Release v0.8

Despite some recent setbacks another milestone has come to a close in exactly one year after previous one. There are slightly fewer new game features but a number of features got fully functional (instead of being stubbed) and under the hood there are lot of improvements.

Download Stareater v0.8

New game features:

• Star system policies - colonies are managed indirectly by picking a policy for whole star system.
• Galaxy scan range - other player ships are only visible within certain distance from owned colonies and starships.
• Fuel mechanic - a resource pool used by ships traveling away from owned colonies. Going further away uses up more fuel and if too much is used the economy is penalized.
• Fleet pathfinding - ships can be sent more then one starlane "hop" away and they'll automatically pick the fastest route.

 Reworked game features:

• Map generator - now actually tries to balance planet sizes and traits instead of placing them purely randomly. There is a lot more planet traits and a star type affects planets. Map preview shows star system quality.
• Colonization - generalized with interstellar migration. Both use same population transporters and automated management logic (routing, loading and unloading).
• Catalyzer (space monster) - retreats from battle after tainting a star.

Under the hood improvements:

• Nestable GUI elements - allows for more complex user interface. 
• Galaxy map GUI - mostly replaced with game engine GUI. Removed Winforms toolbar. Made graphics for new interface elements (end turn button, scan range toggle, toolbar replacement buttons, policy cycle button).
• Tooltips - hovering a mouse over certain UI elements reveals more information about it.
• Reworked text rendering - big texts are not blurry any more but small text are bit less crisp. In general characters to display graphics pipeline is more sensible now.
• Small tweaks to tech tree.
• Fixed issues running under mono on Linux.
• Fixed lockup when a player is attacked at undefended system.