16 May 2026: iPad Play fix & mission engine repair
Critical bug fixes · Mission deadline overhaul · Mobile nav restored
Critical bug fixes
- iPad Play button now actually launches the game. iPadOS and iOS Safari were silently blocking the new game tab because the join token request happens asynchronously: the popup blocker treats anything after the wait as "not from a user click". The dashboard now opens the new tab synchronously the moment you tap and navigates it once the token is ready. Same fix benefits Android Chrome's strict pop-up mode.
- Mission "Report Complete" stuck-state fixed. Faction-board missions like Standing Picket and Flag the System were silently slipping past their internal deadline and refusing to close: the modal would read "9 / 3 Special Cruiser" with the objective clearly met, but Report Complete kept saying Mission Incomplete. The expirer that closes lapsed missions wasn't wired into the new per-acceptance deadline column. It is now, and stuck missions resolve correctly.
Missions
- Deadline policy rewritten. Most NPC missions (destroy, deploy, locate, survey) now ship without a deadline: the previous "every mission has a 60-minute deadline" generator was the root cause of the stuck-state above. When a deadline is attached, it's drawn from a small, recognisable pool (12h, 48h, or 72h) so the cadence is learnable. Protect missions always carry one (that's how they work).
- Time Remaining on the board card and briefing modal: counts down live so you can see at a glance when a deadline mission is about to lapse. No deadline shown means no deadline, full stop.
- Existing accepted missions authored under the old "always deadline" rule have been backfilled to no-deadline, except Protect missions and story-pack chapters; those keep whatever bespoke deadline their author set.
Mobile & iPad
- Hamburger menu restored on Patch Notes, Lore, every per-race page, and the legal pages. The button had gone missing on subpages so mobile visitors could navigate into them but not out.
- Pop-up blocker compatibility (see above) means the dashboard Play / Join flow now works the same on phone, tablet, and desktop.
Marketing site
- Race name titles in each per-race hero are now significantly brighter: white text with a race-coloured neon halo, instead of the dim tinted fill that was hard to read against the dark backdrop.
- Feon-Tar background rewritten to match the Epoch canon: natives of the Milky Way's outer rim, lost their fleet capital in the first decade of the Vatari War. The old Epoch 1 framing is gone.