Dev Blog #001 October 26, 2021

Hey everyone, welcome to the development blog.
Here I will be posting progress, ideas and general chat about AQ2.
I will have more in-depth blogs soon, once progress speeds up. But I thought I would go over a couple of bits as a starter blog.

AQ2 Battles can be MUCH larger

I want battles to be less restrictive so all fighting now takes place anywhere in space, there are no more instanced battles. If you can see someone, you can shoot them. This screenshot is from an early stress test of a few hundred ships all fighting.
Removing the instanced battles not only removed the 3v3 restriction but also allows more interaction in space, this makes things smoother for players but also makes development quicker as everything is done in the same space.
You will still get reports based on your contribution when an enemy ship is destroyed, these reports will include everyone who helped in the fight.
Once a ship is destroyed it will leave behind a wreak you can then salvage for parts and materials.
With the battlefield being much larger you have more options when deciding when and where to fight, you can use asteroid fields as cover to ambush miners, or escape battles by warping away.

Account management and multiple characters

The account management has been redone, you can now create multiple characters under a single account. A much requested feature for AQ1 was character renaming, that has all been reworked and characters can be renamed at any time in AQ2. Renaming is not a destructive process, you will still retain all your in game mail and friends.
A single account means that some things can be shared between characters, such as comsmetic purchases ( And other bits I will write about in a future blog ).

Roadmap

I will put out a full blog/roadmap post as soon as I can, with more details on new and improved features.