Hello!
It is Oleksandr from Starni Games with the new Dev log entry.
Headquarters: World War II Demo has been publicly available on Steam for everyone to explore for the last two weeks, and was well received. Today, I want to look into the feedback we have collected regarding the Demo and give you an update on our future plans.
Our whole team was very excited to participate in the Steam NEXT Fest that ran from Feb 5 to Feb 12. It was the first time we presented the game to a wide audience. We did have two rounds of Beta, but that was the first time anyone interested could sit down and play it without any limitations, except for the limited content of the Demo. There would also come YouTube coverage, of course. So, any critical bug could ruin everyone’s impression.
While there were some issues with the Demo, a bit more on that later, the overall impression seems very positive. What is most important for us as game developers was that a lot of people were genuinely interested in the game and wanted to play it more. This means that all our efforts over the last 3 years have not been in vain. We gathered as much from the Beta players, but having a wider audience play the game and tell us they like the game is even more inspiring.
There were certain issues of course, so I would name a few most common.
In some cases, an incorrect resolution was applied at first launch (could be changed in the game options to correct one)
The visual issues with lighting and certain video settings when a camera moves were quite annoying.
The Gamepad support did not work in the Campaign selection screen, because we were changing that screen right before the Demo was out. (We addressed that with a 0.38.05 update in a few days)
Despite these issues we are now looking to resolve, the game runs quite well for most players with no common crashes or other critical bugs. So, we are very happy that most players could enjoy the Demo without critical problems or other disturbances.
We have received lots of valuable feedback over the course of the festival. Here are some things we are already implementing:
- Adding the Terrain info
- Balancing the AP attack of Machine guns to make sure they cannot damage the 30 mm armor at all. (It was common feedback that MGs having the possibility of dealing even 1 damage to a 30 mm armor is incorrect, so that is addressed)
- Adding arrow keys for camera movement alongside the WASD
- Fixing lighting issues
- Working on adding the option to disable Motion blur in the game options
- And a long list of other good suggestions…
If you want to add your feedback to the pool - it is not too late for that. Join us on Steam Community hub, or talk to the dev team on the Headquarters Discord channel.
We will try to iron out all the key issues you have reported to us, as well, as add all viable suggestions you have provided aplenty. Time before the Q2 release is very limited, so we will have to focus on the selected number of fixes and improvements, but the process of improving the game further does not stop on the day of release. Quite to the contrary, for us, the release is only a new beginning - meaning that we have a good and enjoyable game to begin with and we can focus on making it just perfect in the long run.
We are preparing to announce the exact release date soon, so stay tuned! And do not forget to add the game to your wishlist if you have not done that yet.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1840800/Headquarters_World_War_II/
If you somehow missed the Demo - there is still a chance to play it.
We decided to extend its availability by one more week, so you can play it for free right now, by following this link.
See you next time!