Hey everyone,

Welcome to Dev Brief #130!

This week we're taking a look at smart materials and how we're applying them to vehicles to not only make them looking fantastic up close, but also improve performance at the same time.

If you're not familiar with what 'smart materials' are, don't worry - we'll be explaining all that and more below.

Also make sure to stick around until the end if you'd like to take part in next week's Kursk PTE, we'll have further details, including how to sign-up at the end of the brief.

Right then, let's get stuck in shall we...



Hi everyone,

This week, we’ll take you through the usage of smart materials when it comes to vehicles. We’re rolling this out with our new Soviet vehicles first, and we think the results are pretty incredible when it comes to preserving detail right up close - at LESS expense than any time before.

Many of you may have seen the process of implementing smart materials on handheld weapons. Normally, a 3d artist will bake unique texture sets to be used in-game on a weapon. In order to make sure those textures are optimised (and in a game like HLL with more than 40 handheld objects it’s a challenge), we are forced to adjust the resolution of them - often resulting in extremely blurry looking textures. Unfortunately, this was the same for vehicles. Crisp beautiful textures in renders were crunched down for performance purposes and ended up becoming a blurry mess. For example:



As we’ve grown and matured as a team, Danny was convinced that he’d be able to set up a far more robust smart material system for all vehicles.

In essence, smart materials take the idea that there are core materials (wood, metal, painted metal) and then use those over and over again for different objects or vehicles using unique parameters for wear, colour, roughness and so on. What has resulted is a fantastic visual upgrade for our vehicles. It also drastically speeds up the texturing process (going from 2-3 days per vehicle to 20-30 minutes!) while also enabling incredible detail up close - and best of all a significant performance increase as we move from using 24 low quality textures for our Soviet vehicles to just 6 high quality textures.

We feel the results speak for themselves:



Finally, many of you will be pleased to know that we’ve built a camo system into the new smart material system. While we’re beginning with what we’d consider the base colour scheme for the Soviet, we have the potential to apply totally completely new appearances for each vehicle - at no extra cost.





Lastly, while we’ve applied this system first to the Soviets, we’ll be retroactively rolling this out to all vehicles in-game over the coming updates.





Thanks to all who participated in the recent PTE we held on the upcoming soviet map Kursk. The turnout of players was great and higher than we had expected. Most of the development team was present in this PTE and even though a few anticipated bugs surfaced we were very happy with how this new addition is moving forwards.

The feedback that everyone provided was great to help us now work tirelessly on streamlining this map for the future. Thanks to everyone that played and took the time to post the issues that they found. The team is crushing bugs and already looking forward to the new build for another playtest later next week.

We would really appreciate the community's participation again in next week's PTE. This will be another test on the new eastern front map Kursk, including both Offensive modes. As we are still in development mode for U10, this build will be buggy, so please consider that if you are participating. We really appreciate your help in keeping all feedback to the specific channels and not streaming or broadcasting this content, as we want to build some anticipation before we reveal this to the broader community.

We will also include known issues and a changelog overview so you know what to expect. This test will be best suited for those in the GMT tz, and will take place from approximately 11am to 4pm GMT. We will look to have several more PTEs, so if for any reason you can make this one, don’t worry!.

If you want to know how to join the PTE, please join the official HLL Discord here

YES I WANT TO JOIN THE HELL LET LOOSE DISCORD

You will find all the details you need to join there.




Onwards to the weekend!

That wraps up today's brief! We'll be sharing more Soviet goodies with you in the coming weeks. We hope you are all as happy and excited as we are with this next Update. Next week we'll have a preview of the new overhaul of St. Marie Du Mont.

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

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Dev Brief #129!

This week we've got plenty for you to look at with the announcement of the winners and runners up of our video competition! The level of quality in these are amazing and well worth checking out, so get comfy and give them a watch.

On top of that we've also got news on our next PTE (Spoilers: Kursk) and an update on our current optimisation focus, including specifics on how it's being addressed from Lead Developer Max.

So, we've got entertainment, information and an opportunity to help us test Kursk ahead of its upcoming arrival to the frontline - Let's get stuck in that we...



With an amazing array of many entries it is time to announce a winner for the Hell Let Loose Video Competitions ‘Filming Private Ryan’ and ‘We Want You’.



Again we would like to express our thanks to all those who entered and helped their friends and communities in any way.

The quality and numbers of entries was fantastic and impressed us all here at Dev HQ. After a lot of consideration we have managed to (and this was no easy task) pick a winner for each genre.

Once we agreed on a winner, we hit another roadblock trying to work out a runners up for each category. After a few days of discussion and arm wrestling we have decided that the quality of the entries was so high that we have decided to have multiple runner ups.

Also ‘ALL SUBMISSIONS’ who were not a winner or runner up, will receive a prize. This will be in the form of one Hell Let Loose Steam Key.

Congratulations to all who were involved in this comp, the community is extremely talented! o7

We hope it was as much fun for you all to make those clips as it was for us to watch and appreciate them all. We cannot thank the community enough for their contributions. We have been very humbled by your enthusiasm for our game.

We look forward to seeing you all in the future, with more to come on the horizon.

And now the winners!

Filming Private Ryan

WINNER:
[EASY] submitted by Bickley with the entry ‘War is Hell - Hell Let Loose’



Runner ups for this category are:

[82AD] submitted by Very_Bad_Moon with the entry ‘South West’


[18.PzDiv] submitted by Moe with the entry ‘Hell Let´s Saving Ryan’


[NPA] submitted by Lord Vader with the entry ‘Hell Let Loose Archival Footage Preservation’


Honourable mention:

Submitted by Richie Mason with the entry ‘German Heart Lane’

This was created by one man, who jumped into a random game and recorded the events.


We Want You

WINNER:

Koju Sone with the entry ‘Survive in Hell’.



Runner ups for this category are:

Alpine Sniper with the entry ‘These Blades Only’


Lexhy with the entry ‘Hell of a Boogie Woogie’


Br0ken_English with the entry ‘Plink’


MBS with the entry ‘My First 6 Hours of HLL’


We will be contacting the winners and runner ups directly. Also everyone else who made a submission can expect an email from us, if you haven’t had one already.

Again we wish we could have included you all, and thanks again for the enthusiasm shown! We will look at getting out as much of the content as possible via our various social channels.



We would really appreciate the community's participation in next week's PTE. This will be a test on the new Eastern Front map Kursk. As we are still in development mode for U10, this build will be buggy, so please consider that if you are participating.

We will follow up with the exact day and time next week. We will also include known issues and a changelog overview so you know what to expect. This test will be best suited for those in the GMT timezone, and will take place from approximately 11am to 4pm GMT. We will look to have several PTEs, so if for any reason you can make this one, don’t worry!.



If you want to know how to join the PTE, please join the official HLL Discord below:

YES I WANT TO JOIN THE HELL LET LOOSE DISCORD

You will find all the details you need to join there.



Optimisation is an ongoing process and challenge when developing Hell Let Loose - with a special combination of high player count, huge emphasis on replicated physics and large scale maps. We know that it’s one of the most requested aspects of work, and it’s something we’ve had a dedicated team working hard on for the last several months (as opposed to having to bounce back and forth between content creation and optimization).

One area of key significance (and ongoing pain) is the grass within Hell Let Loose. Setting a game in Normandy - amidst endless rolling fields - demands that grass not only be present, but play a somewhat active role in the gameplay - typically concealing you at close range when lying down. It also plays a large role in adding detail to large stretches of otherwise featureless landscape. As a result, we’ve tried to balance our grass to provide a photoreal look up close that is also appropriate concealment, while also billboarding it in a way that allows us to keep it present at longer distances (instead of culling it - as you’d do in games that don’t rely on longer range engagements).

At present, we’re currently working on creating much smoother blends between the different levels of detail of the grass. This will mean that you’ll notice far fewer shape changes the closer or further you walk from the grass, and that the final transition to the billboard (the version of the grass we use at very long range) will be much softer and less noticeable. We’re also performing some key optimisations to the way it’s rendered - including reducing triangle count to lower costs and increase visual bang for buck.

Next week, we’ll take you through the usage of smart materials when it comes to vehicles. We’re rolling this out with our new Russian vehicles first, and we think the results are pretty incredible when it comes to preserving detail right up close - at LESS expense than any time before.

Optimisation is ongoing and has greatly increased in the last several months. We want to assure you that it has huge priority within the team and we’re excited to show you the results.




Onwards to the weekend!

That wraps up this week's brief, thanks for checking it out!

Have a fantastic weekend everyone, we'll see you on the frontline.

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Dev Brief #128!

This week we're sharing an update on the two Hell Let Loose video competitions, which have been absolutely astonishing by the way, as well as giving you all an update on what you can expect around our next steps with the PTE - Yes, that includes the upcoming Eastern Front content!

We'll wrap things up with a little look at some of the cosmetics you'll be able to wear when representing the Soviets too!

Right, let's get stuck in shall we...



Thanks to everyone for participating in the two Hell Let Loose Video competitions “We Want You” and “Filming Private Ryan”.

Wow what a response to this competition we have had! We are very hard at work on Update 10, and it’s good to be able to take a quick break and enjoy what the community is creating.

We have been super impressed with the number and quality of entries received, there were well over 100 submissions, and we have watched every single one!

We hope it was as much fun for you all to film and capture these clips as it was for us to watch and appreciate them all. We cannot thank the community enough for their contributions. We have been very humbled by your enthusiasm.

The winners and runners up will be announced soon, but as a sign of appreciation we have decided to give ALL entrants a small token of our appreciation.

Stay tuned for more updates on this soon, also make sure you are following on Facebook and Twitter as we intend to highlight not only the winners but also some honourable mentions in the coming weeks.

If you have made a submission, you may receive an email asking for the original file, so please make sure to save these and lookout for any emails from us.

Thanks again to all of you in this amazing community that is Hell Let Loose.

Below are a selection of each of the two categories. And a reminder that we will have more competitions coming up with different prizes in the not so distant future.

"We Want You!"

Lexhy - Hell of a Boogie Woogie


Alpine Sniper - These Blades Only


Moe Savastano - Naked Guns “Best of”



“Filming Private Ryan”

107th Touchdown Jesus - 107th Assemble


Pm. Vova - Para Bellum Movie


Team HFKT - Carentan




Soon we will be back into PTE testing mode, and will aim to have an initial smoke test soon. We would really appreciate the community's participation, as we have lots of new content to test (especially Eastern Front content). We will follow up with the details on how to get involved shortly. So please keep an eye on the official HLL Discord.

If you haven’t already now is the perfect time to join!

YES I WANT TO JOIN THE HELL LET LOOSE DISCORD!



A new front means new Uniforms, hats and helmets!

We will be sharing more cosmetics with you, in the coming weeks. Will will be also adding in a few more to the US and German cosmetic options but wanted to give you a tease of what you can expect to see for the Soviets.





That's all for this week's Dev Brief, have a great weekend everyone!

See you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Dev Brief #127!

This week we're delving further into the arsenal that will be available to Soviet forces when Update 10 arrives later this year. We're also in a position to give a first peek at what we're moving towards with the upcoming armour overhaul. This is still in progress dev side, so as we move towards finishing this substantial task we'll share more details and depth on the changes with you!

Right then, lets take a look at the first primary weapon that will be available for the Soviet Machinegunner role, the DP-27!



The DP-27, developed by Vasily Degtyarov, was the primary light machine gun of the Soviet Union in WW2. An earlier light machine gun designed in the inter-war period, the DP-27 nonetheless proved itself capable on the battlefield and served with the Soviet armed forces for over 30 years.



The DP-27 fed from a 47-round pan-shaped magazine and shared its full-power ammunition with the Mosin-Nagant family of rifles. Affectionately known as the “record player,” it put reliable automatic firepower in the hands of rifle sections. Tankers would also use the Degtyarov machine gun in a form modified to fit the cramped fighting compartments of Soviet armor. This DT variant used a different type of magazine and featured a collapsible stock.



Fierce combat on the eastern front made apparent some of the weaknesses of the DP-27. The bipod was relatively flimsy and the recoil spring was awkwardly placed, causing the weapon to malfunction as it heated up. Furthermore, while the pan magazine was successful in reliably feeding rimmed ammunition, it did so at the cost of being both awkwardly shaped and somewhat fragile. Being magazine fed also limited its firepower compared to the opposition's MG34 and MG42 belt-fed machine guns.

The reliability issues of the DP would be addressed in the wartime DPM variant, and the design would finally be converted to feed from belts in the post-war RP-46.



In Hell Let Loose, the DP-27 will be the backbone of the Soviet Machinegunner role. Due to it’s relatively low capacity magazine compared with its German counterparts, the DP-27 is best used from the deployed position. With a clean sight picture and lower rate of fire, it’s an easy weapon to move from target to target while delivering pinpoint accuracy. The DP-27 will be the first primary weapon for the Soviet Machinegunner role.




Video Content Competition Reminder

We continue to get some great submissions for the video content competition. Again If you are unsure what that is, you can find all the details in Developer Briefing #124.

We want to thank everyone who has made a submission so far. A reminder that the last day for submissions is May 17th! So one more weekend to get these in. We will start to share these via our channels shortly.

If you have made a submission, you may receive an email asking for the original file, so please make sure to save this.


Armour Update

We want to share with you some insight into what the Armour rework will involve. We will have a more in depth view in an upcoming Dev Brief, but this is a total overhaul to remove the instances where projectiles will clip on smaller external geometry and cause one hit kills or points of invulnerability.

Here you can see what the new hitboxes look like.




25% Off Hell Let Loose in the Team17 Publisher Sale!

Join the frontline for less until May 14th with a tasty 25% discount on Hell Let Loose! It's a great time to jump in, join the community and get a feel for the game ahead of the Eastern Front coming to the game for all players as part of Update 10.

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

If you're fresh on the front feel free to stop by the following locations to squad up with other players, join a clan or just chat with the team and other players:

HLL Reddit
HLL Discord

If you're looking for something to do between battles you can check out the full Team17 Steam Publisher Sale here.


Onwards to the weekend!

That wraps up this week's Dev Brief, thanks for taking the time to check it out!

As always, let us know your thoughts and feelings in the comments below, we really appreciate hearing what you think.

Have a great weekend everyone!

See you on the frontline.

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Dev Brief #126!

Last week we took a look at the Soviet T-34, so this week we thought we'd take a look at something a little lighter - sidearms!

When the Eastern Front arrives as part of Update 10 the Soviets will launch with two sidearms to choose from, full details of which can be found below...





1895 Nagant



One of the main sidearms to serve the Soviet armed forces, the M1895 Nagant was a simple and robust revolver. Instead of utilizing a break-open or swing out cylinder, the M1895 had its cartridges ejected and reloaded individually from a loading gate. Initially only firing in single-action and needing to be cocked after every shot, most were converted to double-action by WW2.

The main unique feature of the M1895, the gas seal, was achieved with proprietary ammunition which seated the bullet deep in the cartridge case. These cartridges would then be pushed into the barrel at the moment of firing, eliminating the gas leak found on other revolver designs. Because of this, the M1895 is one of the few revolvers capable of effectively utilizing a suppressor.

The M1895 Nagant served both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union with distinction. The revolver was known to be a brutally reliable weapon, though its trigger pull was quite heavy.



In Hell Let Loose, the Nagant will be one of the most numerous side-arms available. Although slower to reload and difficult to use with it’s minimal sight, we’ve buffed the damage to enable the Nagant to have a slightly higher stopping power than the TT-33.




TT33



The TT-33 was a Soviet designed combat pistol intended to replace the aging M1895 Nagant. It used the same robust operating mechanism as seen on the M1911, but was simplified in all aspects to be as simple to produce as possible. It fired the powerful 7.62x25 millimeter round which it shared with the PPSh-41 and PPS-43 submachine guns.

To increase reliability and to maximize interchangeability of magazines between different factories, feed lips were machined as an integral part of the pistol instead of as part of the magazine. Instead of a safety lever, the TT-33 had a half-cock notch.

The TT-33 served concurrently with the M1895 and was a reliable and effective sidearm.



In Hell Let Loose, the TT-33 is the mainstay of the Soviet side-arms. With a faster reload and clear sight picture, the TT-33 has a slightly lower stopping power than it’s slower older brother - the 1895 Nagant revolver.




Onwards to the weekend!

That wraps up this week's Dev Brief!

We hope you enjoyed your first look at the Soviet sidearms you'll be wielding on the Eastern Front. We'll be revealing more of the Soviet arsenal over the coming week's as we march closer to Kursk and [Redacted].

Have a great weekend everyone.

We'll see you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Dev Brief #125!

This week we're excited to officially reveal the Soviet T-34 medium tank. Alongside that we've got a small update on how the armor reworking is coming along too!

We've got plenty of information and screenshots for you today, so let's get stuck in...



The T-34 was the primary medium tank design fielded by the Soviet Union in World War 2. Tracing its design lineage from the BT series of fast light tanks, the T-34 added additional armor and a larger gun to form a balanced and effective tank design.

The T-34 utilized the Christie type of suspension, which in conjunction with its wide tracks afforded the tank good off-road performance on the muddy roads of the rasputitsa season. Additional fuel tanks were mounted externally, extending the operating range of the T-34 significantly and often allowing it to drive directly into battle.

One of the most distinct characteristics of the T-34 was its usage of steeply sloped armor plates on the front, side, and rear. This gave it excellent protection given its weight and speed, and contributed significantly to its legendary reputation. The T-34 was equipped with a 76 millimetre gun, which was more than adequate for the targets it was facing at its introduction.

The type was not without its shortcomings, however. The bulky suspension and sloped armor limited space inside the tank, causing no shortage of discomfort for crews. The transmission was difficult to operate, sometimes needing to be hammered between gears.

The turret was barely enough for two men to squeeze in with the 76 millimetre gun, and thus the commander of the tank also had to fire the main gun. Optics were generally poor, and visibility out of the tank was much worse than the German equivalents of the time.

Overall, the T-34 was a well-armed, well-armored, manoeuvrable vehicle which performed valiantly as the mainstay of Soviet armor. Though suffering from a number of ergonomic issues for the crew, these tanks were solid vehicles able to be built in vast quantities by Soviet industry.

In-Game

As we redesign the vanilla vehicle roster, the T-34 will function as the staple medium tank for the Soviet forces - alongside the soon-to-be-introduced Panzer 4 and 75 mm gun M3 / M4 Sherman tank variant.

Player’s will need to learn to use the distinct armor angles of the T-34 to best effect in their positioning and orientation of the tank.




















Armor Rework

The second and bulkier half of the armor rework is currently underway, with all tank handling performance being addressed, as well as an entire re-write of the angle and collision detection system of the heavy weaponry within the game. We’re also currently testing different interior components to give greater variation in the ways vehicles can be dealt with - beyond just a simple “catastrophic kill”. We’re very excited to show more of this in the near future.


Video Competition Reminder

We have had some fantastic submissions so far for the video content competition. If you are unsure what that is, you can find all the details in last week's developer briefing.

We want to thank everyone who has made a submission so far. A reminder that all submissions must be made by May 17th, so get recording and we look forward to watching them!




That’s all for this weeks Dev Brief, have a great weekend everyone.

We'll see you on the frontline!

Hey everyone,

We're pleased to announce that Patch 15 is live now and deployed to all servers!

This patch came together thanks to all of your feedback and bug reports following the launch of Update 9, so thank you!

The main focus of Patch 15 is on the following areas -

• Quality of life
  
• Bug fixes
  
• Crash fixes
  
• Terrain collision

The full notes are below for your reading pleasure!

Please note: If you have any missing servers after you've downloaded today's patch, please verify the integrity of your Hell Let Loose game files!



Quality of Life

• Outposts belonging to your Unit and Garrisons now appear green on the deploy menu and tactical map.
  
• Anti-Aliasing Method no longer ignores the user’s settings and defaults to Standard AA when launching the title.
  
• Building and Tree LoD improvements across various maps.
  
• Updated a large number of assets and materials to correctly work with bullet penetration.
  
• Updated textures for the Garand and Carbine.
  
• Updated Game Credits.
  
• Restored the ability to continue an input while opening the scoreboard or map.
  
• Padre's M1 is no longer locked behind Rifleman lvl 3.
  
• The M40 Side Cap now unlocks for Assault, Automatic Rifleman and Medic correctly.
  
• A large number of community reported map bugs have been fixed.

Bug Fixes

[Fixed] On the Enlist screen, clicking a server scrolls the server list
[Fixed] Players can join a team which should be locked by the Auto-Balance threshold
[Fixed] The 'Favourites' list in the Enlist screen updates causing servers to appear as duplicates of other servers
[Fixed] The map will close and chat will be dismissed after having the Map opened and tapping the Map Keybind (M) in chat
[Fixed] Commander can establish an airhead in the water outside of playable zone in Utah
[Fixed] Weapons sometimes showing pixelated edges
[Fixed] Hedgerows have no collision with rockets and tank shells
[Fixed] Collision issues on several assets
[Fixed] Blood VFX color appears black and has rendering issues
[Fixed] On Offensive maps, all barbed wires that are located in the Attackers HQs turn back area are observed to be missing VFX, SFX and do not affect the player in any way.
[Fixed] On Offensive maps, water does not slow or prevent prone when the player is in the Attackers HQ turn back area.
[Fixed] Empty enlist screen after putting in an incorrect password under certain conditions
[Fixed] The "No bandages" message is displayed for a split second when switching between their equipment when the player is damaged
[Fixed] Holding the breath before aiming will cause the player to be unable to shoot
[Fixed] Reviving a player that is on a terrain seam may cause them to fall through the map
[Fixed] In some cases the deploy screen remains up after deploying
[Fixed] Updated minor incorrect main menu text
[Fixed] Being killed during a melee animation locks the camera on the attacker
[Fixed] After confirming the "wrong password" message when joining a server, the password prompt's buttons lose functionality
[Fixed] US "Sherman Jumbo 75MM" and "Sherman Jumbo 76MM" treads have no bullet collision nad are not affected by the blowtorch
[Fixed] A server launched with an "Offensive" map variant will display as the "Warfare" game mode on the Enlist menu until someone joins
[Fixed] Replaced the “Cancel” button with “Back” on the change role screen
[Fixed] The "Spawn Location" list will display 3 HQs even if only 1 HQ is currently available


Crashes
[Fixed] 3 types of client crashes
[Fixed] 2 types of server crashes


Servers
[Fixed] The "Set Vote Kick Enabled" and "Set Vote Kick Threshold" setting is reset after a Map change.
[Fixed] Transitioning from any map resets the Team Switch Cooldown to 0 if changed during the round.


Foy
[Fixed] Shooting through a specific window caused stone PFX and SFX


Hill 400
[Fixed] Barbed wire placed under the ground
[Fixed] A barbed wire asset has no functionality


Hurtgen
[Fixed] Barbed wire placed under the ground
[Fixed] Rock with no collision
[Fixed] A preplaced Belgian Gate can be destroyed with firearms


Purple Heart Lane
[Fixed] Multiple tree models produce concrete PFX when shot
[Fixed] Water has no functionality in a part of the map


Utah
[Fixed] Certain small bushes have Player collision
[Fixed] Players can travel through the water outside of the playable zone
[Fixed] On German Bottom HQ there are two repair stations
[Fixed] Text can be seen on the landscape
[Fixed] Players can drop an airhead outside of the playable area
[Fixed] Players can fall from a specific boat when deploying on the Top HQ on the US team
[Fixed] Players are pushed through the spawn boat if they remain on it when it leaves the map boundary
[Fixed] The spotlights found throughout the map have no collision


Sainte Mere Eglise
[Fixed] A house has no player or bullet collision


That wraps up today's patch notes!

Once again thank you all for your patience, feedback and bug reports - they really go a long way.

We'll be back again later this week with Developer Briefing #125!

See you on the frontline!

Hi everyone,

We want to let you know that the U9 patch is just around the corner, and will have several significant bug & server crash fixes coming. We will provide a full changelog and update the community early next week on the planned patch release date. We are currently very hard at work on U10 and eastern front content, as well as lots of QOL improvements that we feel will move the game forward in a big way. We will follow up in the coming weeks on more U10 goodness, but for now something a little different:

We are happy to announce the first HLL video content competition, and are extremely excited to see what the community will create and share with us. We’ve seen huge amounts of incredible content created since our launch into Early Access, and we want to officially showcase some of the best!

We’ve outlined the two video-specific categories this time around - but don’t worry, we'll have future competitions with different categories - especially if screenshots, photoshop and fan art is more your thing. Lastly, please keep bad language to a minimum, we are keen to share this content and large amounts of bad language will make that harder!

Here are the following categories for this competition:




Create a Hell Let Loose cinematic incorporating your community & multiple community/clan members. Be as creative as you want.

- One submission per community/clan
- Duration: 1 to 10 minutes (please don't exceed 10 minutes!)
- If using voice lines, english speaking is preferred (so we as judges can understand) but all
languages are welcome.

FILMING PRIVATE RYAN Winners Prize:
Representation of your Community/Clan in the game. This could be a street sign, poster or other asset in game, that subtly references your clan/community in a new or existing map. Your community will also get 12 HLL STEAM game keys.

Runner Up Prize: 6 Hell Let Loose STEAM game keys.



A video showing your proudest moments. It must be all original content, recorded by you.

- One submission per person
- Duration: 20 seconds to 2 minutes

WE WANT YOU! Winners Prize:
An in game portrait painting done by our very own DannyArt. And 5 HLL STEAM game keys.

Runner Up Prize: 3 HLL game keys.



Please upload your video to youtube and complete the form below including your full name, email address and Discord name & ID.

Submission Form - {LINK REMOVED}http://bit.ly/HLLcontentComp

We will be doing further content competitions in the coming months. If you have any issues or questions about your submission, feel free to DM Spono in the official HLL Discord.

All submissions must be uploaded to Youtube, and submissions must be made using this form by 2pm GMT, May 17th.

*Please note: We may ask for your original file if you are a winner or runner-up so we can ensure good quality when we share it across our channels, so please don't delete them! Prize/Reward will be discussed with the submitter and contacted by email, original content only will be considered and proof will be required. All submissions may be considered for highlighting on our social channels.

ICYMI Dev Brief 123 - Introducing Kursk! {LINK REMOVED}http://bit.ly/DevBrief123

That’s all from us this week.

See you on the frontline! o7

Hey everyone,

Welcome to Dev Brief #123!

This week we are showing off one of the two new Eastern Front maps added with Update 10, Kursk!



The Battle of Kursk was one of the largest battles of World War 2. Some of the most intense armoured combat occurred at Kursk, with Germany fielding its newly introduced Panther tanks in an attempt to encircle and destroy the Soviet salient. Fighting was fierce, with heavy casualties on both sides.
Fighting on the Steppe





The terrain encountered by the advancing German forces were the familiar rolling hills and grasslands of the East European steppe. They were resisted by layers of soviet defences heavily fortified with all types of anti-tank emplacements and manned by prepared and well-equipped Soviet units. The relatively flat terrain aided in the fielding of armour and air power, and both played a major role in the engagement.



The Battle of Kursk saw the first combat action for the new German Panther tanks, and in fact the offensive itself was delayed to ensure that the Panther would be available for the battle. Nevertheless, the rushed implementation resulted in a worrying number of mechanical breakdowns. Discounting reliability issues, the type performed well in its intended role against enemy armour.

Soviet forces would primarily field sizable numbers of T-34 medium tanks, an effective and well-rounded design which was capable of engaging all but the heaviest of German armour at its introduction. The gun would show its age in the intense combat, however, having difficulties defeating many of the up-armoured German tanks at the longer engagement distances seen at Kursk. The T-34 would eventually be upgraded with a larger 85mm gun in subsequent variants, though the initial 76 millimetre version would serve through to the end of the war.

A summer offensive intended to retake the initiative for the Germans on the Eastern Front, stiff resistance and a rapid Soviet counterattack slowed German momentum to a halt. Ultimately, developments elsewhere would force the withdrawal of German units from the area. After Kursk, the Soviets would dictate the pace of the fighting.



In Hell Let Loose, Kursk is an open map of dominating ridge lines and trench networks that house the “defence in depth” positions that the Soviet forces made famous in their attempts to halt the German armoured advance. You’ll fight from the concealment of the forest out into the small Russian hamlets that scatter the treeline before pushing into the majority of the map - the famous yellow fields of the steppe.













While the open map places heavy emphasis on armoured tactics and success, infantry will be able to manoeuvre via the trench networks that link ridges, hamlets and old windmills that dominate the centre of the map.



We have a pending U9 patch, and will likely be having a play test tomorrow. This will essentially be a smoke test for fixes we have implemented. We will be grateful for those who have the playtest downloaded if they can jump in and help us test for a couple of hours to check the stability of the patch. If you wish to join in and have not downloaded the PTE, search and install the Hell Let Loose (public testing) app in your steam library. We will let you know when the PTE servers are live via Discord.

We will follow up with the patch notes, which include a bunch of bug and crash fixes.


That wraps up this week's Dev Brief!

We'll see you on the front line!

Hey everyone,

Just a quick post today to let you know that we're hosting an AMA especially for you, the community, with Lead Developer Max this Thursday on the HLL Subreddit!

We know many of you have important questions around different areas of the game, from the meta to how tanks will change with the armour overhaul and much more!

As such we're keen to use this opportunity to answer those questions for you AND have an active discussion on multiple community hot topics with you - door's open, come in style.

If you can't make it yourself please feel free to give your question to someone else to field.

Please note: we will try to answer as many questions as possible from as many of you as possible, as such we will likely begin by answering only one question per person.

Time & Date

Starts 2pm BST / 3pm CET / 9am ET on Thursday 15th April and will run for 12 consecutive hours.

You'll be able to join in the Developer AMA HERE.

See you on the frontline.