Our update today is dedicated to everyone who has taken the time to vote, comment or start cases on our UserEcho support website! Thank you all for your input, we’ve been steadily working through cases and hope you are all happy with another big sweep!

New Frontlines rule: Defenders and attackers may no longer be further away than 2 sectors before getting a desertion warning. This should keep the action more concentrated and encourage people to engage in the attack and defense rather than trying to rack up kills from safety.


Douaumont map update: access to the roof has been blocked. We’ll be keeping a close eye out for similar issues.



MG deployment changed: First and third person should now matchup much better. We still have one glitch left to kill when tweaking your position, but we’re working on it!



Medal fix Players missing a medal for participating in the Christmas Truce and/or Early Access should get their medal on logging in.

Inconsistent settings fix: we understand that it’s annoying having to adjust your settings constantly after a game switch, this should be resolved now. Our apologies!

As we’ve been fixing issues with Verdun, it’s helped us address issues in Tannenberg, and vice-versa. The Tannenberg update and changelog can be found here.

Please keep the reports coming! If we don’t know about issues, we can’t fix them. Post them on our UserEcho support website so we can continue smashing bugs and make this game greater! Don’t forget to vote and comment on issues you think are important so we know how many people are affected.

We also have some exciting news from the Eastern Front, where a new Roumanian squad has been added to the game. They come with new weapons and… a new map! The Roumania map is inspired by Mount Cosna and the north-northwestern areas of Roumania. Take a look at the our new trailer dedicated to the Roumanian update: https://youtu.be/1q7mzfUizDE


Now back to the battlefield!

The First World War was the original modern industrial war. It was also one of the earliest wars where cameras were small enough and quick enough to reliably capture unposed scenes of battle. But even with the very best equipment, actually capturing an outstanding image in the chaos of combat is very challenging.

Our question to you is: do you have what it takes to be a War Correspondent in Verdun and Tannenberg! After all, taking a screenshot is just one quick tap of F12 (after hiding the HUD with F8), and then adding an enticing 140 character description. So how hard could it be? ;)

Long story short, we’re starting a competition to see who can produce the best combat news report. Share your best story and screenshot from a battle and get featured in the official Steam Hubs and on our social media!



Want to join the competition?
Make sure to upload all images and info in our Steam Hub - Screenshots section. All content shared on other social media platforms won’t count as an entry.

To enter the competition please include:

• Image + max. 140 character story.
  
• The words ‘War Correspondent’ somewhere in your caption for the images (max. 3 entries) you want to enter.

There are no particular requirements for the content of photos - feel free to make your entries exciting, shocking, beautiful, or anything else. You can capture soldiers fighting, landscape shots, set up posed shots or whatever else you can come up with. Don’t forget to keep focused on the game itself if you’re taking photos during a public battle!

The first competition will end on 3rd of June 10:00pm PST. One winner will be chosen by community choice: the one with the most thumbs up. The second winner will be selected by the moderators and devs! We’ll announce both winners on the 5th of June.

You can discuss the competition on the forums. Good luck everyone!

It's been a busy few weeks for us! Last Wednesday we released a big update, followed by some additional fixes on Friday. We are looking into implementing bots for Frontlines in Verdun, and we know some people have concerns about this. We've said a little about that below.

The Wednesday update also included many adjustments to the new sound system that we're working on - if you want to try it out, we've included instructions in this post! Finally, we have more info about a reenactment battle being run by our community this Saturday.



We have been working on improving the sounds in Verdun and Tannenberg. You can already try them out and give us feedback in this thread on the Verdun forums!

You can join the testing by adding the following to your launch options: FMOD FMOD_WIP
Note: make sure you are on the latest version!

How to add launch options: https://gyazo.com/142bc5d7db202d57b67addd377b2e167

There was a lot of speculation and concern about how bots will be added to Verdun. To clarify things, aside from the survey results showing a significant interest in adding bots to Frontlines, another reason we want to do so is as an option for the low population servers like ASIA, AU, SA, etc. This will also make the game playable in the far future when player count is very low on even EU and US. See it as a last resort when regular matches are not possible. You'll also be able to enable bots in private matches.

We also hope that bots will increase player retention, particularly among new players. If people know they can play a game anytime we should see more people online. For newbies, being able to start out with some easier opponents before moving to more competitive battles with humans should make the initial hurdle of getting into Verdun easier.

We are moving all bug reports and suggestions (except for particular things such as the FMOD beta sound feedback thread linked above) to our UserEcho support site. We have recently made some changes to the system there so that we can answer reports more easily. It's a great tool which:

• Makes it easier for us (and you) to keep track of suggestions and bug reports.
  
• Allows you to vote on what issues and ideas are most important.
  
• Makes it easier for us to communicate progress on issues or request additional information.

Focusing our attention there will allow us to react faster and more effectively. If you have any questions about how to best use the site, let us know.



The two GIFs in this post were taken during events run by the people behind the Verdun x64 and Tannenberg x64 group. They have recently reorganized their events into the three following categories, which should make things easier if you've not joined one before!

- Casual x64 Friday Matches (fun events)
- Historical Scenarios (themed public events)
- Reenactment Events (invite list only)

This Sunday they are running a Tannenberg Battle of Lemberg 1914 event. You can read more in this post!

To get the latest game updates, follow us on Facebook or Twitter. You can also talk with us on Discord!

We are looking for an experienced Unity C# Programmer, who can work remotely on freelance basis. If you think that might be you, get in touch.

Screenshot by player Lil Manny.

We have released a new update to Verdun and Tannenberg. The most notable items include:

• Made sure spawning within 15 meters of an enemy won't happen.
  
• In Frontlines mode, defending squads will now be spread out in the defending sector before the start of the match.
  
• Made spawn point order deterministic by sorting them by name during map bake. This should fix the default spawn changing after each update. Note that this update should therefore be the last update that does change spawn point order.
  
• The game .exe is now called WW1 Game Series.exe, and appears as WW1 Game Series in the Task Manager.
  
• Fix corner in Douaumont barracks being out of bounds
  
• Only do 50% capspeed modifier on HQs if the game is Tannenberg (this fixes a bug where Vosges capspeed is 2x as long)

We’ve made a number of adjustments here based on the sound system feedback thread. It would be great if you could try it out and let us know what you think in the new sound system feedback thread! How to activate the new system for testing is in the post above.

• Ambience volume feeling less empty.
  
• Grenade pull volume is louder.
  
• Trench whistle is louder.
  
• Made shots sound louder.
  
• Beefed up some shots with an added metal clang and resonance.
  
• Beefed up various reloading sounds.

Community highlights

• We now show a network health stats if they are not healthy values. It shows: Host migration, Jitter, Ping and packet loss. This can always be accessed by enabling opening the options screen. Hovering over will display the stats. Using this information we can identify why some players are having network issues such as teleportation and shots not registering.
  
• Backspace in chat can now be held down again to remove multiple character
  
• Added extra logging to find lagshots cause
  
• Made it easier to play offline: When steam is in offline mode, force offline mode
  
• Make spawn point order deterministic by sorting them by name during map bake. This can fix the default spawn changing after each update. Note that this update should therefor be the last update that does change spawn point order for the last time.
  
• Made sure spawning within 15 meters of an enemy won't happen
  
• We're narrowing down why some players get stuck when loading a map (often Flanders): Added a timeout of 60 seconds and extra logging when a map fails to load.
  
• Fixed an issue where loadouts and some other stats were always reset when front-switching (but never lost when in the correct front)
  
  
• Now also show supporter icon when you switch from Verdun to Tannenberg
  
• Frontlines: Defending squads will now be spread out in the defending sector before the start of the match
  
• Fix corner in Douaumont barracks being out of bounds
  
• Only do 50% capspeed modifier on HQs if its Tannenberg (This fixes a bug where Vosges capspeed is 2x as long)
  
  
• Added new private match chat command '/teamdamage [on|off]'. When this is enabled, shooting a friendly will now reduce your points by 10, without killing the friendly. Your points will only be reduced once every 30 seconds on the same friendly.
  
• Added outline to icon of executable so it is also visible on a white background
  
• Fixed deploy widget sticking around when switching to a different specialization.
  
• Switch back to default control map when destroying chat UI, for extra insurance that the controls won't remain blocked when chat is closed.
  
• Allow reload actions directly after inserting a stripper clip to be cancelled
  
• Fixed occlussion culling errors with bunker-peekholes and poland houses
  
• Fixed players being able to damage their previous team by calling artillery and then quickly switching.
  
• Bots should no longer appear to be running while standing still
  
• No more shock/suppression effect from friendlies running past you when friendly fire is enabled
  
• Bots will try to keep some distance between each other (especially noticeable when capturing a sector)
  
• Explosions/Rifle shots cause body parts to have a force applied instead of merely dropping to the ground
  
• Fixed a kick/corrupt state when server host was not set-up yet during switch
  
• When spawning, your arms don't stick forwards for one frame anymore
  
• Disabled rotating camera before player is properly setup, especially noticable during pre-round screen.
  
• Fixed an issue where NCOs were sometimes unable to use their ability call-in
  
• Fixed a rare case where you could spawn with no ammo loaded
  
• Upgraded Unity Post Processing stack from V1 to V2. Image effects should look the same
  
• Changed the "Verdun" taskmanager/startbar name to "WW1 Game Series"
  
• Changed .exe name from "1914-1918 Series.exe" to "WW1 Game Series.exe". Note that the path to output_log has changed. Now at: "%USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\WW1 Game Series\WW1 Game Series\output_log.txt"
  
• Shadows are now more visible on snow
  
• No longer allow spectation in RDM
  
• Worked on the feedback we received on the FMOD_WIP (New sounds). We will now collect a second round of feedback. Changes:
  
  • New ambience layers added (people felt alone on the map)
    
  • Barbed wire volume fix (was too low)
    
  • Grenade pull volume fix (was too low)
    
  • Hitmarker sound removed
    
  • New reload sounds + added layers to beef it up
    
  • New layers to gunshots (beef up the gunshots)
    
  • New tail layer gunshots
    
  • New sounds: Fall damage + Ammo pickup + Bush/tree rustle
    
  • Skull crack fix
    
  • Vocal effects added (distance equalizing + delay)
    
  • Gramophone effect
    
  • New artillery explosions
    
  • Mosin reload - recharge fix
    
  • Overall mix changes
• Various error and exception fixes

Verdun is celebrating its three year anniversary today! The game has seen new squads, new maps, new game modes and much more over the years. We’d like to give a big thank you to everyone who has played and supported our little (or not so little anymore!) World War One FPS. People were skeptical about an indie company making a multiplayer shooter... we’re glad we went for it anyway! Whether you’ve been with us from the early days or picked up the game recently, thank you!

Pictures are worth a thousand words, so here’s one old screenshot Verdun as it used to be, with more below...


Quite a difference, no?

This three year anniversary only counts the years since we launched on Early Access in 2015, following a Greenlight campaign (remember Greenlight?), when Verdun actually has an even longer history. Take a look at this GIF from 2013, when Verdun was a fun side project for a few college students. Back then it was a WW1 deathmatch shooter which you could play in your browser!


This is why you should always aim ;)

We also gave a sizable interview back then which included quite a comparison between the alpha and the release version.

You can see we’ve been busy over the last few years, but what’s coming next? The recent Verdun Survey was setup with exactly that thought in mind.

We had an amazing 760 responses to our Verdun Survey, so a big thank you to everyone who took the time to fill it out! There’s a lot of data to work with and we want to make sure to make wise decisions. That said, we can already see some interesting details jump out at us.

• 78% of respondents enjoyed Verdun a lot, and 46% said they enjoyed the game more compared to when they first bought it. This is a nice morale booster for us on the dev team!
  
  
• Most of you thought there was a good variety in maps and squads… but many of you also said that you would still like more maps and squads.
  
  
• The Frontlines game mode was the most popular by far, with 650+ agreeing that they played it often.
  
  
• More than 350 of you were concerned about the number of players in the game, and lots of you were interested in the possibility of some ‘artificial’ opposition for Frontlines..
  
  
• The technical issues people were most concerned with were performance and player numbers. We’re continuing to work on these issues of course, but without reports on our bug support website describing bugs in more detail it can be hard for us to identify bugs by ourselves.

Do you recognize this map?

• 500+ liked educational content in our social posts, and little more than 50% were most interested in development & update news. This is great because we have lots more of both things to share!
  
  
• A huge 66% of you are interested in the community run historical battles, but haven’t had a chance to try one yet. 14% have played and enjoyed one, so congratulations to the Verdun X64 group, you’re doing great stuff!
  
  
• 48% of you feel that Verdun players are being properly considered in decisions about the WW1 Game Series, and 43% only said somewhat, so we can improve here - hopefully the survey was a good start.
  
  
• Majorities of 600+ said that it was good for the games to be part of a series and for different games to be able to have different mechanics to reflect how the war was fought across different fronts. This is useful information for us ;)

There have been a lot of questions about what’s in the future for Verdun, and the results from the survey have given us the information we need to draw up an outline for a new roadmap going forward.

Here are our immediate action points based on the analysis we’ve done so far:

• Continue to focus on bug fixes and improving performance. Making reports and voting on our bug support website is hugely helpful here - it’s hard to prioritize if we don’t know how widespread a bug is or what the exact issue is.
  
• New sounds. As well as making the overall soundscape better, we know there are certain specific sound effects that you would like to see replaced.
  
• UI improvements. Although we’ve had to delay the release of the new UI, we know that making sure it is polished is better than rushing it out.
  
• Looking into implementing bots for Frontlines. Although there’s some controversy over how exactly bots should be implemented into multiplayer matches, there’s a clear consensus that would like to see at least some bots added to Frontlines when populations are low. This would of course also allow private matches fully filled with bots.

What we’ve described above isn’t the definitive list of planned content, but we believe that these are the key points for now. We’ve been amazed and humbled by the number of people who have played and enjoyed Verdun since all the way back in 2015 - and we hope to meet you all on the fields of Verdun in another 3 years.

It’s time for the Verdun E4I World Championship Finals!
The action will be going down this Saturday & Sunday, 14+15 April between 2PM EST - 7PM EST.


The broadcast will be on the OPNoobs Twitch Stream at https://www.twitch.tv/opnoobsonline, and will include a giveaway raffle in the chat.

Go to http://www.verdun.live to register.

Contestants will play throughout Saturday and Sunday, progressing through double elimination brackets - teams are eliminated only after they lose two matches.

Prizes for the first three places:
1st Place: Outlast 2, Mafia III + Mafia III: Sign of the Times, Subterrain
2nd Place: Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, Laser League, Lara Croft GO
3rd Place: AER Memories Old, Overgrowth

The teams who qualified in the last six months are:

• GARBAGE KID DELETORS
  
• TRENCH ACROBATS
  
• ACROBATICLOWNS
  
• PRIME PERFORMANCE
  
• PEST CONTROL
  
• SCHWERER MIENENWERFER
  
• PIRATES
  
• AVERAGE JOES
  
• TOXIC CONTROL

We’ve had more than 500 responses to our Verdun survey (you can still fill it in if you haven’t already!) and it’s been very informative. Some answers are what we expected while others surprised us. We’re hoping to do a more detailed write up of the findings and our plans in the future, but for now there was one particular question we wanted to go into a little more detail on.

This was the question about whether you felt Verdun should be more realism focused or more arcade focused, on a scale from 1 to 5, with 1 being maximum simulation and 5 being maximum arcade. Unsurprisingly the majority opted for realism, with 74% of you going for 1-2, and another 20% for 3.


Trenches by night, taken by player Anubis6A.

While it’s good to confirm our expectations, we’re now looking for more details about what you mean when you say you want the game to be realistic, especially those of you who picked 2 or 3, which suggests that you don’t want the game to be accurate in every respect.

With that in mind, we have a super-short bonus survey! If you could rate how important you think realism is in a few different areas it would really help us make the right choices. Fill out the survey. Last question, we promise. Except for… more on this later!

We recently released updates with a number of fixes, tweaks, and other improvements. Of particular note:

• The ‘clay soldiers’ are gone.
  
• The stats of all bayonets now match.
  
• In Tannenberg players can now choose which type of artillery they call in from phones - smoke, explosive and gas are available.

Full Verdun Changelog here.
Full Tannenberg Changelog here.

There are more historical events coming up!

First up is the Battle of Champagne 1915. It’s a public historical battle event - once again, that means using particular loadouts and obeying your commanders! You can read the event rules on the Verdun x64 group page, and sign up for the event.


A screenshot from the last historical battle.

The next event is the Battle of Hartmannswillerkopf, september 1915 on Vosges - a realistic battle on Sunday April 29. That one will be a closed match and invite only. If you want to take part, the following post has contact details for one of the community organizers running the events. You can contact them on Steam or Discord to ask about being added to the invite list.

See you for the next Frontline News! Until then, stay up to date by following us on Twitter or Facebook.

At the WWI game series HQ we have been quite busy with wrapping up Tannenberg for its launch whenever the new UI system is finished (It will be better, we promise).

Of course, we’ve not been sitting still on other fronts! While watching the latest games industry trends we’ve spotted a relatively unexplored niche in the market. There are a few games appearing in the survival genre, but we have a most unique twist: Just like the movie Highlander “there can only be one victor”. I’m sure you’ve never heard of such a game idea before, but we are sure it’s going to be popular. We even came up with a name for it:


We all know the bitter Northern Front is the ideal place for such a scenario.

Our concept would include a starting sequence in which players are parachuted out of a monoplane onto the vast Northern Front theater, where they will have to fight wolves, rats and other players for survival. All this will be set in a post-apocalyptic alt-right universe.


After our last cooperation with EADICE(™) in 2016 on the crossover, vehicles are no problem for us! Well… if you have the correct DLC that is.

Beside the innovative gameplay, we would also include community-requested features - one example being the ability to shoot,reload, or pretty much do anything while jumping as high as possible for maximum 1337-skill levels. All inspired by early 20th century Thunderbirds-style jetpack tech.


FAB looking Thunderbird l33t player, moments before recking your last loot crate!

Last but not least we have taken a look at the most successful features of similar games and came to the conclusion that additional bragging and gambling features are the way to forward, if we want that 4th house in Cabo for our shareholders to ensure a sense of pride and accomplishment for players as they collect different mustaches.


WIP of our booty crate system.

That pretty much wraps it up for this April first. An exciting step forwards for the franchise, if not the entire industry. Have a great Easter!

At the WWI game series HQ we have been quite busy with wrapping up Tannenberg for its launch whenever the new UI system is finished (It will be better, we promise).

Of course, we’ve not been sitting still on other fronts! While watching the latest games industry trends we’ve spotted a relatively unexplored niche in the market. There are a few games appearing in the survival genre, but we have a most unique twist: Just like the movie Highlander “there can only be one victor”. I’m sure you’ve never heard of such a game idea before, but we are sure it’s going to be popular. We even came up with a name for it:


We all know the bitter Northern Front is the ideal place for such a scenario.

Our concept would include a starting sequence in which players are parachuted out of a monoplane onto the vast Northern Front theater, where they will have to fight wolves, rats and other players for survival. All this will be set in a post-apocalyptic alt-right universe.


After our last cooperation with EADICE(™) in 2016 on the crossover, vehicles are no problem for us! Well… if you have the correct DLC that is.

Beside the innovative gameplay, we would also include community-requested features - one example being the ability to shoot,reload, or pretty much do anything while jumping as high as possible for maximum 1337-skill levels. All inspired by early 20th century Thunderbirds-style jetpack tech.


FAB looking Thunderbird l33t player, moments before recking your last loot crate!

Last but not least we have taken a look at the most successful features of similar games and came to the conclusion that additional bragging and gambling features are the way to forward, if we want that 4th house in Cabo for our shareholders to ensure a sense of pride and accomplishment for players as they collect different mustaches.


WIP of our booty crate system.

That pretty much wraps it up for this April first. An exciting step forwards for the franchise, if not the entire industry. Have a great Easter!

Welcome back to another Frontline News! There’s a historical battle planned this weekend by the community, and a survey for Verdun veterans and newbies alike! If you want to have your say about Verdun’s future direction (and the direction of the WW1 Game Series as a whole) then the survey is open right now.



There was a great response to our Tannenberg Survey, and more than a few people asking for an equivalent Verdun Survey… so we put one together!
You can fill out the Verdun Survey right now. We’re looking forward to getting more awesome feedback :)

Another community organized historical battle is on the way! You can sign up now for the upcoming historical battle, to be held next Sunday, April 8. Read about the details and sign up in this thread.

If you’re not familiar with these historical battles, the basic concept is that players sign up and agree to follow rules about using certain roles and weapons, and most importantly following orders from superiors. This allows more organized and focused ‘set-piece’ battles - one of our devs joined the last Verdun battle and made some GIFs of the experience. Here's one:



The x64 group don't only run historical battles - they also organize casual events and more. This post explains it all. Take a look if you're interested in joining an organized battle :)



It's not strictly Verdun news, but this latest gun teaser for Tannenberg was too cool not to share! The Roth-Steyr M1907 was the first semi-automatic pistol adopted by a branch of a major land army. It stands out with the long bolt and integral 10 round magazine loaded from the top with stripper clips.



Thanks to our player echo1 once more for their amazing combat photography (the first image in this post), and we'll see you again for the next Frontline News!

Welcome back to another Frontline News! There’s a historical battle planned this weekend by the community, and a survey for Verdun veterans and newbies alike! If you want to have your say about Verdun’s future direction (and the direction of the WW1 Game Series as a whole) then the survey is open right now.



There was a great response to our Tannenberg Survey, and more than a few people asking for an equivalent Verdun Survey… so we put one together!
You can fill out the Verdun Survey right now. We’re looking forward to getting more awesome feedback :)

Another community organized historical battle is on the way! You can sign up now for the upcoming historical battle, to be held next Sunday, April 8. Read about the details and sign up in this thread.

If you’re not familiar with these historical battles, the basic concept is that players sign up and agree to follow rules about using certain roles and weapons, and most importantly following orders from superiors. This allows more organized and focused ‘set-piece’ battles - one of our devs joined the last Verdun battle and made some GIFs of the experience. Here's one:



The x64 group don't only run historical battles - they also organize casual events and more. This post explains it all. Take a look if you're interested in joining an organized battle :)



It's not strictly Verdun news, but this latest gun teaser for Tannenberg was too cool not to share! The Roth-Steyr M1907 was the first semi-automatic pistol adopted by a branch of a major land army. It stands out with the long bolt and integral 10 round magazine loaded from the top with stripper clips.



Thanks to our player echo1 once more for their amazing combat photography (the first image in this post), and we'll see you again for the next Frontline News!