Hey folks, it's been a while, but we've got a new update for you to try out.

First of all, I apologize for the long delay between updates. The last few years have been weird to say the least. The goal with this update was to finish the skeleton of the story content and to tie up as many loose ends as possible.

• Added a new dungeon accessible from a teleporter somewhere along the bottom of the world.
  
• Added a new area for the native intelligent aliens, which is accessible through the new dungeon at the bottom of the world.
  
• Added ability to scan alien text on some structures in the world with your scan laser to gain some understanding of the alien language over time.
  
• Added equippable Drone Accessories that will follow you around and shoot laser beams at enemies.
  
• Added accessory that increases drone firing speed.
  
• Added 6 new Ancient Alien Accessories that can be found in various places in the world.
  
• Added an Ant Goo Arrow.
  
• Added craftable Cymbals (2x copper ingot), Drum (2x hide, 2x boards, 2x plant fiber) & Tambourine (2x hide, 2x boards, 2x plant fiber, 1x copper ingot).
  
• Added Explosive Flare Ammo (1x rubber, 1x black powder) for the flare gun.
  
• Added Empty Fuel Cell (1x plastic, 1x copper wire, 1x aluminum ingot) and Full Fuel Cell (1x empty fuel cell, 1x blue fruit, 1x coal, 1x lye). Equipping and using a full fuel cell will charge your MEG tool's battery.
  
• Added Iron Hammer (1x iron ingot, 1x iron ingot) and Steel Hammer (1x steel ingot) which are used as requirements for certain recipes.
  
• Added the end of the game (credits even roll!).

You will need to generate a new world from the sandbox menu (or a new character) to see much of the new content (new dungeons, re-worked world generator, etc).

• We totally revamped the MEG tool with the goal of simplifying and organizing things.
  
• When you open your MEG tool UI, you now have 3 tabs:
  
  • A Codex that contains a journal, scanned creatures, scanned structures, the text of any datapads you've found, and a section for help topics.
    
  • The Map, which functions like the old GPS device, but it's built into your MEG tool permanently.
    
  • The Upgrade Section, where you can upgrade the tool with various gems.
• The journal function of the MEG tool now automatically records events that happen while you play through the game. The goal here is to give folks some direction without an explicit quest log.

• The grapple laser has been replaced with something slightly less scientifically abhorrent—an extending metal grabber thing!
  
• It largely works the same as it did before but should be a bit less janky.
  
• The grapple gadget is not installed by default, but you can get it installed in the Mining Base to the right of the spawn point.

• Added ability to hide items from the automatic HUD item slots from the item details.
  
• Separated food into its own HUD slot (no longer combined with other consumables).
  
• Added ability to hold the key of a HUD slot in order to open a radial menu for selecting an item in the slot.
  
• Added ability to hold reload in order to open a radial menu for selecting ammo types for weapons.
  
• Fixed various tooltip issues.
  
• Added some descriptions to items that were missing them.
  
• Cleaned up some confusing issues in the current intro/tutorial. Still some work to do here I think.
  
• Protected the escape pod spawn point a bit more from hostile creatures.
  
• When a player receives a key item in multiplayer, other players on the server should also get the item automatically.

• Reworked Ant biomes to be more expansive, interesting, and rewarding.
  
• Reworked Duglette surface environments.
  
• Reworked world generation to flow better and have fewer odd terrain issues.

• Sped up initial loading.
  
• Sped up world generation.
  
• Sped up save loading.
  
• Optimized in-game performance somewhat.

• Adjusted the categories of some of the items to make more sense.
  
• Changed mud brick platform recipe to require 1 dirt.
  
• Changed titanium ore extraction recipe to use only 1 acid instead of 3.
  
• Adjusted material/tool progression to be a bit more straightforward and consistent.

• Micro SMG ammo changed from .45acp to 9mm.
  
• Changed Delicious Chew flavor buff from "Sweet" to "Tangy".

• Fixed some Multiplayer bugs related to containers.
  
• Fixed some crashes with the crafting window.
  
• Fixed some issues with the range on the Tesla Bot's attack.
  
• Fixed some issues with the way slope interactions worked.

• The ending of the game is awkward in multiplayer (You can't initiate the ending in multiplayer, which is lame for whoever isn't the host).

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Part of the reason this update took so long to get out is that we ended up touching almost every part of the game in one way or another. As a result of all the changes, I'm sure there are a bunch of really nasty bugs, and squashing those will be my main task for a bit.

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Ok folks, we're locking in to try and actually finish this thing, and there are a few things you can do to help us end up with a really awesome 1.0 version eventually.

• Report the bugs that you find, and the crashes that you experience.
  
• Tell us what you think about the resource gathering balance (Are there things you get too few of or too much of?).
  
• Tell us what you think about the crafting recipes (Should you get more ammo per recipe?, etc).
  
• Tell us what you think about combat balance (Are some enemies too powerful? Too weak? Too annoying? Broken? etc).
  
• Anything else you can think of!

As always, we would love to hear from you, so feel free to comment on this post, get in touch through the Steam Forums, join the Official Discord Server[discord.gg], or email us at playsignsoflife@gmail.com.