Hey everyone,

Welcome to Developer Briefing #79!

This week marks Hell Let Loose's first anniversary since it launched into Steam Early Access. Time has been flying by and so much has changed since we first clashed on the frontline of Hurtgen Forest.

To mark the occasion Lead Developer Max has stopped by to put together his thoughts and thanks to you, our community. Max has also taken the opportunity to look back at exactly how Hell Let Loose has grown and developed over the last six months, whilst also looking ahead to what the future holds.

Oh and we're totally revealing some new helmets for the German forces...



Hi everyone,

We’re excited today to mark exactly 364 days since Hell Let Loose launched into Early Access on Steam on June 6th, 2019. It’s been an enormous and exciting journey so far, and it’s felt like the year has flown by. Indeed - if Hell Let Loose launched with the Allied invasion force on D-Day, then we’ve been fighting in-game nearly a month past the German surrender! During this time we’ve had huge amounts of fun watching as you - the community - deliver us excellent feedback in order to help us continue crafting the best experience we can.

It’s hard to believe that the initial Early Access build featured only one tank per team, no leaning or vaulting, one gamemode and only three maps (Sainte Marie Du Mont, Hurtgen Forest and Foy). With more than 5000 submissions to our version control, and not a single day without one (including the weekends!), we greatly enjoy our work.

Below we’ve included an image that breaks down the largest additions or changes to the game. That said, for the best idea, the notes for each patch and update truly detail the full scope of the changes. For those of you who have not played for a couple of months, you’ll be returning to a very different game. For those of you who haven’t played since release - it may as well be an entirely new game altogether!





We want to say a huge thank you to the community - not only to those of you who have just joined recently, but particularly to the very first backers of our crowdfunding campaign - all the way back in 2017. Without your initial support, Hell Let Loose would not have got off the ground.

Over the coming months we’ll be making good on any final rewards promised to each Backer tier.

Because of the continued success of Hell Let Loose, we’ve been enormously proud to build the team up to better support the title in every department. Our small team of 7 at the launch of Early Access has now transformed into 15 - enabling us to overhaul fundamental aspects of the game in our ever present push to deliver the best experience possible.



If you’ve followed the development of the game so far, you’ll know that we enjoy dropping as much content as humanly possible - alongside large scale bug fixes and systems overhauls. The future for Hell Let Loose is incredibly bright, and our initial plan to support the title across new theaters.

We’ll be releasing huge amounts of information over the coming weeks about what our roadmap to leaving Early Access looks like - and we’ll also hint to the future beyond it. Please be assured that this is still the early stages of the development of Hell Let Loose. There is so much more for us to do - including new fx, sounds, environments, maps, customisation options, weapons, Commander abilities, optimisation and many other things.

Every step we take will be taken as it always has done, side by side with the community. Your thoughts, suggestions and feedback have been integral to Hell Let Loose's development and will continue to do so.

Our current goal right now is to integrate many of the new optimisation and mapping techniques that we’ve refined into all current maps. We have a good idea of what our 1.0 map list looks like and so we’re excited to make sure that each map is just as performant and fun to play as all the others. Once we release Update 7, we’ll be pushing forward to finalise a version of the game that we feel reflects a successful 1.0 launch, before we move on to more new features, content and lots more.

While so much has happened in a year, we expect the gap between version quality and total breadth of content to be even more significant this time next year. Some of the largest quality overhauls that you’ll experience are yet to come!

From myself and all of the team, thank you.



That wraps up Max's message!

So, at the start of the brief we mentioned new German helmets that are on the way - let's take a look at a few that you'll be getting your heads on in the near future:












Thank you for an amazing first year.

We'll see you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

We're just letting you know that Hell Let Loose is currently 20% off as part of the Team17 Publisher Sale!

If you've been waiting to join the frontline at a discounted price or looking to get your friends into the action now's a great time!




We're closing in on Update 7 and we're incredibly excited for what's coming with it:

• Full 1st & 3rd person animation overhaul
  
• New firearm SFX
  
• New urban map
  
• Further optimisation & bug fixing
  
• And more!

If you'd like to learn more about the Hell Let Loose community, come say hi / join a team or clan feel free to visit our Steam forums, Discord channel and sub-reddit - newcomers are more than welcome at all of these places.

You can find the Developer Team chatting in all of the above locations, we're all about listening to and engaging with our community as we journey through Early Access together.

Welcome to Hell Let Loose, we'll see you on the frontline.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/686810/Hell_Let_Loose/

Hi everyone!

While we’re busy at work on Update 7 we wanted to get a release out to fix the persistent crashes and other issues present in Update 6 as soon as we can. Whilst Patch 11’s primary purpose is to address the crashes introduced by Update 6 it also targets as much low hanging fruit as possible.

As a team, we’re currently working with military precision to achieve our Update 7 release goals. It is absolutely enormous and will be one of the most significant Updates to Hell Let Loose during our Early Access journey.





Sainte-Mère-Église

US Offensive Layer Added - US forces can now go on the attack in Offensive Mode!



The M43 Combat Uniform entered use in the European theatre in late 1944. After D-Day, Paratroopers were issued complete M1943 uniforms, and infantry units began receiving the uniform parts issued individually.



Just like the Winter Warfare pack, this seasonal DLC is free to anyone who owns the game.

To get this seasonal free DLC you must download it from the Hell Let Loose Steam Store page.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1313020/Hell_Let_Loose__Summer_Warfare_Pack/

Please note, whilst the uniform will be added to your Barracks inventory, you will still need to fulfil the required role level requirements to equip it in battle.



Our Seasonal DLC is designed as a thank you to our dedicated community and to reward veteran players. Please rest assured we will re-activate these DLC packs throughout the year - for free - so stay tuned for the return of the Winter Warfare pack later this year.

We've also got something for the German forces in this patch with the addition of three new customisation options in the form of our first hats and caps. No download required here, you'll find them in your Barracks upon downloading the patch:

Please note: Glasses / goggles & smoking paraphernalia are not live yet, these will arrive at a later date.


eins


zwei


drei

Enjoy!



Performance

• Optimised all character models through fine tuning of LODs. This will lower CPU burden across the board.

Crashes

• High probability speculative fix for “ballistics crash” - the key crash affecting both servers and clients (96% of all current client crashes and 100% of all server crashes).
  
• Fixed secondary crash (3% of all current client crashes).

HUD/UI

• HUD image for a Recon vehicle's 3rd seat does not correctly scale when zoomed in on certain resolutions.
  
• 'Refresh Servers' button will be unresponsive to user interaction if the cursor has not been moved off of the button since the last click
  
• Users will be unable to change between 'All Servers' and 'Favourites' if the user already has the cursor positioned over the unselected heading before servers are found

Visual Improvements

• Fixed lighting issues across most maps - where shadows at a distance where not rendered (SME, Utah etc).

Customisation

• Added German Visor Cap
  
• Added German M40 Side Cap
  
• Added German M43 Field Cap
  
• To access head cosmetics click on your chosen face to open a new menu

Bug Fixes

• All closed buildings are now blocked to stop players spawning in them.
  
• Added additional names to in-game credits to reflect new team members.
  
• No window model present while sitting within the 5th seat of the Greyhound Recon vehicle
  
• Clipping issues present on multiple German Uniforms when using the Winter ‘Hans’ head variant.
  
• Graphical issues with various Winter Heads are observed on US/German in active gameplay.
  
• 'Hans' and 'Karl' have distorted textures on their balaclavas.
  
• Puma recon vehicle moves constantly after firing main weapon
  
• Recon tooltip for "Surveil"
  
• The German Puma and US Greyhound does not give any combat score when destroyed.
  
• If a player selects the Officer role after they've been kicked from a unit, they're unable to join any unit.

Purple Heart Lane

• [PHL] Bridge has no collision with players and has one way bullet collision in sector C4

Hill 400]/b]

• [Hill 400] Deep rivers are not marked as red
  
• [Hill 400] The US and German lines are swapped on the deployment and ingame maps
  
• [Hill 400] The US Top HQ Heavy Tank spawn location has the exact same spawn point as the Commander's Fuel abilities spawn location.
  
• [Hill 400]Changed the rocky ground texture to possess correct footstep sounds.
  
• [Hill 400] Fuel orders confirmed within the top German HQ will place the vehicle directly behind the Panther tank
  
• [Hill 400] Spawning on the middle US HQ will spawn the player at the bottom US HQ
  
• [Hill 400] - German repair station and resupply station are floating in sector J5

Utah Beach

• [Utah] Most of the Log Ramps on Utah Beach, in sectors I3-I8, have no collision.

Omaha Beach

• [Omaha] The US Recon Vehicle cannot be spawned on the middle HQ spawn.

Currently Working On (in no specific order)

• Multiple changes to the Garrison/OP spawn meta
  
• Animation overhaul (including overhaul for MG deployment and vaulting systems)
  
• New high density urban map
  
• An enormous-scale non-hedges bridge map
  
• Another non-hedges map
  
• Overhaul of all FX in-game (visual and performance)
  
• New weapons
  
• New armoured vehicles
  
• New customisation options
  
• Continued bug fixes
  
• Continued map overhauls for older maps
  
• Continued work on sound overhaul - including all gunfire, Engineer and Support role overhauls
  
• Fixing the “re-deploy” gameplay loop
  
• Implementing satisfying logistics roles
  
• Open-topped wheeled transport and logistics vehicles
  
• New Commander abilities and fleshing out of the resource meta
  
• Continued polish on both Warfare and Offensive game modes
  
• Continued work on progression systems and experience gain

Essentially - continued work on every single aspect of the game in every area.

Where to next?

While Patch 11 is a small update for us by the standards of our usual workload, it’s in service to the huge changes we’ll be bringing in Update 7 - easily our biggest Update to date. The coming weeks are going to start to deep dive into all the ways the game has changed - including the all new FPP and TPP animations, the new vaulting and mantling system, the new MG deployment system, the new map, the several map overhauls, the sound overhaul, the FX overhaul and so much more.

Community Server Discount

Lastly, Gportal will be offering a 10% discount to existing and new server owners over the next month.

These links will grant 10% off HLL server rental for the duration of the period you book for...
Europe/UK
Rest of world

After many requests, servers are now available for rental in Sao Paulo and Taiwan!

For those already renting servers from g-portal, you can either wait until your current contract expires and set up a new one using the discount, or contact g-portal and they will provide you with credit equal to 10% of the value of the remaining time on your contract (so it's as though you were applying the 10% discount from today).


That wraps up today's patch notes! Let us know what you think in the comments section.

See you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Developer Briefing #77!

This week we're happy to be sharing with you the date for Patch 11, talking about what's next for your Uniform suggestions as well as revealing a new Uniform that's coming soon. We'll also be showing off a bit more of the revamped Foy that you'll be getting in Update 7...

I'm going to hand things over to Max now as gives you his update from the team!



Hi all,

We’re currently hard at work on Update 7 - which is shaping up to easily be our most significant and large Update yet.

Normally, it’s a very easy process for us to put together a dev briefing, as we simply deep-dive into the coming features, artwork or other systems. However, in this case we want to maintain some excitement and surprise for what’s to come, so we’ll be starting to unveil the full scope of changes closer to the release date (and there are a LOT of things that we’re excited about!).

Over the next couple of weeks we’ll also be taking the opportunity to look at some of the methods and processes we use currently in the game to create the various different aspects of it.



We were blown away this week when a very talented Hell Let Loose subreddit member u/Tommy2Legs who put together an incredible Hell Let Loose style tactical map of Juno Beach - the famous Canadian D-Day landing site.

Featuring the same visual language as our own maps, as well as near-perfect scale and layout, we thought it was an incredible piece of artwork.



We not only wanted to show off the incredible work they did on it, but it has also provoked some discussion about pulling back the curtain on the huge amount of work that goes into creating these highly detailed maps, so watch this space!



Patch 11 will be dropping shortly on Thursday, May 28th.

While it feels small to us compared to our usual Updates, it fixes some aspects we’ve had fed back to us in regards to Update 6, as well as laying the groundwork for our push towards Update 7.

On top of the above Patch 11 will also include some additional customisation options for your soldiers.

We’ll be releasing the full change-log which will include all the bug fixes, adjustments and new cutomisations closer to the release date.



Well, what a fantastic response!

Thanks for all your feedback on the Hell Let Loose subreddit with suggestions for new uniforms, helmets and other cosmetic additions. We’ve collated and saved all submissions we’ve received, as well as the additional information you provided.

Soon we’ll start the process that’ll allow us to continue adding these to the game in an ongoing fashion in every patch and Update. We’ve also read much of the additional feedback about the customisation system itself and are looking at any changes that need to be made.

We've also got a little extra something for you! Below you can find some beautiful new renders of the in-game models for the new M43 Combat Uniform for the US forces. This will be added to the game shortly.









Alongside work on 3 unannounced maps, we’ve also been overhauling and upgrading nearly every other existing map in the game. We thought we’d show off a bit more of the Foy work to tide you over while you wait for Update 7.

We fully intend for Update 7 to drastically improve your gameplay experience across many of the most beloved maps - while at the same time we’re also working to make those less popular maps just as successful as the others.

We’re paying particular attention to creating viable infantry paths from Strongpoint to Strongpoint, while also enabling access for vehicles. While open 200m fields lead to poor infantry gameplay, cluttering the entire map with constant objects will harm vehicle gameplay. We’ve played a huge amount and identified a relative cover density per meterage. With this in mind, we’ve been making copious notes on particularly challenging or boring Strongpoints or map locations and have been building them out with greater detail and level of interest.

Please bear in mind that the following images are as work-in-progress.



We’ve built out many existing Strongpoints with additional approaches.

Studying the farming infrastructure of the Belgian countryside, we’ve worked hard to create interesting and varied approaches. Previously, a great weakness of Foy’s gameplay was the un-ending and coverless fields - where wire fences would often result in an impossible assault across 200m+ of open ground. With these changes, we expect armour to be just as potent, but with greater and more intense and interesting infantry battles to take place on and between the Strongpoints themselves.



The AA position has had several open and closed buildings added, with particular attention paid to eyelines and access points.



The push between the AA position and Trainline now features a pleasant birch forest on the east side of the trainline, including semi-destroyed German positions and supplies placed in the forest to conceal them from the air. While the fastest route is to push along the train line itself, capturing this wooded area will provide a defensible spawn location and an easy place to support the fighting at both Strong Points.



Dugout Barn has been overhauled, retaining the tiny farming buildings at the corner, but expanding it with a trench network and several other larger structures. We’ve created more openings in the wire fences, and replaced several of them with stone walls so as to create more hard cover for the open-field battles. These deeper trench networks feature locations designed for in-cover spawn placement, and will provide tense CQB gameplay as they’re flushed out.


That wraps up this week's Developer Briefing, we hope you all have a fantastic weekend!

See you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Developer Briefing 76!

This week we're sharing with you some news on: an upcoming patch, fixing server crashes, how Update 7's development is going and how we want YOUR suggestions for what customisation items you'd like to see in-game.

Let's get stuck in shall we.



We’re currently finalising the lock off for Patch 11. Patch 11 will sit between Update 6 and 7. It's designed to reduce the amount of server crash, and client crash issues that we’ve had reported since the release of Update 6.

In Patch 11, we also fix some low-risk key issues reported by the community in Update 6, as well as introduce some new customisation options and a new Offensive mode overlay for an existing map. We also introduce some optimisations.



Things are full steam ahead as we work on Update 7. It’s an absolute beast of an update, and one we’re incredibly excited to release. At the moment we’re adding smaller touches to the animation system (eg. bespoke camera animations for reloads and gadgets/tools/meds), as well as working through any bugs.

In addition, we’re revisiting absolutely all connected areas of the game to make sure that we fix historically disliked aspects - such as MG deployment and vaulting/mantling. We’ll be revealing much more of it closer to the release date of Update 7 so watch this space.



As many of you will be aware, we’re in the continual process of adding new customisation options for you to use in battle.

We love seeing the community suggest different variants they'd like to see. This has led us to want to formally open up and collect all of your ideas.

Once we have a comprehensive list of them we’ll create a poll and open it up to a vote. The most voted options will then be prioritised for production. That's right, community customisation content - put forward by and voted for by you.

Please post your suggestions on the official HLL sub-reddit HERE



When suggesting a customisation option, please include:

• As much picture reference as possible - with colour reference where possible.
  
• Suggested roles (where necessary).
  
• Rough time period of use.

Our intent with the customisation options for Hell Let Loose is to display the broad spectrum of appearances on the battlefield during World War Two. We do not mind offering rare uniforms or helmets, so long as they are grounded in reality and were present on the battlefield during the war. As such, please bear in mind that we won't consider:

• Prototypes that never saw action.
  
• Uniforms/helmets never used during the war itself (1 Sep 1939 – 2 Sep 1945).
  
• Uniforms/helmets that would be considered highly improbable to see on the battlefield (like a soldier wearing a flight mask or a parade uniform).

Please note: We are currently deciding on a special uniform for our high tier Kickstarter backers. We will be releasing this in the coming months as we continue to fulfill the backer rewards.



As mentioned earlier in the week, the server crash investigation is still ongoing. Although we are seeing a bit more server stability with reduced use of RCON, we are still investigating a critical crash that we are seeing in our log reports. So the more information we have, the easier it will be to narrow this down further, and we can then introduce the potential fixes.

So that being said, we are asking the community to join the punching bag servers again over the weekend.

We would like to thank the entire community for the effort so far in helping us with this, we thank all the server owners and admins for your patience as we continue to tackle this together!

If we can keep the following servers as full as possible as often as we can, by rejoining if they crash:

NA #1 TEAMDIXX.COM :: BM/T17 COMMUNITY PUNCHING BAG :: ALL MAPS
EU #1 TEAMDIXX.COM :: BM/T17 COMMUNITY PUNCHING BAG :: ALL MAPS

Black Matter and Team 17 would like to thank Team DIXX for the server administration, and the reporting of the crashes.



Finally, we’re continuing our work across all maps - upgrading the visual quality, increasing micro-terrain, introducing new gameplay dynamics and working on optimisation. You can see the introduction of a small fighting position between West Bend and the N30 Highway, as well as some farming out-buildings.





Thanks to the entire HLL Community for the ongoing support and feedback, have a fantastic weekend!

See you on the frontline!

Dev Briefing

Hey all,

Welcome to Developer Briefing 75!

This week Lead Developer Max is back to give you a heads up on what the team have been doing since Update 6 - Assault on Hill 400 launched on April 30th.

As we’ve always said, your feedback matters and is important to us, so lets hand over to Max now and get stuck in:



Hi all,

We’re thrilled with the reception to Update 6!

Update 6 was easily the most technically difficult update we’ve ever done - with the ballistics overhaul (including hit detection rebuild) and engine upgrade wrapped together.


The team have been playing the Update as much as possible since release - each department noting down significant fixes, tweaks or changes across the board. Animations and sound not included - we’re very happy with how far along many aspects of the game are coming along.


The bulk of the sound overhaul is coming with U7 and will focus largely on firearms and explosions.


We’ll be showing this off in the coming weeks with a huge overhaul and something that truly changes the entire feel of the game. We went back to the drawing board and brought on several talented animators to rebuild our pipeline. We’ve spent many days in a mocap studio to rework our TPP animations, while all our new FPP animations are entirely procedural.

You can see a sneak peak of what’s coming below.


The gloves are on!


We’re on the right track, but some aspects of the UI can be made more intuitive, cleaned up or expanded. Some very old elements also still are present in the game that need to be tidied up and unified with the new components. We’re also thinking about quick quality of life changes we can make to drastically increase the experience with low technical or artistic risk.


As the Community are also feeding back, the ninja Garrison meta and redeploy meta are both ugly crutches from our previous implementation of the spawn building meta. We’re going to be addressing these in the coming updates before we leave Early Access, as features we’ll be implementing will directly address these.

For example, we’ll be implementing a much more fleshed out Supply and Ammunition metagame that will remove the need for infantry to “redeploy” (We see you, Support players). Alongside this we’ll also be overhauling the way supplies are placed, as well as introducing logistics vehicles. We’ll also be revising the way Garrisons look, and the way they’re taken down. Nearly every aspect of this gameplay loop will be revised, with the end goal being a far more intentional push/parry/block style of gameplay that relies on clever use of tactics to penetrate the front line, instead of the usual Recon ninja units.


The general rule we’ve found with Hell Let Loose is that you really never can have too much cover. It’s important to have some longer range and open spaces, but if that continues for more than 100m or so it tends to make gameplay quite tedious (special shoutout to the horrible push from Bizory-Foy Road to West Bend!). Not only are we overhauling our maps artistically, but a large amount of thought is going into creating natural opportunities for Garrison and OP placement. Hill 400 and the Utah overhaul represent a new style of mapping for us - using specific internal techniques to achieve higher quality visuals and a fast way to build out higher cover areas.

Please be aware, we’ll be bringing all current maps to the same quality level for the time we release from Early Access. This will necessitate the total remaking of Hurtgen Forest and Saint-Marie-Du-Mont. We will retain the layouts, but will be increasing the visuals and general flow and cover density on both maps.


The Commander is now feeling much more fleshed out as a role - with increased ability to influence the battlefield and add greater variation to the strategy used to win each game. We’ll continue to expand the functionality there and the way roles interrelate. This will include overhauls to the much-maligned Engineer role and Support role, as well as changes to every other role to give them a unique application (including many new loadouts, new weapons and new “gadgets”).


Our vehicle handling and armor systems will be revisited in a larger update later this year. While it’s functioning, it can be tightened up and made smoother and more reliable. We’ll be doing this alongside the community feedback we’ve received.


We’re going to look at making Recon marks appear only to leadership roles, as well as the player who placed them. We’re also looking at increasing legibility on the map in order to make this more obvious. We’ll also be tweaking the way Recon vehicles work to increase their effectiveness in surveillance.


We’re going to be turning full attention to this over the coming months. We know that there are many, many areas for us to improve across the whole title and we’re very excited to attack this as a team.


We’ve discovered that the majority of the crashes are caused by a single issue - which we’re currently in the process of debugging for a fix ASAP. This is a huge finding, as fixing this issue will clean up more than 90% of server crashes . Honestly speaking, we predicted far more critical issues than what have occurred - simply due to the incredible amount of fundamental code that has been re-written. We’ll be patching the game the moment we fix these key issues.

To help with finding server and client side crashes we have set up two Punching Bag servers. We are asking the community to please fill these servers from now and throughout the weekend when you can, and please break these for us!

Server Names:
Punching Bag Server - Europe
Punching Bag Server - US East

Thank you.


That wraps up this week’s Developer Briefing! Thanks for taking the time to stop by and give it a read on your way to Hill 400!

See you on the frontline.

Hey everyone!

Welcome to Update 6!

We're incredibly excited to be bringing you a large amount of new content in today's update!

From a new map and recon vehicles to the ballistics overhaul and engine upgrade there's a LOT for you to get stuck into.

We'd also like to say thank you all so much for your continued feedback and support, as you read through these notes hopefully you'll see heaps of community feedback in action.

We hope you all have a brilliant time with Update 6 - Assault on Hill 400.





This is the initial implementation of Ballistics 1.0!



Moving from a line trace to a projectile based system has been a huge challenge - especially in preserving good hit registration at high latencies and 100 player counts. You can read about this new system in depth here.

Please note, this is an absolutely enormous change to the very fundamental systems architecture and we expect some teething issues (alongside reworking the entire ballistics system, we’ve also had to ground-up build a bespoke hit-reg system).

We’ll be keeping an eye out for all bugs reported and will swiftly work to isolate and fix any issues that arise. We’ll keep in steady communication with you - the community - as we do so. Ultimately, we feel that this new system combined with our coming total animations overhaul will provide a far deeper, richer gunplay experience in Hell Let Loose.

NOTE: Please be aware that we’ve enabled the ability to “see” your bullets in the Options. This is specifically designed to help you adjust to this all-new system - to get a sense of projectile performance and lead time. We recommend that you disable this in the gameplay options for a more realistic and immersive experience. We will then be setting this to “off” as a default after this update and period of adjustment.

NOTE 2: Now that the system is built out, we will be revisiting all spread, recoil and damage values for all weapons across the entire game. We are keen to play with this new system and check general performance and functionality before starting to deep-dive on specific weapon performance.



Hill 400 has been a bit of a milestone for us with regard to workflows and creating all new experiences in the game. It’s the most vertical map in Hell Let Loose and will provide very intense combat throughout the entirety of the map - with cover density being incredibly high.

You can read about and see more of Hill 400 here.



















Utah Beach has been revisited - with large updates made to many strong points and more than 2000 pieces of additional micro-terrain and cover added to the map. Stay tuned for the introduction of Offensive mode in a coming release.

You can read more about the Utah Beach overhaul here.



The Commander can now spend resources to call in a Recon plane. The Recon plane is a powerful tool designed to allow the Commander the ability to gauge lines of attack and defence in accordance with enemy movements. It’s also designed to help direct off-map support, as well as artillery strikes.

From a design perspective, we wanted to capture the idea of an information war - where skilled players could interact with Reconnaissance mechanics in both reactive and proactive ways.

Costing Munitions, when called in the Recon plane will survey a select area of the battlefield.
Enemy infantry and vehicles that are in the path of the Recon plane and have an unobstructed line of sight will be marked on the map one time.

The mark has a unique icon on the map and fades over the course of 2 minutes. Once a Recon mark is placed on the map, it is NOT dynamic. It does NOT live-update or move. It is one time in a static location with the purpose of giving an approximate “snapshot” of open-air targets in general locations.

When a Recon plane flies over, hiding under cover is effective to deny it’s chance to spot you.

The Recon marks only differentiate between vehicle and infantry (it does not determine specific roles or vehicle types). It provides no further information (it does not show spawn locations).

The Recon marks only appear on the map. They do not appear on the HUD or in any other location.







These brand new wheeled vehicles have arrived! They can be spawned by the Commander at the cost of Fuel. Driven by Armoured Units, each vehicle contains space for a Driver, a Gunner and an Observer, as well as two passenger seats (we’ve designed these for Recon players, but we suspect different metas will emerge).

Design

We were very keen to make sure that the Recon vehicles didn’t simply exist as a “wheeled light tank” and instead prioritised the act of reconnaissance and information collection over simply shooting every target they saw. These vehicles are designed to be incredibly powerful if used appropriately.

The Driver

The main task for the Driver is to get the vehicle into a great location to bring it’s powerful reconnaissance abilities to the fore. Setting up far behind lines, or at an offset position will provide the most effective way of keeping out of trouble. The most maneuverable vehicle in the game so far - we’ve found these a lot of fun to drive.

Please note, we are road-testing an automatic transmission of wheeled vehicles in order to preserve their maneuverability and accessibility.

The Gunner

The Gunner position can bring to bear a main cannon and coaxial that’ll provide trouble for infantry and softer armoured targets alike. Bear in mind though - is firing at that tank the best option for staying alive and delivering intel to your team?

The Observer

The Observer seat is the key to the power of the Recon vehicles. Possessing a telescoping camera sight and onboard radio, the Observer can select locations for specific surveillance - relaying this to your team via the map.

• Enter the Observer seat in the ‘F3’ position.
  
• Enter the periscope view using your mouse scroll wheel.
  
• Press ‘R’ to load the film.
  
• You can preview the area to recon by holding ‘RMB’, and then ‘LMB’ to recon the chosen location indicated by the dome. Enemy infantry and enemy vehicles inside the dome will be shown as a STATIC icon of the last known position, for a short time - the same mechanic as the Recon plane.

NOTE: Both the Recon plane and the Recon vehicles are designed to provide different forms of information feeds to the rest of the team via the tactical map. Through continual and skillful use of these mechanics, you’ll be able to construct a general sense of the flow of enemy movements across the front line. It was key for our design that this didn’t make players feel like they could always be seen, or that it targeted individuals.

We’ll be constantly monitoring and testing this mechanic with you, as well as listening to feedback on it. We’re also aware that these tools may not always be useful. A Recon plane on a heavily urban map may be less effective than deploying a Recon vehicle, whereas it could excel on an open map - providing the optimal method to gather intel for your team.



The Commander can now decide to spawn different vehicles in their HQ at the cost of Fuel.

You can read more about this system here.

This is a huge step towards further implementation of RTS mechanics in the game and is one of the first steps we’re taking.

Please note: We’ve limited the total spawnable vehicles to 5 (on top of the current vehicle roster) in order to preserve server performance and balance. It’s up to players which these are, as we want you to have enough flexibility to save resources and build a specific lineup.



Listening to community feedback and having played the game, we’ve introduced an ability for the Commander to selectively remove Garrisons. We know that often you’ll want to reposition them for a better strategic advantage.

As an Officer, you will be notified if one of your placed Garrisons has been removed by the Commander.



We’ve spent quite a lot of time chatting with the community and playing the Offensive mode in order to figure out why it wasn’t working as we’d intended - often with tedious mechanics that felt like playing as a defender needlessly inhibited your movement and made enjoyment of the mode difficult.

We’re also aware that Offensive games can be a huge time sink - with irritating Overtime mechanics causing endlessly stalemates where a team feels they should have won. As part of continued refining of this mode, we’ve made some changes that we feel will make this a much better experience.

• The defending team can now cross and enter attacker-held sectors in their line.
  
• Defending teams can move into enemy lines already captured by the attacking team, but still retain their restriction on entering the attacking team’s HQ sectors.
  
• We now allow attacking teams to enter non-capturable HQ sectors for flanking maneuvers.
  
• Once the HQ sectors become active, the attacking team can enter all of the defending team's sectors.
  
• There are also 2 strong points that the attacking team can capture.

Manpower Bleed

When sectors go into Overtime, we now substitute out an arbitrary five minute timer for the current Manpower resource of the attacking team.

1 man power = 1 second

Once overtime starts the Manpower starts being depleted. Once the attacking team's manpower is depleted, the defending team wins.

We feel that this creates engagement with the resource meta, as well as negates continual overtime through the entire of a single Offensive mode round.



While this happens in the background and isn’t an obvious “main event” feature, an enormous amount of work has gone into our upgrade to the latest Unreal Engine version. Whenever we do this, we’re able to take advantage of huge engine-specific fixes (to crashes and many other issues), better workflows and huge upgrades to our ability to optimise. There are also other benefits - better lighting options and greater access to all the newest tools.

While we consider upgrading to currently be a necessity for Hell Let Loose, it comes with multiple weeks worth of hard work in determining what has been broken in the process and then fixing said broken things.

With this out of the way, we’re very excited as a team to turn to more in-depth polish, optimisation and bug fixing.

• Updated AT gun loader rotation speed to 3x
  
• Updated many vehicle icons on the tactical map to reflect their historical icons
  
• Started individuating turret turn speeds based on vehicle - lighter vehicles are now able to turn their turrets more nimbly. This is a balance between the real-life values and the inherent power of the weapon in the game (essentially, most vehicles now turn their turrets faster).

Continual performance updates across all aspects of the title. We’ve been setting up a huge number of tools and workflows that we’ll be using for our optimisation update (which will be shortly after U7).

• Engines now have a wind down sound if the process of turning on has been halted.
  
• Fixed: No click SFX when hovering over the keybindings within the 'Keybindings' sub-menu
  
• Audio menu volume slider “UI Volume (3D)” has been renamed to “Ping Marker Volume”
  
• Large across-title background work for coming audio

• Fixed: [HUD] Sector icons can overlap with the player's iron sights making it difficult to see enemies
  
• Give players 5 seconds to decide on a resolution change.
  
• The map now responds to zooming in and out when hovering over an interactable icon.
  
• Fixed: The "Not placed any Outposts or Garrisons" Hint does not appear
  
• Fixed: Tank UI turret direction indicator not updating to correspond with the gun turret position
  
• Fixed: The Radial Menu becomes unresponsive if the Map is closed while LMB is pressed when the cursor is off the map
  
• Fixed: The Radial Menu becomes unresponsive if it is closed while LMB is pressed
  
• Fixed: The radial menu can be opened while the player is bandaging
  
• Applied the same treatment as the options menu to the main escape menu.
  
• Fixed: The colours of the capture point from the battle map are flipped when the player respawns
  
• Fixed: The 'Personal/Team Stats' button will remain highlighted if the user closes the scoreboard while the cursor was positioned over the button
  
• Fixed: When inviting a user to the unit, the 'Cancel' button and 'Invite' button have partial functionality in certain areas
  
• Fixed: Opening up the 'Field Manual' from the in-game menu results in the 'Field Manual' screen to abruptly shift to the center
  
• Fixed: The Artillery icon has a grey background that is not visible when hovered over.
  
• Fixed: Pulse animation missing from the punish team killer notification
  
• Fixed: The player's current weapon is shown while in the critical state
  
• Fixed: The scaling of the 'Barracks' menu will alter in regards to what role is currently selected
  
• Fixed: Loadout weapon tooltips can be easily misinterpreted
  
• Fixed: No audio cue present when switching between tabs or changing roles
  
• Fixed: The blur effect is missing from the 'Options' sub-menu
  
• Fixed: On the Deployment Screen, the selection ring on Outpost Icons remains red after an enemy moves further than 50m from it
  
• Fixed: Commander abilities are cut off and cannot be used when the game is running in certain resolutions.
  
• Fixed: The 'M1A1 Carbine' weapon icon is smaller in regards to the other weapon icons
  
• Fixed: The buttons for 'View Personal Stats' and 'View Team Stats' both have areas that do not correlate with where the user can click on
  
• Fixed: When viewing the front end menu in 1024x768 Windowed mode, the title text can become illegible due to its size
  
• Fixed: Map key text displays incorrect instructions upon first entering a server.
  
• Fixed: The player progress bar on the barracks overlaps the characters head on certain resolutions
  
• Fixed: Some of German uniforms do not match their respective thumbnails
  
• Fixed: Within the 'Barracks', the orange glow effect present on the cosmetic icons are not present on the loadout icons

• Fixed: Placed barbed wire fences have low LOD distances
  
• Fixed: German Resupply Stations have a noticeable LoD issue
  
• Fixed: The Winter Smock encounters an LOD issue when observing at roughly 6m
  
• Fixed: The water bottle is misaligned with the Melton Winter Coat uniform
  
• Fixed: Rotating a character that is wearing the 'Heer Winter' or 'Motorcycle' coat will result in multiple clipping issues.
  
• Fixed: In the Barracks, the Allies Support has inconsistent textures on its radio between the Summer, Assault Vest and Winter uniforms.

Re-ordered and applied a new series of force-specific heads. The idea here is that over time you’ll ascend in veterancy.

We’ll have new historically authentic facial accessories to come, as well as multiple new uniforms in the next patch and update.

• Fixed: Vaulting/Climbing just as a grenade explodes will lock the player camera to a 180 degree rotation on re-deploy.
  
• Fixed: Being kicked while in the deploy menu and joining a new unit will cause the player to be kicked from the new Unit after redeploying.
  
• Fixed: The player cannot create a new unit after being kicked from an existing unit in the deployment menu.
  
• Fixed: The player will fail to deploy onto the battlefield if they opt to spawn in as the 'Deploy' timer is about to deplete
  
• Fixed: A message displaying "MMB has been unbound from Marking" is shown on the first boot
  
• Fixed: After being killed by a grenade the player's head camera can clip into the terrain and show out of gameworld
  
• Fixed: Explosion decals and PFX spin when shooting the treads of the US Heavy Tanks
  
• Fixed: While observing the cooldowns for the Commander's abilities, they will commence when the server timer begins. This results in a discrepancy between the Warfare and Offensive game modes. In Warfare, the cooldowns can be seen just starting as the players only had to wait 10 seconds to deploy onto an HQ. Whereas in Offensive, all players must wait 2 minutes and in doing so results in the Commander's abilities to be ready or nearly ready to use.
  
• Fixed: Player will not receive ‘Can’t deploy at that location’ message if the Outpost/Garrison is destroyed while they are in the deploy wave.
  
• Fixed: The US 75mm heavy tank will explode if it is shot specifically in the lower front part by a Heavy German tank
  
• Fixed: Inconsistent ranges for destroying AP Mines for Ballistic weapons.
  
• Fixed: German Engineer’s Summer Smock and Winter Smock Uniform icons are missing their tooltips.
  
• Fixed: The Commander is missing a role description in the Loadout section
  
• Fixed: Explosives that affect players in Critical State often cause their player camera to fall under the map
  
• Fixed: The 'White Painted M1/M42' helmet does not have a tooltip
  
• Fixed: After a map change, opting to 'Switch Teams' and returning to the previous team initiates the Team Switch Cooldown
  
• Fixed: Multiple AP weapons deal no damage but cause the “damage” PFX to a specific section the turret of US Heavy Tanks
  
• Fixed: The map marker list will be visible if the previous match ended while the map marker list was open
  
• Fixed: Driving tanks at an angle different to flat terrain causes the Compass Sector Icons to skip past the the Compass Angle Indicator
  
• Fixed: [Barracks] The M1938 Tanker Helmet has clipping issues on multiple heads
  
• Fixed: The radial menu will become unresponsive if the player has the menu open before attempting to aim down the sights of their weapon
  
• Fixed: Scrolling credits clip through the Title Banner on some resolutions
  
• Fixed: Outpost and Garrison Icons display the "Enemy Near" icon when enemies in critical state are within 50m
  
• Fixed: Players can be observed to float from FPP in the second seat of the artillery when entering prone or crouched
  
• Fixed: The Map Marker List cannot be opened on Icons that have tooltips
  
• Fixed: Pressing [Esc] while connecting to a match removes the 'Enlist' screen in the background
  
• Fixed: Closing the 'Options' menu with the [Esc] key does not play the click audio cue
  
• Fixed: Pressing the [Ecs] button on the frontend with none of the sub-menus up results in an audio cue to play
  
• Fixed: Vehicles destroyed by shot anti-tank mines are not being credited as kills
  
• Fixed: Closing the in-game map results in the grid references to flash black before eventually being removed from view
  
• Fixed: The Springfield sniper rifle will not produce bullet decals when shooting the Higgins boat ramp when it is not deployed in the water
  
• Fixed: Scarecrow models produce dirt PFX when shot in areas that have hay
  
• Fixed: Players have been seen inside of Repair Station mesh.
  
• Fixed: Dismantling an enemy Anti-Tank Gun awards no score
  
• Fixed: Players can experience a soft lock if they enter a tank as it explodes
  
• Fixed: The Commander's 'Reinforce' ability can be placed in a sector that is currently in 'Sector cooldown'
  
• Fixed: AT gun not taking damage from Artillery
  
• Fixed: Outposts cannot be selected if an enemy is within 50m of it
  
• Fixed: Headshot hit registration issues are present when the player is shot while walking backwards
  
• Fixed: The Commander can place 'Reinforce' in a sector that has recently been lost
  
• Fixed: The 'You killed yourself' message is not shown if the player bleeds out from their own explosion
  
• Fixed: The 'UI Volume (3D)' will reset to 0% when returning to gameplay
  
• Fixed: "Encouraged" ability will only last 4 minutes and 48 seconds
  
• Fixed: Posters have been seen to change depending on the distance between it and the player

• Fixed: External RCon Client does not recognize spaces within login credentials

• Fixed: [PHL] Missing collision for the horizontal roof girders inside the barn in sector H10
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Floating fence outside the combat area is visible from combat sectors C9 and C10
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Spawn point is not highlighted for players on the deploy screen after an enemy enters and exits a HQ sector
  
• Fixed: [PHL] No collision for the room walls on the 1st floor of a building in sector F6
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Large sections of elevated terrain have noticeable texture issues
  
• Fixed: [PHL] There is a German Soldier model at the bottom of the river in D8
  
• Fixed: [PHL][D10] 0 supplies node outside of left German HQ spawn
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Black textures present on the windows from the building at the top edge of the D4 sector
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Missing collision for part of the walls of a destroyed building in sector G7
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Misaligned foliage texture present in sector C8
  
• Fixed: [PHL] No collision with the corners of a half destroyed building in sector E8
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Vote for map image is incorrect.
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Player has no collision with the roof of the greenhouse in sector F2
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Misaligned grass texture in sector D8
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Player has collision with an invisible wall in sector D8
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Misaligned terrain at the bottom edge of the F3 sector
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Floating wire fence pole is present in sector G2
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Missing collision for the roof of a destroyed building in sector G2
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Extended collision present on a truck wreck from sector E2
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Sections of grass on the outskirts of the map periodically glow yellow
  
• Fixed: Purple-Heart-Lane - missing textures - Madeleine Farm (D7)
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Rain droplet PFX is missing
  
• Fixed: [PHL][C10] Missing textures from ends of the dirt mounds
  
• Fixed: [PHL][H8] Stone bunker model is culled too early - at roughly 80m
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Player can remain stuck after jumping next to a specific tree model in multiple locations
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Incorrect player collision on a section of a road in E3
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Missing collision for inside walls and the roof of a house in sector F7
  
• Fixed: [PHL] [F10] A line of bushes are placed on the main road leading out of the map
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Misaligned edge of river bank in sector on the edge of sector E1
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Interior assets found inside houses the player cannot enter
  
• Fixed: [PHL] Misaligned mud bank texture present in sector G7

For full details please see the extended patch notes here.

Foy

Fixed: 68 collision and visual issues.

Sainte-Marie-Du-Mont

Fixed: 13 collision and visual issues.

Utah Beach

Fixed: 6 collision and visual issues.

Hürtgen Forest

Fixed: 4 collision and visual issues.

Omaha Beach

Fixed: 23 collision and visual issues.

Sainte-Mère-Église

Fixed: 18 collision, gameplay and visual issues.

• Rotating AT Guns causes noticeable jittering to the Gunner
  
• Some light flickering at the edge of the screen on some resolutions. We’re working to understand what is causing this.
  
• The rock layer on Hill 400 is currently playing the wrong footstep sound.
  
• Depth of field in both vehicles and generally is currently absent. This is as a result of the Engine
• Upgrade and something we’ll be rolling out a fix for shortly. The result of this is textures looking ugly and low-res when near the camera (ie vision viewports and the back edge of weapons).

• Animation overhaul
  
• New high density urban map
  
• A enormous-scale non-hedges bridge map
  
• Another non-hedges map
  
• New weapons
  
• New armoured vehicles
  
• New customisation options
  
• Continued bug fixes
  
• Continued map overhauls for older maps
  
• Continued work on sound overhaul
  
• Engineer and Support role overhauls
  
• Fixing the “re-deploy” gameplay loop
  
• Implementing satisfying logistics roles
  
• Open-topped wheeled transport and logistics vehicles
  
• New Commander abilities and fleshing out of the resource meta
  
• Continued polish on both Warfare and Offensive game modes
  
• Continued work on progression systems and experience gain
  
• Essentially - continued work on every single aspect of the game in every area.

Lastly, Gportal will be offering a 10% discount to existing and new server owners over the next month.

These links will grant 10% off HLL server rental for the duration of the period you book for...

Europe/UK
https://www.g-portal.us/?ref=hell-let-loose]Rest of world

More regions - After many requests, servers are now available for rental in Sao Paulo and Taiwan!

For those already renting servers from g-portal, you can either wait until your current contract expires and set up a new one using the discount, or contact g-portal and they will provide you with credit equal to 10% of the value of the remaining time on your contract (so it's as though you were applying the 10% discount from today).



Thank you so much for your continued support over our Early Access. We’re going to be doing a “state of the union” post in the coming weeks to take a look at our journey through Early Access so far, as well as expectations around optimisation and all other areas of development across the title. As usual, there’s a huge amount to come and we’re very excited to be on the journey with you!

See you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

To celebrate the launch of Update 6 - Assault on Hill 400, we're excited to announce that Chuck Dixx of Team Dixx will be heading to the frontline with an epic stream over on the Hell Let Loose Steam Store page!

Watch him live from 7:30pm BST / 20:30 CEST / 14:30 EST -> WATCH HERE

Want to get in on the [DIXX] action? You can join their welcoming Discord here.

He'll see you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Developer Briefing #73!

Before we jump into the brief with Lead Developer Max we’re excited to let you know that Update 6 will be launching on April 30th bringing with it a whole heap of new content including -

• Hill 400 (Offensive and Warfare Modes)
  
• Utah Beach Overhaul
  
• Ballistics System Overhaul
  
• Recon Vehicles
  
• Offensive Mode Changes
  
• New Commander Abilities
  
• New Customisation Items
  
• Bug Fixes
  
• Further Optimisation
  
• Unreal Engine Upgrade to 4.24

And more!

Now I’m going to hand over to Max who’s going to reveal all about the new ballistics system you’ll be playing with from next week.

Take it away Max!



Hi everyone!

This week is an exciting dev brief for us! We’re very, very thrilled to finally be able to unveil our entirely new ballistics system that we’ll be launching in the next Update - Update 6. As you can imagine, this has been a huge undertaking that we feel will radically transform the feel of the game in very positive ways that we’ll outline below.

We’re very proud of the work done to implement this new system while retaining acceptable server performance. For a small indie team, implementing a system like this in a 100 player game (some of which last for more than an hour and a half) has been a huge task and one that we don’t want to understate the difficulty of.

Below we’ll walk you through the thinking of both the old system and the new system, as well as what you can expect in the future for the system. We apologise for the media we’ve attached to this brief. It’s really something that needs to be experienced and played to truly understand - although we hope the videos and gifs give you some idea.

Please note that in these videos we’ve enabled debug colors to better show you the travel and behaviour of the projectile over range. Also be aware that these videos are captured using our current (old) animation system.

Let's get started...



Up until now, Hell Let Loose has used a modified line-trace system which adds bullet-drop from gravity - with the one exception of Snipers using a physical projectile.

Line-trace is typically a very good choice for multiplayer games, and is by far the most common method. It's very fast, has a low networking cost (important for a large-scale game like HLL) and more importantly - it feels reliable and consistent, even in high-stress network conditions (ie. with all 99 other players within 100m proximity of you). You can still simulate almost any physical effect with line-trace, despite the fact that there is no "bullet" to speak of.

The pitfall of line-trace however, is that the bullet travels very quickly from the source to the target - and shooting a player 500M away feels very similar to shooting a player directly in front of you. This can make mid-long range engagements feel dull, and devoid of skill.





For the next update, we have built a completely new ballistics system for our weapons made from the ground up.

The new system simulates every bullet as a projectile - meaning that you now have to accommodate for range and velocity, and lead your shots.



The ballistics simulation also adds new physical effects alongside gravity, such as drag from air resistance - and factors the calibre, grain, shape and profile of the bullet into the equation. The directionality and consistency of bullet "cracks" as they fly past the player has also been improved, and the visuals of tracers have been tweaked (the tracers you now see are the exact round heading towards you!).



All handheld weapons have been unified and updated to use this new system from Pistols to MG's and Snipers. This means that we’ve broken out every rough caliber in the game and built them using their real-world properties.

We’ve spent large amounts of time testing these to make sure no strange effects are produced from the application of real-world values. Please be assured that other non-handheld weapons will also be updated in the future to use this system (tank coaxial and hull MGs - the only bullets in the game to not use this new system).

Many of you may be excited, but some of you may be concerned that the end result may feel inconsistent. Often we’ve found that going for a straight facsimile of real world properties actually results in random and unsatisfying gameplay. Rest assured, something that we were very shocked by was how naturally fun the new system was.

The way the new system translates to in-game, is that each weapon now has a unique but characteristic feel that you can learn to master individually. Short-range shooting still feels snappy and responsive, and mid-long range engagements reward players who can make precision shots. The effectiveness and properties of each weapon is amplified, and the wide variety of battlefields in Hell Let Loose will be better showcased by this new system, creating a bigger distinction between short, mid and long range engagements.





As part of the ballistics overhaul, we have also developed a new hit-detection system to work alongside it. We have added a comprehensive Lag Compensation system for all player weapons, which improves consistency across different servers and eliminates the effects of latency on shooting and hit-detection. This has also allowed us to tighten up our anti-cheat measures, as we can verify hits much more precisely than before (this also improves the reliability of headshots!)

The new hit detection system adopts a favour-the-shooter approach, except in cases where the victim does something to mitigate being shot (such as getting into a vehicle).

This is just the first of many steps towards improved weapon handling and feel in Hell Let Loose, and we will continue to add and iterate on the ballistics system over time (such as bullet penetration).



We’re currently using the previous system’s damage fall-off charts per weapon caliber. We haven’t yet touched these as we feel it’ll complicate the feedback and response to this new system. The idea here is to update the ballistics system as a whole in order to specifically gauge its network and gameplay performance in a live environment. We’ll be in the game playing with you in order to get the best idea of how it’s faring. Once we feel that the fundamentals of the system are solid, we’ll then revisit the damage charts to see if any changes need to be made.

Please be assured that we won’t be softening damage or making the game less lethal.



As you can imagine, this is a huge new system to be brought into the game. We’ve been testing this system in simulated and real latency conditions with the goal of creating a system that functions well even at 400 ping. We know that many players enjoy playing on servers all around the world - so we’ve made a large effort to make sure the system is reliable in high latency conditions and feels good for low and high ping players.

This will be a ridiculously huge update for us. Paired with the new Unreal Engine upgrade to 4.24, we’re very keen to collect feedback on how the system performs.

As with all aspects of development of Hell Let Loose, we’re keen to iron out as potential issues or negative experiences.

We feel as a dev team, that this change to ballistics combined with our coming animation overhaul and continued sound overhaul will drastically change the game for the better. Please know that initially this new system will require some re-learning of the way to conduct engagements at range. Close quarters engagement will largely have the same feel, whereas the further the distance to target the more you will need to aim above the target to compensate for drop, as well as lead the target in order to compensate for the travel time of the bullet through the air.

We have been playing with this new system for many weeks now and have found that - once learned - this new system creates a more logical sense of battle (less instant-death at very long ranges) and defines each weapon’s sense of purpose (machine-guns are now more potent and true-to-function) - as well as creating a better soundscape and more atmospheric battlefield. Ultimately, we find this system to be both far more realistic and far more fun. We’re looking forward to seeing your feedback!

Finally, this is one of the huge infrastructure overhauls that we’ve been keen to finally reveal and implement. The next one will be the animation overhaul. Stay tuned as we’ll dive deep into that in the coming weeks.



One last thing before we sign-off, we've been listening to your feedback in regards to server access in Asia and South America. From Monday 27th April we're pleased to say one of our server hosting partners, G-Portal will be allowing members of the community to rent HLL servers in both Taiwan and Sao Paolo.

We’ll see you on the frontline.

Hey everyone!

Welcome to Developer Briefing #72!

This one's a bit of a broad Dev Brief while we finalise Update 6. It’s been a huge time for the team - with March seeing:

• Unreal Engine version upgrade to 4.24 from 4.21
  
• Overhaul and re-write of ballistics system (a dev briefing on this will be dropping shortly)
  
• Implementation of new Commander vehicle spawning abilities
  
• Implementation of first pass of reconnaissance systems (for Commander and Recon vehicles)
  
• Complete addition of Recon vehicles - including wheeled vehicle physics model
  
• Offensive and Warfare mode implementation and finalising of new map - Hill 400
  
• Utah Beach overhaul
  
• And many more bug fixes, optimisations and customisation options.

Customisation for us as a Dev Team is a way of illustrating the veterancy of the player, as well as offering some ability to add personality and character to your in-game soldier (in addition to enabling you to form historical units with friends). Throughout development we’ll continue to add new options to each of the three categories, as well as potentially add a fourth “accessory” category. We want to reward long-time players with interesting options, as well as create seasonal unlocks to celebrate different historical events. We’re also looking at ways of adding prizes for tournaments and other game-wide competitions.

Specifically, we want to touch quickly on the heads. We’ve felt that many of the faces/heads in-game were quite gormless or bland. While we’re a small team, we always try and push the envelope on each aspect of the game. To that end, our amazing character artist Dmitry has done a lovely job of giving far more character and personality to each head.


The Lineup - Battle Ready

With the expanded options, we’ve now standardised their sizing, as well as broken them out amongst the specific forces. We’ve also staggered their unlocks to specific levels in order to demonstrate the relative climb in experience (with the later unlocks being far more grizzled than the fresh-faced rookies).


This isn't Mendez's first rodeo

In addition to this, we’ve also worked on the shader for skin - enabling them to retain far more detail without any added cost to memory.

Finally, we’ve always wanted to implement accessories for each soldier. These range from pipes, to cigarillos, to spectacles and all the way to motorcycle goggles. As always, we’re constantly looking over reference for historically accurate accoutrements. We don’t want to create absurd appearances - but more a spectrum of different sights that a soldier may have seen amidst the fighting.

Finally, we’re excited to show you some new headwear options coming for German forces (these will be after Update 6):


The team took a hats on approach here!


For those that feel helmets are overrated...


Whilst the base mesh displays a Swastika, the final model will have that icon scuffed / disfigured so as not to fully display it. We will look at implementing un-scuffed versions per territory at a later date.

Like absolutely everything we do - we’re always listening to feedback and continuously working to improve the current contents, as well as expand the total options available.

We currently have several new uniforms ready to go that we’ll be unveiling in the near future.



We’re currently aware of several issues facing armour within Hell Let Loose. The topic is a huge one, and something we’re keen to properly deal with. At present the team has been hugely busy with continued large-scale infrastructure upgrades (ballistics overhaul, engine upgrade, animation overhaul to name a few) that we need to have finalised as soon as possible. However, we want to assure you that we’ll be returning to the topic of armour more broadly in the near future.

Working with our fantastic dedicated communities, we have a giant hit list of design issues, bugs and feature additions or changes. We want to let you know that we’ll be turning our giant development “Eye of Sauron” to these as soon as we’re clear of the most significant infrastructure upgrades. Even in revisiting the initial wheeled vehicle physics model we discovered many aspects were able to be refined and so we’re excited to tackle many of the following issues:

• Allied armour is very numerous given their relative power parity with German armour.
  
• Barb wire should not stop a tank, a tank should be able to pass through (there is a broader note here that barbed wire should also function as barbed wire to infantry). This will also place greater emphasis on usage of mines and tank traps.
  
• Vehicles generally need to be balanced (we’ll be starting to address this with the new vehicle spawning system in U6).
  
• Tank tracks at the moment are too vulnerable (while conversely the solution to this needs to be nuanced as invincible tank tracks will not be fun either).
  
• Revisiting the different damage levels per component and possible expanding, changing and tweaking as a reflection of community feedback.
  
• Revisiting armour penetration and deflection of rounds (our suspicion is the huge engine upgrades have thrown aspects of this off).
  
• Turret rotation needs to be different for each tank. (This is starting to be implemented as of Update 6. We also feel stabilisers need to be added to appropriate tanks.)
  
• APCR, HVAP and other rounds should be introduced to provide an extra dynamic and a heavy hit at cost.
  
• Tweaking performance and speeds of specific tanks to better fit in the game hierarchy.
  Continuing sound improvements.
  
• Vehicle colliding physics improvements (light tanks bumping into heavy tanks etc).
  
• Armour under tank needs to be light to allow AT to kill when we crest slowly
  
• Armour on top needs to be light for AT to kill from windows
  
• Revisiting manoeuvrability at low speeds.
  
• Gears on tanks can bug out and end up cruising at a low speed.
  
• Better camera movement in vehicle interior positions (so it doesn't feel like your head is locked).
  
• Repairing of tracks by crew.
  
• Balancing of experience gain for all crew members.
  
• Additional uniforms for the tank crews – distinguish between driver, commander and gunner.
  
• Implementation of smoke canisters.
  
• Solving rubber banding of tanks (we know what is causing this and our optimisations will be addressing this shortly).
  
• Fixing any poorly zeroed sights.
  
• Addition of sight zeroing.

And more!

That wraps up this week's Dev Briefing, we hope you liked what you saw!

As mentioned earlier, we're very excited to reveal more about the upcoming Ballistics Overhaul and will be talking about it more with you very soon.

Have a great weekend, we'll see you on the frontline!