For those that can survive its fires.

The last and final open session brings with it an exclusive item you can only get until the 8th when the beta ends.  30 victories on hell level missions to earn the Spore shield goggles for male and female.

This is no easy mission and will take the best in you and your crew.  Best of luck and remember, winners get the exclusive mask, losers get nothing.



If you don't see the mission on the main screen, simply relog your game and download the update.

For those that can survive its fires.

The last and final open session brings with it an exclusive item you can only get until the 8th when the beta ends.  30 victories on hell level missions to earn the Spore shield goggles for male and female.

This is no easy mission and will take the best in you and your crew.  Best of luck and remember, winners get the exclusive mask, losers get nothing.



If you don't see the mission on the main screen, simply relog your game and download the update.

New content/features:

- The Ashen Scuffle joins PvP.  Take a peek at our new content in the form of a dark and deadly, although strikingly beautiful, DM map. Take your crew through this deadly landscape in both 2v2 and 3v3. Lava flows and derelict buildings await you and your crew.

- New Gun: Typhon Heavy Flak Mk. II
The old 2 shot flak of yore in a new body.  The demand was high and with new art created for it. The weapon is ready in remastered glory. Expert gunners of old and new rejoice at your chance for the most powerful and demanding weapon


- Static Story Book

Alliance is all about factions coming together, forming alliances, and waging big wars against each other in major seasonal events.  We will be listening in on our various channels of communications from in-game chat to our lively forums to see how you are playing and role-playing as your factions.  We will look at our data and see which players have earned the most effort, bought the most reinforcements, and overall supported their factions the best.  With all this information, we will craft a unique story after each war to commemorate and recognize the events that transpired.  Join us in crafting the history of Guns of Icarus Alliance together!
- Pietro's Veil (Male and Female) for buyers of Alliance
 - Recommended Ship/Loadout for matches/modes/difficulty settings

- New War Goal voting system
- War Period: When war period begins, alliances will be automatically formed and each alliance will have 24 hours to vote on their war goal.  This replaces voting on what alliances to form, which was found to be confusing and less rewarding based on feedback gathered.  These goals range from converting the enemy’s populace by conquering a territory, enforcing a will of strength by growing to a certain size, to activating a super weapon by accruing resources.
- New underdog icon
- Match list opens if Matchmaker goes too long

General
- Goggles are now dyeable
Every piece of equipment is now dyeable. Show off your custom style by matching any item to your complete outfit. There are no limits save your creativity for what kind of sky pirate you want to be.
- New character customization page
New dyes, cosmetics and options gave us a lot more to play with for the character customization screen. It has been completely redone to help you design your character and your tool sets.

- New ship customization page
With 12 ready and an upcoming 13 total number of ships. The ship screen needed an update to make navigation easier. We’ve taken a major pass to improve not only the page visually, but also the usability of the page. Craft, create, and plan your ship!

- Period/Daily Rewards

- Additional titles, in particular Mercenary
- Ship kill count displayed in scoreboard
- Distinct "component destroyed" sound effect for the balloon
- End Match Screen: Show faction progression for both Skirmish and Alliance
- Improved Voice Commands menu
- Added tooltips for class selection, tab settings

Changes:

General
- Faction message panel adjusted
- Adjusted grounded flag on slopes
- Moved the Vote in Progress countdown to right below the map vote panel on the left
- 'Favorite Ship' text on profile page changed to 'Most Played Ship'
- Captain priority extended to team
- Tweaked lights on all ships
- Ladders are easier to notice

Alliance Beta (For Open Period)
- Escape Pod renamed to Enemy Supply Ship
- Alliance world map design improvements
- World UI Ease of Use adjustments
- Icon callouts to indicate Leader choices
- Better communication of Leader status
- Killfeed adjustments
- Flare made to trigger for drill armor break
- Marker bullets will now self destruct after a second and a half

Skirmish
- Balloon outline in Skyball matches is now toggle-able as spectator

Balance
- Overall balance changes to enemies, difficulty modes, and game modes  like repair rate, damage output, ramp up between Novice and Normal etc…
- Survival: all matches are now set to 5 waves, each of which are timed.
- Assault: in-world icons on currently active base
- Retrieve: convoys are now tanky but move much slower, Refineries have increased health while the Final Refinery has greatly increased health
- Defense: tweaks to Friendly Emplacement effectiveness to support more constant push of enemies

Fixes:

General
- Overlapping chat
- Recommend load-out menu appears in match
- When you die spotted, you spawn with HUD displaying as spotted
- Edit Event button leads to "Create Event" panel instead of "Edit Event"
- Help balloon while transitioning back to lobby
- Tooltips showing up off-screen in some cases
- Flickering engine when fireproof coating added
- UI elements on loading screen
- Character positioning on heavy guns

Alliance Beta (For Open Period)
- Failsafe kit starts cooldown on rebuild
- Alliance content missing in Progress screen
- Special Abilities sometimes trigger without pressing the button
- Tar bomb framerate drop on certain maps
- Tar bomb no longer sometimes hits the ship that created it
- Corsair and Crusader: Valentine's theme items placing
- Crusader: catwalk is cutting the main engine in half
- Character model positioning issue on new guns
- Crusaders: pistons are clipping
- Magnate: clipping into brass decorations
- Magnate: walking through wall
- Magnate: pistons clip through material
- Fixed some special ability configuration issues
- Fixed past leader display on unlock markers
- Fixed resource count display for the resource war goal
- Fixed reinforcement purchase error for user buffs
- World map: mission panel was not showing anything
- Missing end match for Stormbreaker ship and balloon mesh error
- Fixed bug with retrieve spawns
- Arc shield generator light flickers with lightning
- Fix to the drill models LODs (Hotfix 581)
- Shader bug that appeared to be breaking UI on some Hardware (Hotfix 581)

Skirmish
- Victory Defeat Notifications in Skirmish reversed

 

 

New content/features:

- The Ashen Scuffle joins PvP.  Take a peek at our new content in the form of a dark and deadly, although strikingly beautiful, DM map. Take your crew through this deadly landscape in both 2v2 and 3v3. Lava flows and derelict buildings await you and your crew.

- New Gun: Typhon Heavy Flak Mk. II
The old 2 shot flak of yore in a new body.  The demand was high and with new art created for it. The weapon is ready in remastered glory. Expert gunners of old and new rejoice at your chance for the most powerful and demanding weapon


- Static Story Book

Alliance is all about factions coming together, forming alliances, and waging big wars against each other in major seasonal events.  We will be listening in on our various channels of communications from in-game chat to our lively forums to see how you are playing and role-playing as your factions.  We will look at our data and see which players have earned the most effort, bought the most reinforcements, and overall supported their factions the best.  With all this information, we will craft a unique story after each war to commemorate and recognize the events that transpired.  Join us in crafting the history of Guns of Icarus Alliance together!
- Pietro's Veil (Male and Female) for buyers of Alliance
 - Recommended Ship/Loadout for matches/modes/difficulty settings

- New War Goal voting system
- War Period: When war period begins, alliances will be automatically formed and each alliance will have 24 hours to vote on their war goal.  This replaces voting on what alliances to form, which was found to be confusing and less rewarding based on feedback gathered.  These goals range from converting the enemy’s populace by conquering a territory, enforcing a will of strength by growing to a certain size, to activating a super weapon by accruing resources.
- New underdog icon
- Match list opens if Matchmaker goes too long

General
- Goggles are now dyeable
Every piece of equipment is now dyeable. Show off your custom style by matching any item to your complete outfit. There are no limits save your creativity for what kind of sky pirate you want to be.
- New character customization page
New dyes, cosmetics and options gave us a lot more to play with for the character customization screen. It has been completely redone to help you design your character and your tool sets.

- New ship customization page
With 12 ready and an upcoming 13 total number of ships. The ship screen needed an update to make navigation easier. We’ve taken a major pass to improve not only the page visually, but also the usability of the page. Craft, create, and plan your ship!

- Period/Daily Rewards

- Additional titles, in particular Mercenary
- Ship kill count displayed in scoreboard
- Distinct "component destroyed" sound effect for the balloon
- End Match Screen: Show faction progression for both Skirmish and Alliance
- Improved Voice Commands menu
- Added tooltips for class selection, tab settings

Changes:

General
- Faction message panel adjusted
- Adjusted grounded flag on slopes
- Moved the Vote in Progress countdown to right below the map vote panel on the left
- 'Favorite Ship' text on profile page changed to 'Most Played Ship'
- Captain priority extended to team
- Tweaked lights on all ships
- Ladders are easier to notice

Alliance Beta (For Open Period)
- Escape Pod renamed to Enemy Supply Ship
- Alliance world map design improvements
- World UI Ease of Use adjustments
- Icon callouts to indicate Leader choices
- Better communication of Leader status
- Killfeed adjustments
- Flare made to trigger for drill armor break
- Marker bullets will now self destruct after a second and a half

Skirmish
- Balloon outline in Skyball matches is now toggle-able as spectator

Balance
- Overall balance changes to enemies, difficulty modes, and game modes  like repair rate, damage output, ramp up between Novice and Normal etc…
- Survival: all matches are now set to 5 waves, each of which are timed.
- Assault: in-world icons on currently active base
- Retrieve: convoys are now tanky but move much slower, Refineries have increased health while the Final Refinery has greatly increased health
- Defense: tweaks to Friendly Emplacement effectiveness to support more constant push of enemies

Fixes:

General
- Overlapping chat
- Recommend load-out menu appears in match
- When you die spotted, you spawn with HUD displaying as spotted
- Edit Event button leads to "Create Event" panel instead of "Edit Event"
- Help balloon while transitioning back to lobby
- Tooltips showing up off-screen in some cases
- Flickering engine when fireproof coating added
- UI elements on loading screen
- Character positioning on heavy guns

Alliance Beta (For Open Period)
- Failsafe kit starts cooldown on rebuild
- Alliance content missing in Progress screen
- Special Abilities sometimes trigger without pressing the button
- Tar bomb framerate drop on certain maps
- Tar bomb no longer sometimes hits the ship that created it
- Corsair and Crusader: Valentine's theme items placing
- Crusader: catwalk is cutting the main engine in half
- Character model positioning issue on new guns
- Crusaders: pistons are clipping
- Magnate: clipping into brass decorations
- Magnate: walking through wall
- Magnate: pistons clip through material
- Fixed some special ability configuration issues
- Fixed past leader display on unlock markers
- Fixed resource count display for the resource war goal
- Fixed reinforcement purchase error for user buffs
- World map: mission panel was not showing anything
- Missing end match for Stormbreaker ship and balloon mesh error
- Fixed bug with retrieve spawns
- Arc shield generator light flickers with lightning
- Fix to the drill models LODs (Hotfix 581)
- Shader bug that appeared to be breaking UI on some Hardware (Hotfix 581)

Skirmish
- Victory Defeat Notifications in Skirmish reversed

 

 

Many new players, many new experiences, and a lot of new data!

Hello everyone,

A huge thanks to everyone who took part in and gave feedback for the December Alliance Open Session.

Also a big welcome to everyone from our Steam notification and feature. It was great to have so many new pilots, engineers, and gunners experience Alliance.

In total, over 35,000 players came in throughout the week to fly in our skies. Between all those players, a total of almost hundred thousand hours of Alliance were played, making this open period our largest one yet!

If you enjoyed Alliance, be sure to pre-order to be one of the first one in and if you email us at http://mailto:feedback@musegames.com with proof of purchase we’ll give you a code to come test with us on the weekend.

The Good

The introduction of the faction leader message provided some amazing tactical choices with allegiances being signaled to all players. It was great to see the interest and passion from faction leaders in trying to take over the world. We got to see 4,370,500 coins used on the world map to help wage war. In addition, coin usage rate has gone up noticeable, now to 65%, with overflow down to less than 20%.

We also were happy with the positive responses to our two new heavy weapons.  The Cavitation gun and Heavy Mine launcher were used to great effect, and the feedback we got on them will help us hone in their message.

Balance and win rates on different maps and modes also improved and were closer to our expected values, but we need continue to work on these to make sure players are experiencing success when they’ve earned it. Again, watching players play throughout the week was amazingly helpful. The common mistakes and maneuvers gave us better ideas on how to craft the player experience.

The Alliance soundtrack was ready for your enjoyment, along with the pre-order special item!  The next step is to have it properly display and configured on Steam, so stay tuned!


The “Needs to Improve”The faction map, while improved in many ways that both the data and feedback showed us, still needs more work. Most importantly, the leader needs more communications and impact while the non-leaders need more reason and push to get involved.

Some of our plans of attacks are map actions to be weighted more in leadership attainment. Overflow and system assigned passive resources would also be directed towards leadership designated locations. We are also exploring more in game communication tools for leadership.  Some other ideas we’re exploring are achievements and bonus rewards for faction alignment and synergy with leadership. Playing in matches with leaders could also be rewarded.  We’re looking at daily and period missions for individual players to learn rewards and bonuses, and a stronger notification on milestone achievements as well as faction world involvement.  For everyone who did his or her best to unite and provide us with feedback, the recorded experiences, ideas, concerns, and thoughts were invaluable in helping to craft the next and improved experience, which we’ve already planned for and are taking actions on.

While other game modes are tracking well during the open period and at MAGFest, Retrieve is unfortunately still an issue. Oblivion Approach exploit is plugged, Thornholt Crest exploit is still an issue that needs to be resolved asap.  Survival is playing tough, likely a bit too tough.  Normal difficulty setting is also playing a bit too tough for intermediate players, which we’ll need to tune.  Transition from Novice difficulty to Normal is also too steep, and we’re making adjustments as well.  Assault and longer form Survival play length could be improved slightly as well, but we’re getting closer.

Ships wise, the Skirmish ships’ successes and win rates are situational, but the latest novice setup and ship loadouts we set seemed to have yielded good results.  Of the faction ships, Stormbreaker was the best performing ship, but the other ships performed surprisingly well.  We’ll be looking at adjustments to the Corsair and Shrike, and a bit on the Magnate to bring them up a bit more.


What’s missing?
The final Alliance player and faction progression and rewards we withheld so that we could have everything unlocked for people to help us test.  Before release, we’ll introduce it to the Alliance experience. Because we already have historical progression data, we’re reasonably confident that the pacing won’t be too off.

More modes and more maps, even while we show off new maps and modes in each test session, there are new and unique game modes being tested internally. We’re really excited to get these into player hands in the development app as soon as we feel they give a consistent experience.  The Yeshan faction ship and enemies are also close to ready for player testing in the development app.  We’ll again prioritize everyone who backed us and pre-ordered for testing.


The Skirmish Front



We’re continuing Wild Week! After a test of tank spire that didn’t pan out, we’re calling on players to say exactly what they’d like to see for this idea that was proposed to us to try, probably will never see the light of day, but if you’d like to try random, goofy idea, for fun, have your voice be heard here!

To stress, the Tanky Spire, previous trifecta-squid, and whatever comes next in Wild Week are not massive plans to change skirmish, but an opportunity to listen to our community and give them a chance to try the random things they’ve thought about for the past 4 years. We hope you enjoy the experiments with an open mind and embrace the fun of the failures and successes.


Lore Recap

The cold swept through from the northwestern front with devastating effect.  The Anglean Republic, learning from their previous missteps, were able to gain key territories in record time.  Bolstered by a horde of zealots, who were fevered by newly discovered Ancient ruins, the Angleans made their way south to meet the Fjord Baronies and Mercantile Guild with unstoppable force.  The esteemed Zero Zero Zero Zero (215,816 effort; 29,899 coin) was able to lead self-financed armies into enemy territories with brutal efficiency.

The Fjord Baronies and Mercantile Guild were affronted from both sides.  Literally squeezed by the Angleans in the west, and the Chaladonians in the east, the two factions came to an uneasy alliance in order to defend against the unfavorable odds.  Eranok (110,807 effort), who controlled the vast Baronite armies, and financed by the aristocratic family of Jeff Bridges (13,560 coin) parlayed with the Mercantile Guild’s most respected trade federation run by TikoXi (278,466 effort; 33,198 coin).

In the end, however, another alliance was formed that overshadows all others.  Unexpectedly, the Order of Chaladon once again found themselves in friendly relations with the Angleans.  Despite their opposed worldviews, another union came to fruition when Order operatives Omnipresent Oatmeal (136,335 effort) and DIehard.zero (18,775 coin) brought word of an Anglean truce to the council.  Perhaps it means fundamental differences can be overlooked in the search for peace.

But such faith needs to be put aside since war reopened wounds across the earth.  Countless millions died, the central plains may never look the same again.  It will take time for the factions to rebuild with a total of 4,370,500 coin spent on Conscription (7,240 units) and training Cadets (8,038 units), and the building of Palisades (2,041 units) that now scar the land.  The future will surely bring about new alliances if war were to spill across the land once more.

Many new players, many new experiences, and a lot of new data!

Hello everyone,

A huge thanks to everyone who took part in and gave feedback for the December Alliance Open Session.

Also a big welcome to everyone from our Steam notification and feature. It was great to have so many new pilots, engineers, and gunners experience Alliance.

In total, over 35,000 players came in throughout the week to fly in our skies. Between all those players, a total of almost hundred thousand hours of Alliance were played, making this open period our largest one yet!

If you enjoyed Alliance, be sure to pre-order to be one of the first one in and if you email us at http://mailto:feedback@musegames.com with proof of purchase we’ll give you a code to come test with us on the weekend.

The Good

The introduction of the faction leader message provided some amazing tactical choices with allegiances being signaled to all players. It was great to see the interest and passion from faction leaders in trying to take over the world. We got to see 4,370,500 coins used on the world map to help wage war. In addition, coin usage rate has gone up noticeable, now to 65%, with overflow down to less than 20%.

We also were happy with the positive responses to our two new heavy weapons.  The Cavitation gun and Heavy Mine launcher were used to great effect, and the feedback we got on them will help us hone in their message.

Balance and win rates on different maps and modes also improved and were closer to our expected values, but we need continue to work on these to make sure players are experiencing success when they’ve earned it. Again, watching players play throughout the week was amazingly helpful. The common mistakes and maneuvers gave us better ideas on how to craft the player experience.

The Alliance soundtrack was ready for your enjoyment, along with the pre-order special item!  The next step is to have it properly display and configured on Steam, so stay tuned!


The “Needs to Improve”The faction map, while improved in many ways that both the data and feedback showed us, still needs more work. Most importantly, the leader needs more communications and impact while the non-leaders need more reason and push to get involved.

Some of our plans of attacks are map actions to be weighted more in leadership attainment. Overflow and system assigned passive resources would also be directed towards leadership designated locations. We are also exploring more in game communication tools for leadership.  Some other ideas we’re exploring are achievements and bonus rewards for faction alignment and synergy with leadership. Playing in matches with leaders could also be rewarded.  We’re looking at daily and period missions for individual players to learn rewards and bonuses, and a stronger notification on milestone achievements as well as faction world involvement.  For everyone who did his or her best to unite and provide us with feedback, the recorded experiences, ideas, concerns, and thoughts were invaluable in helping to craft the next and improved experience, which we’ve already planned for and are taking actions on.

While other game modes are tracking well during the open period and at MAGFest, Retrieve is unfortunately still an issue. Oblivion Approach exploit is plugged, Thornholt Crest exploit is still an issue that needs to be resolved asap.  Survival is playing tough, likely a bit too tough.  Normal difficulty setting is also playing a bit too tough for intermediate players, which we’ll need to tune.  Transition from Novice difficulty to Normal is also too steep, and we’re making adjustments as well.  Assault and longer form Survival play length could be improved slightly as well, but we’re getting closer.

Ships wise, the Skirmish ships’ successes and win rates are situational, but the latest novice setup and ship loadouts we set seemed to have yielded good results.  Of the faction ships, Stormbreaker was the best performing ship, but the other ships performed surprisingly well.  We’ll be looking at adjustments to the Corsair and Shrike, and a bit on the Magnate to bring them up a bit more.


What’s missing?
The final Alliance player and faction progression and rewards we withheld so that we could have everything unlocked for people to help us test.  Before release, we’ll introduce it to the Alliance experience. Because we already have historical progression data, we’re reasonably confident that the pacing won’t be too off.

More modes and more maps, even while we show off new maps and modes in each test session, there are new and unique game modes being tested internally. We’re really excited to get these into player hands in the development app as soon as we feel they give a consistent experience.  The Yeshan faction ship and enemies are also close to ready for player testing in the development app.  We’ll again prioritize everyone who backed us and pre-ordered for testing.


The Skirmish Front



We’re continuing Wild Week! After a test of tank spire that didn’t pan out, we’re calling on players to say exactly what they’d like to see for this idea that was proposed to us to try, probably will never see the light of day, but if you’d like to try random, goofy idea, for fun, have your voice be heard here!

To stress, the Tanky Spire, previous trifecta-squid, and whatever comes next in Wild Week are not massive plans to change skirmish, but an opportunity to listen to our community and give them a chance to try the random things they’ve thought about for the past 4 years. We hope you enjoy the experiments with an open mind and embrace the fun of the failures and successes.


Lore Recap

The cold swept through from the northwestern front with devastating effect.  The Anglean Republic, learning from their previous missteps, were able to gain key territories in record time.  Bolstered by a horde of zealots, who were fevered by newly discovered Ancient ruins, the Angleans made their way south to meet the Fjord Baronies and Mercantile Guild with unstoppable force.  The esteemed Zero Zero Zero Zero (215,816 effort; 29,899 coin) was able to lead self-financed armies into enemy territories with brutal efficiency.

The Fjord Baronies and Mercantile Guild were affronted from both sides.  Literally squeezed by the Angleans in the west, and the Chaladonians in the east, the two factions came to an uneasy alliance in order to defend against the unfavorable odds.  Eranok (110,807 effort), who controlled the vast Baronite armies, and financed by the aristocratic family of Jeff Bridges (13,560 coin) parlayed with the Mercantile Guild’s most respected trade federation run by TikoXi (278,466 effort; 33,198 coin).

In the end, however, another alliance was formed that overshadows all others.  Unexpectedly, the Order of Chaladon once again found themselves in friendly relations with the Angleans.  Despite their opposed worldviews, another union came to fruition when Order operatives Omnipresent Oatmeal (136,335 effort) and DIehard.zero (18,775 coin) brought word of an Anglean truce to the council.  Perhaps it means fundamental differences can be overlooked in the search for peace.

But such faith needs to be put aside since war reopened wounds across the earth.  Countless millions died, the central plains may never look the same again.  It will take time for the factions to rebuild with a total of 4,370,500 coin spent on Conscription (7,240 units) and training Cadets (8,038 units), and the building of Palisades (2,041 units) that now scar the land.  The future will surely bring about new alliances if war were to spill across the land once more.

Alliance Beta will end in two hours (4am EST, 9am UTC). System will restart in another hour.

Alliance Beta will end in two hours (4am EST, 9am UTC). System will restart in another hour.

Hi everyone!

Servers will be down shortly and be back up in about an hour. In honor of Steam's Daily Deal featuring and the extension of the Alliance Loyalty Reward, we're taking Alliance back up for people to play in a bit, and it'll last through the weekend.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/209080/
http://store.steampowered.com/app/252590/

Thanks so much, enjoy, and Happy New Year!
Howard aka Bubbles

Hi everyone!

Servers will be down shortly and be back up in about an hour. In honor of Steam's Daily Deal featuring and the extension of the Alliance Loyalty Reward, we're taking Alliance back up for people to play in a bit, and it'll last through the weekend.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/209080/
http://store.steampowered.com/app/252590/

Thanks so much, enjoy, and Happy New Year!
Howard aka Bubbles