ROVerse Development Newsletter #94

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

The end of the school year has finally come, meaning our Devs will now have much more time to devote to RoVerse Development. Leading the team this week is Idyllic, with advancements in the turret operation systems.

Taking community feedback from a gif we posted a few weeks back, he has tweaked the first person turret movement to track the mouse with better accuracy than before, most notably a smaller deadzone. The initial iteration had a mostly uncontrollable deadzone, making aiming harder than it should be. With the new system, shooting down invading fleets of fighters should be easier than ever.

Also notable in the gif above, though maybe a bit hard to see, is the alternating of barrels. Since we've taken on the task of allowing factions to build their own turrets, supporting a wide variety of numbers of barrels in exotic locations is an important feature, that not only makes the system more flexible, but better looking too. As long as faction developers follow the correct format (to be released later) when designing and building their turrets, we should be able to support as many creative designs as they can come up with.

A discussion about ground base buildings has also come up. Some of the prototypes from quite a while ago were very small structures that you could theoretically build anywhere, but were more suited to a 'camp' than a ground base. Bases are intended to fill the middle ground between temporary structures and cities, much like modular outposts in space are a middle ground between ships and faction stations. If a subfaction was to set up their Headquarters on a planets surface, the structure should be comparable in size and usefulness to those set up by space-bound subfactions, right? With this in mind, Idyllic has been developing a new prototype of base structures at a larger scale. Seen above, these buildings aren't quite the size of a cities' towering skyscrapers, nor are they the size of a vehicle garage. Perhaps we'll support small, medium, and large variants, to better fit different uses.

While we continue to work on this slight change in direction for ground bases, we will be making sure that other base buildings, like hangars and garages are at a functional size for their use, and that they won't cost more resources to build than they will be worth. Any feedback the community has, can be directed to Idyllic in the Discord.

Lordrex took a week's vacation, but I'm sure the work he has been doing to the lobby was on his mind while he traveled.

Stratiz had some Computer Science Exams to study for, we hope he does well.

Airwarfare has continued to work on the gravity system, working out some control bugs that occur under very specific circumstances, but we believe he'll figure them all out eventually.

It's been another short week with tests and other important things to do, but that will definitely improve in the coming weeks. We wish those of you with tests the best of luck, and we'll see you around!


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: How will flagships work?

A1: A special ship only creatable and flyable by a faction leader or other high ranking member of a faction is an important feature on our list. If anybody could build any ship, it would be utter chaos. We should be able to lock certain submitted ships to specific factions, as well as specific ranks in groups, that doesn't seem too complicated.

Q2: Will camera turning on fighters be improved?

A2: We're sort of attached to the camera system that fighters currently use - its a balance between complete freecam, that takes you out of the ship altogether, and a locked first person camera that doesn't let you turn at all. This blended, custom version puts you in third person, but you are still tied to the direction your ship is facing. We are working on improving the radar and tracking systems, as well as a damage indicator system that can give you a general direction for incoming fire, but I don't think we'll change to a free camera for fighters - Capitals with their more limited maneuverability are the perfect candidate for something like that.

Q3: How will group applications work? Can I reject members?

A3: Accepting recruits into your faction should be a pretty similar process to accepting members on Roblox groups - if you want to be exclusive you set it to manual approval, and they can send you an application, or set the default rank to ensign or citizen, and don't give them any permissions.

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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!