If you log in to Cobalt you’ll notice there’s a new update! This update is just one tiny fix:

• Recompiled game.exe to get rid of new DirectX dependencies (the “missing dll” error message)

Cheers!

/ jeb_

Hi again! V105 Alpha is ready and it contains fixes and tweaks to the editor and game and a new map by Frall!

During the past couple of weeks I (thewreck) have been working on laying the technological groundwork for the campaign. There has been and still is a bunch of structure dearly in need of restructuring, and that is what I’m focusing on now.

Kinten has been working on producing content for the campaign and realizing some of the concepts made by a man named Erik! I would love to show some them but that will have to wait until we know how things turnout ingame!

Frall has been streaming himself developing maps for Cobalt daily during office hours central European time. If you are interested in seeing maps being made real-time, or if you just want to hang out in the chat with others and discuss mapping, that is a great place to meet up!

Hit the jump for the full change-log!

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Today it is 10 years since the first pre-alpha of “Whispers in Akarra” was released. Back then I was building the game on my own, but the project was shortly discovered by Kinten and thewreck, and the three of us are now the core of Oxeye Game Studio. I think I always will look back at this game with fondness. It may not have been the best game in the world, but we peaked at over 100 players online, and it’s nice to say that you’ve made an “online RPG.” Maybe we’ll get the chance to revisit that area some time!

Hit the jump for some pictures!

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The Harvest: Massive Encounter 1.18 build has been updated to fix some compatibility issues. Tommaso also wanted to point out that you start the demo by clicking “run_harvest”

Get the demo here: http://www.oxeyegames.com/harvest/download-now/

Or buy the game here: http://www.oxeyegames.com/harvest/buy-now/ (don’t forget to use the “TOMMASO” discount code, which is available this week)

Hey!

It’s over 1.5 years since we wrote about the 1.17 update to Harvest, and finally we’re able to release an updated version. It won’t be 1.17, but 1.18 (fixing a couple of more things), and this time also with builds for Linux!

The game changes are:

• Invert scroll direction setting
• Added drag-and-place buildings, if you keep the mouse pressed the game will place the next building at the edge of the energy range from the previous one
• Made it possible to select and sell multiple buildings at once, also added “getSelectedBuildings” Lua hook
• Added an option for the defenses to hold fire
• Shaded map edge
• Map expansion marker line
• Double-size minimap for resolutions larger than 800×600
• Changed damage calculation of missile turrets
• Removed the age limit of solar plants
• Removed the boss aliens
• Energy links will attempt to avoid sending energy to links that are pointing towards itself
• Made it possible to change language setting in the settings menu
• Changed so that Poseidon and Ares are unlocked by gaining award points

And we’ve also changed a bunch of stuff in the engine:

• Replaced the standard Lua intepreter with LuaJIT2
• Replaced BASS with OpenAL for sound effects
• Made profiles and save games “Program Files safe” (see more below)

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Be sure to check out the Oxeye game studio office live as Fredrik “Frall” Henriksson stream Cobalt level design. (Almost daily) Get a sneak peek on upcoming levels and learn more about the editor.

Check out the stream here: http://www.twitch.tv/frall_

Please also follow @Frall_ on twitter for more info about the stream and Cobalt level design!

Are you looking for help on how to use the editor? Do you need to know how to rotate or scale a tile?

Puffdot on the cobalt forums has a great post that summarizes the hot-keys as well a number of other tips!

http://www.cobaltforum.net/topic/1659-tutorial-how-to-use-the-editor/

Hey

If you haven’t got it already, Harvest: Massive Encounter is 50 % off on Steam today! Get it here: http://store.steampowered.com/app/15400

This daily deal was supposed to be coordinated with the long-awaited 1.18 update of the game, and also the fresh Mac OS X version on Steam. Unfortunately there seems to have been some kind of misunderstanding with Steam, so this update has been delayed. We’ll post again when the update is released!

Cheers,

// jeb_ and Tommo

This is more or less a bug-fix update for v103!

change-log

Alterations:

• profile names can now contain numbers as well as a number of special characters.

Bug-Fixes:

• Loading of some maps would crash because of trying to index status
• Placing tiles in the editor with a default id would crash the editor.
• hud now doesnt restart when moving through doors
• alarms would after being triggered many times lag the game down to a halt.
• some menus in the profiles had the options jumbled
• the old maps that would show up in the v103 menu will now be deleted in an ungly manner. This means that you cannot use those map names for now since they would be deleted…. =)… will remove this function in a later patch.

Hi!

Cobalt v103 Alpha is finally ready, and it contains improvements in many spread out unrelated areas, however, the biggest addition is the Map Editor! For the people who have accessed the editor previously, there is a huge amount of unlisted changes that have been made, but for the others, this will simply be the first encounter with making your own maps.

Bugs discovered post upload:

1. Due to the reorganization of the maps, there are some oddities if you are updating from v102. You might see some duplicate maps with different names in your menu. If this happens, reinstall the game from a v103, or clean out the maps folder prior to updating. (all map files that does NOT have a .localization file next to it are old.)
2. The map editor will crash if you try to place a tile that has a default ID (which goes for a lot of important tiles). This crash is bad enough that if you are already using the map editor, it is advisable to keep separate installations.

If you find bugs, please post them at http://getsatisfaction.com/cobalt/ we will be making another update tomorrow!

Hit more to read all about it!

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