Update 0.9.8.1 - Engine upgrade, redesigned HUD, optimized core, joystick fixes

This update marks a fundamental shift in how the game works under the hood. There are a slew of improvements that increase performance, improve joystick & controller support, optimize HUD space, and future-proof the game. Besides a beefed up architecture, the HUD has been redesigned to improve the 3rd person experience and minimize on-screen clutter. I did a visual polish on all the environments to depict a harsher, brighter atmosphere. A new fixed turret-system is now present in several missions. I'm very happy with the visual style of this new asset and want it to carry over into a new, playable faction.

HUD

• Thinned out many reticles and gauges to reduce visual clutter & obstructions

• Rearranged gauges so that no gauge is obscured in 3rd person

• Implemented an animated leading crosshair to emphasize the location to aim at

• Added a flashing dot that is placed on the origin of the selected target

• Fixed the orientation of holograms displayed for the selected target

• Fixed an issue with target-reticles becoming gimbal-locked

Graphics

• Increased the brightness of star-light in all levels to better match a real space-environment

• Added a post-processing effect to over-expose highlights

• Optimized how skyboxes are drawn

• Fixed an issue with tracers being far too oversized at long distances

• Modeled and textured the new Phalanx turret-system

• Overhauled the "3D asset studio" accessible from the Graphics menu (assets are now only loaded one at a time and camera-controls are more intuitive)

Gameplay

• Replaced many static turrets with a new "Phalanx" turret that is mounted on a floating platform (older turrets were mounted on broken debris)

• Moved the 3rd person camera back significantly on all fighters to reduce the screen space taken by the player's ship

• Reduced the difficulty of some particularly hard levels

• Overhauled the objective-system to make level-scripting much more streamlined

Joysticks

• Overhauled the entire system that feeds joystick-input to the player's ship

• Mapping-presets are now read-only, while the "custom" mapping is always writable

• Replaced the "bypass" option with a "none" option in the mapping-dropdown

• Added a mapping for the Thrustermaster Airbus Sidestick

• Fixed an issue with some fields not being writable

• Offsets are now zero in most cases and multipliers are usually 1 or -1 (inverted)

IO

• Added a mouse-sensitivity slider to control the speed of the menu-cursor without affecting gameplay

• Wrote a new axis-input system to manage simultaneous input from multiple controllers (may have PTSD from this one)

• Eliminated a slight lag from all controllers (keyboard, mice, joysticks, gamepads)

• Rewrote/simplified internal timers responsible for mouse-movement and processing input in general (game should "feel" the same even at 500 fps!)

• Tested VR with the Oculus Rift S (rather glorious)

• Tested the Logitech F310 gamepad and the Thrustmaster Hotas X joystick

Core

• Upgraded to UE4.22 (still behind, but I can get it caught up to 4.27 quickly)

• Replaced many, many Blueprints with C++

• Faster overall load-times (both running the game and opening levels)

• Internal objects are now initialized in the correct order and destroyed when no longer needed

• Level-bounds can now be defined as any combination of spheres, boxes, and cylinders

• Added support for altering level-bounds as gameplay-conditions change

• Added support for prohibited zones within valid level-bounds (a restricted area)

UI

• Menus are now placed in front of the camera in a much more reliable & accurate way

• Improved accuracy of cursor-alignment with buttons & dropdowns