You can grab nightly releases on the nightly release page, which is automatically rebuilt at roughly UTC 09:00 every day. Note that this build is likely to contain some bugs and save files may break in between nightlies.
As Naikari is not digitally signed and notarized or on the Mac App Store, you will receive this error.
Please refer to the following Apple Support Article (HT202491) to allow you to run Naikari.
Some Windows sound drivers don't provide OpenAL. If you have no sound, download and install OpenAL from here.
While not ideal, you can run Naikari in software mode if absolutely necessary by setting the LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE environment variable to true. For example, if you are on Linux, you might do something like this:
LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE=true ./naikari-0.1.0.AppImageSDL doesn't use its Wayland video driver by default, but Naikari may require the Wayland video driver when run in a Wayland environment, depending on your distro and/or setup (we don't know exactly what factors cause the problem). The reason for the X11 driver being the default is a bit complicated, but explained in the commit that reverted the change that would have made the Wayland video driver the default (libsdl-org/SDL@254fcc9). SDL 2.0.22 has a mechanism in place to define Wayland as preferred, which should theoretically solve the issue, but older SDL versions will continue to be in use for some time, so that solution is not feasible for official builds in the short-term. In the long-term, we suspect this issue will go away on its own as things mature on the Wayland front.
For now, if Naikari will not start up for you because you are using Wayland, you can fix the problem by setting the SDL_VIDEODRIVER environment variable to wayland, e.g.:
SDL_VIDEODRIVER=wayland ./naikari-0.1.0.AppImageThis should work, though colors may be distorted depending on your system; you can correct this by adjusting gamma in the Options menu if it occurs.
In short, the reason for the fork is irreconcilable disagreements with Naev's lead developer over the direction the project should go and what kind of game it should be. Naikari is simply us continuing the same work we were doing for Naev previously.
That's a difficult question to answer because Naikari doesn't define itself in relation to the current Naev project. Naikari's only relation to Naev is past versions. In fact, Naikari is so different from current Naev versions that there are significant API incompatibilities between the two. That said, following is a list of the changes we feel are most notable between the two projects as of Naev 0.10 and Naikari 0.9:
- Naev has been adding things which, we believe, amount to feature creep. This is the primary reason Naikari was forked from Naev in the first place. Some examples include: the visual novel system, the stealth mechanic, "safe" lanes / patrol routes, pirate sub-factions, more complicated gimmick-based outfits, a proliferation of minigames, and even a skill tree system for Soromid ships. Naikari doesn't have any of these things; they've been deliberately excluded or (in some earlier cases) removed. We believe in making a solid, cohesive, well-designed, and accessible game above all else.
- Naev has been adding visual flourishes, such as the damage effect and new star background, which Naikari (intentionally) foregoes. For Naikari, we prefer a clean, simple design. This also has a side-effect of making Naev significantly less efficient than Naikari, which may make Naev run slow on older hardware that Naikari runs fine on.
- Naev has been adding large numbers of empty dead-end systems for players to "explore". We disagree with this approach of enabling "exploration" of places the player would never want to go to, and instead prefer for every system to serve a purpose, so any dead-end systems in Naikari are either part of a hidden path, or there to make navigation of certain areas (hidden pirate strongholds and the Inner Nebula) more difficult.
- Naev's story is designed to fit a "chapter" system, where specific events are segmented off between "chapters" that indicate roughly how much progress has been made through the main story, although only "chapter 1" is implemented at the moment. Naikari has no plans to follow this model, instead preferring a more organic system of progression through a decentralized collection of stories that have various levels of connection to each other.
- The way Naev and Naikari are balanced differs substantially. This is hard to explain fully unless you have experience playing both games, but in general, ship outfitting is more complicated and difficult to do properly in Naev than it is in Naikari.
- Naikari's "radar range" system differs substantially from Naev's "E-warfare" system. Naev's system is more complicated, with stats that actually mean exactly the opposite of what their names imply. Naev's system also has a weapon "tracking" system which is entirely static: a weapon's "tracking" for a particular ship is always the same regardless of distance in Naev, which can lead to absurd situations where you can't shoot down a ship right next to you due to how bad the auto-aim is. By contrast, in Naikari, both your ability to see a ship and your weapons' auto-aiming accuracy are dictated by a simpler "radar range" stat, which indicates the distance another ship has to be within for you to see it and for your weapons to accurately fire on it. This is not only simpler and easier to understand, but also means you don't have to struggle to shoot down a Hyena that's right next to your own ship just because the Hyena is small and your guns are big (as auto-aiming always becomes reliable once you get close enough).
- Naev and Naikari have different missions, campaigns, and overall stories. While some missions continue to be the same between the two, most have either been changed or will be taken in a new direction as development continues. We don't know Naev's overall story plan (its lead developer has never been particularly clear about what his plans are), but Naikari's story is meant to be a mystery plot with a hefty dose of political commentary.
- Naikari has a much more streamlined new game experience than Naev does, with a series of missions that naturally teach new players the core game mechanics through a hidden tutorial. Naev still has just a minor variation of our first attempt to make a proper tutorial, which is clunky and difficult to digest.
- Naikari has substantially overhauled how combat works to make it more fun and rewarding, and less punishing. Weapon ranges vary a lot more than Naev ever did, kills grant automatic bounties to reward combat skills in a better way than the previous bounty missions, and as long as you remember to keep some fuel in reserve, you can always get away from a dangerous encounter with the "escape jump" feature.
- Naikari has done away with the "standing cap" system Naev has which is designed to force you to do parts of the story to make progress. In Naikari, you can make as much reputation with any faction as you want simply by killing their enemies, if you like, or by doing repeatable missions. You can even ally yourself with the Collective, if you so choose.
- Naikari's universe has been completely overhauled to better reward exploration, primarily by making the outfits and ships available differ by region a lot more than they did previously.
- Hypergates (a sort of fast travel system) work differently. In Naev, hypergates are special "space objects" where you pay a fee to teleport to the other hypergates, activated when "Chapter 1" begins (which happens after either a lot of missions or a lot of special mining has been done). Naikari's hypergates, on the other hand, are standard jump points that simply lead to a central hub system called the "Hypergate Zone", with each hypergate opening up one at a time as you become known to its respective faction (that is to say, when your reputation with the faction is at least 20%, or less than -20%).
- Naikari has removed clutter from the news feed. Naev's changelog claims that version 0.10's news has been "revamped" to "relate more with current events", but nearly all news entries in Naev 0.10 are still randomly generated filler entries that have almost no relevance to the player. In Naikari, every news article shown at the bar has relevance to the player, usually by telling the player about a mission they can go on, hinting at a place that they should go, or expanding the game's lore.
- Naikari's interface has been significantly improved. The default GUI, Neo, is one that combines the strengths of the "Slim" and "Brushed" GUIs. Other improvements include the ability to sell outfits from the Equipment screen, a better aiming helper, better default controls with automatic weapon handling, a redesigned mission computer, a redesigned commodity exchange, and better colorblind accessibility.
This is not a comprehensive list, of course, and since we are not involved with the Naev project, there may be differences we aren't aware of. However, this should hopefully give a good general idea.
In short, no. Naikari is designed in such a way that the rate of passage of time is routinely adjusted as a part of its normal gameplay. This makes any sort of multiplayer impractical without completely redesigning the game. Endless Sky, whose design is somewhat similar to Naikari's, is likely more suited to being turned into a multiplayer game than Naikari ever will be.
That said, if someone wants to implement it, we are not opposed to accepting a contribution adding either a sort of cooperative gameplay with additional players piloting escort ships, or a sort of deathmatch gameplay mode. These sorts of minor multiplayer additions would be feasible.
Naev, which is upstream of Naikari, has been working on supporting rendering ships as 3-D models. Supposedly the 3-D model rendering works, although sprites are still being used. We are willing to accept contributions toward fixing remaining problems and pulling improvements to the 3-D code from upstream, but have no plans to directly work on the problem at this time due to limited resources and other tasks being a higher priority.
That's actually a diaeresis, not an umlaut, and it has a different meaning. An umlaut (as used in languages like German) modifies the pronunciation of a single vowel. By contrast, a diaeresis doesn't modify pronunciation; rather, it indicates that two consecutive vowels (like the "a" and "o" in "Chaös") are pronounced separately, rather than as a unit.
Naikari uses this convention, which most people consider antiquated or "obsolete", as a matter of style as of version 0.8.0. To be more specific, we use it for any vowel hiatus which is made up of one of the following pairs of letters:
- "ai" (as in "naïve")
- "ao" (as in "chaös")
- "ea" (as in "areä")
- "ee" (as in "reëxamine")
- "ei" (as in "deïty")
- "eu" (as in "museüm")
- "oa" (as in "koäla")
- "oo" (as in "coöperate")
These are all known launch options for Naikari when run from the commandline:
| Launch Option | Description of Usage |
|---|---|
| -f, --fullscreen | activate fullscreen |
| -F n, --fps n | limit frames per second to n |
| -V, --vsync | enable vsync |
| -W n | set width to n |
| -H n | set height to n |
| -j n, --joystick n | use joystick n |
| -J s, --Joystick s | use joystick whose name contains s |
| -M, --mute | disables sound |
| -S, --sound | forces sound |
| -m f, --mvol f | sets the music volume to f |
| -s f, --svol f | sets the sound volume to f |
| -G, --generate | regenerates the nebula (slow) |
| -d, --datapath | specifies a custom path for all user data (saves, screenshots, etc.) |
| -X, --scale | defines the scale factor |
| -h, --help | display this message and exit |
| -v, --version | print the version and exit |
| OS | Path |
|---|---|
| Windows | %APPDATA%\naikari\ |
| macOS | ~/Library/Application Support/naikari/ |
| Linux | ~/.local/share/naikari/ |
Saves and screenshots can be found in the saves and screenshots directories, respectively.
| OS | Path |
|---|---|
| Windows | %APPDATA%\naikari\conf.lua |
| macOS | ~/Library/Preferences/naikari/conf.lua |
| Linux | ~/.config/naikari/conf.lua |
Not as such. However, the Lua console (accessible with F2) allows you to modify many things, including adding credits, refuelling, and adding outfits.
Some simple examples:
player.pay(1000000) -- This will give you 1,000,000 credits.
player.refuel() -- This will fully refuel your ship.
player.teleport("Gamma Polaris") -- Teleports you to Gamma Polaris.
player.outfitAdd("Turbolaser", 6) -- Adds 6 Turbolasers to your owned outfits.And a slightly more complex set:
player.pilot():setInvincible() -- Makes you invulnerable until you next reload.
player.pilot():setInvincible(false) -- Makes you vulnerable again.
player.pilot():setHealth(100, 100, 0) -- Restores all shield and armor, and undisables you.
player.pilot():setEnergy(100) -- Fully recharges your battery.
player.pilot():fillAmmo() -- Refills all of your ammo to max.
faction.get("Empire"):setPlayerStanding(100) -- Makes your Empire standing 100%.For (much) more, see the full Lua API documentation.
Naikari uses gettext for translation. The translation files are found in the po subdirectory.