Podcast 152: Star Atlas Weekly Review

Podcast Transcript

This is Matt with the Intergalactic Herald. Welcome to my Star Atlas Week in Review podcast. This is podcast number one hundred and fifty two. Any articles or video mentioned can be found on my website at intergalactic herald dot com. Just look for weekly…
weekly recap newsletter two hundred. Sorry I kept seeing the two hundred and couldn’t get my words straight. Anyways, yes, two hundred newsletters have been published on my website. So before we get to that oh anyways, sorry. Quick things we’ll go over.
last week I did mention there was a interview with Michael Wagner and I just didn’t have time to listen to it. Before I recorded last podcast, I did. So I have just a couple of thoughts on that. the Atlas Brew occurred this past weekend. The Lore Keepers, also, occurred this, past weekend.
So that’s sort of been the updates from the community. So but before I get to that, just a couple of things that I’m doing in Star Atlas to make you aware of. One, of course, is my website intergalactic carol dot com. It’s a great, Star Atlas re resource website. It’s got guides, particularly,
beginner guides to get started playing. admittedly, a little outdated, but…
it hasn’t changed much. So I think you could still figure it out. At least the UE five stuff, has changed, but the other stuff seems pretty…
similar. Anyway, so there’s guides there. Directories of Star Atlas, content creators, tools, guilds do have recaps, the weekly recap newsletter, do have recaps of the, Star Atlas events that are AI summaries, audio that you can listen to. But if you listen to this podcast, you already know that. And I do have a Discord news feed you can sign up for to get email alerts when the team posts in the different announcement channels on the Star Wars Discords.
You can check all that out at intergalactic carol dot com. Also do have a Star OS merch store. admittedly pretty stale in the sense I haven’t added any products to a while, but you can get a couple, Star OS mugs with different logos. Check that out at intergalactic gear dot com. Also I’d love to get together with other Star Atlas gamers who aren’t going to be joining guilds, to hang out, chat in the community, things like that.
You can check that out at intergalacticcoalition dot com. There is an interest survey there. You can check that out. So let’s get into the content that happened this past week in Star Atlas. As I mentioned, I just didn’t have time before recording podcast last week to listen to the Michael Wagner interview.
It was posted right before the holidays.
he did mention a couple of things. you can find links to that in the last, recap newsletter. But a couple of things did stand out. I it there wasn’t a bad interview by any stretch, but it was, very similar to things that are already mentioned in the town hall. So, didn’t recall a lot of things.
And, again, maybe I missed something. But things that were interesting to me was a little more discussion about how they’ve been releasing different things. And, Michael Wagner used the concept of slices, which I don’t think I’ve heard before or at least didn’t register, of the different mechanisms that they’ve been building. Now that I kinda heard of, but this kinda idea of slicing. Anyways, I thought it was kind of an interesting way to frame it.
The other thing he went into, I a little more detail at least than I recall from the town hall, and it may have been just after three hours,
kind of started glazing over, but that there are gonna be these different modes coming to the UE five version, one called siege, and then this is gonna lead to something called conquest. And…my…kind of understanding now with these is…
not just the shooter on a map, deathmatch, which is kind of seems like what we’ve been doing now, but similar but more…
I don’t know. He even felt like maybe a little squad based, so definitely some different mechanics on how you would play, but more in line with, I think, other things. And, again…
I’m not really into the shooters. I’ve kind of mentioned that before, but doesn’t mean I’m not interested. Back in the day, I would play, what was it, Quake three and a little Unreal Tournament. I just wasn’t good at it. So I went more to RTSs and, again, just time and stuff like that, single player, campaigns were way easier than, online…
networking type things. and to date myself a little, online was just coming. It used to be LAN. So, you know, anyways, I came out of that, you know, that development. So but, anyways, I do have to admit these modes, I think actually could have a lot more appeal, in the sense of, more like what I’m not a hundred percent sure because I don’t play Fortnite and things like that, but much more time based, you know, switch over, things like that, not just run around and get killed.
So, yeah, I’m, again, in hindsight, I think they only teased it. I guess I would like to see more, and it’d be great to, just have a dedicated, Atlas brew, for example, on these. So, anyways, speaking of the Atlas brew, let’s move to that. So,
this one was, what was different for a number of reasons. one, Santi, the community…don’t remember his title, but doesn’t really matter because he’s, decided to…go on and pursue his own things. He apparently saw on his Twitter. He’s starting a new business. So, again, all power to him, totally, great.
But, again, they’re changing up the Atlas Brew. So, apparently at least in the short term, Jose, the lore rider, is gonna be on, but they introduced a new person. It took me a little while to realize that, he’s gonna be the new person or, I mean, he’s gonna be a Rager. His name was Jim. Can’t remember his last name.
So again. it took me a couple of times for him, when he mentioned that he’s the web director, which I don’t know. Sorry. I went to website. I’m like, well, you guys don’t have a website.
Do you really need a web director? But,
it may it was clear later on that they’re classifying things that are web based. So this would be…Sage currently, soon to be c four, and Holosim kinda under his…again…
said he had a team. So I again, first time I hate to say it’s first time I’ve recalled this gentleman. so titles and internal structures weren’t there. But, he did mention, later on in a road here is that, yeah, in addition to Sage and Holosim, even the Starcom product, so not UE five. He was pretty clear he doesn’t know anything about UE five.
But, again, that makes total sense that there are different divisions within the Star Atlas team. We just haven’t heard recently, like, kinda how the org chart works. So, anyways, it was great. one thing he did mention, and it truly…was true, way more development, I wouldn’t even say…
teases or anything, but just here’s what we’re working on. And so, anyways, it was kinda cool. So, so this one was, Atlas Brew is predominantly about c four, which, again, makes sense. It’s under, this Jim’s…
area. So, some of the questions again came about the PTR, and, again, he fortunately explained what it was. So appreciate that because I’m sorry. This isn’t an acronym I had. So, apparently, it’s pub public test release, which is, like, duh.
I mean, sorry. It’s so obvious once you read it, but I didn’t know that. But also mentioned it was, sometimes it’s realm, which is a thing that, which video game maker? Blizzard? I don’t remember.
He mentioned some other ones. So, again, they’re just this is how, I guess, game development’s done. so, anyway, so he talked a little bit about that. One thing he did mention I thought was really great was that, setting expectations that this will be buggy, and it will be a pre release. And again, public test release…is one interesting thing, but pre release is another thing.
So again, I think that’s…
good to know that, yeah, we should just expect it…probably not to work, and that’s okay. That’s why they’re doing it. he also mentioned that they’re gonna try to bring some ideas from Halsim, maybe not right out of the gate, but definitely use that as inspiration to bring things into c four. So I thought that was kinda cool. Mentioned they would like to bring quests to c four, which is the first I’ve ever heard of that.
They’ve been mentioning that within the UE five. But, again, Halsim is all about quests. So, again, that’s good to hear. one thing he did mention, and he partly resonated with me because I’ve been mentioning it a while, to me, games need to be fun, and he said he wants to make the game more fun. So game being c four slash sage and kinda also wonder if, they’re just gonna keep calling it I think it well, I’m not sure.
It I think c four was what it is. I don’t think c four is the name.
so I think it’s an internal project name. I think it’s always been, but I’m not sure. But, anyways, hopefully, all that’ll be clear once they make, everything public. So…
he did also mention that all parts of c four, so the combat…
claim stakes, crafting habs, council rank is all running currently on the internal version of Zinc. So that’s they’ve been obviously building for that. he also mentioned in his first time that the user interface will be familiar but better. so that’s also kinda interesting. And, again, now I think it’s, pretty clear as a the web director of these products that this is obviously a web based game.
not that it ever wasn’t, but, again, just kinda clear. And I think, the reason I bring that up is there’s been a lot of talk on the fleet command moving into UE five. So the fact that there is a team now, again, I don’t know if long term, there’ll always be a web version, but I’ve also mentioned in the past that I think, UE five is gonna be a barrier to entry people without specific computers, and video cards and things like that. So, if the whole concept of post stability is true, not having a web interface slash someday mobile interface slash UE five, it just give everybody choices.
again, it doesn’t have to be same set of features, mind you, but, again, just some part of it. So, anyway, so that’s cool. he was also asked and answered why was there a delay. and this is, I think, reinforcing things we did here…
at the town hall that they really needed to build out this new framework. And, again, they throw around a lot of words, and Jim was upfront that he’s gonna talk technical. And I’m more than happy not to know things, but, that’s cool that, again, they had to build this framework, which I think became the STAR path. Again, he mentioned I think he mentioned that. Also, the Starcom.
And, I have to admit, this was the first time, I maybe can’t say for sure, but definitely, well, anyways, he said the version two of Starcom was a disaster, and he said, yeah. It was on me. And, wow. Cool. thank you.
again, didn’t bother me that it didn’t work. I mean, I know they’re building stuff, but, yeah. I don’t know. That frankness was, I don’t know, just cool. So…
somebody asked on the PTR, if they’ll move over everything, and he said, no. They’re gonna start from scratch, and there might be resets. And then it kinda dawned on me that, yeah, there would be no expectation for a public release test that what you have, ships, resources, would just magically move over. Now the real game, yeah, that’s gonna do in I think, if I remember at the town hall, they mentioned, you know, it should be a one they’re aiming, trying for a one button push. But as a public test release, it’d be like, hey.
Just come and test this. It’s literally…a beta, and you have access to it. So…
didn’t kinda put two and two together, but that makes a ton of sense. So and he did say all four parts will be available to test. they also mentioned that automation, is definitely coming to c four. And, yeah, that’s all. I’m I think we had heard something about that maybe.
but again, he kinda, oh, he framed c four in a phrase I hadn’t heard before, but I think it, finally well, anyway, so it’s really good. And he said it needs to be a fun game with a working economy. And…
I don’t know. that I don’t know why it hasn’t been explained like that, but that was like, oh, okay. Cool. Because…
to be different, we know that, Star Atlas needs a working economy built on a blockchain with crypto because that’s why it’s unique. Otherwise, this has been done before, and no harm in doing it again. But it’s not unique. But having a working crypto economy makes sense. But having a fun game with a working economy, Yeah.
So anyways…so as they wrapped up, they noted the next steps. They will be moving. And, again, apparently, it’s right now in a menu debug interface. Don’t know what that means, but okay. and they do wanna move it to the map interface.
Okay. and continue to do some optimizations to Starcom. So, yeah. So that was a really, yeah, it was a really great brew, and I’ll kinda have more of my thoughts when I move to my next section, which is State of Star Atlas. But yeah.
And, again, Jim said he would be on future brews, and I think they even mentioned the next one,
might be talking more about the zinc. So that’s kinda cool. I’m actually…looking forward to that. I…
I kinda like this idea of what’s next week already known. So, anyways so, there we go. So, yeah, let’s move on to kind of my thoughts on the status star this past week. wanted to touch and kinda lead into that a little more on this game slicing concept, which, again, I think it was just the phrase slicing, but I don’t know that just…
triggered mental images…
as opposed to just, you know, releasing parts or kinda how I thought before. But, anyways, I do totally agree that it makes sense for game development if you’re doing it public. You gotta release something. You can’t just go quiet. But…
I think there’s a trade off. One is these slices, don’t, in hindsight, don’t feel like they have a lot of engagement or they are just quick fixes, quick hits, which, again, I get it. they’re fine. But, games need to have goals, rules, purpose, things like that. And, again, no fault to anyone, because, again, I think, and even I think, Danny in the foundation room has mentioned that if they’re gonna do a crowdfunding thing, they have to show stuff.
And, again…
you know, those are strategic initial founding decisions that were made. So I don’t think you can ever fault those, but you don’t think you can’t say what the result of that…strategy is. And again, this kind of engagement. Things are interesting and then, you know, interest is lost. So but dove time back into c four.
Again, c four has a lot of those slices from the frameworks to the Starcoms to the previous versions of Sage…
the Zinc, all of this stuff. So I know everybody kinda always says, oh, this is the year, but…
it I’m not saying this is the year. This is finally, I think, the possibility. I’ll get to it in a second. But…yeah. Anyways so, moving on, having Jim on the Atlas Brew.
Again, I don’t wanna say there was anything wrong with the past mix of participants, but…
and I think so could just be my interest in which parts of Star Atlas. I really enjoyed hearing about the game development. I mean, again, even if some of it, like, I don’t know. They said words, like react. I don’t or I don’t even know what they said.
It’s things. I know they’re programming frameworks, but I don’t know what they are. But I don’t know. that kinda, I don’t know. It kinda…I don’t know.
It kinda peeled back the curtain a little and really kinda…
thought about design and or development. Excuse me. And again, at this point, I kinda remember back to some of the, discussions we had, on the, what was it? Was it the claim stakes? Well, maybe that’s because I was interested in claim stakes.
But I just remember after one, maybe a year ago, they had, like, multiple back to back brews where we could ask questions on the some of the technical stuff that was gonna be c four. and I don’t know. I again, I might just be interested in the game and, you know, and I’ve mentioned this before. I mean, I the lore I know needs to be there, and I wouldn’t be opposed to it. It’s just I, again, there’s no way they interact with the horror right now.
So I it’s just words. but, again, it’s important. It’s totally important. And, again, I always go back to having that interview with Jose a couple years ago. I mean, that was great.
I was able to ask questions, got feedback, didn’t realize the whole scope.
so, again, a lot of this is just, outside, out of mind type of stuff. But, anyway, so I really, appreciate that. And, yeah, I’m must have been. I’m looking forward to next week, so I’d like to learn more about that. So So spasmigurated to c four.
definitely glad, that I now have better ideas to kinda temper any expectations that this PTR is okay Yeah. No. It’s gonna be broke.
It’s gonna be incomplete. It’s gonna be buggy…
But it was very similar to how they launched the Zinc. I think it was called Alpha. So, made sense. let the team do it. There was no, carryover, even though Zinc there turned out to be some, but this one feels like, again, we’re just gonna all get access to their internal network and be given stuff and can just do whatever we want and break it.
and, again, I think that’s really a smart way to, release something. So especially something that, again, feels…really critical going forward that this thing has to work when they bring…the current stuff we all have to the new stuff. So, so, again, this all makes sense…
really excited, I have to admit, about hearing about our focus on making the game more fun. Yeah. and, again, you kinda wonder if this hasn’t always been the goal. It’s just we hadn’t heard it. and, again, I’m not faulting anybody.
I think it’s just, again, the information we’re presented, I’ve said it before. I’m so glad the economy monthly forums are there, and sometimes they’re really interesting. Other times they’re like, don’t understand. I just don’t. I want a good economy.
I want an economy. I want a stable I mean, I want a structurally sound one, but…
I wanna play a game. And I don’t know. I’ve been upfront about that. I wanna play games. So, if I wanna spend time, I wanna have fun.
So…and then the final thought on kinda c four, this newer understanding we got kind of how it is really taking inspiration from HololSim. So I guess now in retrospect, it kinda seems obvious that they would do this. But, again, they were…
it seemed like they were framing Holosim as a free to play version and which is, again, great. But…
again, well, then why wouldn’t you be in Sage? and they talked about, again, speeding up the…economy or something so that you could do things quicker. And, again, that that’s perfectly fine. Maybe mobile only or, I mean, mobile friendly eventually. Yeah.
I mean, all that made sense. And I guess it was partly this…
well, shall we say what I felt was, like, the last thing. I mean, everything was moving to UE five with…
fleet command, and so the web would be kinda de emphasized. But then this Haul sim was that way, hey. You can try this out, maybe even a mobile version or mobile app. And if you like it, hey, we got this real economy with real consequences, come on over here…
But I don’t know. now realizing that Holosim’s influencing Sage through c4, yeah, I don’t know. And again, time has gone on, team might have changed or again, just this was always a plan, we just didn’t know about it. So, but again, how these, in addition to being that free to play to get people interested in the game or the I’m just gonna keep calling it metaverse or cybernation or I don’t whatever term we’re using now. I don’t know.
Sorry. but that it can be a place to try out game…
mechanisms. And if they are interesting and fun in Hall soon because there’s no…money consequences, then those could come over to…
the economy, Sage, whatever. you know, actually, I need to go back to that road map. No. Sorry. Not the road map.
That seems so outdated. product…platform. You know, that’s actually interesting. I forgot because that came from, Danny, the chief product officer…
Yeah. I don’t know. I’m kinda thinking that Fleet Command can exist, but web can exist too. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter.
It’s whatever they wanna release. I just…
in the short term, they’re releasing c four, so this is all moot. UE five Fleet Command, we haven’t heard about it. don’t know where it is. so this is the next thing. So, anyways, yeah.
So, to summarize or to wrap up, yeah, I have to admit, some of this information, today kinda got me more interested in c four. Yeah. it talked to a lot of things that resonated. Unfortunately, still just hard being patient, because the PTR didn’t have a date and we were told, you know, it’s not ready yet. And we know for sure that Zinc launch is before c four launch.
So, I think Zinc is moving forward. Nobody’s mentioned that it it’s not, but the PTR hasn’t. But, again, Zinc can come out before c four, and the PTR can come out anywhere in there. And…I’m sure they’ve said this, but if they haven’t I mean, if the PTR is unsuccessful, you don’t launch.
so, again, it’s a public test…release, So it has to succeed before they release. So if it takes longer, no one’s gonna complain. I don’t well, I wouldn’t I don’t want a buggy c four to come out with real world assets. So, anyways, yeah. So, it’s also nice understanding the technology…improvements they had to make, both obviously Zinc, which we’ve talked about before, weighted to the toke or transaction fees and reliability by being on an isolated network or blockchain.
Also, again, it was mentioned…I know during the I remember during the summer I think it was summer town halls about the star path, but, sure, now sounds like, and again, it’s probably hard to talk about a framework and get everybody excited when we’re talking about games, but it sure feels like, yeah, without having that, again, all these other things I don’t understand about developing games or blockchain development or whatever, seems like,
that had to exist. And I guess we could say, no. I don’t think it’s StarPath, but the whole Starcom, the communication layer, had to be there too. So and then finally, actually, I’m kinda glad, for, automation, being talked more and more about being just built in the game. Again…
the tools that have been built by the community are awesome. They appreciate all their work, as the fact that it’s…compo Yeah. Compostable, doesn’t mean their tools aren’t valued. But, as it stands right now, manually clicking anything in Sage is…
yeah. It’s really…
Yeah. you know, I don’t think anybody really wants to do that as part of fun. even just moving, I was, respond I’ll get to the second things I’m doing. But even just a couple commands…Again, I just wanna click a button and let the blockchain things happen behind the scenes. So…
So wrap up with my final section, my kind of journey playing Star Atlas. So I have restarted in earnest my…trying to get a Mamba X. So I sent out my, big fleet to start doing mining of nitrogen and kinda just let it go partly because, again, I’m trying to get the experience points for zinc. I did the calculations, but I just got busy. So some point this week, I realized I had mined enough.
So it’s like, okay. I finally just have to get my supply chain working. So I stopped doing that…and, oh, sorry. Not my mining fleet. My miner.
Sorry. The little Armstrong…thingy. So it finished its goal of getting all that high nitrogen. So I moved it over to a different star base to work on silica. So then I took my large fleet which had been mining hydrogen and decided to turn it into a transport fleet.
So sending that out there bringing back the nitrogen. But,
once I got my miner over on the silicon silica silicon, sorry, silicate, Turns out nobody at that local market was…
selling food. So I was like, oh, I need some food. So I forgot that I got a few extra ships from the never alone campaign. So I turned those in with this other one ship that had just been sitting around into a little small fleet. And it storage was I can’t remember, like, five thousand, but better than the other one, which is, like, five hundred or something.
So I was like, oh, okay. This is…this makes sense if I’m gonna burn a transaction. So, anyway, so that one’s taking food off to, can’t remember, which star base number, but one of them. And, turns out I had left some ammo there that I don’t think I need with the miner, so I’m having it burn back. So I’ve actually got three independent fleets moving, which unfortunately is really starting to eat into the salon attractions.
Obviously, three times three lanes. but, yeah, I don’t know. I’m still debating and I don’t know. I don’t know. Now that I know that,
the PTR is gonna take a while and it’s not moving your stuff, which makes perfect sense, I mean, I don’t know. We’ll see. But one thing I have done differently this go around used to be, keeping a little…
scorecard on piece of paper because I was just monitoring how much stuff was used so I know when to refill it. decided to transfer all that to a spreadsheet because then I have actual numbers, and so…
I could do calculations and things like that. I guess at this point, the big one I’m concerned with is how much Solana I’m putting in and how…
when do I have to restock the Solana. So, anyway, so yeah. So there’s that. but one thing that did transpire and I was toying with the idea because I remember doing this too was since I’m sending my fleet out empty to bring back stuff, hey. I could take out resources and sell it.
But given that there was no food at this one star base, and again, these are the places I wanna, work, I was like, well, are there other people that want it there? Would it make some sense to go out and try to sell it? And I’m debating with, but I have this unfortunately bad feeling that there’s just not enough players, really playing anymore to support local markets. Now again, certain local markets, if you’re in this I don’t even know what they’re called anymore…
I don’t know. Whatever the big guys are still playing to get Atlas, I’m not. if you’re not on those, star bases where those things are, then I don’t know. Again, it and I guess I’ll be blunt. It would take more time than I have right now to figure this out.
So, I kinda was leaving with my mind. Just think of this as a single player game. And so if you don’t have resources someplace, you just have to bring your own and trying to sell and figure out pricing points to sell. Again, it in the bigger picture, yeah, it would be a part of the game loop you should figure out. It makes a lot of sense.
You’re already spending things. But, again, if this was Zinc instead of Solana, yeah, won’t even well, actually, I probably have more fleets running around doing things. So, you know, I might break them into smaller things or who knows what I would do? But yeah. So it it’s,
yeah, just more effort than I have right now. So, anyways yeah. So, tracking those things on a spreadsheet, recording daily things, restocking. Pretty much, it looks like, food is my one big commodity that I have to…well, the miner needs it. So transport, of course, they can get everything back at the…
central space station. Can’t remember, but I’m pretty sure…transport doesn’t require food, just fuel. Miner doesn’t require ammo. So, yeah, feel pretty good. but at some point, I have a bad feeling I’m gonna run out of food.
So we’ll see what those new claim stakes, do for me since I bought those. I’m not sure I mentioned that. I did, see a couple, higher level two, I think, claim stakes that got kinda cheap. And, again, since my long term, c four goal is probably to do a claim stake, focused type of gameplay, whatever that means. But, yeah.
So I was able to purchase a few of those that got cheaper. So but in the short term, again, I’m getting more r four, so that’s good. Oh, and I should mention, because of all those claim stakes, I realized my toolkits were growing, and I have no purpose for them. So I have actually been selling those for an Atlas,
you know, purpose on…
what, on the central space station. So at least I’m getting a little bit in that part. So, yeah, so that’s sort of me playing Star Atlas. lastly, so anyways, thanks for listening. again, wrapping up.
Just, if anybody wants to be on the podcast, definitely open to the idea of having guests, So please, let me know. You can reach me out on intergalactic carol dot com. Happy to chat with other Star Atlas, community members, do a weekend review together. content creators, so they have interviews with them. Builders, hear about what you’re doing.
Of course, any team members that wanna come on and mention stuff in on my podcast. Ding. Not looking for alpha. I’m actually more curious on beginner topics or things that, you know, are about Star Atlas in general. please do check out my website, intergalactic carol dot com.
Great resource website with guides, directories, recaps, and the Discord news feed. If you want a Star Atlas mug, please go to intergalactic gear dot com. And if you wanna hang out with other Star Atlas gamers, not joining the olds, please check out intergalactic coalition dot com. Other than that, this is Matt with Intergalactic Herald. That was your week in Star Atlas.
Have a great weekend…