Hello starchasers! Demo 1.8 represents our first major update in almost half a year (though to be fair it would have been sooner had I not been trapped in a cabin in the remote wilderness for four of those months. It's also possibly our biggest update since the demo's launch, bringing in the first two campaign missions, stormchasing, and much much more. Check out the changelog.

KNOWN ISSUES: 

• Cockpit model textures are currently placeholders.
• Station interior models and lighting are all currently placeholders.
• Joystick and controller support vestigial and more or less not implemented and having a controller plugged in can introduce weirdness.
• NPC chatter happens much too frequently. 
• Initial loading times are still long and the game might freeze up during it, please be patient.
• Fading transitions might sometimes be interrupted or sudden.
• Campaign and quest dialogue is currently unvoiced or temporarily voiced.
• Some minor music errors might occur during play.
• Tutorial simulation is a placeholder. 
• Player can walk away from some cutscenes, softlocking things.

NEW CONTENT & FEATURES

• Main Campaign: The first two missions of the game’s main storyline have been added. Join up with the Idolsmashers and find yourself embroiled in a story of cults, swords, and madness. Starting a new game will automatically thrust you into the main storyline, while pre-existing saves can start it by heading to the UHC center on Planet Vauldric. 
• Storms: A major feature, now no longer just a promise. Check the galaxy map and you’ll find various weather blowing across the galaxy. Be wary of storms, as they’ll introduce hazards, new kinds of enemies, and more! But if you’re capable of braving and destroying the rifts they generate (found within any nebula in a stormed system), you’ll be well rewarded.
• Working Cockpits: All demo ships have (untextured) cockpit models that can be customized at any ship customization outlet. 
• Party Members
• Ticker Relays: Take down a ticker relay, found in every settled system, and you’ll find there’s consequences! Do it a few more times, and you’ll find quite a few MORE consequences!  
• Battleship Wreckage: Out in Moncreise you might come across enormous derelicts, the result of a decades old and very violent battle. Cargo containers filled with lots of various things can be found throughout the wreckage field, but be wary of mimics!
• Service Stations: Don’t want to use the UI when docked on a base? Service stations can be found throughout it, offering a chance to take jobs, read the news, or properly service your starship.
• Storage System: Store unused, but not unwanted, equipment! You can find storage systems on most major bases, which will let you store over 100 items. Sadly, Ijunus Supply isn’t offering more space for demo users at this time.
• Ambient Explosion system: Bigger battles can get intense! So intense that the flak and fire will cause ambient explosions! Hot damn!

CHANGES

• Massive memory improvements across the board. Users should see significantly faster load times, with memory usage cut in half at minimum! As a tradeoff, transferring between systems takes longer.
• Sparkplatform’s fight redone. New graphics, new textures, new attacks, new effects! 
• Redone graphics on scrapfields and large scrapfields! Far more model detail, yet ironically better performance!
• New menu options! Hide the cockpit in first person mode, hide your inventory’s graphics if you want to see your game running during it, and rebind additional controls.
• Improved quest and campaign markers. Questmarkers can specifiy individual rooms on a station, and in-game tutorials can give specific, key-dependent directions. 
• Improved UI visuals and improvements. The navmap now has 2D icons for readability, and all UI elements have background shading to make them more readable under certain circumstances. 
• Ship customization window redone to user sliders, rather than color wheels. Way less buggy!
• Docking and autopilot changes: Docking for both NPCs and players is far faster, and far less prone to spinning out. Still, maybe learn to dock manually?
• Quick-action command: Holding shift + clicking or shift + right clicking will execute actions without having to navigate menus. Quickly sell, transfer, equip, or eject your various pieces of equipment without the extra hassle!
• Waypoint changes: Waypoints now auto-update based on the waypoint closest to you, and perform better overall!  
• Heavy weapon overhaul: Heavy railguns are far easier to aim, and heavy weapons have gotten a wiiiiiiide variety of new equipment added. Exploders, railguns, chargers. A select few are in the demo for you to try out.
• Thrusters rebalanced for better charge and recharge times.
• Trying to manually dock no longer keeps you at high speeds, just in case.
• Changed some UI coloring based on user feedback.
• Pause menu now offers tips.

BUGFIXES

• Various fixes to crashes, freezes, and performance drops. 
• Fixed issue where various musics wouldn’t play at their appropriate times. 
• Fixed issue where the player couldn’t target certain objects.
• Fixed spacing and grammatical errors with various UI elements and readable entities. 
• Fixed issue where photomode wouldn’t work properly when docked on stations.
• Fixed issue where shipbuying and adding ships to your garage would cause duplicate items and throw nullreference exceptions.
• Fixed issues with quests not updating properly despite fulfilling their requirements.
• Fixed issues where saves made mid-mission wouldn’t load. 
• Fixed issues with NPCs flying through planets and stations, or spawning inside them.
• Fixed CONTACT hud issues where it wouldn’t update properly.
• Fixed issue where you could transfer between station rooms while paused or in some form of menu.
• Fixed some mislabeled tooltips. 
• Fixed issue where manual docking would occasionally sling you into a planet when you weren’t the first guy in line.
• Fixed issue where finished fights would cause NPCs to teleport.
• Fixed issue where GOTO with autopilot wouldn’t stop GOING TO.
• Fixed some effects that were ending too early.
• Fixed some textual errors with the best buying price UI.
• Fixed issue where you couldn’t unequip items in your inventory when docked.
• And many, many, many, many, MANY more.