Hello there seadogs! We've got another small but relatively significant update for you all this week with some changes to the weapons in Blazing Sails.

We've seen a lot of pirates falling back to the same loadouts again and again to the point where it became obvious some of the weapons were too dominant. Namely the musket and sniper rifles. Some of the sidearms weren't getting much love either due to them being overshadowed by the stronger weapons. So we took another good look at the balance and did some changes to hopefully put all the weapons in the game on a more even playing field. We ideally want every weapon in the game to be viable and serve a purpose. The multi barrel weapons for example weren't solid enough in combat versus the one shot weapons which were quite fast to reload and therefor overall more reliable than multi shot weapons. With today's balancing update one shot weapons have received a slower reload time which should make the multi shot weapons a more attractive choice. We've also tweaked the fire rate of some of the sidearms to allow them to shoot their bullets faster to increase their DPS.

Of course changes like these are based on feedback and what we see from the community. Nor are these changes or any changes we make ever final. If things turn out to be worse, we will have another look and as many after that as needed to get it right. We are still very much in early access and still molding the game to get the overall experience as awesome and balanced as possible.

Full patch notes below:

• Dragon pistol reload time increased from 2.3s to 2.5s
  
• Musket reload time increased from 1.8s to 2.3s
  
• Fast Sniper reload time increased from 1.8s to 2.2s
  
• Heavy Sniper reload time increased from 1.8s to 2.5s
  
• Crossbow reload time increased from 1.8s to 2.5s
  
• Flintlock reload time increased from 1.3s to 1.8s
  
• Quad Barrel flintlock fire cooldown decreased from 0.35s to 0.20s
  
• Dual Flintlock fire cooldown decreased from 0.25s to 0.10s
  
• Dual Flintlock projectile damage decreased from 40 to 35
  
• Dual Quad Barrel flintlocks fire rate decreased from 0.25s to 0.18s

• Jolly Roger flag emblem and sail emblem made a bit bigger

• You can now manually set the time it takes to drop your own anchor (min 0 seconds to max 1 second)

• Dragon Pistol gold material made a bit more shiny (was appearing too flat colored due to a mistake in the material)

• Dragon Pistol headshot kills now show a kill confirm message as intended
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the camera shake to still play from cannons when zoomed in with a sniper
  
• Ship stats should now always show to correct stats

Like this update? Let us know on Discord!

Yarr me hearties! T'is time for another update.

This week we're spicing up the playground with a new and powerful weapon, the Dragon Pistol. There are pirates and there are pirates if you know what I mean. The latter kind knows the importance of a good pistol. When facing an opponent in combat it's important to not only dominate but also look good doing it. We've got you covered!

Seek and equip the the new Dragon Pistol to take your fancyness to the next level. Reload in style and blast those pesky boarders in the face to send them on a one way trip to the locker.

Beside making sure you pirates can keep your cool on we've also improved the game's experience with new features such as a profanity filter for the in-game chat, an FPS counter and a small interaction time to drop the anchor.

Full patch notes below:

• The Dragon Pistol has been added firing a 57 damage bullet that kills instantly with a headshot. It's item rarity is Tier 4 (purple)

• Pistol type idle animations improved. Pistol hand pose should be cleaner.
  
• Added some tint variation to the ship wood planks

• Optional profanity filter added to hide most common swear words (still work in progress, will be improved over time as more words are black listed and exceptions are white listed)
  
• You can now also hide chat messages from players completely (command messages and kill feed remains visible)

• FPS and ms counter option added

• Dropping the anchor now takes 0.5 seconds
  
• Dropping the anchor as an enemy now takes 2 seconds
  
• Anchor dropping progress gets reset every time you take damage
  
• You no longer receive a camera shake when zooming in with a sniper while cannons are fired closeby
  
• Treasure chests now always spawn at least tier 3 items (used to be tier 1) which increases the probability to find better items in treasure chests
  
• Containers now also show the item weight and percentage of the inventory the item or item stack occupies
  
• Blunderbuss pellet spread reduced from 0.2 to 0.15

• Floating wood crates should be easier to interact with now (interaction sometimes wouldn't show)
  
• Fixed a bug that allowed players to zoom in or aim down sight while reloading

Like this update? Let us know on Discord!

Ahoy Mateys! Hope you're enjoying the Lunar Update so far. Make sure you get those few extra cosmetics while you still can! The Lunar event will end on the 25th next week. In the meantime we've got another update for you scallywags!

Check out the patchnotes:

• Upper staircase and higher platform removed
  
• Lower hull staircase moved forward a bit
  
• Ship ladders moved forward a bit more (so they appear more central)
  
• Front mast and sails size increased a bit
  
• Stern reworked to appear more elegant
  
• Added a rope between the two crows nests for easy traversal between the two
  
• Fortification rings added to both masts

• Ship ladders revamped (rope attachments can be seen from the deck making it easier to see where enemies pop up when climbing a ladder)
  
• Rope to crows nest changed to a rope ladder

• Ships now have two types of flags (one normal flag on the main mast and one triangular with no emblem on the secondary (front) mast - the triangular flag will later become an unlockable)

• The ship menu now shows handy ship statistics and a small description (translations will follow)

• Respawn time is now reduced based on the amount of players in a crew (4 players = 100%, 3 players = 85%, 2 players = 65% and 1 player = 50%)

• TNT barrels now cause less ship damage when exploded on the ground (2 x 2 ship damage instead of 3 x 4 ship damage)

• Item tooltips now show how much the items weighs
  
• Hovering over an item or stack of items in your inventory will now highlight the amount of space it takes

• Melee damage now shows the correct damage amount (global melee damage multiplier was not taken into account yet)
  
• Blunderbuss and nockgun (shotgun type weapons) now also show a small pellet icon

• Getting stuck in primary fire mode should be fixed
  
• Getting stuck in secondary fire mode should be fixed
  
• Zooming in and out in the worldmap no longer changes the steering wheel view mode

Like this update? Let us know on Discord!

Ahoy! We're rolling out a small hotfix again to fix a few bugs and with some ship collision improvements.

• Ships should no longer overlap / intersect during boarding or close ship combat

• Fixed some performance issues with the elevators
  
• Fixed some performance issues with the masts
  
• Fixed some performance issues with the username widgets

• Fixed a bug that caused projectile impact effects not to appear when firing from one ship to another
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the character to become two floating arms and a torso when using the world map while viewing the steering wheel in third person mode
  
• Fixed a small visual offset in the cannon UI
  
• Fixed some materials that didn't have red outline implemented yet such as the straw hat and other hats with rope-like materials
  
• The 50 initial wood planks should now be visible in the barrel
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the flags to be rotated 180 degrees

Like this hotfix? Let us know on Discord!

Ahoy! We're rolling out some small changes / fixes following-up yesterday's bigger update.

• Fixed some performance issues with the ships
  
• Fixed some performance issues with the water
  
• Fixed some performance issues with the masts

• You can now view your character in third person while using the steering wheel (use mouse wheel to swap between first person mode and third person mode) - known bug: when using the worldmap your character becomes two floating arms, will be fixed tomorrow
  
• Ships now start with 50 wood - known bug: Wood barrel doesn't visually show the 50 initial wood planks yet, will be fixed tomorrow

• Fixed a bug with the fire animations that wouldn't play due to the automatic reload happening too fast
  
• Fixed a bug that sometimes caused the party leader ship to be your own ship
  
• Fixed some collision issues in the new Lunar Lands

Like this hotfix? Let us know on Discord!

Ahoy me hearteys!

The Lunar New Year will soon be upon us (depending on when you're reading this)! That means it's time for Blazing Sails' Lunar Lands update. This is potentially our biggest update yet, with a new island, new cosmetics, a new feature, and TONS of QoL updates!




As with every major update, this one brings an all-new set of islands with it: The Lunar Lands. These massive rocky pillars are connected through walkways and bridges, and make for excellent sniping spots. You'll find the Lunar Lands in the North, between the Trident and Bandit Bay clusters!



Do you aim your cannons too high? Are you constantly surprised by the incredible laser accuracy of the patented Blazing Sails Cannons™? Well, now you too can be of use, with sail damage! When you hit an enemy sail, it will take some damage, causing their ship to slow down.



Want to learn more about sail damage? Check out our earlier sneak peek (or play the game!)

To further celebrate the Lunar New Year, we've created a bunch of oxcellent and oxciting new cosmetics for you to get yer grubby hands on! Always wanted to be a pirate wearing a dragon hat? Same here, that's why we made 'em.



To get you started, you'll get these special Lunar lantern flag and sail emblems if you fire up the game during this event!



New stuff is exciting, we know. But you know what else gets the blood pumping? Quality of life changes and optimizations, and this update brings a lot of those! You can check out the full patch notes below, but here's a few commonly requested features that we've implemented:

• You can now see the wind direction while behind the wheel
  
• An ADS slider has been added
  
• Pirate and ship loadouts can now be saved
  
• In-game weapon stats have been implemented
  
• Dropping the anchor will now allow for much tighter turns (multi-wave drifting!)
  
• Colorblind players rejoice, you can now change the color of the deadzone!

• The Lunar Lands have been added in the north (between Trident's Fall and Bandit Bay)

• Sail damage has been added (hit your masts using the hammer to repair)
  
• Equiping your hammer will now show a sail HP widget on each mast of your ship
  
• Anti-Sail cannonballs added (they cause 15 sail damage while other cannonballs only cause 5 sail damage)

Event exclusive Items:

• Lunar Knot Sail Emblem
  
• Ox Sail Emblem
  
• Lunar Dragon Sail Emblem
  
• Lunar Knot Flag Emblem
  
• Ox Flag Emblem
  
• Red, White and Black Dragon Hat
  
• Black, Yellow and Red Dragon Hat
  
• Red, White and Black Lion Hat
  
• Black, Yellow and Red Lion Hat
  
• Green and Beige Dragon Hat
  
• Black, Red and Yellow Dragon Hat
  
• Purple and Yellow Dragon Hat
  
• Black and Bordeaux Dragon Hat
  
• Green, Yellow and Red Lion Hat
  
• Purple, Black and Pink Lion Hat
  
• Yellow, White and Red Lion Hat
  
• White, Red and Yellow Lion Hat
  
• Gold and Red Dragon Hat
  
• Blue and White Dragon Hat
  
• Gold and Red Lion Hat
  
• White and Blue Lion Hat

New non-event Items:

• Beige and Black Straw Hat
  
• Black and Red Straw Hat
  
• Beige Straw Hat
  
• Red and Beige Straw Hat
  
• Black Straw Hat
  
• Blue Straw Hat
  
• Dark Green Straw Hat
  
• Dark Green and Red Straw Hat
  
• Pink and Beige Straw Hat
  
• Left Bright Red Footwrap
  
• Right Bright Red Footwrap
  
• Left Blue Footwrap
  
• Right Blue Footwrap
  
• Left Green Footwrap
  
• Right Green Footwrap
  
• Left Brown Sandal
  
• Right Brown Sandal
  
• Left Red Sandal
  
• Right Red Sandal
  
• Left Blue Sandal
  
• Right Blue Sandal
  
• Left Green Sandal
  
• Right Green Sandal
  
• Left Purple Sandal
  
• Right Purple Sandal
  
• Left Young Bamboo Pegleg
  
• Right Young Bamboo Pegleg
  
• Left Old Bamboo Pegleg
  
• Right Old Bamboo Pegleg
  
• Mom Tattoo
  
• Double Fish Scale Sleeve Tattoo
  
• Left Fish Scale Sleeve Tattoo
  
• Right Fish Scale Sleeve Tattoo
  
• Mister Moustache Shoulder Tattoo
  
• Diamond Tattoo
  
• Octopus Tattoo
  
• Crossed Swords Tattoo

• Pirate outfit preset saving added (click the list icon in pirate to open the preset menu)
  
• Ship style preset saving (click the list icon in ship to open preset menu)
  
• You can save outfits / styles, remove them, rename them and overwrite them

• Cannon UI now shows an actionbar listing all the cannonballs you have with you and now includes hotkeys to quickly select a specific cannonball type

• Weapon tooltips now show some weapon stats like damage, reload speed, ...
  
• Special weapons with AOE damage, vampiric damage or with a scope now a have special symbol in the weapons tooltip
  
• Weapons now show a rarity color (white = tier 1, green = tier 2, blue = tier 3, purple = tier 4, yellow = tier 5)

• Snipers rifles (fast sniper and heavy sniper) now have a breathing wobble while aiming down the scope
  
• You can hold shift or spacebar to hold your breath for a short moment to get a steady aim (keybind will follow shortly)

• You can now change the color of the deadzone in any color you want (for colorblindness or just for fun, setting located in gameplay options)
  
• You can now change the camera sensitivity while aiming down sight seperately

• You now automatically pick up as much as you can carry when an item stack is more than your inventory can take

• Glass bottle damage increased from 12 to 17
  
• You can now see the wind direction (lines) while using the steering wheel
  
• Trapshot rarity decreased again from tier 4 to tier 3
  
• Trapshot loading time increased from 3 seconds to 5 seconds
  
• Anti-cannonballs loading time increased from 3 seconds to 5 seconds
  
• Trapshot projectile drop now same as heavy cannonballs
  
• Explosive barrel impact damage reduced from 12 to 4 damage
  
• Explosive barrel AOE ship damage increased from 2x 2 damage points to 3x 4 damage points
  
• "Marked a location" voiceline can no longer be spammed (you can still spam the actual marker though, but the voice line will only play once every 2 seconds)
  
• Ships now tilt much more when turning during anchor drop
  
• Weapon spread will now also be applied when jumping or in air (falling)
  
• Weapons are no longer reloadable while aiming down the sight, they reload automatically when going out of aim down sight though

• New cannonball flight sound

• "They corked us" and "We're sinking" voicelines now use the voice and pitch you have selected

• Ship culling has been added which should greatly improve performance with many ships
  
• Ships that are behind obstacles are massively reduced in cost
  
• Ship interiors are massively reduced in cost when interior is not visible

• Invisible player bug should be fixed
  
• You no longer get sprint blocked when blocking a melee attack, only when you receive actual damage
  
• Fixed a collision gap on the brigantine (you could fall through the floor in front of the upper staircase)
  
• Fixed a bug that showed 0 open slots in green instead of red sometimes
  
• Fixed a bug that would make the bow figure uncolored sometimes
  
• Fixed a bug that sometimes made the beard uncolored (white)
  
• Sorting on free crew slots should now work as intended
  
• Fixed a bug that caused party members to always switch back to unready whenever a new player joined the party
  
• Fixed a bug that caused selected cosmetics not to be highlighted as selected in the pirate and ship menu
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the capstan to move off center after a while
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the cursor to jump to the end when trying to edit ship name in the middle
  
• Fixed some incorrect offsets in the body settings menu screen
  
• Fixed a bug that caused teammates to appear with a red outline for a short moment after using the worldmap
  
• Fixed a bug that caused the weapon spread to be only vertical (now horizontal and vertical)

Like this update? Let us know on Discord!

Ahoy ye scurvy Seadogs! In preparation of our upcoming BIG LUNAR UPDATE (coming soon™) we'd like to share a little preview of the sail damage we'll be adding soon. No longer will you look like a fool for shooting a tad too high and missing the hull, because sails will soon become a juicy target.

And we'll make the joke for you. Yes, Blazing Sails will soon have actual blazing sails.

Without further ado, check out the video below for the full sail damage preview!



It's very simple: damaged sails will cause your ship to sail slower the more damaged they are. Luckily sail damage can easily be repaired by hammering the mast and doesn't require any resource!

Speaking from experience (we've had sail damage during the pre-alpha) we know this feature adds a lot of extra depth to the gameplay and rewards teamwork even more. While the hull will stay the most important thing to repair during a match, sail damage and thus sailing speed can heavily impact the outcome of a game. Especially now with the recently added, agile Junk Ship we felt like this was the perfect time to re-introduce this feature to the game. Also during chase-situations damaging the sails can come in quite handy.

Yes! And not only that. We've added a new special cannonball type to the game: "The Anti-Sail Cannonball". This is a commonly found type of ball that does a lot of sail damage. All other cannonballs can also damage sails but do far less damage than the Anti-Sail. Thus, they are less effective at damaging sails.



While we think having even more resources is not preferable at this point we know from testing (we also had cloth in the prototype) that the need for a resource for type of damage is highly unpractical. Imagine being out in the ocean, your sails completely shredded, you look in your inventory and what do you NOT see? Cloth. You're stranded. (in the deadzone maybe) Have fun sailing at 1 meter per hour to any island or crates. Hence, this would greatly reduce the fast-paced flow of the game.



That about wraps it up pirates! Hope you're excited for the upcoming update!

Like this sneak peek thingy? Let us know on Discord!

Ahoy! We're rolling out some small changes / fixes following-up yesterday's bigger update.

• Weapons now always drop from defeated players even when they are respawning or using a vehicle
  
• Trapshot rarity changed to tier 4 (from tier 3)

• Can no longer enter vehicles from the air while not on a ship

• Kraken roar should work again now (it's also more optimized now)
  
• Sprays should work again
  
• Blunderbuss now has the proper weapon name in the inventory (no longer called "Butcher's Knife")
  
• Smoothing group issue fixed on small woodplank in the front on the Brigantine

Like this hotfix? Let us know on Discord!

Ahoy mateys!

We hope you’ve been enjoying the Kraken Keep and Icy Caverns, because the next island is already on the horizon. Let’s take a look at the upcoming Lunar New Year update.

Ladies and gentle-pirates, soon Blazing Sails will finally have ACTUAL BLAZING SAILS:

Here's a WIP sneak peek:



You probably know the feeling of aiming too high and seeing your cannonball magically whizz through an enemy sail. Well, no more! With the Lunar New Year update, we will be adding sail damage. Damaged sails will cause your ship to sail slower. Of course, these can be repaired easily by simply hammering your masts. This added feature will add an extra twist to the current gameplay and can be very handy during a chase situation.

The Lunar Lands are a collection of steep rocks connected by wooden bridges. Though it has been long since abandoned, there’s still plenty of loot to be found, and the tall buildings make for excellent sniping spots!

Here's a little foretaste




Of course, no celebration is complete without some new cosmetics! We’ve got some oxcellent ideas cooked up for the year of the ox. Stay tuned for more.


Without further ado, here's the updated roadmap:



Find a full resolution version here.


To those asking for better optimisation -- we hear you! Our new team members are eager to jump on this issue. We've recently recruited a new programmer at Get Up Games to help further polish and improve Blazing Sails. We've also found an external partner that will focus on nativising our project. If all goes well this should definitely improve the overall performance. Later this year we've got a few interns joining our team. We believe they'll be able to learn a lot during their stay but also contribute in the further development of our game.

Long story short: some nice updates and optimisations are on the way. The future is looking bright and we simply can't wait to continue further development!

On top of all that we've got a Daily Deal Sale going on right now! (Praise our lord and saviour Gaben) Get Blazing Sails at 25% off right now! The sale will end on the 27th of this month at 7pm CET. So what arrrr ye' waiting for scallywag? Grab it while it's hot!!



Let us know what you think about our updated Roadmap on Discord!

Ahoy ye scallywags!

If a cannon fires in the distance, but no one is around to hear it, does it still make a sound? The answer to that is yes, and with today's update, it'll make a much cooler sound than before! And it's not just regular cannons -- swivels and fast snipers also got a bit of an auditory upgrade.

There's some other changes that you've been requesting, like smoother transitions when jumping from ship to ship, and player weapons dropping when their team is defeated!

• New cannon sounds
  
• New swivel cannon sounds
  
• New fast sniper firing sound
  
• Some water and ship sounds slightly reduced in volume
  
• Cannon sounds optimized (consumes less audio channels)
  
• Distant sounds added to all weapons
  
• New cannonball air travel sound

• Characters jumping from ship to ship should no longer teleport away for a split second (transition should be smoother)
  
• When dropping weapons in the water they will now go up and down with the waves
  
• Junk ship frontal damage points moved a bit so they no longer appear inside the hangmats
  
• Player weapon drops:
  
• All weapons now drop from a player if his team is defeated or when he disconnects

• Sprint is now blocked for 1 second by any type of damage, not only melee anymore

• Turning speed now increases and decreases depending on ship speed and no longer depending on sail deployment (sharper turns when anchored)
  
• Turning speed is now slightly faster when stationary (60% when going full speed and 100% when stationary, half speed would be 80%)

• Removed some leftover components from the character (cleanup)
  
• Improved collision performance on character

• Fixed a bug that caused turning speed to be slowest instead of fastest when stationary until you used the sails
  
• Fixed a bug that caused more than 16 players to be able to join pre-game servers
  
• Bow mounted barrels should now work again
  
• Fixed "Not enough room" warning when trying to steal ship items with a full inventory
  
• Fixed incorrect metal rope attachment points LOD material

Like this update? Let us know on Discord!