Moon Breakers Newswire

Moon Breakers,

Today we just released an update that fixes a number of frequently reported issues and adds the #1 requested feature;  custom key mapping. Here are the details:

• Stability issue fixes
  • We have added OpenGL 2.0 support to prevent the glGenFrameBuffers crash
  • Fixed the load-based random server crash
  • Fixed a crash resulting in leaving the Main Menu before the MotD data was downloaded
  • Fixed the updateInventory and updateUserInfo crashes
  • We are still seeing Steam builds deliver corrupted files occasionally. If you see a PnGError crash, something went wrong with the update and re-downloading should fix it until we can implement a permanent solution
• Custom key mapping; you can now go to Options (at the Main Menu or in-game) and select Controls. This will allow you to re-map most of the major controls to mouse and keyboard inputs. We are in the middle of getting joystick support and, yes, inverted Y-axis for mouse and joystick for you Sim enthusiasts (we heard your lament). This is the first pass on allowing for much greater customisation in the future, let us know what you think.

We’ve seen an AMAZING response to our Steam release yesterday, many thanks to all you new pilots, and all you pilots who have been flying with us since Day One for your support! We’re hard at work on the next round of features, maps and fixing issues as they come up, so stay tuned.

Greetings Moon Breakers,

In anticipation of tomorrow’s Steam launch we have updated Moon Breakers (for both versions) to include a bevvy of improvements:

• Afterburner fuel tanks have been increased on all bombers
• Nighthawk has had a slight improvement to turn rate and afterburner speed
• Control changes have been implemented through feedback from new users
  • A and D now roll your ship
  • Q and E now fire your primary and secondary weapons
  • R and V now show Rear View and Zoom View, respectively
• Help windows have been added as one-time popups for new users, explaining the basics of the UI. Additionally pressing F1 and F2 will bring up help screens when flying. F1 shows the default controls and F2 describes the current gametype
• The arrow cursor is now hidden when flying (Steam version)
• The aiming reticule is now constrained to the active window while flying (Steam version)
• In CTF mode, the flag cannot be returned by defenders when dropped. It can be picked up by the other team or will return after its thirty second time out period (requiring it be defended)
• New skyboxes and lighting have been added to Broken Moon and Broadsides maps
• Resolution has been increased on the Carrier textures
• Rockets now do scaled damage to whatever ship they hit, allowing them to do greater damage to Bombers and heavier ships.

Help screens have been added for new players

A small update today; we’ve had many reports of pilots showing up the game as <Null> instead of their actual Pilot IDs. We’ve fixed this issue and all you need to do is refresh your Google browser and log back in to update the game.

Greetings Moon Breakers. Today we deployed a tuning and bug fix update that includes:

• Ships with Beam Cannons can now upgrade their range in the Upgrade screen.
• Beam Cannon shots now travel slightly faster
• Fast Cannon shots now have a slightly higher rate of fire and velocity
• Capture the Flag mode now awards 200Cred to the entire team when an enemy flag is captured
• Zoom (Middle Mouse Button) and Rear View (Down Arrow) are now also mapped to the ‘R’ and ‘V’ keys respectively
• The recently added ships have undergone modeling and texture updates
• UI backdrop and transparency has been updated to look better.

Important Information Below!

In addition, we’ve made some changes to how you’ll need to log into the game. Currently, we use Uber Entertainments “Ubernet” service to run our servers and provide back-end support for Moon Breakers. To continue using an increasing suite of features we’re switching to authenticating users directly through Ubernet which means if you don’t have an account already you’ll need to go through a one-time process to sign up (you’ll also have access to Super Monday Night Combat, Uber’s new free-to-play action MOBA title). After that you can use either your Ubernet or Google account to sign in to play Moon Breakers. Here’s a simple walk-through process;

 When you click “Sign In” from the main page, you’ll see this screen:

If you’ve been using your Google account to play Moon Breakers, be sure to click the “Sign In With Google” link to keep all of your character data and purchases.

The first time you do this you’ll need to complete the Ubernet account registration:

Fill in the blanks and then hit “Create New Account” and voila, you’re done.

Now you’ll be able to use either your Google or Ubernet account to sign into Moon Breakers. Please let us know if you have problems on the user forum at http://moonbreakers.userecho.com. 

Pilots,

We’ve just added nine new ships to the Hangar today (details) below. In order to get community feedback and let everyone try them we’ve unlocked them all for a limited period of time. In a few days we’ll be locking them down for Cred/He-3, so get flying! Our long-running 30% off launch sale is also going to wrap up, so if you need He-3 make sure you stock up now. The team here will be tuning these ships pretty aggressively over the next couple of days, both from internal playtests and looking at pilot feedback so if you have thoughts – good or bad – on any of the new craft head over to http://moonbreakers.userecho.com and post your thoughts.

So what’s new about these ships? Well, we’ve added a new class (Medium Fighter) that bridges the gap between lights and heavies. We’ve also added 2 new light fighters, heavy fighters and bombers with differing specifications and weapon loadouts including some “top tier” ships (the Merlin for example) that will take a lot of Cred to unlock, as “prestige” ships. You can check out their combat and flight specifications in the Hangar, but here are the descriptions to give you a feel for the latest additions:

Light Fighters

F-10 Krait
Sporting a standard Tion 500TW beam cannon and two rocket pods, the F-10 is St. James Shipwright’s answer to Irata’s Nighthawk, built to strafe ground- and asteroid-based facilities as well as clear minefields in deep space. However, with remarkable speed and heat dissipation the Krait is also a capable bomber-hunter and is favoured by Independent border patrol forces.

V-66 Viper
The V-66 is a militarised version of the Z-60, a renowned luxury craft hand-built on Dawnstar and sought after by every collector of fine ships in the galaxy. Combining a deadly mix of speed, agility and dripping with venom, the Viper can outfight almost anything that it encounters. A favourite for Ace Moon Breakers as both a working fighter and a living trophy, only top pilots can ever hope to even see a Viper, let alone fly one.

Medium Fighters

FM-25 Nighthawk
After the Culture War, many Pirate clans begun re-using abandoned fortified asteroids as operational bases. The medium-class Irata FM-25 was a Government bunker-buster, designed to strafe and eliminate gun turrets and defence infrastructure with long-range beam cannons. The name “Nighthawk” was bestowed by terrified turret gunners. In practice, while powerful at range, the FM-25 lacks the turning speed and zest to hold its own in a dogfight against other medium or light fighters.

G5 Kingfisher
The G5 was dubbed “Kingfisher” by test pilots early in its production due to its long, beak-like cannon housing. This medium fighter was developed to capitalise on the growing number of freelance pilots and bounty hunters need for faster, heavily armed interceptors. The G5 trades shielding for stopping power and speed, making it the lightest craft in wide service outfitted with a 50mm cannon.

X99 Merlin
Legendary amongst Moon Breakers across known space is the X99 series. An experimental medium fighter line commissioned by a notorious privateer, only a handful of X99s were handbuilt by Wilson R&D before a military raid cancelled production. Fast, nimble, and sporting an unusual wide-spread configuration for it’s three machine guns, only the best, or most resourceful, pilots will live to sit behind the controls of a Merlin.

Heavy Fighters

FH-250 Swordfish
Heavy fighters are mainstays of modern space combat, but often find themselves behind the frontlines due to lack of speed. The FH-250 overcomes this limitation with the addition of Wilson A590 afterburners, giving it lighting-fast boosts of speed that take it in and out of combat with ease. The Swordfish is a finely balanced and deadly machine only fielded to Ace fighter pilots who can handle the skill needed to control her.

A80 Barracuda
A veteran of three major wars, the A80, while classified as a heavy fighter, is commonly referred to as a gunboat due to its heavy shielding and focus on firepower over speed. The “teeth” of the A80 are it’s dual missile pods that lend it the name Barracuda. In combat the A80 is used to shred other fighters with barrages of short-range warheads from a safe range.

Bombers

H4B Bison
The Bison’s origins lie in the H4 line of armoured freighters that Erlangen Werft built for corporate transport interests throughout the Rim. Captured models were outfitted with torpedo launchers instead of cargo bays by groups of marauders and eventually the H4B, a militarised version came into being as Erlangen sought to capitalise on the demand for heavy bombers.

B-10X Panther
Designed by the legendary Jennings Group, the prototype model B-10X was based on a rare and proprietary alloy that granted it unparalleled speed and maneuverability. However the cost of producing the secret metal proved prohibitive in the post-war economy and only a small number were built. Replacing standard defensive machineguns with high-velocity 50mm cannons makes it a highly sought-after craft for Ace bomber pilots who have accumulated the reputation to own one.

We’re looking forward to seeing you put these birds through their paces!

Greeting Moon Breakers,

Today we’ve deployed an update that adds the new Capture the Flag game mode to all maps. CTF is a different kind of game that will require a little more co-ordination and teamwork to win so we’re excited to see it go live. The rules are pretty simple:  each team needs to grab the Flag (which is, naturally, an He-3 gas tank) from the landing platform on the enemy Carrier and bring it back to their own platform to capture it. Three enemy flag captures wins the game. If you get shot down while you’re carrying the enemy flag it will float in space for thirty seconds before return to its platform (the flag HUD icon will flash faster as the timer counts down) allowing the enemy team to retrieve it or your team mates to grab it again. Your team’s flag is always the green flag icon and the other side’s is always a red flag icon.

That’s pretty much it! Here’s a guide to the new icons:

Now that CTF is live we’re rolling on some of the other features and updates on our taskboard. We’ll be looking at the new player experience as well as adding more content to the hangar – we’ll follow up with details soon. If you have feedback or problems playing make sure you check out our community forums.

It’s been a little while since our last update so we wanted to let you know what’s coming up soon…

First off in response to many pilots asking for more game modes we’ve been hard at work on getting Capture the Flag (CTF) up and running. It’s functionally running now (screenshots below) but there’s more work to be done to get it polished and tested. Still, we’re pretty close to deploying so keep an eye out for our next update! CTF will initially be pretty simple. Each side’s Carrier will have a platform on the upper side where their flag (A container of compressed H3-3, naturally) will sit. When a pilot swoops over the other side’s flag it will attach to their ship (and may affect their ship’s performance!) and they’ll need to get it back to their own Carrier to score a Capture. The team that gets three Captures, or has the most when the timer hits zero, wins. EAch team will need to defend their flag while making runs on the other side’s as well as be prepared to defend the flag runner back home. It’s a very different kind of game and we hope pilots will have fun coming up with new tactics and strategies for it. Here are a couple of in-development screenshots of CTF in action:

Chasing an opponent with a stolen flag!

The Government's flag platform, mounted on the Carrier and defended by the upper turrets.

Another new feature in the next update will be localisation! Still lots of polish to be done but we’ve done some preliminary work on translating the game for other languages to make it easier for pilots around the world to compete.

As always we’ll let you know as soon as the update goes live, so stay tuned and start practicing your boom-and-zoom flag run tactics!

Greetings Moon Breakers. We just updated the game to include a new gameplay feature (Bounties) as well as a handful of fixes;

• The High Value Target system is in effect. Now, when a pilot racks up a high score streak without being destroyed he or she will become a HVT. This will put a “bounty” marker over their ship, visible to all pilots on the other side, and inform them of how much Cred the bounty is for. Destroy an HVT and you get the bounty all to yourself. The higher your score streak, the higher the bounty will go, up to 1000Cred! If you’re skilled enough to earn a bounty, and you finish the round with a price on your head, you will earn the bounty yourself, so try to stay alive. Wondering why everyone is trying to shoot you down all of a sudden? Check the scoreboard to see if you’re a High Value Target!
• The missile locking system has been further updated. Now, the lock-on timer will be gradually reduced the closer you are to your target, up to 50% less (0.5 seconds for short-range and 0.75 seconds for standard missile).
• The scoreboard has been updated with shorter ship names and the aforementioned bounty region
• Particles have been optimised for improved performance on low-spec machines – if you’ve been suffering from low frame-rate let us know if this helps!

We’ll be tuning the High Value Target system over the next several updates to let us know what you think.

Moon Breakers Update!

CRED SCORING

• So first, a correction; the scoring changes we made last week were actually not turned on in code when we posted the 3/28 update. That’s entirely our mistake and was brought to light by several players who realised that Cred was not adding up as it should. We think we’ve finally got it now, so Cred in Carrier Assault should be working as intended. 
• In Search and Destroy we are no longer giving Cred for Carrier or torpedo kills, but we are still giving Cred for taking out turrets. This is to more definitively separate the two game modes.

ADDITIONAL STUFF

• Missile locking has been updated to what we had originally intended for the game. Like before, to establish lock for seeking missiles a target will need to be kept in the central targeting circle on the HUD. As a lock “builds” red markers will appear and move inwards. When the markers enter the circle and it turns red, a lock has been established and the missile will track. Losing a lock or firing a missile will mean you need to re-establish it. 
• We’ve been trying to fix the audio issues that have been reported. We think we’ve made some significant improvements but feedback from Moon Breakers pilots will be a great help if you continue to hear stuttering, audio/music drop out our other sound bugs.
• Finally, we’ve added a sound cue for torpedoes (beeping while arming). Just to make things a little clearer in combat for our brave bomber pilots!

Refresh your browser to get the latest! As always, please let us know what you think or report issues here on forums: http://moonbreakers.userecho.com/