Beta Version history

The following is the **Version History** of *Helium Rain*.

* Fix transaction quantity limited by its money even for trade with its ours stations
* Fix station destruction bug leading to corrupted save

## Beta-230717

### New features & content

* Add Steam achievements
* Add new scanner mini-game for inspection in Pendulum contract

### Gameplay changes

* No more enable pilot in fire director mode for heavy ships
* Allow docking with menu during navigation tutorial

### Graphics & UI

* Improve all planet and moon render
* Use progress bar instead of percentages in cockpits
* Make fleet to travel selection more persistent
* Update game icon
* Rework ship info buttons layout
* Disable no-cockpit mode
* Use company customization pattern as background pattern in UI
* Improve quality of weapon impacts
* Make the sky slightly brighter
* A lot of small UI and wording improvements

### Bugs fixed

* UI: fix too long joystick button and names
* UI: fix dragging issues in menus causing unexpected rotation on background assets
* UI: fix HUD distance rounding issue
* UI: fix selection of ships with light during piloting
* UI: fix wrong warning when targeting the tracked station
* General : a lot of french translation fixes

## Beta-100717

### New features & content

* Add a meteorites intercept contract
* Add trade route statistics
* Add experimental French translation (some layout issues)

### Gameplay changes

* Don't generate military contracts if the player doesn't have military ships
* Use interception time instead of distance to show aim indicators at a more accurate range

### Graphics

* Upgrade shadowing quality to reduce artifacts
* Upgrade resolution of shadows on Nema's rings
* Reduce performance cost of Eradicator impact effects
* Update splash screen

### Bugs fixed

* General: fix ships ejected from trade route if not all ship were trading
* General: fix research station upgrade effect
* General: fix telescope station upgrade effect
* General: make the player ship not fully destructible instead of the last alive ship to avoir recovery bug
* UI: fix funny key change warning when removing a key assignment
* UI: fix trade slider init with sell to a station for a contract
* UI: fix lock trade checkbox that stop the production

## Beta-300617

### Additions/changes

#### General

* pass the game to qwerty by default
* move default binding of 'lock direction' to capslock and 'combat zoom' to space

#### Gameplay

* no more allow station construction in a sector in danger

#### AI

* make AI able to declare join war againt enemy more powerful than every company induvidialy
* make AI able to setup attack from multiple company to allow multiple company to win against one powerful ennemy

#### UI

* rename "Travel and Order" in "Incoming Events"
* enable notification masking
* show again trade routes in orbital map
* add current battle in incoming events list
* show warning in settings menu when trying to assign an already assigned key
* set default quantity for trade to the right value when the tracked contract have a sell condition

#### Graphics

* add iridescence effect to metals
* improve reflection quality

### Balance

* move default ship count in sector to 30

### Bug fix

* general: fix Boneyard collision mode
* general: fix crash if trying to upgrade a ship with weapon that are not unlock by technology (after ship capture)
* ui: fix external camera and menu camera for Windows
* ui: fix trading status text
* ui: fix fly interdiction text
* contract: fix duplicate fail condition when a trade contract have 2 stations owned by the same company
* contract: various contract text fixes

## Beta-190617

Modifications since beta-120617.

General improvement of game clarity.

### Additions/changes

#### General

* switch to Unreal Engine 4.16
* add Deimos Games logo and info

#### Gameplay

* new more understandable recovery system: you don't have a new free ship but the old one is partially repair and you have a fine.
* don't generate trade contracts with stations being captured

#### Tutorials

* add fleet management tutorials
* add remote fleet tutorial
* add trade route tutorial
* force to buy a freigther in "buy ship" tutorial

#### UI

* rework EULA and credit menu
* auto track the last contract (instead of the first) by defaut when a contract is finished to allow chained quest to be smooth

#### Graphics

* assure that planet texture quality is always good
* add boneyard icons to its substations

### Balance

* make stations a lot more affordable for the player in early game
	+ the price now depend only of the player station count in its company and in the sector
		- from 1000 + 500 \* sqrt(travel\_duration) + 50 \* sqrt(resource\_quantity)
		- to   1000 + 1000 \* sqrt(travel\_duration) + 100 \* sqrt(resource\_quantity)
	+ buy and sell contracts:
		- from 500 + 50 \* sqrt(resource\_quantity)
		- to   500 + 100 \* sqrt(resource\_quantity)
* make trade contract volume more variable if capacity transport of the player vary
* make axis reputation very stable as they are neutral

### Bug fix

* ui: multiple wording fixes
* contracts: fix contract unicity
* contracts: avoid contract to fail at acceptation making them not available as soon as the failed conditions are reached

## Beta-120617

Modifications since beta-090617.

Quick patch to fix risk of economy collapse that a lock a game, with others fixes and improvements.

### Additions/changes

#### Gameplay

* increase anticollision system precision and make it adaptative to ships breaking capabilities

#### UI

* show repair and refill deadline in travel sector
* make player confirm fast forward if the is no incoming events
* make notification slower to disappear (7s → 10s)

### Balance

* tutorial: reduce research needs for technology tutorial from 50 to 30, to match with the new technology base price

### Bug fix

* economy: avoid economy collapse due to people not spending enough money
* autopilot: fix exit avoidance system using incoherent center of sector
* ui: fix sector menu for travel sectors
* graphics: fix planetarium for travel sectors after sector exit

## Beta-090617

Modifications since beta-020617.

A lot of improvements, thanks to all beta-tester feedbacks !

### Additions/changes

#### Gameplay

* make bombs and missiles destructible by the player
* no more make ships assigned to a trade route travel automatically to a dangerous sector

#### UI

* move trade route selection to company menu to make more space to incoming events
* refactor incoming attack list and notifications
* make new contracts notifications no more stop fast forward
* add more details about shipyard state in the shipyard details
* make harder to accidentally dump precious resources
* better texts when trade operation is not possible
* add notification when fleet repair or refill end
* add information about station under construction in trade menu
* rename "World prices" menu to "Economy"

#### Graphics

* move planetarium to follow travel progress
* improve engine render
* improve flight effects
* improve asteroid rendering quality

### Balance

* reduce technology base cost from 50 to 30
* refactor station technologies:
	+ the new level 1 "science" technology allow to build research station and telescope
	+ the pumping technology move from level 1 to level 3
	+ the foundry is now unlock with advanced stations
* change the Solen to give it a cargo bay of 2x50 instead of 1x100
* make Hammer gun more precise but a lot more expensive
* reduce Omen mass from 32t to 16t
* force the player to manually make peace after an AI declare war to him
* make pacifism move more slowly:
	+ pacifism increase base rate: 2.0 → 0.8
	+ pacifism decrease base rate: 1.0 → 0.6
* give reputation when ordering a ship to a company (ship price / 1000)
* increase inter company UBI contribution from 0.001 to 0.002

### Bug fix

* ui: fix crash when editing a trade route operation if no fleet was assigned
* ui: fix tool-tip for when the "Remove ship" button in edit fleet menu was disabled
* ui: make failed contracts due to expiration date not display "1 day left"
* ui: fix minor interface glitch in not visited sectors
* ui: fix rotation of HR logo in menus
* ui: fix The Forge sector description
* graphics: fix AA settings bug
* graphics: adapt resolution when enabling full screen
* graphics: remove tesselation from Colossus to ensure Linux support
* general: fix repair not correctly ending bug
* general: check recovery at the end of each day and not only at the end of fast forward

## Beta-020617

Modifications since beta-290517.

A small patch as response to feedback of the previous build.

### Additions/changes

#### General

* add support of unidirectional joystick thrust
* add support for joystick dead zones

#### UI

* show "missing resources" when a ship construction is lock because of a resource outage
* show incoming threats in red in the travel list
* ensure long joystick names can be shown
* hide precise light ratio as it's not used for now
* make transport fee a lot more visible
* allow to set trade route quantity limit precisely

#### Graphics

* reduce sun intensity
* minor change on dust effects

### Balance

* allow shipyard owners to be in dept to build ships order by others companies

### Bug fix

* contract: fix combat tutorial
* ui: fix menu looping bug
* ui: fix multiple typo in contracts
* ui: fix highlight box not updated in HUD
* graphics: fix Nema rings LOD
* economy: fix crash when canceling ship construction
* general: fix bad file name Windows firewall

### Additions/changes

#### Gameplay

* never destroy a ship completely because of a collision
* allow control of ship rotation in addition to ship translation from the external camera (space bar by default)
* make large ships unafraid of hostile small ships to avoid destabilizing turrets

#### Contracts

* add lots of VIP names and avoid reusing the same names for multiple contracts
* add a 30 days delay in the Pendulum contract after the pirate step
* improve wording in contract tutorial

#### Tutorials

* add combat tutorial
* add ships repair tutorial
* add ships refilling tutorial

#### UI

* aggregate all secondary contract notifications in one
* hide expiration conditions : they were misleading and taken as failed conditions
* show more details about ship state in ship lists
* don't notify pointless "battle lost" notification, and don't lock fast forward in these cases
* give detailed infos about abandoned ships when traveling
* treat ships in paused trade route as regular ships
* show trade routes status everywhere
* forbid abandon of tutorial and story contracts

#### Graphics

* change the look of pumping stations, research stations and outposts to differentiate them
* improve dust effects
* improve firing effects
* improve visualization of damage on destroyed ship parts
* move Orca camera
* add very small chromatic aberration
* fix planetary texture LOD

### Balance

* technology: increase research point reward by 60%
* diplomacy: divide rank based reputation loose by 30
* military: divide large ship reparation speed by 5
* military: slightly improve Artemis

### Bug fix

* ui: fix trade quantity when the company has debt
* ui: fix line wrapping bug in trade menu
* ui: fix "No objects" misleading in sector menu
* combat: fix AI ship and turret pilot aim precision
* combat: fix Kami turret angles and collision mesh
* combat: fix collision issue in The Spire
* general: fix AA quality settings not modifiable
* general: fix sector defense contract not loaded correctly
* general: fix crash if a station collide something different from a ship

### Additions/changes

#### Tutorials

* add technology and research station tutorial
* add buy ship tutorial
* add station construction and upgrade tutorial
* add targeting tutorial

#### UI

* allow T key to select the contract objectif if not in battle
* show contract fail conditions in contracts menu
* add needs columns in ecomomy menu
* show sector population

#### Graphics

* redesign boneyard sector
* better metal, exhaust and bloom effects

### Balance

* economy: increase the "nerf ratio" but apply it only to level 1 cargo bay size of station
* economy: increase arsenal production
* economy: increase plastic factory production
* economy: increase station cargo bay size
* economy: balance Kami ship cost
* economy: limit high end consumer resource consumption if they are expensive
* contracts: generate hunt contract only on travel end
* contracts: add duration fail condition for VIP contracts
* technology: move shipyard construction unlock in a specific technology
* technology: now, only one technology is need to increase its technology level (2 before)
* technology: reduce research point production cost
* world: a lot of balance in the game creation setup

### Bug fix

* flying: fix station bad placement if they are capture before being in an active sector
* flying: fix ship disappearing randomly if stopped
* flying: fix weapon firing empty weapon first on load game
* economy: fix fleet supply consumption bug
* economy:fix shipyard consumption estimation
* contract: fix missing diplomatic fail and expiration conditions in generated quests
* ui: fix trading permission display
* ui: fix external and menu camera control
* ui: station list order in sector menu
* ai: fix a lot of AI bug
* general: various performance improvements