Rimworld Patch Inbound: 1.1 Public Beta Build Available Now

Rimworld‘s full 1.0 release brought what many assumed were the definitive features and QoF adjustments to Tynan’s management sim, but it’s not done just yet. Players can access the 1.1 public beta build right now, and try out the game’s next big update.

The Rimworld 1.1 patch notes are extensive, and you owe to yourself to read them if you regularly play the game. But if you’re feeling a little lazy, just check out some of these highlights:

• UI now uses colored text to highlight important words like character names, places, and rewards.
• Added room stats gizmo, which displays the stats of the room containing a selected building, at a glance.
• Added recon armor, EMP launchers, smoke launchers, and smoke grenadiers.
• Bison, donkeys, ducks, goats, geese, guinea pigs, horses, sheep, and yaks are being added.
• A “bunch” of new backstories.
• Added barricades, and changed sandbags to require textiles instead of steel.
• Added wooden hands and wooden feet.
• Context menu now shows icons next to each option depending on what’s being chosen. E.g. When choosing a building material, see icons for the material. When choosing a drug to administer, see icons for the drugs. And so on.
• Info cards can now include hyperlinks to other info cards. This is used in various places. For example, the info card for animals (and people) links to the type of meat and leather you can get from them. Info card for plants links to what you harvest from them. Info card for surgeries links to each ingredient. Info card for buildings links to the building materials. And so on.
• The game now uses an incremental garbage collector, which should remove the periodic frame hitches that would appear when a lot of memory was allocated and released. However, note that there is still a cost to memory allocations, so modders should still try to reduce allocation wherever possible.
• Optimizations to many systems. Performance should be significantly better, especially in complex game situations with many pawns.
• Pawns now really like the pawn who rescued them.
• Added toggle refuel allow command to pod launcher, wood generator, chemfuel generator, fueled smithy and fueled stove.

Rimworld getting a new patch does mean that mod players need to decide whether to wait for their favorite mods to update for the new match, or whether to accept the vanilla experience for a while.

For now, just avoid the public test beta; come full release week, though? You may have to wait a week or two to get your game back to its previous-modded glory.

Stay tuned for more on Rimworld as it develops. And be sure to check out our guide articles if you’re new to the game or find yourself stuck.