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Outdated Variety is the spice of the Universe 1.0.1.1 for Enraged Koala

Over 50+ new biomes, 10+ new weather types, new music & more

  1. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    Last edited: Jan 26, 2014
  2. Med

    Med Phantasmal Quasar

    Hi, as we are beginning to see more biomes, or planet-types to be more descriptive, added via mods, I thought this might be a good time and place to discuss whether or not that is the best way to add content to the world.

    One alternative would be to keep a relatively low number of planet-types showing up in the starmap, but increase the number of sub-biomes possible on a given planet type.

    It might even be best to show only "hot", "mild", and "cold" planet types on the starmap and keep it completely secret what biomes you will actually find on the planet! This sounds a lot more like "exploration" to me than having 10-15 planet types which are completely predictable and choosable from our starmaps...

    Have you considered this approach?
     
  3. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    New biome to be added in the next update, Tarball!

    [​IMG]
    Features: Dead trees, slime, sewage, tar, boneboo, bones.
    Sub-Biomes: Bone field, Sewage field

    With the current asset system, I don't quite think it's possible for more then 1 sub-biome on a planet without modifying the game's internal code to support that. I may be wrong, though. Might be worth checking more into the asset files to check for a variable which can change that.

    As for it only showing the temperature, when it displays the planets biome, it displays the biome ID. Again, I don't quite think it's possible to mask the biome ID to display something else without modifying the games internal code.
    But... having it so it doesn't show the name or threat level on the planet might be possible, but with the current fuel cost it seems unreasonable to go to a moon-like planet and find yourself stranded having to mine coal because it's not what you wanted.
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2013
    Affero likes this.
  4. Med

    Med Phantasmal Quasar

    Thanks for your quick reply! I'm glad to have a better understanding of what's possible with the tools we currently have.

    I don't think it's possible to get stranded. Every planet seems to have coal, and most have wood, and it only costs 50 fuel to go to another planet in the solar system, of which there are usually a half-dozen.

    I recall looking at the code and seeing that the Forest biome, for example, has quite a few possible sub-biomes. But it sounds like your research says that on any given planet only one sub-biome will actually spawn. Is that right? If so, that still allows for my idea: throw 6-12 sub-biomes - eyeball trees, petrified forest, lakes, etc... - into each "planet-type" - forest, jungle, arid, etc... - and then, when you land there you may get a lot of water or very little, a lot of trees or very few, etc... :D This is, it seems, how the "forest" worlds work currently. You never know if you'll get eyeball trees, a glitch village, or something else entirely! I want to expand this paradigm to the other, more predictable planets.

    For example, it bothers me that you can find a desert, look at its color on the starmap, and with that already know exactly what you'll find there. I think that it would be more fun to sometimes find sand in a "desert", but other times find rock, or snow, and have the full color palette be possible.
     
  5. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    Yeah. I don't really get what point I was trying to make with that. What I mean is that a player would fly to a planet expecting something like... a forest expecting to build and settle there, but end up arriving at an arid biome having used your last bit of fuel. With bad luck, it could take up to 30 minutes to pick up enough fuel to fly somewhere else just to push your luck again because quite a lot of biomes look identical to others on the Starmap.
    Yep. The planet generator chooses one sub-biome listed in the biomes .surfacebiome file and inserts X amount of them onto a planet. 1 detached biome for "Tiny" and "Small" planets, 5 for "Large" planets, 6 for "Very Large" planets and 7 for "Huge" planets.

    This reminds me of how in livestream yesterday when Chucklefish was doing casual play together, Tiy tested inserting deserts, snow biomes and probably a few others into the forest biome. He also mentioned how it's only possible for one of them to be in the forest at once at the time, so he probably put them in as sub-biomes. I tried it myself and it works exactly how it worked in the livestream. Maybe he'll increase the amount of sub-biomes possible on one planet to allow more variation? If so, that'd be great.

    4 HOURS LATER EDIT: They went farther then just having deserts and snow biomes in the forest...
    Chucklefish. Why did you make it so that every biome can generate as a sub-biome in any biome.
    STOP.

    Now I want to have a dessert sub-biome in the desert. Maybe an entire planet based upon that too. I see what you mean, though.
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2013
  6. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    Dracyoshi updated Variety is the spice of the Universe with a new update entry:

    Annoyed Koala update | 2 new biomes

    Read the rest of this update entry...


    __________________________________________________

    For you guys...

    Gah, this "experimental" biome change is strange. While it adds more variation to worlds, sometimes it can produce extremely ugly results and allows biomes which would normally only be generated in later sectors like Sector X to generate in Sector Alpha.

    The other issue I had with it is that temperature and parallax don't work in the minibiomes. If the Arctic is generated as a minibiome in the Desert, it'll still have the same temperature and will still show dusty dunes in the background. Not to mention the.. meh biome transitions.

    This update does some changes to that, but doesn't entirely remove that feature. Temperature and parallax is still not fixed, as I don't think it is currently possible. Overall, I tried to make it seem more balanced by only generating biomes in similar temperature.
    For example: Arctic biomes would no longer generate in Deserts, but Savannahs would generate in Deserts.
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2013
  7. Med

    Med Phantasmal Quasar

    It sounds like the new update is being a huge bother for a mod like this! Sorry to hear that. I think this update is called Offended Koala.

    So, one way to fix the parallax transition would be to say, "Okay, on any given planet, all the biomes that can spawn there will have the same parallax picture, but recolored." So if the arctic wants to spawn in the desert, make the dunes white! Would that work?
     
  8. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    Dracyoshi updated Variety is the spice of the Universe with a new update entry:

    Musical Update


    Hah. You got to feel sorry for that Koala. What are they even doing to it?

    As for the parallax transition, I'd think a simple fade in would be enough to satisfy the transition needs. The main issue right now is that overworld minibiomes don't actually differentiate themselves from normal biomes, which is why the temperature and parallax doesn't change. Interestingly, underground minibiomes do.
     
    Last edited: Dec 15, 2013
  9. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

  10. DXLelouch

    DXLelouch Void-Bound Voyager

    do these biomes work with modded sectors like say Radium Expansions Omega Sector
    dont wanna edit the Celestial config file with them if it wont work
     
  11. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    celestial.config needs to be edited to add the biomes to a sector, yes.
     
  12. Dukko

    Dukko Void-Bound Voyager

    Hi, I noticed that when I travel to the forestsnow biome the game invariably hangs up at the FTL screen.
    Can I help you providing a log or something? If so, how? :D
     
  13. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    Steam\steamapps\common\Starbound\starbound.log
    Just upload the whole file to a site like pastebin.

    Odd though, I haven't experienced this myself.


    EDIT: Reproduced! I had the snow forest biome installed twice in my game files. When I packaged it into the mod, I didn't include all the files, but since I had a duplicate the game successfully loaded the biome for me. Going to fix the issue and update the mod in a second now. Excuse the incoming double post, mods!
    caused by: AssetException: No such asset '/biomes/surface/snowforest/snow.parallax'

    Thanks for letting me know.
     
    Last edited: Dec 19, 2013
    Dukko likes this.
  14. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    Dracyoshi updated Variety is the spice of the Universe with a new update entry:

    Minipatch #1 & #2

    Read the rest of this update entry...
     
    Last edited: Dec 19, 2013
  15. Dukko

    Dukko Void-Bound Voyager

    Great! So no need for that log right?
     
  16. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    Correct, no need for the log.

    As for some progress on the next update with biomes...
    I found a way to get eternal night in the mod for a planned biome, the mushroom forest. It'll have glowing mushrooms and whatnot. I know that the ideal behind that is similar to Terraria, but quite a few games did it before and no harm is done by adding it in this mod anyway. It's not like I'll be stealing assets or items.

    Image: http://i.imgur.com/8WmYlls.png

    That screenshot was taken during the "day". Next up, I need to actually implement the glowing mushrooms.

    EDIT: Oh... https://www.twitter.com/Tiyuri/status/413687028417433600 Welp.
     
    Last edited: Dec 19, 2013
  17. Shadow Wolf TJC

    Shadow Wolf TJC Spaceman Spiff

    Say, with so many modders releasing new biomes, items, and such for Starbound, perhaps you'd be willing to get together with a few other modders and work on creating a collaboration mod (much like with the Reborn mod for Terraria)?
     
    Dukko likes this.
  18. Dukko

    Dukko Void-Bound Voyager

    It'd be so awesome if you could team up with New Horizon modders...
     
  19. Raindrac

    Raindrac Existential Complex

    For now, I prefer working alone. But, that doesn't mean I wouldn't be fine with my mod being included in a "modpack" of sorts with me supporting it. In fact, I'd like that. The reason I'm trying to not include biomes which are listed as a possible biome in Shadowclaimer's unreleased Better Worlds mod is because I want people to use both mods when he releases it.
    New Horizon modders? I can't say I heard of them.

    By the way, progress on creating new biomes has stopped for now. I'm going to continue creating stuff in existing biomes and fixing bugs, but with two new biomes possibly being in the next update, I don't want to create a biome that'll be included officially in the next Starbound update. Tiy already confirmed a bio-luminescent biome right when I was working on a glowing mushroom planet.
     
  20. Dukko

    Dukko Void-Bound Voyager

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