StarMade 0.1616 Infinite Chain Docking

*Just a reminder, the Station Contest will be closing at the end of August 12th*

Hello players,

another update is up. It it foremost bugfixing and optimization, but also contains a nice gameplay feature.

Infinite Chain Docking

Chain docking is no longer limited. The only restriction is, that you can't currently dock anything on a turret.

Bug Fixes

Some major fixes have been done. Especially in the unwanted rotation when undocking or entering a ship. Also the initial docking process when loading in ships with a lot of turrets has been made more robust to not cause lag on server or client.

Several causes for crashes have also been identifies and fixed.

Also, debris now falls down on planets.

 

Optimizations

Shadows have been optimized by a lot, and you should now get a lot higher fps when using the.
Also some small optimizations have been made to general drawing performance.
I also plan a new reduced dynamic lighting mode, that will boost fps for slower machines, but that isn't in this update.

Also, optimizations to the lighting calculations have been made, so chunks should now display much faster.

 

Other Things

Most of the time this week however went into a new launcher/updater system. The new system will have the ability to only download files that have actually changed. Furthermore, you will be able to change the installation directory, manage multiple installations, and switch to any older version with just a few clicks.

For planned features, it's finally time to design a new more interesting structure for the universe, and with that various forms of FTL.

Thanks for playing StarMade,
- schema