Do we know why Ocean/Frozen Ocean Biomes were taken out?

Just a point of curiosity. I heard that Ocean/Frozen Ocean were in earlier Alpha (and maybe beta) versions but were taken out because of some issues they were having. Does anyone know what the issues or bugs were that caused them to be removed?

 

I doubt they were taken out permanently.

 

I don't believe they were taken out permanently, no, I think they will be added back. I think the issue was they haven't yet implemented mechanisms for breathing underwater.

 

Plus I don't think the Hylotl villages where done, which are an important part of ocean biomes. They'll be back, they're a very wanted feature due to their exoticness.

 

They're not playable yet - You can force water planets on, but they are horrible. More land than water, huge pillars, shallow water.

 

Ah. I wondered if it was because when water interacts with lava the water evaporates - meaning you could dig down and effectively drain a planet by digging to the core. I shepherded a large pool of water to the planet lava core once and was sad that it had no interaction beyond destroying the water.

 

The fluid physics aren't complete either - Different kinds of fluids can't mix or interact. The one poured on the other just seems to vanish, leaving a visual effect of having mixed slightly on the surface.

Try irrigating a pool of poison into a pond or vice versa - Same result as water onto lava.

 

I believe it's because you currently beam directly down to the bottom of the ocean. I saw a playtest where this happened several times... I'm sure that if they were in beta it would leave dozens of people stranded on planets they couldn't even visit.

 

Ah - I can see how that would present a problem.

 

Oh... well then.

 

There's likely also an issue of incomplete nature of sub-biomes for these planets. Exploring an ocean sounds like a great time, unless it's just an empty pool of water.

 

From what I was told the ocean biome breaks world generation in general.

 

Even if it is, and even without water breathing, I'd love to make a home in one of these biomes. It'd be worth it for the flavor fun of the race IMO.

 

They will be back, they're just not really playable atm. No race and breathe underwater and it's a real hassle traveling in it. So there's very little gameplay for them, which will most likely change in the future.

 

They are in the game, they're just not currently set to spawn. You can set them to spawn by going into Starbound/assets/celestial.config and adding the biome "ocean" to one of your sectors (don't forget the comma!) the ocean level is a bit iffy right now so ocean planets sometimes spawn without an ocean (Why they're not set to spawn yet). It will also technically work in multiplayer but if you're host the other people will not see the correct biome on the navigation computer or if you're not /you/ won't see the correct biome in the navigation computer. There are also two other biomes you can enable, the savannah and arctic biomes.

 

It would be neat, imagine underwater bases after wiring and stuff is implemented, they could have some sort of water pump system.

Have a sealed room with 2 doors to function as a waterlock at the entrance of your base |_| You would open the door and enter, water would rush in behind you so you would have to hurry and close the door and activate the water pumps to suck all the water out of the room, then just enter your base without flooding anything.

 

I really want oceans because i`ll do my house in there i love water and to hylotl it will be perfect... (sorry, bad english :/ )

 

That's just what I wanted

 

I've seen/heard a few explanations as to why, they all make sense and really opened my eyes to how much work would be needed for ocean biomes:

- not content-finished: right now all we have are small passive fish monsters in game. Also there was mention that Hylotl dungeons/towns are still needing polish. besides that things like reefs, sea life, plants... alot needs to be done because of how unique this biome would be.

-Parallax: there were some performance issues caused by the water planets and b.g. parallax

-world gen: currently world gen is random elevations, caves, and layers. Ocean biomes will require specific geographical points (such as islands not attached to the floor), else we will see tons of planets of just 1~2 block high water on an otherwise "regular" planet, etc...

-issues with fluids: spawning under water, NPCs interacting(breathing and swimming) in water, water mixing with other fluids (i.e. planet cores)....

-biome specific items,dungeons, and mini-dungeons: system needs to be made or it would be awful weird to see a glitch village or an avian sky tower at the bottom of the ocean, and alternatively a Hylotl city in a desert. Not to mention there isn't a system that limits unique monsters to spawn in specific biomes only. (there was a concept art for a giant ocean dragon monster previously, I'm guessing it would be Ocean biome exclusive)

 

GeorgeV also mentioned in another thread that there are issues with the water physics themselves, and that they needed a new system in place for oceans.

Otherwise changing one block underwater would have to affect every single block of water in the ocean. Which caused some memory and processor issues. (I imagine it was like the scene in The IT Crowd when the computer catches on fire.)