Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront - Herr Flick
Strategy lovers! The fastest growing RTS community is calling you through a historically high discount on everything in our WW2 bundle. If immersion is something you seek, this is the perfect moment to dive into Gates of Hell. Our weekend deal offer has ended, but the sale continues!
Considering the large number of players that still have Gates of Hell on their wishlist, we continue the sale, which will now end on Thursday, January 18th! The discount remains at an all- time high for the duration.
So, if you'd like to try something else for a change (like first person view for your tank, and 3rd person view for infantry), or if you like it realistic, or simply because you have a passion for history; this is the moment. Don't miss out!
Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront - Herr Flick
Community members! Our first blog of 2024 is about human models, or “humanskins”, in Call to Arms - Gates of Hell. Our in-house skin artist (no, not a tattoo artist) is working on some new material. Read all about what it takes and what you can expect from him in the next community update. Also, be aware that we are on sale right now. Even Liberation comes at a discount, and the bundle has a record-high discount too! Click below:
The next community update for Call to Arms-Gates of Hell will feature a full rework of the German faction’s models to the same, if not better, standard as the U.S. models which will also be receiving an improvement to their RAM and VRAM usage.
Creating 3d characters and their equipment is a long and arduous process that requires a lot of attention to detail in very specific areas. Since the release of Gates of Hell: Ostfront, the human models have steadily improved. This goes for models, methods, and optimization strategies.
The Liberation DLC showcased that our new methods work for the GEM engine for 3D characters, and we plan to apply it to all other factions gradually. Germany is the first target, as it is the most diverse and complex faction in terms of the number of different, unique models for their uniforms. Other nations are to follow; mind you, this will take us a long time to complete.
This marks the start of our campaign to bring the human models for all factions to the same quality level. Let’s take a look at some of the new material:
Seen here is just a taste of the deep customization the Germans (and in future updates, Soviet/Finnish) troops will have. The sheer amount of variants for every uniform is extremely vast and modular. Not only that, the RAM and VRAM consumption for these models will be under half of the current models.
Very little detail has been left un-modeled as even the straps of which gear attaches to the belt are given enough fidelity to see how they work and keep items of equipment attached to the rig.
Pictured as well is something done extensively with the USA (and now German) gear selections; gradual wear and opening of certain pouches which for whatever the soldier’s reasons have been undone. Small details like these can help add to a varying degree of looks that either modders, or our mission scripters wish to utilize.
Headwear for the Germans will be expanded as well; we will be adding more variations and detail, based on all of the different functions they had. Not pictured here are the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine uniforms which were unique to their factions within the German military. Rest assured they shall be covered and as such are currently in development. All in all, will these be good additions? Let us know in the comments!
Planning
Besides human models, there will be more in the next community update. Release has yet to be scheduled; we’ll tell you more about it in future blogs. In the meantime, as we have mentioned before, work on the next DLC has already started. We’re not ready to announce it yet, but we will tell you as soon as possible. So far, we are full speed ahead to fulfill our plans for 2024 and 2025. Stay tuned!
Did you know?
All 3d models that have to do with humans (specifically uniforms) are usually categorized as ‘humanskins’. This is not a standard name for the industry, we inherited it with the engine.
The same artist who produces the “humanskins” is also working on new human animations!
In GoH, the US was the first faction to be designed from the ground up to have completely modular uniforms, from their gear to their different clothing items.
Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront - Herr Flick
Community members! We have some exciting news for you: we are running a weekend deal, which is an excellent opportunity for everyone to become aware of the game and try their hand at Call to Arms - Gates of Hell. Even Liberation comes at a discount for the first time, and the bundle has a record-high discount too! Click below:
The year 2024 is definitely off to a good start for us, as we have been selected by Steam to be on the front page promo this weekend. To find ourselves on the storefront of Steam with the weekend deal is just awesome! Since Liberation was a success, we have a lot of plans to bring even more to the game this year. We will bring you up to speed on the first results of our work in the next devblog.
In a nutshell, our plans for 2024 are to improve the game in all aspects, so the entire community benefits. We will be adding one or two new game modes in 2024, and we have begun working on the next faction. We are not ready to reveal the next DLC yet, but this is another very exciting project that will add a new layer to the experience for sure. So stay tuned for more, and don’t forget to tell your friends:
Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront - Herr Flick
Community members! We wish you a happy new year, wherever you are.
After counting down to 2024, we now count down to the end of the winter sale. Are you aware that you could complete your CtA- Gates of Hell collection, or surprise your friend with a gift - at a huge discount? Start the year with something new and get up to 75% discount while you can, and join the fastest growing RTS community today!
Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront - Herr Flick
Community members! Just in time for the Steam Winter Sale, we have expanded the Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Liberation DLC with new content. Besides that, we have some bug fixes and the latest QoL changes. In this diary, we will only highlight the most important changes, and link you to the full changelog, as usual. Also, for the second time in short succession, Call to Arms - Gates of Hell is on sale, and the discount is up there. Have a look:
We mentioned one or two new units coming to “Liberation” earlier. This update adds:
Sherman M4A1 Mine Roller
Cargo Trailer ¼ Ton (Ammo Trailer)
5cm KwK 39 L/60 turret emplacement
German campaign briefing videos
We finished and added the German campaign briefing videos. In combination with all the mission improvements we have made, it’s a great time to explore the ‘Festung Europa’ campaign in this upcoming festive season.
As always, we are committed to ensuring fair play and preserving the fun and integrity of our multiplayer environment. We’ve made some improvements to our anti-cheat system.
Other
This update comes with a lot of other developments and improvements, such as the mechanic that has wooden telephone poles disintegrate when hit, a bit like trees do. We fixed a bug where destroyed models influenced performance, so that’s another little step. There are a lot of changes we haven’t highlighted specifically yet; if you want to be fully informed, there’s always our change- log, you can find it HERE. For those who prefer the short version, besides the long list of additions and changes, there is also a good number of fixes that will be introduced with the next version.
And then, there’s the Steam winter sale! The discount is up there, and gifting Call to Arms - Gates of Hell finally became possible a while ago, in case you didn't notice. This sale will undoubtedly grow the community even further than it has, which is exactly what we do sales for. So go ahead and tell all your friends about the ridiculous discount. And don’t forget that with Christmas just around the corner, our WW2 bundle is also the perfect gamer gift. Click on the banner below to check it out:
Added T1E3 M4A1 75 Sherman Mine roller for USA conquest and MP(t1e3_m4a1_75)
Added Ammo Trailer 1/4 ton for USA conquest (ammo_trailer_usa)
Added 5cm KwK39 L/60 to Liberation DLC (50mm_kwk39_platform)
Added briefings videos for Germany Liberation campaign missions
Added destruction to wooden electrical poles (similar to trees)
Added towing weight information to unit icons
Added MSAA 8x and Anisotropic 16x to video options
Added [Liberation] or [Talvisota] tags to Multiplayer map names for easier recognition
Added new USA talks (voices) for Medics (V1 and V2)
Added new USA talks (voices) for Tanks (V2 and V3)
Fixed mesh-decal render info corruption that caused huge FPS drop when some vehicles were destroyed. Common case was 155mm GPT in Pointe Du Hoc mission
Fixed trigger actions sync in coop (caused enemy units to teleport on top of players)
Fixed crash that could occur when entering direct control of a human
Conquest
Added the German platform cannons to DCG Utah Beach & new AA guns to DCG Crisbecq battery
Fixed minor issues on DCG Deulin and DCG Hotton
Fixed 155mm_schneider_us from spawning extra crewman in middle of map in conquest
Fixed flying object on DCG gullheim airfield
Fixed broken texture on DCG Sieg river
Fixed bridge to ground transition on DCG Vainikalan
Fixed bm13 icon in conquest
Fixed Liberation DCG maps trying to play wrong music file
Fixed preload of "conquest_blank"
Fixed CP cost of m4a3_75w in conquest
Fixed badly placed car in front of a mg on dcg_heistern
Changed Landsverk L-62 to show up a little later in conquest fought against AI Finland
Multiplayer
Added [Liberation] or [Talvisota] tags to Multiplayer map names for easier recognition
Added dynamite to Finnish engineer soldiers in early, mid, and late war
Added obstacle volumes to 1v1 forssa dam cliffs to help with pathing
Fixed bridge pathing on MP Vitebsk
Fixed bots buying the wrong Stug3g in late war MP
Fixed cost of Blau Rifleman in Mid and Late war (was 48 instead of 18)
Updated 4v4 Purple heart lane by opening some paths through hedgerows for balance
Increased cost of all stealth squads by 5 DP
Increased cooldown timers of all stealth squads to be consistent with tier 4 cooldowns
Single Player
Added briefings videos for Germany Liberation campaign missions
Added Briefings videos for Germany Liberation campaign with (Chinese subs)
Fixed autosave causing unit assignment issues in hotton mission
Fixed inaccurate headgear for the Red Army in the Winter War missions
Fixed Soviet singleplayer mission snipers not working
Fixed in campaign missions coop scenario cloning triggers causing talks to play more than once
Updated skirmish logics since new binaries fixed action command sync
Removed in campaign missions obsolete calls to localizations or events that do not exist
USA Mission 1 "Day of Days" - Fixed so that all fx explosions spawned via script on water and beach work in cooperative as well. - Fixed lca exits sequence as various events caused not all soldiers to exit such as addition of lca 3 exploding without check if soldiers got out, since lca were impreg on at the time. - Fixed all lca to happen faster. - Fixed plane in intro to actually look more like its hitting the lca.
USA Mission 3 "Operation Cobra" - Fixed positions of mguns/mortars/guns/tanks/infantry
USA Mission 4 "Mortain Counterattack" - Fixed actor fire sequences to stop after targets destroyed in scenarios so they don't keep firing at destroyed target. (pak40/panther) - Fixed certain scenario talks not played because using wrong event check
USA Mission 5 "Falaise Pocket" - Added a few more German vehicles to the reinforcement roster for more variation - Fixed mg/mortar/gun positions, placed enemy soldiers in more logical positions: trenches, emplacements - Updated specular settings for environment (ground was too shiny)
USA Mission 6 "Battle of Hurtgen Forest" - Added flak88 in first ring along with few more infantry in area - Added a few more German vehicles to the reinforcement roster for more variation - Fixed mg/mortar/gun positions, placed enemy soldiers in more logical positions: trenches, emplacements - Changed Siegfried dragons teeth to shed destruction
USA Mission 9 "Battle of the Bulge" - Added a few more German vehicles to the reinforcement roster for more variation - Fixed enemy patrol easy - Fixed mg/mortar/gun positions, fixed wrong breeds, placed enemy soldiers in more logical positions: trenches, emplacements - Fixed hero on doctrine 2 not staying after submenu back
USA Mission 10 "Lair of the Beast" - Removed a lot of heavy entities such as buildings etc on the outside of the map, and unused infantry from when map was being made. - Updated task 2 completion is possible in more logical ways. - Fixed issue where assign2 doctrine vehicle was set to player 0 thus playable right away in single player due to set in start. - Various small fixes.
Skirmish AI General logics improvements - Fixed recrew cannons/tanks to prevent paired up soldiers for recrew not ignoring "dont_recrew" tag - Extend visual range for player units when recrewing
Everything Else
Added T1E3 M4A1 75 Sherman Mine roller for USA conquest and MP(t1e3_m4a1_75)
Added Ammo Trailer 1/4 ton for USA conquest (ammo_trailer_usa)
Added 5cm KwK39 L/60 to Liberation DLC (50mm_kwk39_platform)
Added destruction to wooden electrical poles (similar to trees)
Added towing weight information to unit icons
Added MSAA 8x and Anisotropic 16x to video options
Added new USA talks (voices) for Medics (V1 and V2)
Added new USA talks (voices) for Tanks (V2 and V3)
Added missing satchel charge to Landsverk L-62
Added lvl_8 tank_gun skill (was missing before)
Added gun repair/break animation to 155mm GPF platform version
Added new slope curve for 8.8cm PzGr.39
Added burned texmods for some flora that was missing it
Added 100rd belt version of Browning M19A4 and added it to Willys MB .30 cal
Added Liberation German briefing music to game as action_theme_4
Fixed mesh-decal render info corruption that caused huge FPS drop when some vehicles were destroyed. Common case was 155mm GPT in Pointe Du Hoc mission
Fixed trigger actions sync in coop (caused enemy units to teleport on top of players)
Fixed crash that could occur when entering direct control of a human
Fixed trees from turning black when burned and instead changed to burned texmod
Fixed Panzer3e odd engine break animation
Fixed M10 GMC early from having 1 shell of wrong ammo preloaded in gun
Fixed 122mm Soviet and Finnish smoke ammo to be White Phosphorus
Fixed shooting fx location on M4A3 105 sherman Coax MG
Fixed sight picture for CGMC M15A1
Fixed M3 Lee to have 7 crew instead of 6
Fixed M4A2 (Early) missing 3rd/1st person views
Fixed Thompson M1A1 30 mag not ejecting on reload
Fixed "strange mantlet sight" of jumbos
Fixed off-map Mortar calls for MP not causing damage because blast would occur under terrain sometimes
Fixed BAR to use correct rifle preset for stats (net difference is a slight nerf)
Fixed "strange sight" on 105mm shermans' mantlet
Fixed M8 HMC trying to play cook off fx/animations
Fixed M20 and M8 Greyhounds to be able to tow
Fixed water showing inside LVT4 when in water
Fixed German 15mm HE shells to have enough blast energy to damage unarmored cars/trucks
Fixed missing mesh inside of StuH 42
Fixed shoulder stretch on die_fwd_01c animation
Fixed floating walls on destruction for barn01
Fixed opel blitz transport showing radiator fan on x model
Fixed "working wipers" problem on M6 GMC
Fixed some volumes on pershing to be "cast"
Fixed soviet m4a2 early armor setup
Fixed damage view of sdkfz 251/17's gun/turret
Fixed French barn shed
Fixed Germany house 2 volumes
Fixed some missions gameover using wrong localization
Fixed mission localization for nations on conquest win screen
Fixed missing units in FR localization
Fixed missing localization for weather selection on MP Purple Heart Lane
Fixed UA and RU localization
Updated USA vehicle icons with towing indicators
Updated armor modelling of M4 early-late and M4A1 75 early-late
Changed Veterancy level 6 to get +3 weapon skill (was +2 before)
Changed Veterancy level 8 to get +4 weapon skill (was +3 before)
Changes to 20mm Lahti L39 - Fixed projectiles not being synced - Reduced fire rate (55 to 25) - Added zeroing (increases accuracy for each shot at same target) - Increased damage to armor (60 to 75) - Increased accuracy slightly (.85 to .80)
Increased distance stealth units are spotted when moving in prone stance (25m to 30m) remaining still is 25m.
Increased detect time for heavy tanks and tank destroyers when attacking from 10s to 15s
Increased speed of squat bolt rifle animation for humans so they don't skip animation if firing too quickly
Increased zeroing accuracy for medium artillery (105mm-122mm Indirect fire weapons)
Reduced average time between bursts for assault rifles slightly (increased ROF)
Reduced average time between bursts for SMG's slightly (increased ROF)
Reduced max accuracy spread from motion for SMG's (reduces accuracy penalty for human movement)
Reduced bolt action max rate of fire slightly (only affects Direct control and suppression fire order)
Removed M1 Carbine from USA soldiers carrying M1919A6 MG
Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Ostfront - Herr Flick
Community members! Since the release of Call to Arms - Gates of Hell: Liberation we have continued working on the game in all areas. One of these is optimization, another is a set of new goodies. In this blog we will discuss both.
Community
We have broken several records since the release of “Liberation”, and there seems to be some proper excitement surrounding its release. Many content creators showed off some of their amazing skills online, some very nice video catalogs were made and many campaign seasons are being devoured by their subs. In the meantime, the number of concurrent users has more than tripled, and the community is throbbing with activity. On the official Discord server, which welcomed its 20.000th member a few weeks ago, a lot of novice players’ questions were answered. The learning curve in Call to Arms - Gates of Hell might be steep, but our community is steeped in knowledge!
As the player base tripled, we managed to find edge cases of the game not working perfectly. As the sheer size of the game and diversity grew, the memory requirements grew with it. We have worked on optimizing the memory, disk space and overall performance of the game. We have released an update that takes the first steps to address this problem. We have also addressed numerous mission, unit, netcode, balancing and interface issues, so this update will probably be welcomed by everyone. Moreover, your loading time will decrease.
Everyone ought to get a good performance boost with this update. For anyone who visits our store page for the first time, we have updated the store page with new recommended system specs. Namely, for those that wish to play at maximum settings, we suggest using an RTX 2060 equivalent or higher, and 32GB of RAM for running the game. The reason is simple: Gates of Hell is not your “conventional” RTS game. You have over 1000 different tanks, vehicles and weapons in the game, over 3500 types of humanskins for soldiers, almost 100 MP maps and the same amount of conquest maps. On top of that, the game has third person control, which drives the visual requirements further! “Liberation” added a significant amount of the above content at once. We are really proud to be able to deliver so much content, and now we’ve made the necessary steps to make sure the game performs well for every player in this new environment we’ve created.
We have changed the way the video options influence the look of the game. We have specifically configured the “Ultra” setting for those players whose PCs meet the new recommended system specs that we described above. But, do not worry if you don’t. Because we have redesigned the “high” and “medium” graphic settings to be drastically better in visual quality than before. If you feel that the game is not working well with your system, feel free to try the new presets, your PC will run better and the game will still look great. For those players who run on “low” and “minimum” graphic settings, they will equally be able to enjoy a much prettier game without additional system load.
New units
We have been working on several vehicles that we want to add. We hope to release them, together with some other goodies, in time for the winter sale. Some of them are less well- known, yet very recognizable, like the ones we showed above. Did you expect more units to be added to “Liberation”? Let us know in the comments!
Did you know?
CtA - GoH is Barbedwire Studios’ first game. Anything you see or hear in the game is made by us.
Set 'Late' war as standard, as it is the most popular period and includes all 4 nations in the game.
Optimized textures (improves loading time, reduces memory consumption, optimizes cashing).
Improved rendering performance
Updated all video option presets. - Specifically configured the “Ultra” setting for those players with 32GB of VRAM+RAM. - Redesigned the “high” and “medium” graphic settings to be drastically better in visual quality than before, suitable for the players who want immersive graphics but run into memory issues. If you feel that the game is not working well with your system, feel free to try these new presets. your PC will run better and the game will still look great. - Redesigned the “low” and “minimum” graphic settings to vastly improve the game visuals without additional system load.
Conquest
Fixed maps so that conquest airstrike airplanes are not spawning failing to work due to spawning 'drowned' over water. Note for modders: Position (0,0) of a conquest map must be not below water level.
Fixed USA missing MG for defenses in conquest
Fixed crash in conquest when returning to campaign screen
Multiplayer
Updated zones on 1v1 Farmstead and 3v3 Trenches for BZ gamemode
Updated zones on 3v3 Trenches, 3v3 Steppe, 3v3 Mortain Station, 4v4 Kylmapuro and 4v4 Martinville Ridge for AM gamemode
Updated flare ammo for artillery signalers: - 105mm = 10 flares (9 + 1 in gun) - 155mm = 8 flares (7 + 1 in gun) - 203mm and 240mm = 6 flares (5 + 1 in gun)
Updated in multiplayer 155mm artillery barrage to shoot 4 shells per barrage, 2 barrages total, and increased accuracy
Updated in multiplayer 203mm artillery barrage to shoot 2 shells per barrage, 2 barrages total, and increased accuracy
Updated in multiplayer 240mm artillery barrage to shoot 2 shells per barrage, 2 barrages total, and increased accuracy
Updated some mid and late USA Garand soldiers from inf_tier2_lite to inf_tier2 (from 2 to 3 command points)
Fixed synchronization of empty weapon drop
Fixed USA bots in conquest attempting to buy a incorrectly named rifle squad
Increased capture weight of Jagdtiger in conquest to match other Heavy tanks
Reduced Capture weight of Tier 4 infantry from 3 to 2.5
Reduced Capture weight of Tier 1 & 2 Finnish infantry to be only +0.25 of other nations instead of +0.5
Reduced Capture weight of Tier 3 & 4 Finnish infantry to be only +0.5 of other nations instead of +1
Reduced amount of grenade bounce after thrown onto terrain
(Opt into open beta in order to access this update).
Change Log
Highlights
Set 'Late' war as standard, as it is the most popular period and includes all 4 nations in the game.
Optimised textures (improves loading time, reduces memory consumption, optimises cashing).
Improved rendering performance
Updated all video option presets. - Specifically configured the “Ultra” setting for those players with 32GB of VRAM+RAM. - Redesigned the “high” and “medium” graphic settings to be drastically better in visual quality than before, suitable for the players who want immersive graphics but run into memory issues. If you feel that the game is not working well with your system, feel free to try these new presets. your PC will run better and the game will still look great. - Redesigned the “low” and “minimum” graphic settings to vastly improve the game visuals without additional system load.
Conquest
Fixed maps so that conquest airstrike airplanes are not spawning failing to work due to spawning 'drowned' over water. Note for modders: Position (0,0) of a conquest map must be not below water level.
Fixed USA missing MG for defenses in conquest
Multiplayer
Updated zones on 1v1 Farmstead and 3v3 Trenches for BZ gamemode
Updated zones on 3v3 Trenches, 3v3 Steppe, 3v3 Mortain Station, 4v4 Kylmapuro and 4v4 Martinville Ridge for AM gamemode
Updated flare ammo for artillery signalers: - 105mm = 10 flares (9 + 1 in gun) - 155mm = 8 flares (7 + 1 in gun) - 203mm and 240mm = 6 flares (5 + 1 in gun)
Updated in multiplayer 155mm artillery barrage to shoot 4 shells per barrage, 2 barrages total, and increased accuracy
Updated in multiplayer 203mm artillery barrage to shoot 2 shells per barrage, 2 barrages total, and increased accuracy
Updated in multiplayer 240mm artillery barrage to shoot 2 shells per barrage, 2 barrages total, and increased accuracy
Updated some mid and late usa garand soldiers from inf_tier2_lite to inf_tier2 (from 2 to 3 command points)
Fixed synchronization of empty weapon drop
Fixed USA bots in conquest attempting to buy a incorrectly named rifle squad
Increased capture weight of Jagdtiger in conquest to match other Heavy tanks
Reduced Capture weight of Tier 4 infantry from 3 to 2.5
Reduced Capture weight of Tier 1 & 2 Finnish infantry to be only +0.25 of other nations instead of +0.5
Reduced Capture weight of Tier 3 & 4 Finnish infantry to be only +0.5 of other nations instead of +1
Reduced amount of grenade bounce after thrown onto terrain