Hello everyone!

It has been a month since our Early Access launch, and we’ve finally been able to catch our breath after endless crunches, reflect on our progress, and start planning the future development of The Crust. Despite some initial challenges, the Early Access launch of The Crust went great! We sold 70,000 copies of the game and gathered over 300,000 wishlist additions! We also received an incredible amount of feedback and support from our community, which allowed us to rapidly update and improve the game. Over the past month, we have released 12 patches with bug fixes and several major updates that significantly enhanced The Crust in various aspects. For example, we unlocked the research tree, added a work schedule management mode for colonists, expanded the cargo dock capabilities, introduced new points of interest on the global map, improved the AI and priority systems for robots, added new notifications, and made several QoL and interface improvements. Additionally, we balanced some parameters of the story mode, contracts, and colonists.

We are truly amazed by your incredible support and want to thank you from the bottom of our hearts.


We also have some interesting statistics to share with you:
The average number of unique players per day was 12,978, with a peak of almost 19,000 active players in a single day.

The average playtime per player reached a record-breaking 24 hours, with a significant portion of players spending over 40 hours in the game, and 4% of players exceeding 100 hours, which is impressive considering we’ve just launched in Early Access.

A month after the release, The Crust community on Discord has grown to 14,000 members, and the number of Steam followers has surpassed 37,000. Additionally, we received over 1,000 suggestions for game improvements and hundreds of bug reports, which have been incredibly helpful in reproducing and fixing issues that went unnoticed during closed testing. We read every suggestion, but the sheer volume of ideas requires evaluation and discussion in brainstorming sessions to determine their feasibility and priority in the development plans. You can help us choose the most interesting ones by voting for your favorite idea on the page: https://idea.the-crust.com/ or in the Suggestions section on our Discord server[discord.gg]. You can also propose your own idea.

The Early Access launch demonstrated an incredible interest in The Crust and confirmed its great potential, and now we are moving towards scaling up. Today, we have opened several job positions on our website—we are looking for skilled C programmers, community managers, and testers. If you have excellent coding skills, can think outside the box, and break existing patterns, visit our hiring page[veomstudio.com].


Our main focus right now is fixing the remaining bugs and improving FPS. We are aware of issues with colonists getting stuck in elevators, robots stopping, and navigation errors in robots with specific module configurations, and we are already working on them. Some of these issues only occur in older saves, but we will fix those in upcoming updates to ensure full version compatibility. We are also bringing back the saving of filter and distributor priority settings, adding new colonists to the hiring market, and working on other identified bugs and improvements.
Our second major goal is to achieve a significant increase in FPS on large and very large bases. To do this, we had to essentially dismantle the robot logistics and conveyor systems to find optimization opportunities for PC resource usage and prevent a geometric progression of CPU load as the number of production modules grows—and we found them! We have outlined a plan for the new architecture of each system and have already started working on them in separate branches. We will detail the results of this refactoring with FPS improvement measurements in the next developer diaries. In addition, we have already optimized some secondary systems, resulting in a small FPS increase—these changes will appear in the upcoming updates.


While the development team is working with the hardcode, the content creators continue to create new modules and units. For example, we have completed work on the Harvester for Helium-3 extraction and started creating the model for the thermonuclear generator. We are also preparing two new production modules, one research module, the KS Monument, and a new model of a heavy shuttle. Shuttles will finally have varying arrival and delivery times, as was originally planned. Along with this, we continue to develop the new POI generator and improve the contract system. All of this will be added in a major update in the near future.

We are incredibly excited about the high interest in the game and once again want to express our immense gratitude to our amazing community for your continued support and feedback. As always, we would love to hear your ideas and suggestions[discord.gg] — now is the perfect time for them.

Hello Crusties,

We have just released a new version of The Crust 0.93.15, which optimizes several important systems, resulting in improved FPS performance on large bases. Additionally, we’ve fixed some bugs and improved the balance of the economy, colonists, and fuel generators. If you’ve experienced FPS drops on your large base, try continuing your saved game in Beta version 0.93.15 or start a new game.

Full list of improvements:

• Optimized task allocation for cargo drones.
  
• Optimized logic for wear and tear updates.
  
• Optimized solar panel rotation and energy generation functions.
  
• Optimized water and electricity notification logic.
  
• Optimized production capability update logic.

• Added additional conveyors for the Expansion Center module.
  
• Added conveyors for the Small Equipment Factory.
  
• Added hints for module upgrades.
  
• Added conveyor outputs for the Large Equipment Factory.
  
• Added confirmation windows for exiting to the main menu and exiting the game.
  
• The resource side panel is now visible when the dialogue window or contract offer window is displayed.
  
• Improved visual design of microchips.

• Module upgrades now save correctly.
  
• Increased the percentage of useful resources in regolith extracted from wall excavations.
  
• Streamer Mode adjusted; removed track that interfered with Twitch publishing.
  
• Fixed a rare crash caused by conveyors in a specific case.
  
• Quest dialogues now save correctly.
  
• Canceling the HEMISCO contract no longer interrupts the entire quest.
  
• Added the ability to save/load with F5/F6 while a dialogue is displayed.
  
• Story contracts no longer cause a soft lock if the player has the maximum number of active contracts.
  
• Fixed negative resources in the shop when adjusting quantity with a slider.
  
• Fixed fractional resources in the shop.
  
• Fixed the maximum number of contracts, which wasn't working after saving.
  
• The rover is now correctly highlighted at the orbital level when clicking on a notification.
  
• Tabs in the colonist settings interface now display as selected when highlighted.
  
• The progress bar on drilling drones when they are mining a vein is back in place.
  
• The energy deficit number in the tooltip notification now accounts for generators.
  
• Fixed negative resources in the shop.
  
• Story contracts can now always be accepted.
  
• Fixed incorrect status of colonists who left on an expedition.
  
• Fixed display of data on water and oxygen consumption and production.

• Increased priority for building rooms for regular robots.
  
• Changed the order and cost of capsules.
  
• Research map rebalanced.
  
• Added additional connection points for the Large Solar Panel.
  
• Increased the timer for researching the story point of the relay.
  
• Oxygen capacity balance in rooms.
  
• CPU module balance.
  
• Oxygen consumption balance for colonists.
  
• Balance of natural oxygen depletion.
  
• Increased base efficiency of the fuel generator from 90 to 100.
  
• Increased efficiency of fuel generator upgrades from 105 to 135.
  
• Reduced research costs for the fuel generator.
  
• Reduced costs for fuel generator upgrades.
  
• Increased base fuel price in the market from 250 to 300.
  
• Increased cost of the multi-purifier.
  
• Increased energy consumption of the multi-purifier from 28 to 30.
  
• Increased research cost for the multi-purifier.
  
• Reduced energy consumption of the mono-purifier from 6 to 4.
  
• Reduced upgrade costs for the mono-purifier.
  
• Reduced research costs for improving the speed and carrying capacity of the cargo drone.
  
• Balanced costs for upgrading the Equipment Factory and Microchip Factory.
  
• Balanced construction costs for large modules.
  
• Balanced volume of certain sound effects.

Hey Crusties,

This version fixes the crash on save and a few other issues, it has improvements in the save algorithm - now you can save the game during the dialog box and load it in the same place. Also this version adds a few QoL improvements and a small FPS optimization for very large factories.

• Added confirmation to exit to the main menu and from the game
  
• Improved saves - now dialog boxes are saved at any stage.

.

• Fixed save error - LowLevelFatalError [File:Unknown] [Line: 42] FMemoryWriter does not support data larger than 2GB.
  
• Optimized storages, with disabled drone logistics
  
• Small optimization of logistics
  
• Fixed significant increase in maximum length of underground conveyors after loading
  
• Fixed loading of Battery and Rieteg improvements
  
• Story contracts can now be accepted even if the limit is reached

• Increased the timer for researching a plot repeater
  
• Increased the amount of oxygen in the rooms
  
• Added additional connection points for the large solar panel
  
• Changed the order and cost of capsules
  
• Increased the size and changed the visual of titanium on the conveyor belt
  
• Small changes in the balance of production chains

Hello Crusties,

We have worked on your feedback and brought new update.
In this version, we have expanded the number of outputs for regolith in the Cargo Dock, increasing its maximum throughput capacity by 4 times. Soon, we will add the ability to build multiple Cargo Docks and Exedition Centers.
This update also fixes several bugs, including the save menu issue, introduces several QoL improvements that have been actively discussed, and brings many balance changes. The campaign with the construction of the laser cannon is now smoother and more predictable.

It looks like we have managed to fix a major issue that caused crashes when saving large bases. To solve it, we had to make significant changes to the save architecture, so this version is still under testing and will be available by default soon.

Also today, we updated The Crust Soundtrack by adding 7 new tracks, including a new one that is not yet in the game. We are starting to send keys to all Kickstarter backers who have the Digital Soundtracks reward.

• 3 additional outputs in the Cargo Dock to increase its throughput capacity
  
• Global work time settings for colonists
  
• Ability to select transport by clicking on the notification
  
• New additional quests
  
• Improved AI of hauling drones, they now distribute evenly across all task types
  
• Behavior of unpaid colonists
  
• Indication of the selected conveyor tool
  
• Indication of module upgrade level
  
• Research map is now fully open
  
• "Send Expedition" button now signals the start of an expedition
  
• Notification of idle hauling drones
  
• Updated and added new Steam achievements
  
• Improved visual of resource delivery by robots to some modules
  
• Updated 3D model of the Cargo Dock

• Cost of the Medical Block
  
• Research costs
  
• Science points awarded for the first "Farhad" research
  
• Colonist salaries
  
• Composition of resources and rewards for some storyline contracts
  
• Colonists now default to working 70% of the time
  
• Single bed now locked by default
  
• Minimum science point generation for rovers increased to 50
  
• Lowered oxygen shortage notification threshold
  
• Reduced slag requirement for farm production by half
  
• Increased price volatility range for most resources on the market
  
• Increased available volume of all resources on the market
  
• Increased base battery capacity for rovers
  
• Increased base basalt mining speed
  
• Increased base speed of hauling drones
  
• Increased reward for completing the fifth stage of the laser cannon
  
• Increased mining efficiency of mining drones
  
• Increased time on some timers in storyline tasks
  
• Increased timer for laser cannon construction by 100 days
  
• Increased social science points in the quest for building residential facilities
  
• Increased oxygen consumption by colonists
  
• Increased CPU requirement for large modules
  
• Enhanced research effects for increasing basalt mining speed
  
• Reduced basic price difference between buying and selling some resources
  
• Reduced construction cost of bunk beds
  
• Reduced resource requirement for stages 4, 5, and 6 of laser cannon construction

• Game did not pause during video playback
  
• "Main Menu" and "Save" buttons are blocked during saving
  
• All achievements are now attainable
  
• Capsule getting stuck on the platform in certain cases of contract cancellation
  
• Crash when opening the load menu
  
• Crashes caused by hauling drones
  
• Work time settings for colonists now saving correctly
  
• Display of days for indefinite contracts
  
• Hauling drones generating negative resources
  
• Issue where the capsule from the Landing Platform would not launch in some cases after loading the game
  
• Modules not connecting to electricity inside buildings
  
• Lowered oxygen shortage notification threshold

• Crash when saving large bases (fix is in testing phase)
  
• Rarely сolonists getting stuck on the way to expeditions (temporary solution added: save and reload the game)
  
• ALT TAB disables the LMB until pressed ALT TAB again
  
• Ability to have multiple Expedition Centers and Cargo Docks
  
• Option to cancel expedition loading
  
• Option to dismantle the Expedition Center
  
• Multiple scenarios leading to the blocking of the Expedition Center
  
• Rare crash scenarios
  
• Optimization of RAM usage

Hi Crusties,

I have good news, we have fixed the three causes of crashes that were causing the vast majority of problems, as well as optimized RAM and improved performance in wireframing mode.

• Crash Fixes: Resolved the main reason of crashes related to the digging queue, cargo drones, and upgrading underground conveyors.
  
• Room Detection: Fixed a critical bug that was completely disabling room detection.
  
• Optimization Improvements:
  
  • Significantly boosted performance for conveyor connector widgets.
    
  • Enhanced performance in wiring mode.
• Quest Completion: Fixed a bug that could prevent quests completion.
  
• Module Registration: Adjusted the update process for modules inside rooms.
  
• Resolved the problem with the "Harsh Driller" achievement.
  
• Fixed small issues in the colonist settings interface.

Hello Crusties,

Today we are publishing v0.92.75 update, which includes many bug fixes as well as an experimental expansion of the colonist management functionality. You can now balance the mode of each colonist to get the most out of your production and research base.

• Fixed a bug with robots getting stuck when demolishing a resource elevator
  
• Fixed indoor navigation errors, so colonists no longer get stuck on their way to some modules
  
• Fixed game freezing in some situations when there are no free cells in the rooms
  
• Fixed a crash when loading equipment factories with resources
  
• Fixed problems with robot priorities when working with warehouses after loading saves
  
• The priorities of robots in relation to the expedition center have been corrected; now robots correctly perform other tasks during the construction of the expedition center and loading expeditions
  
• Fixed a bug with saving very large factories
  
• Minor changes to contracts
  
• Minor edits in some interfaces and texts
  
• Fixed demolition of the conveyor elevator in hologram mode
  
• Drastically increased wall building priority (WIP)
  
• Fixed colonist status in the laboratory
  
• Changed the order of tasks in the quest “A Place to Live”, now during the construction of the room are given tasks to search for and extract ice
  
• Fixed situations when the repair button did not disappear after it was clicked.
  
• Fixed the display of repair resources in the tooltip
  
• A few minor UI corrections

• Changes to the research map
  
• Balance of the cost of the expedition center
  
• Kitchen production balance
  
• A new mechanism for reducing the parameters of colonists, now the reduction is non-linear.
  
• The balance has been changed, now the colonists work more and idle less.
  
• Increased capacity of the multi-resource warehouse
  
• Some colonist professions under development are closed with a corresponding overlay
  
• Changed construction materials for some modules
  
• Adjusted repair cost of the story truck
  
• Small Edits in music tracks

• Added a mode for managing the work time of colonists; now you can increase or decrease the work time of a colonist per day.
  
• Added grouping of numbers to credits
  
• The research map is now completely open, all research displays full information about itself
  
• Added video tutorials on manual and automated unloading of a mobile drilling rig