- End of Early Access! - 3 December 2021
A few tweaks to finish off version 1. Hopefully fixed bug with flamers so they fire consistently first time. Fixed mine launched on Argon mothership. Removed 'Early Access' label from Logo. ;)
- Patch notes - Nov 26th '21 - 26 November 2021
Fixed autoturret bug where they weren't cleaned up properly on time out, potentially resulting in hung game. Enhanced autoturrets as they were too puny. Fixed Challenge bug where challenge was changed just viewing components in the Designer.
- Critical bug fix - 24 November 2021
Fixed critical bug for new players introduced in last patch, causing game to fail on the Training mission. Had disabled the video player and didn't test further into the game past the fix for the tutorial to find this obvious fault. Thanks to redditor warbuddha for bringing this to my attention.
- Bug fix - 23 November 2021
Fixed bug : First play through Options froze game when KBM selected Thanks to /MuttonTime's bug report on Reddit
- ionAXXIA leaving Early Access, 3rd December! - 21 November 2021
Thanks to the input of you early users, ionAXXIA has found its identity and is ready for release! What started as a shell of an arena shooter has now evolved into a rich, “Big Brained” tactical space shooter. A lot of (unexpected!) time went into iterating the core engine to enable the kinds of features that make ionAXXIA different to other shooters, plus bug-removal has been a priority in a triumphant stand against the horrific modern trend of releasing broken games. Here’s a summary of what the game contains at launch… Tactical space combat Combat equipment has a bunch of new toys like surface-mounted auto-turrets, and energy sapper mines that gain extra punch when attached to objects. Challenge based game loop Complete challenges to unlock new items. Develop a sense of achievement and progression as you become a better, smarter space-pilot. Refined procedural scenarios Levels now off…
- ionAXXIA Launch Candidate! - 26 October 2021
This is a quite release of the final version of the game. Loads and loads and loads has changed. Putting this release out now rather than sitting it on, and will follow up with full details later when I get chance.
- Quick update - lots of content coming! - 23 May 2020
A number of small changes have been added based on feedback in the discord channel, with user defined keyboard and mouse controls and a high-tempo audio track to liven things up. Now work is focussed on adding out the fun toys I want to play with. The basis of ionAXXIA's gameplay is variety - variety of ships, foes, weapons, and non-weapon abilities. I'm aiming to launch with 12 of each ship component, and perhaps a dozen varied enemy craft. Here we see a Rogue's Gallery of pesky aliens who'll be doing their best to thwart your recovery of our Argon!
- Cloud saves! Discord! - 8 March 2020
One of the key dreams for ionAXXIA was to create a proper arcade game on mobile devices. This major update includes cloud saves, so you can continue your progress on smartphones and back again. The new trailer sums the current build nicely. We've also got a Discord channel up and running for faster feedback. https://discord.gg/s7EaBzJ
- Long awaited epic update - 26 April 2019
https://cdn.steampulse.org/steam/asset?u=https%3A%2F%2Fsteamcdn-a.akamaihd.net%2Fsteamcommunity%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fclans%2F30584995%2F38fbef4c77c4dc20e2297869a381ebb06db84006.jpg After a totally unexpected silence, I'm back with the most significant update yet. 0.6.3 introduces the galactic map that brings the whole game experience together. Plot a course of discovery through the galaxy. Each star can be played either as a strategy game through the star-system, or a straight forward fight to the death (Super Melee in StarControl terms). https://cdn.steampulse.org/steam/asset?u=https%3A%2F%2Fsteamcdn-a.akamaihd.net%2Fsteamcommunity%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fclans%2F30584995%2Fd9cf9eb67f602258a4ddd07b751b2d2d242a2038.jpg One of the major issues with this Early Access process has been a real lack of content variety for you guys, for which I'm sorry. Until the core systems were in place, I couldn't start adding more aliens and ship components. https://cdn.steampulse.org/steam/asset?u=https%3A%2F%2Fsteamcdn-a.akamaihd.net%2Fsteamcommunity%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fclans%2F3%25E2%2580%25A6
- Tactical map released to Beta branch - 27 July 2018
I'm very pleased to release to the Beta branch the beginnings of the working tactical map. Woohoo! https://cdn.steampulse.org/steam/asset?u=https%3A%2F%2Fsteamcdn-a.akamaihd.net%2Fsteamcommunity%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fclans%2F30584995%2Fb3f98c6062106c11516eaf2c7e3e4c38ae68d030.jpg It's very much based on the tactical map of the original Star Control game. You build ships and manoeuvre them around a randomised star-system, building mines, outposts, and fortifications, making money, buying better ships, while the enemy pushes in from the top. Land a ship on the enemy starbase with no enemy ships present to win. It's absolutely perfect for short play bouts and I auto-save so you can pick up where you left off. This tactical combat has become the backbone to the game and its future balancing, and I'm very excited for its hopefully rapid progress. There's lots of opportunity to balance the game and ship designs so that they aren't just what you play in…
- Step two of iteration 2 is released! - 29 June 2018
Lots of work, lots of changes. Quick overview: · Enemies have secondary abilities · Autoshoot aiming super accurate · Classic mode added · Engine enhancements for future content · Beta builds to be made available I've added secondary abilities to the enemies, which required significant changes to the AI and reworking some systems, and implemented a lot of engine changes to allow some really diverse abilities. eg. Notice one of the ships can launch a blob that can transmute a rock into three fighters. AI aiming has had probably three upgrades to the current solution where it should be pretty perfect. Future randomisation can dumb it down if needed! The engine now supports more complex firing patterns like fire once to launch, fire again to detonate, or hold-and-release activation. I've also included a classic mode toggle. Enable that to have every level as a single planet, no extra featu…
- Iteration 2 first draft goes live - 14 April 2018
Finally got it out the door! Woohoo! ːsteamhappyː This is the first step of Iteration 2, being a more fleshed out and solid version of ionAXXIA. There's procedural levels and star maps which are the precursor to the strategic sub-game to come next. AI is much improved and can be punishing on anything other than easy difficulty, which is where using your special abilities and scenery comes in. Component upgrades are in so you can increase things like engine speed, weapon range, damage, hull health, allowing you take on tougher challenges. There's still some engine work to do and no doubt a few bugs have still managed to sneak through despite god-knows how many hours playing and fixing and playing and fixing and playing and fixing... However, I'm in a position now where updates should be far more frequent. Each change - moving to a better sprite system to allow larger ships, adding second…
- 2018 - Progress report (or "what's up?") - 2 January 2018
Happy 2018! Here's what's been happening... My last update hoped to get ionAXXIA out before December. Ha. Ha ha. Ha ha haaaaa. Suffice to say, more life got in the way, including Christmas. That is the problem being a part-time dev; it's not just a lack of hours, but a lack of momentum so even when I had time to work on ionAXXIA, it was hard to focus and find clear goals. Booo. However, post-Christmas with a lot of thinking and pacing, I have a clearer sense of direction now. The AI is improved and the game plays better. Procedural star systems are in. And yesterday was spent solid, implementing a components upgrade system. This'll form a significant part of the game's progression. I'm thinking of a galactic map that gets harder as you move towards the centre, so you'll have to work on designing and building your ships to become stronger to conquer it. Very Diablo 3 rifts! Today I…
- 2018 - Progress report (or "what's up?") - 2 January 2018
Happy 2018! Here's what's been happening... My last update hoped to get ionAXXIA out before December. Ha. Ha ha. Ha ha haaaaa. Suffice to say, more life got in the way, including Christmas. That is the problem being a part-time dev; it's not just a lack of hours, but a lack of momentum so even when I had time to work on ionAXXIA, it was hard to focus and find clear goals. Booo. However, post-Christmas with a lot of thinking and pacing, I have a clearer sense of direction now. The AI is improved and the game plays better. Procedural star systems are in. And yesterday was spent solid, implementing a components upgrade system. This'll form a significant part of the game's progression. I'm thinking of a galactic map that gets harder as you move towards the centre, so you'll have to work on designing and building your ships to become stronger to conquer it. Very Diablo 3 rifts! Today I…
- Development progress report - 12 November 2017
Following an exciting launch on Steam, I've been eager to roll out updates quickly for my players and armed myself with a glorious Road-map to lead the way. Sadly, the sat-nav took me a different route and into a pond... Or rather, a lot of Real Life has gotten in the way and slowed progress. Also, a notable detour has been taken from the roadmap where I wasn't happy with the core game-play. A primary inspiration for ionAXXIA was the campaign mode in the original Star Control. I felt my current objective-based levels and repairing of ships produced a very different feeling game, where the currency aspect didn't make much sense and the ship values were pointless as the biggest, most expensive ship would always be the best. So, even though procedural level creation didn't take too long to get running, I decided against refining the procedural objectives for that as they'd need to be repla…
- Development progress report - 12 November 2017
Following an exciting launch on Steam, I've been eager to roll out updates quickly for my players and armed myself with a glorious Road-map to lead the way. Sadly, the sat-nav took me a different route and into a pond... Or rather, a lot of Real Life has gotten in the way and slowed progress. Also, a notable detour has been taken from the roadmap where I wasn't happy with the core game-play. A primary inspiration for ionAXXIA was the campaign mode in the original Star Control. I felt my current objective-based levels and repairing of ships produced a very different feeling game, where the currency aspect didn't make much sense and the ship values were pointless as the biggest, most expensive ship would always be the best. So, even though procedural level creation didn't take too long to get running, I decided against refining the procedural objectives for that as they'd need to be repla…
- Short delay. Sorry! - 25 September 2017
Sorry that the release deadline has been missed. Wanted to put together a video showing different inputs, and have discovered an issue where touch input doesn't work nicely on Windows where mouse buttons get phantomly pressed. A nice fix means rolling out another control scheme, Mouse, where presently mouse input just emulates touch. So that's a bit more work, but ionAXXIA should be out in a couple of days all being well. The good news is procedural level creation is progressing okay, so Iteration 1 should be out next month.
- Short delay. Sorry! - 25 September 2017
Sorry that the release deadline has been missed. Wanted to put together a video showing different inputs, and have discovered an issue where touch input doesn't work nicely on Windows where mouse buttons get phantomly pressed. A nice fix means rolling out another control scheme, Mouse, where presently mouse input just emulates touch. So that's a bit more work, but ionAXXIA should be out in a couple of days all being well. The good news is procedural level creation is progressing okay, so Iteration 1 should be out next month.
