Soldiers!

First of all, thank you to those that took part in our last weeks poll, in which we had over 6000 votes. As we thought, you are firmly for bugfixing and improvements being a priority over adding more features and this is exactly what we’re going to do. We also plan on more community polls in the future, so keep an eye out on our socials.

This all being said, it’s mostly the programming and testing teams that are focusing on bugfixes and improvements, which leaves the artists to do their job just as they did before – new weapons, uniforms, vehicles and still coming, and maps are also still on track. Our plans for finishing the game on time didn’t change, we just switched the priorities accordingly.

This is why today we’re taking a look at Smolensk, which will be our next big Warzone map. You’ve had a chance to play it a bit and give us feedback and we took some time to prepare the good looking version of this map, along with a lot of gameplay changes that came from our players testing the map and helping us hone in on the direction we want to go with it.

But first, a bit about history of this place. Smolensk is located on several historical invasion routes due to the relatively flat and solid terrain and it being on the way from Berlin to Moscow (best route from east to west Europe). Smolensk area also known as a “smolensk gate” in geo-strategic terms, as had great significance for the many war conflicts in Russia and Central Europe throughout the ages (for example: Napoleonic Wars, World War I & II). This is also the reason why this location was chosen as a background for next World War 3 map.

We want to keep the maps we’re adding a real strategic targets. Big cities are obvious, but most battles take place outside of the big-cities, especially armored warfare.

This is the first of our outdoor maps, it changes the gameplay massively compared to urban combat. Vehicles really can stretch their tracks and good strike usage is critical. The skies are much more deadly, but there’s also more cover between points in the form of trees to hide from those pesky Quadrocopters and in the nearest future – the Combat Heli Drone. There are long distances without breaks in the line of sight, so sniping moves to a whole new level. People running between bushes and branches, a lot of elevation changes and really interesting capture locations make this map a great place to fight. Flanks can come from any angle and they certainly do – make sure to have your squad with you to cover your back.

Smolensk is almost complete, we’re now fixing collisions and other bugs, so you can expect it to come to the game soon™.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1qwmaEz_SvpcAix5DNurzJ8FVZVS_KuAV?usp=sharing [195MB]