I’m very happy to announce that the 0.34a release is finally here!

What’s in this release?

• Four new missions and several new ships
• Customizable  key bindings
• Official mod support – you can find mods in our forum
• Gameplay and balance changes
• Colorblind mode (edit data/config/settings.json to toggle)
• Assorted bug fixes
• General polish & improvements

For a detailed list of changes, check out the patch notes. The manual is also worth a look – especially for the bits that the current in-game tutorial doesn’t cover.

You can download 0.34a here:

What’s not in this release?

There are no big war room changes.  The current implementation is very RTS-like, which, as it’s turning out, isn’t particularly suited to Starfarer. We’re planning to move away from that and focus on letting you make strategic-level decisions, without having to worry about minor details. It didn’t make sense to make incremental changes to the current system now, since we’ll be extensively revamping it soon.

What’s next?

The big-ticket items for 0.35a are:

• Ship refit screen
• Ability to outfit your flagship for missions
• War room revamp
• “Custom Battle” option

The idea is to dig into the customization elements of the game, with custom battles providing a good testing ground for your freshly-assembled  ships and fleets – and more replay value than you can shake a stick at. Well, at least, more than regular missions.

In the meantime, once 0.35a is out, we’ll start working feverishly on 0.36a, which will provide a first look at the campaign layer.

The alpha is coming, soon.  In preparation for this, ahem, momentous event, allow me to present the first official version of Starfarer’s manual.  Don’t worry, you don’t have to read the whole thing just to be able to start playing – the tutorial is supposed to take care of that.

There are a lot of mechanics in play though, and several missions are hard (and indeed, they’re supposed to be). So, if after playing for a while you keep losing horribly and tear out your hair screaming “WHY?!?” (or have some questions), the manual is a good place to find answers. It also features a handy 1-page summary of all the controls and shortcuts.

Let me know what you guys think!