Hi Aurochnauts! ????????
It's time for the July Mission Briefing: Developer Update for Mars Horizon 2: The Search for Life with our latest update on what we've been up to ????
Make sure you are subscribed to our Mars Horizon Newsletter to get these updates direct to your inbox and join our Discord to talk to other Mars Horizon and Space fans.
???????? What have the devs been working on in July? ????????
The Mars Horizon team continues it's lightspeed journey on the search for life.
July has seen many improvements to the surface gameplay. Many payload actions have had their associated VFX passes applied, this gives each payload action its own unique flavour.
World space tooltips have been added into the game which is a massive leap forwards information communication. Having these UI elements is crucial for Mars Horizon to keep the player informed on all of the interconnected resources and their various uses during play.
We are committed to providing as authentic a space exploration experience as possible. To this end, the production and design team continue to reach out to various institutions to get expert insight on our game design decision. Finding life in Mars Horizon 2 will echo expert opinions on the nature of life in the solar system.
The team has also been making time to take part in events, keep an eye out for our talk at TactiCon to hear first hand from one of our designers and coders, as well as one of our partners for the game.
- Matt Holmes, Producer for Mars Horizon 2: The Search for Life
???? Listen to our talk at TactiCon 2024! ????
Tacticon is a celebration of the incredible world of strategy games with discounted games, exclusive demos, and talks and panels with strategy developers! This years event ran from 18th - 22nd July across Steam, including a full list of talks and panels.
As part of the event we did a talk on Space Exploration in Strategy games. Our talk was hosted by our Lead Marketing Manager Will Flanagan and he was joined by guests Claudia Thomas, one of the designers for Mars Horizon 2: The Search for Life as well as Freddie Jones, one of our associate programmers on the game. They were also joined by special guest Dr Sean McMahon, senior academic and researcher in astrobiology at the University of Edinburgh and one of our partners on Mars Horizon 2.
Check out our talk to learn how we've worked with Sean and his team to make space exploration fun but still authentic in our game????
Watch our talk over on the Official TactiCon Channel
???????????? Congratulations to the Ariane 6 team! ????????????
A huge congratulations to our partners for Mars Horizon and Mars Horizon 2: The Search for Life, the European Space Agency (ESA), on their successful launch recently of the Ariane 6 on 9th July!
Get an overview of the Ariane 6 on ESA's website where you can learn all about the rocket's features and planned missions. Also, make sure to check out some incredible shots of the launch over on the official ESA twitter.
We were extra excited to see the Ariane 6 launch since the Ariane 5 is featured in 2 of our games! The heavy launcher bowed out last July after nearly three decades of service but was an important and impressive rocket during its service. Check out this video to see the Ariane 5 appearing in Mars Horizon 1.
You can also see the Ariane 5 appearing in our card game Mars Horizon: Blast Off!, which was a spin off of our game Mars Horizon.
???? From the Archives ????
Back during the development of Mars Horizon 1 we did a stream with the Robotic Exploration Program Manager from the UK Space Agency Paul Smith. You can watch the full stream over on our YouTube channel.
Paul's work focuses on the robotic exploration of Mars and the Moon. He talks to us about the future of Space Travel, colonising other planets, growing plants in space and 2001 Space Odyssey whilst we play Mars Horizon!
????️Join The Official Mars Horizon 2 Socials????️
There's never been a better time to follow our social channels! This will ensure that you don't miss out on the cool content we'll have to share throughout the development journey and some behind the scenes looks at what we get up to. ????
