The last three weeks development of LBKR have resulted in multiple UI updates, a modified bounty contract system, additional monsters and world chunks!

I feel as if I do lots of changes for the in-game UI, but it’s not for nothing- I did some thinking and felt that alot of my UI windows weren’t very clear on what was happening on-screen, and many of the panels began to be cluttered with help tooltips and what-not so I’ve made another attempt to make things a bit easier to understand.

– Inventory & Shop windows

Items are now placed in lists on the far left of the window, instead of previous inventory-slot grid-like system. All sub-panels now have a label aswell to make it easier to navigate each UI window. Alot of bugs and minor issues have been fixed in both the inventory and shop-window too!

– Mission list/overview window

Pretty much the only thing changed here has been the layout and style of the window. Content has remained the same with the exception of the bounty contract list now is using it’s own window.

– Bounty Store window (Bounty Keeper)

The Bounty Store has been long due to update but for some reason I’ve kept delaying it- mainly as I’ve wanted to do some changes to the entire bounty reward system.

The contract window now separate the store-items and available contracts slightly better and will, just as with the mission window, display the bounty description and rewards instantly when selecting a bounty instead of (as previously) opening a pop-up window with the contract description.

As for the bounty rewards- the previous “bounty gear” items that could be purchased has been replaced with new types of items that function more like character/item upgrades. There are currently only four types but more are to be added later.

–Ability Booster: Increases the tier of the targetted ability. The item is class-specific and can only be purchased if the target ability is used by the class of your character
–Biomech Augment: Upgrades the base value of one of your character’s skills
–Item Tier Modifier: Adds 1 – 4 item tier modifier items to your inventory that can be used to increase the tier of an item of your choice
–Item Property Modifier: Adds 1 – 4 item property modifier items to your inventory that can be used to upgrade a random property of an item of your choice
The bounty gear used in v2.26 and earlier of LBKR will still be possible to loot however, most of them will be changed to exquisite/unique items and a few as common monster drops.

Last but not least I’ve improved some of the UI icons that has lingered from a very old version of LBKR, among others- the shards and experience icons.

– Monsters

I’ve been talking about new monsters in more or less all parts of the dev. diary since the release of 2.26 but I thought I’ld make a summary and show some pictures of everyone of them that has been implemented this far. (Numbered from left to right on the screenshots above the descriptions.)

1) Captain Barkley [Unique Fighter] – An infected IGSF officer encountered during a world event in the Armory of the IGCC MPF4 station. Most of the skin on his body has been eaten by other monsters but his IGSF security mask has remained intact, helping to identify him as part of the IGSF security forces. Deals physical and bleed damage.
2)Bekzial [Unique Conjurer] – One of the more powerful Forsaken priests, can be easily recognized by his heavy armor and shiny skin. Encountered in Oxygen Processing facility of the IGCC MPF4 station.
3)Pierced Mouldy of Fortune [Unique Mouldy] – Infected cargo worker that has been impaled by several steel pipes, encountered in the Armory. He can charge the player and also teleport shorter distances- dealing damage to the player if the player character is standing in between the start and end positions of the AI’s teleportation.
4) The Fanatic [Unique Cultist] – Highly devoted to the Forsaken race and their beliefs, this cultist resides inside the Forsaken aliens nest. Is easiest to recognize by the alien scriptures that he has carved on his arms. Unlike other cultists, the Fanatic can’t summon minions, but use both melee & ranged blood magic to harm the player

1) Destroyer of Walls [Unique Rambler] – A Rambler that’s encountered in the Maintenance section of IGSF MPF4 station that seem to enjoy destroying walls for some reason. Unlike other Ramblers this one has a very distinct orange-colored shell, the egg on it’s back does not glow as it does on regulard Ramblers and has a cold blue color- possibly indicating that the fetus inside is deceased
2) Rambler [Common] – A new alien encountered in the Sindre Caverns and the Hive. It’s a support monster that will try to keep it’s distance to the player and focus on aiding it’s allies by healing them or summoning new minions.
3) Nest Keeper [Mission Bound Rambler] – Walks around in the Hive and repairs walls and tend to alien eggs etc. etc. This monster is slightly more powerful than the common Rambler type but are mission bound.
4)Ronald Crump, the Maker of Great [Unique Slasher] – Quite unpopular general director of one of IGCC’s affiliate who visited the IGCC MPF4 on a business trip and got trapped in the crew quarters as the outbreak occured on the station. Despite having his face severely deformed due to the parasite infection his toupee has mysteriously remained on the top of his head.

Furthermore, I’ve added more items again. 2 new missions (Chapter 5 and Chapter 9)
This far in the development stage toward v2.27 there are 5 new weapons, 6 new armor pieces and 1 new consumable type. Also another 5 exquisite-rated item modifiers:

Authority – Killed officers will die in an explosion of the frost elemental, dealing damage to all nearby monsters
Gas Nova – When receiving poison damage there’s a 20% chance to cause an explosion that deal 150% fire damage to all nearby monsters
Teeth – > Chance that poison-coated teeth are ejected in all directions when your character is receiving damage (…. creative names for everyone! 😉 )
Necroiaculat – When a monster is killed there’s a chance that a projectile is shot from the monster’s corpse, targetting a randomly selected monster that is nearby
Blaze – The player character will leave a trail of fire as they move, any monster stepping into the fire will take fire damage and may ignite, taking fire dmg over time

To put an end to this long diary entry, I’ve implemented 34 new world chunks that will be available when 2.27 is released. Many of them featuring new world events and secret areas.

( 1x Oxygen Processing )( 10x Armory )( 10x Bridge )
( 7x Wildlands )( 3x Caverns )( 3x Highlands )

I’m sorry for the relatively infrequent updates lately but as it’s soon time for vacation (and as more or less every construction site of the company I work for aim to be done before the vacation…) I’ve been working quite a few extra hours a day so I simply haven’t had much energy left to mash my keyboard to provide you with any progress of LBKR.

Since my last post though, I’ve begun to add more minions that the player can summon. The minions fight for the player until they vanish, which they do as their lifetime has passed. (An example is the Minebot and Interceptor, Tech-abilities. Both of them summon a minion.)

This far I’ve fully implemented three of the minions, ‘Demon’, a small err… demon(?) that may be summoned if a certain exquisite gear is equiped. The ‘Fishman’ that is summoned by finding it’s lair in Oxygen Processing and the ‘Spirit of Nan-Ma’altxuuz’, can be summoned by holding a certain unique weapon. All of the minions can additionally be summoned on demand with a new consumable item called “Callstones”.

As for new items and gear, I’ve added four new weapons (whereas three of ’em are of exquisite/unique rating.) and three new exquisite armor pieces. Additionally there are four new super(unique) item modifiers:

Multi Healer > Restores health each time you are rewarded with a multikill bonus
Streak Feet > Increases your move speed for a short while after each kill streak bonus you are rewarded
Head Hunter> Provides a small chance that any master- or greater ranked monster that’s killed will drop a unique gear
Blood Gift> 5% chance that a demon is summoned when a monster is killed by the player

As for more common gear, there are 9 new item modifiers. Their effects range from reducing ability cooldown and costs or increase the amount of currency and resources dropped by monsters on death, to buff or modify the effects of specific player abilities.

There’s also a new damage member/effect called “imprison”, victims can no longer move while under the imprison-effect but they can still use their attacks. As with the other damage effects (Bleed excluded…) this effect wears of after a few seconds.

As for the UI, I’ve still not quite found out why the main menu does not respond to actions when playing on Linux in fullscreen mode, I’m having a hard time trying to recreate the problem but I will keep trying. Meanwhile I’ve started to redesign the menu slightly, there are no major changes, merely regarding the layout.

For the in-game UI I’ve added new player debuff-state icons to the HUD that will be enabled whenever the player’s stunned or imprisoned, to make it more clear why the user can no longer move their character, and any minion that is summoned by the player will have their remaining lifetime displayed just above the player character’s health bar.

I’ve had a lack of time to work on LBKR the past two weeks but there has been little progress atleast! To start with, there are now 2 new exquisite weapons named “Sovereigns Bane” and “Spine Moiler”, accompanied by two new super modifiers.

Sovereigns Bane will steal health from your character, when it has stolen points worth your max health value it will summon the spirit of Nan-Ma’altxuuz, one of the first Forsaken emperors, to fight for you.

The Spine Moiler will make all monsters within 3.3 meters from your character to bleed for 2 – 5 % of your overall damage rating until the monster(s) die.

More items than these two will be implemented before 2.27 is released, both common gear and exquisites.

As mentioned earlier, alot more of the environment will be destructible- you can see some of the results on the screenshots below!

Other than that, there have been some further code optimizations and I’ve created a few new world chunks for the Ch.8 [Highlands], Ch.7 [Caverns], Ch.6 [Wildlands], Ch.5 [The Bridge], Ch.3b [Armory]

I’ve received several messages and mails about the Main Menu GUI doesn’t work if playing v2.26 in fullscreen mode on Linux. I don’t know what cause this issue but I am looking into it and will make sure to release an update as soon as it’s sorted out!