After a long time there is finally an update with some minor adjustments and fixes:

• AI players now "fake" some thinking time to avoid shooting too fast in real-time matches. The thinking time depends on the skill level of the respective AI player.
  
• After "faking" some thinking time and before an AI player finally fires his/her shot, it is briefly checked whether the selected alternative is still valid/meaningful. If not, a new shot is calculated.
  
• The AI trait "Jelly Monkey" primarily considers the victory count and secondarily the difference between kills and deaths (not just the number of kills alone) when selecting the "best" shot.
  
• A tank now earns money for winning a round with less than 10 energy left.
  
• Napalm Bomb cost reduced from $ 475 to $ 450.
  
• Tesla Bomb cost reduced from $ 1.500 to $ 999 and damage radius increased from 3 pixels to 4 pixels.
  
• Goo Shot blast power increased from 7 to 11. This is the power with which fragments are flung away from a detonation (usually dirt clods, but in the case of a Goo Shot, those sticky clods that can glue a tank's cannon).

• The "white flag" of a draw offer now waves more or less quickly depending on the current wind strength.

• When a tank dies an out-of-control death, newly spawned bombs are now selected correctly depending on the tank's current arsenal (previously the indices were partially mixed up).
  
• Now "total silence" for the start of the next player's turn also accounts for falling tanks (not just detonations, flying bombs, etc.).

Hello everyone,

Exactly four years ago today, the groundbreaking ceremony for the game's development took place. And this day we have now used to leave Early Access.

We are of the opinion that there is no longer need for fundamental changes. However, this does not mean that we will not continue to care. If we see the need to change certain things or even add new features, we will of course do so. We will also be happy if you tell us about any bugs or other problems so that we can hopefully address them as soon as possible.

We hope you continue to enjoy the game!

Good news, everyone: Tank Wars: Anniversary Edition is now "COVID-ready"! Better late than never:

• In addition to LAN mode, we have implemented another networked multiplayer mode based on Steam Networking that allows you to play with your friends over the Internet.

It was a deliberate decision to limit this mode to players who you are friends with on Steam. There are many reasons for this, but the two most relevant are the following:

1. Tank Wars: Anniversary Edition is still best played as a hotseat match on a Saturday evening with some friends. The main intentions for networked multiplayer mode(s) at all were to enable simultaneous mode and real-time mode against each other and to address unfavorable room situations with regard to input and output devices with several players. While the first is more of a "gimmick", the second aspect is becoming more important with spatial separation in the COVID-19 situation, which increases the need specifically for an Internet-based mode. However, the friend aspect remains: One of the main factors for maximum fun is playing off different human characters against each other. This is not really possible with unknown counterparties. When in doubt, this decision should be left to the players themselves, but then it comes to the second reason:
   
2. Tank Wars: Anniversary Edition is a niche product and not very popular. Finding unknown playmates could be quite frustrating. Using various channels to find interested friends instead should be more promising. To finally close the circle again: the Internet mode is mainly intended to overcome the COVID-related spatial separation of friends in a preferably classic (turn-based) match.

We didn't want to delay the Internet mode even more, but still: if you notice bugs or other problems, please let us know. Have fun!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! The Christkind has granted us two new game options:

• "Keep weapons/items on death": If this option is not activated, a tank will lose one copy per weapon/item when it dies. (Tanks which did not get a turn at all are spared.)
  
• "Weapons/items can be sold": If this option is not activated, purchased weapons/items can no longer be sold.

Today there is a quick little update:

• Steam achievements have been added and enabled, a whole bunch of them.

• A bug where the Tesla Bomb did not cause any damage has been fixed.

First of all, I am sorry that the update has been a long time coming. But we did a major revision and, for example, completely renewed the AI system. And extensive activities are not so easy for a private hobby project with a full-time job and family in mind. However, we have tried to respond to community wishes as much as possible, provided that they did not conflict with our own opinion (for example, we already implemented game options for making the initial money and the per-round earnings configurable per player, but then took that out again because we felt it would negatively affect armory development during a match). This is what we've been doing for the past few months:

• The AI system has been completely renewed. Not only can the basic skill level be set for each AI player as before, but now also different character traits. We hope that this will address some community requests for the "old" AI features, but also that the AI behavior has become more meaningful in principle: for example, AI players would now upgrade their tanks and buy and use more strategic weapons (i.e., Airstrike) and items (i.e., Defense System).
  
• A new game option has been added: "out-of-control deaths". This is to address a community request, and we ourselves think the new feature is absolutely awesome: if a tank receives enough "pressure", it not just smokes and explodes, but it might go "furious" and, as an unwanted last act in life, release a whole bunch of dangerous bomb shells to the environment.
  
• A new game option has been added: "wall type unknown until evident". This goes hand in hand with the fulfillment of a community wish that the wall type should be recognizable: additional information has been added to the statistics window (Tab key), including the wall type (depending on the wall settings and the new option being set or not).
  
• We got rid of the somehow annoying "cash money" sound (this was also a community request) and replaced the sound for earning EP. Actually, the EP sound is more of a tank-died sound now, as the new sound doesn't play when EP is earned but when a tank dies. Some other sounds have been slightly revised.
  
• The Defense System has been tuned a bit and a fabulous sound has been added for it.
  
• The in-game chat has been slightly improved (networked multiplayer mode).

• A bug in the XML component has been fixed where double and single quotes might have bothered each other in savegames.
  
• Some bugs in the AI logic have been fixed. But the entire AI system has been redesigned, so whatever.
  
• The networked multiplayer mode has been slightly improved in general. However, in wild situations it can still be a bit choppy. The game shouldn't be a network game at first, so it's a bit tricky to integrate this functionality in retrospect. But it works, kind of.
  
• Some "minor" bugs have been fixed that caused null-pointer exceptions or invalid memory accesses in certain situations. We recently let 8 AI players play against each other for several hours and we didn't find any more errors, and they also eagerly bought and used weapons and upgraded their tanks etc.

It is not yet certain what we will do next. We still look forward to feedback and suggestions for improvement of any kind. And if you find bugs, please let us know so that we can track them down and fix them. Perhaps we will expand the networked multiplayer mode in accordance with Corona so that Internet games are also possible. This is not a promise, just a possible direction we could take. It remains exciting.

Every now and then we come to a few improvements:

• A first draft of the in-game chat has been added.

• Networked multiplayer mode (LAN) has been improved (but still beta).

We just deployed a first beta version of the LAN mode.

• Networked multiplayer mode (LAN) is in beta now: It could still be a bit jerky. And the in-game chat is not implemented yet.

Happy New Year everybody!

We are still working on the networked multiplayer mode. In the meantime, we deployed some minor changes and fixes:

• The Plasma Melter is slightly bigger now.
  
• The Sequence Bomb doesn't come with overlapping sounds and lights anymore.
  
• For real-time matches, an optional "action cooldown" has been introduced that can be used alternatively to or together with round/turn timers.
  
• For classic (turn-based) matches, the turn order of the players has been improved.
  
• The "intelligence" of AI players has been worsened.
  
• The lights of the tanks changed from point lights to spot lights.
  
• The calculation for the total ambient illumination intensity has been updated.
  
• Water reflections have been updated.

• A bug where the match wouldn't proceed to the next round has been fixed.

Happy New Year everybody!

We are still working on the networked multiplayer mode. In the meantime, we deployed some minor changes and fixes:

• The Plasma Melter is slightly bigger now.
  
• The Sequence Bomb doesn't come with overlapping sounds and lights anymore.
  
• For real-time matches, an optional "action cooldown" has been introduced that can be used alternatively to or together with round/turn timers.
  
• For classic (turn-based) matches, the turn order of the players has been improved.
  
• The "intelligence" of AI players has been worsened.
  
• The lights of the tanks changed from point lights to spot lights.
  
• The calculation for the total ambient illumination intensity has been updated.
  
• Water reflections have been updated.

• A bug where the match wouldn't proceed to the next round has been fixed.