The team has ”integrated many great suggestions already,” and plan to continue doing so. The studio has outlined the new features in the alpha-to-beta upgrade.
AI opponents will now scale their aggressiveness to the player, with better path finding for ships. The economy has been retuned with colonies now able to specialise.
“We are very excited with Horizon’s development, having moved to the next stage!” says Raffi Parsekhian, CEO at L3O Interactive. “The feedback from our early adopters has been terrific and while we have integrated many great suggestions already, we want to continue on this path during Beta on Steam’s Early Access program.”
”Horizon already offers a compelling 4X experience and we are looking forward to enhancing it further as it continues to evolve with the help of 4x strategy gamers.”
Developer L3O has put together an overview of alpha-to-beta upgrades:
A more challenging game experience:
- A.I. now dynamically adjusts its aggressiveness against the player
-
A.I. now plans and executes various military actions with the help of an overall mastermind, several types of tacticians and a fleet coordinator
-
Improved path finding for ships
-
A more balanced game economy and colony population rates
-
Colony management will now require more decision-making and allow for specialized worlds
Other changes and additions:
- A race report view has been added that keeps a history of major events relating to the race
-
Additional story missions have been added
-
12 new Human ship designs added
-
Improved UI and higher resolution animation scenes
-
Galaxy generation with many more stars for bigger and longer gameplay sessions
-
Many fixes and better handling of non-standard windows system configurations
Horizon Game Features:
• Advanced turn-based tactical combat for 4X fans
• Full tactical ship control includes managing movement, weapons and more. Board other ships, attack from planetary and orbital defenses
• A distinct open-world system, where ships can explore without artificial limits and where combat can span many turns before concluding
• Engage in meaningful diplomacy choices that will impact the game outcome, includes coordinated actions with allies against enemies
• Discover more than 80 technologies each with 10 levels of upgrades. Conduct planetary surveys and dig for artifacts
• Design and customize ship weapons and systems based on available technology
• A detailed economy and colony management system with different types and levels of colonies based on players’ building choices
• Play in different galaxy configurations from a few dozen stars to over 100 star systems containing more than 1,000 planets
• Interact with alien races of different levels, including ancient civilizations featuring their own unique storyline, schemes, ships and technology
• An immersive galaxy storyline with open-ended missions that add another layer of gameplay over classic 4X mode which is also available
Visit the Steam Early Access page for Horizon to learn more. It’s priced at £18.98.
