Hey everyone!
Update 5 has been enormous for us, and it’s been fantastic to watch you jump into the rainy fields of Purple Heart Lane (and also jump into some rivers) for the last couple of weeks. We’ve been collecting and prioritising a huge amount of the feedback as we decide the way forward.
State of Development - An update from Max, Lead Developer
While we’re in Early Access, developing Hell Let Loose largely feels like we’re building an airplane while we’re flying it. We’re continuously fixing things as we introduce new features, as we balance out completing the game with ironing out as many new and old bugs as possible.
In addition to this, there are several key systems overhauls that have had to occur in order to finalise the experience and lift things to the best quality possible, but also to optimise each aspect of the game from both a netcode, CPU and GPU perspective.
The next two updates (6 and 7) will contain the largest scale infrastructure overhauls that we need to achieve before we’re able to settle into a significant period of bug fixing and optimisation (paired with lower risk content like maps, weapons, customisation options, vehicles etc). As a team, we’re really looking forward to moving past Updates 6 and 7 as we’ll be able to profile the game from an optimisation perspective without the baseline moving from the introduction of more large-scale features.
As many are aware, the largest overhaul to hit the game will be the TPP and FPP animation update. This will transform the way the game feels and looks and we’re very excited to show you this in the very near future.
The other very significant overhaul is a rework of our entire ballistics system - away from a line trace system to a fully realistic ballistics model. We’ll be deep diving into what this entails in the coming weeks so watch this space!
Patch 9
We’re aware of several issues from Update 5 and have been working since its release to fix up the largest aspects. We’ll be releasing a patch next week that will address the following:
- Spawn location icons are now much more legible on the map.
- Deep rivers and waterways now have more gradual side inclines, meaning that walking or driving into them allows you to back out before quickly drowning.
- Vehicle occupants will now drown
- Enormous memory optimisation for PHL, allowing much faster loading, better in-game physics handling and overall performance increase.
- Added the new Jumbo tanks to other maps and gamemodes to allow us to profile them further (there will be added into the Commander reinforcement ability in the coming Updates).
We’ll be releasing the full changelist on the day of the patch, but we hope to address most of - if not all - your key issues and feedback from our Update 5 release.
To reiterate, this was possible thanks to your feedback. Thanks again to everyone that shared their feedback, both positive as well as constructive criticism / bug reports.
New Roadmaps
We will be releasing our updated roadmap next week that will give you an insight into the order of things to come over the next two updates.
We’ll also be releasing a separate “Project Roadmap” to give you a broader sense of what we want to do with Hell Let Loose up to the end of Early Access, and then beyond that. We know that many new players aren’t aware of our commitments to the Russian front and forces, as well as the broad spectrum of features still to come (melee, flamethrowers, transport vehicles etc.). We hope this works as a great way to quickly show people where the project is headed.
As we’ve said previously, we’re still in the early stages of Hell Let Loose, and there’s far more to come - so we very much appreciate your patience.
First Looks
Two weeks ago we shared with you a first look at some of the updated faces / heads coming to Hell Let Loose.
Today we're excited to show you extra detail being added by Character Artist Dmitry, who's been spending time giving these upcoming faces a much more war torn and photo-realistic appearance.
Rough and ready
The team have also been making great progress on the upcoming Recon Vehicles, which will bring whole new strategic options for Armoured Units to the frontline.
Big cat spotted roaming European countryside, approach with caution.
That wraps up this week's Developer Briefing, thanks for checking it out! As you can see we're getting close to sharing more details with you about some of our most anticipated update content - we're very, very excited to share it with you.
If you're enjoying your time with Hell Let Loose, feel free to drop us a review and let us know about your experiences with the game - it really helps!
See you on the frontline.