Hello everyone! We’re getting very close to wrapping up development on the shapez 2 Early Access release build. At the end of last week we released Alpha 23 with 23.1 and 23.2 – the last Patreon-exclusive Alpha build – following shortly after. We’re moving to Beta builds where Patreons can test the release candidate and report any remaining issues they find. In two weeks, we’ll officially reveal the exact release date (which is set in August) of shapez 2. If you don’t want to miss out, be sure to follow and wishlist the game here on Steam and join the Discord! https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/ If you really want to get your hands on this build before the release, be sure to check out our Patreon! You’ll also get access to the betas to help us iron out the last couple bugs, the first of which released today! Your savegame will be compatible with the Early Access build from Alpha 23.2 onward, barring any unforeseen issues. This devlog will be a bit shorter as we’re currently very busy, but let’s walk you through what Alpha 23 brought to the game. Final note, even at this stage everything is technically still subject to change. [hr][/hr] [h2]New Content[/h2] [h3]Hexagonal Scenario[/h3] As teased in the last devlog, Hexagonal shapes are now real! Added as a separate scenario, a layer now holds 6 segments (sextants), 90° Rotators now rotate 60° and there are three new shape types exclusive to this scenario: [list] [*][b]H[/b] – Hexagon [*][b]G[/b] – Gear [*][b]F[/b] – Flower [/list] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43169810/857e3c856e29e2222a3454180dbffc9cbb8a1e0d.png[/img][i][b]H[/b]exagon (left), [b]G[/b]ear (middle), [b]F[/b]lower (right)[/i] The shape code works as you’d expect, with an example below. We’ll leave the rest for you to explore for yourself :) [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43169810/9920d611ca6846c5546031c1be9fcabdeeb3339a.png[/img] [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43169810/fa6dbcdae1c86be92e4e50ff8395164f00fa7b41.png[/img] [h3]Train loop & Twister[/h3] We added the Rail Loop and Twister to spice up your trains. Wildly inefficient, but I'm sure you'll be forgiven. They're unlocked as part of the shapez 2 Supporter Edition alongside a whole lot of additional soundtrack! [img]https://i.imgur.com/JBVDskV.gif[/img] [i]Gif contains some placeholders[/i] [h3]Other new things[/h3] Aside from that big ticket addition, there are a handful of other new bits of content and balancing changes. [list] [*]Added train speed and capacity upgrades, as well as an upgrade to allow you to dunk a train directly into the Vortex to deliver all its cargo at once. [*]Rebalanced fluid buildings to be more intuitive and added more information in the panels. [*]Supplying a different fluid to fluid buildings now makes them slowly drain and eventually consume the new fluid instead of waiting for the previous fluid forever. [*]The same system also applies to trains loading a different shape or fluid. [/list] [h2]Visuals[/h2] We added brand new visuals for Shape Miners, Fluid Miners and their respective Extensions. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43169810/3cd24dff6f0390d397fddf537858af81da5c19e3.png[/img] Train locomotives finally have their visual! [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43169810/be23f398b7f002915d4b037bc7f193883635984f.jpg[/img] Added new visuals for train loaders and unloaders. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43169810/8a9202ebe3c70158b4ac54a90fc8103d94610c7a.png[/img] Added animations for belt/fluid launchers launchers towards space belts/pipes. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/43169810/762815a2fa783988c6ceb64d637a873b9e103d45.gif[/img] There’s a new animation for shapes going into the Vortex. [img]https://i.imgur.com/zLreAKO.gif[/img] Also included are several animation fixes and improvements across the board, including improvements to fluid shaders. [h2]Development[/h2] As we’re finalizing a lot of things, there were lots of rendering, blueprint and simulation performance improvements. Placing blueprints and large islands should now be much faster, various issues with wire logic were fixed and we’ve vastly improved savegame loading times. To show off the current state of performance optimization, here's the game running on a Mac Book Pro M1 Max at full HD with 420,000 buildings. The goal is still 1 million buildings at 60 fps, but we're happy with our progress! [previewyoutube=P7VBWTGYitw;full][/previewyoutube][i]Video contains some placeholders[/i] [h2]UI / UX[/h2] The origin point (the part of a building that’s placed where your cursor is) of the Painter and Crystal Generator buildings was moved to the conveyor belt instead of the tank. This makes placing these buildings feel a lot better, but it does break any blueprint made prior to Alpha 23 that uses them. There’s now a button to clear the selected platform, space belt/pipe or train (un)loader of all its contents. Additionally, rail placement and the Feedback dialogue have been improved, the latter of which now has a link to report translation issues. Speaking of translations, the translations for almost all of the languages we wanted to include were added. [hr][/hr] That’s it! As we said, a shorter devlog this time. The Beta has started in order to hunt down the last issues. Once that’s done, we can freeze development on the Early Access release build. We’re super excited to finally release shapez 2 next month, so be sure you have the game wishlisted (sorry for asking so often) and we’ll see you again with a big announcement in two weeks. https://store.steampowered.com/app/2162800/shapez_2/ [h3]Join the community:[/h3] [url=https://twitter.com/tobspr style=button]X / Twitter[/url] [url=https://www.youtube.com/@tobsprGames style=button]YouTube[/url] [url=https://discord.gg/bvq5uGxW8G style=button]Discord[/url] [url=https://www.reddit.com/r/shapezio/ style=button]Reddit[/url] [url=https://www.tiktok.com/@tobspr_games style=button]TikTok[/url] [url=https://www.patreon.com/tobsprgames style=button]Patreon[/url] [h3]Check out the previous devlog:[/h3] https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2162800/view/4220517501549404713