Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

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Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

Sorry Los, but giant wind turbine farms are coming to Astroneer. :D

After I burn out on Valheim it might be time to play Astroneer again. And maybe by then, the major update to Hardspace Shipbreakers will be ready.

https://blog.astroneer.space/p/the-miss ... tch-notes/

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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by Losbot »

FlyingPenguin wrote:Sorry Los, but giant wind turbine farms are coming to Astroneer. :D
LMAO

Let me know when you want to play some Astroneer. I'll join ya
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

You playing Valheim yet? It's the new Minecraft, but with combat that feels satisfying.
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by Losbot »

No, haven't looked at it. You playing regularly?
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

Yeah, obsessed is more like it. Minecraftish, but looks and feels more like Rust (except it looks better than Rust). Ssurvive, find food, stay dry, stay alive, don't go out at night, find resources to make better and better stuff, build homes, build better homes, keep building new homes as you explore new areas).

It forces you not to rely too much on one home base because you have to continually explore new areas, farther and farther away. There are a teleport portals you can build, which can be linked anywhere in pairs, and you can just rename them to re-pair them, and they can be broken down to harvest the building blocks, so when you don't need a portal anymore you can take the parts and build one somewhere else. Thus you can always have a quick way back to the main base where your stockpiles are at, or make a quick dash to where your ore mines are at, or plant a portal near your latest working area, or near some boss you're working on who keeps killing you so you don't have to walk all the way back.

The portal has a major limitation, other wise you'd never build another house: you can't transport ores or processed metal. So you still have to walk/swim/sail to wherever your closest smelter and forge is at, with all necessary upgrades installed.

There's a dungeon crawling aspect that's fun. Scary as hell in the skelly dungeons, but that's where the good stuff is hiding.

The game has objectives. There are 5 bosses that have to be beaten. First one comes early and is required to get an item that allows you to mine ore. All the bosses involve rewarding you with an item that unlocks new things you can build, or materials you can build from. I tried the second boss but he's too strong for me yet. All I did was lose a pile of valuable stuff I was carrying when I died, and then spent a lot of time making quick dashes in to pick some of it up before he can kill me again, which was no fun because I didn't have any houses or even a small camp nearby. Didn't get all my stuff back, but I got the important things.

Supports multiplayer up to 10 and it's meant to be a coop experience although totally playable solo. I started playing on Stirge's server with him and a friend of his for a couple of nights, sharing a house and resources, and learned the basic ropes there, but I'm going solo in my own game now. When playing with others there's tokems you can make that prevent people from entering your house or altering anything near your house.

I've got 30 hours in it. Very engrossing in a Minecraft/Astroneer way.

Early access, but as feature complete and playable as Astroneer is now. They steal a lot from Minecraft (beds can be designated as spawn points and sleeping makes the evening pass), but a lot of it's own ideas as well.

I think it's well worth it for $20.

Good overview here:

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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

Just started replaying Astroneer. It's very polished now. Some nice new features like a rewards system for completing challenges. For instance one early reward is a small 1 energy unit RTG generator that can fit in a single slot (including backpack) and is just enough power to run a small base or the small tractor.

There's a new Exo Chip that's required for making some more complex things, like the large shuttle, and these chips can only be found in Exo Cache containers that need to be cracked open with dynamite. Makes junk hunts more interesting.

Lot's of minor, but appreciated, quality of life improvements, like platforms can be locked down so you don't accidentally move them. Time can be sped up now while in orbit and waiting for a landing site to appear (much appreciated!).

Game still sucks me in. I was up late last night getting to the point where I could take a shuttle to the first planetoid.
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by Losbot »

LOL, I might have to take another look. Miss playing it.
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

I haven't gotten into the major automation yet, but I can see how resource auto-sorters would be useful in the late game:

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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

You ever get very far in Valheim? There's a learning curve, but it's like Astroneer with Vikings. Certainly a lot less forgiving than Astroneer. Nothing like having your boat torn apart by a sea serpent in the middle of the ocean, and you're wearing your best armor. All your stuff will float, and it'll be marked with a skull and cross-bones on the map (until the next time you die, so mark it quickly!), but now you have to build another boat, armor up with your backup gear, sail several days back to where your stuff is, and try to recover it. Oh, and avoid the serpent. :)

Near the final boss. Taking a bit of a break from it with Astroneer.
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by Losbot »

No, I've gotten distracted a lot lately with other stuff, TBH. I need to jump back in though and play a bit.
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

A big improvement in Astroneer is the Compass (acts more like a radar). Beacons and major objects like gateways, bases, rovers, etc can be seen on the compass even if they're too far to see them or their beacons.

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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by Losbot »

OH!! Wow!! I like that. I started updating my games. I'll have to take a peek.
Although, I don't know if I'll have the patience to actually go mine for all the mats so I can play with all the toys.
Might have to give my inventory an unfair boost first. ;) LOL
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

I'm actually having a lot of fun on this play through. Since I'm familiar with the game, and no as scared of the hard planets anymore, I decided to dive right in with a hard planet after going to the first planet's moon, instead of working my way up through the easier planets first.

So I went to Glacio (the ice planet) for my third mission, which is the second hardest planet (not worrying about the core yet), and one most people leave for later, but that got me Titanium ore and Iron ore, plus Argon gas a LOT earlier than you would otherwise get it, plus a butt load of high byte science to research. Now I'm off to Atrox. The early titanium and iron got me the big silo storage containers a lot earlier, which is nice as I'm a bit OCD about harvesting resources.

I haven't gone to my fourth planet yet, and I've already got a large shuttle. Heading to Atrox next, which is considered the hardest planet with no wind and very little sun, and again usually left for later, but it has 4 gasses I'd like early, and that will also let me get the RTG earlier than normal.

If you start playing, make sure to check on your mission progress in the mission log, and check the landing pad for rewards for completing missions. The small back-pack size QT-RTGs are nice to have, and you also get some free builds and schematics. I ended up not realizing I had earned a free Hyrdazine thruster AFTER I made my own.

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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by Losbot »

This is a brand new start or continuation of a previous game?
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Re: Astroneer: The Mission, Compass, and Power Update Patch

Post by FlyingPenguin »

Brand new start.

One of the downsides of my strategy is I haven't yet made it to a planet with Lithium, which is usually an early target. So I can't build medium batteries yet and everything I'm running is powered by giant pallets of dozens of small batteries. It works though. :P
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