Originally posted by author: A Message from RocketRead more
We release the key content for free in our updates, pairing them with companion DLCs that contain adjacent or decorative content. For a detailed outline of our strategy you can read more below [expand type=showmore]On 4 December 2021 we released ICARUS to deservedly mixed reviews. It was a big project for a new studio and our launch was filled with plenty of stumbles. At a certain point you have to stop making the game you think you should be making, and start making the game you actually have. We took a deep look at how we were operating and committed to doing a update every week to earn the trust of the community. We did so, every single week, with not a single one missed including through COVID lockdowns, two serious floods, a tropical cyclone, a gas leak, and an active shooting.
We are carving out an approach that involves releasing consistent free updates...
Originally posted by author: Pets Bundle available for Pre-Purchase... Read more
This is the first time we have a bundle that features a "bundle only" package. To minimize the chances that things break, we are preparing as much as possible ahead of time. Just in time for its release alongside the free Laika update next week, we've just made the Pets Bundle available on Steam. This contains the Pet Companions and Creature Comforts content packs, and as a bonus you will get access to the Zebra Rescue Mission - only available if you purchase the bundle.
Hello. Thanks for your reply. And why are Vehicles unfun?
While mounts are only faster than the character when they sprint, but slower when they get exhausted. And moving is a lot of time just the mather of wasting 20mins to get somewhere, without any point. Feels like old OG dayz (walking siumlator).
The vehicles needed our extensive plans for the orbital station, as they were heavily component driven. You would drop down, get the stuff you needed, go to orbit, make better engine etc... When that was taken away, the vehicles were magical devices that kind of just undid the whole idea of movement and going around.
Without all of that the game is a "walking simulator". It is designed as "cavemen in spacesuits", like a Peter F. Hamilton book. So the game is heavily balanced around prepping for a hike basically. That was what was achievable and what the game focused on.
Don't understand, why vehicles work in other games, but not in Icarus.
Icarus seems to have problems with graphical rendering. I have a RTX 3090 and Icarus can bearly do 60 FPS on 2k Mon, while I game Dayz on 120 FPS on High settings. It seems that all Area (even if not looked by the player) is rendered in full detail or sth. And even then, when you enter a cave or sprint in a new chunk, the area is not loaded fully.
As an enthusiast of Icarus, I am really curious, if the development is working on bettering the graphical rendering, and furthermore planning to add vehicles, later, when rendering is fixed?
I didn’t say they didn’t work, I said they caused performance and balance issues. Most especially with how we made the world.
There are enormous amount of trees in the game, and other rocks. How ICARUS tracks the world is more memory intensive than other games, allowing us to set trees on fire and other things.
Loading in/out of chunks is the cause of lots of memory “churn” and this loading in/out causes or exacerbated the circumstances that cause stuttering.
We had vehicles working but they were not fun, and not performant. Additional work would have to be done on a lot of areas for vehicles to have a fun game loop.
Done is the catch all close for tickets on feature upvote. Essentially the ticket has been reviewed and it is not planned.
Vehicles were added to the game and removed during development, as they were not fun and causing significant performance problems.
Instead, they were replaced with tamed animals. These use existing systems and are slow enough to not exacerbate streaming terrain and cave performance issues that vehicles bring.
Originally posted by author: Warning: Next week we are planning on rolling out a patch that our optimization team has been hard at work on. It involves a long standing issue with patch times. Due to the way steam's patching process works with UE4 games there has been issues in the past with some people experiencing long download and patching times. What we are doing is adjusting the way Icarus is being packed and distributed to work better with steams patching process.... Read more
This means that next week you will need to redownload the entire Icarus game but it also means that Icarus updates going forward will patch noticeably faster from week to week and the size on disk will be reduced.
This update will not effect your save files, all progress will be maintained.
Due to this we plan on rolling out next weeks patch a day early as to not interrupt anyone's regular weekend play time.