Hey everyone! Today, we’ll be talking about what you can expect regarding some of the new content coming in the upcoming major update. We’ll talk specifically about some QoL UI changes coming and some anticipated player profile showcases. Let’s dive straight into the details!
Upcoming Major Update
Inventory item recycling
Let’s first take a look at one feature that was part of the Roadmap: inventory item recycling! This one has been in development for some time now and we’re finally able to show you some screenshots and describe how it works.
Currently only on internal Gaijin accounts for testing, it works by selecting items you want to recycle from your inventory, then recycling them, and then creating them into a new item at random in the ratio of 2:1. The newly created item goes into your inventory as normal.
The CM team has been testing it, recycling items and getting some random boosters, wagers, backups and orders from the process! This new feature will be available for testing on the open dev server and if there are no major problems it will be released in the major update.
Player profile showcases
Back in December, magazine2 gave details about the new player profile; the design choices and what we had planned for the future. We’re pleased to announce some new (and important!) player profile showcases are almost ready and will be deployed in the upcoming major update. Here are the ones that will be included:
- Vehicle Collector — here, you’ll show off 1 to 3 vehicles of your choice that you’ve unlocked. The number of vehicles you have unlocked per nation and the total number are also displayed. Below are some random examples:
- Ace of Spades — here, you’ll show off the number of spaded vehicles that you have per nation. Selected types of vehicle from selected countries are also shown so that you can see how many more vehicles you need to spade to be 100%!
- Medalist — here, you’ll be able to show off 1 to 10 medals of your choice that you’ve unlocked. The total number of medals that you’ve unlocked is also shown for the same reason above.
New shell stat cards design
Amongst the previous UI changes implemented last year, the developers have also been working on a new and improved version of stat card for shells. For this one, the aim was to display the most important aspects of a shell so that you can glance and read it quickly. The main parameters for shells are muzzle velocity, armor penetration at close-range and TNT equivalent.
What else can you expect in terms of UI changes in the future? The team are redesigning some other cards right now for all projectile stat cards in the game, including smoke grenades, ordnance and ammo belts, which will be in the same style as the one above.
UAV picture-in-picture mode for light tanks
Higher ranking light tanks can unlock a Scout UAV and launch them in game, giving a good perspective of the battlefield and act as a good way to mark enemy tanks for your teammates. There are a couple of downsides however for the player that launches the UAV — this forces you to be static in your vehicle, lose active control and have to constantly switch cameras, which is unintuitive. This is one area of the UAV where the developers wanted to improve it by adding a picture-in-picture mode when driving your ground vehicle.
Launching your Scout UAV and then switching back to your light tank will give you the option to switch your minimap between two views; the standard minimap and UAV view, which displays the live video feed of the UAV to you. This in turn will allow you to see a glimpse of the battlefield, all while driving your ground vehicle around and fighting as normal. A yellow UAV PoV marker is also shown in the game world so that you can get a sense of where your UAV is looking at. This will of course come with some new ways to play the game, and we’re excited to see what can be pulled off.
UAV view
UAV picture in picture view
We’ve faced a couple of challenges when designing this feature, especially when trying to display the terrain properly and optimization. Much like aircraft Multi-Function Displays in aircraft cockpits, we’re working to ensure that the game runs as smoothly as it can and that this new feature doesn’t hinder performance.
Improved minimap buttons
Last year we added some buttons to the in-game map in the respawn screen, allowing you to move the map around and change the map type. While it worked to some extent, the buttons came off as a bit confusing. So we’ve looked to improve it by being clear on what button pressing does: on PC, left click is to ping attention, right click is to move the map around, and middle-mouse button marks or changes a point of interest. We’ve also ensured that this is easy to use on console controllers as well.
New MFDs for some aircraft
With the arrival of more modern aircraft featuring Multifunction Displays (MFD) in their cockpit, it brings a new level of realism and functionality to our virtual cockpits. Those of you familiar with for example, Eurofighters and Rafales will have already seen this awesome feature in game already, and we are pleased to say the Rafale will soon be receiving its weapons MFD page, as well as a couple of other aircraft that are planned in the major update will receive their own MFD sets.
These types of features really bring modern aircraft to life and add an additional layer to immersion, along with tactical and gameplay comfort benefits too.
Maps graphical rework
You may remember last year, Abandoned factory saw a rework to its visuals to bring it up to date without significantly changing its gameplay. You reacted quite well to this and we can share with you today that several other maps are in progress for a visual revamp to bring some fresh life to them. Rhine, Jungle and Sinai are all currently being worked on to receive this type of visual spruce up, without changing their gameplay. Some of your old favourites have never looked so good! We hope you will enjoy them too.
Message and rewards for intercepting munitions
We’ve also been working on a new system for rewarding the interception of various munitions, destroying incoming bombs and missiles before impact. A successful interception will be shown in the feed as well as the post-battle results screen, where you can see the interceptions you’ve made and the reward gained from them.
We’ll also be adding a special achievement for intercepting a bomb over 5000kg, it can potentially be quite impactful to stop a bomb like this from self-detonating, and now you’ll get a proper reward for doing it!
Vehicle hint
Speaking of things to come. We can say that one vehicle in the next major is definitely causing a buzz. We know a great many of you will be eager to get your hands on it and leave your opponents with a real stinging sensation!
Onto other things
Talking about module and vehicle RP being lost
This bug has plagued the game for a long time now. Essentially, if you played a battle in a vehicle and left before it was finished and then went into another battle and used the same vehicle, the RP earned in the first battle could be lost if the modification you were researching was completed when the second battle finished.
It hasn’t been simple to fix this bug — it has been complex and we can say having looked at our internal report it has been looked at and worked on for quite some time now. But we’re pleased to say there is light at the end of the tunnel, and a fix is currently in testing; as of now, it looks like a fix for this bug will be made.
Incoming events
The next two event vehicles are a ship and ground vehicle respectively. The namesake of one of them is a place quite close to our German office as a bit of a clue. The other is based on a vehicle we have already but with a completely different weapons system which should change how it plays entirely, keep an eye out for them over the coming months!
Monthly decals
One from Oxy here, Monthly Decals! This was one of my favourite events from a few years ago, and I’m very happy to have been able to bring it back recently. I think it’s great to have some short-term goals in a game like this for a bit of soft-direction. Each month we’ll be including one decal for each nation, though maybe one nation will be dropped in place of a marking from a smaller nation, like Norway from this month for example. There will be 5 new markings and 5 reused markings, so new players can collect some of the previous emblems as well.
It took over a year on-and-off to find enough interesting markings we can use, currently we have several hundred options for the future but we’re open to ideas for more! I’ll be keeping an eye on the suggestion area for decals and I’m open to changing the schedule if we get some interesting examples (bonus points if sharks).
I’ll also be updating the descriptions for other decals already in the game soon as well (the extra text you get when you hover over them), currently German and British air decals have detailed descriptions on their history, symbology and placement. It’s a small thing ultimately but hopefully it’s interesting. One of my favourite things in games is when you look for extra detail somewhere and find it, so it’s always nice to get to work on this area when I have the time. I hope you like the decal events, and I’ll always be happy to hear your feedback on it!
Cheers,
the CM Team
