Beasts of Steel News

As you all noticed, we have not been actively working on the game lately, sadly.

We took a well deserved break during the summer, and then after that I spent all my dev time polishing our first game. Developing two games at the same time is a hard task, even more so when you are a team of two, and when there's only one programmer :)

So, just a few words to let you know that the project is NOT abandoned in any way, we're just short on time in general. We are however getting slowly back into it, so we are hoping to be pumping out more updates on a more regular basis.

Our first game being the one that is still paying our bills being on a higher priority than developing something entirely new, it is hard to split dev time equally.

We hope that you will understand the situation we're finding ourselves in, and still enjoy the game as it slowly grows.

A brand new map will be coming soon-ish to replace the current one, as soon as Jules finishes his work on it!

[h3]ADDED:[/h3]
● Missing 'Ping' value in the lobby. Finally!


[h3]CHANGED:[/h3]
● Updated game engine (Unity).
● Updated Steamworks API.
● Updated multiplayer API.
● Mobile spawnpoints max HP = 100 (vs 150).


[h3]FIXED:[/h3]
● ISU-152 external DshK had missing ballistics data.
● AT mines not dealing much damage to vehicles when being driven on.
● AT mines not destroying wheels or tracks when driving on them.
● Mines were not 'damaging' the terrain (making dirt and small craters).
● You could not repair wheels on wheeled vehicles once they got destroyed.

This will be the last update for the next 2 weeks as we going in vacation :)

See you when we get back!

[h3]CHANGED:[/h3]
● Mobile spawnpoints have 3x more HP.
● Mobile spawnpoints takes 3x longer to build.
● Each player can now build a maximum of 1 mobile spawnpoint.
● Mobile spawnpoints can no longer be damaged/destroyed by regular bullets.
● You can now damage objects with melee attacks (doors or mobile spawnpoints).
● If an enemy is near a spawnpoint, it will disable the spawnpoint for the team (works for any spawnpoint).
● APHE shells now have a post penetration damage bonus.
● Improved physics / reactivity of wheeled vehicles.
● Projectiles will now go through wheels/tracks if they have enough damage.
● Bloom effect.
● Ambient Occlusion system.


[h3]FIXED:[/h3]
● Smoke would not spawn in some cases.
● Vegetation graphics issues.
● Potentiall fixed melee issues.
● Doors not destructible sometimes.
● Casing ejection not working properly on Vickers MG and quad maxim.
● OQF 25-pounder had no killfeed icon.
● D-5T gun had too low damage (115 vs 130).
● Daimler AC had no wheels module (destructible).
● Comet I had no gun recoil.
● Sd. Kfz. 251 wheel materials issues with summer and winter camouflage.
● Double farm house would have clipping doors inside.

[h3]ADDED:[/h3]
● You can now dismantle buildables. Simply have your hammer equipped as an engineer and look at a buildable object, then follow the UI indications. Construction points will be refunded after the deconstruction is completed.
● Farm houses are now fully destructible! I have disabled the 'drive over' possibility, otherwise it would be too easy to remove all cover for infantry. They remain destroyable by explosions or direct projectile hits.


[h3]FIXED:[/h3]
● Black/White (depending on platform) bar in the middle of the screen.
● Winter season not working properly (vegetation issues).
● Inverted zoom in the in game map when trying to zoom in/out on Windows.
● Damage UI indicator would quote twice the module hit even when you were damaging the hull on on land vehicles.
● Possibility to hit the host or join button many times and it would execute the logic several times. Could result in very odd things happening.
● Explosive projectile never being despawned in some rare cases when an error happened in the code.
● When a player left the game after he was killed in a vehicle after he respawned, well the vehicle would never despawn, as the network authority would never be transferred.
● New player could not play after freshly installing the game (hosting a game would work but chosing a team would not).
● Destroyed pieces of destructible objects would/could stay floating in the air after being immobile for some time.
● No damage dealt to tanks in some cases when hitting sideplates armour close to tracks/wheels.
● Panther D left track and right track were inverted.
● Some destructible colliders issues.
● AI visibility issues still.
● Reduced AI team killing. It still happens, but so far, what I have seen is things I cannot foresee / would be too expensive to solve for the small bonus it would give. Example: AI is about to fire, LoS is clear, but an ally is running and will be there when the bullet will be mid flight. Or due to the dispersion of fire.

[h3]ADDED:[/h3]
● Possibility to pan and zoom in/out of the in game map.
● 3 new achievements to bring back up the total achievement count to 100: Lined Up, Splatter Party, Precision Payload.


[h3]CHANGED:[/h3]
● Mines spotting (engineers only) highlight refresh rate frequency 1s -> 0.5s.
● Mines spotting (engineers only) distance has been doubled (5m -> 10m).
● Adjusted LODs on houses.
● Map image in game (better looking).
● Your stats and player progress will now reset with every game update (temporary).
● Guns projectiles graphics.
● Bullets from machine guns, rifles, and anti tank rifles will now move through bodies. They will no longer stop when hitting infantry and be despawned.
● Destructible environment objects explosion shrapnel damage checks. More accurate and realistic.
● Death radius of bombs vs vehicles (too easy to one shot even like 15 meters away with a 250kg bomb vs Tiger II).
● Improved casing ejection from small arms. It was 'fixed' before, it will now be randomized between a min/max ejection force and torque.
● Vegetation changes on Normandy Farm. Vegetation item themselves, as well as an update of the vegetation rendering system.
● Doubled magazine amount for all pistols (x2 -> x4).


[h3]FIXED:[/h3]
● Medic helmets were not showing. Huh.
● Bf 109 E-3 had no mesh/model.
● Cromwell Mk. V CS had wrong shell size.
● Uploading to Steam leaderboard was not working.
● AI engagement issues. Could fire at walls etc.
● You could not use static weapons on second floors of buildings (it would teleport you to the ground).
● Walls not being synced during multiplayer joining mid game.
● Occlusion culling issues with destroyable elements. Once destroyed, they would still provide occlusion culling. Which... Was odd, haha.
● One of the loadout of the Bf 410 B2 had wrong ballistics data for its MG 131.
● MG-34 and MG-42 had wrong casing ejection direction (sideways when it should have been vertical towards the ground).
● Shutdown error when joining ongoing game in multiplayer.


[h3]REMOVED:[/h3]
● 3 achievements that were not really necessary (Starting the game, leaving the game, and killing someone while having your parachute ON (this one is simply no longer possible to achieve since having your parachute ON prevents you to use any weapon)).

WARNING: The leaderboards will be reset with version 68.

[h3]ADDED:[/h3]
● Winter is now supported on Normandy Farm map.
● Steam Rich Presence funny phrases for specific situations that may happen to you while playing.
● Steam possibility to invite friend to join game or to join friend's game (through steam overlay).
● Over 35 Steam Rich Presence funny statuses based on your actions during the game.
● Engineers can now spot land mines (AT/AP) when they are close to them ( ● LODs to land mines (AP/AT).
● New british tank: Cromwell CS (95mm Howitzer).
● Missing Steam leaderboard: Allies revived.
● Medics will now have their own helmet (with identification they are medics). Basically the same helmet as the others but with clear identification.


[h3]CHANGED:[/h3]
● 40mm Bofors shells in clip 5 --> 8.
● 40mm Bofors reload time 5s --> 4s
● Flak 3.7 cm AA ammo count 6 --> 10.
● Damage logic for bombs and rockets explosion, they were dealing insane damage to vehicles even when pretty far away.
● Added 30% more stamina for infantry.
● Ambient Occlusion graphical visuals.
● Reworked textures of all small arms (not as in a texture change, more as in texture settings update).
● Reworked reflections.
● Reorganized the collision/physics layers matrix.
● Reworked Ambient Occlusion maps of pretty much all vehicles in the game. Should look more realistic/better now :)
● When trying to lock on target with AA (with auto fuse setting) you no longer need to mash your 'Mark' key on your keyboard. The game will automatically try to lock on any player you are looking at. So, first you lock on enemy by looking at it, then proceed to fire.
● Re did from scratch the Steam integration. I re wrote all the code. Also got rid of some Asset Store asset that used to do the integration for me. Less bloat, better performances, more control :)
● Spawnpoints and flags setup on Normandy Farm.
● Adjusted beans (infantry) color.


[h3]FIXED:[/h3]
● Firefly tank had camouflage issue (one part of the tank was not updated).
● Code issue when spawning on Airborne Assault gamemode in multiplayer.
● Killfeed not highlighted in yellow when you were a member of it.
● You could not properly place buildables inside bulidings.
● AI would still be spawning in unwalkable areas for him (infantry).
● Marker on enemy planes would be pretty wacky.
● 17-pdr AT gun killfeed icon was too small
● Pak 36 anti tank gun had no recoil effect and no spawning of shells.
● ZiS-2 missing ballistic data for one of its shell.
● SG-43 buildable scheme was missing ammo pouch.
● SG-43 aim was off.
● Sliding when infantry standing on roofs.
● Buildable objects would go through roads instead of being on top of it.
● No death UI when crashing with a plane.
● No death UI when dying to a fall with infantry.
● A lot of the walls were not synced when destroyed after a player joined the game.
● AI could see through doors.
● AI will no longer try to throw grenades if it cannot reach its target (because of a wall or a tree, which would make it ricochet).
● 25kg bombs didn't create any crater.
● Camera 3rd person on KV-2 was too little above turret.
● Soviet 37 mm M1939 61-K gun had wrong Z scale and because of that aiming was wrong when aiming up.
● Ladders destroyed bits were not spawned.