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[Firgof Umbra]

We simply do not have the resources to produce that much art.  Not every change or comparative scaling will be reflected in your ship design.  If you add a ship bay, the ship will look like a carrier.  If you produce an engineless ship, it will look like a station.  But there will be no difference between a Scale 8 ship equipped with plasma beams and a Scale 8 ship equipped with a hundred flak cannons.

At this time we have 2 ship sets with somewhere around 12 models each.  We would probably need somewhere around 40 or 80 for each to more realistically represent ranges of ship design possibilities.  However, each model takes from 1 day to 1 week* to be actually made.  At the minimum: Nearly 3 months and a lot of money to pull that off.  The problem with that is that we don't have the time to even put that in to the retail launch if we wanted to at this point.  We weren't able to before simply because we didn't have enough money.

*edit for accuracy

[lordcooper]

That's fair enough.  Will the game be open enough for others to mod these in?

E:  Or have you considered doing this post launch, when a few bucks have rolled in?

[Firgof Umbra]

Definitely.  Models can, these days, check for tags on ships and choose the model to represent that ship accordingly.  It may not be accurate enough to properly demonstrate that your ship has huge engines, for instance, but it would be able to represent the type of engine you have equipped or the type of armor you've got and et cetera.

E:  Or have you considered doing this post launch, when a few bucks have rolled in?

Well, if retail is a very significant event for us financially then we may roll such things into the expansion if we're able to make one.  We have launched digitally since August (which I assume you know) but I thought I'd clarify here that bucks have rolled in for that launch but not enough unfortunately.

[de5me7]

Non Star Ruler question

Will blind mind continue to exist? if so what games are you going to move on too?

[Firgof Umbra]

Blind Mind Studios will continue to persist and we are attempting to pursue further games, yes.  As for what those games might be I couldn't tell you even if I really wanted to, not out of marketing restraint (though there is also that) but simply because we have a lot of ideas we'd like to pursue.

[SeaBee]

Blind Mind Studios will continue to persist and we are attempting to pursue further games, yes.  As for what those games might be I couldn't tell you even if I really wanted to, not out of marketing restraint (though there is also that) but simply because we have a lot of ideas we'd like to pursue.

That's good news. I look forward to hearing what your next game will be!

[Firgof Umbra]

Patch is about to go out today.  We were able to squeeze in a small feature and may be including part or all of the new tutorial system.

Here's what's new (screenshots are prototypes; stuff such as the HP of the unstable star have changed):

[Fixed] Fixed a "Effector Data Mismatch" bug that many people were experiencing.
[Fixed] Significantly improved performance with AIs late-game.
[Fixed] Fixed a memory leak when loading a saved game.
[Fixed] Autosaves are now disabled when paused.
[Fixed] Planets with extremely low population are no longer useless until purged.
[Fixed] Pirates were not updating their hulls, leaving them very vulnerable as the game progressed.
[Fixed] Pirates were starting with random tech levels, sometimes causing them to be excessively powerful.
[Fixed] "Update Threshold" on blueprints is no longer lost when saving the blueprint.
[Fixed] Mining lasers with an emergency power supplying all the power needs caused an error.
[Fixed] Ammo usage wasn't updating when a modifier that affected it was added.
[Fixed] Pausing the game in multiplayer could cause newly connected clients to divide by zero in their interpolation, making stars vanish.
[Changed] When a planet is lost, everything yet to be built, and without any progress, are removed from the build queue.
[Changed] Reduced AI difficulty on lower AI settings.
[Changed] The right-click menu is now implemented in scripts.
[Balance] Planetary weapons gain range when on a Ringworld (10x base range).
[Balance] Fighter Hulls can now be made bigger as their tech level is increased.
[Added] Multiplayer option to prevent AIs from taking over player empires when they disconnect.
[Added] Added three special types of systems that offer unique tactical choices.

Remnant Seats - The old Capital of the Remnant Empire.  Contains many valuable planets and one 50-slot planet.  The Remnants here are cutting edge (TL11~) and each planet is guarded by a network of artillery platforms with repair beams and so forth.

Remnant Gates - These systems contain Gates -- ancient constructs created by the Remnant Empire before its fall which enabled emergency mass transportation of their resources.  If captured, these gates can be used to your Empire's advantage: perverting its original usage you can teleport any object (and all objects within a half-AU of that object) into the gate system.  Due to the massive energies and complex mechanisms required to perform this feat, the Gates require 30 minutes to cool down after usage.  When captured, all players are notified of the new ownership.

Unstable Star - Due to volatile and unstable reactions in the core of this system's star it is vastly easier to create a chain reaction to a supernova.  These systems for some reason  have on average much larger and more hospitable worlds.

TBD: Charged particle star, Ion Storm star

[Astral]

This makes me want to re-purchase the game on Steam; when I got it on Impulse I didn't know any better (and having to manually patch everything in increments is a bit of a pain).

Looks like its come a long way since the last time I played.

[Firgof Umbra]

You no longer need to manually patch; we have an automatic updater built into the game these days since the game no longer has the auto-update function from Impulse.  We built it expressly to help out Impulse users who wanted to keep the updating convenience of Impulse.

EDIT:  It's not entirely automatic though; you do have to click a button in the top-right corner of the main menu. (Check for Updates)

Not that we wouldn't appreciate more money but I am in the business of customer service.

[KaguroDraven]

Yes! I love the sound of the new additions by the way.

[Firgof Umbra]

Patch is now live for non-Steam customers; click here or click "Check for Updates" in your game!

Those who downloaded and installed 1078: you'll need to reinstall.  Sorry for the inconvenience.  It's fixed now so nobody should have issues with downloading and installing the patch now. 

[Firgof Umbra]

(A certain historic event may be very close...)

v1080 is launched!

[Fixed] Fixed issues related to the recently added special systems feature.
[Fixed] Fixed issues with AI diplomacy in loaded games.
[Fixed] Pirates still had incorrect research rates in loaded games.
[Fixed] 'Continue' would not consistently choose the newest save.
[Changed] Load Game menu now shows the current mod you're in.
[Added] Added a new Star Corona effect, which should produce much nicer and more active looking stars!
[Added] Added a completely redone tutorial with more information presented in a, we hope, more effective way.

[Johnfalcon99977]

I have played this game, and its quite awsome.

Edit: I would like to see set scenarios in this game, like trying to help a Species survive againist some deadly odds, and trying to make sure the Remnants last as long as possible would be very cool.

[Symbiode]

I'm hoping someone can give some quick advise. I just started playing Aurora a few days ago and am really enjoying it, but I have never played any if that genre of game (4x I believe?). I see that Star Ruler is on sale on Steam today for $5, can anyone compare Star Ruler to Aurora for me, or am I way off base and these two games are nothing alike?

[Firgof Umbra]

I haven't played Aurora but you can try the demo if you'd like to draw your own conclusions