It’s been 100 days since we entered Early Access. As we pass this milestone we wanted to give a recap of what has changed over the last few months.
Back in January the game was rife with some major issues including:
- Major server browser issues, with some or all servers not showing
- Grenades physics were extremely unpredictable
- We had a bug that was taking off 20-30 FPS across the board
- Many map exploits and bad collision spots that would eat bullets
- Omaha map was barely running on older video cards and the boats were bouncing around on shore
- We had some severe visibility problems due to issues with lighting, fog, ambient occlusion and character models
- Dropped guns and health packs were behaving erratically and going through the floor
- Weapon code had many bugs and strange hitches when zooming, reloading, switching and firing
Since then we have addressed all of these major issues (some are ongoing efforts) along with hundreds and hundreds of bugs. In fact, much of our first 100 days were simply spent fixing things ranging from performance, to reliability, to gameplay.
We also found some time to add new features and content over the last couple months, some examples being:
- Dow_foy
- Fully revamped firing sounds (to feel more powerful), along with additional foley
- Sound occlusion and obstruction (sounds get muffled through walls and objects)
- Kill cam
- Customizeable FOV settings
- Round end screen
- Easy Anti Cheat
- Added vote kick/ban system to prevent griefers when no admins around
All in all, we feel the core of the game is in a MUCH better state than when we came to EA, and we couldn’t have done it without your help or the Early Access Program.
In addition to helping us fix key bugs and polish weak areas, your feedback has helped us shape where we are taking the game in the next few months.
We've got some planned changes in movement and gunplay based on your feedback, but the biggest takeaway so far has been in the map design.
We've experimented with some more open and expansive layouts in maps like Omaha and Foy with the idea of creating more of a cinematic experience. We've had a lot of positive feedback on these maps, and enjoy playing them ourselves, but have realized that these maps should supplement the core experience, not define it.
As a result, our upcoming maps will be close quarters with more structured layouts, designed for a max 32 players in the Domination 5 flag game mode.
Kaysersberg and Carentan are closer examples of what we're trying to achieve, but we've learned a lot in the last couple months on where we can improve on this formula.
So what should you expect in the next 100 days?
If the last few months were about fixing things, the next few months will be all about improving core gameplay, adding lots of content, and raising our active player counts.
So how do we plan to do that?
First we have features that are complete or close to complete:
- VOIP 2.0
- Animations 2.0
- Voice commands
- Map voting
Next, we've spooled up our art pipeline to deliver 4 new official maps (names likely to change):
- Dow_italy
- Dow_valognes
- Dow_chaumont
- Dow_caen
There are still some ongoing issues we must address, such as:
- Map performance – we are now using new methods for constructing our maps that should give a major boost to performance without trading for visual quality
- Freezing and some framerate issues associated with Unreal Engine 4.15
Finally, we will continue to optimize and add new features from our roadmap. We encourage you to vote on the features you find most important.
The biggest ticket item on the roadmap is still the Map Editor and its broader rollout. Since we've already learned firsthand how important the maps are to the identity of the game, we've decided to withhold the public release of the map editor until we've delivered the next 4 official maps. This allows us to better control the identity of the game during this period while also rapidly adding content from our new maps into the editor itself. We will still be giving access to the editor on an invite basis to those with UE4 and mapping experience.
Before we go we wanted to show you some previews of the latest art/content
dow_italy
Our amazingly talented character artist revamped our British and American paratrooper models, which you can see on his ArtStation here
https://www.artstation.com/artist/stirls
-Driven Arts