Virtual Awakening illustration


***


"Driven by their need to terraform and cultivate, it was only a matter of time before the Automatons turned their eyes to the least hospitable planets: Gas giants. A probe ship departed for an uncolonised system, hoping to test technology that could transform these jovian worlds into something livable.

It was a nice plan, but luck and reality had other ideas. The gas giant had a derelict platform orbiting it that had been of the Virtual Endless war effort -- and the Virtuals had left a guard behind. Worse yet, the system was rich in minerals from its asteroid belts, so a small but well-equipped group of Pirates was also keeping an eye on it.

Automaton, Endless, and Pirate -- an interesting enough mix. But there was a fourth unknown actor, watching from the “surface” of the gas giant. Deep in the viscous atmosphere, where the boundaries between gas and liquid and solid are vague and changeable, an intelligent life form tracked the signals from the platform and wondered what was going on.

Up above an uneasy truce was reached: Automatons experimented while the Pirates kept an eye out for profits. The project went smoothly until one of the Automatons, who had shown unusually clever behavior since landing on the Endless platform, noted that the radiation seeping from the planet might be transmissions from a sentient race…

Finish the testing at the risk of genocide? Try again elsewhere, regardless of the costs? Steal the technology and see what you can get for it? There are many questions, not the least of which is: What exactly is going on with that unusually clever Automaton?

The galaxy is about to get even stranger."

***



Hi everyone,


Today is the day! Virtual Awakening will go live tonight (we are still working on a few things at the moment - your game will automatically download the new content), but here are the release notes, so you know what to expect!

Oh and one more thing: we are very proud to announce we sold 300,000 copies of Endless Space and would like to celebrate with this add-on, as well as 50% off on our game, for this Steam week long promotion! Share the love and grab a copy for your friends, family and pugs. smiley: redface



RELEASE NOTES


VIRTUAL AWAKENING (1.0.65)

FREE WEEKEND REWARDS
  • 1 new Technology
    [LIST=1]
  • Gas Giant Transformation
  • 2 new Buildings
    [LIST=1]
  • Deep Space Facility [G2G]
  • High Energy Array
    • [/LIST]
  • 3 new Planet Anomalies
    [LIST=1]
  • Hostile Dust
  • Endless Trouble
  • Humeris Insidentes
    • [/LIST]
  • 4 new random events including stackable/escalating game events
    [LIST=1]
  • Mad Scientist [G2G,byKingJohnVI]
  • New Religion [G2G,byKingJohnVI]
  • Sleeping War Machines [G2G,byCodename_Veers]
  • Endless Facility
    • [/LIST]
  • 4 new heroes with their own biography and portrait:
    [LIST=1]
  • Pirate
  • Deuyivan
  • Automaton
  • Virtual Endless
    • [/LIST]
  • 6 new Exploration Rewards
    [LIST=1]
  • Pool of heroes is refreshed - reset or replace [G2G]
  • Unveil surrounding systems [G2G]
  • 4 boost (industry or approval)
    • [/LIST]
    [/LIST]

    CHANGES AND ADDITIONS
    • Add-On introduction and illustration
    • Victory warnings alert messages
    • Improved blockade effects: now activated on guard and invasion only
    • New scrapping button for unnecessary improvements on the Empire view
    • Tax rate tooltip in the Empire view
    • Reworked game speed effects:
      [LIST=1]
    • Outpost are converted into colony in 15 turns (fast), 30 turns (normal), 45 turns (slow)
    • Ownership progresses 2x faster in fast and 2x slower in slow
    • Bushido, revenge and other traits linked to a turn limit are now bind to the game speed
    • Locust point limit is now affected by the game speed
    • Invasion progress is multiplied by 2 in fast and divided by 2 in slow
    • Max Invasion Limit is now 50% in fast and 12% in slow


    [/LIST]

    AI IMPROVEMENT
    • Option to allow AI governors to auto-scrap buildings
    • Enhanced hero management
    • Better affinity and faction traits management


    FIXES
    • Fixed an issue with hero commander class skill tree that could lead to misunderstanding
    • Fixed an issue with hero pilot class skill tree that could lead to misunderstanding
    • Change influence calculation to fix the bad value of the income applied during the first turn
    • Fixed an issue where the list of available heroes could be empty at the beginning of a game (after creating games many times without restarting Endless space)
    • Fixed a potential desync occurring when a player just destroyed a pirate fleet which was blockading a system.



    Hope you all enjoy this new add-on and let us know what you think about it! smiley: smile

    Cheers,


    S.