KSP 0.90 'Beta Than Ever' Grand Discussion Thread!

[neamerjell]

I love Beta 0.90!!! Awesome work devs! I just discovered another feature I've been wanting: if I install new mods and open an already existing career, I no longer have to "buy" all the lower level parts from my already unlocked tiers! YAY! It doesn't take much to make me happy... The vehicle building controls are by far my favorite additions, but I love it when I discover something new you added.

Keep up the awesome work!

[Fengist]

Ok, I've been with KSP for a couple of years now and mostly I play sandbox. The reason is simple, there's nothing to do in career mode except, get more of what you already have in sandbox. So, with .90 I decided to start a stock career mode and try it. Here's my random thoughts.

1. At first, it's not bad. The missions keep you entertained and trying to build aircraft to do the survey missions was a challenge. Attaching a rover to an aircraft and being able to deploy and retrieve that rover (for some of the more rugged terrain) was a real challenge, especially stock. That part I enjoyed.

2. Ok, so I got a base into orbit. Now I'm asked to put yet another into orbit. Well, that's fine. But my first one serves no purpose anyway so why a second? There's only so much science I can collect on it and the cost of making it a refueling station is prohibitive... so why do I need 2?

3. How many stinking satellites do I need? This is becoming a case of the Kessler syndrome with satellites. And what purpose do they serve anyway once I get them there? Ok, they have an antenna and some science but my station already absorbed all the science so... I'm confused as to why I need more.

4. Ok, a base on the Mun. I can do that. Did that. No problem. I collected science and now what? It sits there consuming Kerbals and does... what?

5. Oh, Mun survey missions... Ah, that's what the base is... not for? So I get these missions to survey the Mun, they're all on the opposite side of the Mun from my base and I'm expected to do them then... return to Kerbin? Or fly to my base and transfer the science to the lab for what? An extra 4% science? And then what about my survey ship? Fly it back to Kerbin or abandon it just as I have my base? I can't refuel it for the next survey mission.

6. Oh. Satellites around the Mun... Ok. And I assume their purpose is just as... clandestine... as all those around Kerbin.

7. Ah, now for some fun. A base on Minmus... that does the same thing my base on the Mun does... nothing.

8. And now I'm expected to get a station in orbit around Duna, Ike and land on Eve. Again, for more science so I can get more parts so that I can land on further planets so I can get more science so I can get more parts.... etc.

9. Ok, so now I need over 3 million to upgrade my research facility. Oh, that 650 I'll get from part testing will... be a drop in the bucket.

One of my biggest complaints about KSC is that once you get where you're going, there's nothing left to do. In sandbox I created my own challenges or took on some of those on the challenge forum. The big problem with challenges, mine and those of others, is once you complete them, it's a huge letdown because all that effort into design, building, launching, flying... ends up sitting just somewhere until you get tired of looking at it. I created a challenge to circumnavigate EVE using an aircraft with stock and Kethane. I had a blast. Took me days of designing and testing and a week of playing to complete the circumnavigation. Once I was done, the plane sat there for months with no purpose left.

Squad is trying hard to make KSP into a sim type game. And they're well on their way. There's one huge difference between a sim that you'll play again and again and again, and KSP. Purpose. Mods like Kethane and Karbonite increase that purpose but they too end up being a letdown. Once you're able to land and refuel ships it's again, back to building ships that go everywhere to do nothing.

While I enjoy the designing of craft in KSP, the testing, the flying, the landing... I need a purpose. (I know I'm sounding like the dood from Matrix but it's true.) Give me a real reason to establish a base on Duna and not science so I can get more parts to build more stations to get more science...

My suggestion... serious resources and an economy. Not just cash for quests. Not just mining for fuel. Give me a resource on Duna to dig up and get back to Kerbin. I know it was discussed as something to add to the game once upon a time, but the time is now, before it goes into full release. If not, people will end up putting KSP on the shelf with other games where they've killed the boss mob and had nothing left to do.

.90 career mode, while a HUGE improvement over previous versions... still left me wanting.

[GTC]

.90 career mode, while a HUGE improvement over previous versions... still left me wanting.

Good post, and I agree. The contracts / missions do little for me. They are utterly arbitrary, which seems odd as the game has a tonne of history to follow e.g. the Apollo program.

It would be like DCS releasing a flight sim of, say, the Apache Longbow, and the campaign had missions such as:

Take off, and fly in circles.

Destroy random tank.

Land at another base.

Fire 6 HellFires.

Instead of a coherent, meaningful campaign such as one centred around Soviet / US programmes, SpaceX etc.

Other than the campaign being arbitrary and the tech tree making zero sense, I have had a blast with this game and enjoyed hundreds of hours of gameplay, and also learned a lot. I'll be very happy when a more legit campaign evolves (such as the community developed ones)

[Janos1986]

Leaving the challenges aside, I have big plans for my kerbals.

I want to install a life support mod, estabilish mining outposts, refueling stations, comm relays and cities on every moon of the system and establilish a federation of planets and moons.

I want a space fleet capable of traveling from and to every celestial body without having to rely on Kerbin for resources.

I want the Kerbol system as accessible as my neighborhood.

I want FREEDOM! D:

[Linear]

Here is my rig

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xfa1/v/t1.0-9/10868141_10202920989658979_1255465957397246740_n.jpg?oh=6a12d3d28a5ad40acb9637ce0abf63f1&oe=5505C1A9&__gda__=1429749060_3b89fdd8f9f6487d7e58e5882d2e3207

Strong laptop but will still falter early compared to a desktop. :-)

[Technical Ben]

Good post, and I agree. The contracts / missions do little for me. They are utterly arbitrary, which seems odd as the game has a tonne of history to follow e.g. the Apollo program.

It would be like DCS releasing a flight sim of, say, the Apache Longbow, and the campaign had missions such as:

Take off, and fly in circles.

Destroy random tank.

Land at another base.

Fire 6 HellFires.

Instead of a coherent, meaningful campaign such as one centred around Soviet / US programmes, SpaceX etc.

Other than the campaign being arbitrary and the tech tree making zero sense, I have had a blast with this game and enjoyed hundreds of hours of gameplay, and also learned a lot. I'll be very happy when a more legit campaign evolves (such as the community developed ones)

That's an interesting idea. Have 2-3 or more "competing" space agency missions arcs. One might be unmanned and science. The other manned and delivery based (get a tank/science pod/aircraft to planet/moon X). The third might just be "first to get" etc. Each one would have conflicting requirements, so you could not do all of them (IE, make a parachute landing, while the other is powered landing and the third aircraft landing). That would mean you'd commit to one area, follow those missions, and play out a mini "story" of achievements.

Oh, and for those with laptops or similar, you can have massive interstellar craft at only 125 parts. However launching those is going to require more.

[fahmiy123]

Strong laptop but will still falter early compared to a desktop. :-)

Comeon :'( . .

i love this game . Oh ya , and the new fiture , but i can't play version 0.90 because FPS drop so bad ,

when i play in version 0.25 i have 15-25 FPS with 350 - 600 part . But in 0.90 i just have 5 FPS . .

can anyone help me ..

NB : Sorry my english so bad , if i wrong please tell me , , thankyou

[Superfluous J]

Strong laptop but will still falter early compared to a desktop. :-)

Not for me. The Desktop will falter the moment I try to take it to any of the 3 places scattered around a 50-mile-wide circle that I frequently (Read: At least one change of locale a day and more frequently two) travel to and then stay for many hours. The laptop can come with me everywhere and play KSP just fine.

[John_Carter]

Am I the only one having a problem with edge highlighting? In the settings it says "No hardware support" but I already used that feature... It's kinda infuriating...

[vexx32]

Am I the only one having a problem with edge highlighting? In the settings it says "No hardware support" but I already used that feature... It's kinda infuriating...

I found that it actually requires the antialiasing settings in-game to be enabled. I just set it to the lowest level, apply settings, exit to menu, go back to settings and enable PPFX.

[cantab]

i love this game . Oh ya , and the new fiture , but i can't play version 0.90 because FPS drop so bad ,

when i play in version 0.25 i have 15-25 FPS with 350 - 600 part . But in 0.90 i just have 5 FPS . .

can anyone help me ..

Obvious thing to check: Are you using the same graphics settings in .90 as you were in .25?

[patflick]

Interestingly, Windows x64 was working flawlessly for me with TONs of mods, including some of the larger ones, like B9, Visual Enhancements, etc, that is until this last update to 0.90, which now gives me a "Failed to initialize player: Could..... not preload global game manager #0 I=0" error when trying to start the x64 executable. Obviously I wouldn't have chosen to upgrade, but my steam settings were apparently set to upgrade that game automatically - guess I learned a lesson today.

Anyone find a workaround to this issue?

Bummed - PAF

[Vanamonde]

Fengist, you're overlooking that different companies are contracting you to perform jobs for them. The benefit to you is rep and funds. What the satellite (or whatever) does after you deliver it is up to the company that asked you to put it there. That isn't fully simulated currently and the companies don't do anything with them, but what do you care as long as you get the rep and funds?

[Fengist]

Fengist, you're overlooking that different companies are contracting you to perform jobs for them. The benefit to you is rep and funds. What the satellite (or whatever) does after you deliver it is up to the company that asked you to put it there. That isn't fully simulated currently and the companies don't do anything with them, but what do you care as long as you get the rep and funds?

Funny, if I'm putting them there for a 'company' then I shouldn't be able to terminate them eh?

Pay me and then I'll just obliterate your satellite because it serves me no purpose?

What I care is, that rep and those funds serve no other purpose than to build even more useless satellites to get even more rep and more funds to build more.... etc.

[pandaman]

Funny, if I'm putting them there for a 'company' then I shouldn't be able to terminate them eh?

Pay me and then I'll just obliterate your satellite because it serves me no purpose?

What I care is, that rep and those funds serve no other purpose than to build even more useless satellites to get even more rep and more funds to build more.... etc.

I think the point here is that you are simply paid to deliver a 'package' for a client. What that client does with it is not within the scope of the game. FedEx do it all the time, they get paid to deliver a parcel to a specific location and if they do it well they get good rep for it. What the recipient does with it is irrelevant.

That said, you are right in that you shouldn't really be able to delete it by pressing the red X button, as it's not technically 'yours' to delete. So maybe additional contracts to change it's orbit or remove it later in the game is an option to avoid overcrowding.

Perhaps a large rep penalty and or fine could be imposed for removing 'clients' property (by whatever means) without pemission?

[pandaman]

Not for me. The Desktop will falter the moment I try to take it to any of the 3 places scattered around a 50-mile-wide circle that I frequently (Read: At least one change of locale a day and more frequently two) travel to and then stay for many hours. The laptop can come with me everywhere and play KSP just fine.

5thHorseman - would you mind sharing the specs for your laptop?

I'm needing to change or upgrade my desktop very soon and a laptop is an option I'm considering if the performance is okay and cost effective. And the info may well be of value to many others too.

Many thanks.

Pandaman.

[John_Carter]

I found that it actually requires the antialiasing settings in-game to be enabled. I just set it to the lowest level, apply settings, exit to menu, go back to settings and enable PPFX.

Thanks, I'll see if it works for me

[Superfluous J]

5thHorseman - would you mind sharing the specs for your laptop?

Remember, this is over a year old, almost 16 months.

ASUS G75VW

17.3" monitor (The specs say 1366x768 but I've been running 1920x1080 since I bought the laptop)

i7-3610QM CPU (2.30GHz) (8 cores, not that KSP cares)

DDR3 1600 MHz SDRAM (16 Gig, not that KSP cares)

GeForce GTX 660M/670M

Seagate 750GB 7200rpm drive

4 USB ports (I sometimes wish there were 5)

7.8 pounds, which people seem to think makes it "heavy."

That's the stuff that's important to me.

[pandaman]

Thanks for that 5thHorseman, much appreciated. It gives me a good starting point having specs that I know work.

[WuphonsReach]

Having played with this for a week, I'm still of the opinion that:

#1 - There need to be more upgrade levels (six is feeling like the right number), even if the "art" does not change.

VAB/SPH

- part counts should be 30 / 60 / 100 / 200 / 400 / unlimited

- basic action groups unlock at tier 2, full action groups at tier 3

- 50k, 100k, 200k, 400k, 800k, 1600k upgrade costs

Launchpad/Runway

- mass limits of 25t, 50t, 75t, 150t, 300t, unlimited

- 25k, 50k, 100k, 200k, 400k, 800k upgrade costs

Tracking Station

- only makes sense to have 3 tiers for this unless some sort of fuzzy math about how accurate the trajectories are

- or maybe the tracking station can only track 5 / 10 / 20 / 40 / 80 / unlimited command modules or probe cores

Research

- limits of 25pts, 50pts, 100pts, 200pts, 400pts, unlimited

- 100k, 200k, 400k, 800k, 1600k, 3200k upgrade costs

Admin:

- 2 contracts, 4 contracts, 8 contracts, 16 contracts, 32 contracts, unlimited

- 10k, 20k, 40k, 80k, 160k, 320k upgrade costs

...

#2 On the contract payout side:

- All "landed at" part tests should payout 1k minimum + cost of tested part.

- "Splashed at" part testing contracts should be 3k minimum + cost of tested part.

- Sub-orbital and orbital testing contracts around Kerbin are about right, but there needs to be more consistency. Probably a base payout of 6k for a sub-orbital contract and 10k for an orbital contract plus the cost of the part. Maybe a scaling multiplier based on the size of the part (< 1t is easy to test, stuff > 1t is harder to test as a payload).

- Place satellite in orbit X around bodies outside of Kerbin's SoI are underpaid given the amount of time that you need to wait for completion. Assume that I can farm Minimus orbit contracts for 100k each and each one takes about 10 days. A mission to Moho / Eve / Duna might require 90-300 days of transit (9x to 30x longer). Unless the Moho/Eve/Duna orbit contracts are worth at least 1M-3M for completion, they're not worth the contract slot.

- Placing manned stations around Kerbin should have a higher base value. Typical reward seems to be around 80k when it should be closer to 150k. Rewards for the Mun / Minimus should also be about 2x higher.

- Orbital contracts should require leaving the satellite in that orbit for 7 days.

...

#3 - There should be other options for earning cash in career mode

- Sell 100 reputation to hold a fund raiser and get 100-500k funds

- Sell off 100 science, get 100-500k funds

- Maybe you get 100k funds every 50 days (1 "Minimus month") adjusted based on your Reputation value (target would be 750 reputation). Less if you have < 750, more if you have > 750.

[HAMsmith]

I am unable to get 0.90 to download. I've been trying for several days at different times during the day. I've tried both the 32bit windows and 64bit windows versions. I get a message that the download has failed after anywhere from 30 to 100 mb downloaded. Anyone else have this issue or a resolution? Google has failed me on finding any info on anyone else having this problem.

Thanks, HAM

[Gan_HOPE326]

I've bought KSP on its previous update and was very happy to see it updated to Beta (Than Ever, no less). After playing a bit with 0.9, my impressions are mixed.

The good

Career is certainly more challenging. I like the experience system, it makes you value your crew. It also gives much more sense to the previously almost equivalent different probe bodies. New biomes are appreciated, and the introduction of more contract types in career mode makes the experience slightly more varied. However...

The bad

I'm kind of torn about the upgradeable buildings. It's a neat idea, sure, but the costs are excessive imho when playing on Normal. And by excessive I mean: they require a lot of grinding. After a while it isn't even a matter of challenge, because you KNOW that you can send how many satellites in however weird orbits around Kerbin, Mun or Minmus, or even Duna. It just takes time. It isn't a challenge any more; you only learn to be quick, dirty, and cost-effective. I'm at a point where I need money to upgrade my research center or I won't be able to research the 500+ science techs. It takes something around 3,000,000 credits! That's... a lot. I racked up almost half the money by fulfilling Duna+Ike exploration contracts, but had to do so with a cheapish 70,000 credits interplanetary probe because I couldn't afford to spend too much on it. The next logical step would be sending a crew to land, but there's no contract for planting a flag on Duna anywhere in sight and I really can't justify the expense - if I want to do it, I'll probably have to go Science or Sandbox. Which kind of kills the purpose. What I mean is, missions have to be logical and progressive, and a bit more programmed. Random missions now and then are okay, but it would be nice to also have more pre-scripted missions with well thought out challenges which naturally follow our progression. On the other hand, I'm asked to land a 12 kerbal supporting outpost on Eve, which is sheer madness right now. Also, it isn't explained what exactly counts as an "outpost" - must everything be in a single piece, or is it okay to just have multiple facilities on the surface? The leveling up mechanic for Kerbals ends up being grindy as well - if you hire a new pilot, you better send him to Mun and Minmus so that he can rack up some experience before you send him on more complicated missions.

So yeah, that's the take away: nice ideas but too much grinding and too little creativity. We can add that ourselves, of course, but I was hoping for the missions to give me a good starting point, not kill it by forcing me to do repetitive, useless tasks in order to gather enough money to spend on what I really value and care about. Though that's a perfectly accurate depiction of how working in science feels like if I've ever seen one (but I already do that 9 to 5, so please spare me in KSP...).

[barfing_skull]

Okay...interesting problem/bug?

I have a rover on Duna with 3 kerbals in it, one in a lander can and 2 in seats. I flipped the rover, the two in seats fell out. After that, I managed to right the rover, and the kerbals were just standing there. So I went to the space center to try and control them to get them back on the rover. No dice, it didn't show them like it normally does with kerbals on EVA. So standing there with no way to control them. I exited and came back, and they were *poof* gone, no trace.

Is this a bug when kerbals fall out of rovers?

[ioexcept]

I have to say devs - the UI is freaking TIGHT. Just getting started with the new release (.90)!

[fahmiy123]

Obvious thing to check: Are you using the same graphics settings in .90 as you were in .25?

no iam not , for ksp .90 i setting low and my fps still down . .