Greetings Pioneers!

A big happy new year from the Team! The holidays have passed with haste so we've started by fetching the best bits from our backlog of progress to bring everyone up to speed with development from the end of last year. With the addition of the portable turret and a massive audio overhaul which we've been wanting to get into the game for quite a while now, we're excited to start the new year strong.

Other essential gameplay components like the objective system/markers are being polished for designers to flesh out the rest of the world story. A lot of focus is being put into quality of the 'initial zone' and interaction with objects. We can't wait to showcase all of improvements properly with an update to our experimental branch.

Here's what everyone's been up to;

Matt - Art Director

Whilst working through environment tasks the art teams main focus has been to get the visuals for the deployable turret up to scratch. Over the last few weeks this has gone through prototyping and has been subject to quite a few visual updates to make it feel more top heavy/creepy looking. We’re keeping in mind that these turrets are effectively glass cannons so they need to feel unstable so every visual change has been made to support this design.

OG Tom - Lead Designer

It's been a mixed month for me this December as I’ve been trawling through our backlog of bugs and smaller tasks and fixing up what I can. Mainly this has revolved around the AI and combat as we are getting very close to our final result once we can clean up a few more errors. Alongside that we’re also busy planning the next steps of in engine work so we can get mechanics and levels together quicker.

Melissa - Technical Designer

Since the build wheel is now at a completed state, with only a few bits of polish left to do, I've been focused on redesigning the reticles.
The new reticles are more minimal and responsive allowing further feedback for what you can and can’t damage in the world. We are hoping to expand the designs and implementation to include different reticles for each weapon type as well as other cool, interactive ways the reticle can respond to things in the world!

Glenn - Artist

I’ve been busy on Eden Star lately! I have managed to improve the road textures significantly so now there is less of a difference between the detail density of the terrain and the road. I’ve also been helping get the deployable assault turret ui designed and implemented. The reticle is also in the process of being updated to provide you with more feedback and should make the game a more intuitive experience in general, so Im looking forward to getting that in.

Ryan - Designer

Howdy! Since last post I have been working on the level design of Pharus 7, ensuring the start of the game sets the player up with all the information and tools they need to survive. This involved placing necessary scrap metal around the landscape to allow players to get back up and running after any unexpected demises.

Lauren - Lead Animator & Chen Thanut - Animator

These past few weeks we have been improving animations for various weapons and AI. Top of the list was animating a shiny new turret that players can pick up and deploy when needed. This powerful companion can fire at foes like the existing buildable turrets but can easily be moved around for the best tactical approach. However due to its portable nature it can also be easily knocked over…

The Shiv, Flare and Spear have had animation updates. Another weapon getting some TLC is the Katana, with updates to both 1st and 3rd person animations in progress :)

Ricky - Lead Developer

Keeping on top of optimisations to the game among a slew of new features coming in, gotta hit that 60/30/20fps… It can’t run on calculators just yet sadly but maybe one day.

George - Junior Developer

Since joining the team I have primarily been developing a new damage indicator system to improve the player feedback and general feel of combat. The system aims to provide the player with more relevant information when taking a hit, such as the direction of the hit, as well as how much damage you took from that hit. Currently this system does not replace the arrows that point out nearby enemies, so the player will still be able to use those arrows to avoid being struck in the first place!

Additionally, I have been working on fixing bugs with the save/load system, especially in multiplayer. Drop bags should behave more now too, such as remain in the world after loading a game, and deal with tap/hold interactions properly in multiplayer. Also fixed a bug that would cause the hologram of consumable items to remain after equipping another weapon.

John R - Developer

I’ve been continuing work on the new Turret weapon. The turret can be carried in your inventory and deployed whenever you need a little extra firepower or something to watch your back while you build. The turret can fire a long burst of bullets at the enemy and if they run to cover then it will keep up the pressure to keep them hiding. It’s weakness is that it can be knocked over but the player can quickly pick it up again and redeploy it.

I’ve also made the player’s aim become less accurate as they run; turn around; take damage or become fatigued. Moving slowly and crouching are the best way to get those perfect sniper shots.

Leon - Developer

I’ve been hard at work continuing the development of the gamepad control scheme for the tab menu, this month that has included new support for inventory and crafting filtering as-well as the addition of two new gamepad shortcuts allowing you to use consumables as-well as repair your armour with a gamepad. In addition to working on the gamepad support I’ve also managed to push a new objective marking feature so we can make it clear what locations a player needs to go to and how far away they are. You can see an example of this below.

Azeem - Junior Developer

I’ve been working on the lift to make sure it works with saving/loading during multiplayer. It can now move even if it is part way up or down and it can continue from where it left off. The button animation for the lift plays the correct animation and transitions back to whenever the lift has stopped.

Graham - Audio Designer

Being new to the project, a review of global current audio content & audio pipelines was started. From there, I planned out a large update of global audio content & tech gamewide.
I have been busy creating a vast array of new SFX content, every part of SFX is being updated and then some more! Everything from Gun fires > Environments > Entity types > UI, etc… a total of just under 1500 new audio assets have been created so far for the initial audio pass 1 milestone.

New pipelines and processes have been implemented allowing for a more detailed audio soundscape + a new Audio engine allows us to utilise modern techniques and larger audio assets variations (minimizing audio asset repetitivity)
Over the coming months, the new SFX content will start to make its way into the game and will be continually evolving as new content becomes available.


More updates coming soon!

See you in the fray,

- Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

The team have been working through more gameplay and interaction improvements across the board this month, including advancements in gamepad support and new animations.
The new build wheel is looking sharp after receiving fixes and polish, new effects for impacting with melee improve the feel of all hits and distinguish more clearly when things are getting damaged vs not damaged, and an awesome new portable turret has been taking shape...

Here's what we've been up to in more detail..

Matt - Art Director

The team have been pushing to improve quality of life with the interface by fixing gamepad and crafting issues, both visual and input driven. The updated build system is close to being in a working/presentable state after being quite.. ‘broken’ whilst we were improving asset and UI visuals.

I’ve also had a hand in directing an update to player built doors which will replace the old shutter style door.

OG Tom - Lead Designer

From a design perspective we’ve had to go back through some of our key game system logic to help improve and speed up our workflow. Our next focus is working the improved A.I into our base designs so they can help us shape improved player enemy encounters.

Melissa - Technical Designer

The build wheel has had even more love this month and now looks very polished with new animations and artwork as well as new prompts to ensure you know how to use it!

A new addition to the build wheel is also Modifications, so now you can fortify your buildings, add lights and add doors.

Ryan - Designer

Hey! This month I have been working on keeping the game looking and playing perfect, by fixing up any issues we uncover along the development process. Along with this I have been adjusting some parts of the landscape around Pharus 7 to get it feeling just right.

Katrine - Senior Artist

Hello! I have a few exciting things on the game this month. I’ve been reworking all of the Visual FX. Making explosions, impacts and destruction!

Lauren - Lead Animator

This month I've been working with Chen to get our 3rd person animations up to scratch, finally replacing some of the placeholders that have been in there for a while. With improvements to both the motion and the blending method, It really is looking a lot more natural. Adjustments to the first person meshes have also taken place and I've been smoothing out the weighting of the first person arms along with making further alterations to various animations including the flare and axe.

John R - Developer

We’ve been creating a Turret weapon, which provides a cool twist to the set of weaponry the player can equip.  The Turret can be carried in your inventory and then placed whenever you want something defensive to watch your back or you just want a bit of extra fire-power when battling the enemy.  And once you’re done, you can pick up your Turret again and take it with you.

Leon F - Developer

This month work on the gamepad support for our Player Menu has continued with functionality added to allow us to select and highlight empty slots allowing us to extend our functionality for gamepad specific actions.

You can now navigate around the menu with just a gamepad with the essential functions such as equipping and consuming now coming together.

In addition to gamepad support I’ve also been hard at work adding the icons to the Build Wheel system that correlate to the resources you’ll need to build various structures and utilities as you create your colony.

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

Polish, lots of polish, just not the typical kind you apply to cars and surfaces you care for the most. There’s been a real push to get destruction effects for designer placed items (which also drop related items and resources). 

Most exciting is the vastly improved appearance of the AI behaviour, which is starting to come together. We’re continuing to make steady progress towards showcasing these improvements in the form of moving images for an upcoming blog!

Here's this months breakdown of what's going on from the core team:

Matt - Art Director

My primary focus has been helping Melissa get the new build wheel and buildables up to scratch. It’s required some slight system changes, and visual polish and tweaking. We’ve unified the iconography for all build items so that every utility and block are now represented by a stylised icon. Which is far more readable on a menu system than something full detail squished into a smaller space.

On the other side of things there has been a big push to get particle VFX more varied and interesting for rocks, and metal destructible objects. This has really helped add to the illusion of things breaking apart, which we feel goes beyond most destruction in other games, helping to elevate the quality of the whole scavenging and mining experience.

Tom Whittemore - Lead Designer

This week I have been focusing on whiteboxing areas of the dam for gameplay testing. With the AI and combat coming along nicely we can start to test them in an encounter settings. A knock on effect of this was adjusting some of the level design in the dam to accommodate our new play space. Other than that it has been mainly cleaning up our levels and blueprints so things will run a bit smoother.

Melissa - Technical Designer

I’ve been working on quite a few different elements of the game recently including UI for the new melee system, implementing further destruction elements and various bug fixing throughout.

My primary focus thus far has been continuation on implementing the new build wheel. 

New artwork has gone into the wheel (courtesy of Matt Clark) to improve the overall aesthetic and make it much clearer as to what you are building and selecting; as well as this a lot of animations have had a second pass and we have some much better transition animations in the works. 

The finishing touches are still being worked on and hopefully the wheel will be completed soon! (Here’s another teaser though)

Ryan - Designer

Hey! Recently I have been going over the terrain around the Dam to continue my work on the landscapes and ensure we maximise buildability, while maintaining an interesting environment. 

Katrine - Senior Artist

Hello Pioneers! These last few weeks has been very exciting as we have been updated the destructibles and PFX throughout the game. Anything from flashy electrical explosions to runny toilet waste is coming soon to your game, near you... I have also been updating the visuals in and around the drop pod.

And last but not least I have made goo, guts, blood and intestines. Skipping lunch for a great cause!

Ellis - Environment Artist

Hey guys! In the past month I have been mainly working on destructibles for the environment. I have made a variety of different assets that can be smashed with a swing of the axe, they look well cool when they break! I have also delved into some of the levels in the dam, especially the canteen room. Finally I made a new makeshift flare for the game which looks really cool and can be made from drop items. Im looking forward to posting some gifs in the next blog post!

Hannah - Environment Artist

Hey everyone :) This past month I have been creating some more drop assets, including a makeshift bandage which can be utilised by the player to gain extra health, and some simple wiring which can be used for crafting various electrical items in Pharus 7. I’ve also had a lot of fun making some destructible props, including an air filter and series of wall pipes that break into pieces when shot at or hit with a melee weapon. Watch this space for some images and gifs in the upcoming blog post.

Lauren - Lead Animator

Refinements and fixes have been the main focus these past few weeks, animations for the axe are nearing final polish level and we’ve been working with a new animator Chen who has been hard at work updating our third person locomotion and spear animations.

John R - Developer

I've been working on the melee combat system to improve the feel of the weapons and fix some bugs.  Attacks and blocks now flow together more smoothly and are more accurate too.

Leon F - Developer

Since my work with Ricky on the Build Wheel from last month is now complete I’ve been spending this month developing the Gamepad Implementation for the inventory and crafting menus working off of Melissa’s designs and making exciting improvements to the player experience with a controller. 

In addition to gamepad support additional contextual short cuts are being added to the tab menu which includes double clicking weapons and armor to equip them with ease as-well as some other shortcuts I’ll hopefully be able to show off in the next blog post!

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

Refinements and many many fixes have been the focus of this month with core player interactions and the melee combat experience getting some much needed development time.

Multiplayer has also been getting steadily better in the background and we’re looking forward to sharing the next update with you all to play when it’s ready.

Matt – Art Director

It certainly has been a while! Lots to update everyone on as you’ll see from the rest of this blog.. we’ve been updating and refining drop items to make the progression system feel more grounded and connected to the environment.

There’s been a focus on driving the interior quality of our base structures, we’re particularly proud of how the visuals for these environments are coming along. The end result will be something consistently repeatable and customisable. Lastly, I’m looking forward to the production team giving us permission to get a new experimental build drop scheduled so everyone can sample the delights!

Tom Whaley – Lead Designer

I’ve been busy with re-working a lot of the AI encounters. The hunters are looking pretty good and have been passed on our developer and animation team. I’ve also been working with a handful of other devs on improving the AI in the upcoming content updates, as well as improving AI movement on higher difficulties and so on.

We’ve also been working to improve the AI behavior in all of the smaller-scale encounters. I’m hoping to get some of the larger ones playable and tested before release. I also plan to make some changes to how certain encounters are handled, so that they are less frustrating for the players as well.

The biggest item on the list for the upcoming content updates is the UI. After the feedback I’ve gotten from the community, I think there will be a ton of potential for improvement. I have a few ideas for improvements, but we’ll see how it goes.

So many Jumpermites were harmed in the making of this video!

Melissa – Technical Designer

The last month or so has seen a great deal of progress in the build wheel and buildables. The wheel has now been fully implemented and is now in the stage where we are just tweaking & ensuring everything is set up to use the new system. The controls are much smoother too and it works with gamepad! (Animations and art are still being improved)

I have also been working on other elements of the UI such as the block points that are used when blocking in combat. I’ve also done a revamp of the TAG Unit (previously Eden Kit) and fixed some issues with the stages of upgrades as well as some UI tweaks.

The build wheel should be completed and fully implemented fairly soon, so hopefully you guys will get to play and test it out in the near future!

Ryan – Designer

Hey! I recently joined the team and have been working on the progression through the beginning of the game, refining the crafting system so the game has a smoother build up in difficulty. I have also been reworking the landscape to be less bumpy to allow for easier base building and navigation.

Charlotte – Concept Artist

Hey there, this month I have been doing many different concepts for things! I started with some various different iterations of mineral node types, like quartz, silicon and lithium for players to mine.

In addition to this I have been creating a lot of different drop items that will be picked up from destructibles, such as scrap metal, mesh patches, fibre, smaller pieces of the mineral nodes and crafted items like refined fabric, bandages and a makeshift flare.

Lastly, I have worked on a couple concepts for different rooms in the dam like reworking a previous one of the recreational canteen and for the toilets.

Katrine – Senior Artist

Hello! Lately I have been focusing on upgrading some of our drop items like fabrics, oils, resin and guts (yes, my job sometimes consist of making monster intestines)

While not splattering around monster meat, I am fixing bugs here and there, making sure that the player experience is as awesome as possible.

Andy H – Lead QA

Wow some big changes have been going on and I’ve been very busy testing it all! From massively improved interactions, a massive Dam makeover to a new build menu.

I’ve also been investigating bugs and verifying fixes here, there and everywhere from the Engineers, Animators, Artists and Designers. They have been fixing problems with the new respawn system, Interaction markers, Interaction in general, melee weapon issues, A whole bunch of HUD/Menu issues. Problems with the pioneers animations/camera, Decals, Floating rocks/minables/foliage, fixing the fuel system with the in-game utilities, collision issues with new Dam rooms and more. But the biggest thing that I have been testing out has been the work on getting…

…MULTIPLAYER back to a playable state!! Woohoo! Well back to more testing I go.

Glenn – Senior Artist

I’ve been hard at work making some exciting looking rooms to explore in the dam. These rooms are currently mostly empty as this helps us re-use them where appropriate.

The lighting still needs work but it’s already feeling atmospheric and industrial. I’m really looking forward to when we get more story elements in there and have some tense encounters with lurking creatures!

Ellis – 3D Artist

Hi Pioneers! My name is Ellis and I am a new starter here at Flix. Since onboarding I have been working on various drop items and scrap metals for Eden Star as well as learning my way around Pharus 7.

Hannah – 3D Artist

Hi everyone! I have recently joined the Flix team and have been busy making various drop items for Eden Star. Check out the Lead asset I made during my first week, which will soon be added to the game as a pickup item that can be obtained from the metal ores dotted around the landscape

Lauren – Lead Animator

Recently the animation focus has been on the core combat experience with player and enemy attack animations getting further refinement passes. We’ve been tweaking the way AI react to the player blocking and parrying which adds a new dimension to the combat for players who are after a more skill based approach.

While you can still just bash attack and run you also have the ability to block incoming attacks and push back the enemies so long as you manage your stamina. Overall these changes will be giving more rewards for well timed interactions and creating more challenge and fun for combat in general.

Dan – Developer

The new spawning system has been finished, ensuring players will have the world loaded and ready for them before they take control of their Pioneer. This also includes some improvements to the appearance of HUD elements when spawning in. There have been some improvements to the display of hit markers too.

Multiplayer has seen a host of improvements and fixes bringing it closer to being stable. This includes work on the in-game HUD, loading, respawning and local IP games. There has been some tweaks to the network code too, to improve client-side performance.

Leon – Programmer

I’ve spent August making some big changes to how interaction works across Eden Star so that you can more reliably scavenge scrap, and harvest the organs of our Alien foes across Pharus 8.

In addition to this objects in the world now display a much more appropriate icon on their marker giving the player a better idea of what type of item they are picking up.

Outside of interaction work I’ve been extending the functionality of our latest iteration on the tent so that the player is forced to crouch when entering as-well as supporting Ricky and Melissa with input functionality and data handling for the new version of the build wheel!

Overall it’s been a very productive month and I’m excited to see these features finished over September.

John R – Developer

There are a range of melee weapons that can be used for quick attacks, or you can keep holding the attack button to charge-up your attack and give a more powerful hit.

Enemy attacks can be blocked using melee weapons. Some weapons are more effective at blocking than others and there are shield icons shown on the HUD to indicate how effective your current weapon is.

• If the shields get too low then it’s time to fight or run.
  
• If you time your block just right then you can parry the enemy’s attack and damage your opponent. This is a useful trick that’s worth taking the time to perfect.
  
• When the enemy is too close then you can shove them away and, depending on their size, watch them stumble back giving you a valuable opportunity for revenge.

The final melee action is the ability to dodge an enemy attack. You can jump away from an attack for a fast dodging action.

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

“In a distant sector of the Milky Way… on a planet that was thought to be lifeless... A native entity and its ecosystem thrives, stopping at nothing to protect it’s domain from interlopers who wish to make it their own”

Whilst the updates have been a little less frequent (waiting patiently for the cool stuff to land) Development has been at a steady pace! Overall improvements have been focused around our new progression curve, build system, AI engagements, and visual improvements to mining and inventory items which are all geared towards improving gameplay immersion.

Matt - Art Director

Tech Art is the order of the month. Lots of organisation has been going on with our in house testing team to get mineral rocks, drop items, and physical materials (which control sounds and effects on surfaces) all covered off to make the experience as nice as possible with our coming updates.

The decision to make this world more Alien to begin with has come with a large responsibility on the Art side to make the world feel a lot more dangerous. It’s nice to see that feeling come to life even with the smaller bits of cleanup that we’re doing. That said, there’s still atmospheric work to do along with finer tuning of sound that will make the experience really come together.

Lee - Tech Director

The new Planner Graph is now finished as far as version one is concerned. The design team are in full swing with it, putting new behaviours together and reporting back any bugs they find with it.

I’ve also started making some enhancements to our Octree to enable the storing of any objects, which will enable us to write some very fast EQS generators by using the information stored within it.

Joe - Lead Artist

After lots of planning and prep we are finally ready to start piecing together our interior kit work into a cohesive whole!

As well as consolation the team’s art into placeable assets, I have put together a basic system for to get them in game which should make the creation of these interior spaces much quicker!

John T - 3D Artist

Being the hero that I am I have been fixing bugs mostly this recent week. I also took the opportunity to implement the new particle effects for our new alien tree! Some fleshy goodness for sure!..

Charlotte - Concept Artist

It’s been a while since I created some work for Eden Star but I am back on it and have recently been focusing on creating some new concept art! Firstly for some pioneer hand VFX which will be visible while building various different items, selling them and while currently idle within the build wheel.

Not only this but I have also been creating some environment concepts for a new silo facility area, where I have started with the lab section which has been abandoned and taken over by all the creepy.

Lauren - Lead Animator

Player animation bug fixes has been the focus these past few weeks, also revisions to several motions to better align with revised design goals for player and enemy combat.

Alongside this we've been developing better enemy IK solutions (this makes the legs of enemies touch the floor, to get them to feel more grounded in their environment) and look-at solutions (because everything looks creepier if you can see it watching you...)

Matt W - 3D Artist

"Its 'Life', Jim, but not as we know it" Spock mused cautiously…

"It looks a bit like some sort of tree, but with H.R Giger Peperami inside it if you ask me...what shall we do with it - eat it!?" Kirk replied, wincing slightly as he recalled those Excalbian Meatballs Spock had rustled up whilst on routine patrol in the Delta Quadrant all those years ago. The Vulcan may be many things, but a chef he was not. Needless to say the Captain's Log that day did not bear thinking about.

"I'm not sure...", Spock replied icily, ignoring his captain's light-hearted jibe; "Perhaps we should just put it on Space ArtStation with the rest of the specimen's and see if anyone actually 'likes' it?".

"Hmm...I'm not sure anybody will, Spock - but sod it, we probably should at some point", agreed Kirk.

"Yes - and the sooner we can get back to playing Eden Star, the better - its bloody awesome", Spock urged "and I reckon there'll be a new update soon with some strange-looking alien tree thing filled with pulsating, glowing meat by that incredibly talented, but also extremely humble 3D artist chap - 'Matt Wilkins' - that's what I heard anyway...", he continued - ears now quivering with excitement....

Katrine L - Senior Artist

After a long, terribly sad break from Eden Star, I am back!
I am currently updating the look and feel of the drop items in the game. I have also placed new rocks and cliffs around the Dam as well as giving the terrain a fresh paint. (In other words: giving the QA team lots to do).

Tom Whittemore - Lead Designer

Recently, I have been reviewing lots of designs to make sure we are making progress in the right areas and also going over plans to make sure all our ideas are documented and ready to be prototyped and put into production. That's all I’ll say about that so we don’t give too much away about where we are taking certain areas.

In between these tasks I have been working on our Assault Turret Prototype, a turret that the player can quickly deploy in sticky situations, it's all going well getting the behaviour together although as you can see from the gif it still needs some ‘tweaks’.

Andy H - Level Design

Completed the updated layout for the Dam Interior, as for the exterior the Buildings above ground have now been replaced with a new destructible version that I created. Fixed a bunch of bugs to do with rocks clipping through structures and a floating Prefab building.

Melissa - Technical Designer

The build wheel first pass has been completed and passed over to the engineering team to finalise all the aspects before art implementation! (You can see the first pass though in this GIF below).

Since the build wheels first pass, i’ve been working on multiple aspects of the design - looking at the current tools we have, possible upgrades and various UI elements.As well as looking over and reviewing the current control scheme, including gamepad support! Lastly, I created and implemented some horrific SFX for a new fleshy tree.

Carlos - Developer

The long road to revamping our respawn system seems to be near an end now! Our respawn logic in the back end has now been put into place. Ricky and I have now started the process of implementing the front end work for this!

I’m currently in the process of adding a few extra tweaks to our respawn blocks that will make them feel that extra bit better but I won’t say too much on this now!

Leon - Developer

I’ve been hard at work tracking down and destroying bugs in the game as-well as working with Carlos and Ricky on some new features. With Carlos I’ve been helping set up a Marker that reacts to our new Respawn Blocks being owned. With Ricky I’ve been optimizing the way we stream assets in to reduce load times.

Dan - Developer

Lots of work has been going in to make sure that the respawning process for players is free of any technical issues. This has mostly been focusing on issues that can arise during networked multiplayer games and allow us to ensure the pioneer is safe to respawn before giving control back to the player.

Ricky - Lead Developer

Getting the new respawn system hooked up and implemented has led to a slightly more embiggened task than first thought, but I’ve been tackling it anyway this week and it’s finally coming together. The groundwork needed for the respawn menu is also going to be used for future menus like the new build menu which has already been in progress.

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

Reporting in.. the team have been in the underground bunker with their focus goggles on. We’re now in the process of working towards our next update where MANY things have changed. Our build system is getting some vast UI improvements. Our AI system is becoming more designer friendly as well, which means more variety with in world encounters, not to mention vehicles on the horizon.

Matt - Art Director

There have been some big ol’ tasks on the horizon for a while which we’ve just started to tackle. A bit of radio silence on our end due to the lack of pretty things to show recently! And let’s face it, you read these updates for the nice pictures ;)

Now that we have layouts that meet the gameplay criteria for this overhaul.. the Art team have been tasked at building a more streamlined way to theme and construct our ‘non destructible’ underground facilities. This has involved some heavy planning from an assembly point of view, to ensure we get the variety needed to produce a number of different and varied structures all using one master kit.

Lee - Tech Director

So I have finally had some time to create a new custom editor for our AI system. It’s something I have been wanting to do for a long time.

It will allow the designers to quickly put together new prototype behaviours using blueprint tasks which can them be assembled in the editor and tested. This should enable anyone in the office with some basic blueprint knowledge to tweak AI behaviours with ease.

This version of the editor doesn’t include much in the way of debugging, so my next task will be to add a debug mode, but for now people can start using it.

Joe - Lead Artist

A big mix of different (but all equally important) tasks and meetings over the last few weeks. I have mainly been working through pipeline and process changes for our interior spaces. The hope is we’ll be able to create large, visually impressive ‘dungeon’-style areas - quickly and efficiently, once the first couple are complete. Additionally, there have been many discussions to ensure we hit the ground running with new tasks that provide a ton of value for players going forward.

Glenn - 3D Artist

David and I have been busy working on the maintenance kit for the dam. We have made some good progress and now have a new trim sheet so that we can make some interesting rooms quickly and efficiently. I have also finished work on the Transport Vehicle model. The model is complete and looking cool in engine, we still have some implementation work to do on it though.

Tom W - Lead Designer

This week I have been part of a production clean up to help focus the design team towards solving the problems that will allow us to get closer to a shippable build. This has been mainly finishing lots of designs that we had backlogged to make sure the engineers have stuff to implement. Also with this there has been lots of clean up happening with removing old prototypes and refining what we do have so hopefully everything works better and faster!

Lauren - Lead Animator

Animations and rigs for our new vehicle meshes have been the focus recently. The hoverbike aka ‘The Speeder’, and the transport vehicle have been getting some attention after a long time on the backlog.

Matt W - 3D Artist

Plenty of progress made creating an alternate ‘non-terran’ tree that is part of the same genetic family as the local creatures. Moved onto baking this monstrosity at the end of this week.

Katrine L - Senior Artist

Lately I have been helping out with some spring cleaning (yes it is still spring/winter here in England). I have also done some landscaping in Eden Star, placing some new rocks on top of pione.. I mean terrain! It is looking good!

Andy H - Level Designer

The Dam has a lot going on in and around it at the moment as I have been busy making adjustments to the layout to make it feel better from a gameplay perspective, giving some areas a purpose and I’ve been making blockouts for additional areas within the Dam Including a new way for enemies to spawn. Also I have been changing our triggered spawners over to use a more efficient system throughout the world.

Melissa - Technical Designer

Besides lots of meetings this week to discuss various elements of the game, work has been going smoothly on the new build wheel and I'm making a lot of headway ensuring that the new wheel works well with the building system itself.

This also means that I’ve had to review the structure of the building system itself and have plans to internally improve the flow.

I’ve also been looking into and planning how we can integrate further gamepad support and controls for the game as a whole which will include both gameplay and any UI / menus; ultimately working towards much better controller support for the future.

Carlos - Developer

I’ve been delving deep into our respawn logic. Our new tent and respawn managers are now in a good place. I’m currently looking into re-working the way we spawn the pawn to make it easier to follow and more robust. This should hopefully lead to more stable respawning logic that ensures our Pioneers don’t go missing below the new lovely terrain!

Tom - Developer

This week I’ve been mostly working with Leon on our new marker system - making it much more expandable so we can mark pretty much anything!  The new system should allow for landmarks to be easily placed on the compass, the world map, or your screen without much extra effort.

Leon - Developer

Hey guys I’m new on the team but have been taking a look at a number of bugs related to the markers placed on objects you interact with, as-well as adding multiplayer functionality to the lift in the tower!

Markers are now cleaned up from the user interface when you open your inventory and I’ve been working on making it so foliage instances behave nicely with these interaction UI elements.

In addition to this I’ve updated the Pioneer armor pieces so they now provide appropriate amounts of shield making it easier for the Pioneers out there to survive the harsh reality of a desolate planet.

Dan - Developer

With changes on the horizon to the respawn system, I’ve been preparing a system to improve the respawning process - ensuring the world has loaded smoothly for a newly respawned Pioneer.

When finished, this should prevent a few reported multiplayer issues that occur during respawning. In addition, various bugs have been addressed regarding the inventory UI and interacting with lootable items in the world.

Ricky - Lead Developer

Among the wave of several UI design talks I’ve been creating a weapon holstering mechanic this week. This will coincide with changes to player equipment management and player progression going forward.

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

Design and Art have toggled laser focus mode (aka the mode of focus above the normal focus mode). Our major encounter points are getting some much needed attention to get the progression working well with the variety of exploration that is going to be on offer.

Matt - Art Director

I’ve been ‘syncing’ with designers on what is left to do from a design perspective for different types of encounters around what we deem the critical path. We’re keeping our attention firmly on visual improvements which can be delivered without influencing or changing any of the established gameplay progression.

A good example of this is just randomly adding creates for visual polish.. Due to the nature of the game a crate may have items you collect from it which can upset the balance of material collection at that point in time, and therefore upset designers. Sad designers = unhappy artists, and the vicious production cycle of passive aggressive notes left on peoples desks begins.

Joe - Lead Artist

More art polishing this week, with post processing and atmospheric tweaks going in, as well as implementing Tom’s rather nice cliff work.

Glenn - 3D Artist

Been hard at work creating some good uvs for the Transport Vehicle, really looking forward to getting this vehicle textured and in game. I’ve also been helping Joe with lighting when I get the chance, he’s been making great progress and the game is feeling really atmospheric.

Tom W - Technical Artist

Been looking at improving the spline tools we use to generate more complex cliff work. This has been useful for reducing setup time of the surrounding ground. I’ve started to implement auto adjustment and generation features that allow cliff rocks to blend better with the world terrain.

Davide - Concept Artist

Lots of concept work this week, I’ve been doing a first design pass on the alien foliage assets. The goal was to communicate the visual of something that can be visually associated with trees and bushes, but without being an actual plant, as that would be something that visually and conceptually belongs to the terran biome.

More concept work has been done to update the prefab bases that can be found around the world, plus a pass of set dressing on the shipwreck area.

Basia U - Animator

Continued creating new animations for fist melee attacks. I’ve finished off with some pretty cool new spear attack animations for the 3rd person. Today is my last day (which is a bit sad) but also I’m looking forward to moving onto other things and seeing where Eden Star goes! And I’m sure it’s going to be awesome.

John T - 3D Artist

After flinging himself at every rock around David was no longer able to produce the high quality rock collision we require so I have bravely taken on the mantle of Rock Collision Artist. I take this with a great honor and will fling myself at rocks with precision and pride.

David M - 3D Artist

So as Mr Tranter mentioned, the rock collision life wasn’t the life for me. I am now tasked with sprucing up the Dam interior with some fancy new wall panel variants as well as some other assets that will help the overall look and aid with future storytelling within. I have not forgotten my days as a rock collider, but I am surely glad they are behind me.

OG Tom W - Lead Designer

This week has been an interesting one for the design team as we have been reviewing the current game on the experimental branch and assess the players progression throughout the game. Our main concern was that the two of the main focus of Eden Star, base building and survival, were not working together as well as we wanted.

So we locked ourselves in a meeting room for the day and formulated a plan to restructure the progression around the player experiences we want to create. Without spoiling too much our current plan is looking at how we can integrate unlocking schematics into encounters and challenges.       

Melissa - Technical Designer

I've continued working on the new build wheel system & prototype this week. The build wheel prototype has developed quickly and we are currently at a stage where the wheel is almost functional from a basic user interface standpoint. The next stage however will be to get it functional from a gameplay standpoint, allowing the player to actually select an item and build it.

Hopefully it'll be at a stage soon where we can share some screenshots with you all.

Carlos - Developer

Being back on Eden Star has allowed me to begin my work on the respawn system in ernest! I’ve started the backend work to allow players to build our new respawn blocks in the world, as well as being able to claim any neutral respawn blocks as their own! I’ve also ensured that our new respawn blocks work both in multiplayer and singleplayer!

I’m excited to show you guys more on this once I have the backend work finalised! :)

Tom - Developer

This week I've been reworking a bunch of logic to do with how we decide what icon to stick on what object when you’re near it - whether its ammo or food or a lightswitch, the logic that drives that icon is a lot more robust.  Aside from that i’ve also been working on making them a lot more performant, and had a crack at solving the lag between the camera movement and the marker being realigned to its appropriate object.

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

There’s been some Worldly changes going on. The team have been making further improvements to UI, world atmospherics and the base/build system. Design have been improving and balancing crafting and resource collection.

Matt - Art Director

Eventful week to say the least! many new elements of development are coming together to improve and unify the visual styling across the board, from the future vehicles to new UI elements.

There are quite a few VFX and atmospheric improvements that are being made which is pushing up the realism, making a big difference in the dangerous immersive feeling we’re trying to get across to Pioneers when they play this first area.

Joe - Lead Artist

Loads of high-level visual work has gone into ES over the past couple weeks - in particular, I’ve finished an initial pass on our lighting and day/night cycle visuals, and am now working on tying everything together with VFX and atmospherics.

The UI boot sequence and damage effects have also been improved, and I’ve made a couple of benchmark assets and placement systems to assist with level design.

I also had time to add some more informative, segmented health bars, just so players can see what they’re getting into when they initiate combat.

Davide - Concept Artist

Moved swiftly onto colour concepts and Orthographics for our hostile world tree variant. These trees are more in keeping with the visual language of the creatures. Pictures to come soon!

Glenn - 3D Artist

I’ve been working on the transport vehicle model, getting it closer to the latest concept and making it more functional with some removable parts. We have constructed it in such a way that the back compartment could potentially be removed and other modular assets put there instead, perhaps a trailer for carrying cargo or a gun turret.

In general it should look and feel more exciting and fit well with the rest of the Eden Star aesthetic due to Davide’s great concept work. It has also been optimised more, so it should perform well when in game. I’m really looking forward to driving it!

Andy H - Level Designer

This week I’ve been playing the early areas of the game to get an idea of how easy it is to gather materials for crafting, looking at item descriptions as I go. Been smashing all of our destructibles to see if they feel right and investigating damaging them with each type of weapon for balancing.

Some of the interaction markers for some Items were wrong so I’ve fixed that right up too. Also John T has gone over some new shipwreck assets that I’m going to spread around places next week to make shipwrecks look and feel more believable.

Lauren - Lead Animator

We've had time this week to delve into fixing up some of the 1st person player gun animation issues, also 3rd person melee animations with the fists and shiv have been getting some love, and are shaping up nicely. With the fixes incoming to 3rd person aiming this should make for a much nicer experience.

Yves - Senior Developer

Spent some time on the traces for 3rd person melee aiming to make bashing AI and picking things up in 3rd person much easier.

John T - 3D Artist

This past week I have looked back at the shipwreck and assessed how we could improve the overall aesthetic. This included breaking up the silhouette with some new panels and rebar. Also the arrangement of these assets better reflects the narrative that we wish to convey. The blending with the new terrain has overall been hugely beneficial to the scene.

David M - 3D Artist

First time joining the blog post and boy do I have a treat for you guys...I’ve been creating collision meshes for our beautiful rock collection! This may or may not have involved me flinging myself at real life rocks to test how collision should work. Either way, it’s been super fun and I hope it never ends.

Tom W - Lead Designer

This week I’ve been getting stuck back into Eden Star playthroughs so we can review certain elements of the game for balancing. This has also been great for spotting little bugs we’ve had and cleaning them up as we go along. The only noticeable change for players will be some animations for the reticles on melee weapons, kinetic tools and build tools.

Melissa - Technical Designer

Jumped onto this project for the first time recently and have been prototyping a new build wheel interface and back end system to make it more user friendly and easier to navigate. This prototype is in the early stages but is coming together well.

Look back here for more updates soon!

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix

Greetings Pioneers!

The Art and Design team have been hard at work making some much needed improvements to the atmosphere and surroundings. Fundamentally this all helps define important areas in the world. There's been some much needed visual and lighting re-balancing with further placement passes to make the rock structures appear more natural.

Matt - Art Director

We’re throwing our all at visual improvements to the surrounding area in what is our ‘vertical slice’ for this experimental branch work. Been making sure everyone is focusing their attention on the right things to keep the latest art pass consistent across the game.

Joe - Lead Artist

Lots of work on unifying the visuals for our environment this week. The nature of this work has meant touching on all aspects of our world. We’ve tweaked the lighting, atmospherics and how those things interact with the day/night cycle, as well as replacing many placeholder assets and implementing a whole new terrain shader setup. We want to move away from the sandy mars look, and go for something a little more “Eden Star”...

Glenn - 3D Artist

I’ve been working on the cliffs, rocks and terrain painting. Tom Whaley gave us some great rocks and materials he had and I created 2 new cliff models to match them and got them working in game with collision. It’s looking pretty cool around the main path the player takes at the beginning of the game, we are working hard to set a high standard in this area that we can aim for in the rest of the game. I’ve also been helping with the lighting setup where I can.

Andy H - Level Design

I’ve been working on Placing more objects into the world around key locations, adding in outposts and adding in a bit more foliage around too because everyone loves more stuff to forage.

Also I’ve been adding effects around hives to add more atmosphere inside the dam.

More to come... we'll be looking at dropping this new content to our experimental branch soon!

See you in the fray!

-Team Flix