As I wrote in my previous Planet Crafter post, it is difficult to find a break point at which to sit down and write an update because new things come at you all the time changing the game and advancing your goal of terraforming the world you’ve landed on. Certainly A Planet Crafter It feels like you get a few technology unlocks every hour or so, and a big one often enough to change the dynamics a few times over the course of a week. Last time I mentioned that we had just unlocked teleporter technology and was wondering how that might change things up. We do, in fact, have a network of four teleport booths setup on the planet now. The teleporter in Clavius base Ignoring the lessons of Larry Niven, the teleport booth was placed inside the base. But the likelihood of strangers arriving seemed pretty small. So far we had only seen notes from people who were quite clearly dead or off planet. But a single teleporter, like a single video phone, is not very useful. It was time to go explore. Exploration is very much a part of the game. Some times, when you’re building up new terraforming equipment, like our huge new T5 drills, and are trying to move the needle on some of your metrics, you can end up spending a bunch of time just working on your base or marshaling supplies. If this were a carnival ride you could stick a few people in each of those cylinders This is especially true where there is some useful new tech unlock getting close that will make your life better. More inventory space? Yes please! Eventually you need to get out and explore. So Potshot gathered up the materials to build another teleporter and we got on our jet packs and went out to find some place to connect to our transportation network. By this point the atmosphere was sufficiently breathable that we were no longer constrained by oxygen. Our suits could now keep us supplied indefinitely. Likewise, we had picked up the water filter option, so we could refill our suits from any open water, and we had a lot of open water by this point. The main constraint to just flying around was food, and water if we strayed too far from a place where we could resupply. But food lasts a long time relative to water, so we were able to fly pretty freely without needing to seek shelter. We also flew by many little one room life support pods that we had scattered about the map back when oxygen was the primary constraint. So Saturday we went on a big loop of the map, which is feeling much smaller now that we are less constrained. We traveled for a while and settled on a big, open area, previously hidden by ice walls that have since melted. An open valley to explore This open canyon area the leads out to an ocean, ended up having a lot of locations to explore. It was near a spaceship crash site… and seriously, it seemed to be raining spaceships at some point because their wreckage is everywhere… that we set up our first teleport network connection. And a good thing too, because there was a lot to haul home from this site which combined wreckage and what looked to be a past civilization that might have lived here. That bridge and those arches didn’t fall from space. Was this planet habitable at some previous time? As we spread out the pick up what included a seemingly endless number of rocket engines… useful for many things, but there is a limit to our need… we found a water filled grotto area that had a whole under water complex of things to discover. The grotto back in the canyon depths Accessing the deep water area meant going down what we ended up referring to as the “deep hole” where Potshot nearly drowned due to being in third person view. Looking up from a bit down the deep hole As in EverQuest… didn’t I mention drowning there just yesterday… swimming in Planet Crafter is pretty awkward in third person view because the camera angles are severely limited. Basically, you cannot look straight up, which you need to do to swim straight up. This is where we discovered that he had been playing the game in third person, over the shoulder view the whole time while I had been playing in first person view. Normally I prefer the over the shoulder view because it allows for situational awareness and some semblance of peripheral vision, which is important in game with combat. So in a game like EverQuest where I need to make sure there isn’t a cyclops wandering around, I stay in third person view. (Again, borrowing from yesterday for illustration.) Fippy Darkpaw! We meet again! And in third person perspective! I had not worried about this in Planet Crafter because there hasn’t been anything like combat so far. (We’ll see what happens when the frogs start running the place.) In fact I had only just discovered the night before that there was an option besides first person view. You change views by clicking on the middle mouse button, which is the mouse wheel button, something I always forget is even a thing, which toggles you between the two perspectives. So we exchanged that bit of information and swimming overall because less of a traumatic experience. Still, I almost drowned because it is a bit of a labyrinth down there and I got lost and couldn’t find my way out… and while oxygen isn’t a problem above water, it still is when you go diving. Fortunately I was cautious and had a couple of oxygen bottles on me for emergency use. Our explorations also got us to the first of the Warden Keys, which are scattered around the planet, but which need a special chip to be able to see. You get the first one free then have to get the upgrade to find more. The first Warden Key location This also led us to a cave with yet another spaceship… though this one appeared to be intact rather than splattered over the landscape. A ship that might still fly We couldn’t get to the ship. It is floating out in a big open area beyond our ability to reach. But it being there at least implies we’ll get getting to it some day. In addition we picked up the ability to make explosives along the way. There were a number of blocked passages throughout the game that said you needed to blow them up. Now, with bombs in hand, I set out to do so. I messed up a a bit on the first try. You have to position yourself so when you drop the explosive charge… which seems like a bad thing to do, but whatever… it lands in the right place, because you can’t pick it up again, you can only activate it which turns on the five second timer. Still, I managed to clear some stuff out. Blocked passage with the bomb set And then boom. Passage soon to be clear The explosives do not harm anything but the stuff flagged as susceptible to damage. (Which I assume includes me, so I got clear.) So the ship that was in sustained no damage even if the stuff blocking the passage was obliterated. Some of these opened up to doors that required key cards. Others opened up to new areas and wrecks to salvage. How did this ship even get in here That in turn led to more salvage operations and more stuff to haul and more rocket motors to store. Meanwhile, on the terraforming front we reached the fish stage of planetary life, which meant building aquariums and fish spreaders. Then the amphibians showed up and our front yard was taken over by what I refer to as the “blue frog group.” But we just keep adding things to make the numbers go up. The numbers… they go up That has led to further reconfiguration of our main base, which now has more storage and drones… we unlocked drones… which can auto-harvest and keep things supplied, like the auto-crafters, so we are just a hive of production. The base as of this week Finally, we reached the point where I could bake some cookies and a birthday cake. Not just a cake, a birthday cake It isn’t anybody’s birthday, but there it is, decorating our lab. Nothing to report on Save Sync, which we continue to use to share a save file between us. It suits our needs and we haven’t messed up yet.