RimWorld's Royalty DLC and 1.1 update snuck up on us last week, with Ludeon Studios typically only updating players once things are finished cooking. It looks like that's changing, however, with players getting a rough idea of what's to come courtesy of a blog post.
Along with hotfixes, the next thing on the agenda is a content add-on for Royalty. The goal is to make it play nicely with mods and not break saves, but as for everything else, it's still up in the air. Nothing is decided, but the add-on could include new combat psycasts, tweaks to mech clusters and extra quests.
The mech clusters are one of Royalty's big new additions. They're tricky mech bases made up of connected buildings with special elements like alarms, turrets, shields, factories that spawn more mechs. They're affected by extreme world conditions, too, filling the air with poison or blotting out the sun. They require players to go on the offensive, but the tweak being considered would make leaving them dormant for a long time worthwhile.
"The dramatic tension of having a mech cluster present on the map, but not yet fighting it, seems valuable," writes designer Tynan Sylvester. "So, if we can find more ways to have players intentionally keep clusters around it could add a lot of interest to play stories."
Further away, a 1.2 update is also on the cards—though Ludeon Studios' plans for that will probably be a mystery for a good while yet. In the meantime, players will be able to check out updates before they're live by hitting up the unstable development branch on Steam.
