Category Archives: Game Updates

Game Updates

Low Earth Orbit Retexture

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This mod changes the clouds and the lights on the Low Earth Orbit map. 12 textures have been modified.

CLOUDS:

I reduced the overall haze on the planet and I made the lighter parts of the clouds more transparent. The whitest parts of the clouds are at the same level as the vanilla version so you still have nice looking clouds. Overall, it’s a less cloudy day down there on Earth.

LIGHTS:

The vanilla lights were way too bright in my opinion as they were pulsing as all bright lights seem to do in this game. So I brought their brightness way down. Clusters of lights especially on the east coast of the US and in western Europe were so bunched together that they had no detail. They were just blobs. So I brought them into Photoshop and added pixellation to them to create more detail. I also added an orange filter as sodium light seems to make it out to orbit the most from the photos I’ve seen. There’s a bug in the game where sun-lit areas still have the electric lights visible. So I reduced the overall brightness of all of the lights to help with this problem.

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http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=658296767

Game Updates

Manned Mobile Lab Retexture

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This is a texture replacement for the Manned Mobile Lab. I’ve replaced almost all of the textures inside and out.

DETAILS:

The idea behind the changes is that exterior airlock doors should be marked with a bright color to indicate their importance. I’ve also added caution stripes around the edges of interior doors to avoid pinched fingers. Some doors would be used for rescue purposes, so I’ve added instructions for rescue procedures, explosive bolts and other safety items. Ramp and door edges have received the requesite NO STEP and CAUTION warnings where appropriate. There’s even a bumper sticker!

I’ve painted the exterior lighting frames white so they are easier to work with in dark and dusty environments if the lights need to be replaced or reaimed. I’ve replaced the interior flourescent bulbs with LED panels as flourescents do not make sense to me. I’ve also added LEDs to the tail lights.

I’ve noticed that the colors of the vehicle are more or less saturated depending on the map, time of day, storm conditions, etc. So on Earth and the Moon maps, the red color really stands out. But on the pale blueish lighting of the polar caps, the red looks more like a rust color.

I changed the color of the interior flooring from metal to dark gray/black so as to simulate rubber flooring. I’m not very good at bump mapping so the original texture can still be seen from certain lighting angles, but I’m working on replacing that.

The original gold wheels have been changed to a darker gray/black color inside and out but I did leave the edge of the rim coated in gold where it meets the rubber for better thermal management at that potential weak point.

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http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=657394731

Game Updates

Stars and Sun Improvement Mod

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This mod reduces the brightness of the Milky Way and reduces the brightness and size of the stars making them appear much more realistic. It also changes the graphics surrounding the sun, removing the low-resolution rays and circle surrounding the vanilla sun and replacing them with a simple and cleaner-looking fade. This does not change the lens flare (for now).

FYI, I tried MANY variations of star patterns, rainbow effects, etc around the sun and found that a simple and clean sun looked the best because the same sun is used for space as well as Mars. Perhaps this will change on the vanilla game in the future (I think The Moon map has it’s own sun textures), but for now, what I’ve come up with here looks like a good compromise to me.

Future improvements may include changes to the lens flare shape to something higher quality.

StarsImprovementMod_76561197972323340

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=603276174