The Unknown Worlds team have release a new patch they’ve been referring to as “Gorilla”.
The team have been teasing players about this mystery patch via Twitter, their forums and their Facebook page for quite a while now.
Here’s the changelog:
Features:
- You can now evolve to Onos when your team has three hives.
- The Onos can toss marines with his Gore attack, smash structures and Stomp on the ground, sending a shockwave that disables marine structures for 5 seconds. Upgrades are no longer available, sentries stop firing, Infantry Portals stop spawning, etc.
- Added Prototype Lab and the ability to research and buy Jetpacks
- Added new map: ns2_mineshaft
- Added camera animation and display during count down phase.
- Name tags now appear over the head of nearby teammates.
- Added lines for rally points.
- Mines detonate when hit by Stomp.
- Added an option to enable mouse acceleration (off by default)
- Infestation is now displayed on minimap (dying infestation is indicated red)
- Added some missing Marine structure icons.
Balance
- Reduced Rifle butt range from 1.5 meters to 1 meter (now same as Skulk bite)
- Shotgun damage changed to Light (armor is twice as effective against it). Made it lighter to carry and increased the damage to compensate (# of shots vs. base Skulks, Lerks and Fades should unchanged, 1 extra pellet vs. Gorges). So Shotguns should become less effective against heavily armored targets. (thanks Schimmel!)
- Bile bomb range and splash increased a lot, damage decreased somewhat and energy cost decreased a little (trying to make Gorge less vulnerable on front lines and also more able to do at least some damage to entrenched Marines). He is NASTY now, watch out.
- Increased Hydra health from 500 to 600 and armor from 0 to 75.
- Increased Lerk Spike cost from 1.5 to 2.5. Changed distribution of Command Station health and armor so it’s more resistent vs. Light damage (ie, Lerk Spikes).
- Disabled res for kills to simplify the game, remove confusion about what happens when you make a kill, reduce end-game stalemates with 1 tower and to increase the strategic aspects of the game.
- Armory no longer required to drop med packs (unnecessarily restrictive during rushes)
- Lowered bile bomb damage from 300 to 225.
- Increased repair rate for Marines repairing each others’ armor from 18 to 35 (to make it less annoying and to allow Marines to sustain attacks better).
- Reverted Fade carapace armor buff from 50 to 30.
- Removed Lerk "hide" armor.
- Reduced Shotgun research time from 40 to 20 (it was 0 in NS1). Helps Marines get a foothold with early aggression.
- Increased minimum egg spawn time from 8 to 10 seconds to less that early Alien assault (now it’s the same as Marines)
- Lowered infantry portal build time from 10 seconds to 7, and Armory from 15 to 12 (to try to lessen effectiveness of Skulk rush)
ns2_tram
- Moved warehouse north.
- Removed north-east Warehouse entrance.
- Opened tram tunnel between Server and Warehouse.
- Reworked connecting corridors into Warehouse.
- Fixed drifter pathing issues between Server and Control.
Fixes
- Fixed bug where the Gorge Bile Bomb ability used the Spit ability icon.
- Fixed bug where the Gorge Mini Cyst ability used the Hydra ability icon.
- Fixed script error if a Hive was destroyed while the Gorge that built it as Commander was a rag doll.
- Cleaned up some Client console spam when a Fade blinks.
- Fixed script error caused by a spectating player receiving points by getting a kill with a structure placed when they were not a spectator.
- Added placeholder icons for the Shell and Veil.
- Fixed bug where the game would randomly lockup while placing a Cyst.
- Drifter spawn sound effect will no longer play at world origin.
- Fixed a bug that prevented Skulks from leaping at maximum speed.
- Fixed bug where the physics representations for the Armory and Infantry Portal did not match up with the visual model.
- Weapon secondary attacks can no longer occur at the same time as primary attacks while coming out of a sprint in some cases.
- Armory buy menu will not instantly appear once construction is completed.
- Adjusted Skulk wall walking smoothing rates so that that the 3rd person model rotates more quickly to match the 1st person model (especially while jumping)
- Health and Ammo packs can now be dropped directly on top of a Marine player.
- Restored reloading of script files when they change on disk.
- Fixed Whip ‘grenade whack’
- Bombard projectiles will not collide with the Whip and nearby friendly structures anymore and is created at the correct attach point.
- Alien player names for Hydra kills will no longer appear in blue text in the death message.
- Fixed a bug causing Mini Cysts placed by the Gorge to be disconnected when created even in cases where the ghost model indicated the connection was valid.
- Fixed bug causing dropped weapons to disappear too quickly if they were picked up and dropped again after initially being dropped.
- AI units cannot attack friendly players anymore unless FF is enabled.
- Fixed bug causing script error when a Cyst died due to not being connected to a Hive.
- Fixed crash when too many objects are visible.
- PhysX scene now supports mirrored geometry.
- Initial team starting locations chosen with a more random method.
- Mine will detect enemies more accurately.
- Slime effect during sprinting will not show up in thirdperson anymore.
- The ARC will prioritize other structures before Eggs and Cysts.
- Player turn poses (arms moving with feet planted on the ground) reset once the player starts moving.
- Fixed multi-threading crash when using the o_stats console command.
- The "getting ready to spawn" blue spin effect now disappears immediately upon the Infantry Portal being destroyed.
- Fixed bug where the Spore cloud would be created improperly when a Lerk was not moving.
- Fixed bug where connecting to the localhost would cause the game to go into an infinite loop.
- Fixed bug where Marines would spawn above the Infantry Portal platform.
Improvement
- Added "warp" console command to teleport to a position in space when cheats are on, "warp 0 0 0" for example.
- Improved Skulk wall walking (sticks better to surfaces, thanks matso!)
- Skulks can now leap from mid-air, ala NS1.
- The "locate" Client console command will constantly display the local player’s location on the screen if "true" is given as a parameter.
- Added Mine icon for death messages (Thanks Saba!)
- Reformatted Scoreboard so more player names can fit on the screen at the same time.
- Server name is now displayed at the top of the Scoreboard.
- Improved ScenarioHandler (Thanks Matso!)
Sound
- Removed Bile Bomb hit sound when Gorge creates a structure.
Optimizations
- Optimized network fields in Structure, CloakableMixin, ScriptActor and PowerPoint (thanks Matso!)
- Reserve memory for faceSets (prevents excessive allocation)
- Reduced networked bandwidth for Camoflauge by eliminating an unnecessary network field (thanks Matso!)
- Reduced networked bandwidth for Skulks by eliminating wall walking network variables (thanks Matso!)
- Optimized Door auto-opening.
- Reduced number of cells CollisionGrid queries look through.
- Reduced network bandwidth required to send which fields of an Entity changed (uses indexing scheme when only a few fields changed and a bitmask when many changed)
- Reduced network bandwidth usage for entities that have energy.
- Reduced bandwidth for transmitting attachment points for entities by 26 bits.
- Reduced bandwidth for transmitting angles.
- Eliminated lastTimePlayerMoved networked field in Player.
- Mines require less processing time to check for nearby enemies.
- Reduced bandwidth by 20 bytes per second for each Entity sent to the client.
- Changed particle effects to only update if they were visible last frame.
- Slightly more aggressive compiler optimization options.
SDK
- Added Vector:Add method.
- Added Shared.SortEntitiesByDistance.
- Removed ProximityGrid.
- Added sphere query to CollisionGrid.
- Added EntityQueryManager (fast queries for entities within range, uses CollisionGrid)
- Exposed EntityQueryManager to Lua, started converting script to use new API.
- Added support to ObjectTagQueryManager for testing whether entity has a specific tag.
- Entities get tagged with their class name (and base class names). Tag is prefixed with ‘class:’.
- Added time network variable type.
- Added "private" network fields which are only sent to the client controlling the Entity.
- Added support for networking floating point values as fixed point (specified as float (<min> to <max> by <step>)
- Added Client.GetServerName() function to return the name of the server the client is connected to.
- Added Server.GetName() function to return the name of the server.
- Added Server.GetFrameRate() function to return the current tick rate of the server.
- Added Mersenne twister Randomizer class to Lua, same API as Lua random functions but better generator.
We hope you enjoy this mega-build with us!
And here’s the trailer you can watch whilst the patch downloads:
NS2HD and the Unknown Worlds dev team have uploaded a new video that talks about multithreading, what it does, why it’s important, how it’ll be used in Natural-Selection 2.
Interesting stuff, give it a click.
Natural-Selection 2 has been updated to include the following changes:
Balance
- Buying mines now gives you 2 mines instead of 3.
- Increased mine arm time from 3 seconds to 4 (to reduce them in-combat).
- Mine health, armor, and point value lowered.
- Mines now set off other nearby mines when they explode.
Fixes
- Alien commanders are no longer able to see flamethrower effects when they don’t have LOS to the Marine firing it.
- Dropped weapons no longer collide with the player controller.
- Fixed bug where console commands on the server were not properly verified to be coming from a local client.
- Fixed bug where players were not always frozen during the round start countdown period.
- Fixed bug where sometimes ready room players could become frozen during the round start countdown period.
- Fixed bug where the game did not use the Lua entry points specified in the game_setup.xml file.
- Fixed rally points.
- Fixed various script errors (thanks dePara!).
- Prevent slowing down of leap when leaping off a wall.
- Removed additional resource display for alien buy menu.
- Restored docking props to the build.
- Changed nano-shield "create" and "take damage" sounds from 2D to 3D (so you don’t hear them everywhere).
- Skulks will not land on their back anymore when jumping from the ceiling in tight corridors.
- Less dubstepy nano shield damage sound.
Restart your Steam client if the auto-update didn’t kick in.
Restart your Steam client if your build hasn’t auto-updated. Here’s the changelog:
Features
- Added Whip "bombard" ability. Mature Whips can throw ball projectiles to destroy metal structures and corrode marine armor.
- Added skill-based movement to Skulk: try jumping off walls and props for a small speed boost
- Added support for ladders
- Added loading screens
- Added the ability to connect to a server while it is still loading
- Added changemap console command to the server to change the map while keeping the clients connected
- Pressing tab when running the dedicated server opens the console window
- Added average packet choke percentage to the net_stats display
- Added net_snapshot command on the server to log information about the state snapshots being sent to clients
- Changed the net_classes console command to output information about the size of the individual fields in the class
- Changed the net_log console command to accept a number specifying how verbose it is
- Added net_log, net_loss and net_lag console commands to the server
- Added retry console command to reconnect to the server last connected to (Thanks acid_rain!)
- Added an option in options.xml to disable multi-threaded rendering
- Added an option in options.xml to restrict the number of frames the CPU can get ahead of the GPU (defaults to 1)
- Added multiple collision representations for objects to make some targets easier to shoot, movement collision smoother, etc.
Balance
- Flamethrower and shotguns don’t slow you down quite as much now
- Hydras have more forgiving collision shapes
Fixes
- Reduced input latency
- Parasite is no longer removed when a Marine enters the command station (Thanks Motig!)
- Fixed teamNumber out of range error message for doors
- Removed duplicate error messages when a file could not be precached
- Leaping while Parasite is the active ability will now play the leap sound effect
- Fixed bug where ARC cannot deploy during attack mode
- ARCs will stop their charge up effects when undeploying
- Fixed issue where the server would choke client snapshot packets incorrectly
- Alerts that trigger when a Hive or Command Station are taking damage will now always be heard by players no matter how far away from the structure they are
- Fixed the mouse cursor not being properly displayed
- Voice over will no longer announce "Command Station is under attack" when the Infantry Portal is being attacked
- The backpedal step sound will no longer play while side stepping, the normal step sound plays in this case now
- Changed how potential Egg spawn points are calculated to ensure enough exist around each Hive (Thanks Matso!)
- Fixed bug in Egg spawn time calculation code when a player spawns from an Egg (Thanks Matso!)
- Whips will now trigger mines when walking over them
- Fixed bug where mines would play the spawn item effect each time they get revealed for a player
- Player names won’t get truncated anymore at the first space in the spectator message
- Mini-cysts may no longer be connected through walls and ceilings (Thanks Matso!)
- Flamethrower will no longer do more damage the faster the trigger is pressed
- Resource points will show the steam effect when the attached resource tower is visible
- Smashed tech points will now only adjust their animation state once they have been scouted (prevents early scouting of alien start point by marine commander)
- Egg mist effect will now be triggered client side only if that egg is visible (prevents early game hive scouting through the egg mist being visible)
- Med/ammo packs cannot be used anymore to scout alien start locations
- Gorge will no longer be spammed with messages if they hold down the build Hydra button in an area it cannot be built
- Marines that are Parasited or on standing on Infestation will now be sighted and show on up the minimap (Thanks Matso!)
- Fade may no longer stab while blinking
- Fixed calculation of ping times
- Fixed a networking bug with acknowledging reliable packets
- Marine rifle bash will no longer hit the wall behind the Marine
- Fixed bug making it appear that Parasite can be used more often than it actually can be used
- Structures/units will not update their energy anymore until the round has started
- Fixed a bug where marines blood effect plays at world origin when hit by spikes or heal spray
- Health circles will properly display for each individual entity selected as commander now instead of sharing one health circle
- Fixed bug where players were not always frozen during the round start countdown period
- Fixed bug where sometimes ready room players could become frozen during the round start countdown period
- Fixed unclean shutdown of the dedicated server
- Fixed shutdown process when exiting from a script error or an assert so that it doesn’t crash or generate additional errors
Sound
- Hooked up special hit sound effect for the Lerk spike played on the Marine
- Hooked up special hit sound effect for the Gorge spit projectile played on the Marine
Optimizations
- Path is no longer constantly generated for AI units (Thanks Matso!)
- Improved performance of code that searches for nearby usable entities for a Marine on the Client
- Inventory weight is only calculated when the inventory changes instead of every frame
- Some of the sentry effects are now handled client side only (reduces network traffic)
- Optimized Lua memory allocator
- Changed physics objects to use instancing and aggregates
- Server no longer simulates rag dolls unnecessarily
SDK
- New CSS-based UI layout system (not in use yet)
- Changed child entities to only be relevant if their parent is relevant (used to force the parent to be relevant if a child was relevant)
- Removed redundant Client.SetMouseCaptured function
- Added collision representation parameter to sweep API functions
Now we’re back to work on "Gorilla", which will include the Onos, Jetpack and some other juicy features…
Natural-Selection 2 gets better with every update! Some would say it’s evolving nicely…. Haha! Get it? Because Darwin… forget it.
Source: http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/news/2012/1/build_190_released
NS2HD has posted a new Natural-Selection 2 video that looks at the technical side of things as they work on optimizing the game to improve stuff like load-times, frame-rates, etc.
The Natural-Selection 2 team is pretty small but their custom-built engine is taking shape nicely and I eagerly await the release of beta build 190.
Some quick Natural-Selection 2 news.
Firstly, Natural-Selection 2 won an “Honorable Mention” over at Indie-DB.com in their “Indie of the Year” category.
Having won last years event Natural Selection 2 has just managed to place somewhere within the top 5, however you cannot win twice, honorable mention it is!
Here’s the page with the rest of the winners:
http://www.indiedb.com/events/2011-indie-of-the-year-awards/features/ioty-players-choice-upcoming
Secondly, the Natural-Selection 2 team are looking for a programmer to join their team in San Francisco.
Interested? Head over to their jobs page for more information:
http://www.unknownworlds.com/jobs
