Development Status #43

[h2]Dear Tankers,[/h2]

Welcome to our 43nd Development Status. You can see what we were working on in the new year!

[h3]Main Menu UI Work in progress[/h3]
A lot of work has been done in recent weeks on the interface in the main menu. Among the major changes are the Lobby, Settings, or Loading screens.



In addition, windows communicate an event such as quitting the game or another player joining the server.



[h3]Shader for Vehicles[/h3]



One of the basic things that the tanks in our game must have are materials and shaders. We have created a new basic shader for vehicles to support our assumptions about damage states and more. It will be possible to display camouflage or some inscriptions such as markings on the material.



[h3]User Experience[/h3]

This time our design department took a short break from map creation and focused on analyzing the current state of User Experience. We are aware of the importance connected to UI’s transparency, game mechanics' intuitiveness, or simply knowing “what to do and where to do it”. Therefore, most of our time this month was dedicated to testing gameplay loops and proposing necessary improvements.

We started with the Repairs Scene, where players will spend their time in between missions, conducting repairs, managing their resources, and preparing for the upcoming battle. Our priority was to design an easy-to-learn and instinctive vehicle repair sequence - taking into consideration an enormous amount of feedback from our recent whole-team tests, it was pretty obvious that we need to implement a solid portion of “quality of life” updates. This process of repetitively challenging various features with questions like “does it REALLY serve its purpose?” or “would players CERTAINLY know what to do here” bore fruits in form of multiple concepts, such as a new visual guidance system, need for more icons in place of text, reworked equipment or notebook functionalities and so much more. Now, these ideas are being assessed, which in a short time will certainly lead to improving the overall feel of repairs, hopefully also bringing you more fun from this part of the game.

The second point of our concern was the battle scenes, to be precise: navigation on the battlefield, various messages that the player obtains (ex. warnings about the incoming airstrike), and once again, visual communication. Conclusions were pretty similar to those above, although the dynamic specific of armored warfare requires a little different approach than using a screwdriver 😛. In the weeks to come we will do our best to raise tankers' awareness in the field of their machine’s condition, and battle objectives and generally improve the experience of driving the steel goliaths.

[h3]Community Contest 2[/h3]

Another year, and another contest! This time prepared together with Madnetic Games, and their WW2 Rebuilder game, which is going to be released on 16.01.2023!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1573280/

Your task will be to generate graphics through AI graphics generators (there are plenty of them on the internet) thematically combining WW2 Rebuilder and Tank Squad. In addition, participants must add a caption to the graphic - a catchphrase, which will also be evaluated.



To participate in our contest, you must be a member of our discord server, the link to which can be found below.

https://discord.gg/MRjreApkvW

You can post your works in the dedicated channel #contest on our discord. Each participant can only send one message containing their submission. Winners will receive a keys for WW2: Rebuilder!

Contest starts today, and will last till 22.01.2023 We are going to post results in the next development status.

[h3]KV-1 Progress[/h3]

Today we want to show you the fighting compartment in the Soviet KV-1 tank. The whole crew consisted of five people, three of them were operating in the turret and the rest two crewmen (driver and radio operator) were placed at the front of the hull. Inside you will be able to find fuel tanks, ammo racks, radio station, some optic stuff, and other most important devices which would help you to survive on the battlefield. Remember, do not let your enemy flank your KV-1 because ammunition storage under the turret can be pretty sensitive to any hit you get. The real strength of KV-1 comes from his front armor so have in mind to always correct your position while fighting.



[h3]Bridges & Factory buildings[/h3]



We have created several new objects for use on the maps. These include steel and wooden bridges. We are also working all the time on other infrastructure such as adding factory buildings on the stages.



Thank you and have a good one!
DeGenerals