RoVerse Development Newsletter #105

Hello everyone! Welcome to the 105th issue of the RoVerse Development Newsletter, where we keep you updated on the progress we've made over the past week.

This week, we have two new ships from Sae'Tzar, as well as an updated model of the Garfish to follow the no-CSGv1-partial-coloring rule we introduced last week; we have an update on the continued work on station NPC's by Stratiz; further development of the asset-loading back-end systems from lordrex, and a quite substantial website overhaul from Idyllic. Lets get started!

Over the past several weeks, Sae'Tzar has been working on additions to his fleet of ships to be added to the game. He had one of these ships completed last week, but we decided to hold off on showing it until the full fleet could be assembled.

The largest Capital in his fleet is now the Conqueror. Seen here adjacent to several Guardians and Bolithos, as well as the Titan.

Truly a massive ship - with an armament of about 18 medium mounts, a sprinkling of light mounts for defensive weaponry, and equipped with enough missiles to blow out the sky, this ship is a force to be reckoned with on its own, let alone as part of an invading fleet.

Adjacent to the Small Capital Guardian, which is about 50 studs long at 2% scale, with the 125 stud Conqueror.

When building your ships, it is important to know where to use high detail, and where it is unnecessary - details like fixed broadside guns that will be a focal point can have a bit extra, while the majority of the hull is smooth and low-detailed.

This doesn't always work, especially with rounded hull shapes, but where possible, reduction of excess polygons is encouraged.

The second ship Sae'Tzar completed this week is the Iphigenia, here being rigged up for addition to the Capital Update.

​Stratiz attended RDC this week, so his development time was limited, but he has started the process of teaching NPC's to search for available seats around them in the station. This behavior will later be expanded to include a variety of activities and interactions with objects scattered throughout the station, and emphasize what technology is available for interaction to the player.

With all those showcases available to explore, with all sorts of fancy holographic displays and door access panels, it's hard to tell what is available for the player to interact with. The use of NPC's will be both for aesthetic reasons, as discussed before, but also to show just how detailed our stations are. From walking through doorways into darkened corners, to browsing the local weapon dealer's selections, stations should be full of interesting and engaging activity.

On the back-end side of things, lordrex has gotten the initial demonstration model of asset loading working, as seen last week with the image of the world tree; this week, he has pushed forward with designing and beginning to code the entire asset loading system. From faction stations to nebulae in the void, all sorts of stellar details will need to be loaded in when the server starts up, and specific details will have to be replicated between running one and might disappear. We can't wait to see what he comes up with.

Last week we debuted the RoVerse Development Roadmap, showing where we've been, and where we're headed. To be honest, it wasn't very pretty, and was fairly hard to read. So Idyllic took some time on his roadtrip to spruce it up, as well as some of the other pages on the RoVerse Website.

Now it includes a legend, so you can tell what the different shades mean, selected images showing the work already completed in each phase of the project, from the ALPHA and BETA stages, to beyond Primary Release, as well as some descriptive paragraphs about those phases. Take a chance and check it out.

We've also significantly changed the FAQ page. Previously, it was a list of every question ever asked in a newsletter, and it wasn't very helpful for those looking for introductory details. So we thinned it down to our top 10 most frequently asked and important questions.

If you're looking for every answer ever given, to every question ever asked, reading all 104 newsletters is probably the better way to go, to get a better idea of the project as a whole, not just the questions people ask us.

​Much more approachable, if you ask me.

Beyond that, we've made a few aesthetic updates to the home pages, edited a few descriptions, updated old photos; the Photo Archive has been updated to include the last few newsletters, and an update to our contact page.

Another new page this week is the Introductory Videos page, linking you to all our development diary video updates, rather than sending you searching for Vaktus' youtube page.

The most useful for seasoned community members will be the new Starmap page, where you can view a high-resolution image of the galaxy without any nebulae obscuring systems or routes. Released to the community earlier this week with a zoomable map, this page now includes information on the 7 sectors of the galaxy, and will be updated with more information over time, like basic resource information or who controls the sector.

In the future we'll be creating a shipbuilder's guide with all the information you'll need to build faction and subfaction fighters and capitals, but that'll have to wait until next week.


Each week we compile a Q&A section here whenever there are any new questions posted on the RoVerse Community group wall or in the Community Discord Server. Be sure to join if you have any questions about RoVerse:

ROBLOX Group: https://www.roblox.com/My/Groups.aspx?gid=2948290
Discord server: https://discord.gg/npxBGwJ

Q1: Will there be an arcade version of the game where ship destruction doesn't matter, and you can try out all the ships?

A1: Beyond the Capital Update's various ships and unlocks, we do have some plans for a practice field for factions to use to train new pilots without risking their valuable ships and resources, so something along the lines of an arcade version will probably come around eventually.

Q2: Will there be communications jamming?

A2: An interesting concept. Though it may find it's uses in real-world combat, I'm not sure there would be an effective way to use it RoVerse. If we add a jamming function, factions would jump to discord chat or voice chat, over using an inconsistent in-game chat system.

Q3: Space Torpedos?

A3: Sure!

Q4: Will there be any medical equipment for healing during combat?

A4: For ships there should be a few different options, like deploying nanobots to repair hull damage, or energy boosters for shields. Creating or purchasing these repair items should be fairly expensive and have a built-in delay, so ships don't just spam them.

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​​You can support us by joining our Community Group or Discord server! So far, the community has been absolutely amazing, supportive, and very friendly. We are very appreciative of all the support you guys show us!

If you want to catch any of our developers streaming, you can always follow our official Twitch channel here!

Remember, we are always looking for new, talented builders, scripters and artists! If you’d like to help us you can always get in touch with us through RoVerse_Official on the ROBLOX website, or by contacting an Administrator in the community Discord! Don’t worry, we don’t bite!