New StarMade Launcher v12 Test Release

Hello players,

after waiting and verifying for SSL signing the certificates are finally here, and I was able to sign the executables. That means upon starting, there should not be any malware warning, which happened because of missing certification.

 

I'm not raising the current minimum launcher version, so players using the old one will not get a message that a new one is out until public testing is done.

Both launchers should work at the same time.

Download them here (Please make backups just to be sure):

Windows: http://files.star-made.org/StarMade-Starter-v12.exe

Mac/Linux: http://files.star-made.org/StarMade-Starter-v12.jar

Here are the new features:

Features

Download only differences in updates

When downlaoding a new version, the launcher will no longer download files that havent changed. This makes the base download slightly bigger (since it's no longer zipped), but regular patches will be as low as 30MB. We will further reduce that size by externalizing even more.

Installation Path

In the top menu there is now a new item for installation settings. You can either enter a relative path from where your launcher is (like it is now), or choose a fixed location. Also you can use this to switch between installations on the fly. The launcher will automatically scan the selected directory for an installation.

Build Branch

Also in the installation settings, you can now choose the branch of builds: Release (default and recommended), Pre, Dev, and Archive. Please note that if there is no entry for a branch (like pre, and archive currently), an error message will pop up. Leaving it as release is best at this point.

Dev versions are accessible now, but they will soon be exclusive usable by testers.

Version Switching

A new options button the main panel has been added. In this panel you can choose to go to any version and build of the branch you selected, so rolling back if your server is on an older version is no longer a hassle. The differences between the versions are of course downloaded here as well.

Download Repair&Resume

By selecting the latest version in the options, you can not repair a damaged installation (if the damage is not in the player database but the game files of course). It works like the steam file verification and re-downloads every file that became corrupted or changed. You can also choose to force re-download every file of the chosen version, which of course will take longer.

Better Download Statistics

The progress bars are now much more detailed giving you exact information of what the launcher is doing

Backup Modes

Before every version change you now have the option to either backup every file, or only backup the player database, which can be a lot smaller for singleplayer worlds. You also of course have the option to not backup at all.

News display

Finally the display of the latest news is fixed. Also there were quick links added to the most common StarMade resources.

Self Updater

For future fixes and updates on the launcher, the system now can update itself, which makes updating to a new launcher version just clicking one button. WARNING: since i didn't raise the minimum version yet, doing this option now will replace your new launcher with the old one

 

Bugs

Please send any problems with the new launcher to either one of the testers (better for me to handle), or to my email.

 

 

Other things

A new version with a lot of bug fixes is on the way (thanks to all the testers!), and the planning for the new universes as well as ftl-related things is almost done, and implementation can begin probably next week.

 

 

Thanks for playing StarMade,

- schema