A unique part of Washington that drivers can experience are its renowned logging cliff roads. These dirt roads will certainly test the skill of any driver, as you haul heavy logging equipment, machinery and tree logs up and down these dirt roads.



We have previously shown off these challenging roads in a recent blog post, and we are eager to show you more of these beautiful but dangerous roads. Take a peek of what challenges lie ahead in this gameplay video from our upcoming map expansion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQwX_x0PnpA

And if you enjoyed that glimpse into Washington, we are hosting a special Washington stream today (on both our Twitch and Steam) featuring more gameplay of the new map expansion and special guests who were involved in the making of Washington. So make sure to tune in from 4pm UTC today!

https://steamcommunity.com/games/americantrucksimulator/announcements/detail/1815420464157583278

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1015160/American_Truck_Simulator__Washington/

We have loved sharing with you our progress on Washington, and with the final touches being made to the map, we are now ready to confirm a date...


We hope that this short trailer will give you a small glimpse on what you will be able to experience for yourself very soon.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfMXLvxqgoI
And as you can see for yourself, Washington will be rich in content for drivers to explore.

• 3,800 miles of dense road network
  
• 16 brand new cities (Vancouver, Longview, Aberdeen, Olympia, Tacoma, Seattle, Everett, Port Angeles, Bellingham, Omak, Wenatchee, Yakima, Kennewick, Grand Coulee, Spokane, Colville)
  
• More than 20 landmark bridges
  
• 10 original truckstops
  
• Keystone-Port Townsend Ferry
  
• Spokane swing bridge
  
• Grand Coulee dam
  
• Washington's iconic mountains (Mount St. Helens and Mt. Rainier)
  
• Challenging logging cliff road
  
• Dynamic speed limits and LED signs
  
• New unique cargoes: aircraft engines, piggy back trucks, boat...
  
• Large and realistic ports (Seattle, Tacoma, Everett)
  
• Many unique junctions
  
• Distinct company docks: yacht builders, vast farms, material storages...
  
• Washington-specific achievements to unlock

With the upcoming release of this map expansion, you will see news, reviews, images, and videos appearing online this coming weekend. With a plan to lift the embargo, the media as well as trusted friends of SCS Software will be able to openly start showing their footage from the map.

Additionally, on Thursday the 6th and Saturday the 8th of June we will be hosting a special Washington stream (on both our Twitch and Steam) featuring gameplay of the new map expansion and special guests who were involved in the making of Washington. They will be guiding you through this new state, hosting giveaways, talking with you in the chats and much more, so make sure to tune in from 4pm UTC on Thursday and 5pm UTC on Saturday!

Related Washington posts: announcement, urban landmarks, prefab building, logging cliff road, farming, landscapes, Kenworth Renton assembly plant, Everett aerospace factory, Mount St. Helens, bridges, Seattle, Grand Coulee Dam

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1015160/American_Truck_Simulator__Washington/

On this day in 1942, the construction of the Grand Coulee Dam was completed, after 9 years of construction.



Currently, it holds the title of not only the largest dam in the Columbia River Basin but one of the largest in the world. Located west of Spokane, it provides a whopping 2,300 megawatts of hydroelectric power across the state, which is enough power to continuously supply the needs of two cities the size of Seattle!



Taller than the Great Pyramids of Giza, at over 550ft tall from its bedrock base and spanning over a mile long, this impressive landmark has been recreated in spectacular detail using unique assets in our upcoming American Truck Simulator map expansion.



Amongst one of the new Special Transport routes which you will find in Washington, you will be able to deliver unique and heavy loads to a nearby town, which will offer dam good views of this man-made wonder.









https://store.steampowered.com/app/1015160/American_Truck_Simulator__Washington/

Seattle is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Northwest region of the USA. Becoming the fastest-growing major U.S. city in 2016 with over 3.5 million residents, it is home to some of America's largest businesses.





With its iconic skyline, famous landmarks and sport stadiums, drivers in our upcoming map expansion will have plenty of scenery to admire, as they travel on the cities' winding highways with its unique interstate junctions. Can you name any of these famous buildings?





Creating a mega-city like Seattle is no easy task for our map team; it required careful planning and decision-making to fit the scale and limitations of our map. Despite the challenges of ensuring both quality and optimization for our players, we believe we have managed to create a realistic depiction of Seattle and its landmarks.


As you admire the views from your cab, make sure to stay alert for changing speed limits on your drive past Seattle. New technology on variable message-signs will keep you informed of speed restrictions throughout your travels in this busy city.


We are sure you will find no shortage of jobs from Seattle, being the shipping gateway to Asia through its many seaports and large airports; truck drivers are always in high demand to distribute and deliver freight across the West Coast and onwards.


We are sure you will love traveling to and from the city of Seattle. With its hundreds of coffee shops, it's bound to be a truckers' paradise.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1015160/American_Truck_Simulator__Washington/

A considerable part of the eastern side of Washington has multiple bodies of water flowing around it; with the city of Seattle being surrounded by Lake Washington and Elliot Bay. Looking at a map of the state, this may seem like a logistical nightmare for any driver. To connect towns, cities, and islands, the state has built an impressive amount of Bridges.


With approximately 7,300 bridges, they form a critical transportation link for residents and industries. In our upcoming map expansion for American Truck Simulator, you will be able to drive on over 20 of these unique and landmark bridges; which have been re-created in impressive detail with unique assets and mechanics. One such example of this is the steamboat slough swing bridge located in Everett, which was built in 1954.







From floating bridges, fantastic views over state parks, you can truss us that there will be lots to explore in Washington.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/1015160/American_Truck_Simulator__Washington/

On this day back in 1980, Mount St. Helens erupted in the largest Volcanic event in U.S. history. The devastating effects of this disaster resulted in the loss of over 150 square miles of forest, homes, railways, and roads.





Located 96 miles south of Seattle, it has since become a National Park and more importantly a world-famous natural laboratory for the study of volcanoes and how nature responds to a catastrophe. Standing at 8,365ft tall after the eruption, the mountain is still a very impressive sight.





Just as magnificent as the view was how our map designer team was able to re-create this landmark. The area was designed in fantastic detail using satellite imagery and land-scans.





In our upcoming Washington State expansion, drivers will be able to drive down to a beautiful viewing spot of Mount St Helens with surrounding forests starting to grow again. This combined with locally adjusted draw distance makes for an impressive sight. It will be hard for you to believe you are only a short journey away from the city.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1015160/American_Truck_Simulator__Washington/

At any given time there are on average over 9,000 commercial aircraft flying above us in the skies, and it's a good chance that one of those aircraft was built in Washington. Located in Everett you can find the states largest aerospace factory, which can produce up to an impressive 20 commercial aircraft a month.




The size of a small city, the buildings real-life counterpart holds the record for the Worlds Largest Building which has enough space to fit 13 Empire State Buildings inside its walls. As you can imagine, it would take a large workforce for everything to run according to schedule in such a huge space, and truck drivers hold a very important role in the operation of this industry.





In the upcoming Washington State expansion for American Truck Simulator, drivers will be able to deliver to and from this impressive factory; transporting aircraft parts as well as driving a new Special Transport route for heavy and unique components. The Everett factory has also been created using unique prefabs based on the real building which makes for an impressive sight for anyone driving past.



We can't wait for you to explore this unique industry for yourself! In the meantime, why not add Washington State to your Steam Wishlist?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1015160/American_Truck_Simulator__Washington/

Since version 1.34 for American Truck Simulator was more of a maintenance update, we understand how eager you all are for the 1.35 Open Beta - which is finally here!



Where to start? This update is yet again larger than any of its predecessors - and when we say "larger", we mean a LOT! There are changes in almost every part of our game, so let's get on it!


American Truck Simulator will receive two new roads, OR-58 and CA-299. OR-140 will also feature the final segment of its length. The Arizona sign system has also been improved along with Traffic lights (coming in later builds of the Open Beta) which have been re-worked for all current states.


Besides the various new trailers listed in the change-log (B-doubles of all types, chip van trailers, container trailers, etc) and new cargoes, vehicles in our game also received some new features. This includes three windscreen wiper settings which will help drivers handle the improved rain, an accessory browser for owned trailers, expandable container trailers and a copy function for your truck and trailer configuration - which will come in handy, as your company continues to grow.

From the list of new general additions, some longtime wishes take first spots. One of those is a highly demanded option to use your own trailers for external contracts (World of Trucks jobs). From now on, you can!

DX11 experimental support. It's exactly as it sounds - most of the work on DX11 support is done, so the majority of its aspects are working quite well in our games and feedback from Experimental Beta promises a nice increase of FPS.  Still - it's not in its final state, so use it only at your own risk. Although we'll be grateful for your feedback.



Now comes a number of "smaller" additions, based mostly on your suggestions. A large amount of new hireable drivers have been added, so as your trucking empire grows you can expand much more than previously. To help with that growth, we've also added an option to purchase garages online (without the need of having to discover the city previously).


Another helpful feature is emergency refuelling, which will be an important option for those loving to drive on the edge (why do so many of you like to go with empty tanks?). And to make your travels a little bit more diverse and interesting, you'll now see STAA doubles in traffic.


Considering all these changes, the UI had to change drastically. Players who helped us by entering the Experimental Beta have reported no serious issues with it, so we hope you'll have no problems as well. And to close the list, there're many new input improvements and official support for external peripheries.

So enjoy all the new additions, but please remember: It's only an open beta, not a stable public version - so you may encounter bugs, instability, kinks or crashes. It's completely okay if you want to wait for the final release. But if you're interested in helping us to move there faster, we'll appreciate all of your feedback on our forum and your bug reports in this section.

If you wish to participate in the open beta, you can find this version in the public_beta branch on Steam. The way to access it is as follows: Steam client → LIBRARY → right click on American Truck Simulator → Properties → Betas tab → public_beta → 1.35 public beta. No password required.


MAP

• New roads: OR-58 (Oregon DLC), CA-299 and another segment of OR-140 + Arizona signs improvement
  https://steamcommunity.com/games/americantrucksimulator/announcements/detail/2603552833093700029
• Traffic lights improvement (all states)
  https://steamcommunity.com/games/americantrucksimulator/announcements/detail/1620644023166552984

VEHICLES

• Ownable container trailers
  https://steamcommunity.com/games/americantrucksimulator/announcements/detail/1819924505115654527
• Regular owned trailer accessory browser
• Trailer run-time adjustment (extendable trailers, sliding tandems)
• Copy truck/trailer configuration across the fleet
• Wiper setting improvements
• Ownable B-double trailers (all types)
• Ownable chip van trailers
• Saddle-mounted truck transport (KW T680)
  https://steamcommunity.com/games/americantrucksimulator/announcements/detail/1648790886583445844
• Specialized boat trailer

FEATURES

• Owned trailers usable in External contracts (WoTR)
• Online garage purchase
• Refuelling service
• Input improvement (Steam controller support, Tobii eye tracker support, controller hotplug support, better FF on Linux)
  https://steamcommunity.com/games/227300/announcements/detail/1648790886611500736
• RAZER RGB support (colour lights)
  https://steamcommunity.com/games/americantrucksimulator/announcements/detail/1620644023173261723
• New options: truck stability, suspension, dual localization names (map)
• Lots of new drivers to hire
• STAA doubles in traffic
• Experimental DX11 support (config only, r_device "dx11")

MOD ALERT

• Modded trucks support (in-game function)
• COG moved from trailer def to trailer chassis (easier edit)
• Wipers delay+speed format
• Removed default trailer bracers sound (now empty default)
• Cargo model randomized (eg container)
• Timezone areas (introduced in 1.34)
• Transmission mode names

Reminder: We are streaming right now on our developer page!

https://steamcommunity.com/games/americantrucksimulator/announcements/detail/1620644023202383962

We would like to thank you all for your massive support on last week's 1.35 Preview Stream for Euro Truck Simulator 2. We are very thrilled to find out that over 25,000 of you have tuned in with us. As promised, we will be doing a similar stream for American Truck Simulator.

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The 1.35 Preview Stream for American Truck Simulator will be held on Thursday, 9 May 2019, from 15:00 CET (17:00 CEST) on Steam and Twitch. We will be showing you some of the new features coming to 1.35 for American Truck Simulator, with a focus on the new additional roads and map improvements made across the entire map. You will also hear one of our lead map designers, Jakub, who will give you an insight on the map creation process. To put the cherry on the cake, we will be giving away another Tobii Eye Tracker 4C, as well as game/DLC keys too! More details on how to enter the giveaway will be announced on the stream.
During last week's giveaway of the Tobii tracker, the hashtag #ETS2Tobii was posted on Instagram and Twitter more than 200 times!



We are happy to announce that the lucky winner of the giveaway is Wesley (@wesmanboy). We will be contacting you soon to help you claim your prize.
For those who have missed our previous stream, or are curious to find out how the Tobii eye tracker works in our games, here's a very short gameplay snippet of reverse-parking while using the device.



We had an amazing time doing last week's stream. Don't forget to mark your calendars and join us for another fun stream later this week, where we will show you the features coming to v1.35 of American Truck Simulator. Another Tobii Eye Tracker 4C is up for grabs!