- Liittynyt
- 05.11.2016
- Viestejä
- 273
En löytänyt tälle vielä ketjua, joten tänne voi porukka keskustella tästä tulevasta WW2 FPS pelistä. Itse olin mukana Kickstarter- kampanjan alusta asti, tosin pienimmällä mahdollisille rahasummalla, mutta mukana kuitenkin tukemassa tämän kehitystä.
Virallinen julkistustraileri:
Ensimmäinen Pre-Alpha gameplay-video 31.3.2017:
Virallinen kotisivu:
Homepage
Edistysaskeleita:
[9.3.2017] Viesti kehittäjiltä spoilereissa alla, koska tekstiä sen verran paljon. Kannattaa lukaista, aika paljon isoja kehityksiä
[22.3.2017] lisää infoa:
[28.3.2017] Tänään taas tullut uutta tietoa, ennakkotilaaminen humblen kautta siis loppuu kuun loppuun mennessä, joten nyt kannattaa vielä ostella mikäli kiinnostaa. Seuraava kerta, kun siihen on mahdollisuus menee sitten Steam Early Accessiin:
32
Pre-Order Store Closing and EGX Information
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys
After our long run of it being available for pre-order and with our Alpha phase fast approaching, therefore it’s almost time to officially close our Pre-order Humble Store.
This means that as of March 31st, 2017 you will no longer be able to pre-purchase any versions of Battalion 1944. This will not be re-opening and the next time you’ll be able to buy a copy of Battalion will be when it comes to Steam Early Access.
The main reason for this closure is so we can control the amount of people in the Alpha and allow us to have the right amount of servers for everyone during our Early Access phases!
We were really glad to be able to provide all of you with the ability to pre-order Battalion after our Kickstarter ended and we appreciate everyone that used our Humble Store to buy into our Early Access packages.
If you want to pre-order your own package of Battalion 1944 before the store closes on March 31st, you can do so here: https://www.humblebundle.com/g/battalion1944
Kickstarter Backer Surveys: We’re working on it!
One of our most common questions we receive is: “When will the kickstarter backer surveys be sent out so we can receive our backer rewards?” We’re now getting the surveys ready to be sent out ensuring minimal hassle on both your part and ours to make the delivery process as smooth as possible. This includes compiling all the pre-purchases we’ve gained since the Kickstarter ended through the humble store.
We will make an official Kickstarter post to announce when the surveys have been sent out.
Until then, keep your eyes peeled on our Battalion Official Facebook Page and Twitter accounts!
EGX Rezzed Reminder - 31st-1st April Tobacco Dock, London, UK.
Just a quick reminder that this Thursday from the 31st of March to the 1st of April we will be playtesting Battalion 1944 LIVE at EGX rezzed, 4v4 Team Deathmatch on Battalion’s ManorHouse map.
Head down to the Tobacco dock in London to get your hands on Battalion a few weeks before Alpha and speak to Joe, Howard and Tuna as well as some of the Bulkhead art & programming team about the game’s development!
Here’s a map and an address for EGX Rezzed so come and take a look at Battalion for yourselves!: https://www.egx.net/rezzed/location
Thanks a lot and hopefully see you there!
[31.3.2017] Uutisia ja ensimmäinen Pre-Alpha pelivideo:
33
Battalion 1944 Official Pre-Alpha Gameplay Footage Reveal!
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys,
It’s been a long time since the amazing success of the Battalion 1944 Kickstarter and since then we haven't shown much in terms of gameplay... until now!
The following 15 minutes of gameplay is RAW from a pre-alpha playtest of our casual TDM mode on our first map, which will be play tested during our first closed alpha weekend; Manor House.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGtZhgdTxpg
A few key points to consider after watching are:
We’ve recently been testing the ‘base game’ with some super closed playtests with pro level Call of Duty 2 players and gaming press, making sure the BASE GAME feels good to play. That’s what our aim is with sharing this gameplay footage, to show you guys how the movement, aiming mechanics etc feel. We feel we’ve got to that point where we’ve completely modified Unreal Engine to feel like a classic FPS with 1 to 1 movement and aiming mechanics. This should hopefully clear up any misconceptions about our intended direction with the game!
Weapon balancing, map design, and animations are all trivial and fixable issues. But what we’re trying to nail is the feel of the game, we can tweak weapons and maps on a weekly and even daily basis, but the game MUST feel like a classic shooter from day 1. We’re getting as close as we can at alpha aiming to lock off all movement tweaks and changes by early access or even beta. This is why we need our team of alpha testers/backers to help us really nail the feel of Battalion.
Battalion 1944 at EGX Rezzed!
Here’s a quote from Howard about our goals with making a classic shooter:
“Battalion has always been about bringing back the 'feel' of classic shooters which peaked in the era of the early CoD titles. Almost all of the FPS games from that era were derived from the Quake Engine, which since then developers have shied away from in favour of prettier visuals and easier to pick up mechanics for newer players (in turn reducing the skill cap of FPS games). These modern FPS titles are great polished games in their own right but by fixing 'bugs' such as fast reloads, strafe jumping and eliminating the rough edges, a lot of developers left that classic feel many gamers miss behind.
This is what Battalion is aiming to recapture from that era. True skill based mechanics to allow players who are good at the game to push the skill ceiling higher. We miss those classic FPS days before unlocks/killstreaks. These classic games were by no means bad, they've just not been remade for the current generation yet.”
- KingHoward, Creative Producer at Bulkhead Interactive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25EmAsJadWo
More ‘Community Driven Development’ from this point forwards
Now we’ve got to the starting point where we’re happy with the base game we’ll be able to start sharing much more ‘smaller’ updates, screenshots, videos and tidbits of information with you guys to keep you involved with progress on the game from now until release.
So, with Alpha coming soon this is a key point for us to remind everyone involved that Closed Alpha/Beta/Early Access is NOT a marketing tool for us, unlike some companies who use them to drum up hype for the game when in reality the game is already done. We’re actively still developing the game which means things will be broken and unfinished.
- The Bulkhead Interactive Team
[7.4.2017] Sisältää vastauksia kysymyksiin, mitä kehittäjät saivat edellisen päivityksen videon tultua linjoille!
34
Post Rezzed Feedback, Updates and More!:
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys!
So Rezzed is over and I just want to thank every single one of you that has contributed to all the amazing feedback and interest we have received over the past week. It has a been a very busy period but Battalion will definitely benefit because of your pre-alpha feedback!
We completely exceeded our initial expectations, having a constantly full queue of players waiting to get their hands on the game (with people even re-queueing for up to an hour just to get a chance to play again!). We received great feedback from everyone who attended and 99% of people that played Battalion loved it so it's always hugely encouraging to receive that kind of reaction. It was great to speak to some of our backers and dedicated community members.
One side of the Battalion 1944 booth at EGX Rezzed 2017
As well as this, we got a some great feedback on our online content that was released over the weekend and due to this there are a few things that we would like to discuss and hopefully get cleared up.
Post EGX Rezzed Pre-Alpha Changes:
1. Visual Fidelity/Environments:
We have always gone into making Battalion with the intent of making it look as great as it can without compromising gameplay. One of the most important aspects of classic games is their performance and clear and clutter free visuals within their level design, so we decided to take the route of opting for smooth gameplay and high frame rates over performance hampering visual effects. Our aim was to create a game that feels fluid to play and we feel like we have achieved that.
In short; we’re retaining gameplay essential characteristics such as clearly visible players; smooth. high frame rates and overall reducing the amount of clutter within the levels. There may be some lighting and post processing tweaks but the video was pretty representative of the direction Battalion is taking; performance first.
Our intent of prioritising performance is working out well as our frame rates on EGX’s supplied PCs hitting 144fps easily and when unlocked reaching over 300. High focus on performance is transferring well over to the console test builds too, and we’re expecting high results from the console version of the game.
Note: User Interface and third person animations were ALL work in progress.
Que to play Battalion 1944
2. Gameplay Feedback, Updates and possible Changes:
Most people loved the pre-alpha footage we released and we have had a great reaction to it with some great feedback. However some people had a few concerns that we wish to address:
Movement speed: We received many comments on the speed of our movement and our sprint. One thing we’d like to remind you of is that Joe is the one playing in the video. He and Howard designed the levels and Joe has a lot of map knowledge/movement skill after playing nearly 200 hours on the manor house map throughout development. He can do these jumps and move at a certain speed because he spends hours in the game everyday and has pretty much mastered the jumps he created. Also remember that was TDM gameplay on our smallest map.
That gameplay footage was not representative of how players played the game at Rezzed. Skill based movement is highly important to Battalion differentiate players of varying skill levels and will always be in the game to some extent. However, this is community driven development and we’re actively working based off player feedback from both our forums and players at EGX Rezzed.
We are looking at reducing the speed of our sprint function, strafe jumping distance and reviewing how that affects gameplay. We have always been aiming at fast paced intense infantry combat and we still aim to retain that.
Producer Joe Brammer delivering his talk on "Defining a Old School FPS"
Third person animations: These are currently being completely reworked as we speak, using a new system for smoother blending between animation states. A whole load of new animations will be added soon ready for the Alpha, including running, jumping and death animations!
All new animations will be updated by Closed Alpha in May. We’re planning to post a development update in April showing you the full range of our new third person animation system.
Recoil: So again the player in the video is one of the designers Joe Brammer and for the most part he is extremely accurate with his weapons and pretty good at controlling recoil. Therefore there is more recoil in Battalion than shown in the footage.
However, we have had similar feedback from people that have played the game and we’ll be looking at altering this. Weapon recoil is on a slider and we buff and nerf weapons weekly to attempt to balance them. Although, with the introduction of other weapons into the game there will have to be constant rebalancing to allow each weapon to have its own characteristics and uses within Battalion!
We’d also like to remind people that if we ‘increase’ the recoil amount, players will simply adapt to control that recoil (this has been tried and tested). Within a few hours of practice players will be back to the same level of control as before. After a certain point it's difficult to improve on recoil as a player. Battalion as with many old school games, Call of Duty, Enemy Territory, and Quake the skill was in the movement, positioning, and game sense. Recoil was never a focal point of those games, accuracy and aim still plays a huge part, but on specific weapons.
These things are what play testing is for! Don’t write the game off from a few balancing issues that you saw, this is open community development. This is what our Closed Alpha and Closed Beta stages are for!
Lucky people playing Battalion 1944 in our private booth!
3. The closing of the Pre-Order store:
For those of you that don’t know. We announced the closure of our pre-order store on the 31st March. Unfortunately that means that you will no longer be able to purchase Alpha, Beta and Early Access packages of Battalion. We really appreciate everyone that pre-ordered Battalion and we are so excited to see you all in these pre-release stages!
EGX Rezzed - The Development of Battalion 1944:
Check out this talk our producer Joe Brammer gave at EGX Rezzed about the development of Battalion 1944:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IewUBml4eZM
Also if you’ve got half an hour spare take a look at Joe’s panel on The Second Coming of WW2 games here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62BTcCuu7M
Upcoming Updates:
From this point onwards we’re planning weekly development updates to keep you guys in the loop with Battalion 1944’s development.
Next Thursday (April 13th) we’ll be announcing the Closed Alpha start date and the date that we’ll be sending out the Battalion 1944 backer surveys. We’re also super pumped to announce that we’ll be releasing a brand new trailer to get people hyped for the Closed Alpha testing.
That’s it for now!
Thanks a lot for reading!
Alex ‘BigTuna’ Preece & The Bulkhead Team
[13.4.2017]
35
Closed Alpha Date Announcement KS Update + NikkyyHD Trailer Reveal
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys!
As our Closed Alpha draws closer we have decided to set the Official Closed Alpha Release Date as May 26th!
We’ve decided to release a hype trailer to get you guys pumped for the Closed Alpha testing made by the one and only NikkiHD, the creator of amazing frag movies such as ‘Clockwork 4’ and ‘sViix’. We hope you all enjoy this Closed Alpha announcement trailer from NikkyHD! We all love it and we hope it made you ready to get stuck in to Battalion 1944.
In anticipation of the Closed Alpha, we’ll be sending out our Kickstarter Backer Surveys on the 28th April! Make sure to get your survey answers sent back to us as soon as possible after this date to make sure we can send you your Closed Alpha Steam code on the 24th May (which activate on the 26th).
We are all really excited to share Battalion 1944 with our Alpha backers and we’re looking forward to getting great feedback from all involved to make strides towards improving the game for everyone at the Beta & Early Access stages. Our Alpha is hugely important for us as it will enable us to identify bugs within Battalion quickly and efficiently with such a large first online playtest.
For our Alpha we have really focused on the feel first and foremost. The game is in no way done and we know there are things that need fixing, implementing and finishing but right now we are really trying to work on nailing down the feel of the game and it’s movement. Once we have the base we can build upon it and add more features/content ready for Early Access. The community is massively important to us and we are glad we can show you what we have been working on as well as giving you the chance to have your say in the direction of the Battalion.
Development Roadmap
Within the coming weeks we’ll be releasing a full development roadmap with a list of features that are expected to be implemented for each development stage. We’ll also be releasing a Alpha weekend schedule which will show what we’ll be focus testing as a community each weekend.
Next Week’s Development Update
Next week we will be releasing a small development update where we’ll be showing you the progress with our new third person animations & graphics tweaks! Stay tuned!
To recap, here’s all the dates you need to remember:
• April 28th - Kickstarter Surveys get sent out
• May 24th- Closed Alpha Steam Codes get sent
• May 26th - First Closed Alpha weekend!
That's all for now. Remember to watch your emails for our the surveys and for your Alpha Codes and we’ll see you in our servers May 26th!
Virallinen julkistustraileri:
Ensimmäinen Pre-Alpha gameplay-video 31.3.2017:
Virallinen kotisivu:
Homepage
Edistysaskeleita:
[9.3.2017] Viesti kehittäjiltä spoilereissa alla, koska tekstiä sen verran paljon. Kannattaa lukaista, aika paljon isoja kehityksiä
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys,
We have some really exciting news for you all today.
We’ve been extremely hard at work on Battalion getting the game feeling good at it’s most basic level ready for Alpha in May. This goes from fluid ingame movement and solid weapon mechanics all the way to balanced map design for 5v5 Search and Destroy. We’ve known that even though there’s extreme hype for the game that It’s important we don’t rush our work so that we nail the feel of our game. This isn’t just a UE4 shooter, Battalion’s editing tools are becoming their own engine which we can update for years to come.
Knowing this, we felt it extremely important that we look for a development partner who would understand our ethos as a growing development studio and understand how we work as developers, which is pretty far from the norm. We would never partner with any publisher that would take our creative freedom. This is why we’ve decided to partner with our friends at the Square Enix Collective, who some of you may know from our previous release ‘The Turing Test’ which released on Steam, Playstation 4 and Xbox One, February 2016.
This is a deal we’ve been looking to secure for quite some time after the Kickstarter finished after we were unable to attain some of our higher tier stretch goals. We’ve spoken to multiple huge publishers and Square Enix Collective were the best fit for our aims and ambitions whilst still allowing us to retain 100% of our creative control over the game.
So what does this mean for Battalion 1944?
GDC 2017 and Forgotten Soldiers LAN feedback
Last week the team were at the 2017 Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco to find new development techniques and meet more developers who could help push Battalion 1944 further as a truly competitive FPS.
One of the main take backs is how we can improve on Battalion’s fluidity and performance on lower end systems. Unreal Engine 4 by default is a naturally demanding game engine on your PC, however these tweaks will enable us to squeeze extra FPS out of lower end systems and increase stability at the high end, without sacrificing too much on Battalion 1944’s graphical fidelity. At the end of the day we feel it’s much more important to have a stable and fluid game like the classics than focusing solely on visual prowess.
This year’s GDC event has been one of the most productive and useful for the Bulkhead Interactive team, so we’re looking forward to you guys seeing these performance results during Alpha.
Straight after GDC we decided to demo the game in a closed LAN environment at the Forgotten Soldiers LAN event in Munich, Germany. We did this to get feedback from some of the best CoD2 players the competitive scene has to offer.
The testing session was under NDA, however feedback has been generally positive (accepting of the fact it was pre-alpha). Just from this small amount of focused feedback on the movement/feel etc, We can improve a lot before Alpha to make the experience better for everyone. It wouldn't have been fair or representative to our backers to release the game online in it's current state, it's something we could really only test on lan at this stage with the devs on hand to fix crashes/take notes etc. It was more about checking we're heading in the right direction FOR alpha without the stress/pressure of an online release.
Closed Alpha, May 2017 & Kickstarter Surveys
As we’re in the run up to the official Battalion 1944 Closed Alpha, backers will be receiving their Kickstarter surveys within the next month. We know how anxious you are to get your rewards so we’ll make an official announcement when the surveys are sent. Keep holding on tight until then!
Battalion 1944 Reveal Trailer coming soon…
We’re currently working on our reveal trailer to show you guys our progress on the game since Kickstarter. Within the next few weeks we’ll be releasing a trailer to show you exactly that. Keep your eyes peeled for that next reveal.
That’s it for today’s announcement, we’ll be speaking to you again very soon!
Make sure to follow (now verified!) @Battalion1944 on twitter alongside our developer twitter account @TheBulkhead
Thanks for reading and stay tuned!
Hey guys,
We have some really exciting news for you all today.
We’ve been extremely hard at work on Battalion getting the game feeling good at it’s most basic level ready for Alpha in May. This goes from fluid ingame movement and solid weapon mechanics all the way to balanced map design for 5v5 Search and Destroy. We’ve known that even though there’s extreme hype for the game that It’s important we don’t rush our work so that we nail the feel of our game. This isn’t just a UE4 shooter, Battalion’s editing tools are becoming their own engine which we can update for years to come.
Knowing this, we felt it extremely important that we look for a development partner who would understand our ethos as a growing development studio and understand how we work as developers, which is pretty far from the norm. We would never partner with any publisher that would take our creative freedom. This is why we’ve decided to partner with our friends at the Square Enix Collective, who some of you may know from our previous release ‘The Turing Test’ which released on Steam, Playstation 4 and Xbox One, February 2016.
This is a deal we’ve been looking to secure for quite some time after the Kickstarter finished after we were unable to attain some of our higher tier stretch goals. We’ve spoken to multiple huge publishers and Square Enix Collective were the best fit for our aims and ambitions whilst still allowing us to retain 100% of our creative control over the game.
So what does this mean for Battalion 1944?
- Square Enix have access to a massive network to help us publicise Battalion.
FPS games live and die based on their active player base at launch and we plan on making a massive splash with our day one early access release. Square Enix have a plethora of marketing expertise to enable that to happen. However, this means nothing if the game isn’t good. This bring us onto the next point… - More development resources
We can’t go into financial specifics, but we’re able to apply many more resources into the development of Battalion to create a more polished experience. This is on top of their expertise in their outreach to the gaming community. - Using the same talent as Call of Duty & Battlefield The Square Enix Collective have a unique partnership with ‘Petrol Advertising’ who create and manage the marketing campaigns for both the Call of Duty and Battlefield franchises. They’re now actively working on the Battalion campaign as well. We’re really pleased to be able to take advantage of this awesome opportunity for an independent game to take advantage of the same marketing talent given to the biggest games in the world.
GDC 2017 and Forgotten Soldiers LAN feedback
Last week the team were at the 2017 Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco to find new development techniques and meet more developers who could help push Battalion 1944 further as a truly competitive FPS.
One of the main take backs is how we can improve on Battalion’s fluidity and performance on lower end systems. Unreal Engine 4 by default is a naturally demanding game engine on your PC, however these tweaks will enable us to squeeze extra FPS out of lower end systems and increase stability at the high end, without sacrificing too much on Battalion 1944’s graphical fidelity. At the end of the day we feel it’s much more important to have a stable and fluid game like the classics than focusing solely on visual prowess.
This year’s GDC event has been one of the most productive and useful for the Bulkhead Interactive team, so we’re looking forward to you guys seeing these performance results during Alpha.
Straight after GDC we decided to demo the game in a closed LAN environment at the Forgotten Soldiers LAN event in Munich, Germany. We did this to get feedback from some of the best CoD2 players the competitive scene has to offer.
The testing session was under NDA, however feedback has been generally positive (accepting of the fact it was pre-alpha). Just from this small amount of focused feedback on the movement/feel etc, We can improve a lot before Alpha to make the experience better for everyone. It wouldn't have been fair or representative to our backers to release the game online in it's current state, it's something we could really only test on lan at this stage with the devs on hand to fix crashes/take notes etc. It was more about checking we're heading in the right direction FOR alpha without the stress/pressure of an online release.
Closed Alpha, May 2017 & Kickstarter Surveys
As we’re in the run up to the official Battalion 1944 Closed Alpha, backers will be receiving their Kickstarter surveys within the next month. We know how anxious you are to get your rewards so we’ll make an official announcement when the surveys are sent. Keep holding on tight until then!
Battalion 1944 Reveal Trailer coming soon…
We’re currently working on our reveal trailer to show you guys our progress on the game since Kickstarter. Within the next few weeks we’ll be releasing a trailer to show you exactly that. Keep your eyes peeled for that next reveal.
That’s it for today’s announcement, we’ll be speaking to you again very soon!
Make sure to follow (now verified!) @Battalion1944 on twitter alongside our developer twitter account @TheBulkhead
Thanks for reading and stay tuned!
[22.3.2017] lisää infoa:
31
Battalion 1944 playtest at EGX Rezzed, London, UK. Official Gameplay Reveal coming soon!
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys!
It’s been a long time since we ran the Kickstarter we’ve shown gameplay, and for very good reason. We’ve been completely and utterly gutting and rebuilding the unreal engine to mimic the gameplay feel of old school shooters and maximising performance to ensure our first ‘pre alpha reveal’ is representative of what our sights are for Battalion 1944.
With that being said…
Today we can announce that next week we’ll be showing gameplay for the first time since the Kickstarter!
This will allow all our backers to see the game before Closed Alpha in May. This should help clear up some misconceptions about what the game is and how we’re going about nailing that classic game feel.
We’ve recently been testing the ‘base game’ with some super closed playtests with pro level Call of Duty 2 players and gaming press, making sure the BASE GAME feels good to play. That’s what our aim is with sharing this footage next week, to show you guys how the game plays. We feel we’ve got to that point where we’ve completely modified Unreal Engine to feel like a classic FPS with 1 to 1 movement and aiming mechanics.
A few key points to consider before next week are:
Our second MASSIVE announcement is that Battalion 1944 will be available for an early playtest at EGX: Rezzed, 30th March- 1st April at the Tobacco Dock London, UK!
More awesome news is that we’re bringing the Battalion 1944 Pre-Alpha build to the Tobacco Dock in London for EGX Rezzed 30th March -1st April, so that gamers will be able to test Battalion 1944 offline before we jump online for the closed Alpha in May 2017.
A few of the key Bulkhead team members will be at the event to play against and chat to, including Joe, Tuna and myself (Howard!) aswell as some of the Square Enix Collective team! Feel free to come and say hi and talk about Battalion, we don’t bite!
That's it for new until next week. I Hope you’re hyped for next few months, I know we are!
Thanks,
- KingHoward and the Bulkhead Team
Battalion 1944 playtest at EGX Rezzed, London, UK. Official Gameplay Reveal coming soon!
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys!
It’s been a long time since we ran the Kickstarter we’ve shown gameplay, and for very good reason. We’ve been completely and utterly gutting and rebuilding the unreal engine to mimic the gameplay feel of old school shooters and maximising performance to ensure our first ‘pre alpha reveal’ is representative of what our sights are for Battalion 1944.
With that being said…
Today we can announce that next week we’ll be showing gameplay for the first time since the Kickstarter!
This will allow all our backers to see the game before Closed Alpha in May. This should help clear up some misconceptions about what the game is and how we’re going about nailing that classic game feel.
We’ve recently been testing the ‘base game’ with some super closed playtests with pro level Call of Duty 2 players and gaming press, making sure the BASE GAME feels good to play. That’s what our aim is with sharing this footage next week, to show you guys how the game plays. We feel we’ve got to that point where we’ve completely modified Unreal Engine to feel like a classic FPS with 1 to 1 movement and aiming mechanics.
A few key points to consider before next week are:
- Third person animations in this build are in a very early state. We have much more fluid anims already working in engine which are currently mid-implementation, coming in before the closed alpha goes public.
- User Interface is still a work in progress, there’s a lot of placeholder assets in there. However you can see how we are aiming for a simple UI with minimal clutter.
- We still have a way to go! Which means we’re still looking for your valuable feedback next week.
Our second MASSIVE announcement is that Battalion 1944 will be available for an early playtest at EGX: Rezzed, 30th March- 1st April at the Tobacco Dock London, UK!
More awesome news is that we’re bringing the Battalion 1944 Pre-Alpha build to the Tobacco Dock in London for EGX Rezzed 30th March -1st April, so that gamers will be able to test Battalion 1944 offline before we jump online for the closed Alpha in May 2017.
A few of the key Bulkhead team members will be at the event to play against and chat to, including Joe, Tuna and myself (Howard!) aswell as some of the Square Enix Collective team! Feel free to come and say hi and talk about Battalion, we don’t bite!
That's it for new until next week. I Hope you’re hyped for next few months, I know we are!
Thanks,
- KingHoward and the Bulkhead Team
[28.3.2017] Tänään taas tullut uutta tietoa, ennakkotilaaminen humblen kautta siis loppuu kuun loppuun mennessä, joten nyt kannattaa vielä ostella mikäli kiinnostaa. Seuraava kerta, kun siihen on mahdollisuus menee sitten Steam Early Accessiin:
32
Pre-Order Store Closing and EGX Information
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys
After our long run of it being available for pre-order and with our Alpha phase fast approaching, therefore it’s almost time to officially close our Pre-order Humble Store.
This means that as of March 31st, 2017 you will no longer be able to pre-purchase any versions of Battalion 1944. This will not be re-opening and the next time you’ll be able to buy a copy of Battalion will be when it comes to Steam Early Access.
The main reason for this closure is so we can control the amount of people in the Alpha and allow us to have the right amount of servers for everyone during our Early Access phases!
We were really glad to be able to provide all of you with the ability to pre-order Battalion after our Kickstarter ended and we appreciate everyone that used our Humble Store to buy into our Early Access packages.
If you want to pre-order your own package of Battalion 1944 before the store closes on March 31st, you can do so here: https://www.humblebundle.com/g/battalion1944
Kickstarter Backer Surveys: We’re working on it!
One of our most common questions we receive is: “When will the kickstarter backer surveys be sent out so we can receive our backer rewards?” We’re now getting the surveys ready to be sent out ensuring minimal hassle on both your part and ours to make the delivery process as smooth as possible. This includes compiling all the pre-purchases we’ve gained since the Kickstarter ended through the humble store.
We will make an official Kickstarter post to announce when the surveys have been sent out.
Until then, keep your eyes peeled on our Battalion Official Facebook Page and Twitter accounts!
EGX Rezzed Reminder - 31st-1st April Tobacco Dock, London, UK.
Just a quick reminder that this Thursday from the 31st of March to the 1st of April we will be playtesting Battalion 1944 LIVE at EGX rezzed, 4v4 Team Deathmatch on Battalion’s ManorHouse map.
Head down to the Tobacco dock in London to get your hands on Battalion a few weeks before Alpha and speak to Joe, Howard and Tuna as well as some of the Bulkhead art & programming team about the game’s development!
Here’s a map and an address for EGX Rezzed so come and take a look at Battalion for yourselves!: https://www.egx.net/rezzed/location
Thanks a lot and hopefully see you there!
[31.3.2017] Uutisia ja ensimmäinen Pre-Alpha pelivideo:
33
Battalion 1944 Official Pre-Alpha Gameplay Footage Reveal!
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys,
It’s been a long time since the amazing success of the Battalion 1944 Kickstarter and since then we haven't shown much in terms of gameplay... until now!
The following 15 minutes of gameplay is RAW from a pre-alpha playtest of our casual TDM mode on our first map, which will be play tested during our first closed alpha weekend; Manor House.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGtZhgdTxpg
A few key points to consider after watching are:
- Third person animations in this build are in a very early state. We have much more fluid anims already working in engine which are currently mid-implementation, coming in before the closed alpha goes public.
- User Interface is still a work in progress, there’s a lot of placeholder assets in there and some functions aren't working the way we envision them to. However you can see of general thought process of how we are aiming for a simple HUD with minimal clutter.
- We still have a way to go! Which means we’re still looking for your valuable feedback. This footage was recorded two weeks ago, a lot of issues are already known to us and a lot has already been fixed within this time frame but we’re always looking forward to hearing your comments.
We’ve recently been testing the ‘base game’ with some super closed playtests with pro level Call of Duty 2 players and gaming press, making sure the BASE GAME feels good to play. That’s what our aim is with sharing this gameplay footage, to show you guys how the movement, aiming mechanics etc feel. We feel we’ve got to that point where we’ve completely modified Unreal Engine to feel like a classic FPS with 1 to 1 movement and aiming mechanics. This should hopefully clear up any misconceptions about our intended direction with the game!
Weapon balancing, map design, and animations are all trivial and fixable issues. But what we’re trying to nail is the feel of the game, we can tweak weapons and maps on a weekly and even daily basis, but the game MUST feel like a classic shooter from day 1. We’re getting as close as we can at alpha aiming to lock off all movement tweaks and changes by early access or even beta. This is why we need our team of alpha testers/backers to help us really nail the feel of Battalion.
Battalion 1944 at EGX Rezzed!
Here’s a quote from Howard about our goals with making a classic shooter:
“Battalion has always been about bringing back the 'feel' of classic shooters which peaked in the era of the early CoD titles. Almost all of the FPS games from that era were derived from the Quake Engine, which since then developers have shied away from in favour of prettier visuals and easier to pick up mechanics for newer players (in turn reducing the skill cap of FPS games). These modern FPS titles are great polished games in their own right but by fixing 'bugs' such as fast reloads, strafe jumping and eliminating the rough edges, a lot of developers left that classic feel many gamers miss behind.
This is what Battalion is aiming to recapture from that era. True skill based mechanics to allow players who are good at the game to push the skill ceiling higher. We miss those classic FPS days before unlocks/killstreaks. These classic games were by no means bad, they've just not been remade for the current generation yet.”
- KingHoward, Creative Producer at Bulkhead Interactive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25EmAsJadWo
More ‘Community Driven Development’ from this point forwards
Now we’ve got to the starting point where we’re happy with the base game we’ll be able to start sharing much more ‘smaller’ updates, screenshots, videos and tidbits of information with you guys to keep you involved with progress on the game from now until release.
So, with Alpha coming soon this is a key point for us to remind everyone involved that Closed Alpha/Beta/Early Access is NOT a marketing tool for us, unlike some companies who use them to drum up hype for the game when in reality the game is already done. We’re actively still developing the game which means things will be broken and unfinished.
- The Bulkhead Interactive Team
[7.4.2017] Sisältää vastauksia kysymyksiin, mitä kehittäjät saivat edellisen päivityksen videon tultua linjoille!
34
Post Rezzed Feedback, Updates and More!:
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys!
So Rezzed is over and I just want to thank every single one of you that has contributed to all the amazing feedback and interest we have received over the past week. It has a been a very busy period but Battalion will definitely benefit because of your pre-alpha feedback!
We completely exceeded our initial expectations, having a constantly full queue of players waiting to get their hands on the game (with people even re-queueing for up to an hour just to get a chance to play again!). We received great feedback from everyone who attended and 99% of people that played Battalion loved it so it's always hugely encouraging to receive that kind of reaction. It was great to speak to some of our backers and dedicated community members.
One side of the Battalion 1944 booth at EGX Rezzed 2017
As well as this, we got a some great feedback on our online content that was released over the weekend and due to this there are a few things that we would like to discuss and hopefully get cleared up.
Post EGX Rezzed Pre-Alpha Changes:
1. Visual Fidelity/Environments:
We have always gone into making Battalion with the intent of making it look as great as it can without compromising gameplay. One of the most important aspects of classic games is their performance and clear and clutter free visuals within their level design, so we decided to take the route of opting for smooth gameplay and high frame rates over performance hampering visual effects. Our aim was to create a game that feels fluid to play and we feel like we have achieved that.
In short; we’re retaining gameplay essential characteristics such as clearly visible players; smooth. high frame rates and overall reducing the amount of clutter within the levels. There may be some lighting and post processing tweaks but the video was pretty representative of the direction Battalion is taking; performance first.
Our intent of prioritising performance is working out well as our frame rates on EGX’s supplied PCs hitting 144fps easily and when unlocked reaching over 300. High focus on performance is transferring well over to the console test builds too, and we’re expecting high results from the console version of the game.
Note: User Interface and third person animations were ALL work in progress.
Que to play Battalion 1944
2. Gameplay Feedback, Updates and possible Changes:
Most people loved the pre-alpha footage we released and we have had a great reaction to it with some great feedback. However some people had a few concerns that we wish to address:
Movement speed: We received many comments on the speed of our movement and our sprint. One thing we’d like to remind you of is that Joe is the one playing in the video. He and Howard designed the levels and Joe has a lot of map knowledge/movement skill after playing nearly 200 hours on the manor house map throughout development. He can do these jumps and move at a certain speed because he spends hours in the game everyday and has pretty much mastered the jumps he created. Also remember that was TDM gameplay on our smallest map.
That gameplay footage was not representative of how players played the game at Rezzed. Skill based movement is highly important to Battalion differentiate players of varying skill levels and will always be in the game to some extent. However, this is community driven development and we’re actively working based off player feedback from both our forums and players at EGX Rezzed.
We are looking at reducing the speed of our sprint function, strafe jumping distance and reviewing how that affects gameplay. We have always been aiming at fast paced intense infantry combat and we still aim to retain that.
Producer Joe Brammer delivering his talk on "Defining a Old School FPS"
Third person animations: These are currently being completely reworked as we speak, using a new system for smoother blending between animation states. A whole load of new animations will be added soon ready for the Alpha, including running, jumping and death animations!
All new animations will be updated by Closed Alpha in May. We’re planning to post a development update in April showing you the full range of our new third person animation system.
Recoil: So again the player in the video is one of the designers Joe Brammer and for the most part he is extremely accurate with his weapons and pretty good at controlling recoil. Therefore there is more recoil in Battalion than shown in the footage.
However, we have had similar feedback from people that have played the game and we’ll be looking at altering this. Weapon recoil is on a slider and we buff and nerf weapons weekly to attempt to balance them. Although, with the introduction of other weapons into the game there will have to be constant rebalancing to allow each weapon to have its own characteristics and uses within Battalion!
We’d also like to remind people that if we ‘increase’ the recoil amount, players will simply adapt to control that recoil (this has been tried and tested). Within a few hours of practice players will be back to the same level of control as before. After a certain point it's difficult to improve on recoil as a player. Battalion as with many old school games, Call of Duty, Enemy Territory, and Quake the skill was in the movement, positioning, and game sense. Recoil was never a focal point of those games, accuracy and aim still plays a huge part, but on specific weapons.
These things are what play testing is for! Don’t write the game off from a few balancing issues that you saw, this is open community development. This is what our Closed Alpha and Closed Beta stages are for!
Lucky people playing Battalion 1944 in our private booth!
3. The closing of the Pre-Order store:
For those of you that don’t know. We announced the closure of our pre-order store on the 31st March. Unfortunately that means that you will no longer be able to purchase Alpha, Beta and Early Access packages of Battalion. We really appreciate everyone that pre-ordered Battalion and we are so excited to see you all in these pre-release stages!
EGX Rezzed - The Development of Battalion 1944:
Check out this talk our producer Joe Brammer gave at EGX Rezzed about the development of Battalion 1944:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IewUBml4eZM
Also if you’ve got half an hour spare take a look at Joe’s panel on The Second Coming of WW2 games here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62BTcCuu7M
Upcoming Updates:
From this point onwards we’re planning weekly development updates to keep you guys in the loop with Battalion 1944’s development.
Next Thursday (April 13th) we’ll be announcing the Closed Alpha start date and the date that we’ll be sending out the Battalion 1944 backer surveys. We’re also super pumped to announce that we’ll be releasing a brand new trailer to get people hyped for the Closed Alpha testing.
That’s it for now!
Thanks a lot for reading!
Alex ‘BigTuna’ Preece & The Bulkhead Team
[13.4.2017]
35
Closed Alpha Date Announcement KS Update + NikkyyHD Trailer Reveal
Posted by Bulkhead Interactive (Creator)
Hey guys!
As our Closed Alpha draws closer we have decided to set the Official Closed Alpha Release Date as May 26th!
We’ve decided to release a hype trailer to get you guys pumped for the Closed Alpha testing made by the one and only NikkiHD, the creator of amazing frag movies such as ‘Clockwork 4’ and ‘sViix’. We hope you all enjoy this Closed Alpha announcement trailer from NikkyHD! We all love it and we hope it made you ready to get stuck in to Battalion 1944.
In anticipation of the Closed Alpha, we’ll be sending out our Kickstarter Backer Surveys on the 28th April! Make sure to get your survey answers sent back to us as soon as possible after this date to make sure we can send you your Closed Alpha Steam code on the 24th May (which activate on the 26th).
We are all really excited to share Battalion 1944 with our Alpha backers and we’re looking forward to getting great feedback from all involved to make strides towards improving the game for everyone at the Beta & Early Access stages. Our Alpha is hugely important for us as it will enable us to identify bugs within Battalion quickly and efficiently with such a large first online playtest.
For our Alpha we have really focused on the feel first and foremost. The game is in no way done and we know there are things that need fixing, implementing and finishing but right now we are really trying to work on nailing down the feel of the game and it’s movement. Once we have the base we can build upon it and add more features/content ready for Early Access. The community is massively important to us and we are glad we can show you what we have been working on as well as giving you the chance to have your say in the direction of the Battalion.
Development Roadmap
Within the coming weeks we’ll be releasing a full development roadmap with a list of features that are expected to be implemented for each development stage. We’ll also be releasing a Alpha weekend schedule which will show what we’ll be focus testing as a community each weekend.
Next Week’s Development Update
Next week we will be releasing a small development update where we’ll be showing you the progress with our new third person animations & graphics tweaks! Stay tuned!
To recap, here’s all the dates you need to remember:
• April 28th - Kickstarter Surveys get sent out
• May 24th- Closed Alpha Steam Codes get sent
• May 26th - First Closed Alpha weekend!
That's all for now. Remember to watch your emails for our the surveys and for your Alpha Codes and we’ll see you in our servers May 26th!
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