Howdy Folks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTqDwSKsBYA

Hope you're all doing well this week. Have some EXCITING new stuff to play around with this week. I've built a sort of Annex in the Proving Grounds scene specifically designed to test the Sosigs in a more interesting topology and context than... well a square small room.

It's called the TeamFight area, and it allows you to flip on two teams of Sosigs, with various thresholds for team size, equipment style, AND, you can jump in and fight alongside or against either team, or hell, both of them if you fancy that.

In addition to that, the Sosigs now have voice hooks! Both for communicating their state, and various pain/damage indicators as well. I hope you enjoy their affable personalities :-)

Lastly, for those of you wondering when you'll _finally_ get to use the Item Spawner and 'real' guns on them, that's coming next week! My sole focus this coming week is to migrate the damage system over to the rest of the game, and begin the rebalancing process *gulp*. It's going to a massive, exhausting slog, but it'll be worth it in the end.

Hope y'all have a wonderful weekend.

Peace!

Anton

Alpha 4 of U59 Changelog:

Additions:
- Added TeamFight Annex to Proving Ground Scene
- Added new Sosig Vocal Callouts
- Added new Sosig Melee Weapons (crowbar, tomahawk)
- Added new Sosig beheading for bladed weapons like tomahawk
- Added new Sosig indicator state icons above their heads

Important Notes:
- Item Spawner Vault is currently Disabled

Remember, to switch to the Alpha Branch:
- Right Click H3VR in Steam and go to 'Properties'
- Click on the 'Betas' tab
- Click the dropdown and select 'Alpha 1'
- Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Hi folks!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVNR6sSvckQ
Another Alpha for you this week! I've made some huge headway this week on the Sosig AI behaviors. Honestly some of the most complex stuff I've ever gotten working. They can pick up, prioritize and store equipment now, have limited ammunition. They can fight in melee (granted a bit wildly), something I'm still trying to improve. The damage system continues to be expanded for them, and I've been tweaking levels of mustard bleed out, how much integrity damage projectiles cause, and a number of other things.

The Proving ground scene now has a larger testing chamber with expanded spawning options for y'all to mess around with. Please tell me what you think!

More fun stuff next week, including (hopefully) migrating the player itself to the new damage system, so you can finally test your meat against the Sosigs directly!

Hope you folks have a wonderful weekend!

Peace,
Anton

Alpha 3 of U59 Changelog:

Additions:
- Expanded Proving Ground Scene For Better Combat Testing
- Added new Sosig Behaviors (weapon swapping, better search, inventory usage, limited ammo for reloading)
- Added new Sosig Combat Ability: Melee
- Added new Sosig Damage Calculation For Collisions, Stunning, Confusion, Blinding, and damage from collisions.
- Added new Sosig Guns: Uzi45, Mac11, Scout, AKM, 870, M16
- Added new Sosig Melee Weapon: Tanto

Important Notes:
- Indoor Range ReEnabled!
- Sniper Range ReEnabled!
- Breaching Scene ReEnabled!
- Sampler Platter ReEnabled!

- Item Spawner Vault is currently Disabled

Remember, to switch to the Alpha Branch:
- Right Click H3VR in Steam and go to 'Properties'
- Click on the 'Betas' tab
- Click the dropdown and select 'Alpha 1'
- Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Hi folks!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAu1T6GFVbU
Hope you're all doing well! We've got some exciting new experiments for you this week! Both a preview of the new ballistics system, and the new Sosig agents. Do note that the _only_ weapons that can actually interact with this system right now are the Testing Configurable Gun in the Proving Ground, and the objects and bots in that scene. PLEASE watch the latest devlog to see how it all works!

Peace,
Anton

Alpha 2 of U59 Changelog:

Additions:
- Added New Scene: Proving Ground
- Added New Device: Ballistics Testing Configurable Gun
- Added New WIP System: H3 Ballistics Mk. 3
- Added New WIP System: Sosig Bots

Important Notes:
- Indoor Range is currently Disabled
- Sniper Range is currently Disabled
- Breaching Scene is currently Disabled
- Sampler Platter is currently Disabled
- Item Spawner Vault is currently Disabled

Remember, to switch to the Alpha Branch:
- Right Click H3VR in Steam and go to 'Properties'
- Click on the 'Betas' tab
- Click the dropdown and select 'Alpha 1'
- Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Hi folks,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3piKFKaxCZM

Short message today as Anton is sick in bed.

To switch to the alpha branch:

Right Click H3VR in Steam and go to 'Properties'
Click on the 'Betas' tab
Click the dropdown and select 'Alpha 1'
Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Peace,
Anton

Howdy Folks!

Hope you're all having a pleasant beginning to your August. As my vacation is coming to a close, I figured it would be a good time to prepare you all for what's in store for H3 for the remainder of the Summer.

We're going to be starting a new Alpha cycle, similar to what was done for Update 52 (but hopefully much shorter). For those of your not familiar with the last cycle, in short, Updates over the coming weeks will ONLY be pushed to the Alpha Branch on steam.

In addition, during the Alpha cycle, several things will be different about the game that will result in a sub-par experience for folks used to 'things as normal' such as:

• Some scenes will be intermittently disabled or broken without warning as core systems are replaced/modified.
  
• Game balance will be WAY OFF in modes like Take and Hold, while things related to firearm damage, etc. are rebuilt.
  
• Performance may be terrible in certain scenes, with certain objects, agents, etc.
  
• Bugs, so many bugs

Now, you might be asking, why is this all happening? Well similar to with Update 52, there are systems in need of work, to support future modes, to improve performance, to fix long-broken issues, that need a level of rewrite that is... not frictionless. Some of this work is experimental/iterative where testing will need to be done in phases to determine if design decisions being implemented are the right ones. It will likely get messy. For the Update 59 Alpha Cycle, my focus points and goals are as follows:

System Set 1: Ballistics System Refactor

H3's current ballistics system is OLD. Much of its structure and thinking actually predate the game, and come from an earlier non-vr prototype I was working on, back when... I... um... was a far far worse coder. It's wasteful, tries to simulate far more than is needed, is almost impossible to control design-wise, makes bad assumptions, and doesn't actually produce terribly interesting ricochet and penetration behavior, despite performing a lot of expensive calculation. It was also designed at a time where the player was the only one firing projectiles, and so its computation overhead was acceptable. That is no longer the case so...

SO, instead of continuing to do what I've done for the past 2.5 years, which is just to throw more on the pile, and engineer around old terrible decisions, I'm ripping off the band-aid and completely rebuilding the projectile class itself, and the generic damage class system that everything uses for transmitting 'damage' and related things like force, references to things that do damage, etc.

The hope is that when this is all done, we should get the the following benefits:

• MUCH cheaper projectile code in general.
  
• More interesting, differentiatable behavior when projectiles of various types strike various materials. Wood, plastic, and thin metal, plaster and like will be more able to be penetrated.
  
• Ricochets will be more common and occur at the types of angles they should.
  
• Multiple penetration will actually happen when it should.
  
• Transmission of damage, especially differentiating armor-penentrating rounds from expanding and frangible projectiles will be more interesting and accurate.
  
• Projectiles and melee hits will be able to 'carry' other types of damage as well, from thermal, to emp, to just physics force. Instead of a nasty hacky set of additions i've made over the past year, this will all be unified.

In short, it will matter more what type of round you're firing out of a gun (AP, FMJ, JHP, Slugs, Buckshot, Flechettes, etc.). Certain round types will be far more situational, and there will be more reasons for me to to make combat environments contain more types of materials, as the penetrability of those materials will make the range of cover-to-concealment more tactically interesting based on weapon platform.

It will be a cleaner, faster, and roundly better simulation, and despite juuuuuuuust how many things I will have to break and rebuild to make this happen, it will be more than worth it in the end. The goal is to make this the last time I ever have to significantly change or expand this part of H3's systems.

System Set 2: Impact Sounds

This was originally planned for Update 52, but due to the changes that were needed both for core Physical Objects and Melee weapons, I opted to hold off on this upgrade rather than delay Update 52 another 2-3 weeks. So we're going to finally deal with this now. The focus will primarily be on cartridges, shells, guns, mags and melee weapons, but other generic holdable objects should also get a sonic upgrade from this. Everything will be migrated over to the sound pooling system, so in addition to sound better, impact sounds should get the consistency and performance improvements brought by those systems.

System Set 3: Sosig Agents

Anyone who has been watching the Twitch streams know about these. I've been planning these on paper since the New Year, and development on them is finally moving apace. Essentially a Wiener-bot Mk. 3, the Sosigs are the first truly new bot approach I've taken since the first multi-segment agents.

They will have a host of new features including:

• Truly physics reactive movement and behavior rather than the current bots just pushing through things
  
• Ability to 'crouch' and go 'prone' to more effectively use cover
  
• More efficient and reactive pathing that will allow for the placement of obstacles without the bots freaking out
  
• Complex damage system that includes leaking mustard, joints that can be broken, the ability to fall down and recover.
  
• Jointed weapon holding such that held weapons can be deflected and disarmed
  
• The ability to be grabbed, whacked, thrown, stabbed, lodged, and every other manner that you folks enjoy beating your meat.
  
• Significantly more nuanced and complex perceptual system that will be able to be manipulated better with toys, sounds, as well as enabling stealthier game-play
  
• More hilarious Voice Lines
  
• HATS!

The order of development on these will proceed from the ground up in three rough phases:

Phase 1 (in progress): Sosigs will be implemented as incredibly reactive targets first, with damage balancing done against firearms, melee weapons, explosions and physical/collision trauma.

Phase 2: Following this, they will be 'taught' to 'fight locally', meaning to react to targets in their immediate area and attempt to dodge fire when engaged. Their only navigation in this mode will be immediate vicinity, and they won't yet 'know' anything about the map in general

Phase 3: A new, much more efficient pathing-and-cover grid will be built for them (available only in some modes), that will allow them to cross large distances to fight, pick cover and engagement direction based on what they're fighting, flank, and run away. This will be the _hard_ part. Truth be told, I'm not even sure this will work out how I envision, but I'm going to give it my best shot.

Important Note on these: Due to just how different these bots will be from the existing wiener-bots, these will NOT be replacing the bots in Wurstwurld and Take & Hold. They will behave far too differently such that those entire scenes would have to be rebuild/redesigned with them in mind, and that effort is better spent on new content and modes moving forward.

The Update 59 Alpha Cycle Will Begin On Friday

If you would like to participate in the Alpha: Right click on H3 in steam, go to properties, go to the betas tab, and switch to the branch called 'Alpha 1'. REMEMBER, things will be broken randomly during the Alpha cycle, and there may be multiple 2-3gb downloads a week during it. If bandwidth usage is important to you, do proooobably don't want to be on the alpha.

If you do NOT want to run the Alpha: Do the above, but make sure you have 'none' selected in the betas drop down.

So in conclusion, to those of you who stuck through reading all of this, thanks! and I hope you're excited to journey through another Alpha cycle with me. This one's tremendously exciting to me, as its emphasis is on truly refining the core game-play systems of H3, creating new opportunities both tactical and ridiculous, and establishing the ground work for some exciting seeeeecret things coming early in 2019 (taps fingers together maniacally).

Hope you all have a wonderful week, and I will see you all on stream this week, or on the devlog on Friday!

Peace,

Anton

Howdy Folks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mb-3dGuSFxY

Have got a jam packed update for you this week. As this is going to be the last update this month (vacaaaaaation time), I made sure to stuff as many things in as I was able.

There are two major systemic changes I'm experimenting with in this update that I'd like y'all to give a shot when you get a chance. The first one is the attempt to make the virtual stock still function usefully when a gun in held in only one hand. The blend-in of the function is suuuuper specific, so you need to get your firing hand pretty close to the HMD for it to kick in. Mostly it's there for folks who like to carbine up pistols with stocks, but omit a forward grip. Let me know what you think.

In addition to that, as shown in the vid we've got the ability to rack pistols against objects (including each other) now. PLEASE let me know if this system 'fires' in moments where you don't want it to. I tried to make it as smart as possible, but it might still act a little odd.

Anywho, I will leave you to the new toys. Hope you all have a wonderful next two weeks, and I will see you all again on August 10th!

Peace,

Anton

Update 58 Changelog:

Additions:
- Added New Firearm: M1Shorty16 (7.62x51mm) w. 10 rnd magazine
- Added New Firearm: AKM Tactical (7.62x39mm) w. 30 rnd magazine
- Added New Firearm: P762 Marksman’s Rifle (7.62x51mm) w. 20 rnd magazine
- Added New Firearm: SCR AR-15 Pistol (5.56x45mm)
- Added New Firearm: CZ Evo3 Carbine (9x19mm) w. 30 rnd magazine
- Added New Firearm: P22 Pistol (.22lr) w. 10 rnd magazine
- Added New Firearm: FiveSeven Pistol (5.7x28mm) w. 20 rnd magazine
- Added New Firearm: Deagle50 (.50 AE) w. 7 rnd magazine
- Added New Firearm: M14 (7.62x51mm) with 20 and 30 rnd magazines
- Added New Firearm: ACR Sport (5.56x45mm)

Changes:
- Virtual Stock Experiment: Attempts to stabilize stocked objects with only one hand
- Handguns can now be slide-wracked against objects
- Rebuild stocked-pistol recoil system. Should behave correct relative to other smgs now.
- Powerups Now Have Labels On Them (Finally)
- Raised Slot Position For Backback In All Configurations
- QC9 Now has magazine grab trigger
- Flipzo can now be lit by flicking other hand by it

Fixes:
- Renamed Body Pillow to Soseji-chan Dakimakura
- Fixed MP-40 Magazine Interpolation Bug
- Fixed Quickbelt Pose for Bangsnaps Box
- Fixed Quickbelt Pose for Matches Box
- PP91 Fire selector positions fixed
- Minigun Quickbelt Pose fixed
- Fixed Mk211 50 bmg ammo explosion
- Objects in backpack can no longer be accidentally grabbed
- Fixed harnessed backpack not returning to correct position

Removed:
- Old M14-Vietnam Model removed
- Old M14 DMR Model removed
- Old M14 20 and 30 round magazines removed

Known (Major Issues):
- Vault is still broken

Howdy Folks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEha1AGNCNc

Howdy Folks!

Hope you’re all having a pleasant beginning to your weekend and staying cool (we’re melting here in LA currently). Have a smaller update for you all this week, couple goof-ball toys I’ve been meaning to throw in, along with a really important system test.

The backpack shown in here is designed around the idea of making the loadout you run be able to be more ‘realistic’ in regards to modern infantry combat. Paires with either of the new tactical test loadouts, it should allow you to carry everything you might need for a primary engagement on your chest, while keeping spare ammo and alternate platforms on your back for situational use.

To try it out, I _highly_ recommend playing T&H with the constraint of only duplicating magazines when at the supply point. I’d LOVE feedback from you about how tenable this is, and at what difficulty levels (# of hold points) you find that you simply can’t carry enough ammo to deal with before the hold point ends. I’d eventually like to make this an actual mode/option, but am still trying to get a sense of how it impacts the difficulty curve/ceiling.

Update 57 Changelog:

Additions:
- Added New Firearm: SCX Futuristic Machine Pistol (4.6x30mm)
- Added New Melee Weapon: Katana
- Added New Throwing Weapon: Shuriken
- Added New Grenade: Impact Smokebomb
- Added New Quickbelt Layout: Tactical Centered
- Added New System: Backback-only quickbelt slot
- Added New Backback: Standard Frame Backpack A

Changes:
- Magazine pose interpolation system built. Inserting and ejecting magazines should now be much more visually smooth/physical looking/immersive
- Altered Melee Weapon Collision behavior to try to help prevent them ‘glitching’ into things
- Melee weapons now always use ‘floating’ mode to prevent them passing through targets while moving
- All Stripper Clips can now have rounds ejected from them onto the ground, into the hand, into a quickbelt slot
- G19 Magazine corrected from 19 to 15 round capacity
- Adjusted Quickbelt Layout #9 - TacticalTest Mk 3
- Tweaked PSO scope settings
- Item Spawner now has categories for: Foregrip, Stock, Bolt-action Pistol
- All relevant items to above categories moved where appropriate
- Suppressors Category renamed to Muzzle Devices
- Sako Obrez and Mosin Obrez moved to Bolt Action Pistols

Fixes:
- MT1 Sight orientation fixed
- Fixed incorrect lock points on several 1911s
- G3A3 Rotating Bolt Handle behavior fixed
- Fixed XM84 pin positions and optimized collision
- Fixed sound effect on XM84 explosion

Known (Major Issues):
- Vault is still broken

Howdy Folks!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inbnO8NLCCo
Hope you're all having a wonderful day! On this most thematically appropriate holiday of the year for H3, we've got some very special (and goofy as all get out) toys for you today.

We hope you enjoy them very much! Remember, it's not just the new gats in the indoor range, but the fireworks have been rebuilt as well, so hop on over to the Arizona at Night range, and fire off some roman candles, or load an AA-12 up with some Cannonball 12 gauge and enjoy the lightshow :-)

Have a Happy, Safe and Relaxing Holiday!

Peace,

Anton & All Of Us Here @ RUST LTD.

Update 56 Changelog

Additions:
- Added New Firearm: Quackenbush 1886 Boy’s Rifle (.22lr)
- Added New Firearm: Takedown 10/22 (.22lr) with 10 and 25 rnd Magazines
- Added New Firearm: 1894 Lever Action Rifle (.44 magnum)
- Added New Firearm: Hand Crank Frank Portable Gatling gun (45-70 Govt.)
- Added New Firearm: M2 Tombstone (.50 bmg)

Changes:
- Rebuild Roman Candles & 12 gauge Cannonball Rounds to Make them prettier

Known (Major Issues):
- Vault is still broken

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZguCwZw--NE
Howdy Folks!

Hope you're all doing well and have some fun things planned for the Holiday weekend. We've got a small update for you today, in part because there's going to be ANOTHER update on the 4th of July. That one will be going live approx. 9am PST on Wednesday so you folks who have the day off can have the whole day to play with it!

As for today's update, I hope you all enjoy the AA-12 as much as I do. It's easily the most powerful 12gauge platform, and has this bulky, almost sci-fi edge to it. It's almost too good with its incredibly controllable recoil, with it's size being it's only real downside. I imagine we'll have to move to fictional firearms if we ever want a shotgun that's even more ridiculous.

Anywho, I will leave you now with the links mentioned in the devlog, and this week's changelog. For those of you having your 4th of July weekend early, I wish you best, and I'll y'all here again on Wednesday.

Peace!

- Anton

LINKS:

Anton's Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/rustyhand/

H3VR Unofficial Discord: https://discord.gg/DyZz9BP

H3VR VR Gaming Discord: https://discord.gg/RyYjAnF

Update 55 Changelog:

Additions:
- Added New Firearm: AA12 (12 gauge) with 8 round and 20 round magazines
- Added New Firearm: AKS-74U Tactical (5.45x39mm)
- Added New Attachment: Classic Flagtachment
- Added New Attachment: Wiener Pride Flagtachment

Fixes:
- Fixed Incorrect G3A3 spawning in T&H
- Fixed incorrect reflection probe culling
- Fixed incorrect references in FirearmAudioClipset profiles
- Made PSO Reticle clearer

Known (Major Issues):
- Vault is still broken

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeusBy6fUR0
Howdy!

Hope you're all doing well! We've got another little update for ya this week comprising some new toys, and some systemic changes that I think will make a big impact for many you!

The Virtual stock has come out working better than I could have anticipated, and I honestly don't think I've turned it off since I started using it earlier this week. I'm just glad I got over my irrational dislike of the concept to give it an implementation shot myself. Would love to know what you folk think.

Anywho, I'm gonna jump back to my tinkering, so I'll leave you with a change-log for this update. Everything else important this week is more than well covered in the devlog!

Peace,

Anton

Changelog:

Additions:
- Added New Firearm: G3A3 Battle Rifle (7.62x51mm) w. 20 rnd Magazine
- Added New Firearm: Fal Battle Rifle (7.62x51mm) w. 10, 20 and 30 rnd Magazines
- Added New Firearm: SKS Classic (7.62x39mm)
- Added New Firearm: Micro Uzi Machine pistol (9x19mm)
- Added New System: Virtual Stock (enable in Input Options)
- Added New Quickbelt slot Type: Magazine
- Added New Quickbelt Option: Tactical Test Mk. 3

Changes:
- Adjusted ‘size’ parameter used by many objects for determining what quickbelt slot things can go in
- All ‘over the shoulder’ quickbelt slots are now ‘Massive’ meaning they can carry 2h melee weapons, lmgs, the M107, and equivalently sized things.
- Powerup meats are now half the size

Fixes:
- Fixed Quickbelt pose for ammunition, magazines, clips, speedloaders

Removed:
- Removed Option: Mag duplication uses default load (kept being turned on accidentally and noone uses it)

Known (Major Issues):
- Vault is still disabled due to being broken.