We're very proud to announce that the Seals will make their first appearance in Onward, and are available in the game as of this announcement.
Onward has always focused on the battle between the Marine Forces Special Operations Command (MARSOC) and the fictional VOLK militia. Although MARSOC will continue to play a central role in Onward's universe going forward the addition of Seals will accomodate upcoming changes in the game where forces will take up a special operations role deep inside VOLK controlled territory. We are looking forward to sharing more details about these changes soon.
It has been a long road to get this new class of warriors in the game, and we would like to thank the Seals and the Naval Special Warfare Command for working with us to clear the way during this long and complicated process. In particular we'd like to send our thanks to Andre, Gaston, Hoover, Midge and 'Popeye'.
Semper Fortis!
March 2021 Sitrep Now Available
Hello Everyone!
We hope everyone is enjoying the 1.8.7.2 patch! 1.8.7.2 was a community driven patch and we wanted to really take time to focus on areas where we could improve your gameplay the most. The feedback you have given us has been overwhelmingly positive and a lot of you have reported issues have been fixed. If you still encounter any major issues then please use the official Onward Discord or website support form to reach out.
We know hopping in and playing with other like minded players is what a lot of you are looking for. While you are waiting for the Friends and Party system we discussed in earlier Sitreps, we are providing some tools/guides to help better connect and play with people. Please check out the Community Center below for more info.
From The Devs’ Desk: Now that 1.8.7.2 has been released we will be moving our focus to update 1.8.8 and security improvements. Those of you who have been keeping up with our Sitreps may recall 1.8.8’s main feature is a coding refactor, so while it will not contain a lot of new content the update will fix a lot of outstanding issues with the game, especially when it comes to lobbies and game mode specific problems.
We will have new content for you as well. Included in 1.8.8 will be a nighttime version of the Shooting Range. In addition, testing will soon be underway for another map: the redesigned version of Abandoned which will be released in both a day and a night setting. After Abandoned we will be releasing more maps to keep the content coming. You might even see some teasers of the maps coming soon: be on the lookout!
The ranking and friends/party systems are also in the works. These are much bigger projects that will be worked on over a longer period of time. We are setting a higher standard for new features we develop to make sure they meet your expectations while making sure that the increased amount of features in Onward will not impact the game’s future development where possible.
Community Center: We often get asked how the Friends Filter works in multiplayer and how to best find your friends and their lobbies. Below we have laid out instructions for how/when to use the filter and how to more easily find your friends’ lobby.
A guide to find and play with your friends in Onward Multiplayer
If you and your friends are on the same platform
SteamVR Make sure both you and your friend are friends on Steam One person will need to start a Multiplayer Game Choose “Show Friends Only” from the filter options in Onward Multiplayer Lobby listings, press apply You should now see just your friends game in the lobby list
Oculus Home Make sure you and your friend are both friends/on friends list in Oculus Home One person will need to start a game and put a helmet on in the tent Choose “Show Friends Only” from the filter options in Onward Multiplayer Lobby listings, press apply You should now see just your friends game in the lobby list
Oculus Quest Make sure you are both friends/on friends list through the Oculus app. One person will need to start a game and put a helmet on in the tent Choose “Show Friends Only” from the filter options in Onward Multiplayer Lobby listings, press apply You should now see just your friends game in the lobby list
If you and your friends are NOT on the same platform Make sure you DO NOT have “Show Friends Only” selected in the filters One person will need to start a match and put a helmet on in the tent Ask your friends what game mode they are going to be playing Filter by that game mode and search through remaining lobbies for your friends game
Now that you can more easily find your friends, you can now jump in together and really start building those skills together and develop some team tactics. To assist you with this we will soon be providing you with aerial/top-down maps in the Media area on our website. Use these to formulate your best plan of attack, and use them wisely!
The map makers in the community have been working hard and have developed some new maps for you to play on. Show them some love and give them a test run. For more information about joining the custom maps community, join our Discord server Discord.gg/Onward.
From user KIRI : "Weapons Factory" is my first successful attempt at making a map. It has a nice mixture of close quarters and long range engagements, and is tailored to competitive play, receiving frequent map updates based on player feedback. I hope to see this map become popular with the league community, as I feel it has potential to be an extremely fun and balanced map.
From user MOTYSHIZ: A procedurally-generated map? In Onward? sb_procedural tries to offer a unique CQB experience that trains players' moment to moment adaptability. This map will have its layout re-shuffled on a semi-weekly basis. Even without the weekly re-shuffle, the spawns rotate between rounds to keep the layout feeling fairly random. New pieces will be added from time to time, and some weeks may feature some very experimental modifications. Motyshiz (sb_procedural creator) would like to credit LeonMail for the initial idea.
From Doomblade187: Backstreets is an urban map with three long, interconnected lanes and plenty of places to hide. Evade your enemies in the hotel, or watch the streets from your rooftop perch. Just keep an eye out for the VIP. This map is inspired by the America's Army 3 map, Alley.
That wraps it up March here at DPI. Make sure to keep an eye out on social media for some Onward Easter eggs beginning in April.
Spring has sprung, but Stay Frosty!
Patch 1.8.7.2 is Now Available
Hello again everyone!
Today we launch a patch for Onward: version 1.8.7.2. This patch is a bit more beefy than the last one and it includes a long list of fixes for issues that affect all of you: from audio and AI graphic issues, to walls that you could walk through on maps. Overall, the patch addresses some of the bigger issues affecting the gameplay and overall experience in Onward. Your experience is important to us and we value the feedback you the players provide us.
Among the key fixes included in this patch are bot visibility at long range, and smoke grenades correctly blocking visibility of objects behind them. Fixes for most lingering audio issues are also included. In addition, we have added changes/updates to some maps. See the list below for an overview of the fixes that are included in this patch.
1.8.7.2 is now live and should automatically prompt you for an update the next time you go to jump on the battlefield.
For all the details check out our blog post. https://www.onwardthegame.com/devblog/
February Sitrep
Hello Everyone!
February came, and now that February is pretty much gone it’s time for our monthly sitrep. The Developers continue to work hard on some much needed improvements, redesigned features and bug fixes.
Stay Frosty!
Kidding...
From The Dev Desk: In our last sitrep we mentioned that 1.8.8 would come out quicker than our usual patches, but unfortunately that turned out to not be the case. We hit some speed bumps and are making sure it’s in the best condition for you. 1.8.8 will significantly reduce the occurrence of broken lobbies, which often cause problems such as voice chat issues, lobby lockups, and rounds not assigning points correctly. The update rewrites the code that is the foundation of Onward’s game modes. This part of the code interacts with a lot of areas in the game, and we’ve run into a lot of specific and unforeseen issues as a result. We appreciate the patience you’ve all shown over the past month, and we are working to get the update out as soon as possible.
Because of the delay with 1.8.8 we’re working to release a couple of patches to address the most urgent issues with 1.8.7, the first of which (1.8.7.1) has already been released. Next up will be patch 1.8.7.2. The 1.8.7.2 patch will focus on fixing issues that affect a lot of you, and issues affecting competitive play. - Connection issues for PCVR players, where a registry reset was needed. - A number of Voice/Audio fixes and adjustments while inside the tent, along with a design change to the team chat function. - AI adjustments such as footsteps and visibility from a distance. - Some Map adjustments, such as broken walls and railings are likely to be included. - We are pushing to try and get improvements to tablets and smokes in as well. A detailed breakdown of the fixes and adjustments will be given when 1.8.7.2 is released.
In addition to the focus we’re putting on the 1.8.7.2 patch and the 1.8.8 update we are making strides with future features: as Onward continues to grow the player base has increased exponentially. Having this many players (and lobbies) in the game means we have to rethink some of Onward’s features. For example we need to make it easier to find and play with your friends, and we want to make sure you have as much fun playing the game as possible. To get to that point we are working on implementing a party system to find and more easily group up with your Onward crew to get games going. With any multiplayer game, there are different play styles and different mindsets. We are also working on the features to help with toxic players, for example allowing you to mute them, and adding measures to prevent sustained team killing.
Also being looked into is an implementation of a ranking system. A place where you can get statistics on kills, deaths, revives, and more. Once we get closer to the final design we’ll share more details with you! Another addition will be a revamped version of Abandoned. The map is set in an old abandoned soviet factory located next to a lake in the harsh Siberian landscape. Also high on our list is improving graphics for PCVR users with the use of Shadowmask lighting. We don’t have an estimate on the Shadowmask update quite yet however, as we are waiting for a Unity update to start this implementation.
Community Center: This month we have made a major update to our official Onward Discord channel. We have always shared a home with the VR Master league, whose roots lie in the Onward Discord. However, with the growth of both Onward and the Master League, the VRML has spread their wings and opened up their own server to give the Onward Discord community a chance to make some adjustments. Explore new channels and new ways to interact with fellow Onward players. If you’re not in the Discord, what are you waiting for? https://discord.gg/fYHHJFkwTr
Our Twitter campaign for finding out the fan favorite map is coming to a close! We are in the Semifinals and the Finals will wrap up at the end of the month. Make sure you check out our Twitter account (@OnwardTheGame) to see the progress and get your final votes in!
Starting in March we want to Highlight you, yes you, our community! We want to showcase our players and show off your Onward fandom. Send us your photos in a DM of you being an Onward fan for a chance to be featured on our social media Community Spotlight.
If you’d like to get to know a little more about the people who work at Downpour you can also follow our company accounts on Twitter (@DownpourInt) and Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/DownpourInteractive) , this month we are featuring our QA Lead, Kaysaun.
Stay Frosty! (for real this time)
Onward Hotfix 1.8.7.1 Available Now
We have just released a hotfix for #OnwardVR 1.8.7. The hotfix fixes a problem where if you’re playing on custom maps the game could become unresponsive.
We intend to release another patch in the next couple of weeks to address more issues, ahead of the 1.8.8 update release. We’ll post a sitrep with the details later this week.
The fix is available now, and will download automatically to your device. Stay frosty!
Winter Onwardland Map Winners
We are wrapping up our A Winter Onwardland contest by announcing the winners for the map creation portion. The community submitted some really fun maps. Thank you to everyone who submitted entries. Lots of creative style throughout them all.
As a refresher: we are announcing winners in three categories today: cross-platform, PC and Quest! The overall winner will receive their choice of an RTX 3090 or an AMD 5950X processor with a high-end motherboard, whereas the best PC and Quest maps will be rewarded with the author’s choice of an RTX 3080 or an AMD 5900X with a high-end motherboard.
Without further ado, the winners are…..
Cross Platform Sommet - Submitted by Weidz What some of the judges had to say: Tribly: Sommet is impressive from when you first spawn in the cable car looking out over the mountains, to sneaking around in the caves and back rooms. Everything felt hand crafted from the observatory at the top of the mountain, all the way down to the map on the tablet. From the museum, to the kitchen, the wine/cheese cellar, every area felt unique which makes learning the map and orienting yourself much easier. Eritheis: I liked that the map had different distinct areas. All of them were interesting and made me want to explore to see what else could be found. Having the different areas being so different from each other made it easier to figure out where I was on the map too.
PCVR Panda Towers - Submitted by Monorchid What some of the judges had to say: SyrinS0ng: This is a unique design style we haven’t seen yet. Set on the rooftops of a large building with skyscrapers all around you. You have to weave through different obstacles to find your enemies and need top communication to navigate though this map. WH1SKEY: An enjoyable map that adds verticality to Onward. The battles that engage on this map make any angle action packed and really puts a player's tactics to the test.
Oculus Quest Frostbite - Submitted by Evolution What some of the judges had to say: SyrinS0ng: As soon as I spawned in I felt immersed in the location. I could feel the cold fog around me. The rooms were great to explore and lots of area throughout to get some team tactics going. KasperVld: I enjoyed the verticality in this map quite a lot: the fact that your opponents can be hiding behind any hill makes for a slower paced, nerve wrecking match. Never let your guard down, and always keep your gun pointing up.
Congratulations to the winners! All of the maps that were entered are available for you to download and play on. Go check them out! If you are interested in custom map building, check out our discord for more information and chat with fellow map makers.
Map Contest Entries available for Play: Arctic / Arctic Night (PC & Quest) - Heclak Ashes In The Snow (PC & Quest) - Stahr Cerbere Landing (PC) - Justin Dumpster Fire (PC & Quest) - 04 Hotham Day (Quest) - DaveSparhawk Ice (PC & Quest) - Koiz J-Street (PC) - GiantRobot North Pole (PC) - WhiteFang Trench - At Christmas (PC) - Winston Wilderness (PC & Quest) - Monorchid
Sitrep for January 2021
Hello Everyone!
Happy 2021! We are stepping into a new year and have a lot of opportunities and things to look forward to. Onward keeps moving…. well… ONWARD! This month’s Sitrep is a little lighter on development updates than usual due to the holiday season, but we still have some news to share.
Earlier this month we released Update 1.8.7. We have received lots of feedback from the community, we are listening to it all and we hear you. We are happy that you are enjoying the audio improvements and the updated Snowpeak map. With all improvements come some bugs and rest assured, we will be addressing things in 1.8.8.
1.8.8 will be coming out a little quicker than our usual patch releases as a maintenance release to address some ongoing issues and make some adjustments from 1.8.7 based on community feedback. Fixes that will be addressed include significantly reducing the occurrence of broken lobbies, which often cause issues such as voice chat issues, lobby lockups, rounds not assigning points correctly. Additional Audio improvements based around voice chat are also in the works. Fixing an issue allowing players to sometimes see through smoke emitted by smoke grenades and a fix for the infamous “jiggle peek” are on our provisional list as well. We also continue to work on a couple of large new features which are due to release over the next couple of months. Be on the lookout for more details as the patches get closer.
Downpour Interactive continues to grow as a company and we have been adding to the team to keep up with the game design, improvements, and the future of the game. You have already been introduced to our new Community Manager Korine (SyrinSong) earlier this month, and now we would also like to introduce a new Programmer, Ben, and Level Designer, Joe who many of you may know under his nickname Snooper Fax. They have been a great addition to the team here at DPI. We would also like to announce some changes to people you know and have interacted with in the community. Daan (MrDeath) will shift his focus from Community Management over to level design and Kasper (KasperVld) will be taking up the role of Producer while still keeping an eye on community tasks and supporting Korine where needed.
We have wrapped up our Community Contest and judging for the custom maps has begun! We will be announcing the winners in the upcoming weeks. If you missed the announcements for the Fan Art and Video winners, check out our social media accounts.
In addition, for our community we have posted a new Support area to our website with an FAQ section to help with common questions that people may have about playing or any suggestions/reports that need to be sent to us.
To stay up to date on the latest news between Sitreps, make sure to follow our social media accounts and join the Official Onward discord.
Stay Frosty!
Update 1.8.7 Available Now
Hello everyone!
We are pleased to announce that the time for the 1.8.7 update is now! This update is primarily focused on audio upgrades and the re-release of the Snowpeak map, but also contains a lot of bug fixes and general improvements. The full change log is posted below.
Our audio improvements comprise amongst many other things gunshots that are more consistent in their quality, more immersive and directional footsteps, higher quality voice chat, more immersive environmental sound, and more consistency between the volumes of different sources. Two new features for audio are the ability to independently adjust the volume of gunshots and voices, and audio mixing presets to select.
Enjoy those updated audio sounds while playing again on the re-released Snowpeak map (day and night versions available!) and hear the crunch of the snow under your feet as you tactically sneak around on the ice to get that perfect shot in as you notice the other team coming your way. Snowpeak features long distance engagement and close quarter combat options. This map will test your skills in stealth and tactical abilities.
Smoke grenades have also been reworked. They have changed to spherical from the previous comic spray to allow them to be used in a more predictable way which benefits gameplay. Full screen tint will be more accurately bound to the area of the smoke, and is harder to see through. We have also fixed an issue where AI wasn’t affected by smoke grenades and could ‘see’ players as usual. Finally and perhaps most importantly scopes no longer fully tint when looking at smoke grenades, allowing you to see players in front of the smoke through scopes once more.
For all other changes, refer to the full change list below. Update 1.8.7 is available now and will download automatically. Enjoy!
For all the details check out our blog post. https://www.onwardthegame.com/devblog/
Community Contest Winners Announcement - Artwork & Videos
Thank you to everyone who entered our Winter contest in the fan art and videos sections! All submissions were great and this was a hard one to judge. We appreciate the hard work and creativity you’ve put into these masterpieces. Today we’re announcing the winners in the first two categories: Artwork and Videos, while those working on their custom maps still have just over a week to finish their entries.
The winner in the artwork category is … *drumroll* …. Ovoideum! This gorgeous art piece is done in a Japanese block art style. It has so many Onward references in the details, everytime we look we seem to find more. We already ordered a print to have put up in Dante’s office!
Our winner for the best fan video is a long time active community member: nin10doVR
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His video really brings home the feel of team playing with a catchy music tune. It’s a reminder of how during the pandemic Onward has given us an opportunity to play online with our friends and offer us some community and social interaction while we can’t go out.
We will also be posting our runners up and other entries on our social media accounts throughout the coming weeks. Keep a lookout and thank you again for all the great entries.
Onward Sitrep - December 2020
Hello everyone!
Welcome to the last Sitrep for 2020! Work continues on update 1.8.7, and although we had hoped to release it before the end of the year we had to acknowledge that making sure this update is as good as it can was the more important factor in that decision. With Christmas approaching that meant that the update wouldn't release until mid-January. We'll be spending the coming week working on the last few bugs and improvements, and polishing the new features.
One of the key new features coming in 1.8.7 is the overhauled audio system. The audio update is currently being tested and the general picture is that it will be a big improvement in both accuracy and immersion. We have been working towards providing better audio across the board. The changes to note include gunshots that are more consistent in their quality, more immersive and understandable footsteps, higher quality voice chat, more immersive environmental sound, and more consistency between the volumes of different sources. New are also the options to adjust the volume of sfx, gunshots, the volume of voices, and the audio mixer being used. Customised audio will also be available again for our custom map gurus!
If you've been keeping up with the Sitreps over the past couple of months you'll know that the second big new feature coming in update 1.8.7 is the re-release of a fan-favourite map: Snowpeak! Last month we teased the layout of the map, and this month we're ready to share some on-the-ground images of what's coming your way soon.
Keep an eye out for improvements throughout the game. These improvements include the smoke bombs behavior change that we detailed last month, and a fix for a bug where AI would ignore smoke grenades. We've also applied a small boost to the night vision to make it brighter in dark areas. A memory leak that would result in crashes if players stayed for extended periods of time in respawn-enabled game modes has been fixed and should help those of you who like playing in the Shooting Range. A final highlight of the small changes is that you'll be able to set custom time limits in private Uplink matches now. Keep an eye out for the full change log when the patch releases!
We would be remiss not to mention an issue that's been affecting Onward's competitive scene. The "jiggle peek" issue is being worked on and we are hoping to have a fix that will come out in the new year soon after the 1.8.7 update releases. Speaking of things we're actively working on for the new year: we haven't forgotten about the graphical improvements we mentioned a while ago, and continue to research and develop improvements in that area, including shadowmasks and various shader and lighting improvements.
Unit 51 continues to be a great help and valuable asset for helping test some of these new features and help provide valuable feedback. In December we found that we needed to recruit new members to the unit to help with the evolution and expansion of the game. We received over 300 applications and are grateful for everyone's interest. From that we picked and added our new members to the unit. Due to the overwhelming interest and limited space we weren't able to invite everyone we wanted to based on their applications this time around, but we'll definitely have more recruitment drives in the future.
Switching gears from development news to community highlights we'd like to give a huge shout out to the Onward Master League. After intense battles the VR Master League (VRML) has finished Season 10. Congratulations to the Beginners for topping the league, Aimless Gaming for making sure they don't get too comfortable up there, and Bossfight & Mayhem for completing the podium with nothing to separate them.
Season 11 will be starting up in the new year, so make sure to hone your competitive play skills if you're looking to participate. If you are interested in joining the league for season 11, check out the Onward Master League website for more info.
We have our Winter Community contest running and have a lot of great prizes to give away including up to an RTX 3090 graphics card or an AMD 5950X processor with a high-end motherboard! There are prizes for three categories. Fan Art, Videos & Custom Maps. We have been seeing some very promising entries coming in already, and we're looking forward to seeing more coming in over the next couple of weeks!
To put the cherry on top of our year, Onward has been titled Best Action Game of 2020 by Oculus Quest. We are incredibly proud and happy to provide players with a great action experience and we are very grateful to Oculus for this recognition. Of course we'll want to grab similar titles on all platforms next year as well!
Finally, we wish all of you, your friends, your family, and everyone else a very Happy Holiday Season, and however you celebrate it we hope you are staying safe and healthy. We've got a lot in store for 2021, so keep looking Onward!
We know it's cold out for most of you: Stay Frosty!
