although they can take a while to mine.
Sorry in advance if any of this changed in 1.0. For what it’s worth, on Unstable I was pretty quickly able to get 27 of them, so I don’t think it’s meant to be tedious.
Worst case scenario, I’d be happy to join your game and give you some of my extra fragments. :)
Thanks all. That actually sounds really cool, even if it still ends up being more gated / directed than Terraria. I can always play Terraria on a billion different platforms if I want something more open-ended.
Thanks, I’ll have to delve a bit deeper under ground. All the crystals I have found so far have been in a mining area that I stumbled on, where it had a bunch of crates filled with various things. Out of those crates, I got 17 crystals. Found 2 more in random crates on the surface. I didn’t realize there were ones you could mine yourself.
I will say that as I’m moving deeper and deeper, all I keep thinking is “crap, I’m going to have to dig my way back up out of this place at some point”. Makes me a little claustrophobic.
My other question - does Starbound require a lot of external documentation to make any real progress? I remember when I first played Terraria I had to constantly reference wikis to know how to craft stuff because, at the time, the UI was absolutely terrible at making that stuff naturally discoverable.