Ongoing progress

Posted November 12th, 2015 by Tynan Sylvester

Hello everyone! As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I’m still on a bit of a break here until early next year. However, I just wanted to update you on our ongoing progress.

With the magic of laptops and Internet, and excellent work from coding prodigy Piotr ‘ison’ Walczak, progress on the game itself is continuing at full speed even while I’m not at home. Currently I’m working something like quarter-time on finance, business, game design, PR and code consultation, while Piotr provides most of the mental muscle and keystrokes to actually write and refine the code. The end result is that we’re adding features almost as fast as we ever have.

We work iteratively, so things change a lot, often in unexpected ways. So I won’t go into detail about exactly what’s being added. But I can offer some generalities. So far, we’ve added:

  • Self-reproducing, spreading underground insect hives
  • Social relationships with friends, rivals, family, chats, arguments, and fights
  • Many more animals, some of which will hunt people
  • “Components” resource used for machinery and electronics
  • Ground-traveling trade caravans from other factions
  • Character records which keep stats on each character like number of kills, injuries, surgeries, etc.
  • Extreme desert biome

I appreciate all discussion but please don’t ask for more details on these! Check the FAQ for more info on why we don’t release detailed descriptions of unreleased designs.

I’m afraid there won’t be any releases until I’m back. I want to be fully present to manage the tricky and sometimes hectic process of testing and release. So I’m sorry you won’t see these goodies for a while. But that should mean the next version will be a bigger content jump than any before.

59 Responses to “Ongoing progress”

  1. Stonn

    That is unexpected. I did not think much is happening at the moment. But it sounds great! Thank you for the quick update on the things.

  2. Jaco

    ‘Extreme Desert’!?

    Get my Ozymandias boots!

  3. Sparklethong

    !!!Hype!!!

  4. Chriss

    Your game is total disaster for my life!

  5. Pantalaimon

    Take your time! Thanks for the update.

  6. Potemps

    It will be nice, if you will add something like Field of View, or something like fog of war, then the game will became much much harder ; >

  7. Peterowsky

    This is absolutely beautiful, thanks Tynan! Perhaps it’ll make for a (quite late) Christmas gift once you’re back?

  8. Chriss

    And hey Tynan, we definitely need relationships between pets and people much more than between people itself, i hope its going next after this update 🙂

  9. Mike

    Great stuff, wasn’t expecting any updates, or progress during this time, great to hear. Love the idea of more animals and animals hunting people!

    I also think the suggestion of a fog of war is actually a really good idea, and something I didn’t realize, but I’ve subconsciously always wanted in this game. You probably don’t want suggestions right now but if that were easy to do and could be made optional it would really add to the exploration of the map I think. Hope you will consider it.

    Enjoy the rest of your holidays!

    (make sure you take some full time off!)

  10. Michael

    Awesome thanks for the update. Have a good vacation.

  11. Björn

    Steam! I want to buy your game! =D

  12. DenChetto

    Extreme desert? Even more extremly then arctic with that wild winters -60 celsium and cannibalism? 🙂

  13. Chimichanga

    I’m already hyped!

  14. Mårten

    Still hoping for a Scandinavian Boreal forest biome where it’s -40 in the coldest winter and +32 a day or two in the summer.

  15. Bren

    WOW what a surprise! I can’t tell you how excited I am for trade from other factions. Thanks for keeping up the god work and I hope you enjoy your vacation!

  16. Calvin

    I think that guy who mentioned -60 degrees and cannibalism perfectly summed up the extreme arctic perfectly xD , anyway can’t wait for this update, and the fact that it been a while is no problem, man this update looks big! And enjoy the holiday 😉

  17. Henry

    One of the biggest requests I could have for any expanded relationship update would be good friends or better sharing the same bedroom or even the same bed space without negative thoughts. That way I don’t have to devote as much residential space to still get good thoughts for decent sized bedrooms.

    Either way… Glad to see work is continuing! Have fun on your vacation, Tynan.

  18. M

    Hype is coming!

  19. Rommie

    I’ve abandoned interest in this game. This game would do so well on early access, but no, you don’t want to do that.

    GJ, GJ…

  20. Alex

    “Social relationships with friends, rivals, family, chats, arguments, and fights”

    This is what I’ve been waiting ALL the years RimWorld as existed.

    Differently needs some attraction between males and females. Desire to be together as well as apart. This is make such interesting stories.

    What makes it more fun if someone is jealous when a couple is seen together, but make her mood drops down to the point where she might break and go berzerk.

  21. Jelon

    When it will be on Steam? Anyway, good news. 😀

  22. Mash

    Sounds great.

    Will water ever become important in this game? Water pumps and pipes, water well, irrigation, showers, sinks, etc..?

  23. Dave

    Can’t wait, keep up the great work!

  24. Kevin

    Trade Caravans?! Now I can actually mod in Brahmin and have a full-scale Fallout experience!

  25. AllenWL

    “Social relationships with friends, rivals, family, chats, arguments, and fights

    Does this mean that we can get fights of various intensities(life-or-death battles, friendly scuffle, angry arguments, etc) and superficial wounds(scraps/scratches that don’t bleed/bleed very little, hits that don’t bruise, etc)? Because otherwise, I can totally see colonies self-destructing because pawns are punching each other unconscious(or dead) over every argument that turns into a fight.

    Plus, it would be totally neat to put two pawns in a sparring match against each other.

  26. johnnysantonio

    “Self-reproducing, spreading underground insect hives”

    Can’t have a sci-fi game without giant man eating insects 😛

  27. Marcus Lawrence

    Good job, extreme desert will enable Dune mode, and colonist’s became freeman’s yay.

  28. Ken

    It would be nice if in future updates the colonists can procreate, also more variety of weapons and clothing would be nice. Overall I think the game is very fun.

  29. Sammi

    Just wanted to say, this game has me hooked and im always checkingthis blog and other parts of your site for news. Super excited to hear more is in the works and on the way. Love what you guys are doing, it is always getting better.

    From the Jungle Biome of Kornephoros, regards-

    Commander Sammi

  30. ciditi

    underground insect hives… ffffffff

    starship troopers anyone? 🙂 I think we need like flamethrower turrets now or something.

    Totally didn’t expect feature adding while you were on vacation, really excited to see the new relationship dynamics, and machinery components.

    Great work!

  31. Vetch

    Wow, amazing things are coming and I am so thankful for this news. It’s not an update but still to get this info during my birthday kinda counts.

    Couple things here, one, fog of war would be silly since you see the terrain during the drop and presumably are receiving updates from something in orbit, two, I fully agree we need water please, three, procreation would require an awfully long game for people unless balanced out, cloning would perhaps be better.

    What I would most like to see at this point though is continuation of the game AFTER building your ship and blasting off. Here are the main points for why this SHOULD happen. There are pirates operating in the system, what is to keep them from cutting your trip short unless you deal with them? You had a better ship before the disaster and still ended up in the stew pot. It would really expand the story if you had to travel to other places on planet to acquire parts for the ship. It would expand the story even further if you had to choose what to do once you could travel in space, either go home, go to war against pirates and slavers, become pirates and slavers or engage in battle with the mechs. It would also expand the story if your colonists had opinions based on backstory and those colonists who disagreed with your choice became an enemy faction.

    Now going a bit further into possible story mode, I am in love with the backstory for the Android, can that get worked a bit more into the game? Particularly in conjunction with the war veteran, give us options please for really bringing home this story of a war between synths and organics, with the Android and war veteran among the central cast. And one of the best parts of any good story is the unexpected ironic twist, so the Android could become an ally of the War Veteran. Just some ideas for taking this game to the next level at some future time, though I suspect you don’t need the help!

  32. Falcongrey

    Love the sound of things. Once this is in the game, I may look into trying to ‘mod’ a little with creating ‘Easter egg’ worlds. Would be cool to enter into the generator “Dune” and a planet resembling Arrakis be the result among other ones… like “Hoth” and so on.

    Granted…. if these Easter Eggs end up already into the game, that would save me a world of a headache of trying to learn things while fighting with a memory damage disability. (Still might be fun…)

  33. Comrade

    Just like Ken, I think human procreation is something we need in this next update, hopefully this new social relationships element will allow for that. Also, further down the line, the ability to create a web of colonies, just like the stargate mod (It’s called Enhanced Defense/Development if you’re not aware of it). Keep up the awesome work guys!

  34. Mur

    I understand I don’t know of the current direction of the game or what has been added but I would like to state that during this time the “Superior Crafting” mod has stopped being in development and it made me understand how much I enjoy this modset with the game.

    I would really love to have a lot of its function brought into the core gameplay because I think that would be a good thing for long term gameplay, complexity and just all around fun.

    Just something to think about.

  35. Mark

    Hmmm… Rim World, in my opinion can take a variety of approaches of establishing Social relationship elements. I agree with Vetch’s and Ken’s approach on cloning or procreation but in my opinion procreation seems much of a better choice because it establishes a sort of History within the survivors. Having procreation also sort of makes the game more challenging rather than a game that is less of a challenge. On the other note I believe Vetch has a very interesting idea about cloning because it will make the gameplay shorter and less of a hassle. The ability to clone would also maybe allow you to keep your favorite survivors that in return will make it very easy to replace dead ones. However, cloning would be the same thing as cheating in the game. Rim World is a story based and surviving game, adding the element of caring for a babies can make it both enticing and unpredictable. I do get Vetch’s argument that it’ll be very frustrating to care for a baby but maybe when they grow up they can be very useful. (Make it easier for babies to grow faster to a teen) Such as being haulers or cleaners as a teen but not being able to do harder things like shooting, melee, etc. Love this game.

  36. Alex

    I believe procreation is a GREAT idea.

    To some people, a child makes life worth living you know?

    Imagine if we finally set foot on Mars. The first 4 settlers from Earth. They are colonies. But when the first human was born on Mars,

    They will not be called Earthlings, but Martians.

    That would be a huge-step in the History of RimWorld Social-ness. Make it happen RimWorld! Let the first Rim-ers be born!

    PS: I feel cloning is fine, as long as it’s balanced = or CRAZILY expensive.

  37. Alex

    I’m so hyped.
    This will probably the best RimWorld update of all time: with that very sweet social-drama-element in it.

    After all: our head is what keeps us alive, but our hearts and emotions makes us human.

  38. Ken

    When is Rim World going to be on steam? I want to buy the game so much but I’m waiting till it gets to steam. I’m not asking the developers to hurry up because I don’t want them to be pressured and this game is a masterpiece, they should really take their time so it doesn’t look like a last minute project. I’m just curious if maybe someone on here has a clue.


  39. I don’t mind waiting for an update, so take your time and make it a great one! The last update was already really cool and I’m looking forward to the announced new features.

    I already got my money’s worth and I guess I’m not alone.. so how about setting up patreon, so we can give you a little extra for every update?

  40. Henry

    Straight up cloning I’m unsure but think it’d be too easy, but what about birthing vats? Colonists that like each other can mix in their genetics and childhood memory scans. Child spends a few months growing in the vat. Out pops a teenager (whatever the minimum age for colonists in the game is. I think I’ve seen them as young as fourteen or fifteen?) who has some small amounts of skills based on the uploaded memories and is ready to work. Could limit it by requiring some manner of Slug Plug that can only be purchased from passing traders? Basically a ready made recipient for genetic material that takes the genes and then grows into a fully formed human after some time. Could be a good way to get more pawns without having to convert captives or buy slaves.

  41. William

    It is games like these that I wish i was part of designing… absolutely love this game and these updates sound great.

  42. Raf's

    When can he expect optimization and performense improvements? il he have them before the games hits beta?

  43. Thunderclone

    Hey, I am a writer. I would love to help in anyway I can.
    I love your game. The story telling that can occur within it is so gripping. I would like to write descriptions or dialogues or backgrounds for you.
    Email me with the Subject Write for Rimworld

    tell me what you need

  44. Sorenzo

    Aww. Underground insect hives? Sounds great. But I want underground insect hives NOW! 🙁

    Seriously, though, you’ve worked very hard on the game and I could never begrudge you a well-earned break from full-time work. I’m sure it can get stressful.


  45. Your endless vacation is a waste. Life is not so easy I hope you appreciate the work done and invest the money you have gained wisely. It is these things that killed many well known game studios. Self Control is crucial.

  46. Mark Kendrik

    You Guys are awesome!
    That is great i want only say many thanks for all your work and enjoy your Break.

  47. Ken

    I’m hoping there would be a population cap increase. I agree with Derek don’t forget the game because it is really good. Don’t abandon it. Enjoy ur vacation.

  48. Brainbug

    Hm. So, no multiplayer, this time?

    😉

  49. zandadoum

    I welcome all those new features, but I’d appretiate if more effort would be put into QA and efficiency, like better support for multithreading. game slows down to the point of total freeze with huge manhunter packs raids, but the CPU usage is barely over 15%

  50. Skip

    I’ll agree that I would love to see water become a part of the game.

  51. zerggodmaster

    the game is very well done and when i tested the hardest difficulty somehow the game sent over 200 manhunter mosquitos which in turn is not quite fair but it does bring a challenge to the game (no lag though)

  52. TheApolaustic1

    I wasn’t expecting any updates during the break either (that’s great that you’ve found a code monkey that synergizes with you! And if you’re thinking of hiring more, I know a guy who’s looking…). It’s especially cool because it sounds like a lot of the things that were being worked on were things I have been wanting for a long time.

    Would it be too much to hope that because of this update’s timing being based on your return more so than the code, we’ll get a soft release date? Maybe just the month? :p

  53. zac

    plz fix animals breeding to thanks

  54. Hartschteiler

    Wait wait wait….

    “Self-reproducing, spreading underground insect hives”

    Does that mean a Z-Axis is comming into the game
    ? Maybe more then one?

    Can my dreams come true? Since i do believe having the z-axis unlocked is the only thing that makes Dwarf-Fortress stronger in gameplay then Rimworld. 🙂

  55. Jonb

    so pretty much what you are trying to say is I already got paid guess ill take a vacation. The devs these days, what happened to the days when developers worked non stop on a title and then got to reap the benefits after they finished a game. Now we buy games in the early stages and they take there sweet time but when funding is used up because of taking so long the project gets abandoned. I really really hope this isnt the road this game is gonna take

  56. Lupus

    @Jonb: What the hell are you talking about? No one would expect anyone to work non-stop on anything. People need personal time, you know? This is not some triple A game by some megacorporation with hundreds of developers to offset vacation time. Give the man a break and be patient.

  57. tiba

    insect as animals could be nice ?

  58. zerggodmaster

    the game is currently on the Z and X axis and it will possibly be adding the Y axis

  59. Hartschteiler

    @Zerggodmaster

    Actually no, currently we are “watching the game” from the Z axis if we are using the Cartesian coordinate system.

    The game map, so far, is limited to the x (left to right) and y (up and down) axis (given the viewers point is definded as Z-Axis).

    But, whatever you want to put it, i’d really love to see the “quarzeö” axis getting used, making building towers and/or underground bases usable like in dwarf fortress. 😉