Insurgency: Sandstorm News

In anticipation of our upcoming Operation: Exodus update, our Play with the Devs event is happening NOW from 11:00 AM MST - 12:00 PM MST on the Community Test Environment.

Help test upcoming content for Operation: Cold Blood on the Community Test Environment:

• New map: Citadel
  
• Two new weapons (MR 73 and Desert Eagle)
  
• New Weapon Upgrades: Pistol Optics
  
• New Mode: Survival 👀

To play with us, go to your Steam Library and download “Insurgency: Sandstorm Community Test Environment". Boot up the CTE, and please set matchmaking regions to US East. Click Play, select Versus, and Find Match. All of the devs won’t necessarily be in one game, but you’ll see us floating around your matches!

During the CTE, we will be restricting the playlists to focus solely on the new content.

Please note that all devs will have a DEV tag next to their name in-game. Anyone posing as a dev without the DEV tag is not an NWI developer.

After playing, please fill out our CTE survey. The only other place the team will be funneling feedback is on our Steam CTE Sub-Forum. Please ensure to use the search function in the Sub Forum to see if your feedback/question has already been posted, and stick to ONE topic per thread.

For more information on the CTE, please visit our frequently asked questions article here.


See you soon!

[h3]Today we are launching a playable preview version of our upcoming update - Operation: Exodus. This includes the new map ‘Citadel’, two new weapons (MR 73 and Desert Eagle), new weapon upgrades, and more! See below for more info.[/h3]

This content is now available on the Community Test Environment. Go to your Steam Library and download “Insurgency: Sandstorm Community Test Environment” to play. Please remember this is a preview build, so some issues are expected (see 'Known Issues') and all content is considered work in progress. If you encounter any problems or have feedback for the development team please don’t hesitate to let us know in the CTE sub-section of the Steam forums. Also be sure to fill out our 1.10 CTE Feedback Survey. Our team will be monitoring feedback during the CTE and aim to push this update to players on the live version of Insurgency: Sandstorm on May 18th. The CTE will be available until Monday evening.

The full changelist for the release version of Update 1.10 will be available at the time of release of Operation: Exodus on May 18th.

Please note: If you launch the CTE and your mods start downloading, please close the CTE and use

-DisableModSubscriptions

as a launch parameter on Steam.

[h3]New Map: Citadel[/h3]
Are you ready for an assault on the Citadel? Battle through a museum-turned-warzone, traversing muddy trenches, navigating sprawling tunnels, and battling across an ancient amphitheatre. Citadel is an expansive map and was built with our new game mode Survival in mind, requiring players to adapt to different combat styles as they travel across it. Close-quarters can swiftly shift into open terrain before descending into narrow tunnels. Citadel supports the following game modes:

Versus

• Push Security
  
• Push Insurgents
  
• Firefight
  
• Domination
  

Co-op

• Checkpoint Security
  
• Checkpoint Insurgents
  
• Hardcore Checkpoint Security
  
• Hardcore Checkpoint Insurgents
  
• Outpost
  
• Survival 👀
  

[h3]New Weapons: MR 73 and Desert Eagle[/h3]
There are two new secondary weapons available: The MR 73 for Security (in Versus) at 4 supply points, and the Desert Eagle for Insurgents (in Versus) at 5 supply points. Both are available for each faction in Co-op. Each weapon supports optic, barrel, and other upgrades, including a speed-loader for the MR 73. These new firearms will have you ditching your primary for some hand-held stopping power.

[h3]New Feature: Pistol Optics[/h3]
Pistol optics are here, adding both precision and accuracy to your secondary weapons. The 1x Mini Green Dot for the Insurgents and the 1x Mini Red Dot for Security.

[h3]New Game Mode: Survival[/h3]
We’ve added a new co-op mode called Survival. Hunt for a safe extraction zone as you’re being overrun by wave after wave of relentless enemy forces. Cut off from your allies and supply lines, starting with only a sidearm, you’ll have to scavenge for weapons and ammo, using our new weapon crates to acquire randomized primary weapons and upgrades.

Survival mode is available on the maps below in both day and night scenarios. We hope to expand the mode to more maps in future updates:

• Citadel
  
• Outskirts
  
• Hillside
  
• Hideout
  
• Summit
  
• Farmhouse
  
• Precinct
  
• Powerplant

[h3]Outpost Mode[/h3]
We’ve added Outpost Mode to more maps, and improved some of the existing layouts with better objective placement and enemy AI spawn areas.

New Outpost Maps

• Citadel
  
• Summit
  
• Precinct
  
• Refinery

[h3]Frontline Mode[/h3]
We’ve made some adjustments to improve player experience in Frontline matches.

• Decreased starting wave count from 20 to 15
  
• Decreased round timer from 20 seconds to 15 seconds

Frontline Improvements
Previously, when the final weapon cache objective was exposed to the enemy team, your team would lose all remaining waves. We found that this was too punishing and could potentially end a round very quickly. To combat this, a new wave drain mechanic was added to allow the losing team a chance to fight back. Once the weapon cache is vulnerable, the waves will begin to drain at a rate of 1 wave per 20 seconds.

[h3]New Mutators[/h3]
Six new mutators are now available. The details on each new mutator can be found below:

• Budget Antiquing: this mutator allows only old, cheap weapons, along with normal equipment and explosives.
  
• No Drops: Weapons, explosives, and equipment are not dropped by dead players and enemy AI
  
• Makarovs Only: Makarov pistols only
  
• Poor: Players start with 2 supply points
  
• Fully Loaded: All weapons, equipment, and explosives in the game available in the Loadout Menu
  
• Gunslingers: players are equipped with the MR 73, normal equipment, and explosives

[h3]Firing Range[/h3]
New weapons have been added to the Firing Range:

• Honey Badger
  
• AS Val
  
• Sterling
  
• Grease Gun
  
• Welrod
  
• M110 SASS
  
• M1 Garand
  
• QBZ-97
  
• QTS-11
  
• MR 73
  
• Desert Eagle

[h3]Gameplay Improvements[/h3]

• The color of character materials have been adjusted to subtly increase the overall brightness of characters
  
• NVGs no longer automatically equip onto the player’s face after interacting with a supply crate
  

[h3]User Experience[/h3]

• The ammo carrier icons have been updated in the loadout screen to clearly indicate how many additional magazines and explosives are added
  
• The teammate indicator has been made more visible by increasing thickness and opacity
  
• Scroll boxes have been improved in the Loadout Menu and Inventory Menu
  
• Moved the placement of the Client Version element to the right hand side to avoid overlapping other elements

[h3]Enemy AI[/h3]
With the introduction of the new Survival mode, our team had to adapt the spatial awareness of the Enemy AI. The built-out spatial awareness infrastructure is currently used only on Survival but will enable future adjustments to all game modes in the future.

[h3]Modding [/h3]

• The checkbox to toggle “Allow Derived Game Modes" has been removed. Instead the setting is set to enabled in all scenarios

[h3]Level Design [/h3]
We’ve made many changes and adjustments to our existing maps, look out for more details in the official 1.10 patch notes.

[h3]Resolved Issues[/h3]

• Fixed an issue where players were able to vault into and through objects
  
• Fixed an issue where planting a C4 or IED and moving your camera would cause the player’s arms to disappear and cause the player to stop planting
  
• Fixed an issue where players were unable to interact or pick up dropped objects while holding an explosive or knife
  
• Fixed an issue where the M1 Garand 2.5x M1C scope was set to a higher magnification
  
• Fixed an issue where the weapon that is equipped with the 2x-1x Holographic would disappear while ADSing
  
• Fixed an issue where the tanker trucks had larger collision volumes than what was visible to the player
  
• Fixed an issue where the Menu button was not opening the Menu on the controller
  
• Fixed an issue where the controller layout in the Settings Menu where the “Speed Reload (Double Tap)” button was showing as “Quick Reload (Double Tap)”
  
• Fixed an issue where UI elements in the Loadout Menu would not always appear
  
• Fixed an issue in the Settings Menu where the sensitivity values were not capped to the same decimal place
  
• Fixed an issue where the character was not centred in the Loadout Menu
  
• Fixed an issue where the SlowMovement mutator was not being carried over through map changes
  
• Fixed an issue where the password widget appeared to be out of focus when attempting to connect to a password protected server
  
• Fixed an issue where the binds in the leaning hint #108 were showing as UNBOUND
  
• Fixed an issue where the Wet Feet achievement was not obtainable after completing Basic Training under Tutorials

Please note: There are a number of fixes coming with 1.9.2, and this is not the full list of bug fixes coming in 1.10

[h3]Known Issues[/h3]

• The new Citadel map has yet to be completely optimized therefore players may experience drops in frame rate
  
• The title for Citadel Domination is incorrect in the Map Vote screen while playing Versus
  
• Desert Eagle cannot be picked up from the display table in the Firing Range
  
• The magazine that is dropped by Speed Reload is too large when using the Desert Eagle
  
• The red and green dot sights on the Pistol Optics are slightly off-center
  
• Players are able to be killed by airstrike through a wall on Citadel Objective D
  
• There are instances where the weapon and optic will jitter during ADS
  
• There is an issue when the SVD with the Aiming Grip and 7x Sniper Scope is equipped causing the player’s thumb to obstruct the sight picture
  
• There is an issue where the silhouettes of players would show if they were surrounded by smoke effects from two different sources
  
• There is an issue when using switching to a weapon with an Underbarrel attachment combined with a 2x-1x toggleable optic will cause the scope to appear to be toggled to 2x instead of 1x
  
• There is an issue where the overtime element remains on the screen even after the round has ended
  
• There is an issue when viewing a replay with a controller the playback control buttons are too small to read
  
• Players are unable to open the Menu during a match
  
• Players are unable to interact with the Overview Screen during a match
  
• The refresh button does not work in the Community Servers Menu
  
• The left arm is bending unnaturally when aiming down the sights on the AS VAL with the Aiming Grip upgrade and NVG Point Shooting mode
  
• The Mosin-Nagant Stripper Clip weapon upgrade does not push in properly when reloading in third person
  
• AI vehicles can get stuck in the Range level under Tutorials
  
• Switching to or from the Smoke Launcher upgrade with no ammo plays the incorrect animation when using the M1 Garand
  
• There is an issue with weapon and knife hitboxes which may block players that jump into the weapon being held by other players

Hello everyone, my name is Tim Perreault and I’m the Production Director at New World Interactive. It’s hard to believe we’re already four months into 2021. The year is rushing by, but we’re happy with how it’s going so far. This month we’ll touch base on our two upcoming releases that were both recently announced in our Development Streams.

Key Points for State of Production #19

• Update on 1.9.2 Progress
  
• Operation: Exodus Open CTE Playtest
  
• Production Outlook
  

[h3]Update on 1.9.2 Progress[/h3]
The team is still putting some final touches on content for this community driven update. We’re excited to release it at the end of the month. If you missed the reveal stream and wanted to get a bit more info on what’s included, you can check it out here.

[h3]Operation: Exodus Open CTE Playtest[/h3]
We recently announced our next major update: Operation: Exodus launching on May 18, 2021. If you didn’t catch the stream, you can watch it here. You can also follow updates on content reveals on our website.

As one of the final steps before we release, we’re doing our Open CTE event from Thursday April 22 until Monday April 26. During this time, players will be able to get an early preview of content coming in our latest updating. To help encourage testing of a few specific things, we’ll also be running some scheduled Play With Devs events during the weekdays:

April 22, 11AM MST/1PM EST Queue into the New Map: Versus playlists to join our devs. April 23, 11AM MST/1PM EST Queue into the New Map: Co-op playlist to join our devs. April 26, 11AM MST/1PM EST Queue into the [REDACTED] playlist to join our devs.

If you play the CTE you’ll be able to pass feedback to us in two ways: by using the in-game feedback option or by filling out a survey. The feedback option is best used for reporting bugs while the survey focuses on collecting feedback on gameplay related changes in the release. Once the CTE event ends, our team will review the feedback from both sources and set out to make the final adjustments on the build before release. Keep your eyes open for a news post on Steam with more details on how to participate!

[h3]Production Outlook[/h3]
I wanted to take a little time to talk about the overall state of Sandstorm. From a production perspective, we’re really excited about where we have strengthened our ability to hold dialogues with the community on a regular basis and act on the feedback. We’ve continued expanding our behind-the-scenes tools that help us better understand how the game is performing and how we can best continue to grow the community. Over the last year we’ve made some important hires to expand our capabilities internally which are going to be noticed in our upcoming releases. To summarize, our outlook for production is great, and with Saber’s help on consoles bringing us closer to a release, we have a lot more in store for Sandstorm and our community.

Next month, we’ll be diving into some behind-the-scenes details about Operation: Exodus and all the fun new content that it brings, so until then, keep your stick on the ice.

Hello Gamers™,

2021 is already a quarter over and we’ve had a lot going on behind the scenes.

Our latest livestream just ended (if you missed it, you should tune in next time - www.twitch.tv/NewWorld) and we announced 1.9.2. It’s a minor release, but we’ve included a big community request. More details on that a few lines down.

The next stream will be Thursday, April 15th at 2:00pm MST, and we will start talking about 1.10!

Console development is chugging along and we’re still hopeful for a release in late summer of this year.

Let’s dig into the good stuff.



For anyone new here, we have smaller updates that come between our major updates (i.e. 1.8.1 came between 1.8 and 1.9). They’re community driven and usually focus on improvements to quality of life and occasionally small features.

For 1.9.2 we are proud to announce that we’re adding something you’ve all been asking for since I started just over a year ago:

WE’RE ADDING RAILGUNS...

Just kidding, we’re bringing back some HD Textures!

There were some changes to some textures with 1.6 for the sake of performance and optimization. While this helped Sandstorm to be more accessible to those with lower spec PCs, those with rigs on the higher end of the spectrum wanted their pretty graphics back.

We decided a while back that we wanted to dedicate time to exploring how to do this, and with 1.9.2 we had the time.

This will be an optional download via Steam, so those who saw the performance improvements that came with 1.6 - no need to worry, nothing will change for you.

While this took a large chunk of the 1.9.2 development time, we saw the constant requests (I’m looking at you, Discord members with HD Texture Pack in your name), so we think it’s a great addition.

Here is what will be included:

Character Textures:

• All character textures
  
• All equipment textures
  
• All cosmetics textures
  

Weapon Textures:

• All weapon textures
  
• All weapon skin textures
  

We are exploring weapon upgrade textures, but are not able to commit to this for 1.9.2 yet.

Most importantly, the toilet and fire extinguisher props will be returned to their former glory.

In addition to the optional HD Texture pack we will be reverting first person muzzle flashes to how they were pre-1.6. All the beautiful bespoke muzzle flashes unique to each weapon will be re-added with 1.9.2.

Our secondary focus was quality-of-life additions. Here's a quick rundown - the full extent of changes will be available in the 1.9.2 patch notes.

We spent some time adjusting the brightness of flashlights for night maps, so no more being blinded by team-mates (although the effect they have on AI remains).

The brightness of characters has been tweaked as well, this will improve visibility and team identification.

We’ve improved the server browser, so you can expect a handful of fixes and enhancements there (details will be in the patch notes of course).

We revisited a request from a few releases back and are adding the ability to bind voice commands, so those of you who dislike the radial wheel, your time has come.

Something else I kept hearing about was players rejoining the same server after being vote-kicked. We have added some matchmaking rules so that will no longer happen!

This is not everything - all of the other changes and bug-fixes will be detailed in the patch notes, when 1.9.2 releases on April 27th.



I have been working with our Player Support team a lot lately on improving player reporting and reducing in-game toxicity.

In-game reporting helps us track problematic players, but as we’re a relatively small team it can be difficult to act on these reports alone.

With things such as Nvidia Shadowplay being so prevalent we’d like to ask for your help to curb these kinds of players.

If you encounter someone cheating, someone constantly griefing other players, or players using racist, homophobic, or misogynistic slurs please grab a video for us - preferably with the scoreboard showing at some point in the video.

If you can then provide us this video via a support ticket, along with a quick explanation of what we’re looking for in the video, and timestamps of when the offenses occur, it will make it much easier for us to act.

If you see someone cheating please also provide a replay ID in your support ticket.

To submit a support ticket, just head to this link.



It's with a heavy heart that I have to announce that at some point in the next 3-4 months I will be leaving Canada. This kind of complicates me being the Community Manager for NWI. Makes it somewhat impossible to be honest.

As some of you know, my wife is from Australia; some family things have arisen that are forcing our hand a bit and necessitating a move back there. At least it's Australia and not... Antarctica or something. Always a silver lining.

Because of the current COVID-19 situation and Australia's incredibly strict-even-when-not-in-pandemic quarantine laws for dogs (and the fact we have two dogs), this process will take a few months, so I will still be taking your feedback and reading comments about console until at least July - likely August or later.

The time zone difference between Canada and Australia is about as extreme as it could be, so staying on as the Community Manager would, sadly, be impossible.

Luckily for me, NWI is being very supportive and I will likely be staying on with the studio, but shifting into a production role.

While you will still all have to put up with me for a few more months, I wanted to say thank you all for all the feedback over the past year - you've all helped me grow in my position and helped us to steer Sandstorm in the right direction. It's a very challenging job, but being able to announce things like HD Textures really makes it worth it.

You’re all the reason I have a job in the industry at all, full stop; so thank you for existing. It’s been a whirlwind 13 months working with all of you, and it’s been a lot more good than bad.

Even after moving I will still be around on the Discord servers and the subreddit. Sadly you can’t get rid of me this easily.

Whomever the next CM ends up being - go easy on them, it’s not as easy a job as it looks. You know how you get when you’re tired, hungry, or talking about deathcam.

Keep the feedback coming, I've got a few months left as your Community Manager.




We're leading with a wholesome meme this month. Thanks Capturesque.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
The A-10 can put in some work (shoutout to Danatov on Reddit).

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
Eziokas with some excellent editing skills on display here.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
This is what modding was made for (From WintorOperator via Reddit).



Closing it up is our boy Tom, who has managed to port Embassy (and some other maps) from Insurgency 2014 to be playable in Sandstorm!

[hr][/hr]

[h3]That's it for this month. I'm happy for textures, but I'm sad to be moving on from Community Management.

I'll keep up the fight for y'all until NWI changes my title (and beyond that, let's be honest)

fatherHank[/h3]

After weeks of careful playtesting and deliberation by our judging team, New World Interactive is pleased to announce the winners of the Insurgency: Sandstorm Mapping Contest.

Before we dive into the results, we would like to take this opportunity to thank our sponsors Intel, Nvidia, Epic Games, and Mod.io. As well as all the players who helped test, provide feedback, and vote for submissions, and of course, the entrants who spent hundreds of hours crafting incredible custom maps for the community.

There were many fantastic entries and only five prize positions; however, all finalists will receive a copy of World War Z - Game of the Year Edition thanks to our partners at Saber Interactive & Focus Home Interactive.

Maps were extensively playtested and judged based on the following criteria:

• Gameplay (50 marks)
  
• Visual Aesthetics (25 marks)
  
• Performance & Optimisation (25 marks)
  

After careful consideration, the winners are…..




Winning: $5,000 + 1x RTX 2080Ti GPU(1) + 1x Intel i7 7700k CPU + $100 Unreal Marketplace credit for each team member(2) + 1x Epic Game Store key for World War Z Game Of The Year Edition



Judges feedback: This map has an amazing atmosphere and some great storytelling that blends well with the gameplay. The feel of fighting through a prison is a lot of fun and results in quite intense firefights due to the narrow spaces. Navigating through the map can be challenging, but it didn’t have a huge impact on the fun factor.


Winning: $2,500 + 1x Intel® NUC 10 Performance + $100 Unreal Marketplace credit for each team member(2) + 1x Epic Game Store key for World War Z Game Of The Year Edition



Judges feedback: This Is a very fun map and has a great atmosphere. Firefight is the absolute must-play mode on this map, the firefight design works really well with the more compact size and layout of the level. Checkpoint, however, suffers a bit from the more compact size and doesn’t offer enough gameplay variation to stand out.


Winning: $1,500 + 1x i7 7700k + $100 Unreal Marketplace credit for each team member(2) + 1x Epic Game Store key for World War Z Game Of The Year Edition



Judges feedback: An absolutely stunning-looking map with a great atmosphere! An adventurous experience that offers something new to the player every time. It almost feels like treasure hunting, finding an underground waterfall was definitely one of the highlights in our playtests. Unfortunately for Firefight, the map falls a bit short, it’s too much of a platformer and quite difficult to navigate through. Still a work of art that has a lot of potential for Checkpoint.


Winning: $750 + 1x i7 7700k + $100 Unreal Marketplace credit for each team member(2) + 1x Epic Game Store key for World War Z Game Of The Year Edition



Judges feedback: Overall a great-looking map. The mud village was very well constructed and offered some fun gameplay, especially on Checkpoint. It almost feels like a mini-campaign where each objective offers something different, the larger capture zones are a nice touch and require more tactical gameplay than usual. We had a lot of fun with this layout.

Push Security however is not working so great on this map, the line of sights are too long and we had a difficult time as Security to even exit the start spawn, overall the map just feels too big for Push.


Winning: $250 + 1x i7 7700k + $100 Unreal Marketplace credit for each team member(2) + 1x Epic Game Store key for World War Z Game Of The Year Edition



Judges feedback: This map has a strong visual identity, the spaces have a purpose, like the tank factory, which is definitely one of the visual highlights of this level. The cohesive design and visuals make it feel like a real place. Unfortunately, the realism that was put into this level made some of the spaces less fun to play in. Lacking cover on objectives made them difficult to defend and long travel times to objectives, were things we all noticed in our playtests. Nonetheless, this is a map with a lot of potential.



Congratulations to all our winners; our team will contact you via mod.io to arrange prize distribution and additional feedback over the coming days. Entrants can now update contest submissions to reflect feedback from the community or any changes made during the judging phase.

We hope this was a valuable experience for all involved and look forward to seeing many more community maps in the near future!