Rec Room UPDATE - the "Room Rec" edition

We're experimenting with a room recommendations system.  Some users will see recommended rooms instead of the Rec.Net tab.  These recommendations are based on your previous room visit history as well as a point-in-time analysis of the aggregate history of the community.  We expect to update the aggregate analysis periodically.  We hope this new system will make it easier to discover rooms that you'll enjoy!

Also, some general bug fixes:

  • Players can no longer use their own Room Settings AI menu to kill AI in rooms that they don't own.

  • The Game Rules chip now caps the player count at 40.

  • The welcome mat now immediately shows whether it is configured to link to a room name, or a subroom.

  • You can now report another player's comment in your room, even if you have never met them.

As always, thanks for playing Rec Room!

Please see here for convenient links to controls, tutorials, comfort options, etc.: https://recroom.com/community

We love to hear your feedback, so please don't hesitate to let us know what you think...

Rec Room UPDATE - the "iOS iteration" edition

Some of the touch controls for iPad/iPhone players have been redesigned to make it easier and more comfortable to play!

What used to look like this...

https://imgur.com/a/I3KUupH

...now looks like this!

https://imgur.com/a/sKycjXS

In our latest blog post we started to talk about experiments we’re running to make players on screens devices better able to express themselves with their hands.

https://recroom.com/developer-blog/2020/6/9/social-expression-on-screen-devices

This control redesign is our first step towards that more-expressive screen-player future as you can now wave with both your left and right hands!. 

We also took this opportunity to make interacting with the world a little more comfortable and a little more consistent.

Instead of this...

https://imgur.com/a/FlTsQRS

...do this!

https://imgur.com/a/RXe5IPT

Players on iPad/iPhone will also see a streamlined login flow. We have removed the portrait mode chat UI for now. We will likely bring it back in improved form at some point. But for now we want to focus on getting you into the game as quickly and as smoothly as we can.

In other news, we’re also bringing circuit pins to the Costume Dummy! This version of the costume dummy will replace the old one in the Maker Pen, but you can still find all of your old costume dummies without the pins in your rooms and still use them.

[General Changes]

  • Equip UI on the costume dummy no longer orbits the base.

  • The distance at which the equip UI opens and closes was tuned to be closer to the dummy itself.

  • The costume dummy is no longer physical, and will now stay in place while you’re working on it.

[Configure Options]

  • Select multiple roles to add to the player that is wearing the costume.

  • Select whether to remove the roles that were added when the costume is removed (on by default).

  • Select whether to show or hide the equip UI.

  • Select multiple categories of avatar outfit items to hide when the costume is worn. You can choose from Head, Torso, Left Hand, and Right Hand.

  • Option to disable the zip sound

[Circuitry]

  • Input Pins

    • Equip to player ID - equips the costume to the provide player ID.

    • Reset - removes the costume from the current wearer and puts it back on the costume dummy.

  • Output Pins

    • Equipped Player ID - now reports 0 when no one is wearing the costume.

We also created a new screen where you can view all of the content a player has created in Rec Room – The Portfolio Screen! You can access your portfolio screen through your profile and view other players' portfolios through their player details pages. On the portfolio screen you can view all of the rooms, inventions, and clubs a player has created as well as viewing a list of their subscribers. You will see both unpublished and published content on your own portfolio but you can only view published content on other players' portfolios.

You can now view a list of all players you're subscribed to through the "Subscriptions" tab on the People screen. Here you'll find a searchable list of subscriptions with links to each creator's portfolio.

Creators can now publish custom announcements for their subscribers! Announcements can be created from your portfolio or when publishing a new room or invention. Other players will be able to view your announcements on your portfolio and can follow links to check out your new rooms and inventions.

Also, some general bug fixes:

  • The rangefinder will now report the most recent player ID or object ID on the next circuit tick, so you will no longer miss out if a player or object passes through the laser beam between circuit ticks.

  • Wall run behavior is back to normal after an unintentional change last ship - maintenance has cleaned the walls to verify you should be able to wall run normally again.

As always, thanks for playing Rec Room!

Please see here for convenient links to controls, tutorials, comfort options, etc.: https://recroom.com/community

We love to hear your feedback, so please don't hesitate to let us know what you think...

Rec Room PATCH - the "Announcements in the Club" edition

Charades fixes:

  • Primitive shapes spawn without pitch or roll, just like if you were using the Maker Pen.

  • Fixed the triggers on PS4 DualShock. You can actually play Charades (BetaUpdate) now!

Room Chat upgrades:

  • Room chat messages have a new look that makes it easier to read and to see who the message is coming from

  • Messages show the sender’s profile photo, this is also a button (for Touch and VR at the moment) that will open the sender’s profile page.

  • Fixed a ton of bugs with the formatting, transitions, and other interactions with Room Chat. It should be much more stable and consistent now!

And some general bug fixes:

  • The radio menu is fixed for screen players

  • Fixed an issue on screens where you could click on scoreboards and other world UI while trying to close the watch menu by tapping in the margins.

  • Fixed laser pointing a player not working if you were gripping your Index or Oculus controller.

  • Bear standee should no longer cause errors when saving into rooms

  • Fixed an issue that could cause players to perpetually drift after landing on the ground

  • Fixed an issue with manipulate tool that caused it to impact multiple sides at once

  • Fixed an issue causing state machine nodes losing their configured values when being connected to a state machine graph

  • Fixed "Cancel" button on Safe Mode confirmation screen during login

  • Fixed bug that was causing some players to get stuck while viewing their chat messages

  • Fixed an error in club details where members where showing as blank boxes

As always, thanks for playing Rec Room!

Please see here for convenient links to controls, tutorials, comfort options, etc.: https://recroom.com/community

We love to hear your feedback, so please don't hesitate to let us know what you think...

Rec Room UPDATE - the "Announcing in the Club" edition

Club announcements are a great way to publish info for everyone in your club to read! As a club leader (or someone with the announcements permission), you can post an announcement with a title, body, and an optional image. It will show up for everyone in your club just a few minutes after you hit publish.

Only club members can view club announcements. Members can find the announcements in a new section of your club's page, just under the actions section. Members will know your club has posted a new announcement when you see a number on the clubs button on the watch home screen. Once inside the clubs browser,  a green marker will appear on clubs with new announcements. Then in your club's announcements section, each individual announcement will have the same green maker showing you if it's new.

Club owners control who can post announcements. On your Club page, go to "Club Settings" and configure the "Can create club announcements" permission for each membership level. Announcements will be a great way to post about upcoming club events, new creations the club has worked on, updates to the clubhouse, or anything else you'd want to let your members know about. We're thinking about what a true club events system will look like, but for now announcements will be the best way to organize your members.

Thank you so much to everyone who has created a club so far! We're really happy with the variety and love put into all the clubs we're seeing.

On another note, Charades is now in beta for screen players! Try it out in ^CharadesBetaUpdate. We will be refining the experience over the coming weeks and adding a brand-new venue! Soon

As you might have guessed, screen players can now use the charades pen! It also includes some exciting enhancements to make drawing in charades better on screen mode:

  • Finger painting mode! Tap the finger paint button to start drawing tubes and other shapes using a cursor on the screen.

  • Shortcut menu for the charades pen with quick access to a few shapes and colors

  • Trigger sensitive tube size with a controller

  • Dynamic tube size on mouse/touch based on how fast you draw

  • Pressure sensitive tube size with Apple Pencil while finger-painting

Charades pen has gotten some general improvements:

  • A fresh coat of paint on the tool menu

  • More shapes (cylinder, pyramid)

  • Shape previews at the tip of the pen

Bug fixes:

  • Screen players can now pickup objects that are “sticky” such as charades shapes and polaroids, even after they are stuck to something.

  • iPad Pro 11 inch home menu now works in landscape.

  • Fixed Apple Pencil pressure sensitivity for whiteboards

  • Fixed some cases where the UI would break after returning to a backgrounded iOS app

We've also added a new way for creators to easily highlight content for their players  -- Link Buttons! The link button is a new dynamic prop which can be spawned from the maker pen palette. Once spawned, players can configure these buttons to link to any of the following: Players, Rooms, Clubs, Inventions, or Player Events. Players that press the button will be shown the details UI for whatever the button is linked to (ex: A specific player’s details UI). We hope creators can use these buttons to call attention to some of the cool people and creations that can be found in Rec Room.

We also added a Rangefinder Gadget - Point this new gadget at anything and it will output the distance to whatever the laser beam hits.  If the target is an object or player, it also outputs the target's ID.  It can be configured to provide distance values in meters, centimeters, or millimeters, and can filter for objects by tag, and players by role.  You can configure it to show the recolorable laser beam even when gadgets are hidden, so get ready for some cool laser light shows!

And some general bug fixes:

  • Reduced latency on screen creation tools. Dragging now happens instantly rather than in .25 seconds

  • Can now drag objects which are far away

As always, thanks for playing Rec Room!

Please see here for convenient links to controls, tutorials, comfort options, etc.: https://recroom.com/community

We love to hear your feedback, so please don't hesitate to let us know what you think...