Zero Hour’s next major update consists of a new map, attack dog(co-op), Molotov, gameplay tweaks & more. This update focuses on content updates and quality improvements.
Road Map
All dates noted are in a predicted schedule. A portion of the few announced features may come in parts earlier than scheduled, but we plan on completing them by the month announced.
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August 2022 - Attack dog featured While the attack dog is very CO-OP oriented, we believe adding this feature will achieve a more rich and dynamic swat breach experience. Attack dogs will be used to detect various explosives to protect their handlers and personnel from danger and other crime scene evidence, along with more plans to be announced soon.
September 2022
- Improving Game Modes We will be improving the current game modes to improve the overall experience of each map and make it more fun and exciting, particularly the hostage extraction mode.
September 2022 - April 2023
- CO-OP NPC/Story-Telling.
November 2022
- New character models The current placeholder Swat and Suspect models will be replaced with better-detailed characters while more accurately representing the story lore and more. With an added possibility of general character customization.
December 2022
- Game Audio Finalization While we are satisfied with many of the game's audio, a lot still needs to be changed before we can say we are finalized. We are taking feedback from you guys to ensure we find a more accurate and immersive Audio Experience.
January 2023
- Optimize and Polish - Total of 15 map content - Total of 22 weapons and 13 utility varieties - Training ground usable workbench - Releasing official Ost on steam store including various Zero Hour artwork - More achievements, including CO-OP
January 2023
- Mocap Featured All existing animations will be replaced using mocap to bring a more accurate and immersive visual to each movement. This includes animations for the Swats, Suspects, and even the Hostage and Civilians. The current animations are hand-made, thus giving them a more cartoon-like look, and we aim to fix that.
January 2023
- Gameplay Overhaul and Finalization
February 2023
- Fixing all existing bugs Declaring to fix the list of current major bugs, but these things take a long time when the recreate-ability of some bugs is rare or even unknown.
- Co-Op Squad AI We were expecting to add the Squad AI in the next few months; however, due to the delay in mocap equipment, we are unable to bring it to a more visually appealing state. We aim to have it complete by the end of February 2023.
June 2023
- UI/UX Finalization
June 2023
- VFX/Lighting
August 2023
- Total of 20 map content - Total of 25 weapons and 15 utility varieties - Re-evaluating the balancing of the overall game - Finalizing more achievements, including CO-OP
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New Update Info
New Character Models and Minor Animation changes
The current placeholder Swat and Suspect models will be replaced with better-detailed characters while more accurately representing the story lore and more. With an added possibility of general character customization. New Attacker character models will be coming in the next update, while the new Defender character models will be out by November as noted in the Road Map.
Attack Dog
Attack dogs will be used to detect various explosives to protect their handlers and personnel from danger and other crime scene evidence, along with more plans to be announced soon. On release it will only be available in co-op and only the host of the session can bring it in. We plan to bring it to pvp once we find a more balanced approach.
Gameplay Touch Ups
Fine-tuning and optimizing various aspects of the game such as gunplay and stamina for a better feel and quality of gameplay. We are redoing some of the animations temporarily (as our mocap is still not here) to improve the overall look and feel of the characters.
New Map
Only the co-op mission will have the top floor and the underground parking accessible. In PvP this map will be slightly smaller.
MS-Unit just received a call of a raid at the Danshiri Police Station. Since the Terrorist leader, Ahmed Al Zoori is held captive inside this station, we assume the terrorist’s motive is to break him out. MS-Unit are tasked to stop Ahmed Al Zoori from escaping and to eliminate all suspects. A timer will indicate when all prison doors open leading to Ahmed Al Zoori running towards the exit. However, MS-Unit is ordered to bring capture him alive so making him surrender is the only option to complete the mission successfully.
OST Release
The original soundtrack from Zero Hour, featuring 20 official soundtracks (about 1 hour 8 mins) composed and mastered by Muhaimen Zia. All tracks are of the highest quality, each consisting of various Official Album Art. A PDF containing words from the artist, talking about each track will be available in the package. As an extra, you will receive Beta Music from the beta phase of Zero Hour. All tracks are available in WAV and MP3.
Zero Hour Original Soundtrack will be available from 13th August
We apologize for the delay and lack of updates in the past few weeks. We hope to bring out quality content with our upcoming update sometime late August.
We really appreciate and thank the community for the unconditional support and love for the game.
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Patch 9.3.7 [ Small Update ]
Change Log
Added the ability to equip dead user's Utility 1 using Inventory
Added the ability to equip dead user's Utility 2 using Inventory
Removed chat rich text commands
Announcement We apologize for being slow in updating you with our future plans. We are still working on minimizing these delays. Our mocap equipment is still to be shipped and their shipment delay has greatly slowed our progress down. We do plan to reveal our roadmap with Zero Hour very soon and we are very excited for that, stay tuned.
How to use (Currently only useful in PvP) To use the inventory system stand close to a dead user and press Tab(default key). You will then be able to equip the user's Primary, secondary weapons or even their utility 1 or 2. Do note, not all utilities can be equipped. Some utilities are team exclusive such as the night vision goggles as the system basically replaces the enemy resource with player resource.
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Patch 9.3.6 [ Small Update ]
Change Log
Fixed Co-Op Time-out Disconnect due to high send rate
Improved Co-Op Bandwidth usage
Improved Co-Op Suspect AI movement
Improved Co-Op Suspect AI syncing in high ping
Updated Weapon SFX for MK12
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Patch 9.3.5 (Silent Patch v2)
Change Log
Fixed not being able to change spectating camera once joined on going match
Fixed rare game breaking bug of being able to spectate even after spawning in match and not dying
Fixed stuck in intro camera while joining the defender team after preparation phase after joining on going match
Fixed main menu background having misprint
Improved co-op map preview images for better readability
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Patch 9.3.5 (Silent Patch v1)
Change Log
Fixed Major Bug ( Joining on-going match and spawning but not getting controls to the character requiring the opposing team to get out and kill the player in order to end the match )
Fixed Rat's Den Tunnel door frame collision
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Zero Hour | Operation Rat’s Den
Zero Hour’s Operation Rat’s Den consists of a new map, the addition of CO-OP puzzles, improved loading times light optimizations & more. This update focuses on content updates and quality improvements.
New Map
Rat’s Den
‘Through an interrogation from the terrorists we took in, we have news about a suspicious building located on the outskirts of Sylhet. We received evidence of suspects abducting locals who have been reported missing. We believe they are all ending up in this building here. This base is run by their leader Jubayer Kashem, the brother of Abdul Kashem who we captured in Operation Breaking Meth. He seems to be continuing his family legacy, and along with that, he’s taking in locals subjecting them to forced labor. The convict also mentioned a hideout hidden somewhere in the AO. The objective is to infiltrate the premises, bring in Jubayer Kashem and locate if there are any possible traces leading to a hideout. Be sure to go through the building with your eyes peeled.’
Addition of Co-op Puzzle
We plan to add various puzzle-based objectives in CO-OP, requiring the players to find and solve codes to enter secret locations to complete the mission. This will further add to the experience with an investigating tone of immersion. For this release, we will only include them in Rat’s den. Puzzles for other maps will be added in the future.
Improved Loading Time
We reworked the internal data system to improve loading times. According to our tests, it has cut down the loading time by 1/3. This has fixed prolonged issues such as crashing resulting in heavy memory usage or CPU heating.
Lights Optimization
We used new lighting techniques which got rid of unnecessary rendering time and additions of Realtime GI which will allow the lighting of every scene to reflect the environment in a more realistic & immersive fashion. This is essentially useful for Lights that change slowly and have a significant visual impact on the Scene, such as a slowly pulsating light in a closed corridor.
Leaderboard Reset
The matchpoint leaderboard has been reset to give more accurate readings and scores to players. The issue where players receive inaccurate match points in online matches has been resolved so the points players earn are precise and fair for everyone.
After every operation, we will have a Leaderboard Reset where the top three players will be displayed as milestones. This should push players to be at the top of the leaderboard.
Misc Improvements
These improvements contain better Ambient Occlusion, AI Behavior Improvements, and Environmental SFX and a New CO-OP UI
Conclusion
Many new exciting features such as Squad AI and Motion Capture are still on the way along with more updates which we will announce soon. We always hope to progress through smaller patches until the next major update. Thanks to the private testers team for testing out the builds with every internal update to ensure a more polished experience for the public release of the update.
We really appreciate and thank the community for the unconditional support and love for the game.
Update Logs
ADDED
New Playable Map "Rat's Den"
New Realtime GI & Faster Lighting method [Not all maps have it implemented yet/ WIP]
New environmental SFX for when shots fired
New Coop Puzzle mode Variants
New Blue print model for document secure
New Attack Dog preview in training ground [Functional from next update]
Fixed
Match Points Back up not retrieving properly when steam fails to fetch data
Rare crashes resulting from initially loading game
Long loading times [Even in SSD]
C2 Damage not working against AI suspects
Melee applying damage through obstacles
Reticle texture resolution lowering with quality settings
Terror House backyard lighting issue
Camera shake causing internal mild errors
Scroll bars in menus not working properly
Improved
Optimized All maps [Should get +(15-30fps)]
Overhauled Internal asset loading system for more efficient memory usage
Co-Op AI behavior for active shooter situations
Co-Op AI reaction differences when lights are turned off
Co-Op AI weapon handling differences based on movement and firing duration
Ambient Occlusion effect
Co-Op Main Menu UI
Blood Impact VFX
Increased
Co-Op AI firing spray when shooting in the dark without flashlight
Changes
Re-adjusted NVG Visuals
Re-adjusted Laser Sight Visuals
Reverted Melee System
Reset Leaderboard
Occlusion Culling all maps
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Patch 9.3.0 (Silent Patch v1)
Change Log
Improved Lighting & Shader for all weapons
Improved Co-op cutscene now skippable with spacebar & escape
Improved Laser visualization with NVG
Fixed Laser looking weird due to it bending to point exact impact location
Fixed Door Reset causing desync
Fixed Rappel issue in Red Wedding Service Balcony
Fixed Laser not going through transparent objects
PS. we are working on an announcement to reveal the anti-cheat solution we would be using along with planned future content updates.
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Patch 9.3.0
Change Log
Added Animated Door Inertia [Iteration p1]
Added Physics based door interaction [Iteration p1]
Added Bomb explosion scene for Red Wedding Co-Op
Added Bomb timer of 6 mins for Red Wedding Co-Op
Added Material based door interaction SFX
Fixed Recoil recover not cancelling when controlling recoil
Fixed Weapon shots going offset after first shot
Fixed P10C iron sight aim offset
Fixed Being able to place door trap with 1 press
Fixed Completing tutorial in Training Ground not setting achievement
Fixed AI stuck in room due to procedural prop placement in Red Wedding Co-Op
Fixed Light interaction with reflection not working in few spots in Red Wedding
Fixed GFN quick match not working due to Denuvo not being able to install with restart
Fixed Tutorial for picking up dropped weapon displaying outdated information
Updated Weapon SFX for Honey Badger
Updated Weapon SFX for MK12
Updated Match Scoreboard to display Secured match ID
Updated Melee combat hit registration system
Updated Defender door trap interaction to not prompt when walking
Improved Lighting & Reflections for "Residential House"
Improved Lighting & Reflections for "Terror House"
Improved Lighting & Reflections for "Hotel Trouble"
Improved Lighting & Reflections for "Training Ground"
Improved Lighting & Reflections for "Embassy Raid"
Improved Lighting & Reflections for "Breaking Meth"
Improved Lighting & Reflections for "Bank Heist"
Removed Steam Guard match-making option
PS. The new physics based door interaction changes the dynamics with slightly open doors. The Doors still have the system to hold 3 stages ( Open/Slightly Open/Closed ) however now once the door is slightly open you will be able to push it open/close.
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Zero Hour | Operation Red Wedding
Zero Hour's latest update of 5 new weapons, one new map, Optimizations, and other miscellaneous improvements. This update primarily consists of content updates, but more 'Quality Of Life' improvements are still on the way.
New Map
Red Wedding
The Major General’s daughter Taniya was to be married to Mashrub on the 4th of January but hell broke loose as Terrorists attacked the venue during the ceremony. Local Officials state at least 40 people have been killed and 15 wounded. If the terrorists manage to capture Taniya, they will use her as leverage to get what they want from the Major. The MS-Unit has been dispatched to the scene with the area in strict lockdown. The venue has already been taken over by terrorists, along with civilians still inside. There are fears the number of dead could rise.
Five New Weapons
SKS: Sat right between the distinguished old bolt action Mosin Nagant and the historic AK-47 platform, which dominated for decades. For this reason, the SKS is like the middle child everyone forgot. The SKS-45 is a homely, though robust, rifle. Its metalwork and stock may be crude, but it has proven to be a remarkably reliable rifle, as are most Soviet-made guns. The rifle's lightweight and open style iron sights made acquiring a target easy at even 200 meters. This is available for Terrorists.
Honey Badger: The honey badger was created at the request of an elite U.S special operations group looking to replace their mp5 SDS with an upgraded platform. Two of the main requirements included the ability to shoot a rifle caliber round while maintaining low visibility, and of course, it needed to retain a high level of suppression. This is available for Counter-Terrorists.
MK12: The Mk12 was built for the U.S army to make a smaller, reliable gun and more versatile. The reason is they need something to blend better in urban environments. One of the commonalities of all mark 8 across mark 12's is an 18-inch barrel so that it's long enough to be ballistically effective but short enough to be portable. This is available for the Counter-Terrorists.
CZP10C: The P10C is a polymer-framed striker-fired handgun. It came to market in 2017 for personal defense, and the military introduced this handgun to be a direct competitor of the G-19. This is available for both Counter-Terrorists and Terrorists.
FN FAL: The FAL or, to give its full name, the 'Fusil Automatique Léger', is a battle rifle characterized by its selective-fire ability and chambering for a full-powered rifle cartridge. By modern standards, the FAL is a hefty weapon. Modern assault rifles fire smaller cartridges and make extensive use of polymers to reduce weight while the FAL is a full-size rifle of entire steel construction. This is available for Terrorists.
More Features
Geforce Now Anti-Cheat Issue
We are aware of the issues players face using Geforce Now due to anti-cheat installation being a requirement for Quick-match. Everything from our side has been fixed, we are just waiting for Geforce Now to enable the settings.
Other Improvements:
We have optimized all of the maps in-game and added a skip button for the selection phase in CO-OP along with a longer phase duration.
Features not added yet
Mocap Equipments
The Mocap Equipments is being delayed due to the unavoidable circumstance. The equipment will help make better and more grounded TPS (Third Person Shooter) animations and further add to our future content experiences. We are very excited for the Mocap equipments to arrive and work with it for Zero Hour.
Updating Network Structure
We haven't gone through with updating the network structure yet, but it will be updated soon with the following few updates. What this will do is give you the best experience with online gameplay. We expect better service and connectivity compared to the prior network structure. It would also further improve our security for anti-cheat detection. This may lead to the removal of unused or unpopular regions to compensate for the more active regions.
More Civillian Models
We have made several new civilian character models which we will add once all the animations are ready. We will soon start implementing the characters into our CO-OP experience which would help add immersion and difficulty to the game.
Conclusion
Many new exciting features such as Squad AI are still on the way along with more updates which we will announce soon. We always hope to progress through smaller patches until the next major update. Thanks to the private testers team for testing out the builds with every internal update to ensure a more polished experience for the public release of the update.
We really appreciate and thank the community for the unconditional support and love for the game.
[previewyoutube="2kBIv2Nbi4w;full"]
Update Logs
ADDED
New Playable Map "Red Wedding"
New Weapon P10C (Both Sides)
New Weapon FAL (T Side)
New Weapon SKS (T Side)
New Weapon MK12 (CT Side)
New Weapon Honey Badger (CT Side)
New Co-Op Hostage models
New Co-Op Hostage animation sets
Execute button for Skipping Selection Phase in Coop
Fixed
"Steam not verified" issue for extended lobbies
Switch to Aim Transitions sluggish movement
Training Ground DPS targets inaccurate collision
Training ground missing casing SFX material
Missing sway effect for some weapons
Improved
Optimization for all maps from Operation Massacre to Operation Meghna
Increased
Co-Op Planning Phase Duration
Co-Op Selection Phase Duration
Changes
(PvP) Defender Side Resources Readjusted
Occlusion Culling all maps
Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
Zero Hour | Operation Red Wedding Details
Zero Hour’s Operation Red Wedding consists of 5 new weapons, 1 new map and miscellaneous improvements. We are also bringing improvements in Network Structure and setting up Mocap equipments. This update primarily consists of content updates but more 'Quality Of Life' improvements are still on the way.
Main Features:
Five New Weapons
SKS: Sat right in between the distinguished old bolt action Mosin Nagant and the historic AK-47 platform, which dominated for decades, for this reason, the SKS is like the middle child everyone forgot. The SKS-45 is a homely, though robust, rifle. Its metalwork and stock may be crude, but it has proven to be a remarkably reliable rifle, as are most Soviet-made guns. The rifle's lightweight and open style iron sights made acquiring a target easy at even 200 meters. This is available for Terrorists.
Honey Badger: The honey badger was created at the request of an elite U.S special operations group looking to replace their mp5 SDS with an upgraded platform. Two of the main requirements included the ability to shoot a rifle caliber round while maintaining low visibility, and of course, it needed to retain a high level of suppression. This is available for Counter-Terrorists.
MK12: The Mk12 was built for the U.S army to make a smaller, reliable gun and more versatile. The reason is they need something to blend better in urban environments. One of the commonalities of all mark 8 across mark 12's is an 18-inch barrel so that it's long enough to be ballistically effective but short enough to be portable. This is available for the Counter-Terrorists.
CZP10C: The P10C is a polymer-framed striker-fired handgun. It came to market in 2017 for personal defense, and the military actually introduced this handgun to be a direct competitor of the G-19. This is available for both Counter-Terrorists and Terrorists.
FN FAL: The FAL - or, to give its full name, the 'Fusil Automatique Léger', is a battle rifle characterized by its selective-fire ability and chambering for a full-powered rifle cartridge. By modern standards, the FAL is a hefty weapon - modern assault rifles fire smaller cartridges and make extensive use of polymers to reduce weight - while the FAL is a full-size rifle of entire steel construction. This is available for Terrorists.
New Map
Red Wedding
The Major General’s daughter Taniya was to be married to Mashrub on the 4th of January but hell broke loose as Terrorists attacked the venue during the ceremony. Local Officials state at least 40 people have been killed and 15 wounded. If the terrorists manage to capture Taniya, they will use her as leverage to get what they want from the Major. The MS-Unit has been dispatched to the scene with the area in strict lockdown. The venue has already been taken over by terrorists along with civilians still inside. There are fears the number of dead could rise.
More Features
Overhauled Movement Animation
We are experimenting with various methods to improve the overall fps movement animations to counter the feel of stuttered animation transitions (This overhaul is set to change with all current animations in the game thus far.)
Updating Network Structure
We are working together with Photon Networks to give you the best experience with online gameplay. We expect better service and connectivity compared to the prior network structure. This would further improve our security for anti cheat detection. This may lead to removal of unused or unpopular regions to compensate for the more active regions.
Geforce Now Anti-Cheat Issue
We are aware of the issues being faced by players using Geforce Now due to anti-cheat installation being a requirement for Quick-match. Rest assured with this update we will have that fixed.
Upcoming In Later Updates
Squad AI Progress
Dynamic AI stacking up behind doorway.
Dynamic AI breach in.
AI follow on command.
AI move to position while assigned target.
AI Dynamic move to position with formation.
We have made good progress working with Squad AIs with the basic functionality added, such as Stacking up, breaching preparation, covering, or following when ordered to do so. More features are yet to be done, and more information will be out with later updates.
The idea is to create a dynamic system that wont require predefining anything for the AIs in existing or new maps.
Mocap Equipments
We are setting up our own Mocap Studio which we plan to use to make better and more grounded TPS animations and further add to our future content experiences.
The planned release date for this update is in 7th March 2022. We have more news and updates for Operation Red Wedding which we will provide in detail soon so stay tuned. We really appreciate and thank the community for the unconditional support and love for the game. Thank you for your patience, please make sure to report Toxicity, feedback & suggestions in our Discord server using the following links. Discord Global Community : Zero Hour Official Discord French Community : Zero Hour France
