Hello Steam !
Today's update takes multiplayer to a whole new level.
Multiplayer clients use to suffer from several parts of the game not looking the way it should, and while the game was usuable it was indeed a disadvantage to be the client in a multiplayer game due to limited visual feedback.
Clients will now see everything in game just as anyone else, including planned army actions (even chained actions), every little bit of info you can see through clouds around your visible area. Replay map at the end of the game is now also complete for clients !
Usage of the lobby has also been improved, so you can see when people are playing even if they are in game already and also join back a game you've been disconnected from !
There's also a bunch of new graphics options, in case you'd like to change the scale of UI for example or standard things such as resolution, fullscreen etc.
There's more listed right here:
Multiplayer
- Clients now receive the whole action chain after giving an order to their armies (i.e. when giving a colonize order, you see the colonizing areas before the army finishes moving and begins the actual colonize action)
- Now syncing replay data to clients when they finish the game
- It is now possible to join back a game after exiting it (in case of computer or internet reboot for example)
- Now showing already started public lobbies as unjoinable, showing "STARTED..." instead of the join button, except if able to late join due to being a member of the lobby before
- More fine grain area data syncing, less bandwidth wastage and fixes issues with late joining players not receiving some data properly
- Kicking player should now update lobby members correctly
- Players leaving lobby now warn others properly they left to update lobby members correctly
- Fixed rim of fog of war not showing the tiles underneath for clients
Visuals
- Now flashing tiles that can be colonized to further emphasis those have to be targeted by the colonize action and not the nearby tiles
UI
- All UI in the game can now be scaled with the new UI Scale graphics option
Balance
- Cities no longer provide an extra defense bonus (use to be x2 strength to the defending army)
Misc
- Added resolution, fullscreen, fullscreen mode, quality level and UI Scale graphics options
Bug Fixes
- Fixed some achievements not working properly
- Fixed max player option not getting set properly when creating a multiplayer lobby
- Fixed empire menu not displaying city gains including empire bonuses
Performance
- Optimized some of the materials used by city elements
- Slightly simplified some city buildings
More content that was close to ready but not quite yet had to be cut off for now as those fixes were deemed very important to put in your hands as soon as possible, feel free to expect cool stuff comming out next update !
Please let us know about your experiences in multiplayer, are your friends yelling badly when loosing land to the ocean like mine are ?
This version is not compatible with older ones for multiplayer games.
_met44
Changed files in this update