Welcome to our 49th Development Status. You can see what we were working on in two weeks!
Environment on Tutorial Mission
Ten months ago we started developing tools and workflow necessary to push our graphics fidelity forward. Environment artists have been working tirelessly to achieve high quality immersive scenery for Tank Squad. The whole production pipeline was made from scratch, and all workflow necessities with tools were made with help of our programmers and designers. Every piece of map you will see is carefully designed, tested, and created manually.
Deep forest path
For today’s update, we want to show you the upcoming Tutorial Map, which will introduce players to the game mechanics we have, and how to operate with battle plans in the field.
Sunroots and wheat fields
T-70
This time a new vehicle for the Soviet side. It is a T-70, a light tank that was used by the Red Army during World War II. This tank replaced the scout tank T-60 and infantry tank support T-50. T-70 is armed with a 45-mm L/46 gun and carrying forty-five rounds. T-70 is also equipped with a coaxial 7.62mm DT machine gun. The tank was operated by a driver and a commander who loaded and fired the gun. Armour thickness on the turret front was 60 mm, turret sides, and rear: 35 mm, hull front, and sides: 45 mm, and roof and bottom: 10 mm.
Crater generator
We made another new tool for Tank Squad, and it is called Crater Generator. As the name suggests, this technique is responsible for terrain deformation after explosions. Some readers may remember that a similar system is included in Tank Mechanic Simulator, where a crater generation process is involved for creating excavation places. Our experience collected last year allowed us to refine, redesign and optimize this algorithm. Now the whole stage of geometry and topology recalculation is done parallelly with GPU power. It means that simultaneously we can generate many craters at the same time - not just one - without a significant drop in performance. An interesting feature is that craters are fully procedural. It means they have thousands of various shapes, depending on random seed and input parameters. It is based on a mix of fractal noise and signed distance fields.
Steam Next Fest in June
To prepare for the upcoming demo fest in June we are running an ever more intensive QA of our game. Last week's tests were an introduction to sending the build to our publisher QA team, to have the required recommendation for the demo fest. The most important problems were:
low performance with many AIs at once
enemy AI not reacting correctly to our actions (being very static and shooting back only when shot upon)
AI is able to see through high grass/vegetation (when a player could not)
Every few weeks we will be running such tests to have the game as polished as it can be for the fest and then the Early Access version.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #48
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 48th Development Status. You can see what we were working on in two weeks!
PzKpfw IV Ausf. G
Another panzer from the family of German medium tanks. Not many changes between the F2 version. The right visor from the front of the turret has been removed, as well as the visors from the turret sides. A rack for carrying spare road wheels on the left wing and hooks for attaching seven track links to the top plate at the front of the fuselage has been added.
Underwater System
We created a system designed specifically for our game that enhances the player's experience when submerged in water. Our technique features a special post-processing graphics effect that simulates the feeling of being underwater. The effect alters the visuals of the game, with the ability to add a color tint, a blur, and distorted sounds, making the player feel as if they're truly underwater. The deeper the player stays submerged, the more intense the effect becomes.
Tutorial
In the last two weeks, we designed a tutorial for Tank Squad consisting of two parts: repair station and battle. The tutorial aims to teach players only the essential mechanics and functions of the game, keeping it minimalistic and basic without unnecessary distractions. Tutorials are typically tedious, and players wish to complete them as soon as possible; therefore, we have designed them to be short and user-friendly. Players will learn additional cool mechanics as they progress through each mission. If a player wants to learn a specific mechanic in detail or remind themselves about it, there will be a menu with visual and text descriptions of each mechanic.
The repair station tutorial comprises nine steps:
Movement
Headquarters interaction
Spawning a tank
Checking the tank's status
Repairing the tank
Using the crane to place the engine in the tank
Using the wrench to fix broken parts
Placing the missing part
Starting the mission
The battle tutorial consists of eleven steps:
Battle map menu
Tank controls
Tank movement
Terrain surfaces
Destructible environment
Airstrikes
Repairs in battle
Shooting
Conquering objectives
Destroying objectives
Calling artillery
Completing the tutorial will take around 10-15 minutes.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #47
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 47th Development Status. You can see what we were working on in two weeks!
PzKpfw IV Ausf. H
This time, we are adding the PzKpfw IV Ausf. H to the rooster of playable vehicles. As always, our team worked hard to ensure that the PzKpfw IV Ausf. H is authentically recreated with detailed graphics.
Path Finding
As we’re progressing with the game we are spotting more and more issues with various game modules. One such issue was found when the level design of the mission with codename C1M4. Tanks could not handle crossing narrow positions, blocked themselves, or tried to do impossible climbs on the trees/terrain around. This week we’ve addressed this issue and the pathfinding works more stable and predictable. We want to have high performance system that will allow the AI to follow our orders or waypoints without bigger issues.
Level Design
We’ve been continuing to work on the level of forest (C1M4). It is going to be level, where a player will face mostly close distance combat. Unlike other levels, this level is going to have quite dense fog and some rainy weather. Players’ tanks will have to move through muddy and narrow roads. A player will be threatened by traps set by soviet infantry. We’ve been reading some memories of german tank commanders and what has caught our attention were stories about battles on roads through forests, which sometimes were so narrow that a destroyed tank would block them. We wanted to recreate that experience. That also means a more intense battle condensed in one place. Looking around each corner and moving slowly will be the best strategy to leave the forest alive.
Environment
SFX
We’re also progressing with sound design, last two weeks were spent on voice over design and in-game notifications from the crew about various situations. Instead of voices, we would like to showcase the sound design for an off-map artillery barrage.
When the game calls the artillery barrage:
1. There will be a radio notification about it (but only if the radio in your vehicle is mounted and works, as well as if the radioman is alive). 2. There will be a distinct sound of artillery salvo, different for allied and enemy artillery, in the far distance. 3. After a few seconds, the shells drop, taking into account the distance to the listener.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #46
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 46th Development Status. You can see what we were working on in two weeks!
X-Ray
In Tank Squad we’re going for realistic armor penetration and ballistics. This creates a problem, that more arcade approach has an easy answer to: how to show damage done to the enemy if that enemy is far away?
Most of the time the easiest answer is to just make a huge explosion that is very distinct and visible from far. Additionally, the tank/vehicle turns its main material to burned/wrecked which also adds to the visual effect. The last effect is mostly dense black smoke.
Everything above is to tell the player that this enemy is no longer a threat. Without this effect or kill-feed, the player does not know if that target is knocked out or not (which is very realistic). Not until the crew bails out (if there is anyone alive to bail out) or the tank blows up/gets on fire as the effect of damage applied.
We’ve obtained a license to an X-Ray system that in real time shows the damage done to the enemy (hit-cam) and damage done to us, the player (kill-cam). This, connected with a few other visual and sound effects should end up in players staying in control over the battle chaos.
You can see it on these videos above. We are working on to implement this system to the Tank Squad now.
KV-1
Today we want to show You the final model of the KV-1 which will be part of the Soviet armored forces. As You can see our tanks will have a full interior including engines and gearboxes.
At this stage, the model is optimized with Level Of Detail to assure better CPU and GPU performance. It is a heavy tank so be prepared for tough and massive battles against those metal beasts.
Environment
For the last 2 months we have been working hard on the environment in Tank Squad. At this moment we are finishing work on C1M3, which is a typical Russian steppe. What we missed in previous iterations is the reduced number of vegetation. Thanks to the fact that every piece of terrain is hand-crafted by our artists, each place on the map has its own unique touch. Each mission and scene is prepared individually, the terrain's colors and special features are meant to reflect as much as possible the spirit of realistic places where armored battles were fought.
Below you can see some pictures from the C1M1, C1M2 and C1M3 maps!
Next Fest June 2023
We are thrilled to announce that Tank Squad will be taking part in the upcoming Next Fest on Steam, which will take place in June of this year. This is a significant milestone for us, and we couldn't be more excited to share our demo with the world!
In the Tank Squad demo, you can expect one battle scene and one repair scene to get the full experience of the logistical approach and the battle itself.
We are incredibly proud of what we have achieved so far, and we can't wait to showcase our game to the world. Next Fest is a fantastic opportunity for us to connect with our community, receive feedback, and make the final tweaks before the EA release.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #45
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 45th Development Status. You can see what we were working on in two weeks!
Animations
Luger and M1895 Animation for German tank crew with Luger P08 sidearm and Nagant M1895 revolver. In the event of an evacuation from an inoperative tank, the crew will be equipped with sidearms or a submachine gun
MP40 Work in progress- First Person animations for the MP40 gun (without VFX or camera shake). In Tank Squad, the player's ability to use weapons is an additional element, the gameplay will mainly focus on tank battles.
Migration to Fusion
We have spent the last 2 weeks on migration from Photon PUN 2 multiplayer system to Photon Fusion. The main aim of this whole operation is to use the new possibilities the Fusion has to offer. Better performance during gameplay, optimized number and size of packages sent during online gameplay, etc. It is a must have for our needs as the game is very complicated and requires a stable and high performance engine to work perfectly.
PzKpfw III Ausf. M
Our objective was to ensure that this tank would be as true to the original tank that was used on the Eastern Front. To accomplish this, we have made a concerted effort to include as many additional and authentic details on the actual mesh and textures as we possibly could. From the external armor plating to the internal mechanics and painting, we have spared no expense or effort in order to make this tank as accurate and realistic as possible. This was a challenging and time-consuming task, but we are confident that the result is a true representation of the tanks that were used on the Eastern Front during WWII.
Level Design
For the last couple of weeks, members of our Design Department have been working on a new map, numerically designated as C1M3 - the third battlefield that you are going to fight on, during the Kursk Campaign. The inspirational fundament for this level was the steppes, an unending sea of grass stretching as far as the eye can see. What will you find, when your forces enter this open area, filled only with flora, small lakes, and blazing fire of enemy cannons? Keep on reading! This map was probably the most challenging level that we’ve worked on so far; steppes are by definition a wide, empty terrain where there is not many cover or strategical objectives and therefore our options for the targets' design or blockout were highly limited. We’ve decided to work mainly with ground deformation, creating a mirage of bumps and smaller hills. To break the monotony, we placed a soppy, marsh-like region, that is running through the middle of the battlefield; the life-giving water provided space for various plants and trees, which will bring some diversity to the mostly empty area. Further to the north, you may also find some sparsely scattered farmhouses and mills whose inhabitants had to flee from the upcoming war. This map will offer a decent amount of long-range shooting, forcing players to strategically choose their positioning - one false move and you may find yourself in the middle of open ground, having nothing but bushes to hide from a crossfire. Lines of trenches mark the ground here, trying to slow down the German advancement. The artillery has been positioned somewhere in a distant forest and its fury is falling on the aggressors, shredding their tanks with deadly shrapnel. Countless soldiers and armored units were thrown into this green desert in a desperate attempt to defend the Soviet land and thus prevent you from conquering the Kursk Arch. Will you fight your way through enemy fortifications and escape the hell of emptiness? Or will you be flooded by waves of Russian forces and this grassy ocean becomes your tomb? Stay tuned for the upcoming Development Statuses and future early access to find out for yourself!
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #44
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 44th Development Status. You can see what we were working on in two weeks!
PzKpfw VI Tiger I Ausf. H1
The last few weeks have seen a lot of intensive work in the art department, among other things. We have been fine-tuning the tanks, and this week we would like to show off the Tiger I model. Below is a sample of how these tanks will look in the game. The color scheme as well as the camouflage or side numbers are just examples of what can be done and what can be given. Here is an example of a Tiger in dunkelgelb shade in camouflage with the number 231. We are experimenting a bit with shaders, below is a shader/material showing the insides - x-ray. It can help showing damage or destruction inside a tank. The topic is interesting to explore in terms of design - we will try to cover this in more detail in future development statuses
Tutorial Design
As we’re approaching more and more to the release, we need to add the tutorial to the game. Last week we’ve designed the whole process, divided into sections, to help and explain the basic game concepts, interactions, etc.
Section 1 of the tutorial is about repair station gameplay, explaining what to do and when, how to proceed with the campaign, and how to repair, rearm and refuel a vehicle.
Section 2 of the tutorial is explaining battle gameplay, how to control the vehicle, how to aim, how to change ammo, how to give orders, how to call off-map support, how to check objectives and win them etc.
This is a complex game and the tutorial will be extensive. Wait for the next statuses to see some screenshots from the tutorial :)
Second Contest Results
As announced, we present the winners of the second contest for our community!
JaG kanpz Gomax6 Petja85k
Thank you all for participating! The creators of the above works can expect a message on our discord with a code for the WW2 Rebuilder game.
Field Hospital
We’d like to invite you to take a look at the field hospital that we have created. To make it we had to create models of:
Ambulance based on Opel Blitz
Medical tents
Medical equipment
Medical boxes
Medical stretches
Characters with bandages
Paweł, our animator, has animated medics and wounded soldiers.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #43
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 43nd Development Status. You can see what we were working on in the new year!
Main Menu UI Work in progress
A lot of work has been done in recent weeks on the interface in the main menu. Among the major changes are the Lobby, Settings, or Loading screens.
In addition, windows communicate an event such as quitting the game or another player joining the server.
Shader for Vehicles
One of the basic things that the tanks in our game must have are materials and shaders. We have created a new basic shader for vehicles to support our assumptions about damage states and more. It will be possible to display camouflage or some inscriptions such as markings on the material.
User Experience
This time our design department took a short break from map creation and focused on analyzing the current state of User Experience. We are aware of the importance connected to UI’s transparency, game mechanics' intuitiveness, or simply knowing “what to do and where to do it”. Therefore, most of our time this month was dedicated to testing gameplay loops and proposing necessary improvements.
We started with the Repairs Scene, where players will spend their time in between missions, conducting repairs, managing their resources, and preparing for the upcoming battle. Our priority was to design an easy-to-learn and instinctive vehicle repair sequence - taking into consideration an enormous amount of feedback from our recent whole-team tests, it was pretty obvious that we need to implement a solid portion of “quality of life” updates. This process of repetitively challenging various features with questions like “does it REALLY serve its purpose?” or “would players CERTAINLY know what to do here” bore fruits in form of multiple concepts, such as a new visual guidance system, need for more icons in place of text, reworked equipment or notebook functionalities and so much more. Now, these ideas are being assessed, which in a short time will certainly lead to improving the overall feel of repairs, hopefully also bringing you more fun from this part of the game.
The second point of our concern was the battle scenes, to be precise: navigation on the battlefield, various messages that the player obtains (ex. warnings about the incoming airstrike), and once again, visual communication. Conclusions were pretty similar to those above, although the dynamic specific of armored warfare requires a little different approach than using a screwdriver 😛. In the weeks to come we will do our best to raise tankers' awareness in the field of their machine’s condition, and battle objectives and generally improve the experience of driving the steel goliaths.
Community Contest 2
Another year, and another contest! This time prepared together with Madnetic Games, and their WW2 Rebuilder game, which is going to be released on 16.01.2023!
Your task will be to generate graphics through AI graphics generators (there are plenty of them on the internet) thematically combining WW2 Rebuilder and Tank Squad. In addition, participants must add a caption to the graphic - a catchphrase, which will also be evaluated.
To participate in our contest, you must be a member of our discord server, the link to which can be found below.
https://discord.gg/MRjreApkvW
You can post your works in the dedicated channel #contest on our discord. Each participant can only send one message containing their submission. Winners will receive a keys for WW2: Rebuilder!
Contest starts today, and will last till 22.01.2023 We are going to post results in the next development status.
KV-1 Progress
Today we want to show You the fighting compartment in the soviet KV-1 tank. The whole crew consisted of four people, two of them were operating in the turret and the rest two crewmen (driver and radio operator) were placed at the front of the hull. Inside you will be able to find fuel tanks, ammo racks, radiostation, some optic stuff, and other most important devices which would help you to survive on the battlefield. Remember, do not let your enemy flank your KV-1 because ammunition storage under the turret can be pretty sensitive to any hit you get. The real strength of KV-1 comes from his front armor so have in mind to always correct your position while fighting.
Bridges & Factory buildings
We have created several new objects for use on the maps. These include steel and wooden bridges. We are also working all the time on other infrastructure such as adding factory buildings on the stages.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #42
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 42nd Development Status. You can see what we were working on during the last two weeks.
Level Design C1M1
For the last couple of weeks, our Level Design department members were tasked with the creation of the new map, numerically designated as C1M1. It is loosely based on the environmental surroundings of Kursk (about 200 km from this city) and shall be featured as the first map players are about to explore. As always, we’ve started with general molecule design, holistically planning the four scenarios and intersections between each of the objectives. For now, our work is focused around Scenario B, which includes 4 objectives - it will provide you with gameplay experience both in open spaces and urban locations. At this stage we are nearly finished with this path - general level design is finished and the scenario is fully playable. It will, obviously, require some more love and polishing, especially from our environment artists, but the general foundation is ready. Now, in days to come, we will be testing, obtaining feedback, and introducing various iterations in order to provide you guys with the best possible entertainment, which will serve as a training zone before the true challenge awaiting in the world of Tank Squad. What’s next? For now, we may only unveil a small mystery - we are rapidly arriving at one of our milestones and therefore all departments are heavily involved in extensive development of the project, including Level Design. Most probably we are going to start working on the new map, also focusing on one scenario, so that we could present you the biggest scope of the variety… but you will read about it in the next Development Status - stay tuned! 😉
New Environment Assets C1M5
According to the level design of the scenarios, we are replacing placeholder blockout objects with new assets. C1M5 as you might still don’t know it's Mission 5 from the first campaign in Tank Squad. Last weeks we focused on making trenches, fortifications, bunkers, and surroundings. Below is a sneak peek from the editor/game itself showing the work that is in progress on the environment side of the missions we are producing. Fortified enemy arterillery positions received some touch and love as there role is to stop the attackers. Villages and other residential areas received new assets, We are using a simple destruction system on objects such as fences so that they can collapse or be destroyed after a vehicle drives into them. Below are some of the other assets you'll be able to find on our C1M5 map!
High poly Gearbox for KV-1
This week we present you a high poly model of transmission with a brake system for a KV-1 soviet tank. It is a completely different model than used in the T-34 tank which we showed you a pretty long time ago in previous Development Statuses. The whole high poly model of the tank is done so be careful not to miss the next statuses of the production and see how the crew compartment in KV-1 looked like from the tanker's perspective!
Contest results
As promised, we have prepared the announcement of the winners from the picture caption contest announced 3 weeks ago. We received as many as 25 entries from you, from which we selected 5 that made us laugh the most!
McDonnell Douglas AH-64 Apache - kanpz - Batman - Hyperion - BIG! -
Thank you to all participants and congratulations to the winners! We will contact you via Discord with the won cd-keys.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #41
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 41st Development Status. You can see on what we were working the last two weeks.
Community Contest!
Together with our friends from Gaming Factory, we have prepared a contest for you, in which you have a chance to win keys to the Electrician Simulator game!
The rules are very simple! To participate in the contest you must join our discord server and to think of how a tank could respond in that situation from the screenshot!
You can put your idea directly into the graphic or send a text message in a specially prepared #contest channel! The funniest wisdoms of the tank will be rewarded with the key to Electrician Simulator. Each user can participate only once, so think a second before sending your answer!
You can submit your work until 4th December, and we will announce the results in the next development status!
Environment optimization
On the repair scene, we’ve begun the process of optimization of its environment. That means two things: most of its environment is done and there is major performance improvement. Optimization of the environment consists of:
Merging several models into one to make GPU have to make fewer calculations.
Lowering the resolution of textures.
Adding LODs to 3D models (we’ve explained how that works in our Development Status #21)
Simplification of collisions.
Lowering the amount of triangles in models that have less importance on the scene.
Soviet Anti-aircraft gun M1939
We’ve decided to add some anti-aircraft guns as a feature in the game. As a player in some missions, you will have to destroy them to unlock for yourself a possibility to call airstrikes and aircraft recons.
Environment
In the last development status, you could see how we've moved from level blockout to scene dressing. Here we show you some more progress that we have done on the environment at the Prokhorovka level. It is our first pass at scene dressing, which means, we've focused on the basics like painting terrain, and placing the largest and most repetitive objects like trees, trenches, and buildings. In the next stages of development, we are going to add more details to the environment.
Thank you and have a good one! DeGenerals
Development Status #40
Dear Tankers,
Welcome to our 40th Development Status. You can see on what we were working the last two weeks.
Walk through the repair station
We are still working on the repair scene board. We invite you to take a short walk through it with us.
Environment
We've finished most of the level design at the Prokhorovka battle. Below you can see progress from blockout to the first environment pass. What you see is 1/16 size of the map, scene dressing of the whole map is going to take a few months.
Ammo & medical boxes
Special thanks to our community member ✠LootSoldat✠ from discord for reference pictures!
KV-1
KV1 is in the development stage. First, we are preparing a high poly model which we will use to bake all the details on the low poly model.
For now, the exterior is almost finished (without additional stuff e.g. boxes, and tow ropes; this pass will be in the next stage) and we are adding all stuff mainly inside the hull like control panels, ammo racks, fuel tanks, electric parts, etc.
The Interior of the turret also is almost done, there needs to be made some smaller fixes to set all objects properly in “technical harmony”. Also, the engine and transmission will be reworked or made from scratch because of the different structure than in T-34 which is ready. We try our best to provide as accurate historical quality as we can.
