Axis & Allies 1942 Online News

Another Hot Fix is coming to Axis & Allies 1942 Online today! It should help solve a few server issues & errors we’ve been seeing since last week.

The Axis & Allies 1942 Online servers will be offline from 1:00PM PDT / 8:00 UTC to 2:00PM PDT / 9:00 UTC today.

Today we're dropping the fourth patch for Axis & Allies 1942 Online. Thanks to our community for sharing their great feedback as we continue through early access development!

There will be a brief outage from 10 - 11 a.m. PT on October 2, 2019 to implement the patch.

Read on for patch #4 details!

NEW FEATURES AND IMPROVEMENTS

• Automated Landing of Fighters in Noncombat Move Phase

- We've added a new button to the Phase Confirmation popup at the end of the Noncombat Move Phase which allows players the option to land any unlanded Fighters automatically. Choosing this option places any Fighters and/or Aircraft Carriers needed to land planes safely to move to the required zones / territories; any Fighters requiring a mobilized Aircraft Carrier will be moved to the necessary Sea Zone.
*Please note: these moves will not always be the most strategically optimal, but will help unblock any players who are confused about Fighter Landing requirements.

• Windowed Mode and Automatic Screen Resolution Sizing

- We’ve implemented the ability to set the window size of Axis & Allies 1942 Online when in Windowed mode to specific 16:9 resolutions (1280x720 - 3180x2160). This should provide a much better game play experience for those looking to play in Windowed mode or on a non 16:9 aspect ratio monitor (Ultrawide).
*Please note: this feature is only available when playing in Windowed Mode.
Axis & Allies 1942 Online should also remember your last screen position in Windowed Mode when the application is shut down.

• Improved Error Handling and Bug Submitting

- We’ve improved our automatic bug submission with some new features that will help us track down issues faster. Players now have the option to include their PC specs and a screenshot of the game when submitting a ticket within the game.

• Changing Commander Names and Emails

- Players can now change their Commander Names and Emails associated with their accounts from within the game. No more separate Service Desk tickets! Both fields can only be changed once every 24 hours, and emails will now need to be verified on account signup and email change. If you are unable to verify your email due to a typo, we will still be accepting Service Desk tickets to manually reset an associated email account. Please note that players will not receive any email notifications until they have verified their email account after signup or changing their email. Existing customers who do not change their email will be unaffected.

• Map Note Tip Text

- We’ve added some additional tips to the Map notes panel that explain how to leave a Map Note, and how to guide any Computer teammates by using Map Notes to tell them what to aim for!

Rules Implementation

• Automated Stranded Fighter Landing/Crashing

- We have implemented the automatic landing and/or crashing of stranded Fighters in the ocean when their accompanying Aircraft Carrier has been destroyed while defending during the Combat Phase. Fighters will now seek out a valid landing zone within 1 space of the current region (prioritizing Aircraft Carriers over territories). If there are no valid landing zones, the Fighter(s) will crash into the ocean, and the event will be logged in the War Diary.
This brings the game closer to the Axis & Allies 1942 Second Edition rules-as-written: "Stranded defending fighters also land during this phase [non-combat move]. These are carrier fighters whose aircraft carrier has been destroyed in combat or fighter interceptors whose original territory is now under enemy control. These fighters are allowed movement of up to one space to find a friendly territory or carrier on which to land. If no landing space can be found, they are lost."

BUG FIXES

• Various reported issues surrounding the Retreat Action.
  
• Transports can no longer be selected to take hits after a Battleship has taken a single hit.
  
• Moving Tanks through one territory and into another will no longer result in a crash.
  
• Combat will no longer freeze when sending 10 Fighters into battle against 10 ships.
  
• We’ve removed the bug caused when a player joins a slot the AI was attempting to join.
  
• AI Fixes: We’ve fixed a number of issues with the AI that would result in the AI crashing and not being able to start back up.
  
• Crash when accessing the Game Settings screen in Hot Seat mode.
  
• Crash when attempting to end the Purchase Phase as any power.
  
• Several issues that were a result of the client computer becoming desynced from the server instance.
  
• Automated Blitz paths causing issues when blizting or moving out of Karelia S.S.R.
  
• Fixed issue where Japanese Turn Summary would appear over the victory screen, regardless of observing player allegiance.
  

WE LAUNCHED!

Since the July 31st launch we’ve seen players from all over the world join the battle to relive the game they know and love— or take the plunge and play Axis & Allies for the first time. We’re incredibly grateful to our awesome community members who are essential to the game’s development through Early Access.

In this retrospective I’ll be sharing:

• Some of my favorite visual highlights
  A brief discussion of server issues
  An overview of our plans for the near future…!

WAR STORIES: SCREENSHOTS
First up - some levity! These maps and screens tell the story of your victories and defeats.

A sea of green:

Hoarding Units:

When a Strategic Bombing Raid wasn't very strategic:
- Three bombers attacked an industrial complex
- 1 plane survived doing 1 damage


THE SERVERS ROLLED A SIX

We're absolutely aware our launch to Steam began with some considerable stability concerns, so we're especially grateful to those of you who've stuck with us. Upon release, our server infrastructure was simply not up to the task of hosting the influx of players. We faced server-side issues right from the start, including:

• Disconnect / reconnect loops
  
• Server side latency
  
• Online AI errors and disconnects
  

We'd made several assumptions about how to handle simple events like disconnects, without proper consideration for the servers failing as hard as they did. Although we’ve since patched up most of the issues, you can be sure we’ll continue to work on major networking and server improvements throughout Early Access.

Thank you to everyone playing the game, providing feedback, and sticking with us through the hurdles.

Here are a few ways to get in touch (and hear from us):

• Service Desk
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Steam Forum
• Newsletter Signup

WHAT'S NEXT?

Back in August we introduced some major player-requested features and fixes:

• Streamlined Combat Board Experience
  
• Alternate starting condition: The Larry Harris Gencon v3.0 variant
  
• Added animation and visual control options
  
• Performance and networking improvements
  
• Over 200+ bug fixes
  

Looking to the future, we'll continue to keep the Axis & Allies community at the heart of our development plans.

Here are a few of the features we plan to include in future development work:

PLAYER PROFILES

• Keep track of your wins and losses
  
• See which power you play the most
  
• Review previous games
  

UNIT MOVEMENT & ARROWS

• We hear you loud and clear - there are too many clicks and the movement arrows get pretty confusing (...and it looks like spaghetti).
  

- We plan to refine unit movement reduce the number of clicks needed to move unit stacks
- We have a plan for how to represent unit movement in a much clearer way that should reduce the confusion (and no more spaghetti).

MATCHMAKING

• We want to speed up the time it takes for players to get into a game
  
• We're working on a system to match players searching for games together
  
• We also plan to include a ladder system that matches players based on skill level
  

GAME NOTIFICATIONS

• We're looking into ways we can notify you that it's your turn, aside from email
  

FIGHTER, AIRCRAFT CARRIER AND TRANSPORT IMPROVEMENTS

• We agree it's not always clear how the rules for these units work (especially if you're new to the game)
  
• We're taking steps to make the UI and visuals for these units more clear.
  

BETTER AI

• We're working on getting our robot players up to snuff - but you are tough competition.
  
• We have a few ideas how we can make the AI more challenging contenders.
  

BUGS, POLISH, STABILITY

• As always, we're prioritizing work on the stability of servers, improving the speed, and overall polish to the game.
  

AND MORE!

We currently have a ton of content in the Early Access pipe. While we've been releasing content patches with fixes and features about every two weeks since our launch, we now plan to focus on a few larger changes to the game. Expect a slight slow-down in our patch schedule as we'll have our heads down to implement these awesome features. We'll be sure to keep you updated on our progress (the newsletter is a great place for this).

I want to thank all of you for having patience with us as we work through these growing pains. It didn't all go as planned at launch, but we appreciate your feedback, reviews and commentary on the game so far. Keep posting feedback and suggestions. We're listening!

Sincerely,
Cody Ouimet
Producer, Axis & Allies 1942 Online

We're launching a new patch for Axis & Allies 1942 Online today. Thanks to everyone for your feedback and support as we continue to develop this Early Access title.

This patch focuses mainly on fixes, rather than features, but stay tuned for a development update from game producer, Cody Ouimet, later this week!



Features

• File support tickets in-game: If you receive an error while playing, you can now send us a support ticket in-game. This will also give us a copy of your saved game, which will speed up our ability to identify and respond to issues
  

Bug Fixes

• Removing Abandoned Games from the Lobby: We'll now remove games that are more than 7 days old from the lobby area.
  
• Fixed Fighter and Aircraft Carriers: Fighters must have a valid place to land during the non-combat move. There were a number of errors with enforcement of these Fighter / Aircraft Carrier rules that we've polished for this Patch.
  
• AI Fixes: We've fixed several issues that were causing AI to crash.
  
• Menus and Scrolling: We resolved a number of issues where elements in the menus or pop-ups were not displaying correctly.
  
• Server and Infrastructure: Numerous server fixes to reduce latency and increase stability.
  
• Tutorial 4: Resolved issue occasionally causing a crash in the final combat of Tutorial 4.
  

Hello commanders!

We're deploying another Hot Fix today to improve server stability and performance.

Note: ***There will be a brief outage at 12pm PDT to perform the update.***