/!\ THIS UPDATE REQUIRES YOU TO CLEAR CACHE IN YOUR IN-GAME SETTINGS MENU /![/b]
Intro
Two months ago we released our map called Best, smallest map of Post Scriptum, designed to seed servers and provide a new angle on how PS can be played.
Today, we are here again with another brand new map called Grave.
Grave will be the last map to release for “The Bloody Seventh” and thus, closing Chapter 1 of Post Scriptum. But worry not, support will continue on previous maps as well as adding more layers to levels like Best, Veghel and new released Grave in both AAS, Offensive and Armoured for the last two.
Memory Lane
About three and a half years ago we started development of a small Squad mod, which was not even called Post Scriptum when we started. We had the dream of doing our very own World War 2 game based on our childhood favorite games like Red Orchestra 1 (and its famous Darkest Hour mod), Battleground Europe: WWII Online and many more.
We wanted to create a game with no compromises, where players are thrown into intense battles where they will need to learn the game mechanics by themselves and become veteran players by helping each other with teamwork and roleplaying with one another. We hoped players would share memorable gaming moments with both laugher and shellshock horror...
Periscope Games is incredibly proud of Post Scriptum: our dream came true.
To close Chapter 1 is a very important milestone for us as a professional and emotional fulfilment. What started as a mod with 2 factions and only 4 maps, it grew to a fully fleshed game studio with more than thirteen full time employees scattered all around the globe and a stand-alone game with more than 60 weapons, 50+ vehicles, a total 10 maps for around 180km² of fully playable terrain with over 100 different layers.
What a journey that was, and guess what, it was only the beginning! We are currently working on Chapter 2 that will arrive for free to Post Scriptum later this year!
We will announce the new theater in the near future, so make sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter and join our wonderful community on our official Discord discord.gg/postscriptum
Chapter 1
A little less than a year ago, Post Scriptum released on Steam, here is a brief overview of what changed since August 2018.
- Game Release
- Added Sdkfz.7 with Flak 38
August 2018
- Radioman and Regroup Call
- In game 35mm camera
- Localization to 6 countries
- Sandbags for rifleman
- Logistic section upgrade with supplies and new bunkers
September 2018
- Added Arnhem
October 2018
- US Airborne release
- Added Velmolen
- Free Weekend on Steam
November 2018
- Added Veghel
- Bayonet system
- Sherman M4A3
- Sdkfz 234 Puma
- Internal components on vehicles
January 2019
- Old maps updated
February 2019
- Armoured game mode
- Ammo bag for infantry
- New tank handling system
- Map voting
- Added Best
March 2019
GRAVE
Now that we have covered the past, let’s dive in today’s massive update and we have a lot to cover! This is one of the biggest updates we have ever made.
As you must know by now, Grave will be our last map of Operation Market Garden, it is a 3x3km map which includes paradropping on both sides of the bridge.
US Airborne will be tasked with capturing both sides of the bridge before heading toward the city center of Grave, a medieval town with wall fortifications, canals and flooded areas.
A few historical landmarks have been carefully remodeled and placed exactly where they were or still are today, like this odd little bunker on the West side of the bridge. Its painted pattern was designed to fool the enemies in not knowing where the actual firing positions were from a distance.
The more you know!
Here it is today
MENU & UI OVERHAUL
In this update you will also see that we have completely revamped both the main menu and the in-game UI.
There are multiple reasons behind the UI overhaul, the first one was to makes things a bit easier for newcomers to get into Post Scriptum. While we were running our booth during PAX East in Boston earlier this year we noticed that a lot of game mechanics such as spawning were not clear enough to new players.
We hope the addition of this and our set of new tutorials in the main menu will help new players understand the core concept of the game a bit better.
The training range is now available in local (still subject to issues) for you to test weapons and vehicles before heading to online games.
In order to polish the game a bit more, we’ve also added custom loading screens for each maps of Post Scriptum and the music will also play during the loading time to then fade out once you
have joined a server.
WEAPON RESTING & SWAY
Weapon resting is a feature that we’ve wanted to integrate into PS for a very, very long time and is now a feature in the game!
If you are not familiar with what weapon resting is, it will simply allow you to rest any rifle or submachine gun on a wall, window frame or side of a tree and allows you to make your weapon a lot more steady, improving your aim, especially if tired with low stamina.
This is automatic and does not require you to press any key, the weapon automatically detects any nearby surface if they are in resting distance.
You will know if you weapon is rested if the bipod icon shows at the bottom right of your screen
We have also increased the sway values based on weapon weight, this will be even more visible if a bayonet is attached or if you are exhausted and turning a 200m standing shot in the open, you might want to consider resting your weapon on the nearest object (or teammate) or try crouching to have more stable aim.
AIR FRICTION & TANK SIGHT RANGING
Air friction, also known as drag, is how much velocity your projectile will lose over time due to gravity and air resistance. All tank shells are now affected by it and will make your shell hit the ground sooner over distance.
However, if you lose velocity over distance that also means that you will obviously lose penetration capacity too. We have also added different penetration curves based on projectile velocity, this applies this for all shell types, you can see in the image below a PzGr.40 88mm APCR round commonly found on Panzer VI E1 Tiger.
We have added a lot of new shell types to Post Scriptum, all of them having their own realistic penetration curves based on data gathered from tank encyclopedia, wikipedia and various books.
Tanks equipped with ranging system can now range target
If you like stats and wants to know more about all the values in Post Scriptum, make sure you check this Google Sheet where everything is stored.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1XI5DwCRs92sU2nq2H42PncfRDnnjVk21pbkPTBIwQxE/edit#gid=822514543
NEW LAYERS TO VEGHEL
We are also adding 9 AAS layers and 3 Offensive layers to Veghel, this will allow a lot more replayability on this 4 months old map.
VARIOUS GAMEPLAY TWEAKS
All regroup call radios timer values are now doubled, both inside and outside the red zones. This change will allow Section Leaders to focus more on leading their soldiers than the radio itself.
Artillery has been heavily buffed as well to include shrapnel being thrown at longer distances, you will now need run for your life when shell starts landing nearby!
HE splash damage has now been increased by 35% on all shell types except 20mm HE, grenades and mortars.
To disable a radio, an enemy soldier will now have to be closer to it.
To avoid spawn kills on the defense flag, we added 3 to 5 different spawn locations, that will allow you to spawn somewhere a bit quieter if one location is compromised by the enemy forces.
To access an SMG as a Section Leader, you will now need 2 members for a MP40/Thompson/Sten and 3 to access the StG44, we hope that this fix will prevent people from creating empty sections just for the weapon.
As a logistic AT or AP soldier, you will now be able to lay down minefields instead of a single mine.
3x5 AP mines and 2x3 AT mines for all factions.
OPTIMIZATION
Like with every update we do, optimization is still a very important topic and an ongoing battle.
We have made a lot of improvements to the game, by further optimization to some of our 3D models and textures. Foliage on all maps was also tweaked which should result in better frame rates overall.
SOUNDS
A few new features are also showing up in this patch, firing inside buildings and under structures will now change the way you perceive sounds with our new dynamic reverb system. Churches will cause gunshots, explosions and player voices to echo prominently, while small houses will feel more claustrophobic, with a tighter reverb time.
This system will be improved and tweaked upon in future patches, and may hopefully be utilised for other dynamic audio states.
LOCALIZATION
This update will probably conflict some of the previous localization work.
Our amazing community is already helping us on getting it up to date, so give us a bit of time, it will be updated soon.
/!\ THIS UPDATE REQUIRES YOU TO CLEAR CACHE IN YOUR IN-GAME SETTINGS MENU /![/b]
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CHAPTER 2 AND THE FUTURE
Our 3D department started working on Chapter 2 late last year, all the models are now completed and our animation department is going at it full speed as well as our sound designer, making sure we have an even more immersive soundscape than Chapter 1!
With the first few results we have, this is clearly the case!
Level designers are also completing the first 2 maps of chapter 2 as we speak and a third one will come out at a later point since it has not started yet. There has been a massive step up as well in the level design department, the maps are absolutely stunning and we are dying to announce it so we can finally show you all the upcoming goodies.
While we are working on chapter 2, we are also working on chapter 3 in the level design department.
PS 2.0
In between Chapter 1 and 2 there will be a massive engine upgrade to Unreal Engine 4.21 as we currently are on OWI Core 4.16 that is over a year old, bringing us a lot of legacy bugs in our current build.
We are hopeful that the engine upgrade will grant some performance increase to the entire player base, from modest rigs to more high-end builds.
If you have played the recent Squad A13 build, then you know what type of optimization and performance increase to expect.
However, before we get 4.21 running on the public branch, there is a massive amount of work ahead of us: code breaking, compiling issues, missing links and more funny glitches to sort out.
We do not know just yet how big the task is going to be, but based on the last engine upgrade, we are not expecting a simple flick of a switch unfortunately.
After the 4.21 update is done and polished, we will release the first iteration of the PS SDK so that you guys can start messing around in the editor.
Coding on Sandbox will also resume around that time.
FREE WEEKEND
We have a free weekend coming up very soon, we are currently in talks with Valve about it as they need a bit of a heads up to make sure things are ready on their end.
We are also waiting to see how this build is fairing on the public branch, then hotfix what is needed to make sure the build is as clean as it can be for the event.
COMMUNITY
As you will see in the changelog below, we are also starting to mention what fixes are being made to Post Scriptum based on our community’s feedback. We can’t address them all obviously, but some good ideas were thrown our way and we thought it would be a good idea to acknowledge them publicly.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, a lot of new content is coming with this update, we hope that you enjoy the fruits of all the hard work and passion the team have put in over the last few months.
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Changelog:
-Add: New map "Grave"
-Add: Main menu overhaul
-Add: Tutorial and wiki added to main menu
-Add: Local play enabled for the training range
-Add: Loading screen for each map and game mode
-Add: Weapons can now be rested on nearby surfaces
-Add: Tactical HUD now replaces the compass key
-Add: Tank sights can now be ranged (same keybinds as weapon ranging)
-Add: Air friction to tank shells (drop)
-Add: Shells now lose penetration factor over distance based on real life data
-Add: New shell types APC and APCBC
-Add: Kill volume under all maps
-Add: New canteen animation for US
-Add: Arnhem range updated minimap
-Add: 9 new layers of Veghel AAS
-Add: 3 new layers of Veghel Offensive
-Gameplay: Weapons have more sway if not rested (even more when low on stamina)
-Gameplay: All regroup call values are now doubled
-Gameplay: Artillery damage radius is increased by 35%
-Gameplay: HE splash damage is increased on all shells except 20mm HE
-Gameplay: Radius to disable a regroup call is now 33% smaller
-Gameplay: More spawn points on flag to avoid spawnkills
-Gameplay: Squad leaders can only access SMG's if 2 or more players are in the section
-Gameplay: Pistol rounds deal 15% more damage to soldiers
-Gameplay: AP and AT mines are now grouped in multiple mines
-Gameplay: Mines are consistent for all factions. 2 AT and 3 AP per player
-Gameplay: Rebalancing Best bridge area
-Gameplay: Strafing run impacts are more effective against flesh targets
-Fix: Best bridge collision blocking wreck destruction
-Fix: Doorwerth S10 cap zone size
-Fix: Leaning not working in some capture area
-Fix: Missing reload sound on Stuart hull MG
-Fix: Disable engine toggle for ATG's
-Fix: Flak 38 using wrong tracers
-Fix: Parachute animation stuck when killed while dropping
-Fix: All commanders can now use the radio without getting out of the vehicle
-Fix: Emplacement can be rebuilt after partial destruction
-Sounds: Dynamic reverb system added to interior spaces
-Sounds: M1 Garand tweak
-Sounds: Grenade close sound update
-Sounds: Panther Engine tweak
-Sounds: Cromwell new engine
-Sounds: Music now plays over loading screen
-Sounds: Various volume and balance tweaks to all areas
-FX: New bullet impact on grass, dirt and mud (small and medium calibers)
-Optimisation: Vehicle wreck lod values
-Optimisation: Building lod values (heavy change)
-Optimisation: Shockwave FX tweak
-Optimisation: Drawing distance for foliage tweaked on all maps
-Community: Adding IceKK's TAA antialiasing tweak as default
-Community: All shovels now have the same construction speed
-Community: Supply crates can be destroyed by explosive damage
-Community: Allow placement of deployables near FOBs when over free limit using nearby CT
-Community: Adding collision to logistic truck cargo so people can't hide under them
-Community: Allow regroup call radios to be used as functional radio (Commanders can now use them for support call-ins)
-Community: Reduce ability to build bunkers where it should not be possible
-Community: Correct sight on Jagdpanzer IV and Stug III
As always, from the whole team at Periscope Games, we thank you guys for your continued support and feedback, we have some epic stuff to show off in the near future!
Sincerely,
Periscope Games
