Hello Blackvoxel players,

We are proud to announce the deeply reworked release of Blackvoxel V2.0.

The months of silent work for this release bring a complete rebalanced and reworked game, the addition of a lot of new stuff and tools, various improvements and redesign, a new airplane and, finally, the introduction of the game missions(complete list of changes and improvements bellow).
In addition to this, we made a Raspberry Pi 2/3 port. Despite it's little CPU and GPU, we managed to make a full game port running with a good framerate.

If you enjoy our work, you'll be happy to hear we are working on ways for you to support the game developpement. Stay tunned for this.

Enjoy the game and don't hesitate to signal any bug or problem in the forum.

The Blackvoxel Team

 
The Complete list of changes and improvements

Completely Rebalanced Gameplay

We replayed a very long time with the game. This experience along with the community returns lead to a complete game rebalancing.

• Easer starting, more "beginner friendly".
• A smoothest evolution.
• Added more affordable elements.
• More guidance for playing : introduced the missions.
• Added "the missing stuff" : the things that were missing to all of us.

Main changes and additions

• Finally introduced the missions (use the RTFM cube).
• A new airplane : the training Plane Z0. Very affordable but need runway.
• Runway for airplanes.
• A lot of machines are now much more affordable.
• Rebalanced distribution of ores.
• A new distant location with much more ores.
• New set of "low cost" range of automations for early game phase.
• Added 3 new mining robots and rebalanced the 3 existing one for more power.
• Finished the Tool System and the Powers System along with several new tools.
• Location system device for world navigation.
• Complete universe documentation and map (in the manual).
• New Analyser tool : can display a lot of informations on many voxels and machines. Can show what elements are now in a machine and composition of molten metals (great help for metalurgy).
• Deeply redesigned overall look of the game.
• Ground Analyser, let you know what's in ground here.
• Rotation tool for conveyor belts (yes, finally).
• Added a new kind of mid game voxel transmitter network.
• Inventory is now preserved on death (less punitive game).
• Worlds management improved : added the ability to use more than 16 worlds( 'N' and 'P' keys) and a(rustic) way to name a world.
• Lots of details, bug fixes and little changes to make the game more polished, playable and user friendly (see bellow).
• Support of new Linux distributions.
• Published a lot of code examples for Squirrel and assembly robots in a the educational material section in the manual.

Raspberry Pi 2/3 Compatibility

Please read carefully the mandatory installation instructions in order to run on the Raspberry Pi.

• Use the new experimental VC4 OpenGL driver.
• Adapted texturing system to comply with the capacity of the PI's GPU(Selective resolution system).
• Provide an hardware detection system for automatic optimal default settings for each type of Raspberry Pi.
• Made some optimisation on RAM use.
• Improved game physic engine schedulling in order to improve reactivity in low framerate situations.
• Specific game tweaking : ex. Airplanes are allowed to run slower on Raspberry Pi version in order to play despite lower rendering distance.
• Reworked World generator Scheduling for better CPU use.
• Added a "Loading" screen during texture loading to GPU because Raspberry Pi is much slower than a regular PC.
• Raspberry Pi specific compilation option.
• Raspbian .deb binary Package.

Other changes, improvements, bug fixes...

• Plane Z1 still can land anywhere, but can now break much shorter when landing on the new runway.
• Sound volume handling finished, sound settings are now fully functionnal.
• Fixed airplane not crashing on ground on some collision cases.
• Lowered delay after respawn.
• Big mountains now have ice on it.
• Resolution dependant sized fonts support.
• Added "Flip Mouse Y Option" (activate it in the settings_harware.dat file).
• Disabled F4 and F8 keys (Analyser and Location System make it much better).
• Inventory display of big block count are now much better.
• Sequencer programming doesn't require anymore to use some true material quantities.
• Fixed some graphic glitches : voxels doesn't appear to vanish on the entry of some machines anymore.
• New respawn message.
• Removed obsolete "Demo Version" compilation options.
• Belt conveyors are now grouped to a common type when collected.
• Base Machine now have manufacturing instructions.
• Added a security to preserve Atomic Compressor content  : now you can't collect them if they aren't empty.
• Improved mouse button emulation with keyboard : now, it work in all situations.
• Fixed inventoy bug : when "dividing quanties", some rare cases was creating a "zero quantity" slot that appeared as a dummy unplaceable voxel.
• Improved optical networks : now, an Optical Voxel Receiver can be placed directly after an Optical Deflector/Splitter for more compact design.
• A materializer can now be placed directly after a network receiver (optical and wireless).
• Fixed assembly robot movex.w : instruction is now assembled/disassembled correctly.
• Fixed assembly robot rotation and multiplication buggy opcodes.
• Fixed assembly robot y and z servo axis not working.
• Fixed tree texture side is now in the right direction.
• Squirell programmable robot now have a function to overclock it up to 16x faster.
• New command to stop Squirrel programmable robot at the end of a program and prevent auto-rerun at game reload.
• Screen Resolution under 1024x600 are not proposed anymore in the screen setting interface as it would be too small for correct interface display.
• A lot of little fixes and change I forgoted to note...

Raspberry Pi is a trademark of the Raspberry Pi Foundation.

Hi friends,

A new Beta version of Blackvoxel is out.

Here are the changes :

Version 1.31 Beta 1 (World and architectural changes):

• Added a new zone after the blackwoods (and shifted the world).
• Made architecture modifications for better handling future world changes.
• Improved the world saving system : now, your worlds will take much less space.
• Corrected various bugs.

Warning : Due to strong architectural changes, bugs could have been introduced. Save your worlds before testing.

Good game

Changes :

Programming missed some input/output user interfaces for user interaction. So we added two simple ways to communicate with the user : Switches and Indicator Lights. Indicator Lights can even be used to make some display walls of voxels.

• Finished Blackvoxel Font redesign.
• Added : new interfaces GetInfos and SetInfos for communication with voxels.
• Added : Input Switch voxel for using with robot.
• Added : Indicator light voxel for using with robot.
• Added : new programming function var Voxel_GetInfo(int x, int y, int z, int index)
• Added : new programming function bool Voxel_SetInfo(int x, int y, int z, int index, var info);
• Added : new programming function var Voxel_GetInfoDoc(int VoxelType, int index, int infotype);
• Redesigned RTFM voxel.

Some infos on these new voxels in the new Human Interface section here : http://www.blackvoxel.com/view.php?node=1519.

Example to get the input switch state :

state = Voxel_GetInfo(x,y,z,1);
Examples to set the input switch state :

state = Voxel_SetInfo(x,y,z,1, 1); // Set switch on
state = Voxel_SetInfo(x,y,z,1, 0); // Set switch off
Examples to set indicator light state :

state = Voxel_SetInfo(x,y,z,1, color); // Color can be 0...15

Here are the changes :

• Added : GetInfo(23) Give the context of execution where function are called.
• Fixed : GetInfo(22) Now return the right script number when Voxel_Unload() is issued at program change.
• Fixed : PickVoxel3D() should work correctly now.
• Added : GetInfo(24) Give the number of slot of the robot inventory.
• Added : Started an internal squirrel test program for better detecting some regressions and little bugs.

Values for GetInfo(23) :

0: Creation. The robot has been created. State can be found with : Voxel_Load().
1: Destruction. Robot is about to be destroyed. State can be found with : Voxel_Unload().
2: Normal Step. The robot is doing normal step operation. State can be found with : Voxel_Step().
3: Serialization. The robot is in loading/saving operation. State can be found with : Voxel_Load() (Means Loading) and Voxel_Unload() (Means saving).
4: Program Change. The program is changed in the interface.  Voxel_Load() and Voxel_Unload()

Here are the changes and additions :

• Fixed : User-Texture Engine can now be broken with the base constructor/destructor tool.
• Added : Large address aware activated for windows 32 bits. Not sure it will be activated on the final 1.22  because it seems capable of creating problems and compatibility issues.
• Added : New UserData directory for user program data. Data saved by your scripts should go in it.
• Added : New Functions for programming.

New Functions Added :

int GetRobotLevel()

Not really for immediate use. Returns the robot level. This function is intended for the future addition of other robots in the case we restrict some functionality depending on the robot.

int GetRobotID()

Return the unique serial number of your robot. Can be used for generating an unique file name for saving datas.

var GetPath(int PathType)

Return the paths of the working directories of Blackvoxel. Should be used instead of absolute path because the directories can be located in different locations depending on operating system and/or version. For maximum compatibility, don't forget to use GetInfo(20) for the path separator character to use.

For PathType :

0 : (int) Maximum value for PathType
1 : (string) Blackvoxel main data directory.
2 : (string) Actual Universe save.
3 : (string) Squirrel script location.
4 : (string) The Location for saving the data of your scripts.

var GetInfo(int InfoNum)

Added new informations with offset 16-22:

0: sq_pushinteger(v,22); break;
1: Player Location (x)
2: Player Location (y)
3: Player Location (z)
4: Player Location (x) in Voxel Units
5: Player Location (y) in Voxel Units
6: Player Location (z) in Voxel Units
7: Player Viewing direction (yaw)
8: Player Viewing direction (pitch)
9: Player Viewing direction (roll)
11: Player Head Location (x)
12: Player Head Location (y)
13: Player Head Location (z)
14: Player Head Location (x) in Voxel Units
15: Player Head Location (y) in Voxel Units
16: Player Head Location (z) in Voxel Units
17: Player Velocity (x)
18: Player Velocity (y)
19: Player Velocity (z)
20: File path separator character
21: Program Version
22: Actual Script Number

var GetInfoName(int InfoNum)

Added the description for GetInfo() new items.

bool PlayerMove(float x, float y, float z)

This function moves the player. Coordinates are relative. Useful to move the player along with some voxels. Move is limited to +-5000 per call.

bool PlayerAddAccel(float x, float y, float z)

Add provided values to player acceleration.

bool PlayerSetAccel(float x, float y, float z)

Replace the actual player acceleration values by the provided values.

Hello,

A new version of Blackvoxel is available!

Important Warning : It's a beta version. Save your universes before testing.

List of main changes : Version 1.22 Beta 1

• Added : A new application log system.
• Added : The RTFM voxel.
• Fixed : Little memory loss.
• Added : New Egmy (Not yet activated).
• Fixed : Aspect ratio problem with Eyefinity/Multiscreen and non standard screens.
  
• Added manual setting Opt_SectCFactor in the Settings_Hardware.dat to
  change one of the sector rendering optimisation agressiveness.
• Changed : Removed voxel_input interface flag from XR robots to prevent extraction robots to see containers in other extraction robots.
• Added : voxel_output interface to XR robots so content can be emptied by some means. XR robots can be emptied using other voxel mechanism. When they are empty, they restore to their original state and can be collected again.
• Fixed : Programmable Robot : Redone some init/load/save code.
• Fixed : Programmable robot : Added stdout flush after print command.
• Fixed : Programmable robot voxel_input and voxel_output wasn't worked as intended.
• Fixed : XR Extraction Robots hanged when no storage was found. Now search for new storage.
• Fixed : programming : Voxel_Load and Voxel_Unload was buggy.
• Fixed : Programming : Access to libraries (iolib...) wasn't working.
• Added : Programming : bool PlaceVoxel3D(int x,int y, int z, int VoxelType) function.
• Added : Programming : bool PickVoxel3D(int x, int y, int z) function.
• Added : Programming : int Look3D(int x, int y, int z) function.
• Added : Programming : bool MoveVoxel3D(int sx, int sy, int sz, int dx, int dy, int dz) function.
• Added : Programming : var GetInfo(int InfoNum) function (Infonum=0..16).
• Added : Programming : var GetInfoName(int InfoNum) function (Infonum=0..16).
• Fixed : Programming : GetX(),GetY(), GetZ() get the right voxel location after Move() is called.
• Fixed : Programming : PlaceVoxel() function. Voxel in a slot didn't disappeared when quantity reached 0.
• Fixed : Programming : GetGameTime() function returned a negative number. Now return the number of millisecond since the start of the game.
• Fixed : Added support for new BMP variant format used by recent version of gimp.
• Fixed : Silicon Wafer manufacturing list now include the needed blackrock blue.
• Fixed : Minor problem in the player save file.

The Blackvoxel Team