{"id":4134,"date":"2020-04-30T21:23:22","date_gmt":"2020-05-01T04:23:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/?p=4134"},"modified":"2021-05-26T14:52:29","modified_gmt":"2021-05-26T21:52:29","slug":"universe-sandbox-roadmap-2020-beyond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/2020\/04\/universe-sandbox-roadmap-2020-beyond\/","title":{"rendered":"Universe Sandbox Roadmap: 2020 &#038; Beyond"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/ZZ1D5qO.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"650\" height=\"366\"><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Universe Sandbox has improved significantly since our first Early Access release in 2015. We plan to add features and fix bugs for a long, long time to come (we even <a href=\"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/2019\/05\/new-look-same-great-sandbox\/\">removed the \u201c2\u201d from our name for that reason<\/a>). Here\u2019s a look into what we have planned for 2020 and beyond.<\/span><\/p>\n<h1><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What did we do in 2019?<\/span><\/h1>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/s1Hq99a.gif\" alt=\"VR Hands in Universe Sandbox\" width=\"650\" height=\"308\"><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Last year saw 3 major feature releases (and a handful of minor, but still important, updates):<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Better Galaxies (Update 23)<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">More stable and accurate galaxies and better collisions<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">New and improved Introduction tutorial for helping new users<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Surface Grids &amp; Lasers (Update 24)<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Surface Grids is a huge, complex feature that simulates the surfaces of planets, moons, and other objects<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Vaporize entire planets with the new Laser tool<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Custom Object Colors (Update 24.1)<\/span>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Customize colors for just about every object including planets, moons, stars, and black holes<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Dock graph windows alongside the other panels added with Surface Grids<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">View our \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/docs.google.com\/document\/d\/1TTsJL-ddM_i5RjfnQV5_R-hocRCin6hxAiCuVlytRtA\/edit\">What\u2019s New<\/a>\u201d for a chronological list of changes.<\/span><\/p>\n<h1><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What\u2019s the Plan for 2020?<\/span><\/h1>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The following list are all things we are working on currently. We\u2019re aiming to deliver on all of this in 2020, but when they\u2019ll be ready is difficult to predict, and priorities can change.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">With its ability to simulate localized surface temperatures, water level, vapor content, and more, Surface Grids (Update 24) perfectly sets us up for a multitude of new features. Localized temperatures enabled us to create the mighty Galactic Empire Superlaser, but that\u2019s only scratching the surface\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Surface Grids Improvements<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/iYGU7U3.gif\" alt=\"Surface Grids - Supernova near Earth\" width=\"650\"><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019ve been saying that Surface Grids is the foundation for many things to come, so it only makes sense that we start the year off by further improving it.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>Improved Temperature &amp; Atmosphere Simulation<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Surface Grids improvements started this year in January (Update 24.1.2), continued with Update 25 (March 2020), and will be a theme all year long<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Update 25 introduced a major rewrite to Tidal Heating and Vapor Flow calculations<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><b>Better Performance &amp; More Power<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not only have we accomplished localized surface simulations on your everyday computer, but we continue to make performance improvements<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Shader Model 5.0, a graphics card technology, became a requirement in Update 25 because it will give us some legroom for current and future enhancements<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Detailed Surface Manipulation<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>We are in the early stages of designing tools that allow for directly manipulating temperature, elevation, water level, vapor, and more on the surfaces of objects<\/li>\n<li>We plan to add the ability to view and edit the properties of individual surface grid &#8220;cells&#8221;. Take your planet customization and terraforming to a new heights with a level of precision you never thought possible<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Material Composition System<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Building off of the localized materials (water, CO2) in Surface Grids, we\u2019re working to rebuild our material composition in a more robust way.&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>Better System to Unify Materials<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Every point on the \u201cgrid\u201d will better contain a mixture of various materials, in various material states<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Complicated calculations of, for example, when some liquids become heated to a gas, should be handled more efficiently in our new simulation code<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>A Universe of Possibility<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Better terraforming, more realistic cloud and climate simulations, tidal waves, easy ways to manipulate the surface topography, and more detail on the surface view could all be the results of this new Material Composition System<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Who knows, maybe our planets could one-day support life?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Full Desktop User Experience in VR<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/Ib9kelh.gif\" alt=\"VR Hands in Universe Sandbox\" width=\"650\" height=\"308\"><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We have embraced a seemingly impossible goal of having a unified Universe Sandbox release no matter how you play. Whether you are on a powerful gaming PC, a laptop, a phone (coming soon), Virtual Reality, Mixed Reality, or a console (maybe soon? who knows!) the experience should be undiluted and awe-inspiring.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>A Magic Leap Forward<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">With our recent Magic Leap 1 release, we were able to bring the full Desktop experience to the world of Mixed Reality<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hard work pays off: the bulk of our Magic Leap 1 development helped unify our Mixed Reality, VR, and Desktop experience into one single vision<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><b>Get Your Hands on it<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Enjoy Universe Sandbox in VR without limitations and with the full Desktop User Interface<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Grab planets with your hands, shoot lasers out of your fingertips, and watch galaxies collide as if you were really there, floating in space (but a bit less cold).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">User Interface Improvements<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-4158 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/2020-04-30-22_53_16-Untitled-Gravit-Designer-650x366.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"650\" height=\"366\" srcset=\"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/2020-04-30-22_53_16-Untitled-Gravit-Designer-650x366.png 650w, https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/2020-04-30-22_53_16-Untitled-Gravit-Designer-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/2020-04-30-22_53_16-Untitled-Gravit-Designer-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/2020-04-30-22_53_16-Untitled-Gravit-Designer.png 1137w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 650px) 100vw, 650px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Creating the user interface (UI) for Universe Sandbox is a fun challenge. How do you give someone full control of the universe? As we add features and complexity to the simulation, keeping the UI accessible, discoverable, and easy to use becomes a constant challenge.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Over time, some portions of the interface can start to feel cluttered or outdated and are ready for a redesign. We\u2019ve been working on some of these design changes for a long time, and it\u2019s exciting to move closer to improving everyone\u2019s experience with Universe Sandbox.<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Redesigned Bottom Bar<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our current bottom bar has been collecting new buttons over the years without a cohesive vision for how it should all work. So we\u2019ve rethought how everything should be organized and how we can make it work on really small screens.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Improved Add Panel<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Like the Bottom Bar, the Add Panel is due for a makeover. We\u2019re targeting a single shared UI for all platforms (desktop, touch, VR\/AR, and consoles), so the new Add Panel is being built with that in mind.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&nbsp;<\/span><\/p>\n<h1>&#8230;and beyond?<\/h1>\n<h2><\/h2>\n<h2>Mobile<\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-4142\" src=\"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/iphoneX-transparent-650x300.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"650\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/iphoneX-transparent-650x300.png 650w, https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/iphoneX-transparent-300x139.png 300w, https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/iphoneX-transparent-768x355.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 650px) 100vw, 650px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Enjoy Universe Sandbox on your phone or tablet! <a href=\"http:\/\/universesandbox.com\/mobile\/\">Sign up to get notified about&nbsp;our mobile version.<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>Is that Universe Sandbox in Your Pocket?<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our mobile version is in development right now for both Android and iOS. It\u2019s no easy feat to simulate the universe on a smartphone, but we\u2019re doing it!<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><b>A Pure, Unadulterated Experience<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Some of the breakthroughs we made with both Surface Grids and Magic Leap have paid off and will allow for the full desktop version on your pocket-sized device<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Life Simulation<\/h2>\n<p>Create the right conditions for life and watch it grow, or end it all with a major impact.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Turn a cold, lifeless space rock into a vibrant planet<\/li>\n<li>Many details are still TBD, keep an eye out for a DevLog when we get started<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Fluid Simulation<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/1jgKDZM.gif\" alt=\"SPH Test Animation\" width=\"650\"><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Smoothed-particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) will help create more detailed, realistic simulations of collisions, fragmentation, and formation of different types of objects. Read more in our <a href=\"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/2019\/12\/sph-devlog-1\/\">SPH Fluid Simulation DevLog<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Experiments with Tools<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.imgur.com\/Y04OIx2.gif\" alt=\"Laser Moons\" width=\"650\"><br \/>\nThis is firmly in the realm of experimentation at the moment, but we&#8217;re looking at new and interesting ways we can use our tools within a simulation. Driven by a need to automate testing of features, we&#8217;re working on ways to programmatically activate tools. By automating and attaching different tools to objects, we discovered that we can enable some pretty fun&nbsp;scenarios. The above clip is what happens when we attached a bunch of lasers to moons and tell it to automatically fire at the nearest object. Awesome stuff, right?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gamepad Support\u2026 and more?<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do you want to sit back on your couch and play Universe Sandbox? So do we! We\u2019ll be experimenting with full gamepad support. Who knows where that leads us, maybe even a console version in the future.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hiring<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We are currently hiring a Spaceship Physics Developer, <a href=\"http:\/\/universesandbox.com\/jobs\/\">join us!<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"twitter-follow-button\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/universesandbox?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" data-show-count=\"false\" data-size=\"large\">Follow @universesandbox<\/a><script async=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border: none; overflow: hidden;\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/page.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2FUniverseSandbox%2F&amp;tabs&amp;width=340&amp;height=70&amp;small_header=true&amp;adapt_container_width=true&amp;hide_cover=false&amp;show_facepile=false&amp;appId\" width=\"340\" height=\"70\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Universe Sandbox has improved significantly since our first Early Access release in 2015. We plan to add features and fix bugs for a long, long time to come (we even removed the \u201c2\u201d from our name for that reason). Here\u2019s a look into what we have planned for 2020 and beyond. What did we do [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":52,"featured_media":4184,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4134","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-development","category-roadmap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4134","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/52"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4134"}],"version-history":[{"count":33,"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4134\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4656,"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4134\/revisions\/4656"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/universesandbox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}