EVERSPACE™ news & patch notes

Greetings pilots! As 2024 comes to a close, the ROCKFISH team is headed out for the winter break. Our end of year gift to the community is a little peek at what we've been working on for EVERSPACE 2 plus a killer discount on EVERSPACE games and DLC! Skip down to the end of the post to check out the teaser, otherwise read on for our recap of the year! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/51b81ea52efffba931cc4b13a1c02d5edeaaec85.png We began 2024 with looks at content coming in the free Incursions update as well as insights into the Unreal Engine 5 migration we released along the same time. Incursions brought a new horde mode event, legendary gear, and reliquaries, as well as even greater endgame challenges. A tremendous amount of work went into this update, giving players more to do and our developers tools to create expansion content for EVERSPACE 2. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/dd790965e1d332a77689b1cac69123efb7f45912.jpg We also celebrated the 10 year anniversary of ROCKFISH Games! Our CEO and Creative Director sat down to chat about their experiences working together since the studio was started. We’re a small team and many of our developers have been working together for years, even previous to the founding of the studio. Here’s to another decade of space games! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/a537d2acf8c6628ffacbdab8745724c505675ec2.jpg Shortly before the release of the Incursions update, EVERSPACE 2 was awarded Best German Game at the 2024 Deutschen Computerspielpreis (German Computer Game Awards)! We couldn’t be more proud as this is Germany’s biggest game developer event. Winning this was recognition for the incredible work done during the team’s six year journey on EVERSPACE 2 and gave us renewed motivation to continue crafting quality space games on PC and consoles! Along with Incursions came many engine changes under the hood that brought improvements and a few challenges that have largely been solved. We released a fun blog showing many of the more amusing visual bugs that popped up early in the project. If you’re curious about some of the hurdles we faced, check out this article on the Unreal Developer Blog outlining some of the work the RFG team tackled in the update. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/3216874235e3052da1771bb4b2776f3764c28d9e.png Alongside the Incursions update, we also released the EVERSPACE 2: Supporter Pack. The community of space fans had been asking how they could support ROCKFISH while we worked on future content, and this was our answer. The team packed this full of ship skins and customization features, including a cool cybernetic glow look inspired by a bug shown in our Unreal Engine migration bug blog, this optional cosmetic DLC. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/1fee739a15e8dc512623d16971d9a24fef520017.jpg We also released a physical print edition of The Art of EVERSPACE 2. Originally, this book was supposed to be a much smaller volume, but with all the amazing concept art created for the game, we got away from ourselves. This fantastic 280+ artbook is still in stock on Amazon and makes a great gift for space and sci-fi fans *hint hint*. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/458a6df02c464290d0448ee314d3185ea5a217df.png Alienware has supported us at events during our launch journey, so we developed a special free Alienware Ship Skin as a way to say thanks to their team and the PC space game community. The ship skin is still free on Steam! Grab it today to give your ships a sleek white, black, and green look. EVERSPACE 2: Titans is our first gameplay DLC for EVERSPACE 2 and amongst the team, we’re calling it our smaller one! Teased on the ROCKFISH Games stream shortly before Gamescom, Titans brings two exciting mini-adventures with replayable encounters and a whole armory of new weapons and gear to the table. These new repeatable experiences brought plenty for space fans to do while we focused on more story-based adventures and locations for our upcoming expansion. As part of the Titans reveal, our Community Manager, Garry voiced a fantastic deep dive into the inner flora and fauna of the Leviathan. Perhaps we should get him in the V/O booth as a character someday! Like the idea? Let us know in the comments! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/c83440c17267a37bf04b28e1919c689de79f1fde.jpg As a German studio, Gamescom is our home show and the Indie Arena Booth is one of the best places to see upcoming games at the event—There’s no better place to see a sheer amount of creativity per square meter in the whole show! We surprised space fans at the show with a hands-on demo of a mission from the Dreadnought mission chain from Titans. It was great seeing familiar faces and new space pilots from all over Europe. Truly, this is one of our favorite events and we can’t wait for the next time we have something timely to show there. While we were at Gamescom, we met a bunch of incredible indies to give shoutouts to, many of whom were also from our Studio’s hometown, Hamburg! If you haven’t yet watched our ROCKFISH Shoutouts video, check it out! All these developers were excited to share their creations with gamers—you might just find your next favorite indie! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/4726157cbb6363c7e04529340b64df63342b3ed0.jpg Funny how we always seem to be placed right next to our friends at Egosoft! Meeting fans from Japan, China, and all over the world at Tokyo Game Show was an exciting time as well! We frequently join the German Games Pavilion at events to showcase some of the best games created in Germany to fans around the globe. If you ever hear of us at an event, please drop by to say hi. It’s always appreciated! The team has been quiet about what we’ve been working on, but that’s going to change next year! As part of a new adventure, space pilots will return to Aethon, just one of the star systems coming in an all-new EVERSPACE 2 expansion launching in 2025. That’s just the tip of the asteroid, we don’t want to give too much away—Stay tuned for the full announcement, expansion title, and more info in the new year! Also, that cool BOB shirt Garry was wearing on stream is available on the IGN Store. The holidays are here, so treat yourself! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/f316f92641156507490c7d346d0e684f8c698a65.jpg We wish all you space pilots a happy and safe holiday season. See you in the new year! Lee and the ROCKFISH Games team

The Steam Winter Sale is here and we salute all you deal hunters who’ve held out until the end of 2023 to pick up games you’ve had your eye on. The ROCKFISH Games team is about to head off for a much-deserved winter break. Before we go, we wanted to share a studio update! This year has had us busy! After more than two years in Early Access, EVERSPACE 2 launched on PC to critical and community acclaim and we followed shortly on consoles. The Armed & Dangerous Update made news and super-fans fell in love with our digital artbook and soundtrack. Development on EVERSPACE 2 isn’t done yet—We’ve got big plans for 2024! Without support from fans, our journey through the stars would not have been the same. We truly value the feedback and praise the EVERSPACE community has shared over the course of development and we hope our frequent updates adding content, tweaking gameplay, and making community-requested changes are appreciated. This holiday season, we ask that you leave a review on our games or those of another indie studio—every single positive note means the world to independent studios like ours. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/26cf11da436c7fc87d027a7b00aadf74bd32cf5c.jpg

EVERSPACE Series Discounts

Everything EVERSPACE is on sale! Both of our games and all of our expansion and DLC content is discounted for the Winter Sale. If you already own an EVERSPACE base game, make sure to check out the bundle deals to maximize your discount. Winter Sale Deals: EVERSPACE 2

• EVERSPACE 2 - 40% off
• EVERSPACE 2 Official Soundtrack - 20% off
• The Art of EVERSPACE 2 (digital edition) - 20% off

EVERSPACE

• EVERSPACE - 85% off
• EVERSPACE: Encounters - 67% off
• EVERSPACE: Upgrade to Deluxe Edition - 67% off

It’s been a YEAR. Go on and treat yourself. You deserve it.

EVERSPACE Series Sneak Peek Stream

Want a sneak peek at what’s coming for the EVERSPACE series in 2024? Make sure to tune into our last stream of the year! In addition to a look back at our launch year, Erik and Garry, our Community Ambassador and Community Manager, will be showing off a few legendary items coming in the EVERSPACE 2 Incursions update and a new feature we’re working on. There may even be some classic EVERSPACE gameplay! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/08eee35167c1cf149f4ef58550a3b0a7ad0e3f6c.png We’ll be live on Twitch, YouTube, Steam Broadcast, and Facebook this Friday, December 22nd at 11am PT / 2pm ET / 7pm CET. If you miss the stream, we’ll have it up on YouTube shortly after. That’s all for us this year, but there’s lots to come next year—the series roadmap is just the tip of the iceberg! We hope you all have a wonderful holiday season filled with gaming. See you in 2024! Lee and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games team 🚀🫡

Greetings pilots! It’s been more than five years since we released EVERSPACE! What a ride it’s been… and we’re not done yet: EVERSPACE 2 v1.0 launches in just a few weeks on April 6, 2023, and the adventures in the DMZ of Cluster 34 will continue beyond the launch of this sequel. Make sure to follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and to join our Discord for the latest! Definitely check out our major news about the imminent v1.0 release and the story trailer if you haven’t already: Now to speak about EVERSPACE specifically, we’re lowering the price of the game to $19.99 USD, €19.99, £16.99 and adjusting regional pricing globally to best reflect this change. With EVERSPACE 2 on the horizon, we’d like to give more pilots the opportunity to pick up the first instalment of the series at an affordable price even when the game is not discounted. Despite this price drop, in some cases EVERSPACE will be more expensive in a few regions as we examine both Steam’s recommended price adjustments and regional currency changes over the past year. Part of this is due to people taking advantage of extremely low prices in other regions via VPN. We understand it’s a way to get a game darn cheap, but this practice has become a significant issue for developers and publishers on Steam including ourselves. All these changes will go into effect on March 17 at 10am PT/1pm ET/6pm CET. :) That’s all for now! We’ve got a deadline to hit on EVERSPACE 2, so back to work. Thanks for sticking with us for so long! Michael & your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team 🚀🪐👽

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5efc809826e171ff89ddb58c43350de5dcfc7461.jpg Greetings, pilots! The wait is over: the hotly anticipated Summer Update aka Drake: Gang Wars is finally here! It’s our most significant Early Access update, adding tons of new things to the game even though we’re not done yet - there’ll be one more update later this year before we wrap things up and work on the v1.0 release which is still scheduled for early 2023. For now, you can enjoy Drake, an all-new star system featuring well over a dozen carefully hand-crafted locations with stunning lava and ice environments, underwater exploration, exciting new enemy types and status effects, brand new challenges and puzzles as well as a three-chapter side quest, introducing daring pilots to the new system, and much more. Have a look at our official release trailer!

Drake | New Side Missions

Drake is undoubtedly the star (pun intended) of the summer update with its mesmerizing new lava, ice, and underwater locations. These environments not only look darn pretty; they also feature new damage types that players have to deal with on planets and in open space, too. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/68d34f12639debd9c693b03675d5c2f1c877ccb7.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/9efded6d760c49b94afcef16ef2d04a292d2494e.jpg I think both the lava and ice locations are absolutely awesome. However, I was just blown away when I had to go underwater to disable mines and plant my “own” explosives in a gigantic, half-sunken space station. I haven’t seen anything like this in any other game before, and from my own wreck-diving experience I can testify this is precisely how it looks and feels. Granted, I wasn’t scuba diving on another water planet, but you get me. Gosh, I wished we had even more underwater content, but our team already said we might be revisiting those locations, again at v1.0; fingers crossed! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/a3835c60e542b6eb9da85714f02ff34d53eeb1b6.jpg You get to Drake via a side quest you must pick up from Elek at the Homebase in Ceto. It’s quite a deep side quest, expanding over three missions, and will introduce you to the new system, its most prominent locations, new gameplay mechanics, and three new factions.

New Factions

In Drake, you’ll have to deal with three new Factions, the Coalition, Retaliators, and Zurilia. They have quite a vicious beef with each other which will escalate into a massive space battle. I don’t want to spoil too much but here’s some basic info about them. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5bcbb967c183490cf8ecc4154d1a8fed58448261.jpg The Coalition is a faction that veteran pilots probably still remember from Elek, one of the five side characters in the EVERSPACE — Encounters expansion. It’s loosely named after the Cohhilition community from top streamer CohhCarnage who’s a huge fan of the EVERSPACE series and one of our top Kickstarter backers. This time, he even went for the Space Architect pledge, which allowed helping name and design a space station in the game: The massive Letho Star Port, the main hub in Drake you have seen in the trailer, is what Cohh has been working on together with Uwe, our Creative Director. This is also where the three-chapter side quest kicks into gear — if you know what I mean when checking out Cohh’s logo on his twitch channel. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/b8835374ae4b2660883627dfb3d6cc00166f6922.jpg The next faction you’ll encounter is another fan-inspired faction, The Zurilia, named after Zurilia, another top-tier Kickstarter backer of ours. They control all locations that are fire-themed. Naturally, they are a pretty hot-headed bunch, and even their ships and gear make good use of some fancy heat-based technology, which can severely damage your ship components. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/16ea0bb229a3bd2c7ff6cfe523c561ccccf006d4.jpg The third faction is The Retaliators, who control the water/ice-themed locations in Drake. You might expect them to be cool-headed, but they are also aggressive when you enter their territory, attacking with frosty weapons and dealing stun damage to your ship which can have some dire consequences when hit in the heat of a fight. Ok, my puns are not getting any better, but you’ll get the gist when listening to their dialog. ;) BTW, since we know that not everyone is a fan of our TTS placeholders, keep in mind the new story content will be voiced at v1.0; the same goes for localization as things are still subject to change, and to make sure that voice-recording and translating text and UI are worthwhile, we need to hit a certain amount of lines.

New Perks

With the new update, we raised the player level cap to 25 and added three new player perks. Pro-tip: Retaliation, reflecting 30% of incoming damage to your attackers, is especially useful when dealing with the new damage types within the Drake system. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/a73c347823b8ecd62bbce860467610d67b3b0a26.jpg Good ol’ buddy Tareen, also known from the Encounters expansion, received new perks for ship dealers. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/0401742d5de33c10f38bd459ce3af5c95ed5701a.jpg Lastly, HIVE also offers a new perk, improving your ability to switch secondaries mid-battle. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/d89cc50a37c0df6d18af01c3e774e89f9fab220f.jpg

High-Risk Area Mutators

High-risk areas have received a major upgrade by adding Mutators into the mix. These expand upon the gameplay variety while creating a higher challenge for those who want to get a taste of what to expect in the upcoming endgame of EVERSPACE 2. And yes, HRA bosses are now a delicious loot piñata. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/b7a767d273085d40db46b4b5855ce8dc5c00cc80.jpg There are a number of positive mutators, like “Enemies dropping lots of credits upon death”, “G&B reinforcements on-site”, or “Spawn a protector sphere generator, which can be grabbed and used to get immunity to debuffs. On the negative, you might have to deal with “Enemies deal area damage upon death”, “Enemies drop proximity mines upon death”, “Enemies slowly repair their hull”, “Two bosses”, “Enemies are resistant to EMP”, “Enemies leave behind corrosion fields when killed”, and more nasty surprises.

QoL Improvements

Furthermore, the team has been working on several Quality of Life improvements, many of which were community-inspired. For instance, the possibility to craft consumables. But that's not all! You can now craft components from resources, too, so you can build that much-desired Catalyst even though you might not have every single component in place but plenty of others — you're welcome! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/74766e82eb92445f9d729aa759940f64df5adb65.jpg Tracking required resources for crafting is an all-new feature that goes nicely together with the new resources map mode. Not only will you see right away what resources are still required to make that nifty new piece of equipment, but with one click on the map's submenu, you'll see right away where chances are high to find that precious ore or crystal that's still missing. Hot-swapping armor was long in the making and a hot community demand, too, so now it's here! Furthermore, some perks like Percussive Maintenance have been overhauled to better work with regenerating armor. Not really a QoL improvement but very noticeable: Gero, our Sound Director, has implemented significantly improved weapon SFX based on item rarity, giving primaries more oomph and distinction.

Major Rebalancing

With Drake: Gang Wars Early Access pilots are also receiving a massive round of rebalancing based on internal playtests and community feedback, which is one of the main reasons for our open-development approach. Therefore, we highly encourage everyone to start a new game and let us know how the progression/difficulty feels on the Steam forums. Especially around level 10, the difficulty curve should feel much better now. That said, we also want to give all pilots a heads-up that Drake sits at a much higher difficulty level, so you will have to use all your weaponry, consumables, ship devices and mainframe expansions to the fullest while also keeping your gear up to your current player level to succeed. Also, we strongly recommend doing side activities and not just beeline through the story content — Drake is no picnic in space!

TrackIR and AMD FSR Support

On the technical side, TrackIR support and AMD FSR have also been added to the game. The implementation of TrackIR was much more complicated than we thought — the devil was in the details, as it always is. However, Ingmar, our technical programmer, didn’t let go, and we’re pleased with the result. He was also responsible for implementing AMD FSR and is still working with our friends at AMD on improving the experience with FSR 2.0 further down the road.

Changelog - 0.9.28028

Features

• Added new star system: Drake
• Added new side missions
• Added new faction: Coalition
• Added new enemy faction: Retaliators
• Added new enemy faction: Zurilia
• Added mutators to high-risk areas
• Added crafting of consumables
• Added new companion perks
• Added new player perks
• Increased level cap to 25
• Added new music
• Added new challenges
• Added new consumables
• Tier 3 ships are now available at ship dealers
• Added new ship modules
• Added new decals
• Added new weapon sounds
• Added new secondary weapon bonus attributes
• Added new passives for all ship sub-classes
• Added new map mode to show resource deposits
• Added new job type in Drake system: "Battle Support"
• Added option to enable TrackIR v5
• Added option to enable AMD FidelityFX™ Super Resolution
• Added option to hide XP numbers
• Added tracking of resources
• Added action to craft from an empty equipment slot
• Added an info banner when all secrets have been discovered in a location
• Added shortcut keys (and bindings) to directly open specific menu pages like "Missions" and "Perks"
• Added pre-caching and quick refresh for crafting tab to improve performance
• Added proper (gamepad-) navigation for crafting inventory incl. implicit scrolling
• Added various new G&B turrets

Tweaks

• Armor can now be swapped out at any time
• Prevent Flak projectiles from triggering while player is inside damage radius (prevents most cases of accidental self-damage)
• Armor hits will now also trigger the "Percussive Maintenance" perk
• Consumables now have item rarities assigned to them
• Freshly installed primary weapons now start with 0 energy and need to charge first
• Potential mining yield display on the star map can now be unlocked earlier with a HIVE perk
• Vanguard Time Extender ULT will now leave the ship mostly unaffected by the time dilation
• Changed movement pattern and speed of first Outlaw boss' ship so it can be hit easier
• Wrecks will now fully repair a Vindicator drone when used
• Enemies now have better accuracy when firing at stationary targets
• ARC-9000 explosion can now be triggered manually by deactivating the ULT prematurely
• The Flying Dutchess is now also offering a handful of ships (via perk)
• An alternative set of passives of offered ships can now be chosen (via perk)
• Ship dealer offers can now be rerolled every 10 minutes (via perk)
• Shops will now sometimes offer equipment 1 or 2 levels above the player level
• Jobs now give faction-independent "renown" instead of faction-based "standing" (consolidated old save files by transferring "standing" into "renown")
• Decals are now unlocked after completing certain side missions, reaching a certain renown rank, or when completing Prescott Starbase location 100% (when loading old save games decals are given retroactively)
• The small lines at the top and bottom of the HUD now turn red while in combat (if any enemy is targeting the player or if any enemy is within 2km range)
• Tweaked look of G&B ships and turrets
• Tweaked look of Maddocks' freighter
• Refined many environments and assets
• Moved autosave file generation after undocking to start of animation to avoid freeze while flying out
• Integrated localization changes suggested from Crowdin community
• EMP Generator "Shield Surge" mode will now restore 10% shield hitpoints for each target hit, instead of an explicit value
• Fusion Hook now takes ship mass into account
• Balancing: Rebalanced loot rarity drop chance
• Balancing: Doubled effect of high-velocity affix
• Balancing: Mainframe Expansions will now increase an attribute's value by 5%, not by 20 points
• Balancing: Reduced player ship base shield and plating hitpoints
• Balancing: Increased armor and shield bonuses of most player ships across the board
• Balancing: Increased player ship hitpoint scaling from tier level
• Balancing: Reduced Structure attribute scaling
• Balancing: Increased base weapon damage but reduced Firepower scaling
• Balancing: Revised energy economy and leveled out shield, boost, and weapon energy to equal ranges
• Balancing: Reduced Quantum Tether duration from 20s to 16s
• Balancing: Buffed "Prime Zapper" and "Equalizer" coil guns and made them feel more unique
• Balancing: Increased Corrosion Injector damage
• Balancing: Reduced Armor Drone buff radius
• Balancing: Increased Annihilator Virus cooldown, slightly reduced range and damage
• Balancing: Switched Annihilator Virus damage types so it will primarily deal kinetic damage
• Balancing: Dismantling items will now yield fewer lower rarity parts
• Balancing: Increasing the rarity of an item now also requires lower rarity parts
• Balancing: High-Risk Area bosses and Elite units will have a greater chance to drop higher rarity loot
• Balancing: Decreased Outlaw Drone Carrier deployment frequency for Link Drones
• Balancing: Reduced Scatter Gun charge duration by 50%
• Balancing: Increased Flak range and damage radius
• Balancing: Reduced Rail Gun energy consumption
• Balancing: Increased Missile Defense System duration
• Balancing: Decreased Recharge Booster's recharge delay
• Balancing: Revised Bloodstar Repeater, making it more competitive
• Balancing: Significantly increased Scatter Gun damage
• UI: Reworked catalyst selection including craft & install functionality
• UI: Added option to craft missing components to speed up catalyst and consumable crafting
• UI: Reworked error-prone "tap to show" (unlock-) banner behavior and added proper queuing
• UI: Added and improved multiple smaller features for the perk tab like invest indicators
• UI: Perks - Changed that invest indicator is only visible if player can upgrade the perk
• UI: The state of having the dialog board open or closed in the pause menu is now saved
• UI: Added option to immediately resume the game from the "game saved" screen
• UI: Change style of HUD warning that warns players that a mission will fail when leaving the location
• UI: Prototype and Starforged Items now stand out more
• UI: Added border to clickable buttons
• UI: Items now display the name of the companion perk and the current invest ratio if this item is tracked
• UI: Added complete new indicator logic for the crafting tab (e.g. unlocked blueprints)
• UI: Stackable items in shop or container now show the owned item amount in the upper right corner of their item info widget
• UI: Optimized display logic of the item level arrow indication
• UI: Added quick jump markers when buying resources
• UI: Crafting inventory now lists already found resources even if current amount is zero. (To make them trackable)
• UI: Crafting panel - Multiple design adjustments and optimizations (e.g. requirements)
• UI: Crafting: Removed result screen for catalysts and components to speed up the process
• UI: Crafting tab - Added ship cargo empty slot ratio
• UI: Added an error message after trying to unequip an overheated item
• UI: Added an animation for the compare slot indicator image
• UI: Added "new" indicator for devices within device pool (will be reset after device was equipped for the first time)

Bugfixes

• Fixed Gunship turret tracking targets without line of sight
• Fixed Plating Item not receiving condition change when armor hitpoints are healed via Void Swarm
• Fixed that Outlaw ships launched from Redeemer base hangars
• Fixed that some pillar-shaped asteroids in random Zharkov locations still could have a wrong rotation
• Fixed that some "Rips in Space" tasks did not succeed when having them active at the time of installing update 0.8
• Fixed location progression bug where one secret was counted multiple times, leading to > 5/4 display and >100% completion rate
• Fixed question marks shown for location progression on some occasions
• Fixed missing Expertise name for Stinger in Ship Dealer screen
• Fixed compare values falsely transferring from Ship Dealer tooltips to Ship tab tooltips
• Fixed health and ULT ratio falsely taken from different ship when switching ships on Homebase and undocking
• Fixed Gunship turret not being hidden when arriving via Spatial Bypass
• Fixed Excessive Force perk falsely working without a shield installed
• Fixed high-capacity secondary weapons not using less energy when flying the Bomber
• Fixed Teleporter's "Parting Gift" Mode mine damage not scaling with Utility
• Fixed ARC-9000 and Quantum Tether recharging their own ULT energy
• Fixed Scorpion Missile having an infinite range
• Fixed upgrading rarity of plating items
• Fixed ULT icon and charge ratio not immediately updating after changing ships on Homebase
• Fixed destroying enemies with mines not repairing armor
• Mounted turrets are less likely to hit their owner and do not cause damage if they do
• Fixed Spatial Bypass locations not being selectable on any zoom level
• Fixed that there was an Outlaw Turret in one of the random Redeemer bases
• Fixed hud marker of vindicator drone wrecks disappearing after ULT use
• Fixed that under certain conditions it was possible to infect yourself with your own Annihilator Virus
• Fixed that some location actors like turrets were not respawning after some hours
• Fixed that weapon characteristics like splash damage could carry over if you swap weapons before the projectile hits
• Fixed optimized affix still present on item after installing new affix catalyst
• Fixed corrosion mines spawned from minefields applying too much corrosion damage
• Fixed zero amount pickups being spawned for hardened ore patch explosion
• Fixed that when completing a job with item rewards and pressing tab while "claim rewards" was shown, no xp, credits, or renown (used to be standing) were given if item reward was then claimed before leaving the current location
• Fixed that Eclipse weapon switch buff was not granted when directly equipping weapons via hotkey
• Fixed that modify action wasn't displayed for purchased equipment
• Fixed that missile locking animation and sound persisted when uninstalling all secondary weapons while currently in the process of locking
• Fixed Fusion Hook activation VFX
• Fixed that Vindicator drones would attack and potentially kill Maddocks during chase
• UI: Fixed that amount of items in crafting inventory was sometimes clipped while scrolling
• UI: Fixed that longer item names may have been cut off in the shop tab
• UI: Fixed multiple smaller spacing and alignment problems with the numeric font
• UI: Fixed item selection button design in crafting modify panel
• UI: Repair widget gamepad navigation was sometimes broken
• UI: Fixed some minor rendering issues of inventory sorting icons
• UI: Fixed Quickly CTRL+Left click on a lot of items for mass-marking sometimes skips one
• UI: Fixed that item icon shine animation wasn't always working
• UI: Fixed that using the mouse-wheel in the device selection menu could lead to unexpected selection behavior
• UI: Fixed misleading outdated equipment indicator on coilgun in tutorial
• UI: Fixed missing refresh of cooldown slot animation after "craft and equip" of secondaries
• UI: Item selection - Fixed that slot indication frame of source item wasn't properly rendered sometimes
• UI: Item selection - Scroll indication bar at bottom was accidentally shown in case there was nothing to equip
• UI: Item selection - Fixed bug that ship inventory was invisible when trying to swap fully stacked consumables of the same type
• UI: Item selection - Fixed bug in "other ships" category that was listing empty slots after ships slots expansion via Tareen perk
• UI: Item selection - Fixed multiple bugs when installing consumables from another ship
• UI: Item selection - Fixed that initial slot information may have been wrong for modules in some cases
• UI: Fixed bug that ingame inventory could be rendered haft transparent due to stuck fadeIn-animation
• UI: Fixed Preferred compare target slot logic was not fully working in some cases
• UI: Fixed that moving the mouse during crafting (hold-) action may reset the progress sometimes
• UI: Fixed Elek perk requirements. For new games, upgrading the Elek perk now requires an Equalizer (coil gun)

Tweaks (Only relevant when having played on the experimental branch before)

• Increased Advanced Combat Challenge Reward Buff duration from 10 to 20 seconds
• Changed secondary autofire bonus attribute to only work for locked targets and missiles

Bugfixes (Only relevant when having played on the experimental branch before)

• Fixed that there could be floating turrets and other weird issues in a generic Zurilia base
• Fixed that some cargo drone containers could be opened by shooting them instead of requiring interaction
• Fixed that there was an engine trail missing on some of the new ship modules
• Fixed that upgrading prototype gear did not change the ring color
• Fixed asteroid turrets in high-risk areas not giving XP and armor refill
• Fixed that "Wealthy Foes" mutator could spawn Bloodstar equipment and credits for boss entourage in high-risk areas
• Fixed Advanced Combat Challenge Reward Buff triggering after loading
• Fixed that the "Flying Dutchess sells ships" perk was not considered for shop/ship dealer icons on the map and in space
• Fixed Fusion Hook being usable underwater
• UI: Fixed that inventory mark action was active in some cases even though no slot was selected

Ok, and that’s that for our summer update! We hope you will enjoy all the new content, improvements, and fixes, and we very much look forward to your esteemed feedback. If you like the experience, please give us a thumbs up, leave a comment, or even a positive review, which really does help a lot. If you don’t, feel free to let us know, too. Rest assured, we read every comment and every review, while we hope for your understanding that we won’t be able to please anyone, and that some features would be just too much work or simply don’t fit into our vision for EVERSPACE 2. With that, I’ll leave you to it, and we hope to see many pilots in our first official Drake: Gang Wars live stream on Twitch and YouTube, every Friday from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EDT / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PDT. This time, we’ll have another premiere, as Garry, aka GeekByteUK, long-term EVERSPACE fan and Kickstarter backer for both titles will be your host since Erik, aka Giraffasaur, our beloved Community Ambassador, is on another short break. 🚀💥🙌 Don’t stop being awesome, and see you in Drake! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/881dd970bc880e9b2305e0443dcd9b8f8ca276a6.jpg Greetings, pilots! Holy scrap, what a journey so far! After over three years of hard work, we launched EVERSPACE 2 in Early Access with a rocket launch release in January 2021. We sold three times as many copies as the predecessor within the first week and hit 91% positive reviews right out of the gate. This massive success was followed by the release of two major content packs, Zharkov: The Vortex and Khaït Nebula: Stranger Skies, both extremely well received, with the game currently sitting at 93% positive reviews. Last but not least, we also partnered with our friends at Microsoft, again, to bring EVERSPACE 2 to Xbox Game Pass for PC allowing us to make an even better space game for all pilots no matter what platform they’re playing on. Thanks so much to every single pilot who has put their faith in us. Apart from all the glowing but also critical feedback to help us make a better game, the financial commitment from daring test pilots means a ton to us. This enables us to stay fully independent, allowing us to make a game that our team is super excited about. EVERSPACE 2 is probably one of the most expensive Early Access titles out there, so yeah, thanks again for your trust. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/2dfdeb4559888feed0b27e102be36e03f88e9a03.jpg Galactic thanks from the RFG Family & Friends, Bernie Duffy, Games Writer, and Joshua Rubin, Narrative Consultant!

2022 Roadmap

Before we talk about what’s coming, let’s have a quick look at what’s already been added to EVERSPACE 2! We see the question about how complete the game is popping up quite a lot, which is very understandable. With the most recent content update, Khaït Nebula: Stranger Skies, about 65-70% of the planned story content is in the game, and five out of six or seven planned companions have joined Adam on his journey. That said, we might still add more perks to some or all companions if we have enough time and, most importantly, cool ideas (knowing our team, the latter won’t be the bottleneck). We also brought back some beloved features from the Prototype (aka the demo), like the Shadow creatures and, hopefully, the side mission with those dodgy scientists asking you to realign a bunch of solar panels in a future update (this was meant to be a multi-staged side mission spanning across multiple solar systems, so pencil this in as a maybe). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/6fe4be4458ebe2cec79dfa7c22556410b6e9d786.jpg Screenshot of the “solar panel” side mission from the 2019 Prototype. There are currently four out of seven star systems to explore. With Ceto and Union being the largest, the current world content is close to 70%, not factoring in any endgame content or procedurally generated locations, though. We have eight out of nine player ship classes (89%), with tier 3 and 4 models as well as additional wing types yet to come, so the current player ship content is actually closer to 50%. Gear-wise, we have four out of five tiers already implemented. Legendaries will be introduced in 2022. We’ll also add more weapon types and sets, as well as more consumables and devices. I’d say we’re at 75% of the gear you’ll see at launch. Except for trading features, all gameplay systems are in place. However, not all are done yet. For instance, crafting will receive a significant overhaul. Then, there are essential features like localization, difficulty and accessibility settings, as well as porting EVERSPACE 2 to Linux, Mac, Xbox, and PlayStation. In terms of total dev time, we're close to 80% of a 5+ year-long production, not including any potential post-launch DLC. Ok, now let’s take a closer look at what content we plan to release and when:

EVERSPACE 2 — Rogue’s Debut, Spring 2022

The spring update will bring the Rogue player ship sub-class, the remaining light fighter class as well as additional rear engines and hulls for all lights and heavies. Furthermore, look forward to a major crafting overhaul, where you can unlock blueprints by acquiring them in different ways (loot, buy, dismantle) and determine the outcome of your items' attributes as well as better trading opportunities and resource gathering/processing. Along with new equipment and challenges, we also plan to raise the player level, introducing another set of player perks. International pilots will be pleased to hear that we’ll add UI and text language support for German, French, Italian, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Polish, Czech, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean, too. Last but not least, we’ll add a bit more story content with English voice acting and substitute all current TTS placeholder dialogues.

EVERSPACE 2 — Drake: Gang Wars, Summer 2022

In summer, it’s gonna be all about Drake, the new star system. Drake introduces an intense conflict between three rival factions. Unlike previous reveals of new star systems in EVERSPACE 2, Drake will be accessible via a new side mission starting in Union and can be explored even before playing through the campaign thus far, adding more open-world appeal to the game. For more information on what new adventures await, check out the teaser at the bottom of this news update.

EVERSPACE 2 — Ancients Rifts, Autumn 2022

This update Introduces a sliver of endgame content and will be released sometime after Gamescom. Using these first Ancient Rifts, daring pilots will be able to venture into the most dangerous areas of the game and hunt legendary equipment. We’re still working on the game design, but imagine some high-risk/reward mechanics you may have come across in other looter titles, but in space! This should provide plenty of (new) content to toy around with until the full release. Ancient Rifts will likely be our last big release for 2022. From there, we’ll be head-down, working towards launch.

EVERSPACE 2 v1.0, Early 2023

Launch! Completing the game’s content, adding final polish, squashing as many pesky bugs as possible, and porting EVERSPACE 2 to Linux, Mac, Xbox, and PlayStation will take us six to nine months after the previous beat (we’ll partner with a specialized porting house for the console ports, though, so we can put all our effort in the PC version of the game). Apart from the final act of the campaign and additional side missions, the full release will also feature all tier 3 and tier 4 player ships as well as much-requested difficulty and accessibility settings. Oh, and a bunch of nice achievements, of course! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/54c49803dbd9fced9715e91520092efba270a03f.png

Hottest FAQs

We’re constantly updating the FAQ channel on our Discord, but we thought it might be worth highlighting three hot topics that continue to pop up on the Steam forums and our social media channels.

Will Save Games Wiped at v1.0?

We’re 99.99% sure that’s a yes! Sure, we haven’t had to wipe saves since the Early Access release, which is great, but do understand it could happen due to major technical changes along the way, especially when implementing the endgame. Even if backed up save games would still be compatible at v1.0, we cannot guarantee those would work (we know some pilots will still try). After all, Early Access pilots zooming to the finale of the campaign and into the endgame will miss out on all the content that we’re still adding to the game in earlier star systems. Plus, there’s a high chance that balancing could be completely off for anyone still using an Early Access save after full release. Frankly speaking, no one should play our game during its Early Access phase if they can't live with the thought that they are going to lose all of their progress. Fair warning to everyone on the fence: We'll raise the price reasonably, yet significantly, at full release. So, no complaining! You have been warned, no matter what! ;)

Is EVERSPACE 2 open-world?

Yes! Now, I’m aware that this will inevitably cause some pilots to make a case about why THEY think EVERSPACE 2 is NOT an open-world game (because of brief loading screens, story-gated content, level boundaries), and that’s perfectly fine. In fact, we perfectly understand their point of view. However, we think it is not all black and white, and there are plenty of examples of iconic “open-worldish” ARPGs that wouldn’t match their high expectations, either. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/75731597d7a1fe559d5bac5f919310a761d03be4.jpg The popular vote is clear: Not only is EVERSPACE 2 considered to be open-world by thousands of space pilots, making “open-world” one of the top tags on Steam, Valve was also perfectly fine to feature the game in the 2021 Open-World Sale under:

• Space/Action/Open-World
• Space/RPG/Open-World
• Space/Simulation/Open-World
• Space/Controller/Open-World
• Sci-fi/Action/Open-World
• Sci-fi/RPG/Open-World
• Sci-fi/Controller/Open-World
• Open-world/Action/Exploration
• Open-world/Action/Shooter
• Open-world/Action/Single-Player
• Open-world/Action/First-Person
• Open-world/Action/Third-Person
• Open-world/RPG/Exploration
• Open-world/RPG/Singleplayer
• Open-world/RPG/Third-Person

Making the leap from a linear roguelike to an open-world action RPG in space has been the very centerpiece of all our communication about EVERSPACE 2. While you cannot travel in any direction “forever” like in proc-gen space games, we have spent a ton of time and effort to make exploration of locations meaningful. We want you to roam and do your thing at your own pace and order mostly independent from progression through the campaign. Putting quality over quantity, we went for a hand-crafted game world with high-quality assets and baked global illumination in EVERSPACE 2. Consequently, there are technical limitations because of this major design choice, like sending pilots back when reaching the boundary of a location and having brief loading screens between supralight travel and maps. For one, streaming world data on the fly has never been UE4’s strong suit, so we had to divide our massive, hand-crafted(!) game world into chunks (EVERSPACE 2 is probably the largest, most versatile, and ambitious space combat game ever made NOT relying on procedural content generation). Secondly, even though it’s just a cluster of a galaxy, we’re using two separate game scenes to handle the vastness of open space and the high level of detail required even deep down in underground caves, while collision detection and hit-scan must still work at 10km away at the boundary of any location. Even if SSDs were 10x faster, there would always be a “loading screen” because your CPU is working hard on initiating the next new game scene when swapping back and forth between supralight and open space or planetary scenes. Since it has been suggested a few times, playing some animation to hide the transition wouldn’t make any sense because in EVERSPACE 2 you can already see what’s right in front of you, making the experience arguably more immersive than hiding a hub-based open-world structure with wormholes and jump gates between hand-crafted maps like in other iconic space sims/shooters. And no, creating a sheer endless amount of animations for each possible approach to any given location is just not feasible for obvious reasons. Open space games are technical beasts. 😅 That said, we understand that some pilots have a very specific take on the open-world (space) genre, especially when certain areas are story-gated for obvious dramaturgic reasons, so we’ve changed our communication to semi-open-world to be more accurate.

Will You Get Rid Of Level Scaling?

Nope! While we understand that some pilots really hate any kind of level-scaling, we believe there are good reasons to adjust enemy difficulty when coming back to lower-level areas. Like, one-shotting a formerly mighty destroyer is just bollocks and doesn’t make any sense in terms of plausible world-building unless you want to throw any kind of immersion right out the window. Of course, pilots should feel much more powerful when going back to Ceto or Union because they earned it, so we only make subtle changes to enemy stats and their behavior, still tweaking the system along with the overall game balancing. Think of level ranges that enemies can adapt to. I mean, lore-wise, wouldn’t you expect enemies to improve their gear over time, too?

Drake System Teaser — Fire & Ice

The release of the Drake system will be our biggest beat in 2022, scheduled for June/July when the big online gaming events are happening. Following the two comparatively smaller star systems, Zharkov and the Khaït Nebula, Drake will not only be significantly larger but also our most extreme system yet! Look forward to mesmerizing locations featuring fire, ice, and everything in between! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/2518bce18aca9d2e4f9580648358a881a412d6e8.jpg Planet Mota is as dangerous as it looks: the entire place is like hell’s kitchen, with lava pretty much everywhere causing stacking heat damage, while erupting lava geysers can tear apart shields and armor with ease. For risk-takers, there’s a high-tech thermal power plant defying the ocean of lava that might be worth exploring... {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5002aa4e68442143b0b009fa07271596473f9a67.jpg On Gilbert, water can be your ally or your enemy! Dive underwater to escape from enemy attacks like a classic submarine, but fair warning: dive too deep for too long and the pressure warning will be the last thing you’ll see! Set in a system of natural extremes, three rival factions fight for dominance over the rich resources of the Drake system. You will have to keep a low profile to not be caught in the crossfire, while also not becoming a victim to the harsh environment. Lucky for you, one of your companions will be able to pull some strings with one of the gangs to get a foot in the door while you wait for an opportunity to take advantage of the complex situation.

Surprise Trailer

Last-minute addition: While I was drafting yet another 2K+ words piece, ZeTeam worked on a surprise 2021 recap/2022 teaser trailer, awesome sauce! Well, we hope everyone is enjoying the EVERSPACE 2 Early Access so far and to see pilots at the weekly ROCKFISH Games Show on Twitch and YouTube. Erik Schrader, ace pilot and beloved Community Ambassador, will take you on a tour through the latest dev build and answer all your questions. It's always a ton of fun, so be there, or be square, Fridays from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CET / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm ET / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PT. 🚀💥🙌 Keep it civil on the forums, and have a wonderful winter holiday season! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team, aka ZeFelsenfische

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/ae91d5a03c0db60f3571fa22135eb9869febdaf2.jpg Hey there, pilots! BOOM shaka-laka-laka, dankeschön, auf wiedersehen! The 3rd major EVERSPACE 2 content update, Khaït Nebula: Stranger Skies has launched on Steam and GOG— WOOHOO! Check out the massive changelog of what’s new, or just delve right into our strangest star system yet, featuring a new faction and gear, new gameplay mechanics, new alien lifeforms, new story content, another companion bringing freaking FaaaaaaST tRAveLlllll to your space map and more, as well as an all-new player ship class that will make you go “awww, look at those pretties…!” This is me genuinely enjoying reaching out to 8K backers and 150K Early Access pilots directly, while also testing the limits of how goofy and entertaining we can go in our communication very similar to how Erik does in our weekly gamedev & community streams on Twitch and YouTube — you really should swing by if you haven’t! It’s always a ton of fun, especially when things go wrong while showing the very latest dev build. Also, if you have a burning question that has to be answered the heck right now, drop it in chat! I’m behind the keyboard and will answer everything Erik might not be able to cover.

The Khaït Nebula

There are space games that fascinate with billions of proc-gen locations to explore, seamless transitions, and the ability to exit the spacecraft to drive vehicles and walk on planets with loads of alien flora and fauna, and they have been massively successful with this space sim formula. However, in EVERSPACE 2, we deliberately took a completely different approach by focusing on fast-paced space combat and close-range exploration with 100 to 120 carefully handcrafted locations, each filled with secrets to unveil, puzzles to solve, and precious loot to find. Having full control over gameplay at any given time and being able to design the environment by utilizing the amazing graphics power of Unreal Engine 4 to the fullest, allows us to create limited yet unique experiences within the space game genre. With the 4th star system in EVERSPACE 2, our intention was to take this promise to a whole new level (WARNING: MASSIVE SPOILERS AHEAD!):

New Faction: The Redeemers

The Redeemers began as part of the "Research Department for Extinct Extraterrestrial Monuments", a group of scientists, adventurers, and mercenaries who entered the Khaït Nebula seeking clues to The Ancient’s past and keys to their technology. After unlocking an ancient portal and capturing the Ancient Warden within, obsession and the dark energies from the portal have driven these researchers to worship everything related to The Ancients. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/dc7e730ce247067da572627c3df701b1226788a2.jpg Corrupted and slavishly obsessed with The Ancients, The Redeemers are now a cult dedicated to the understanding of this precursor race. Drawn by mysterious stories, new recruits travel to Khaït to learn about the wisdom of The Ancients. Here they are forced to make a "rite of passage" by leaving all their material belongings outside the jumpgate and passing through without their vessels, "unburdened by their past". Successful recruits (namely those with useful skills) are brought to a "sacred location" in order to be bombarded with strange Ancient dark energy and initiated into the cult. Those who do not pass muster, are left in the vacuum of the void. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/77d4e999650e1313f0c6ebc46080b1f7527fdb4d.jpg This sub-faction is hostile to all to enter the Khaït Nebula, using a mixture of Freelancer gear and adapted Ancient technology to destroy or capture travelers within the star system. They survive off illegal trade (arms, drugs, slaves), but also offer Ancient tech and artifacts to those with the right connections.

New Gameplay: New Ancient Puzzles

As you can see in the new trailer, we’ve added a slew of new Ancient puzzles in the Khaït Nebula. Now, instead of explaining how they work in detail—that would be super-lame—let me share why we did this. One of our secondary pillars for EVERSPACE 2 was creating a distinctive look & feel for every star system; not just through variation in key world design assets, signature color & lighting theme, new enemy types, and focus on game lore, but also by slightly shifting the focus from the franchise’s iconic fast-paced loot & shoot gameplay to introduce new gameplay mechanics—phew, what a sentence! To keep things fresh and interesting and make world exploration worthwhile; we have spent a lot of time and effort introducing new types of activities with each star system. In some cases we explore new twists on already-introduced mechanics, but they always bring something new to the cockpit. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/8768f1499e5ad5ee8f8e2945d8ea2c2cb55355ff.jpg In Union, you’ve been introduced to the first Ancient puzzle, set in a confined space with hard-to-miss-pointers to its solution. In Zharkov, you’ll find Ancient puzzles based on established mechanics which require further exploration to solve. In the Khaït Nebula, we’re introducing entirely new mechanics and more complex puzzles that can even spread across an entire location, making for some jaw-dropping moments when things fall into place. Before moving on: To all space pilots not fans of puzzle-solving, again, don’t you worry! Most of them are optional, while the few that are part of the campaign are really not that hard. BTW, a scientific study in 2017 showed that playing a very popular 3D-platforming game increases hippocampal grey matter in older adults; meaning, complex 3D video games prevents Alzheimer’s—crazy shit; isn’t it? Man, I can’t wait to turn 70 and play video games all day long and maybe go for a walk at least every other day just not to get rusty. Where was I? Right! We’ve also got a brand-new player ship sub-class!

New Player Ship Class: The Vindicator

This new Heavy Fighter type ship class switches it up with the highest mobility of all Heavies and the unique capability of using drones to deal damage. The Vindicator’s drone focus is supported by both its expertise, which increases drone hull hit points, and its Ultimate ability, Phalanx, to immediately spawn all missing drones, greatly increase their fire rate, and synchronize them to attack your locked target. The Vindicator’s Special ability, Reanimator, turns the wrecks of destroyed enemies to your advantage. Interacting with wrecks spawns or repairs your currently active drones. These reanimated drones have an unlimited lifetime and you can have up to 5 active at a time. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/e057f4031dad0a833110e93899275011d723fad0.jpg Just like all other player ship sub-classes, tier 1 and 2 Vindicators can be purchased at any Ship Dealer in the DMZ if you’re lucky. Before you pull the trigger, though, you might take a closer look if the roll of Passive Perks suits your playstyle:

• Maximum number of active drones increased by 1
• Drones are invulnerable during Phalanx
• Drones regenerate 1% hull per second
• 50% reduced damage from enemy drones
• Drones explode in a violent blast, damaging and slowing down nearby enemies

New Story Content, Companion, and Perks

Picking up where the story left off, Maddocks has caught up with Adam back at the base. He needs help finding his other companion Eduardo who has the last piece of information leading to the treasure Maddocks and Dax have been seeking for many years. An audio log will lead you on a merry chase through the Khaït Nebula where you’ll find many new areas, including a strange planetoid. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/f72cdc4f0376db4a1d17842b3ede7f043a1c7906.jpg When you finally catch up to Eduardo, he’s not alone, and things are getting just even more complicated. Despite tension in the air, your new acquaintance proves to be a valuable addition to the team thanks to some impressive star navigation skills.

Khala the Navigator

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/bb8d3342520d999d6228b2d61570927c7df025a8.jpg Khala belongs to an alien species previously unknown to the crew. Her remarkable astro-navigation skills make her a valuable companion. Khala can create jump nodes for shortcuts through space—Woohoo, Fast Travel unlocked! Furthermore, by unlocking the Location Scanner perk additional information details will show on the map, like how many secrets are still to be found. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c14bd143eb0abe28c89a9c2e5122da7900065a7f.jpg Khala has been stranded on the asteroid for years after crash landing during a battle with adversaries she describes as "The Greel". She’s been stuck with only Eduardo as recent company, time used to learn his language. She is extremely quick-witted and has an extraordinary knowledge of the galaxy, although much of what she describes seems to belong to a part of the galaxy unknown to anybody else. Having nowhere else to go, Khala joins the crew at Home Base, putting her knowledge to use mapping and finding shortcuts between systems as the base navigator. Much of the surrounding area, however, is unfamiliar to her, and she uses her time, and newfound equipment, to seek geographical markers which will help her find home. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5cf8a582e625b4802f3532a2184f7f5ba81611ad.jpg Khala’s brusque attitude occasionally may clash with the other companions as she finds her way amongst alien species. Though Adam’s other companions may initially distrust her, especially Maddocks, and Elek may fear she is going to eat him, Khala has a lot to offer to the crew. Pilots will discover more about Khala’s background and species as she comes along as a companion. As one of the first new races introduced in EVERSPACE 2, Khala is just a tiny glimpse into the wider universe.

Changelog 0.7.22328 (Official)

Features

• Added new main and side missions
• Added new star system: Khaït Nebula
• Added new player ship class: Vindicator
• Added new companion
• Added new enemy faction: Redeemers
• Added new lifeforms
• Added new puzzle mechanics
• Added fast travel mechanics (companion perk)
• Added map completion display (companion perk)
• Added more resources
• Added new star map assets to represent planets and celestial objects more accurately
• Added "relative mouse controls" option for centered mouse crosshair controls
• Added new Pulse Laser type
• Added projectile sounds
• Added new WIP narrated cinematics
• Added new music tracks
• Increased level cap to 20 and added three new player perks
• UI: Info widget - Added support for disabling tooltip style via settings when using M&K

Tweaks

• Player ships now have names depending on ship class and ship modules
• HUD markers for pickups now have a new look and individual icons for each category (weapon, module, resource...)
• Enabled target lock for outlaw station cores
• Made fighting G&B in "In Transit" mission a bit more challenging
• Added planet names to supralight and star map
• Sniper Drones will now telegraph their shots more accurately
• Made Sniper Drone shots easier to evade
• Increased distance at which boundary warning is shown and ship turns around
• Show time since last save in pause menu and game over screen
• If saved on station, show station name in save game slot
• Limited the number of Quantum Tether targets to 5 and reduced the damage bonus from 10% to 5% per target
• Renamed "Aeterna Bypass" to "Mainframe Expansion"
• Once initiated, holding F to pull multiple items at once with tractor beam now does not break if item is not hovered anymore
• Allow "High Capacity" affix on primary weapons which increases energy capacity
• Slightly increased Outlaw Sniper precision
• Improved texture memory allocation
• Improved Fusion Hook "Kunai" mode target acquisition
• Increased Nano Transmitter "Distribution" mode range to 1km
• UI: Added action bar divider to improve readability
• UI: Perks tab - Added animations for selection highlight and "new" indicator
• UI: Item info widget - Added input specific scrollbars and indicators
• UI: Item info widget - Switches display style implicitly based on last navigation input (WASD=static or mouse=tooltip)
• UI: Item info widget - Optimized side-by-side compare window interaction and (sfx-) feedback
• UI: Shortened hold action durations like dismantle, destroy, store and more
• UI: Added a rarity dependent duration bonus to the new default dismantle hold duration
• UI: Added actual object name to loot screen headline (e.g. "Shipwreck" instead of "container")
• UI: Shop - Default amount when buying resources set to 1 instead of stack limit
• UI: Crafting - Saving last used crafting rarity independently instead of per category
• UI: Item management - Batch move - Added implicit sorting on gamepad
• UI: Item management - Batch move - Added info banner in case action did not move all items
• UI: Changing modify action from simple press to hold action to be more consistent with crafting
• UI: Added new indicator logic for devices and the ship tab
• UI: Tutorial - The plating Adam got from Dax has a new marker now
• UI: Perks - "Last opened perk tree" changes to "first not fully upgraded perk tree" in case it is fully upgraded
• UI: Hyper travel - Gamepad button opens map tab instead of inventory tab
• UI: Reworked special item action bar. (WIP)
• UI: Added new ingame menu footer action styles like "pair" and mouse-only

Bugfixes

• Fixed that "Union Border Control" location was unlocked too early
• Fixed bug where upgrading items in cargo boosted the stats
• Fixed wrong max hull hitpoints calculation when repairing your ship while any Augment is put into Structure
• Fixed Vesna Mining Colony shop not being shown on map
• Fixed occasionally wrong navigation result when using gamepad or WASD to select colors/decals
• Fixed that the Bomber perk that converts mines would break Minesweeper jobs
• Fixed flickering of outlaw station cores
• Fixed "Ultimate Ready" display not showing the correct icon
• Fixed that secondary weapons will not count towards "Upgrade a weapon's level" achievement
• Fixed that the "Accelerated" affix for shields wasn't changing any stats
• Fixed Recharge Speed attribute for shields falsely decreasing with higher levels
• Fixed bomb indicators in the mission "Tipping the Scales", which didn't stop pinging after interaction
• Fixed calculation of Flying Dutchess spawn position
• Fixed that some equipment received affixes that did not change any attributes, e.g. "Swift Repeater"
• Fixed being able to re-enter invalidated, already cleared high-risk locations
• Fixed being able to leave the location using jump drive right after retrieving the signature in "The Vortex", before the suppressor drones even become active
• Fixed slide door open/close sounds playing although door was already opened/closed
• Fixed outlaws being able to spawn below surface during "Spares & Scrap" mission at Nepthys Plains
• Fixed not receiving all rewards when finishing multiple jobs at once by docking
• Fixed not receiving a reward when bringing the Flying Dutchess her designated quest item
• Fixed an exploit that made it possible to create energy spheres without time limit
• Fixed same keybinding for "increase setting" and "decrease setting" being shown in photo mode when using gamepad
• Fixed set bonus background border not aligning correctly when comparing items
• Fixed that containers did not drop loot when hit by player from further than 2km away
• Fixed a case in which dialogs could overlap after undocking from Nephtys Plains station during a mission and immediately docking again
• Fixed blocked paths for secrets in Volta Nebula
• Fixed "Low" texture quality setting not being applied correctly
• Fixed that setting gamma value via pause menu while docked looked weird/broken
• Fixed missing location image for "Union Outer Rim"
• Fixed Fusion Hook "Kunai" mode pulling disabled targets at ludicrous speeds
• Fixed Okkar Corvettes flying straight out of locations
• Fixed one frame input lag in auto-aim
• Fixed that an item bonus was not displayed for an attribute like Utility if there are more than 5 items with a bonus equipped
• UI: Fixed that drag and drop actions of weapons within equipment inventory could lead to wrong slot highlighting
• UI: Fixed item management - Batch move - Missing consolidate when using Hive's "send to homebase" feature
• UI: Fixed item management - Batch move - Sometimes not all items were moved even though there was space in the target inventory
• UI: Fixed item management - Batch move - Disabled multi-selection of items located in container or shop
• UI: Fixed data tab - Empty slots in mission items inventory
• UI: Fixed focusing wrong slot after consumable fillup via item selection
• UI: Fixed issues with inventory sorting type "Latest"
• UI: Fixed a bug where the player could get soft-locked in the crafting materials screen after minimizing the game
• UI: Fixed item info widget - Side-by-side compare getting stuck when hovering over non-comparable items
• UI: Fixed perks - Some companion avatar images were cut on top during animation
• UI: Fixed loud SFX when selling multiple items at once
• UI: Fixed item selection - Reset item info scroll progress after selected slot changed
• UI: Fixed ship selector - Change ship actions were active in tabs that didn't support it
• UI: Fixed item repair costs could be zero in case they were between 0 and 1

Features (Exp Diff)

• (Exp) Added new Redeemer Drone Beam Laser VFX

Tweaks (Exp Diff)

• (Exp) Some performance optimizations
• (Exp) Added list of required resources to mission log of mission "Rips in Space"
• (Exp) Renamed three Redeemer ships
• (Exp) Increased initial delay for invasions
• (Exp) Do not spawn invasions at Prescott Starbase
• (Exp) Reduced Synchro Pulse range by 100m
• (Exp) Slightly increased Synchro Pulse energy consumption

Bugfixes (Exp Diff)

• (Exp) Fixed location progression not correctly counting devices or mainframe expansions in armored containers
• (Exp) Fixed location progression not correctly counting some objects (Ancient Jars, Wrecks in Anemones)
• (Exp) Fixed location progression display not showing a full circle at 100%
• (Exp) Fixed planet names in the Khaït Nebula system
• (Exp) Fixed a dialog being repeated while searching the shipwreck during "Picking Up The Pieces"
• (Exp) Fixed the collision of iris hatches in location "BRI Bioplant"
• (Exp) Fixed being able to enter the bottom interior of the ancient structure in "Chabar Tower"
• (Exp) Fixed entry dialog in the first location of the Khaït Nebula system
• (Exp) Do not spawn invasions in High-Risk areas
• (Exp) Fixed ancient door open sound being played again although door was already opened
• (Exp) Fixed "Travel here" button being visible on spatial bypass locations in map mode while not using a spatial bypass
• (Exp) Fixed that enemies could spawn before the gate to the Khaït Nebula system was unlocked
• (Exp) Fixed a bug in which, during a certain stage of "X Marks The Spot", no enemies would spawn when not continuing the mission
• (Exp) Fixed a bug in "X Marks The Spot" that prevented enemies from spawning if mission was not continued
• (Exp) Fixed skybox elements missing in randomized locations (Unknown Signals, High-Risk Areas, etc.)

Roadmap 2022 Preview

Phew, this was quite a hefty news update, but we’re aware that many of you also want to know what’s next. To be brutally honest, we haven’t fleshed out all the details for our 2022 roadmap yet as the team has been hard at work getting as much community feedback on the experimental build incorporated into the official release. However, we can share that the next update is planned for spring; it won’t feature any new story pieces as we hit about 70% of the campaign content with today’s update and we need to keep some of our powder dry for the full release. Now, before anyone goes (╯*□*)╯︵ ┻━┻, we plan to have another star system and maybe even a teaser of the endgame, as well as the third Light Fighter sub-class in the next update. Furthermore, we also plan to have UI and text language support in German, French, Italian, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Polish, Czech, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean for all content released so far, which was very high on the list for many Early Access pilots. As always, check out our weekly ROCKFISH Games Show on Twitch and YouTube where, Erik Schrader, ace pilot and beloved Community Ambassador will take you on a mesmerizing tour. Be there, or be square, this Friday from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EST / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PST! 🚀💥🙌 Keep it civil on the forums, and see you in space! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/42f956898b30c53e1369b69620ba37c17fa43f71.jpg Greetings, pilots! Grab a drink, sit back, and relax! What was intended to be a short & snappy news beat about the official Zharkov release on top of all the information shared in recent news updates, became our longest news update so far, covering new topics of the 2nd major content update of EVERSPACE 2 in-depth as well as some important studio and community-related news. First off, a big shout to all the daring test pilots who smoke tested the experimental release opened up a few days ago. You all provided very useful feedback on the overhauled game balancing and also flagged a number of bugs that slipped through the cracks. The team acknowledged and fixed most of them, while a few improvements have to wait until the next major content update, currently scheduled for fall (or spring if your home base is on the Southern hemisphere of planet Earth). You’ll find the official changelog at the bottom of this news. Changes based on the experimental build are marked with the prefix (Exp). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/f35e4fe6f413f0501f854616789d23711273be56.jpg Now, before you jump cut to the bottom of this release to check out the 150+ changes this update brings, let me put a spotlight on several team members and external partners who’ve been hard at work to hammer out yet another meaty content update. It sounds easy, but one of the most critical tasks for any update is left to Sven Lohse, our Technical Director, who has moved his mouse and clicked a few buttons to open the jump gate to Zharkov on Steam and GOG for all Early Access/GiD pilots. Technically, you’ll have to play through the new main story to unlock the jump gate yourself, but you’ll find the way. And yes, all new and previous content is fully voice-acted... except for Banjack, the adorable scrapyard robot. He has his charming TTS voice back by popular demand from the community and because we also think TTS just perfectly fits his character. In fact, since he became such a beloved shop dealer, we’ve decided to write a proper side mission for Banjack, shedding some light on how he ended up in that abandoned scrapyard in the first place. But that’s for a future content update. Now, let’s have a look at our new gameplay trailer, produced by Lol_bye, one of our Kickstarter backers (of course, we’ve compensated him like a pro for his excellent work)! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vn0kEi4e_-c

The Vanguard

For those who haven’t watched Erik Schrader, our one-and-only Community Ambassador talking about the all-new Vanguard light fighter class during its reveal stream, here’s the nuts and bolts description and a nice äktschon shot from GeometryPrime, one of the most active space photographers on our Discord: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/9ad091747ccadfa317b05cde857464edea38c43d.jpg The Vanguard is a lightweight, highly maneuverable reconnaissance ship with a high emphasis on speed/mobility and defensive measures. The Vanguard’s Special “overcharges” the shield to up to 200% capacity when boosting or when in Cruise Mode allowing for shield-buffed attacks. Thanks to its Expertise of increased critical hit chance when attacking enemies from the rear, clever combat positioning can provide a significant advantage in dogfights. When things get too messy, the Vanguard’s Ultimate “Time Extender” slows down the action, allowing pilots to regain the upper hand in any given combat situation. Vanguards also come with one out of four random Passive Perks that let cruise drive be activated with enemies nearby, reduces Web effect by 50%, lowers up to 20% support device cooldown depending on overcharge percentage, or makes Time Extender immediately restore all weapon and boost energy. But wait, we’ve got even more ship news coming from Matthias Kummer (Senior 3D Artist) who’s exclusively been working on all player ships for over two and a half years. With the new update, pilots will have access to Tier 2 ships of all currently existing ship classes, featuring fancier wing types and better base stats, such as increased cargo space.

New Story Content and Companion

In the new content update, the plot thickens. You’ll finally catch up with Maddocks in Union and get a better understanding of how all the parties involved so far are connected to each other. After you found out how to activate the Outlaw’s jump gate, Zharkov will be your new oyster, filled with new secrets, activities, alien mystery, puzzles (yes!), and loot, but lots of danger too. Watch out for lightning rods that cause havoc when flying too close as shown in the Zharkov teaser trailer and other environmental hazards. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/9a6a94c1b775bb74e723374e07245d9ff322cab7.jpg In the continued campaign, you’ll meet another old friend: Tareen, the Okkar trader from the EVERSPACE: Encounters expansion, will join your roster of companions and provide some very useful perks. As your new quartermaster, Tareen will allow you to expand storage and increase the number of ships to park at your Homebase. He’ll become even more useful later in the game, but that’s a topic for another day.

New Gameplay

One particular highlight of the main campaign that we haven’t talked about yet are the all-new drone missions. These are all about your 6DOF maneuvering skills as you remote-control a maintenance drone through narrow tunnels and bypass moving security barriers deep underground of the G&B Lunar Mining Colony to prevent an undercover job from going down the drain. So no looty-shooty for a change but no touchy-touchy those lasers either, or AAAALERRRRT!!! No worries, there’s no time limit so you can take it slow and careful, and you can immediately try again if discovered. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/6363f2049dd90a02c253ca888390c02bc5e655aa.jpg Some fans of hardcore space sims might think: “RC drone gameplay and even more puzzle-solving, what the heck!? I thought this was supposed to be a space game…? I didn’t sign up for this, I want more space combat and exploration!" Well, our vision for EVERSPACE 2 has always included introducing new gameplay mechanics and objectives to keep things fresh, like puzzle-solving or, in this case, remote controlling a drone à la Descent. If you’re also a fan, go check out the Overload Kickstarter, the spiritual successor created by the same devs; Overload is currently sitting at 94% positive on Steam, and they even have a free demo, also currently sitting at 94% positive. Now, even though we’ve talked about this before, anyone not into puzzle-solving or 6DOF drone gameplay, please understand that EVERSPACE 2 is meant to stand for its own within the space game genre. There are much bigger titles already out there or in the making, so there would be no point in us trying to compete against the juggernauts of space games. While on the creative side, we believe there’s enough room for an arcadey space action RPG with looter-shooter mechanics bringing new things to the space game genre, which our team is very much excited about. On the whole, allowing our designers the freedom to flex their creative muscles with additions like these is going to make for a stronger game overall. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/efe8487770318b607eada5079abe515162df515c.jpg Continuing the main mission, you will be introduced to another gameplay mechanic right before bumping into the next boss encounter, testing everything you should have learned so far. Without saying too much, HOTAS pilots don’t throw your precious gear at the screen! It’s gonna be rough, but don’t you worry! We’ll have various difficulty and accessibility options at full release, so it’ll be fine™! For now, you might want to fly some of the more challenging missions with a mouse + keyboard or a gamepad of your choice, though. Along with voice recordings that are replacing the TTS voices of the story content of the previous update Contracts/Hinterland, Gero Goerlich (Sound Director), Uwe Wütherich (Creative Director), and Bernie Duffy (external Lead Story Writer) have worked with 20 voice talents to record 2180 new lines with over 20,000 words for more than 40 roles just in the most recent recording session alone. In the final game, we’ll have well over 6,000 lines / 60,000 words of voiced dialogue, putting EVERSPACE 2 on par with various iconic AAA action adventures/RPGs. Gero, Uwe, and Bernie have also worked closely with our friends from Puppetworks to add new quality cinematics based on concept art by Moritz Manhart (our in-house Concept Artist) and Tobias Frank (external Concept Artist on artstation, but part of the RFG family since the very beginning). {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/416c258acdfd503793744e6ec1b410313acb9f89.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/cc21943053b27cdcee25d8135005194a82b7bc9e.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/49aaee1ae6d7686e75962627c7dc16e8f1dec658.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c4f009b83f4f270611b25743ab721d8fea62de92.jpg So yeah, while we won’t have gazillions of proc-gen planets in a vast, seamless universe, we hope that experiencing our carefully handcrafted content in a pseudo-open world while playing through a proper sci-fi story is a journey worth your while. And we’re not even done yet! Speaking of more story content being in the works: with a heavy heart, we have to share that Kevin Mentz, our very much esteemed Quest Designer, has left the RFG family on good terms. We have very much enjoyed working with Kevin for three full years. He was the mastermind behind the EVERSPACE 2 tutorial and most of the side missions. Kevin also worked closely with our story writing team on the main campaign, bringing lots of great narrative ideas into the mix. If you’ve been laughing over some of the absurd 4th-wall-breaking TTS jokes or bloopers of yet unfinished missions, that was also him. Here are some fond memories of watching top content creator Cohh Carnage losing it when he played the closed Alpha: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDvycrt32Ys&t=1200 Kevin will be joining Osmotic Studios to work on more narrative-driven and less action-heavy games. Everybody at ROCKFISH Games wishes him nothing but the best for his future, and godspeed to our indie dev friends at Osmotic with their offices pretty much just around the corner, while our doors will always be open for Kevin to return just in case... nudge-nudge, wink-wink! Ok, put away your tissues because here’s the good news: a) Kevin left us with a ton of more wicked ideas for future side missions, and b) since the core gameplay mechanics of EVERSPACE 2 are mostly in place, you can look forward to Andi, Senior Game Designer and Programmer, who’s been working with us for over 15 years(!), as well as the creative-minded Gameplay Programmer, Thorben Kohler, who already was a former colleague of Kevin when they were working together at Daedalic Entertainment taking over. They’re both super excited about creating new main and side missions for you, and I can say from experience, you won’t be disappointed. In fact, Thorben already got his hands dirty by designing and programming the side mission VaultWorthy in this very update, while Andi, in case you didn’t know, worked together with HCK, our Lead Game Designer, on all main and side mission of the Galaxy on Fire 2 - Supernova add-on (arguably the closest thing to Freelancer on mobile, but that’s a looooong story maybe for another day). All that said, with Kevin leaving and no substitute in sight, we have to slightly reduce the complexity of the game world. Meaning, instead of having eight star systems at full release as originally planned, we decided to go with seven — imaging Erik playing his inglorious BOO! sound on stream before telling everybody to calm down — but to hear us out: System 8, as we call it internally, has always been designed to be a rather small star system primarily meant to stage a major plot point in the campaign. Thus, we can integrate it into one of the other seven systems without cutting any super relevant content.

New Gear

Playing through the new content would be only half as fun if there wasn’t any new gear! We’ve got all you loadout tinkerers covered with a slew of new weapons and devices. Get ready to try the already teased Fusion Hook for some cool Zero-G swing maneuvers, new types of secondaries, such as the (mostly) self-explanatory Corrosion, Armorbreaker, Shieldbreaker, and Destabilizer Missiles, and the Web and Corrosion Mine Launchers for more sophisticated crowd control. Last but not least, we’ve also added set bonuses for Bloodstar items and introduced a new item affix Swift, which reduces ramp up and charge time of certain weapons by 30%—you’re gonna love this one! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c529e6f8fc4c789538c0764b08dd6b834434a81a.jpg Swift auto cannons now take less time to go DAKADAKADAKA, significantly reducing TTK, if you can land all your shots, that is. However, you'll notice that weapon ramp up / charge time is not shown; this might change in the future when we're done designing all weapon attributes.

Crafting UI/UX Improvements

Thilo Eggers (UI/UX Designer) and Mathias (Thies) Ebell (Senior UI/UX Programmer) have been working hand-in-hand to make crafting more intuitive and more streamlined. Not only can you now perform any action with both mouse click or hitting a key. Use is also visually and functionally the same for both mouse and keyboard users and gamepad pilots so that neither side has to sacrifice comfort options or usability. Another new feature added is the Material Overview Overlay, which can be summoned over the crafting interface. It shows which materials you already have and how to obtain any further required resources. Thilo & Thies have also significantly improved the UX of unlocking blueprints. New unlocks are now visually highlighted with a shine animation, while upcoming unlocks are teased. So when unlocking a blueprint, you can immediately see the next two unlockables. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/33e6c0c903eeb80bbdc5955960fd11308a26c2a1.gif Furthermore, you can now change the rarity of an item directly without losing focus on your selected item. The selection will remember the last slot selected, even if you toggle through rarities or reenter the crafting interface to improve user experience by letting players start over where they left off. Thilo & Thies also improved the side-by-side compare function before and after successful crafting, so you are always aware of possible changes and improvements. Also, all interactions are now more mouse-friendly.

Technical Improvements

Finally, we’ve made significant technical changes under the hood. For instance, game assets are now compressed to save disk space and are distributed among several PAK files to speed up patch installation via Steam, so no more hours of copying data from your jampacked SSD to your HDD and back for incremental updates. That said, due to all the handcrafted content and baked high-quality GI lighting still to be added, we’ll probably hit the 75 GB mark for the final game. To help running EVERSPACE 2 on lower-spec systems, we optimized texture memory usage even further, but please don’t expect any miracles when running EVERSPACE 2 on a potato from several years ago. To smooth out some spikes in the overall game balancing, especially when fighting against ten or more enemies simultaneously, Sven also tweaked our in-house developed AI director (we went a bit too far in the experimental build, so we had to scale it back for this official release; thanks again for providing community feedback). It’s a pretty complex beast, so if you want to know more and see it in action, check out Erik’s most recent gamedev stream where he talks about us addressing game difficulty issues in highly populated areas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38ENARXfAZk&t=1567 While Sven was knee-deep in the technical code of the game, he also improved floating-point precision for more accurate hitscan and long-range weapon targeting. Bonus news: this allowed us to even add weapon zoom for Rail Guns, a much-requested feature by several marksman pilots. 🎯

Changelog

Features

• Added new main and side missions
• Added new star system: Zharkov
• Added new player ship class: Vanguard
• Added new companion: Tareen (spoiler)
• Added new device: Fusion Hook
• Added new missile weapon types: Corrosion, Armorbreaker, Shieldbreaker, Destabilizer
• Added Bloodstar items set bonuses
• Added new item affix "Swift" (reduces ramp up and charge time by 30%)
• Added "Union Explorer" challenges + challenge reward for "Explorer" challenges, allowing to fast-forward in supralight
• Tier 2 ships are now available at ship dealers
• Added English voice acting for all dialogs that were added since the previous Contracts/Hinterlands update
• Cinematics now feature improved animation and professional voice-overs (but are still WIP)
• Added new music tracks
• Increased max level to 18
• Added 10 new ship colors to collect
• UI: Added "new" and "invest" indicators to the perks tab
• UI: Item crafting and modification rework including item preview and materials overview

Tweaks

• Game assets are now compressed to save disk space
• Distributed game assets among several .pak files to speed up patch installation via Steam
• Optimized texture memory usage
• Improved Thermo Gun projectile performance
• Overhauled enemy damage and hitpoint balancing
• Balanced difficulty when fighting against multiple enemies at the same time
• Fewer Outlaws in Siren's Sea and Palaemon's Wound
• Cargo space will now increase with higher ship tiers
• Slightly reduced Scout agility
• Increased ship acceleration while not boosting
• Outlaw Ravager and Bloodstar Overseer now have fewer and more prominent weak points
• Outlaw Vipers now leave behind a corrosion field when destroyed
• Creatures and cruisers can no longer be targeted by the Magnetic Repulsor
• Nanobots and Nano Injector will now repair a percentage of hull hp, not a fixed value
• Improved Teleporter collision detection to prevent getting stuck in geometry
• Corrosion will now first damage the armor before damaging the hull
• Annihilator Virus: reduced explosion delay and doubled infect interval
• Annihilator Virus: reduced kinetic damage from 150 to 90
• Annihilator Virus: limited maximum number of infected targets to 6
• Annihilator Virus: increased range from 400m to 600m
• Annihilator Virus "Symptomatic" mode: increased target damage reduction from 20% to 50%
• Annihilator Virus "Incubation" mode: renamed to "R-Naught" - now increases the maximum number of targets by 2
• Corrosion Injector, Annihilator Virus, Quantum Entangler, and Quantum Tether (Striker ULT) can now be used on capital ships
• Doubled Quantum Tether (Striker ULT) effect range
• Rail Gun: Reduced energy consumption
• Rail Gun: Added zoom when charging
• Rail Gun: Increased full charge damage by 50%
• Baron Executioner: Increased max spread angle from 0.5 to 1.5 degrees
• Beam Laser: Increased energy consumption by 20%
• Elek will only jump in if the player is in a fight with more than 2 enemies
• Reduced "Play It Safe" perk effect duration from 12s to 5s
• NPCs will now gain EMP resistance immediately after receiving the EMP debuff to prevent stun locking
• EMP resistance duration is now scaled with the duration of the EMP itself
• Increased hull hitpoints of G&B and Freelancer freighters
• Decreased probability of Interceptor passive perk that recharges Weapon Overdrive with critical hits from 50% to 20%
• Increased global elite enemy probability
• Signal Decoders will now reveal a high-risk area inside the current region of the system
• Signal Decoders will now always have a higher rarity (no more common signal decoders)
• The first boss now gives more and better loot
• Improved support for mixed input methods like joystick + mouse (added option to specify input method or use auto-detect)
• Prevented crafting exploits via reloading
• Fully mine ore deposit when using Flak or Missile Launcher
• Portable debris can now be picked up from a further distance
• Only play detonator drone warning sound when it is flying towards a target
• The pinging sound and icon-effect of invisible containers continue until the container is emptied
• Added options to quickly invert camera pitch/yaw (in addition to the already present invert option in the "customize controls" screen)
• Force fields now have two distinct textures representing their access state
• Flying Dutchess will now spawn-kill enemies when jumping in
• Post effects produced by conditions, devices, and damage are now hidden in Photo Mode
• UI: Added dedicated HUD marker icons for different drone types
• UI: Improved speed when first opening the map
• UI: Joystick keybindings are now displayed in HUD when a joystick binding is assigned
• UI: Tractor Beam Range is now shown in "Ship" screen
• UI: Master rewards for challenges are now instantly revealed
• UI: Added implicit cargo sorting for M&K in case sorting was active on the last menu visit
• UI: Repair and device hold actions trigger an error on the start of hold action in case of insufficient credits/points
• UI: Clickable action buttons in crafting result screen
• UI: (Batch) marked items now feature an animation
• UI: Added ingame menu tab pre-loading for Inventory, Ship, Perks, Mission, Data, and Map
• UI: Better explanation of locked player perks when in space
• UI: "Crafting XP" is now called "Crafting Data"
• UI: Opening ingame menu with gamepad implicitly sorts inventory and selects the first slot
• UI: Dismantling and destroying while using a controller now implicitly sorts inventory (removes empty slots in-between)
• UI: Enabled "Expand Cargo View" / batch actions in loot container view
• UI: Enabled "Send To Homebase" action in loot container view
• UI: Added navigation SFX to mission item inventory
• UI: Hovering one of the six main attributes will now show the items that contribute to the respective value
• UI: Added descriptions for condition tooltips in ship screen
• UI: Added storage slot ratio to inventory headline
• UI: When activating a high-risk area and choosing to show it on the map it's now highlighted and centered

Bugfixes

• Fixed ship selector sometimes not being displayed in Homebase despite owning multiple ships
• Fixed floating-point precision issues related to weapon aim
• Fixed already destroyed Bomb Thrower Turrets sometimes still throwing bombs
• Fixed energy orbs not restoring armor
• Fixed not being able to activate buttons using a flak cannon
• Fixed a potential blocker and a wrong dialog being played in "I Heart Scrap" side mission
• Fixed dialogs related to fights being played when colliding with level geometry
• Fixed destroying Okkar units not yielding correct XP
• Fixed Okkar being spawned by the Wanted System giving loot and XP after re-entering a location.
• Fixed player stats not being updated immediately after re-entering stats screen
• Fixed highlight effect on some structures being visible from far away
• Fixed "Data Fishing" side mission briefing dialog being played again when docking before leaving the location
• Fixed mission item "Drone Debris" not getting removed from inventory after becoming obsolete
• Fixed Gauss Cannon and Rail Gun having improper affixes
• Fixed Baron Executioner weapon receiving energy damage modifiers
• Fixed item bonus attributes that grant extra damage not working properly
• Fixed bounty not increasing when defeating an enemy with a device like the Corrosion Injector
• Fixed problems with axis inversions also affecting other logical axes that were bound to the same physical axis
• Fixed that Elek could appear multiple times in a location
• Fixed that Elek sometimes left too soon
• Fixed that Elek and Dax could die when acting as wingmen
• Fixed enqueued hull repairs being lost when docking to a station
• Fixed faction rewards not being displayed for accepted jobs in the missions tab
• Fixed being able to use warfare devices on allies
• Fixed timestamps of items accidentally being renewed after having been moved to a different inventory slot
• Fixed device inventory did not update after changing ships under some circumstances
• Fixed quick equip with right mouse button in loot container screen might send an item to Homebase instead of equipping it
• Fixed that some item attribute bonus values (like Resistance) would not spawn
• Fixed Sentinel ULT (Static Overload) not scaling with Utility attribute
• Fixed Sentinel passive "20% reduced cooldowns for warfare devices." falsely stacking until cooldown was zero
• Fixed that missiles could not be destroyed after the ship or turret that fired them died
• Fixed additionally spawned Okkars not leaving location after having paid bounty
• Fixed "ULT ready" not being triggered by Interceptor passive perk
• Prevent being able to switch camera while in "1st person no cockpit" view and having activated auto-pilot
• Fixed that retractable turrets could be destroyed by very high damage, e.g. Annihilator Virus
• UI: Fixed that only one missing attribute was shown when comparing items
• UI: Fixed item actions for Aeterna Bypasses and Signal Decoders being visible in multi-select mode
• UI: Fixed equip action being visible in multi-select mode
• UI: Fixed focus and hud visibility problems after very quickly opening and closing ingame menu
• UI: Fixed wrong device slot length in item selection
• UI: Fixed wrong implicit cargo sorting when using a gamepad and first opening the menu
• UI: Fixed inventory items clipping through scroll indicators
• UI: Fixed icons for companion perk upgrade requirements sometimes being wrong
• UI: Fixed that when using mouse+keyboard, gamepad icons were displayed on a device icon and consumable slots in the menu
• UI: Fixed stats and condition tooltips sometimes still being shown on screen after changing ships
• UI: Using dedicated icon for ship special in the stats panel
• UI: Fixed that log sometimes displayed items with the wrong affix
• UI: Fixed that pressing Tab while "Press Tab to Show" was shown for completed or new challenges not opening the challenges screen
• UI: Fixed slot focus being lost after clicking on various regions in ingame menu header
• UI: Fixed item sorting type 'Latest' (newest item first) not working properly
• UI: Fixed "Quick equip" action of selected equipment in storage inventory being broken after changing ships on Homebase
• UI: Fixed icon scale for devices that can't be used not being reset after being replaced by another device
• UI: Fixed damage numbers not shown for damage-over-time conditions like Corrosion
• UI: Fixed shop icon not being shown on Map for Flying Dutchess beacons
• UI: Fixed Ben's speaker image not showing implants after his operation
• UI: Fixed "Outdated Equipment" message appearing at a bad time
• (Exp) Fixed a bug that resulted in inadvertently easy fights against large numbers of enemies
• (Exp) Fixed that energy spheres would show resist marker in radiation fields
• (Exp) Fixed false unlock of random system regions when entering supralight which leads to Union Explorer Challenge unlock banner not being shown
• (Exp) Fixed being able to activate gas harvester boss from the outside
• (Exp) Fixed invisible forcefield spawning right above shield generators after beating gas harvester boss and loading checkpoint save
• (Exp) Fixed being able to damage the Okkar Corvette during "Tipping The Scales" Side Mission
• (Exp) Fail "The Vortex" main mission when attacking G&B at Vesna Mining Colony
• (Exp) Fixed colliding with invisible ships on ship dealer platforms
• (Exp) Fixed that fast-forwarding in travel mode affected playtime
• (Exp) Fixed faction standing not increasing after completing a job
• (Exp) Fixed fast-forwarding not pausing when opening menu
• (Exp) Fixed camera being inside remote drone occasionally
• (Exp) Fixed that the Raid Booster's "Boost After Kill" bonus was stackable

Phew, that was quite something! We hope everyone will enjoy all the new content and improvements. If not, let us know, and we’ll have a look into your concerns; Again, that’s why we’re doing Early Access to constantly improve the game based on community feedback. While full transparency is of utmost importance to us, so every space game enthusiast can find out where EVERSPACE 2 is heading, but also where it isn’t. To get everything, you gotta read all our news material, though. Or, even better, join our weekly ROCKFISH Games Show on Twitch and YouTube to watch the latest dev build in action and hear it directly from the dev horse’s mouth, Erik Schrader, ace pilot and beloved Community Ambassador. He’s there for you to answer all your questions every Friday from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EST / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PST. 🚀💥🙌 In case you missed grabbing EVERSPACE 2 during the summer sale at 20% off, we deliberately timed another weeklong 20% sale with the release of Zharkov: The Vortex, so here’s another chance to get in the cockpit and save a few more bucks. Note that we’ll raise the price at full release, so you won’t find a better deal to grab a copy of EVERSPACE 2 anytime soon. Keep it civil on the forums, and see you in space! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c59615f232fe4ad835e32913f2f31e7630d5c0b8.jpg Greetings, Pilots! In this actual gameplay teaser trailer, space game enthusiasts get a glimpse of the third star system that leads deeper into the mystery of the Ancients, a powerful alien race, as well as shady business being done by the Grady & Brunt mining operation, two factions that were already established in the original EVERSPACE. Keep an eye out for new natural hazards, weapon types, and a new planetary location that is briefly shown. Time to get excited, pilots! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeBPY56nm10 Make sure to swing by tomorrow's ROCKFISH Games Show when our beloved Community Ambassador Erik Schrader will give a sneak peek of Zharkov on Twitch and YouTube from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CSET / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EST / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PST. Chances are, things go sideways yet again when showing the latest build, plus even more spoilers heading your way, so it should be fun! 🚀👀💥🙌 Keep it civil on the forums, and see you in space! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/adde9705bb5c40798bda648c79d736291711808a.jpg Greetings, pilots! DRUM ROLL! After being smoke-tested by daring Early Access test-pilots without running into any issues and some last-minute tweaks & fixes to address much-appreciated community feedback on the experimental version, we’re excited to announce that we just pushed the button to release the first content update, EVERSPACE 2: Contracts/Hinterland, on Steam and GOG - WOOT! Make sure to follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, and join the Discord for future chances to jump in early on upcoming builds! While we’ve already shared quite a lot in our previous info update on Steam, we’ve put together a 12 min explanation trailer to wetten your appetite if you don’t mind spoilers, that is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4-SFjsXaXE

Smuggling

The biggest addition, beyond all the new contents, previously revealed on Steam, is a multi-stage smuggling mission taking pilots to several locations in Union through the continued story campaign included in this update. It features cuddly Elek helping you out, drawing enemy fire while you deliver precious, yet highly volatile cargo stored behind your cockpit seat. Meaning, better to keep your finger off the trigger and sneak around hostile units by using the environment to your advantage. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/41d26cb9d7765078bb969ba020943aea11ab120d.jpg Steer clear of the firefight while hauling an explosive payload! Volatile cargo is dangerous, but it pays top rates. To stabilize hazardous goods between Supralight jumps, quick pit stops will cool things down. We’d love to hear your feedback about these kinds of missions—we plan to add more smuggling activities in the future for all those space truckers who enjoy making extra credits on the side. Still too early to say how exactly it's gonna work, but illegal smuggling jobs might have an impact on your trading reputation later in the game. Would be dope if we even added special gear and certain ship class capabilities in the future that would come in handy for dubious tasks further down the line, wouldn’t it?

Music Overhaul

Now, before you frantically click on the link to the 100+ entry changelog to find out what else is new in our first major content update, let’s talk about what’s under the hood of Added/Improved various music tracks, plus some general thoughts about music in video games and EVERSPACE 2 in particular. Disclaimer: Having a great soundtrack alongside everything else we’re making for EVERSPACE 2 is hugely important to us. The team is filled with suckers for great music so this section grew longer than planned; Anyone who always turns off in-game music to listen to their favorite playlist on Spotify, feel free to skip right to the end with the link to the changelog; no hard feelings! :) {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/ff3cf139dac12057ff927b3b7eb0d3380522cee5.jpg Meet our one-man-army sound designer & director Gero! He has been “lost in music, caught in a trap, no turning back” Sister Sledge-style in his sound-proved studio at our office without going nuts all by himself. For over two years, he’s been composing and tweaking well over 60 tracks, mixing a plethora of iconic SFX for primary and secondary weapons, activated ship devices and consumables, distinctive audio clues about environmental events, UI actions, as well as directing and editing countless hours of voice acting. If that wasn’t enough, Gero is also a veteran audio programmer, making all that in-game audio magic happen at the right time and place. Oh, he also does layout edits for the cinematics and in-game cutscenes. It’s been a ton of work and it’s far from being finished, but as long as coffee doesn’t run out, all is good, Gero assures us. We probably all agree great music and fitting SFX has always been super important in video games. Even if excellent game audio might elevate the game to higher levels for many players just subconsciously, playing your favorite games, from 8-bit classic to the latest AAA blockbuster, without music can make you realize how much of the total experience is missing. Now, when making an open-world space action RPG, many epic soundtracks from iconic space movies and sci-fi shooters immediately come to mind as inspiration. From Star Wars, Star Trek, and Battlestar Galactica to Halo, Destiny, and Fallout—the list of fantastic sci-fi music is endless. Expectations for a top-notch sci-fi action RPG score are very high, especially when the visual fidelity is so good. However, we don’t have a AAA budget for a highly-decorated composer and full-sized orchestra to produce several hours of in-game music. Even if we did, we think it wouldn’t be the right fit for this title. So, being budget-limited and wanting to produce as much as possible in-house, we had to come up with a music direction that Gero could produce all by himself on keys and guitar along with high-quality percussion samples and all sorts of SFX from premium sound libraries. Instead of trying to produce an epic space opera score on a budget, we doubled down on Gero’s variety of talents and went for the iconic sound of 80s electronic pop music, like in the first installment, but with some modern EDM vibes thrown into the mix. Whatever your take is on this, we think the new music direction is the right fit for a fast-paced, arcadey spaceship looter-shooter at its core with optional exploration and other activities on the side. If you want to read a deeper meaning to the change of our music direction for EVERSPACE 2, you could say that EVERSPACE 1 had a rock-solid foundation of top-notch space combat and striking visual but was a bit rough around its UI/UX edges, paired with a grindy roguelite game loop and a pretty dark story campaign, held back by an edgy learning curve. The game was meant to break established rules of the classic space combat & exploration genre while bringing modern roguelike elements to the mix. Hence, its unusual music direction based on 80s synthesizer sounds and 90s electric guitar riffs, combined with modern beats. With our change of direction for EVERSPACE 2, the stakes are higher than ever. As our new title appeals to a much larger audience and is meant to be more accessible than hardcore space sims, the game’s audio direction had to follow suit. Consequently, fewer quirky sounds or tracks with a strange 7/8 beat hard to jam to, instead a straight 4/4 rhythm going right into your feet, with some off-beat syncopes here and there to keep things interesting. Last but not least, a more positive score is also a better fit for the hero’s journey in EVERSPACE 2 as Adam is growing from a formerly naive clone pilot to a real human being that finds his place in life and a goal that is worth dying for. Now, if you’re still reading and thinking “man, that sounds quite boring, and I really don’t like that one battle track with its boring theme and stomping Euro techno beat.” Don’t fret! Gero is constantly exploring his creative boundaries and with some sixty tracks already in the game and even more to come, you’re bound to find a favorite track. Gero has an open ear for feedback from the community and from our team. Ok, everything aside: Gero has been hard at work creating new tracks and sanding off the edges on tracks in progress; while there is still a lot to be done, I gotta say, the team and I are super pleased with some of his latest work for Union. Check this out:

• All-new Union Supralight Theme
• All-new Union battle theme ramp up 01
• All-new Union battle theme ramp up 02
• All-new Union battle theme ramp up 03

Changelog

A few more disclaimers before you head on to the full changelog of the EVERSPACE 2 Contracts/Hinterland update below: As the update seems to be very stable and balanced pretty well, we probably won’t have any maintenance updates before the next content drop in Summer. Even if we did, we wouldn’t add the Vanguard, as previously considered, because we wouldn’t want to code freeze production for at least two weeks and lose precious development time just to add one more job between major beats, consequently delaying the next update. Also, to enable us to add more main and side missions during Early Access, we’ll be working with TTS as placeholders for quite a while and have maybe one or two more voice recording sessions before the full release further down the line. We added a temporary option to disable TTS placeholders if anyone finds them immersion breaking.

Features

• Added new main and side missions
• Added new player ship class: Bomber (heavy fighter)
• Added new companion
• Increased level cap to 15 and added three new player perks
• Added EMP Missiles
• Added new Outlaw units: Bloodstar Prospector, Bloodstar Overseer, Outlaw Drone Carrier
• Added new Bloodstar-branded equipment
• Added resolution scaling setting
• Added NVIDIA DLSS setting
• Added experimental HDR support
• Added setting for third-person camera stiffness
• Added keybindings for cycling through on-screen enemy targets
• Added batch actions for processing multiple items at once
• Added overview screen for data tab
• Added new WIP narrated cinematics
• Added new/hint indication marker for some menu tabs and items
• Added current conditions bar to ship menu tab
• Added dedicated mission inventory to hold mission items instead of ship cargo

Tweaks

• Manual saving is now possible anywhere while not in a fight or mission
• Balancing: Slower leveling by reducing enemy XP, slightly increased enemy DPS and HP
• Enemy levels are more varied now; enemies above player level more common
• Slightly reduced Uncommon and Rare drop chances for low levels
• There are now cooldowns when installing new weapons/consumables
• Homing missiles now require a short lock-on sequence, and missiles will only home in when fired while a target is on screen
• Reduced Augmentation bonus from 30 to 20 per Augment
• Increase ship slots on Homebase from 3 to 5
• Greatly increased resulting Critical Hit Chance bonus from Precision attribute
• HUD markers for discovered objects will now be saved and restored when entering a location / loading a save
• Modules will now always have a Firepower, Precision, or Structure bonus attribute if rarity is at least Uncommon
• Increased heavy ship deceleration with enabled inertia dampening
• Show additional offscreen damage indicators in HUD
• Reworked movement for most NPC ships, resulting in a less "beeline" attack style
• Enemies will now boost when investigating
• NPC ships will less likely carry the battle to the location bounds
• Reduced Outlaw Sniper Drone focus time
• Outlaw Destroyer: Now fires missiles while weakpoints are exposed, easier to spot weakpoints that now also change color when hit, more base hitpoints, higher weakpoint damage multiplier
• Sniper Drone will now try to keep 2km distance from player
• Consume at least 30% of maximum ULT charge when canceling ULT
• Faction item rewards will now have the player level when claimed
• Challenge tasks are now tracked individually instead of the whole collection
• Increased controller Auto-aiming strength for mines
• Auto-aiming will now ignore friends/neutrals
• Increased amount of damage needed for a G&B Freighter to turn hostile, but now always turn them hostile when a container was (mostly) destroyed by the player
• Changed Speed Booster Recharge Speed from 500% to 300%, increased Recharge Delay from 1s to 2s
• With a Cruise Booster equipped, you can now activate Cruise Mode faster (1.8s → 1s) and closer to enemies (2km → 1km)
• Increased charge duration and energy consumption of Rail Gun, slightly decreased kinetic base damage
• Targets affected by EMP will now receive 30 seconds of EMP immunity after the effect ends
• Energy Orbs: Now always floating towards the player, replaced effect bonus perk level with armor recharge, better spawn effect
• Slightly decreased signal decoder and color drop chances for some enemy types
• Added VFX to make Outlaw Armor Drones stand out more
• Slightly increased maneuverability while webbed
• Added RESIST and IMMUNE impact labels (e.g. EMP on freighters: Immune, EMP on fighters with EMP Resistance: Resist)
• Reduced magnitude of bonus attribute values (Firepower, Resistance, Precision, Utility, Structure)
• Decreased Thermo Gun kinetic damage by 33%
• Baron Executioner: Increased kinetic damage, removed energy damage
• Salvor Jaeger: Decreased spread, slightly increased kinetic damage / decreased energy damage
• Show "influence" offscreen indicators for npcs that are debuffing the player (e.g. webbed by Webber)
• Dedicated Supralight music in Union system
• Optimized sorting options and internal order of item property priorities
• Removed unnecessary amount selection for some item transfers
• Added small animation and highlight when selling to rebuy shop inventory
• Added icons and quality of life improvements for perk upgrade and the investment process
• Custom ship style slots now display the selected colors
• Hide HUD marker for items pulled with Tractor Beam
• Made page indicators in customization screens navigatable and clickable
• A small indicator is displayed below the player health bars when inertia dampeners are turned off
• Show "tracked" icon in pickup log on top of item icon when tracked for perks
• New mesh for the Flying Dutchess trading ship
• Freelook/orbit cam is automatically entered when activating autopilot in Supralight
• Autopilot can now also be activated/deactivated with target lock binding (middle mouse button is the default)
• Player armor, health, and shield bars now all have the same length
• Show energy bars in a different color when carrying an energy orb to make it more obvious that energy is unlimited now
• Reworked Thermo Gun projectile VFX
• Reduced Energized Boost "High Pressure" mode impulse to prevent physics-related issues
• Rigged Asteroid UI displays the currently activated and the overall amount of detonator triggers
• Changed name and appearance of "Outlaw Ravager" to "Bloodstar Overseer" in the tutorial
• The game is now also auto-saved when undocking from a station and having visited a menu or made any changes
• Decreased "create new energy sphere" hold duration from 3 seconds to 2 seconds
• Show max level info message when reaching Max Level
• Prevent save scumming in regards to ship and shop offers
• Various UI/Menu tweaks
• Updated Unreal Engine to 4.26, potentially fixing some low-level issues (like graphics crashes or problems with available resolutions)

Bugfixes

• Fixed Bomb-Thrower re-enabling shield after death
• Fixed broken state when loading a save game on Ayres Relay Station with Striker
• Fixed player ship not being auto-repaired when levelling up while docked at a station
• Fixed energized boost "Compressor" mode stacking
• Fixed weapons not always facing straight during supralight
• Fixed overlapping dialogues after finishing a job
• Fixed finished job locations still showing on Map if they have item rewards that are unclaimed
• Fixed Tractor Beam sound not pausing when the game is paused
• Fixed camera view occasionally being automatically switched to third-person after using jump gate
• Fixed playing time not properly updating after crossing the 144 hours mark
• Fixed Interceptors "Power Converter" not using Boost Energy for charging weapons
• Fixed Coil and Rail Guns having the "high-velocity" affix
• Fixed Corrosion Injector "Mercy Kill" mode not resetting cooldown for insta-kills
• Fixed consumable/device keys not showing changed keybindings and also automatically refresh many icons/buttons after a keybinding change
• Fixed new high-risk area waypoint not immediately showing after using signal decoder at a location and setting waypoint via map
• Fixed "Tag Mines" attribute of Sensor not working correctly
• Fixed having to change joystick throttle or other axis input again after pause/resume in order to receive the current axis input
• Fixed Missile Defense System sometimes locking up in a loop
• Fixed that when trying to use shoulder buttons as modifiers for keybindings the options menu tab would change instead
• Fixed that activation of Signal Decoders was not possible if the max amount has been reached and one high-risk area was just discarded
• Fixed stat attributes not updating after upgrading an item
• Fixed shop discounts falsely granted for non-equipment
• Fixed previously used player ship in Hangar still casting a shadow when currently viewing another player ship
• Fixed high-risk-location icon looking different in Supralight to what it looks like on the map
• Fixed secondary weapon meshes being hidden after having switched to "1st person no cockpit view" and going back to third-person
• Fixed dialog window being transparent after plating help message was shown
• Fixed interact repair hold sound not stopping when moving out of interact range but still holding the interact button
• Fixed that EMPing a mine counted as having cleared the mine although the effect wears off after some time
• Fixed reactor repair costs not matching the mission amount
• Fixed player mines being hostile after loading a saved game
• Fixed minable resources HUD marker being visible after fully mining a resource and then re-entering the location later
• Fixed multiple bugs regarding sorting of inventories
• Fixed a problem that showed zero credits for all items in shops
• Fixed wrong rarity displayed in resource log (HUD) after taking-all-items action in containers was used
• Fixed inaccessible Distress Calls being shown on the map
• Fixed that upgraded modules may not receive mandatory firepower, precision, or structure attribute
• Fixed devices and ULTs becoming less powerful in higher levels

Ok, that was a lot of words; time for some action! Make sure to join our next “ROCKFISH Games Show” to watch Erik Schrader, beloved ROCKFISH Games Community Ambassador and ace space pilot, delve into the EVERSPACE 2: Contracts/Hinterland update live on Twitch and YouTube, Friday, April 30, from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EST / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PST. 🚀👀💥🙌 Keep it civil on the forums, and see you in space! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/8ddfe3d3ec28ecf9f773a45506ad12a9eaeb95f6.jpg Greetings, Pilots! Time to get excited about the first EVERSPACE 2 content update! Union: Contracts/Hinterland is scheduled to officially drop on Steam and GOG on April 28! As the suffix suggests, there’ll be new things to discover and do in the second star system. While we don’t want to unveil too much, we know that many early pilots are yearning for some teasers, so here we go—there will be spoilers; you have been warned! We’ve already shared some information about the two new ship classes, the Bomber and the Vanguard, including some detailed concept art in our previous update. While the Vanguard still needs some work in the ROCKFISH shipyard—it’s now scheduled to be deployed with the next maintenance patch after the content update has dropped—we’re excited to share the first in-game screenshot and some more details of the Bomber with you. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5a0ebb40689bb5baed69efa935cdcba2944db742.jpg First in-game shot of a Cyclops, Bomber Class, Tier 1 in action. Although some pilots perceive subclasses in EVERSPACE 2 to be like different ship types in other space games, it’s worth mentioning that each ship subclass in EVERSPACE 2 will feature subclass-specific wing types as well as different perks. The heavy-class Bomber is a bulky demolition expert with a virtually unlimited supply of missiles and mines, including the infamous ARC-9000. This much-loved secondary weapon in the first installment makes a comeback in EVERSPACE 2 as the Bomber’s very impressive Ultimate: It fires a massive ball of destruction that damages ANY ship in its vicinity and explodes on impact, so use it with great caution! The Bomber’s Special "Conversion" is also nothing to sneeze about as secondary weapons use energy instead of ammunition. In combination with a set of random passive perks, like the ability to convert hostile mines or reduced target lock-on duration, plus the upgradable Expertise to self-repair its hull based on a percentage of damage dealt, the Bomber allows for a unique playstyle.

Meeting An Old Friend

It’s no secret that Elek, our Outlaw friend from the EVERSPACE: Encounters expansion, will have a comeback in EVERSPACE 2. As Outlaws do, our furry friend has got himself in quite some trouble. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/66dc2787a17c69c3c12fc23593d8fce6b42a9eae.jpg You might wonder how Elek ended up hanging upside down... trapped in a cocoon... in a dark, spooky cave deep underground at Cephas Downs... you’ll find out soon! The main mission rescuing Elek will take combat and exploration gameplay underground a notch further compared to what you have experienced in the tutorial by featuring a bigger and more complex cave with several tunnels as well as a new type of alien creature, fittingly named “Cave Crawlers.” While the pests are individually weak, they compensate through quantity and have some nasty tricks up their sleeve. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5098b9ef5ddc9dceeb65b0230fd2d125a3a29bb0.jpg While you can easily splatter Cave Crawlers with any weapon, make sure to avoid the stacking corrosion damage from their acid spit attacks. Corrosion goes right through your shield and eats your ship’s armor and hull within seconds if hit by too many times. Better to be safe than sorry; a full stack of large nanobots might come in handy! Once you have figured out how to make it back to the surface, Elek will drop a clue that’ll help you progress further in the main campaign, leading to an all-new type of mission. Later on, Elek will join your companion roster, where you’ll be able to unlock and upgrade his perks. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/dde30e120f32efe371a863b77d9a2611942c2fc8.jpg The chance of Elek joining the fight when Adam is under attack is the first of several perks to unlock and upgrade for our furry pal. Later in the game, Elek’s connections in the DMZ will come in handy, too. Veteran EVERSPACE - Encounters pilots who have fought together with Elek know him as a skilled wingman; it’s always good to have him flying alongside you, ready to pull yet another ace from up his Outlaw pilot sleeves when things get hairy. However, Elek being Elek, he’s not a fan of sitting around at the Homebase, waiting for you to call for help, but being busy. By further investing in your relationship, you’ll be able to increase chances that he’ll take your call. IF he shows up, his space combat skills never disappoint.

Chasing Spaceships

Some pilots wondered what those racing challenges scattered all around in Ceto and Union are all about. After all, EVERSPACE 2 is a looter shooter RPG with spaceships, not Mario Kart, right? While this loose quote from a comment on Steam about race challenges in EVERSPACE 2 might be a bit exaggerated, we also understand that racing in a space combat game could feel out of place, especially to fans of hardcore space sims. However, our creative vision for EVERSPACE 2 is more like an open-world action RPG in space. We want to provide various gameplay mechanics that you can delve into while progressing through the game in your preferred manner. Much of these side quests are optional objectives to pursue whenever you’d like to take a break from the main story campaign. That said, we aren’t implementing all these different types of gameplay mechanics for nothing. Some super-duper loot will require top maneuvering skillz AND brainz to obtain. No worries, we’re not gonna force anyone to solve lots of complex puzzles and tight pursuit missions to progress through the story campaign à la Uncharted or Tomb Raider. However, many in our team enjoy games that challenge players in lots of different ways, so we also like throwing various challenges at pilots that are up for testing their capabilities outside of established gameplay mechanics in the space combat & exploration / looter-shooter genre. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/61500f7b11c2795caeb10a0a8a8917cc1375d032.jpgWatch out for sudden obstacles, unexpected turns, and nasty surprises dropping while chasing an informant through a dense field of asteroids. A great example of how to keep things interesting off the beaten path are those inglorious exotic weapons quests in Destiny 2, throwing bonkers platforming challenges at Guardians before the final boss fight. At first, you might hate them, but once mastered, it’s all the more rewarding when that precious legendary drops. With that in mind, look forward to a twisting high-speed pursuit within the busy delivery drone flight routes at Prescott Starbase and an adrenaline-rush spaceship chase through a dense asteroid field to test your maneuvering skills.

Ancient Puzzles

As said earlier, puzzle-solving in EVERSPACE 2 has generated a lot of feedback, especially from hardcore fans of space sims. Be sure that we are constantly reevaluating and changing things throughout Early Access. For example: In the new update, the rigged asteroids puzzles will now show the current amount of activated and total detonators. It's a small change, but it will make this puzzle more accessible without rendering it trivial. Again, no challenge, no fun, right? Anyhow, looking at 92% positive reviews, it’s fair to say that the vast majority of pilots do like puzzle-solving to keep things varied, so good news for most of you: Union: Contracts/Hinterland will also introduce new types of puzzles in combination with the second boss encounter, featuring another old acquaintance from the predecessor, The Ancient Warden. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/bb5b87f93fe6a75ddfc503f96786e9a195d5eace.jpg Veteran EVERSPACE pilots already know that the Ancient Warden is no push-over with his long-range hyperbolic attacks that can hit you even behind cover and its capability to teleport when receiving too much damage. Make sure you have weapons with high energy damage installed, dodge its attacks, and pay attention to the final combat phase that will be even more devastating in the confined space of a cave.

Overhauled Game Balancing

We’ve heard from a few players struggling with the overall game difficulty, especially when coming from space flight sims featuring more atmosphere-style combat with fewer weapon types and ship capabilities. Some are even using HOTAS, which is a more difficult to use setup in the EVERSPACE series compared to mouse + keyboard and gamepads. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/6a9d58e63450ef224bdf18fed8460d96932e397d.png According to a recent survey on the ROCKFISH Games YouTube channel, about two thirds of space pilots prefer mouse + keyboard when playing space combat games; based on current player data, we’re seeing a whopping 82% playing with mouse + keyboard in EVERSPACE 2. On the other hand, we’ve received a lot of feedback from pilots that the game is much too easy, thus reaching the current level cap of 14 far too fast, a point also shown in anonymously collected player data. To improve player progression throughout the story campaign and local challenges, we’ve reduced XP from kills, buffed some enemy’s hitpoints and damage output. Furthermore, drop chances for uncommon and rare items have been reduced, too. To make things more interesting across the board, enemy levels are now more varied and more commonly above player level. Speaking of player level, we also decided to increase the new level cap to 15, enabling pilots to unlock a new set of perks: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/9e4f3eca8a903e2618dc0b5304b80a2124b88e69.jpg The new set of perks is all about dealing extra damage that might come in handy when venturing into high-risk areas. Now, to all pilots that had a hard time in EVERSPACE 2 so far, don’t fret! Once we’ve nailed game balancing of the full game for the vast majority of players, we’ll introduce various difficulty levels plus more granular gameplay and accessibility options to tweak the overall difficulty to everyone’s liking. That said, our creative vision for EVERSPACE 2 is an open-world action RPG with looter shooter mechanics and various side activities. Meaning, just like any other open-world action RPG, anyone just bee-lining through the story campaign would not only miss a ton of content and features, the game will also be incredibly difficult. So, we strongly recommend going for side missions, jobs and random events, solving puzzles to get more rare loot, using crafting to always have items at the current player level, and optimizing your ship and gear loadout depending on the current objective. Most importantly, always keep moving and circle-strafe to avoid incoming fire, lead your shots, and use the environment and all ship capabilities to your advantage! This is how EVERSPACE 2 is meant to be played! ;)

Additional Content, Features, Improvements, and Bugfixes

As teased in previous live streams, the first EVERSPACE 2 content update will also introduce the Bloodstar, an all-new Outlaw sub-faction with different combat capabilities, and the chance to drop special Bloodstar gear introducing set-bonuses. Here’s Erik revealing Bloodstar NPCs in a recent live stream. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5ec3a6122fc571b848b90469aafade5230882aa0.jpg Bloodstar items only drop from defeated Bloodstar units and come with unique attributes that can significantly boost gear stats when equipped simultaneously. Beyond adding new content and features, we’ve also tweaked a ton of things. As of writing this production update, I’m counting over 40 improvements currently listed on our internal changelog, ranging from migrating the project to UE4.26 to potentially fix some stability issues, more sophisticated enemy AI, to numerous QoL and UI improvements across the board. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/a1598dc1be5f104e6fa9971093a5cc7cee226678.jpg The all-new Batch Actions feature makes dismantling, destroying, selling, or sending several items to Homebase so much easier!

Closing Remarks About Our Vision

Thanks to a ton of great support from our hardcore fans in two wildly successful Kickstarter campaigns, over two million EVERSPACE 1 pilots since its Early Access release in September 2016, and an incredibly successful Early Access launch for the sequel, we’re living the indie dream. With this success, we’ve been able to forge our creative vision of an open-world space action RPG that everyone on the team is really passionate about, while working closely with our community to make it the best game within our financial and crafting capabilities without having to make compromises based on the agenda of a 3rd party. Now, commercial success of a predecessor alone is not all it takes to make a great sequel. The most important thing is that everyone on the ROCKFISH Games team is on board for the journey and aiming for the same goal, which is harder than it sounds! Our team is composed of a very diverse type of gamers. While some of us prioritize deep storytelling, casual combat, and deep exploration, others mostly want to blow stuff up and maxout their loadout without too much thinking, looking behind each asteroid for hidden treasures, or watching cutscenes. Whereas some, like our “hardcore” players, mostly thrive on challenges that are absolutely insane, like the way Erik enjoys playing, while still appreciating deep lore and compelling storytelling. Meaning, building accessible loot & shoot gameplay with intuitive shooter-like controls is the common foundation not only for our team but also our promise to our community. We want to offer a decent amount of depth to the EVERSPACE 2 world in various additional mission types, worthwhile gameplay mechanics, and more further down the line. We know that many design decisions may not make every pilot happy, but we hope everyone can appreciate us being as open as possible about our creative, technical, and commercial decisions. To help digest all this new information and answer any burning questions you might have, make sure to join our next ROCKFISH Games Show on Twitch and YouTube, on Friday, April 16, from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CET / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm ET / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PT. Chances are, things go sideways yet again when showing the latest build, plus even more spoilers heading your way, so it should be fun! 🚀👀💥🙌 If you’re new to the franchise or have waited for a great deal, this might be the time to pull the trigger: Get the first EVERSPACE installment at 85% off (DLCs 70% off) and/or the sequel for 10% less on Steam. Both special promotions end on April 21, 10am PST. Keep it civil on the forums, and see you in space! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/ffba6c6a8ba70947e87abce9ede0e90fa602fb2e.jpg Greetings, Pilots! Our first patch including community-requested features, tweaks, game balancing, and overall performance improvements, as well as several bugfixes, is out. Steam reviews are sitting at 1700+ with 92% positive, sales are beyond expectations, and current outstanding wishlists are through the roof (as in over 3x compared to the predecessor after 30 days post-launch). There’s no denying that things are looking really good so far. On the other hand, avid space pilots from around the globe have already burned through the current content and are demanding MOARRR! Well, that’s definitely a good problem to have, and we’re already working on lots of new stuff.

Roadmap 2021

Our first content update is on track to be released in April, featuring various additional side and mini-missions as well as new activities taking place in Ceto and Union. There will also be new loot as well as two new player ship sub-classes. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/552b4a6d8e6cf0dd5c0bcb66ef1196a3ac8dbacf.jpg he Vanguard is a lightweight, maneuverable reconnaissance starfighter with a high emphasis on speed, mobility, and defensive measures. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/97de96204b57017cfde70fe9ce6c9586e88451f6.jpg The Bomber is a missile and mine specialist with access to unique explosive weapons and warheads. Think “shoot first, ask questions later…” Not enough you say? We agree! Even though we originally didn’t plan to add more main story content beyond what’s already in the Early Access release version, we feel you guys. The “cavehanger” is brutal and totally unexpected, making you go: “NOOOOOO!” TBH, that’s exactly how I felt when reaching the current end of the story campaign. I knew I hadn’t discovered every location and solved all puzzles yet. I’d already reached level 14 because I’d constantly got side-tracked doing side missions, jobs, challenges, distress calls, unknown signals, and high-risk areas. Good job, team! However, I didn’t move on while playtesting before the Early Access release because I didn’t want to spoil my first playthrough experience for the rest of Union and instead wanted to look at our WIP game from a consumer point of view. It really left me with a weird feeling. On the one hand, I couldn’t wait to see all the cool stuff to experience for myself that I have missed and be able to write about it here—there’s content for 25+ hours of gameplay in the current version if you’re willing to explore. On the other hand, I wanted to preserve that feeling of discovering new locations when new main and side missions will take me there once the new update dropped. Meaning, I can totally understand everyone who’s yearning for more story content. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5db1d8828eb723466243d525bb8bbd6652aea3ee.jpg Along with new cinematics being further polished with great help from the talented folks at Puppet Works, based in Budapest, look forward to continuing the story campaign in Union, bringing back the beloved WIP TTS voice-overs (and maybe some more 4th-wall-breaking dialogues), only available during Early Access. Now, we’ve also received a ton of questions about what’s coming and when. We love your excitement, yet we also want to manage expectations, as adding new content and features to a complex “open-world action RPG with spaceships” is no joke for a small indie dev team of 25—we already feel the pressure 😅 Even though we just launched in Early Access, some media outlets are touting EVERSPACE 2 as “Roque Squadron meets Diablo,” being “The Witcher of Spacer Shooters,” “Nailing Those Freelancer Vibes So Far,” praising it as “Descent and Privateer had a baby.” No doubt, we love these kinds of headlines, but as an indie studio, we also don’t want an overblown sense of hype around our game, while we also aim to make EVERSPACE 2 stand out on its own. To manage expectations, as “the hub” in EVERSPACE 2’s game world, Union will be the largest of our planned star systems. While some will be substantially smaller, each star system will feature a unique look & feel and offer new types of activities. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c19bb37fba943b3b021ee4f22ccb7ce050d437d8.jpg In the star system Zharkov, EVERSPACE 2 pilots will get to the core of Grady & Brunt's shady business operations when infiltrating their ranks and learning about G&B's dark deeds. Here are the major improvements, new features, and content additions that we’ve PLANNED for this year: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/534072367ce4dc14cfa5487414f071986169bd91.png On the EVERSPACE 2 Steam store page, we’ve listed all major improvements, features, and content additions that are PLANNED for v1.0. However, it’s really hard to share detailed milestones beyond the next 12 months . Of course, we’ll update the roadmap every three to six months, accordingly.

Space Critters

As some of you have already seen in the sneak peek of our live stream from two weeks ago, space critters will be a thing in EVERSPACE 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iReG0syyUo We’re still working on their “abilities” and experimenting with how they can interact with the player, but look forward to saying hello to Cave Crawlers (the name might change) in the first content update. Ok, that’s it for now. If you wanna know more, join our next “ROCKFISH Recap,” hosted by Erik the Shredder, Community Ambassador and ace pilot, on Twitch and YouTube, today from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CET / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm ET / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PT. Rumor has it that he’ll have some all-new content to show! 🚀👀💥🙌 Keep it civil on the forums, and see you in space! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/0c2bba9644e726cd40851fcce60eecea289cf1e0.jpg Greetings, Pilots! PHEW, what a launch week! EVERSPACE 2’s start in Steam Early Access exceeded our wildest expectations. So far, we’ve received overwhelmingly positive feedback from fans and press all over the world. After we started Early Access with more than 260,000 wishlist entries on Steam, we were very confident. However, we would never have dared to dream that we would land at number 1 on the global Steam Charts in no time and stay in the top ten for six consecutive days, resulting in EVERSPACE 2 becoming Steam's #2 top seller of last week. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/4179d9998a2b7124058bec96629ccda6baf079f1.jpg Last week’s sneaky reveal: You wanted it, you got it: EVERSPACE 2 is available on NVIDIA Geforce NOW! After a few hours, we saw over 3,000 concurrent players, which is more than double the record of the lower-priced, original EVERSPACE during its first big summer sale. With currently 93% positive reviews, we seem to have hit the bulls-eye with tens of thousands of space shooter fans. The critical consensus from the media and content creators is also overwhelmingly positive, and we’d like to share a few articles and our favorite video previews with you: “Everspace 2 is close to being the new gold standard for space shooters | I like tinkering with graphs and plotting galactic domination as much as the next guy, but I'm enjoying Everspace 2's singular focus on energetic combat and exploration. Even though it's an Early Access game that Rockfish says still needs 12 to 18 months of work, Everspace 2 is absolutely worth buying when it releases on January 18.” - PC Gamer “I’m already heavily impressed by Everspace 2 and think Rockfish Games is doing an incredible job. The combat is excellent, the graphics look great, and the game naturally explains all of its mechanics in an extremely clear manner that makes it more than easy to grasp all of its many facets. The only worrisome thing is that, yes, you’re going to lose your save if you play now. Aside from that, though, the game is very much well worth picking up, as it’s a blast.” - PC Invasion “EVERSPACE 2 | The Best Space Adventure In A Looong Time. This space shooter brings along a single-player galaxy exploring adventure, fluid controls, worthwhile upgrades, and great combat.” - Boomstick Gaming https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HHeJKBYzf8 Everspace 2 - Excellent Already! Karak with ACG does a 5 point rundown of differences and details he likes in this 5 point inspection preview of the early access. - ACG https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDFYTrhTWqU

Troubleshooting

As with every “major” launch, quite a few users ran into technical issues, especially as the game is still in Early Access. A lot of the issues discovered are on our list already; some require deeper investigation on our side; for others, there are workarounds, a few are engine-related issues where we have to rely on our friends at Epic Games.

Mouse + Keyboard, Gamepad, and HOTAS Input

Some pilots have mentioned MKB input feeling laggy or sluggish, which was surprising since we had received a lot of praise for the tight shooter-like WASD-controls in the predecessor. It’s one of the few code snippets that we didn’t rewrite for EVERSPACE 2, but we made some adjustments as the sequel’s combat is slightly slower-paced. If you prefer a more direct input, go to settings->input->mouse+keyboard and set "mouse position" to "operating system." If you’re a veteran space pilot coming over from a classic space flight sim and just can’t get the feel of EVERSPACE’s primary gimbal weapons and twitchy aiming, we got good news for you: Due to popular demand, the option to have the crosshair always centered when using the mouse, as well as options to show or hide the mouse deadzone and a small dot indicating the screen center, will be available in the next patch. If you play with a gamepad controller and are used to it, you should feel fine with at least one of the presets that you can still customize. We also invested quite a lot of time and effort into getting HOTAS/HOSAS support right from the start. While it works fine for all Logitech (Saitek) and Thrustmaster models we tested, the devil seems to be in the details. If you run into any HOTAS issues, please try disabling Steam Input, which did the trick for quite a few HOTAS pilots. If things still don't work properly, we kindly ask for your patience. We will look into these issues soon, but it won't be an easy task. We plan on opening a dedicated thread on the forums regarding key binding issues, and with your help and feedback, we should be able to find out why it isn't working for everyone. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/6a9d58e63450ef224bdf18fed8460d96932e397d.png Even if HOTAS input is preferred by “only” 12% of pilots according to our recent poll, we understand it is important for them. We really want to nail this, but we need your feedback if things don’t work as expected and hope for your patience. If anyone wants to add their vote, the poll is still live.

Ongoing Optimization Efforts

Before we go into the details, please bear in mind that playing EVERSPACE 2 with max settings puts a lot of strain on both your CPU and GPU. We’ve done a fair amount of performance optimization, and while there is still some room for improvement, don’t expect any miracles when playing on older hardware. We’ve been working closely with our friends at Nvidia and AMD to performance-test builds - both rated the Early Access version with “good” - and utilize their in-depth feedback for further performance optimization. To get the best experience, always make sure you have the latest graphics drivers installed and try running the game with DX11 if your GPU is older than two years. Most crash reports were submitted by players running EVERSPACE 2 at max settings on older hardware or Windows versions or on overclocked GPUs. Here’s a pretty good article on how to troubleshoot. Please note that we most likely will not support Windows 7 or Windows 8 as we cannot guarantee that future versions of Unreal Engine 4 will still support those operating systems.

Pricing

One of the biggest discussions on the Steam forums and on social media is about the pricing of EVERSPACE 2 in Early Access. While we understand $39.99 / €37.99 might feel steep compared to typical indie games in Early Access, please bear in mind that EVERSPACE 2 is a AA production with a development cycle over 4+ years by a veteran team of 25, plus a handful of long-term contractors as well as additional external AAA art services. We feel our asking price is right for the current production quality and the amount of content and features already in the game. At full release, we plan to reasonably increase the price to what is common within the genre of high-quality open-world space games. If the price is not right for you, that’s totally fine. You might pull the trigger sometime down the road or never at all. To manage expectations: We plan to run only a few moderate sales between 10% to 15% during Early Access as we respect and value the financial commitment of our backers who shelled out up to $38/€35 for a digital copy on PC during our crowdfunding campaign back in 2019 when we had only a prototype to show. Now, we noticed that in some countries, the price for EVERSPACE 2 is somewhat higher, which sucks. However, much like any indie dev, we followed Steam’s suggestion for regional pricing, and we don’t want to open a can of worms by adjusting prices in certain countries. This would inevitably cause outrage in other regions where we don’t adjust the price. Constantly monitoring and adjusting regional pricing, factoring in exchange rates, and purchasing power is big publisher territory.

Disliked Features

Even though EVERSPACE 2 is currently sitting at a staggering 93% positive reviews out of 1275+ right out of the gate even without a day #1 patch, we’re not surprised about some negative feedback, especially from pilots that prefer a more hardcore, “realistic” space sim experience over our arcadey spacer shooter approach. We created EVERSPACE 2 with a focus on high accessibility and fun gameplay mechanics set in a game world with vibrant colors. Well, here’s the good news first: if you prefer a more simulation-style flight mechanic to cut engines and drift through space, etc., you can already do so by binding a key for this in the customize controls menu. The action does not have a default binding right now as we don't want to confuse players who might accidentally press the key and wonder why their ship all of a sudden keeps drifting. Now the not so good news for space truckers that are not fond of puzzles in EVERSPACE 2. In the widest sense, simple puzzle-solving, like shooting generators to deactivate shields or activating several generators on the clock to power up a service space station, has already been a side gameplay mechanic in the predecessor. Those have all been optional and were intended to add some variety to the overall combat & exploration experience while yielding special rewards without breaking the flow of playing a fast-paced arcade space shooter. Since exploration and discovery play a much bigger role In EVERSPACE 2, we wanted to test the waters in Early Access and take puzzle-solving a bit further by having a greater variety of puzzles utilizing the new grappling mechanic. This concept was introduced during our Kickstarter campaign back in 2019: https://youtu.be/AxxRcCRo4GA Long story short, puzzles will stay, but also know that we plan to balance the distribution of these puzzles with combat and other gameplay mechanics we add in the future. We plan to add more engaging puzzles, but the vast majority will still be optional. However, since accessibility is also really important to us, we consider the addition of a gameplay option to adjust puzzle timers. Furthermore, a few pilots, mostly coming from die-hard space sims, find the short loading screens when entering a new location annoying or at least immersion-breaking, and we understand where you guys are coming from. We too would love to have no loading screens and will look into further optimization towards the full release, but it is not a priority as a lot of things are still subject to change during Early Access. To manage expectations, there will always be a lot of data to be loaded into memory when entering a new location in EVERSPACE 2 for technical reasons. Since we cannot hide the loading process by riding in an elevator or traversing through a tunnel, like in other games, and as streaming is probably not gonna do the trick either as you already can see the destination right in front of you before leaving supralight travel, don’t expect any miracles to happen The second "disadvantage" of having a handcrafted game world in an arguably pseudo-open space game is that locations have to have boundaries because space… Well, maps in EVERSPACE 2, or locations as we like to call them, are 10 km x 10 km x 5 km in size and bigger than in any other space game featuring handcrafted locations that we are aware of. We cannot go that much further without running into severe gameplay issues at the far ends of the maps without implementing dynamic world origin shifting, which would be a huge undertaking and may even break the game. We’re not saying that isn’t technically feasible; we think it is just not worth the effort and the risk. In fact, we’re pretty happy with the size of the locations as they are since it fits our vision to design a great gameplay experience within a controllable area, featuring great maneuvering with robust 3D collision physics while flying at high speed in open space but also inside narrow spaces, like hollow asteroids, derelict space stations, tunnels etc., precision-maneuvering in centimeters - yeah, let this sink in, it’s nuts, we know! :D Last but not least, bear in mind: EVERY one of those fixed locations you can see on the map in EVERSPACE 2 was carefully designed, manually crafted, and tested by our team. For the final game, we plan to have some 100, each one featuring at least one challenge or mission objective plus various optional activities. In video game development, you gotta pick your battles, especially if you don’t have deep pockets. We went for quality over quantity.

Wanted Features

The closing sentence of the previous topic is also a great intro for this one: We already made a big leap in game development by taking EVERSPACE from an indie roguelike space shooter to an AA open-world space looter shooter with RPG elements plus endgame content. We know space game fans always want more, but there is only so much we can do as a 100% self-funded team of 25. Consequently, big features like multiplayer (PvP, Co-op, shared online space, you name it), EVA (extravehicular activities aka Space Legs), piloting capital ships, and VR support have never been on our list. There is a plethora of technical, game design, and business reasons that have already been discussed at great length for each one of them, so no need to delve into each topic again here. We are 100% committed to the promises we made in our Kickstarter, and we’re laser-focused on our creative vision to make the best single-player open-world space looter shooter that we possibly can. Yet again, we’re putting everything on the line with EVERSPACE 2, and we don’t have any other irons in the fire. We don’t have any filthy-rich investors, big AAA publishers, or platform holders paying our bills in case things go sideways. This is just us and you, our fans! If you want to know where we’re coming from, here’s our story.

Outlook

With this update, we had planned to share our high-level roadmap with you guys. However, we’re still digesting the enormous amount of feedback we’ve received so far on the Steam and GOG forums (2000+ open threads even after us merging threads wherever reasonable), our discord, and social media channels. While we’re already working on a lot of new content and additional features, we also want to make QoL improvements based on community feedback. There is some really good stuff being shared, so keep it coming! Now, we don’t want to leave you hanging in the air with this update: System 3 is already in the works and scheduled to drop in summer because we’re not done yet with System 2! We still have some cool new stuff for Union up our sleeves with our first major content update in April. You can also look forward to piloting two new ship sub-classes as soon as the update drops. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/28322ea9dd6937211289dd0a08e9b341427edbba.jpg Concept Art: Right now, visitors will find a side mission, assignments for various jobs as well as shops to trade goods at Noah Damaris Starport. And there is much more yet to come! Rest assured, we didn’t build this sprawling beast of a station just as a pit stop. But wait, there is more! We’ve also been busy working on the first patch bringing various bug fixes, QoL improvements, and further performance optimization to be released sometime next week. Here’s the kicker: Everyone can jump right into it by switching to our all-new Experimental Branch on Steam. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/d84af67a508a814936920d9e825c08acdbfd82d0.png To access the EVERSPACE 2 experimental branch, right-click on EVERSPACE 2 in your Steam library -> select Properties -> pick Experimental Branch under BETAS. The Experimental build changelog can be found here. So, it’s fair to say that overall, things are looking pretty good. And while we will keep reading through every thread no matter if good or bad, glowing feedback like the fan video below makes our day and never gets old: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIjK5TD3Njg Alrighty, this is it for now! In case you are not familiar with our weekly “ROCKFISH Recap,” hosted by our one-and-only Community Ambassador and ace pilot Erik Schrader, make sure to dock on Twitch and YouTube to watch the latest dev build in action, from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CET / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EDT / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PDT. 🚀👀💥🙌 Keep it civil on the forums, and see you in space! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/76c444ac6aa36c5152e03cd6f5a348b7e9eafba9.jpg Greetings, pilots! We know, we know! Waiting sucks, but it's finally happening: EVERSPACE 2 will launch in Steam Early Access on January 18 at 7 pm CET / 1 pm ET / 10 am PT. Priced at €37.99 / $39.99 / £31.99, the game will launch in English with professional voice acting for the first 12+ hours of the story campaign and several side missions that take place in the first two star systems of the final game. The initial version will be good for at least 25 hours of gameplay, while introducing pilots to EVERSPACE 2’s core gameplay mechanics of space combat, exploration, mining, puzzle-solving, traveling, trading, itemization, crafting, ship customization, player and companion perks. You’ll be spending all that time in five different player ship subclasses. Lots to play with! The full version for PC, including Mac and native Linux support, will be released at a reasonably increased price in the first half of 2022 and come with UI and text language support for German (incl. voice dubbing), French, Italian, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Polish, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. After multiple rounds of community testing by some 2,000 players, and great feedback from various gaming outlets and content creators on the closed Beta, EVERSPACE 2 is ready for Early Access, and we can’t wait to receive your much-appreciated feedback on the initial release version. If anything does not feel right, is missing, or you got a great idea, make sure to let us know on the Steam forum. Rest assured, we will read every single comment. Of course, the game is far from being finished. On top of the two star systems pilots will be able to explore in Early Access at launch, we plan to have four to six more as well as several additional player ship subclasses beyond the Interceptor, Sentinel, Striker, Gunship, and Scout at launch, to be gradually added on a quarterly basis. In the final game, players will also be able to enjoy twice as much story content plus lots of worthwhile endgame activities. We look forward to working closely with you guys and gals over the course of the next 12 to 18 months to make an outstanding narrative-driven open-world space looter shooter. If you're still on the fence to even wishlist, check out our YouTube channel where you'll find numerous streams of our weekly production videos to see for yourself where production is currently at. We also recommend giving the free EVERSPACE 2 demo here on Steam a try but please note: This demo is the Prototype from last year, so it is quite outdated. We’ve already implemented a lot of improvements based on community feedback on UI and controls as well as new features and content like additional graphics settings, cockpit view, HOTAS support, and a ton more into the upcoming Early Access version. Speaking of which, Erik Schrader, our beloved Community Ambassador and admired Ace pilot will demo the current safety build on Twitch and YouTube this Friday from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CET / 2 pm to 4 pm ET / 11 am to 1 pm PT. This will also be the last opportunity on our channel to win a pre-release key incl. immediate closed Beta access, so you really wouldn’t want to miss it. Anyway, enough teasing. The hype is real even for us. See you this Friday or in Early Access on January 18 🚀💥👀🙌 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/448cb6830a5e05e05d9d0cc4f290a2eed27e9358.jpg Greetings, pilots! Today’s production update will be the last for this year. Obviously, we had a different main topic planned for this one. We’re fully aware that many of you still feel bummed out about our new Early Access release date, even though we have received a lot of understanding for our reasoning from our backers. So thanks again for your support! We’d like to conclude an unprecedentedly rough year for probably all of us on a high note. Thanks to our new timeline, we got some cool new content and features to share that would not have made it into the Early Access release version (our code freeze was pushed back by two weeks, the content freeze by four weeks).

Ruins Of The Ancients

You might recall from the Kickstarter campaign that you awesome EVERSPACE fans unlocked the stretch goal “The Ancients’ Rifts,” a sector in the endgame offering extra hard challenges and the best loot in the game. In this area, you will encounter remains of a mysterious alien race first found in EVERSPACE, and you’ll get an early taste of what’s to come in the ruins of Ancients’ structures scattered on an all-new moon in the Union system. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/4800463b2f19284c2a7389df0da9fc8b4d99ff14.jpg Concept art overpaint of ruins of The Ancients on Cephas II, a moon of the gas giant Cephas within the Union system. While you won’t run into any Ancients yet, we squeezed a couple of their mysterious ruins in as a teaser for the initial Early Access release, thanks to the extra time. Encountering The Ancients without any warning whatsoever was a major highlight in the original EVERSPACE. Their ability to transfer energy into matter as well as control time and space added new challenges in combat, the opportunity of fast-travel, as well as some wicked alien tech to play within the endgame—all must-haves in any great open-world space RPG, right? So, how better to introduce the mysteries of fast-travel as well as “mind-bending” weapon technology and devices (with a chance of surprising side effects) in the universe of EVERSPACE than utilizing some ancient alien tech that nobody seems to know much about yet, hence the generic name. But what if The Ancients turn out to be deeply connected to the established lore? Definitely not a new concept but proven in popular sci-fi classics many times before, and yet endless possibilities for adding new ideas in EVERSPACE 2…

Prescott Starbase

As revealed in production update #19, the star system Union is a bustling trading hub in EVERSPACE 2. While the newly-introduced and independent Freelancers run extremely profitable businesses in high-tech gear, medical supplies, and mining resources in the clouds high above planet Culver, the omnipresent Outlaws, already known from the predecessor, make a killing by selling loot of any kind from scavenger and piracy hunts for high profit to the highest bidder at the black market of Prescott Starbase. Think of it as a highly condensed version of an entire city floating in space with various departments, ranging from the neon-light-flooded shopping and entertainment area, the jam-packed residential neighborhood, all the way down to the industrial and dirty space harbor district—you know the gist of such sci-fi megacities because humans and aliens are alike when it comes to basic individuals’ needs and business. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/845a786ba403120e72ac00c06f839ca2199935a1.jpg Around Prescott Plaza (concept art overpaint), travelers will be able to delve into all the human, as well as alien, guilty pleasures you can think of; as an antipole to the grim reality of living a harsh life in the DMZ, far, far from Earth, moral and ethics have no home in this place, especially in the uptown district. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/3cd55e2f70f95726600ed0fccaddb2ee281fe742.jpg Concept art of the casino’s bar from a story campaign cutscene; this is where experienced shooters hang around when on the hunt for challenging high stakes assignments. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5c75f6fde50dcdf7e905263d49ba29b54bd773af.jpg Concept art overpaint of the space docks at Prescott Starbase, a rather dark and filthy place. While officially under the control of the Prescott Port Authority, opposing mafia clans call the shots, literally. Even though these families live by different morals and conducts of doing business, unconditional loyalty is non-negotiable. “If you need it, we have it” is the mantra at this infamous black market within the DMZ; just don’t ask where the goods came from. Greed for profit and deep loathing towards the Colonial Fleet and the Okkar Authorities is what holds this sizzling melting pot of questionable human and bizarre alien individuals together. For anyone good at operating under the radar and willing to play by a different set of rules, this is yet another place where to look for risky but very profitable “business opportunities”. While it is still under development and far from being complete, we’re excited to announce that Prescott Starbase will be explorable on day #1 and that we’ll add more functionality and opportunities to interact over the next year during Early Access.

Enemy Caster

Using an analogy from the movie industry, NPCs in video games are somewhat like actors that have to be cast for each role from a pool of talents and show up on set at the right time—definitely not all at once, except for the inevitable cast photo, maybe. Our systems were designed to populate locations with the occasional visit from different NPCs for both friend and foe—like background actors, to make a scene lively and convincing that there is more going on in a given fictional world than what you can actually see. No matter if watching a movie or playing a video game (especially in RPGs), it’s all about triggering that amazing Kopfkino to make you believe you are actually present in that fictional world of your choice. If not done right, you may not be able to put your finger on it, but you can tell something is off, immediately making you realize you are just sitting in front of a screen. Obviously, in video games, especially in open-world looter shooter RPGs, you can interact with NPCs in many different ways. At the same time, your current loadout and stats add yet another dimension of complexity “to the scene”. This requires both careful level and combat design to prevent immersion from breaking, no matter what players do. Most of the time, we’ve worked with groups of enemies sufficient for compelling encounters in the Alpha and Beta. However, as the game world of EVERSPACE 2 will grow a lot over the next 12+ months, so will the need for more encounter variety. While it seems that we’re off to a good start with the closed Beta, keeping you guys and hopefully many more space pilots hooked in EVERSPACE 2 for tens if not hundreds of hours during Early Access and beyond is by far our biggest challenge. This is why we focus on making each location worth visiting beyond exploring and looking at new stuff—which can get old quickly, no matter how pretty the vista might be. To get a tighter grip on things, we established a new in-house tool (aka Enemy Caster) to help our designers in trying out different combinations of enemies within seconds and playtesting if they make an exciting challenge without leading to any unfair results—provided players engage within a reasonable level. That said, there's nothing wrong with feeling lucky and testing your skill boundaries against lvl +5 enemies if you so wish… (Erik didn't know that we changed the tool's name to Enemy Caster as the original one was misleading). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fha5CuXiYEA Generally, every enemy ship has its individual stats (hit points, damage output, speed, agility, etc.), all sorts of equipment as well as specific attack and retreat behavior—it’s almost as complex as designing for the player and can easily turn out being an even deeper rabbit hole than what it looks like on paper. However, the more shortcuts game designers are willing to take by limiting what enemies can do and which items they can use compared to what’s at the player's disposal, the shallower the overall combat experience, the weaker the immersion, and the less fun overall. Thanks to the comparatively simple player progression through the predecessor’s linear game world, plus not being able to back-travel made things even easier, we were able to balance all enemy stats within long spreadsheets. However, due to the much higher complexity in combat design for our ambitious vision of a top-notch open-world looter shooter RPG with spaceships, we already reached the limits of this method within the first star system of EVERSPACE 2—which is why we’re pretty excited about our new tools. Imagine how nasty it would be if you get pinned by a bunch of pesky Webber Drones and before you even had a chance to stun them with an EMP blast and free yourself, a group of self-destructing drones or a squadron of enemy fighters would appear right next to you... Oh, wait! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bj0HIhBuaw Long story short, for the Early Access release, we already have quite a few more enemy types than in the Beta, and more to come over the next 12+ months. Thanks to our new in-house tools, we’ll be able to offer you guys an even broader gameplay-variety in combat on your journey through six or eight star systems, plus endgame. To ensure that these combat encounters are properly balanced and fun for as many pilots as possible, we’ll heavily rely on everyone’s feedback during Early Access, so keep it coming and share your thoughts on our discord or in the forums on Steam and everspace.game.

HOTAS/HOSAS Support

Due to popular demand from EVERSPACE players, we added rudimentary HOTAS support post-launch to the predecessor, even though it had never been a promised feature because we believed it wasn’t a great fit for fast-paced 3D space shooters in general. The implementation did work but required some fiddling to assign input parameters for each model, which led to some frustration and quite a few negative user reviews on Steam. Now, to create a better experience for HOTAS fans in EVERSPACE 2, we’re putting more emphasis on this feature right from the beginning. For initial test purposes, we already implemented experimental HOTAS support in the closed Alpha/Beta, which still requires some tweaking depending on your hardware and is not as robust as you can expect from an officially released product. After analyzing feedback from test pilots using HOTAS, we decided to overhaul the entire implementation completely and also add presets for the most common setups on day #1 of Early Access for the models below:

• T.Flight Hotas X
• T.Flight Hotas One
• T.Flight Hotas 4
• Hotas Warthog
• T16000M (Single)
• T16000M (Dual Config)
• Logitech Extreme 3D Pro
• Logitech/Saitek X56
• Logitech/Saitek X52
• Logitech/Saitek X52 Professional

While this should be solid enough for Early Access (but not the final product!), joystick pilots should bear in mind that piloting a starfighter in EVERSPACE 2 is more like flying an agile assault chopper than a supersonic jet fighter. To defeat ES2-baddies in space, combat is more about 360° two-axis precision aiming and dodging enemy fire by swift two-axis strafing as well as quick-boosting to get out of the fire zone and then turning on a dime to counter-attack. Much different than pulling off barrel rolls, corkscrew loops, or an Immelmann, like in old-school in-atmosphere dogfighting. Of course, you absolutely can do all that, but fancy dogfight maneuvers won’t help you much in EVERSPACE 2 because your opponents can turn on a dime anytime, too. We know this probably won’t hold back any die-hard space sim fans using their beloved HOTAS/HOSAS gear and disable inertia dampeners for the extra kick of immersion in EVERSPACE 2—which, admittedly, is a fun experience. We’re just saying: be aware of what you are getting yourselves into… it'll be a tough ride! Having said that, we're working hard to give you the best HOTAS experience for such a fast-paced game as possible. Alrighty, that was quite a lot for our concluding production update in 2020. We hope everyone has enjoyed the space ride so far. If you did, don’t be a stranger and join our fun/informative/goofy live streams every Friday on Twitch and YouTube, from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CET / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm ET / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PT. I’m pretty sure that Erik, our one-and-only Community Ambassador, and host of the weekly RFG show, will spill a few more beans than we agreed and run several giveaways for EVERSPACE 2 pre-release keys incl. immediate closed Beta access, as well 😱 Well, it probably has been an unexpectedly rough year for everyone. So more than ever, we wish you y’all a wonderful winter holiday with your loved ones and hope to see you super relaxed, happy, and excited for the EVERSPACE 2 launch in January. The hype is real, see you in Early Access in January... 🚀💥👀🙌 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team PS: If you like what you see, make sure to wishlist, follow us on Facebook and Twitter, and join our community on discord. Still on the fence? Give the free EVERSPACE 2 demo a try but please note: This demo is the Prototype from last year, so it is quite outdated. We’ve already implemented a lot of improvements based on community feedback on UI and controls as well as new features and content like additional graphics settings, cockpit view, HOTAS support, and a ton more into the upcoming Early Access version.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/2f41b85543a901c4c3af298aef74b97855b40580.jpg Greetings, pilots! Let’s get the cyber elephant out of the room right away: The Cyberpunk 2077 release has just been pushed back to December 10, which is a major blow to our planned EVERSPACE 2 Early Access release in mid-December. Not only will every media outlet and content creator cover the arguably most-anticipated AAA game in history throughout the entire holiday season (and not much else), we also know that there’s quite a bit of audience overlap within our community (and our team), so... After a quick consultation with our marketing friends at Evolve PR, Plan Of Attack, and Swordfish PR, we’ve decided to push back the EVERSPACE 2 Early Access release to January. We know that sucks, but hear us out! There’s actually some good in this.

Closed Beta Access For All Eligible Backers

To ease the pain for backers who don’t have access to the closed Beta, we’ve decided to send out pre-release keys to all eligible backers on November 2nd. Yes, you heard right, instead of waiting until mid-December, everyone who pledged for a digital copy will be able to delve into the closed Beta this Monday and start experiencing the first 10ish hours of what we have planned for Early Access. Of course, there’s no time constraint, so feel free to melt your PC as long as you want to and share some pretty screenshots with our awesome community on our discord. Just do us one favor: please make sure to check your spam folders before sending us messages on all channels and dropping comments all over the place if you haven’t received your key within 24 hours. In case you are still missing your key, the fastest way for us to serve you is by sending us a direct message on Kickstarter so we can look you up in our database with only one click and reply with your key swiftly. Also, in case anyone is wondering, all(!) pre-release keys will be revoked when we hit Early Access, as we will send out new keys for each platform. Everyone who pledged on a digital copy for PC, will be able to choose between Steam, GOG, and the Epic Game Store (provided Epic Games accepts EVERSPACE 2 on their store, we’re working on that) a few weeks before full release. Last but not least, opening the Beta to all backers who pledged for a game copy means we will get even more quality feedback from up to another 6K backers. It also gives enough time for us to evaluate and make improvements for the upcoming Early Access thanks to an extra four weeks of development time. Our entire team will have their much-deserved winter holidays to recharge their batteries and spend time with their loved ones without making a single mouse click on the project.

Crafting

With this news out of the way, let’s delve into our plans for crafting in EVERSPACE 2. We have been teasing this major feature in our weekly streams for quite a while, and we’re excited to finally share some snippets with you guys (big disclaimer: everything about crafting is SUBJECT TO CHANGE). In EVERSPACE 2, everything revolves around flying, shooting, and looting. To help with combat against tougher enemies, better equipment is much-needed. To give us better control over player progress in a narrative-driven RPG as well as overall difficulty balancing within each star system, we chose to have player and item levels. Accordingly, items and enemies scale in strength based on their level. So, when you level up, you should hunt for better equipment by shooting down slightly stronger enemies or completing higher-level activities providing more powerful equipment as reward - so far, so good, RPG business as usual. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/97136be19b5f11183082ec372a2553bfe9c66f78.jpg Every open-world RPG player knows, defeating opponents and completing activities at lower-than-player level might be inevitable to progress in the story campaign, but it can also be fun - who doesn’t enjoy ripping through a bunch of low-level mobs every now and then? However, loot drops from lower-level opponents and activities will mostly be underwhelming. Here is where crafting comes into play, supplementing that good shoot-and-loot feeling by providing a convenient way to turn trash loot into valuable gear. This approach helps when tackling issues that especially come with the looter-shooter genre:

• Enabling players to turn otherwise worthless loot into better gear
• Encouraging players to try out different weapon types, especially in the early- and mid-game, before settling on a few favorites (going Beam laser only e.g.)
• Preventing players from hoarding items or crafting resources, so inventory management doesn’t become a chore
• Preventing players from being under-equipped in case of “RNG unlucky” or them not bothering about side quests or certain activities that (might) provide much-needed powerful gear to beat the next boss

Now, as you progress through the game, you’ll gather better blueprints which will enable you to have more control over the outcome of the crafting process, albeit at higher costs the more valuable a given crafted item is. We hope that unlocking blueprints will keep you motivated to max out crafting, which might scratch that completionist itch. To craft or upgrade an item you’ll need a defined amount of crafting resources and in some cases specific items. The required amount of ingredients doesn't depend on item level but its rarity. When crafting a new item, it will always be at your current player level, so you can use it right away. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/d6bb335db8f55e171af20f62427a3073a07e1e4f.jpg Here's a preview comparing your freshly crafted item with your currently equipped gear to see if it suits your playstyle - or not. Generally, crafting items from scratch starts with the lowest rarity (common) for each of the three gear categories. Primary Weapons, Secondary Weapons, and Modules. After choosing which type of gear to craft, you’ll have to spend enough crafting resources to receive a new randomly generated item of your chosen rarity. Furthermore, by dismantling items, you’ll be able to progress your "crafting experience" which can then be used to unlock new blueprints. These new blueprints will allow you to craft specific item types like pulse lasers, shields, mine launchers, and any other equippable item over time. But that’s not all!: You’ll also be able to unlock higher rarity blueprints via companion perks. When an item was crafted or is modified, it receives an icon label "Improvised" and cannot be modified any further. That means an item is only upgradable once and a crafted item cannot be upgraded any further. However, we might allow further upgrading/modifying with perks or special NPCs at a later stage - crafting can be a deep rabbit hole.

Gunship Porn

100% clickbait, I know, I know, but no worries: This section is still family-friendly. It’s just we think the all-new Gunship looks really sexy with its shiny all-metal livery and curved hull. At the moment, this thicc boi is not ready for duty due to some issues with its targeting software. Basically, it currently is only good for punching big holes into the void and for bragging rights - which is a good start, don’t get me wrong, but we want this baddie to live up to its look. With this Gunship sneak peek, we slowly move it back into the hangar for further tweaking. Rest assured, this beast will be playable at launch of Early Access in January. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/37de2807ef1a5fa47755cf32779904db8f02fc5a.jpg Say hello to the Gunship, a Heavy Fighter subclass armed to the teeth by using four primary hardpoints as well as a devastating 360° auto turret Ultimate. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/177ce1e7452f3cb531b573b3ba080f0b294af046.jpg Bulky and intimidating, but that’s what fans of this subclass were looking for, right? Before we move on, I’d like to take this opportunity to give a warm round of applause to our PR experts Aidan, Astrid, Christopher, Freyja, Laura, Lee, and Vytautas doing a fantastic job in helping us spread the word, find and secure promotion opportunities, as well as proof-reading every production update and interview since we finished the Kickstarter campaign successfully. Don’t worry, we’re still indie-style, and every piece you read is from us, but comes with professional polish because top-notch marketing & PR is equally important as making a killer game :) Well, if you are excited about the new Gunship, want to learn more about crafting in EVERSPACE 2, and maybe even win a pre-release key incl. immediate closed Beta access, make sure to join today’s stream on Twitch and YouTube, from 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm CET / 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm ET / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PT, where Erik will share more details without losing his job for breaking our NDA. The hype is real, see you in the Beta... 🚀👀💥🙌 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team PS: If you like what you see, make sure to wishlist, then follow us on Facebook and Twitter, and join our community on discord. If you are still on the fence, give the free EVERSPACE 2 demo a try. Please note: This demo is the Prototype from last year, so it is quite outdated. We’ve already implemented a lot of improvements based on community feedback on UI and controls as well as new features and content like additional graphics settings, cockpit view, HOTAS support, and a ton more into the upcoming Early Access version.

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/353fa4aac8f66401f83c70df12424cbd38133cb2.jpg Greetings, Pilots! Time is relative, indeed. For us developers, it is flying because the next major milestone is always just around the corner. But for you all it probably feels like forever until you can get your hands on the next pre-release version of EVESPACE 2, right? Well, we’ve got some great news.

Closed Beta Drop

We have just updated the official EVERSPACE 2 pre-release build on Steam. Alpha backers can simply fire up Steam to receive their update. Beta backers (Early Adopter Edition reward tier and higher) will find their brand new Steam keys in their email inboxes. If you don’t see your key, please be patient as keys are sent out in batches. Also, make sure to check your spam folders! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/919a63e7678078f9cf3ddc017724c859b8860681.jpg Unfortunately, the new animated main menu background did not make it into the stable Beta build on Steam. We wanted to give an early look at this improvement with you here because it adds a sense of the deep exploration that all of you can look forward to when EVERSPACE 2 launches with the additional “Union System” and even more new stuff in Early Access this December. So, what has changed since the previous production update, you might wonder? Well, apart from new content in the Ceto system that we want you to discover for yourselves, we made further UI/UX improvements based on the much-appreciated feedback from Alpha backers. We implemented cockpit view featuring fully functional instruments, improved the visual quality of several environmental assets and the overall performance of the build, and, of course, fixed a ton of bugs. More side missions, job variations and enemy types, points of interest, and puzzles have been added as well. Last but not least, Gero, our Sound Director, has been tweaking and adding sound effects and in-game music tracks. Basically, the Beta is a heavily revamped Alpha with a few content additions as well as more and better LOOT!

Pre-Release Key Giveaways

Now, anyone who feels bummed out because of not having access to the closed Beta, there are still a few days left to participate in a massive giveaway contest at the PC Gamer Forums with 5 (five) chances to win an EVERSPACE 2 pre-release Steam key; one of which will come with a slick Alienware gaming PC - yup, no joke! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/b49345cbb3c43954a302a25a7150d4c4c11def0f.jpg You can win THIS — just head over to our dear friends at PC Gamer before the contest ends in a few DAYS! There are quite a few entries already, but when has an EVERSPACE pilot ever let the odds get them down? In the case you are not a lucky star on this one, there will be another run with even better starting conditions - hm, where have we heard that before?

Narrative Deep Dive

If you haven’t already checked it out, our Creative Director Uwe Wütherich, dropped a deep dive into EVERSPACE lore on The PC Gamer forums with a few tidbits about companions and the story of EVERSPACE 2. Give it a read! We’d love to hear what you think. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/44fb76a1908e73498ca3f411eb62b917f0573eea.jpg Spoiler Alert: The Okkar trader Tareen from the EVERSPACE - Encounters add-on will have an important come back in EVERSPACE 2. You'll find out more about his role as another companion in our narrative piece on PC Gamer. Make sure to join today’s official Beta reveal stream on Twitch and YouTube, from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EDT / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PDT, where Erik will walk you through the overhauled story campaign in Ceto and give away 3 (three) more pre-release keys of EVERSPACE 2. The hype is real, see you in the Beta... 🚀👀💥🙌 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/3a9c1dbee27ab5fe52644d4d5f88c4cdea4bb286.jpg Greetings, Pilots! For any of you who might have been hiding under a rock in a galaxy far, far away, we would like to get the following major news onto your radar.

Steam Early Access Announcement

We are sticking to our promise of bringing EVERSPACE 2 to Steam first (duh!) and have officially announced Early Access in December 2020: A few minutes ago, we dropped a dopamine-rush gameplay trailer, followed by a snazzy dev commentary video by our infamous ace pilot, top streamer, and beloved community ambassador Erik Schrader, on IGN during the opening day of gamescom 2020. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIAIXXJYmV8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMWcd4kcgiE

RFG Studio Spotlight on PC Gamer

You may have noticed that this production update is a bit shorter than usual, and there is a great reason for that: We’ve partnered with the awesome dudes and dudettes from PC Gamer for a massive ROCKFISH Games Studio Spotlight on the PC Gamer Forum, centered around an in-depth piece about the story and companions in EVERSPACE 2 as well as an AMA with some of our lead developers. The spotlight will start on Monday, August 31, and we highly recommend that you register at the PC Gamer forum ASAP because you wouldn't want to miss out on some awesome loot dropping during the coming 30 days. Especially for those who have missed on getting into the imminent closed Beta program - hint, hint, nudge, nudge, wink, wink! Ok, enough goofing around! Make sure to swing by tomorrow’s stream on Twitch and YouTube, from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EDT / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PDT, where Erik is probably gonna ignore my instructions once again and spoil some hot stuff for you, dang it! The hype is real, see you in the space clouds... 🚀👀💥🤘🙀🙌 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/51825fcfd3878dc092eb6578b894401fcb787bdb.jpg What. A. Blast! The EVERSPACE 2 “alpha beat” has been our biggest marketing event ever in terms of media coverage and user engagement. IGN reported over one million live viewers on their streaming platforms during the block when EVERSPACE 2 was on, and while we don’t have any stats from PC Gamer, we can tell by comparing the number of Wishlist additions during those two days, the PC Gaming Show must have been absolutely bonkers. Then there was also the amazing charity stream by Cohh Carnage, raising some mind-boggling $232K in funding for a great cause. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/b3de3578af6f86b50025f144ac629c8137ca5135.jpg {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/a6d89e15f70c87066e7a05c833ef664b9c61e131.jpg With over 14K viewers, EVERSPACE 2 was on the Twitch front page and drove a similar number of Wishlist additions compared to when EVERSPACE 2 was featured on the Steam front page during last year’s Gamescom - thanks a ton, Cohh! If that wasn’t crazy enough already, when the EVERSPACE 2 Prototype launched as a free demo during the Steam Summer Game Festival, the number of Wishlist additions went through the roof, peaking at 13K+ Wishlist additions on the first day alone, putting us at 155K+ outstanding wishes in total, which makes us quite optimistic about the upcoming Steam Early Access release in December. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/9cc1eab9d2a93c2db16723bef39c7c4288673376.jpg Erik’s weekly EVERSPACE 2 game dev and community stream also became the #1 Steam Game Festival Broadcast on that day, clocking 2.8K concurrent live viewers. It’s not just the sheer volume of new Wishlist additions though! What has blown us away the most is how many space game enthusiasts actually played the free Steam demo: we have seen well over 90,000 downloads to date, with a 70% attach rate and median playtime of 14 minutes. The daring test pilots have left us a lot of positive feedback, and also some constructive criticism for us to take forward into the Early Access game.

Alpha Highlights & Improvements

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYOAYabEycQ Undeniably, marketing & PR was firing on all thrusters and exceeded our expectations by far. Now, those of you who don’t have access to the closed Alpha forum on Steam and didn’t have time to watch any of our game dev streams might wonder how the feedback from eligible backers has been so far. Well, let’s hear what Cohh had to say about the closed EVERSPACE 2 Alpha: https://clips.twitch.tv/ManlyAmazingWalrusDendiFace https://clips.twitch.tv/DirtyDeliciousLobsterBatChest https://clips.twitch.tv/VainSuavePlumberOhMyDog Needless to say, those clips are music to our ears, and browsing through tons of praise from Alpha backers on the closed EVERSPACE 2 Steam forum has also been super rewarding for us. However, constructive feedback on where we could make the game better is why we are doing all this primarily. Here are a few examples of improvements and additions that we have already implemented based on community feedback so far:

Lateral Thrusters

The arcade-y flight physics featuring inertia dampeners are a core pillar of the EVERSPACE franchise. However, quite a few pilots have been criticizing a lack of immersion even though they understand that EVERSPACE 2 is not meant to be a classic space flight sim. To fix this, we not only allow die-hard space sim enthusiasts to disable inertia dampeners, we even implemented a visual effect for lateral thrusters on all player ships. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/2cbc24e15ffcf821e708363bd10414c24e4685ee.gif

Display Options

Having additional Display Options was probably the biggest wish from test pilots, so we prioritized quite a bunch of features that we had on our list anyway. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/bcf88419f784bbbf7766e054eda7b617d3335de4.jpg While we were at it, we also added “Toggle Boost” in Gamepad Options. Of course, we are not only working on topics that were brought up by the community. We also constantly re-evaluate our own design decisions and try out new things. For instance, we felt that the game menu, the Ship Dealer screen, and perk system could be more streamlined so we made some further UI/UX changes:

Main Menu Navigation

Based on internal feedback, we redesigned the navigation and usability of the different tab menus. You can now navigate within a screen using specific keys, which is much faster than using WASD to emulate arrow key navigation or clicking on buttons. Due to this significant change, the root button navigation and its home screen no longer exist, and you are right at the hangar when docked. Another advantage of the new design is that you can now launch into space without having to make the detour via the home menu. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/ce869ec8468184cb773f5d1a839feb012225d1af.jpg The icon bar on top has also disappeared, and we’re now working with labels for better clarity. We’re still undecided about this change as we really liked the look of sub menu icons and localizing labels into French and German might become an issue - zut alors and verflixt nochmal!

Tracking Perk Resources

Another community request and something that has been on our list is the possibility to track investment requirements of any perk at the touch of a button: You can now have a small tracking icon for items in your inventory, so you can see which resources can be used to upgrade selected perks and by what degree such requirements are met. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/125329166295c8910d2b3e8815b27d4420f51b20.jpg Dr. Delia Wendo, the third companion you will meet during your journey, introduces another set of perks affecting Nanobots, Energy Orbs, and something else (mysterious!) that you can invest in. Basically, think of her being a doctor for the well-being of your spaceship. Other than these, we are working away on finalizing the Alpha and heading towards the closed Beta release, scheduled for September. This includes balancing (always balancing!), bug fixing (always bugs to squash!), adding more polish to System 01 aka Ceto, among other things.

Introducing Star System 02 aka Union

While we are working on bringing all Alpha content and features to Beta level, we have also been busy creating new content for Union, the second star system in EVERSPACE 2. As some of you know from our weekly streams, Ceto serves to introduce pilots to the basic gameplay mechanics and set the tone for the story campaign. It already offers quite some freedom of how to progress through the first ten or so hours of the game, but Union is where the game world of EVERSPACE 2 really opens up. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/e62831a0fb2e840a6169f7e5a5afccc29cdbf73d.jpg Our vision of a bustling mega trading station within a massive formation of space clouds. With trading playing a bigger role in Union, smuggling opportunities arise. Whether you are involved in transporting illegal goods or looting a freighter, criminal acts against the local authority will result in the Okkar jumping in and handling the situation as they see fit. Gear yourself up for a hard fight as the Okkar might chase after you if you manage to jump away. Or maybe you deliberately provoked them so that your wanted level increases. The Okkar will eventually send in their biggest battleships for you to challenge. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/ba49b6db76c2bfd99b2f5db1e5654348bb10ee9d.jpg ...still work in progress, but we think you can feel it already. Lore-wise, this system is controlled by all sorts of freelancers who are organized in various sub-factions and individuals specialized in interstellar trading. Union is the bustling hub of Cluster-34 with numerous space stations, trade routes, and even a vibrant port city. It is also an area of rising conflict between different factions clashing in their attempts to shape the future of the DMZ (demilitarized zone). Adam will get caught in these struggles while trying to figure out his own role in it all. New side missions await, new challenges and lots of new secrets just wait to be discovered. If you are as excited about Union as we are, make sure to join today’s stream on Twitch and YouTube, from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EDT / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PDT where Erik will give you a taste of some of the new stuff that we have been working on. Did we mention there will be giveaways of pre-release keys, too? The hype is real, see you in the space clouds... 🚀👀💥🤘🙀🙌 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/2a6ee38c9e7a2586b3e14820a69876cf2935fa2e.jpg Greetings, Pilots! After the closed EVERSPACE 2 Alpha was rolled out to eligible Kickstarter backers just a few days ago, our community ambassador and ace pilot Erik Schrader aka @Giraffasaur will take the latest version for another spin to show you a few more missions, discuss the first round of community feedback and share some gorgeous fanart as well as a few things that we are currently working on. We also got good news for avid test pilots who missed the deadline for getting into the closed Alpha and Beta program as we will giveaway three EVERSPACE 2 pre-release Steam keys during today's stream on: https://twitch.tv/rockfishgames https://youtube.com/rockfishgames https://mixer.com/rockfishgames In case you cannot make it today, don't you worry: we will continue running this kind of events every Friday, 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CET / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm ET / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PT. See you in space 🚀👀🍀 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c00655881d056d9d4d9bf6f88541f93a867d9d3e.jpg After some back and forth with a few of our most important media partners, the roadmap for the EVERSPACE 2 Closed Alpha release finally stands - WOOHOO! While our team is still working hard on some final touches, you can start getting excited about the awesome online events that we have lined-up. Before we get into details of the roadmap, let us share a high-level overview of the already included features: the Closed Alpha will give eligible backers access to approximately 10 hours of gameplay including a story beat and free exploration, culminating in the first star system’s boss fight. In addition to new Ship Devices and Ultimate Abilities, you will be able to explore the all-new pilot and companion perk system. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/d7c5882ca3dbe8719885cf7af6d20f1c2dac2fe2.jpg While pilot perks are level-based, companion perks can be unlocked through various resources you gather along your journey. Through main storyline content, scripted side missions, and various jobs, you will be able to reach the Closed Alpha cap of level 10. New ships, NPCs, and equipment have also been added for you to discover as you explore even more regions in space, planetary locations, and cave systems in the game’s first solar system. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/6d04c845872b634a7a59c2942067a6f93e630a46.jpg There are lots of handcrafted locations to discover in the first solar system; some won’t even be on your radar until you stumble across them. The Closed Alpha is English-only, with plans to localize in French, Italian, German, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Polish, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean at full release. Quality narrative cutscenes and text-to-speech mission dialogues will serve as placeholders until Steam Early Access.

Alpha Drop Roadmap

In a few hours from now, Erik, our dedicated Community Ambassador, will have the pleasure of kicking things off with a tasty sip of that First Flush backer reward with the revamped tutorial and one or two missions of the main campaign. Same place and time as always later today. The stream will be featured on the Mixer front page, so please give everybody on Mixer a warm welcome to our great community. Later today, around 11:30 pm CEST / 5:30 pm EDT / 2:30 pm PDT, we will have a big appearance on IGN dropping our first(!) Alpha gameplay trailer, followed by a 15 min interview, hosted by Brian Altanao aka @AgentBizzle, at IGN’s Summer Of Gaming with some Alpha gameplay footage spliced in. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYJ3t9PT6bg On Saturday, June 13 at 9:30 pm CEST / 3:30 EDT / 6:30 pm PDT, you’ll be able to watch a 30 min hands-on demo of the Alpha with Erik on The Escapist Indie Showcase before the official Alpha Gameplay Trailer will drop on PC Gamer during the PC Gaming Show at 8:58 pm CEST / 2:58 pm EDT / 11:58 am PDT sharp. Keep your eyes peeled for yet another teaser that will drop on https://twitter.com/everspace_game right after we had our gig on IGN, later tonight. After all that teasing, Alpha pilots should be well-prepared to find their pre-release Steam key in their inbox (make sure to check your spam folders!) Monday evening CEST / afternoon EDT / morning PDT, on June 15. Now, if some non-Alpha pilots are having second thoughts and would like to upgrade their pledge, shoot us an email to [email protected], and we’ll see what we can do for you. Mind you, as soon as we have rolled out the Alpha keys, doors will be shut for buying into the Alpha and Beta program due to Valve’s Terms of Service for Steam. We also have good news for all those who missed backing the game or could not afford it for one or another reason: There will be several giveaways over the summer, made possible by some of our media partners. We are excited to announce that top streamer and EVERSPACE superfan Cohh Carnage will kick-off our EVERSPACE 2 giveaway campaign with 10 pre-release keys during his upcoming charity stream on this Twitch channel on Monday, June 15, starting at CEST 2:00 pm / 8:00 am EDT / 5:00 am PDT. Also on Monday, our German-speaking pilots can look forward to a 60 min live interview on GameStar with our a-gazillion-tasks-juggling project manager Caspar, hosted by Christian Schneider aka @GrummelFritz, starting at 8:00 pm CEST. Now, there is only one thing left to do: Join us for today’s Alpha reveal stream on Twitch, YouTube, and Mixer from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EDT / 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PDT! The hype is real, see you in space... 🚀👀💥🤘🙀🙌 Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/06753ce1e083726a25c0e11efbf90b2c7a3e6a41.jpg

The rumors are true: planet exploration is coming to EVERSPACE 2

Keep your 👀 peeled for our planetary combat gameplay trailer at PC Gaming Show on PC Gamer, June 6 🚀💥 Also, the closed Alpha will be starting very soon! So, last chance for sending us an email to [email protected] to get involved before program doors will be shut for any further test pilots until Early Acces in December 2020. Fly safe! Michael & dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/fe5a994e1bc26cd06da8747bb33538a0f2836056.jpg Greetings, Pilots! We hope everyone is doing alright during these challenging times. Fortunately, the entire ROCKFISH team and our loved ones are safe & sound. We are incredibly grateful that we can work from home, and for the fact that we are still in a financially comfortable position so we can continue working on EVERSPACE 2. Sure, we're losing a bit of steam as up- and downloading tens of gigabytes of graphic assets and test builds to and from the cloud is no joke. What used to take minutes can now take several hours. Our communication is also a bit slower, but considering the situation the world is currently in, we can be very pleased with the progress we're making. As we don’t expect this crisis to be over any time soon, we decided to run more Prototype code giveaway campaigns like we currently do on Bleeding Cool, LogitechN, Critical Hit Gaming, PCGamesN to compensate for missed opportunities to demo the alpha and beta version of EVERSPACE 2 to our fans, content creators, and the media. Make sure to also follow us on Twitter, so you won't miss out on any future goodies.

New Concept Art

As we promised a much bigger game world in EVERSPACE 2, we have been hard at work producing a lot of new concept art pieces. Some of you have already seen them in our weekly dev & community streams on Fridays, but we’d like to share them here, too, so none of you fine space pilots miss out on anything. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c8ad8432c47c52e4ab39d40e8dda8fecaf3241f5.jpg The Outlaw Viper fires corrosion missiles from afar. When closing in on its target, it switches to drone behavior and folds out its armor to fire with a battery of scatterguns while orbiting around its prey - snakey! {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/4ff138c892fcd797236e07a23c1ce7abf6063180.jpg Armed to its teeth and heavily plated, the Outlaw Dreadnought is the Frigate-style capital ship of the Outlaws. Because of its massive armor, it is almost impossible to destroy it from afar. Pilots need to dodge its high-frequency output of barrel bombs and horrifying plasma thrower turrets to find a weak spot, fly inside and take it out with a critical hit deep down in its belly and get out without being caught in the nuclear blast. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/1fe029fa548b24fe90d1e7c83b4be38f5e21c9e7.jpg The Colonial Light Cruiser is a true masterpiece of high-tech in sci-fi warfare: It is equipped with rapid-firing rail gun turrets that do not overheat as well as EMP bombs with an enormous blast range. Thanks to its fighter hangar, the capability of making several consecutive long-range hyper jumps, and sneaking up on its target in almost undetectable stealth mode, it is perfectly suited for taking on expansive spec ops missions. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/e2c473890e235cdd7d06d4fa15a0780034c87262.jpg The Carrier is the pride of the G&B Fleet. To compensate for its low mobility, it not only features a super durable hull underneath massive plating, but a small fleet of fighters and drones can also launch from openings in the hull on each side to keep attackers at bay. Those hangars also serve for mining and supply vessels to land. Consequently, security measures and defense systems are extremely sophisticated to prevent any introducers from sabotaging the carrier’s supralight energy coils and its plasma turbines.

Hi-Res Player Ships

As you already know from a previous production update here on Steam, all player ships in EVERSPACE 2 are based on a modular component system that allows for a large number of different combinations of hulls, wings, sterns / rear engines, cockpits, and attachments. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/fe2f5eb3b420f176c91af3313644ae9eecb43082.jpg To prevent having just a bunch of generic-looking player ships, we spent a lot of time and effort in defining distinctive design rules for main and sub ship classes, as well as for all the ship components, so you can easily tell which sub-class a certain ship model belongs to. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/768a4cdcf09412674aecf946a519662ed88475a7.jpg But that’s not all! Thanks to our new texturing and modeling techniques, using floaters, decals, and emissive materials, you will also feast your eyes on much higher per-pixel details on the exterior and interior ship surfaces in addition to customizing your vessel by choosing primary, secondary and tertiary colors, which will impact the color of your ship’s glowy bits, too. We have even more ideas for further customization features and will share more when they are fleshed out. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/70e478dfc7c38154f6ee3790c52fcbe2276a047b.jpg

Ship Devices And Device Modes

Devices in the original EVERSPACE were items that would drop as loot from various sources and could be installed into your ship's device slots. They came in two flavors, active and passive. While active devices needed to be activated in order to apply their effect, passive devices would provide permanent stat bonuses or other benefits while they were installed. The similarity to skills you know from traditional RPGs has not escaped us, of course. That's why we want to take this idea further in EVERSPACE 2 and have decided to link the devices directly to the player progression. That means that once found, devices will remain unlocked and can be accessed and installed at will. Passive devices were replaced by the equipment items you install into your ship, such as platings, energy core, etc. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/405f48cd10fd07fcfdf590790a2bfc08ffdf0824.png New Devices and Device Modes offer a variety of combination possibilities and synergy effects for pilots who want to get the most out of their spaceship. A further novelty over the predecessor are the so-called Device Modes. These are passive extensions that alter the function of a device to varying degrees. A maximum of three modes can be unlocked per device and only one of them can be active at a time. To unlock device modes, you will need special tokens that can be obtained, for example, through level-ups or as a reward for missions. The idea behind Device Modes is to allow you to tailor your build to your taste through complex synergies with other devices, perks, items, etc. For example, there is a new device called Annihilator Virus that infects targets with a system virus that spreads to nearby enemies and causes a massive explosion once the timer ends. One of its device modes causes it to deal increased damage for every debuff active on the target. Now, if you use your EMP Generator right before the virus explosion, the target will receive extra damage for the EMP debuff. The EMP Generator, on the other hand, has a device mode that causes affected targets to lose shield hitpoints over time. Since this is another debuff, the explosion will deal even more damage. This is the kind of decision-making we're aiming to promote with these systems, and we would love to hear your thoughts about it on our Discord server, our EVERSPACE forum, or in the comments below.

Planetary Locations

Being able to explore new and strange planets has always been one of the biggest dreams for many space game enthusiasts. In space simulations, where exploration for hundreds or even thousands of hours is the main pillar of the game, there is no way around procedural world generation, and we’ve already seen some great examples for this concept. However, there are some fundamental downsides to it. For starters, working with high-quality, pre-baked global illumination solutions in procedurally-generated environments is not possible, especially if the game world is truly seamless. Secondly, game designers have much less control over gameplay and environmental design in procedurally-generated game worlds, which only gets worse when trying to implement a proper story campaign, featuring cutscenes and scripted events. In fact, we spent a lot of effort and time managing randomization and player frustration in the original EVERSPACE. Since we dropped the roguelike formula in favor of a persistent open world with fixed handcrafted locations in EVERSPACE 2, we can now take the overall experience to a whole new level, especially on planetary locations as you can see in this planet exploration GIF (too large to upload here). However, having handcrafted planetary locations with super hi-res height maps, high-quality illumination solutions, large set pieces featuring lots of surface details as well as lots of interesting activities going on in the sky and on the ground, comes at a price: They not only take a lot of time and effort to create, they are also very memory-heavy. To manage your expectations: We really want to prioritize those features mentioned above. What it means though is that we're not able to implement a large number of explorable planets, rather, we're focusing on a few that are most important to the story and the overall game experience. Also, there is no way around the fact that these sections will impact load times by a few extra seconds but hey, we like to think seamless atmospheric descending is totally overrated anyway. So, if you want to see more of the all-new planet locations in-game as well as Ship Devices and Device Modes in action, check out our dev & community stream: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJUCI_kuP5M Take care and stay safe! Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/a67d6403a27a0cfe36c644575c7cf4da32b83105.jpg

New Timeline

It sounds like right out of a sci-fi horror movie: An aggressive virus is spreading around the globe, causing great uncertainties, severe supply chain issues and cancellations of big international events pretty much everywhere. Unsurprisingly, all our GDC meetings with major platform holders and potential console co-publishing partners have been canceled, too. We are now setting up conference calls or meetings at upcoming events. Right now, we are prepared for everything and are hoping for the best. In short: We have to deal with a lot of uncertainties regarding business development, external game production as well as marketing and PR. Another issue is that some AAA blockbuster titles will hit our initial Steam Early Access release date: The hotly-anticipated open-world sci-fi shooter RPG Cyberpunk 2077 was recently pushed back to September, plus the brand new sci-fi looter shooter RPG Outriders from Square Enix has just been announced to release the same month, too. Obviously, there is quite an overlap between those audiences and ours, so we have decided it wouldn't be wise to directly compete against two sci-fi shooter RPG juggernauts, leaving not much room for any other sci-fi shooter coming out at the same time. Considering all those new challenges, we had to make a tough decision about postponing the EVERSPACE 2 launch on Steam Early Access, now aiming for early December this year. Consequently, we’re also pushing the closed Alpha back to the end of May and the closed Beta to August. We will reach out to backers with creative rewards towards the end of this year. Even if this is just a strategic decision to mitigate commercial risks when major market conditions change, we are fully aware that some of you won’t be too happy about this, but we hope for your understanding. Thankfully, we’re in a financially comfortable position, so the project itself is not at risk, and we are developing the game internally as planned. This extra time also means we’ll have more content for you to enjoy in the closed Alpha, Beta, and Early Access builds. Okay, now that we've got that news off our mental stack, let’s finally talk about some new awesome stuff in EVERSPACE 2.

Cockpits

Fast-paced combat in open space as well as inside of interior locations will remain the main pillar of the EVERSPACE franchise, so location awareness in 3D space as well as strafing quickly in any direction is key to survival. This is a reason why playing in 3rd person view is advantageous. However, we know from the predecessor, there is also an avid group of space pilots who put game immersion above everything else so we’re spending quite some effort on designing detailed cockpits with fully functional instruments for each player ship subclass. Let’s have a look: {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/ed68746319f7a9bf4aec57e7d55828c712815a2e.png Early concept art of light fighter cockpit interiors focusing on maximal FOV and minimal obstruction by display panels. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/dc9734d28987528831fe2ed0425a07bf6d9d59b1.png With its focus on forward-oriented combat at high speed, cockpit interiors of the medium fighter class resemble the layout with centralized instruments in military jet fighters of the 21st century. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/2bfe7bf01cb5c34cb3ab5f9cf6e502f8220a5a80.png At the price of a partially constrained view, ships of the heavy fighter class will feature sturdy cockpit interiors equipped with large displays, making pilots feel always comfy and not lose control even when taking a few frontal hits... {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/af9d357cadfa762bcec2cecdbdc3c5c215a3c23d.jpg 3D modeling of the Interceptor cockpit. You can see in the early concept art above that each cockpit interior is based on the exterior geometry of each subclass, so when swapping views the transition between exterior and interior looks accurate. The distinctive cockpit designs will also make you immediately aware of which subclass you are currently piloting. As the cockpit system is modular, it even allows us to display certain parts of the geometry based on the ship’s tier, class or subclass. So are the positions of the display panels, whereas the interior materials will be based on the color scheme of the ship. Similar to the original EVERSPACE, we'll have special effects displayed on the cockpit's windshield based on the status of the ship, like the current damage and shield level. We also plan to display vital information on the cockpit displays so that you can even play without any HUD elements for the ultimate immersion of space piloting.

State Of VR

Now, before some of you ask: We still haven’t decided if we will support VR at some point. All we can say is that based on the experience from the predecessor, supporting VR is a ton of work for many reasons (like overhauling the UI, rebalancing the game, optimizing to demanding VR specifications) for a total addressable market of presumably close to 35 million on PC and console. At first sight, that number doesn’t look too shabby. However, the technical requirements for VR, as well as significant fragmentation issues and major marketing challenges, have to be factored in. To elaborate a bit further, optimizing for PSVR on a regular PS4 all the way to the brand new Valve Index with its proprietary VR controllers takes even more effort than porting a typical PC game designed for mouse + keyboard input to also run console with proper gamepad controls from last-gen to current-gen and even to the next-gen. On the marketing side of things, we have seen non-VR players who ignore or hesitate to buy games with a VR tag. While on the other hand, quite a lot of VR players miss or have trouble altering graphic settings in games with optional VR support, resulting in negative reviews and complaints about performance issues in VR, which of course hurt overall sales. Last but not least, it would actually be hard to justify to our entire community if we spent a lot of development resources exclusively on a feature for a comparatively small group of players. Therefore, we decided to look at VR as a separate platform that requires a solid business case to make it worthwhile to support. Long story short, EVERSPACE 2 for VR is currently not on our list, but who knows what kind of deal might happen in the future…?

Assault Fighter Redesign

As you have probably seen in our vlog about player ships, we also spent a lot of time and effort on making sure that our modular design approach does not lead to a pool of generic-looking ships. Our mantra is that every model has to look slick and distinctive but also fit in its subclass. While we were very pleased with the community feedback on our ship designs so far, we felt the original bi-wing design of the Assault Fighter was underwhelming if not a bit awkward, so we decided to come up with a redesign. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/73bb222f3820126623811c45f597992349d41b43.jpg Aero spikes on spaceship engines? Yes, please! Apart from that, the redesigned Assault Fighter is our new favorite player ship, and we would love to hear your feedback in the comments below or on Discord.

Ultimate Abilities

What’s a looter shooter without a devastating superpower attack that you can unleash to gain back the upper hand when under great pressure...? Exactly! Think of your class-based Super in Destiny or Ultimate in Anthem, Overwatch or any MOBA. {STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/6de140afa9a8f1a8b82d5cdd535da9e702c42c08.gif The ULT ability “Static Overload” temporarily turns the Sentinel’s primary weapons into lightning guns, firing arcing electricity at enemies and everything around them - annihilate by electrocution, that is. For those who are new to this, here is how it’ll work in EVERSPACE 2: Ultimates (ULTs) are special ship abilities that can be activated to unleash a mighty offensive or defensive power. They need to be charged by shooting down enemies, or, later in the game after the right perk has been unlocked, they can also be charged by other means, e.g. by collecting energy orb remains or getting hit by lightning. Each Ultimate is tied to a specific ship subclass, designed to exploit its full potential. For example, a certain heavy subclass might have an energy shield that reflects incoming shots back to the attackers, while one of the light subclasses unleashes a power that allows the ship to quickly teleport between targets, leaving behind a shredding energy trail, corrosive mines or web fields. Sounds very exciting, right? Well, if you want to see more of the new cockpit interiors, how the Assault Fighter blockout looks in-game, and also get a taste of the Sentinel’s Ultimate electrocuting waves of enemies, watch the archived dev stream: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzHvKydVhXY Also, don't miss today's dev & community stream covering yesterday's EVERSPACE 2 production update about handcrafted planetary locations, hi-res player ships, RPG-style ship devices & devices modes, and new NPCs on Twitch, YouTube and Mixer from 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm CEST / 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm EDT. See you online, Michael and your dedicated ROCKFISH Games Team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/284296c12bb74f0c1622d0a52e0f411d42d522a8.jpg In this production update, we’ve got cool new drones, hot UI improvements, and some scalding concept art pieces for you to look at. But before we move on to those, we’d like to give you an update where development of the Early Access version is currently at and how the Prototype was received by some four thousand test pilots and the press. Given the positive feedback, we had received on the early demo version at various gaming conferences, we were quite optimistic about releasing the Prototype out in the wild. However, letting our superfans take it for a spin on all sorts of hardware setups and without us being able to watch over your shoulders is another thing, so we’re extremely happy that we have received nothing but overwhelmingly positive feedback from our fans and the gaming press alike. Anyone who missed out on pledging on the Prototype, go check out the #gallery channel on our Discord! There are some truly amazing screenshots from the community as well as yet another awesome fanvid from lol_bye on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNxe5zL5oC4 While the Prototype was rolled out a while ago, we’ve been busy cracking on the Closed Alpha, which is still scheduled to be rolled out to eligible backers around the end of May. We’re making good progress on creating the game world and implementing the main missions. We already had a lot of fun during the first internal playtest last Friday and plan to share some gameplay footage in future development updates for your viewing pleasure.

New Drones

If you have played the original EVERSPACE you may have noticed that drones were more of a ‘thing’ than in any other (space) game. Due to our limited budget back then, we could not afford to create a plethora of high-detailed enemy spaceships. However, having a lot of opponents with a broad range of behaviors was paramount to keep things interesting, especially for a roguelike. So, coming up with many types of different drones was the way to go. While we now have a bigger budget for EVERSPACE 2, we still like the concept of throwing even more enemy types with all sorts of capabilities at you while keeping our production costs at bay. So, without further ado, say hello to our latest drone family members:

The Advanced Outlaw Sniper Drone

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/11c5e8da1990fc6a320746ec3205d3766a7cecb5.jpg The Outlaw Sniper Drone uses a targeting laser to focus on enemies from afar. If the line of sight is not interrupted for a couple of seconds the target will be hit by a deadly rail gunshot. If you are quick enough you may be able to evade the shot, but your main strategy should be to take cover before the drone fires. Close in on the drone while avoiding being in the open for too long in order to take it down or turn the tables and snipe it with a rail gun yourself.

The Outlaw Detonator Drone

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/d466107c2562eaa71dcc3b423bf7e91e93d121be.jpg This drone is packed with devastating explosives, and it only has one goal: to close in on a hostile unit and crash into it, triggering a huge explosion. Luckily, the Detonator Drone is quite noisy once it settles for a target, so you will at least hear that it’s about to annihilate you if you do not initiate countermeasures immediately.

UI Improvements & Novelties

In our previous update, we already had a sneak peek of some UI tweaks for item management. Today, we are excited to share even more improvements as well as some entirely new screens with you.

The Station Home Screen

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/cf1b8a8725a8561ce610c786df4df457eb64ca52.jpg A top-level screen that offers specific menus depending on the pilot’s specific docking situation. It serves for quick navigation for both mouse and gamepad users. You can see at a glance which interactions and services are offered.

The Storage Screen

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/1a59d943cdca273681f1b3190e6bb0095757d7e3.jpg Storage and Inventory are now separated for more clarity and better item management. There is also a revised Item Info window with current stats showing more details than before.

The Ship Dealer Screen

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/5d35d7137ccc831ca3b1edbc00d685ca643aefd3.jpg Some stations or traders will offer to purchase ships. This interface was designed to have maximum screen real estate for showing off your new object of desire in all its beauty. Ship details are available in two modes, simplified and detailed. This is the simplified version.

The Job Board Screen

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/c58ed37bbd9d13f163d6e22c4b722709b19cafa0.jpg The job board is a job board is a job board. Pilots can get jobs here, who would have thought? The purple highlight marks jobs that are above the player's level and therefore potentially difficult. On the right side, you can see the rewards for the job as well as a small preview of the standing of the respective faction you're doing the job for.

The Ship Screen

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/f4da7bb53214830e993d9b5fd063d119efe0468f.jpg Similar to the inventory screen, you can modify your ship on this screen and view the vessel’s properties. However, elements such as upgrades, extensions, appeal, and perks are still subject to change. Again, ship details are available in two modes: simplified and detailed. This is the simplified view - take it with a pinch of salt.

Cinematics Teaser

Another area where we had to make some compromises for the predecessor because of budget limitation was lore and storytelling. That said, we still take pride in having innovated by introducing a proper story campaign including event-based exposition to the roguelike genre for the first time ever. We highly encourage any space pilot to play through the very end of the story in the original EVERSPACE as there is more to its plot as you might think at the beginning. Thanks to your fantastic support, we are now able to work with Joshua Rubin, some of the finest in video game storytelling, to tell an even bigger story within a world full of exciting lore in EVERSPACE 2. Of course, we don’t want to unveil any secrets or spoil major plot points, but we think it is ok to tease you a little with some gorgeous looking concept art for the cinematics, right?

Clone Chamber Concept Art

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Katopalace Concept Art

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Penthouse Concept Art

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Control Room Concept Art

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/a629798c03d3399cea4370e01ce0fb43181be88c.jpg So, we hope you like what you see. If you want to know more, especially about everything that comes with the new screens, check out our latest game dev stream where Erik, our fabulous Community Ambassador, shares more details and gives a sneak peek of the first mission, too: https://youtu.be/YKEAK2tWUTk?t=4022 Enjoy, and see you in space! Michael and Your dedicated ROCKFISH Games team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/0a519d5bbfbc0d3125cb2135f6feb8a976e49e62.jpg Catching up with the state of development: In the full version EVERSPACE™ 2, there will be at least eight star systems, each divided into zones with different threat levels and featuring numerous hand-designed locations to discover, between which players can travel freely. Further surprises await daring space pilots in the form of procedurally generated locations styled after those in the first EVERSPACE title, offering even greater variety for player pilots. The combination of fixed, hand-designed and procedurally generated locations and events with ingenious design rules offers the best possible gaming experience while allowing a vibrant and stunningly beautiful game world with countless trading stations, shipyards and secret locations in a visual quality that is not possible with purely procedurally generated game worlds. One of the biggest fan wishes to be able to fly down to planet surfaces is now also fulfilled in EVERSPACE™ 2. Planetary levels are designed by hand for maximum visual quality and gameplay control. Differences in gravity and air resistance as well as new types of enemies put the skills of pilots to the test, and provide further variety before players tackle new missions on ground stations, equip their ship or trade. Watch our game dev vlog below for more: https://youtu.be/n-9fBi0uWNw Enjoy, don't forget to wishlist, and see you in space! Michael and Your dedicated ROCKFISH Games team

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/35665597/df2b7a8bcc8808969b1a6153dad793ef4c9be55d.jpg A common critique about our previous game was that there were not enough enemies and other alien creatures to encounter. This can be explained by our limited budget back then but also due to the fact that not too many pilots made it to later sectors where more baddies and other surprises awaited (yes, normal difficulty in a roguelike can be tough, especially for players who are new to the genre, but there really is no shame to play on "easy"). In EVERSPACE™ 2, we want to take things a lot further. Not only will we improve the visual quality of the established NPCs and alien creatures of the predecessor with the aid of the talented folks at Volta, Streamline Studios and Liquid Development. We also want to have new types of enemies and more wicked wildlife in space that might freak you out, make you smile or just scratch your head… https://youtu.be/AxxRcCRo4GA Don’t want to wait until late 2020 to play EVERSPACE™ 2 on Steam Early Access? Support us on Kickstarter and play the demo later THIS YEAR! https://www.everspace.game/go/kickstarter/es1steamnews

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/8fbb2d7dbec6cddcb143b6e44acab85849e92a34.jpg Due to our limited budget for the predecessor, we only had three vessels in the base game to choose from and added one more in the Encounters expansion, but we took great care that each of them offered unique play styles, much like classes in an RPG. While the gameplay diversity of player ships in the original EVERSPACE™ was much appreciated by our fans, having a much bigger pool of spaceships with deep customization possibilities was in high demand by the community for our next space game. Well, we heard you loud & clear, so check out our latest vlog! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Sf320epLNg Don’t want to wait until late 2020 to play EVERSPACE™ 2 on Steam Early Access? Support us on Kickstarter and play the demo later THIS YEAR! https://www.everspace.game/go/kickstarter/es1steamnews

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/627de7aae23141e2dfd4e55cb4ec81ca1e0fb9bd.jpg With EVERSPACE™ 2, we're making a big leap from a roguelike to an open-world space shooter RPG with a 20-30 hour story campaign. Check out our first vlog giving you a glimpse of the expanded game world and the story of our upcoming game. Our creative director, Uwe Wütherich, will lead you through the beginning of the story in EVERSPACE™ 2 and the in-house production of the animated cinematics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uA8YM8dGDdc Kickstarter: https://www.everspace.game/go/kickstarter/es1steamnews EVERSPACE™ 2 on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1128920/EVERSPACE_2/

{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/26000820/cdda03fac44677ba78118c1f899329160173b96f.jpg We're very excited to announce that the Kickstarter campaign for Everspace 2 just launched! The sequel to Everspace won't be a roguelike, but an open-world space shooter with deep exploration, tons of loot and classic RPG elements. Your invaluable feedback helped make Everspace the success it was, which is why we'd like to get you on board as soon as possible. With your support we will be able to stay in full creative and financial control and increase the overall quality of the game. So please have a look at our reward tiers and maybe help us unlock a few stretchgoals as well. We would also like to point out that anyone backing on a digital game copy of Everspace 2 will receive a playable Demo Version before the end of this year! Kickstarter: https://www.everspace.game/go/kickstarter/es1steamnews Everspace 2 on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1128920/EVERSPACE_2/