Dittobyte/Recompia v0.13.0-beta.2

Pokopia Recomp 0.13.0-beta.2 (Seamless Co-op)

on GitHub

Changes in this build

• #615 CHANGELOG: notes for the 0.13.0-beta.2 Testing build (seamless co-op)
• #614 Story co-op: every player plays their own story, with rules that keep both worlds whole
• #613 Docs: Link Play guide

Update: press Update, then Finish update once. This is the last update that makes you wait like this: it builds the game code one more time in full, already with the faster build (about half the time it took before). Your shaders and saves are kept; no shader is translated again.

New in this Testing build: seamless co-op (experimental). In a Link Play session every player plays their own story in the host's world, with their own requests, talks and progress, kept in their own save. Turn on Visitors can talk to story characters on the launcher's Link Play page; every player of the session needs it on and needs this build.

Coming from 0.13.0-beta.1, this is the first update that prepares in the background: press Update and keep playing.

This build is about waiting less. Building the game code takes about half the time, updates stop rebuilding parts of the game that did not change, and from the next update on the launcher builds the new game code while you keep playing. Link Play over the internet also gets simpler: no more room codes, every room shows up in the game's own list.

Highlights

• Seamless co-op (experimental). Every player of a Link Play session plays their own story, the host and each visitor alike. Pokémon give each player the requests and story talks of that player's own progress, and it is saved in that player's own save. A story step that changes a town waits until you are back in your own world, a visitor cannot take a story item away from the host, and your save from before each start is kept
• Updates no longer take the game away. From the next update on, the launcher builds the new game code before it installs the update, and the version you have stays playable the whole time. The update goes in once the game is closed, and you can cancel at any point before that without losing progress
• Building the game code takes about half the time. A full build on a 16-thread PC went from 13 minutes to 7. PCs with little free memory gain more, because the build now runs twice as many jobs in the same memory
• Small updates stay small. The launcher only builds the parts of the game code an update really changes. Two of the last releases rebuilt the whole game for a change that touched little or none of it; that no longer happens
• The game build takes an eighth of the disk space: 0.3 GB instead of 2.4 GB
• Link Play over the internet without room codes. Every room on the public relay shows up in the game's Visit a Friend list: pick the host and join. For a private room, set a Link Code when the game asks; only players who type it can join

Added

• The launcher prepares an update's game code in the background, with its progress on the Home page, and installs the update once the game is closed
• Link Play: every room on the public relay is listed in the game's Visit a Friend, for players on the same release with the same Same for everyone switches
• Link Play: the game's own Link Code makes a room private. The room is still listed, and only players who type the code can join

Changed

• Finish update and Set up again compile the game code in about half the time
• One compile job per GB of free memory instead of per two, so PCs with little free memory build with more of their cores
• An update that changes only comments or other platforms' parts of the translator no longer compiles the whole game again
• The game libraries the launcher keeps for the next update take 0.3 GB instead of 2.4 GB
• Link Play over the internet needs no room code any more; the launcher's room code fields are gone
• If an update cannot finish, the launcher puts back the game build you had, not only its own files
• The launcher no longer promises "about 7 minutes" for a rebuild: it says from a few minutes to an hour, depending on your PC
• Story co-op (experimental): every player in a Link Play session now plays their own story, in the host's story areas too. Pokémon give each player the requests and story talks of that player's own progress, and the progress is kept in that player's own save. Every player of a session needs this build: an older Story co-op is refused
• Story co-op keeps a copy of your save from each start (the newest 5, in story-coop-backup in the save folder) and a journal of every story quest change (story-journal)
• Story co-op: a story step that changes the town (a Pokémon moving in, its home) waits until you are back in your own world
• Story co-op: an important item a visitor picks up stays in the host's world, and each visitor takes it once
• Story co-op: your own save is written after each story step in a session

Fixed

• The launcher no longer reports "The game stopped unexpectedly" (0xC0000409) when the game closes itself
• Removed the touch screen Menu button, which could show up in the corner on desktop PCs

What to test

• Seamless co-op, as a visitor: talk to Pokémon in the host's world and open your Requests: they should be your own. Do a request the host has not reached and check that the host's list does not change
• Seamless co-op, a step that changes the town: when a visitor meets the goal of a request that brings a Pokémon in, the request stays open with a message on screen. Go home and load your own world: it should complete there, with the Pokémon arriving
• Seamless co-op, items: an important item a visitor picks up should stay in the host's world for the host. Drop an item for the other player: one of you has it afterwards, not both
• Seamless co-op, after a lost connection: do a story step as a visitor, close the game without leaving the session, start again: the step should still be done
• Seamless co-op, reports: attach pkp.log and the file in story-journal in your save folder from both players
• This update: how long Finish update takes on your PC, next to what it took before (the launcher's Set up log has the times). Tell us your processor and memory with it
• The game after the rebuild: play as usual. The game code is built with new compiler settings, so anything that behaves differently from 0.12.0 is worth a report
• Link Play over the internet: host with Internet, and have a friend open Visit a Friend: your room should be in the list without any code. Then host again with a Link Code and check that only the right code gets in
• Link Play on the same network still finds hosts as before
• The next Testing build is the first one that installs in the background: press Update, keep playing while it prepares, then close the game and watch it install. Try Cancel while it prepares, then Update again: it should continue, not start over

Regressions and known problems

• Seamless co-op is experimental. Your save from before each start is in story-coop-backup in the save folder (the newest 5): to go back, copy its account folder and .meta file over account with the game closed
• Seamless co-op: an important item a visitor already took still lies in the host's world for that visitor, who cannot take it again
• Seamless co-op: when the host picks an item up, it is gone for everyone, as in the game
• Seamless co-op: what a visitor picks up or is given goes into the game's Link Play bag, not the bag you have at home
• Seamless co-op: the launcher's switch still has its earlier name, Visitors can talk to story characters
• This update itself still waits on Finish update: the launcher you have now runs it. The background build starts with the update after this one
• While an update prepares in the background, the game can run slower on small PCs and handhelds. The Set up page's Slower, keeps the PC usable switch makes the build gentler
• While an update is in progress, Set up, repair, profiles and mods are locked in the launcher until it has installed or you cancel it

How to report

Open a bug report, choose Testing as the channel, say which version you have, and attach pkp.log (and setup.log if Set up ran). Thank you for testing.