It’s been a few years since 1.0 was released, and in the little spare time I’ve had around major life events and a busy work schedule I’ve been slowly working toward a 1.1 update with some fixes and improvements based on feedback from 1.0’s release, and now 1.1 is finally available!

Here’s what’s new in 1.1;

If you have any thoughts, comments or feedback, leave a reply below or let me know on Twitter or Facebook!

Enjoy and stay safe, pilots!

Fractalus 1.0.0 is now available for download from the Fractalus project page, and is available for Windows, MacOS, Linux, and VR (Oculus/OpenVR)!

It’s been a long running project but it’s finally complete! Fractalus 1.0 includes a heap of changes that bring it very close to the original game (including the alien pilots!).

The 1.0.0 build may not be the last build, as I’m sure there will eventually be bugs and issues found that will need fixing, and there have been several ideas put forward by others and some I’ve had myself for things to expand a bit on the original game.

Huge thanks again to David Fox, Loren Carpenter, and Charlie Kellner from the original Rescue on Fractalus team for their help with bringing the remake as close to the original as possible, and also huge thanks to everyone who helped out with testing and gave feedback during development!

Here’s what’s new in Fractalus 1.0.0;

If you have any thoughts, comments or feedback, leave a reply below or let me know on Twitter or Facebook!

Enjoy and stay safe, pilots!

G’day!

Its been almost a year since the release of 0.9 and when I’ve had time around work and other things, I’ve been working on 1.0.

Progress towards the 1.0 release is now well underway, and many changes have been implemented so far. My main focus in 1.0’s development is on finishing up the gameplay logic and flow, graphics and 3D modelling work (including the alien pilot), and general improvements to bring the remake closer to the original game. I have not yet started work on the alien pilot but I have been working on a model for the mothership, the players ship (the Valkyrie) and an updated model for the cockpit;

Mothership Model

Valkyrie Model

New Cockpit Model

These models are still works in progress (the mothership model’s geometry is largely finished but the texture hasn’t been finalised, and the valkyrie and cockpit models are unfinished and untextured) so the above images are only early previews. The alien model will likely be the last model I create for 1.0 as I am still new to 3D modelling and learning as I go.

The gameplay logic and flow is now much closer to the original gameplay, complete with the starting/ranking level selection screen before entering the cockpit, bonus points calculated and awarded upon return to the mothership, variable mothership availability, etc.;

Starting Screen

There is still a lot of work to be done before 1.0 is ready for release, so I’m currently hoping to be able to release 1.0 some time later this year. Follow me on Twitter or my Facebook page for updates and in the meantime the 0.9 build is still available for download from the Fractalus project page.

– Luke

Fractalus 0.9.0 alpha build is now available for download from the Fractalus project page, and is available for Windows, MacOS, and Linux!

Fractalus 0.9 has had a number of significant changes, including new procedural terrain generation with a new random terrain every time you enter a level, models for the crashed ship and pilot (and the two are now distinct entities), and a variety of gameplay changes that bring the remake much closer to the original game.

Huge thanks to David Fox, Loren Carpenter, and Charlie Kellner from the original Rescue on Fractalus development team for helping me out with details of the original implementation! On December 28th, David reached out to me on Twitter in a thread where he posted a heap of information about the original game’s development in response to an article in Finnish computer magazine Skrolli which I did an interview for about my remake, and he offered to answer any questions I had about the original game’s development. I asked about game timing, pilot/turret placement, and the terrain generation and he provided information on the timings and placement, and then put me in contact with Loren and Charlie who worked on the terrain generation in the original, so through discussions with them on the details of the original game I have been able to create what I feel is a fairly accurate replica of the original gameplay and terrain generation, with some extra detail made possible on modern hardware.

Here’s what’s new in 0.9.0;

If you have any thoughts, comments or feedback, leave a reply below or let me know on Twitter or Facebook!

Enjoy!

G’day!

I’ve been working on Fractalus in bits and pieces when I’ve had a chance to since the last build and there are a couple of new things I’ve been working on for 0.9 that I want to show the progress on:

Procedurally Generated Terrain!

The first is procedurally generated terrain which is more reminiscent of the original game’s terrain. A new terrain is generated at each level start so that no two levels are quite the same. The terrain is generated using the Diamond-Square algorithm which I chose as it was created by Loren Carpenter who also made the terrain for the original Rescue on Fractalus, so I figured it was very likely to be the same algorithm used in the original game.

Pilot model! Click on the image to zoom in to see it – to the left of the crosshairs.

The second is the pilot finally has a model! I’ve been experimenting with making the pilot model in Blender for a while and it’s about time for it to be included.

The above images are not final and these features are likely to change a bit before the release of 0.9 as I continue to develop them and other features. I hope to have 0.9 ready some time in the next few months. Follow me on Twitter or my Facebook page for updates!

– Luke

Fractalus 0.8.0 alpha build is now available for download from the Fractalus project page, and is now available for Windows, MacOS, and Linux!

Fractalus 0.8 has been entirely rewritten using Unity Engine so that I can focus more on the game itself instead of spending most of my time working on my own custom engine. There isn’t much new in the way of features or gameplay in 0.8 over the previous build as most of the time was spent on porting everything across to Unity. As I can now focus more on the gameplay and art rather than the engine code, I will hopefully be able to release new builds more frequently than every few years.

Here’s what’s new in 0.8.0;

If you have any thoughts, comments or feedback, leave a reply below or let me know on Twitter or Facebook!

Enjoy!

G’day!

Once again it’s been a while since the last release of Fractalus. As before, I’ve been very busy and not had a lot of time to work on it, and for the time I did have to work on it I didn’t make much progress. Most of this comes down to Fractalus being built on my own custom engine which meant that in the little time I had, I was working on both the game and the engine, and it turns out developing a game engine is quite time consuming (I know! Who’d’ve thought?). In a previous post I mentioned thinking about moving to another game/graphics engine but wasn’t sure if I should. I ended up deciding that it would be the best thing to do for the project, and would allow me to focus more on the game itself, and so I began work on rebuilding Fractalus from scratch using the Unity engine.

Fractalus 0.8 Unity prototype in development

So far it has been a long process to rebuild everything in Unity, but at this point I have an accurate reimplementation of the in-world graphics and a portion of the gameplay as it was at 0.7. There is still more to be done to bring it fully up to what 0.7 had, and there are some new things that need to be added for 0.8 as well.

I hope to have Fractalus completely ported to Unity within the next few months, with 0.8’s release to follow soon after.

Follow me on Twitter or my Facebook page for updates!

– Luke

Fractalus 0.7.0 alpha build is now available for download from the Fractalus project page.

Fractalus 0.7.0 Cockpit HUD

Here’s what’s new in 0.7.0;

If you have any thoughts, comments or feedback, head over to the forum and post them!

Enjoy!

G’day all!

It’s been a while – a long while – since Fractalus’ last release, v0.6 back in 2012. Quite a few of you have contacted me asking about the next release, so I figured I should write up a blog post to tell everyone what’s been happening.

So, progress is still being made on Fractalus, and v0.7 is still in development. I have not abandoned the project, I’ve merely been preoccupied with other things – work and life have a habit of getting in the way. I have also been considering what to do with Fractalus’ implementation, in particular with the graphics and rendering the models for pilots and the cockpit.

As Fractalus is built on my own custom graphics engine, I am writing everything from scratch including the model rendering logic. As my time is quite stretched, I’ve been considering abandoning my own engine and rebuilding Fractalus using Unity3D or another engine, which would potentially allow me to work on the game more often and release new versions more frequently, as I could focus more on the game itself rather than spending as much time working on the game as I am working on the underlying engine code to support it. Anyone else think this is a good plan?

That aside, I have been working on Fractalus in bits and pieces in my spare time, and a few things that have been done include;

• Saucers now ignore player if ship systems are off.
• Saucers no longer occasionally appear completely unlit.
• Saucers do less damage upon collision and affect your direction less severely.
• Saucers now move slower, allowing the player to outrun them.
• Ship engine sound now pitches up and down as well as fading to reflect speed (Still some work to be done on the sound).
• Fixed texture repeat pattern in high detail terrain mode.
• Stars now rotate with the sun.
• Title screen starfield now rotates.
• Joystick support (control customisation still being worked on).
• Selected menu entry now pulses slightly.
• Engine now uses SDL 2.0 and is built with GCC 4.8.2 (under Windows).

I have also begun work on a model for the cockpit, complete with the instruments which will be moved from the HUD to the cockpit’s panels. Here’s an early screenshot of the cockpit’s model in development;

Fractalus 0.7 Cockpit Prototype

This is an early prototype modelled on the cockpit design from the original game. I’m still working on this design, so it is likely to change (and quite likely to become a bit more detailed) before it makes an appearance in a new version.

Hopefully it won’t be too long before I have 0.7 released. Any questions or comments? Comment below or visit the forums.

Follow me on Twitter or my Facebook page to keep informed as I work towards releasing 0.7.

Thanks for everyone’s support!

– Luke

Fractalus 0.6.0 alpha build is now available for download from the Fractalus project page.

Here’s what’s new in 0.6.0;

If you have any thoughts, comments or feedback, head over to the forum and post them!

Enjoy!