Making a game is like building a house: if its foundation is cringe, the whole house will turn out cringe. And that's why we spent whole month writing documentation and planning stuff.

I divided progress for this month into two parts:


1. RUNGORE UI 2.0
We are in the middle of revamping UI, so that gaming experience will be even more comfortable. We updated enemy info screen, changed the font, card icons and many more


2. Added bullet time on a press of a button



3. Optimization
There was a bug on a lot laptops which caused quite bit of lag. We fixed it ^-^

4. Another cool things
- Playing cards with number keys (just like in Slay the Spire)
- You don't need to use cards to change your target anymore
- Sorting cards can be done at any time


So, we wrote A LOT of documentation. All heroes' mechanics are finalized on paper, as well as all level mechanics and themes. We are planning to make a total of ~75 new mobs and ~35 new bosses for the full release.

Also there is lore. Yup. No one saw it coming

So stay tuned, folks. New content coming soon, really soon.

Friends!

We are pleased to announce that on October 7, in honor of the opening LXXV season of the Arena, the traditional Great Battle for Territories will take place. Anyone who is ready to defend the honor of his union, we are waiting on the lands of Irselnort!

Schedule is here:
US-Sapphire - 20:00 PDT
EU-Emerald - 19:00 CEST
SEA-Pearl - 17:00 CEST
BR-Tourmaline - 01:00 CEST (next day)
RU-Amber, RU-Topaz, RU-Ruby - 17:00 CEST

Rewards:
3 taken territories:
- increasing of resilience, physical and magical strength by 10%
- increasing of arena points gain by 10%
2 taken territories:
- increasing of max HP and energy by 10%
- increasing of arena points gain by 10%
1 taken territory:
- increasing of HP and MP regeneration by 30%
- increasing of arena points gain by 10%
Incentive prize (0:0; 0:1; 0:2; 0:3)
- increasing of physical and magical defense by 10%
 
All bonuses may be summarized, except for the incentive one.
Rewards will be active for 3 days.

Good luck in the battle!
AIGRIND

■Update
-New Sublime Ougi have been added!
-Fallen Angel Pack Added!
-[Lucifer and Satan's Favourite] Event Added!
-[Assault! Infernal Gargoyle -Puragtorium-] Added!

Please see [10/6 Update Contents] for the detail.

• A bug has been fixed where vertical strobe radars were vibrating when vehicles turn on a slope.

• A bug has been fixed that caused graphical artefacts on vehicles on PS4/PS5 consoles.
  
• Fixed an error that prevented post-battle trophies from being given out when a player was using Israeli vehicles. All earned but as yet unreceived trophies will be now given to the players.

The current provided update notes reflect the major changes within the game as part of this Update. Some updates and fixes may be not listed in the provided notes. War Thunder is constantly improving all the time and certain fixes may be implemented without the client being updated.

1. Prisoner camp release general bug
2. The font of the meeting submit task button is not the same
3. Some of the interfaces are closed when prompted by the tutorial
4. The convoy has added a shutdown button
5. Access to the card playing bug
6. The production drawing interface is displayed incorrectly
7. The training interface cannot open bugs
8. Glossary bug
9. When the factory and transportation team are shut down, there will be no more injured personnel even if they are tired
10. Open the choice of city managers
11. Modify the display of battle interface, country and faction icons
12. Fix city battle, facility damage issues
13. Modify the combat distance determination problem
14. Problems modifying the process of tank movement
15. Modify the display problem of the attribute of the battalion general entry
16. Skip the settlement animation
17. Fixed an issue where selecting enemy facilities had options

It’s bloody brilliant this week, with our hotties showing off their blockbuster bloodsucking skills as they take to the screens as vampires. Gather some sharp fangs and red juice to thicken the plot and give our sexy suck buddies a bit of oomph to carry out their roles suckcessfully!!

Event Details
-Brand new Unlock Animation with Amber
-New sexy threads for Giselle and Candy
-Vampire collection with 3 events themed costumes
-Collect Mysterious Drinks in America (north and south) and Fangs outside of America
-Play the event mission to get more event items (opens after the first level up, only once)
The Event goes until the 13th of October at 7AM UTC

『更新內容』：
※系統：
1.更新模式選擇名稱：
玩家VS電腦→玩家VS電腦(初階)，死鬥模式(一般)→死鬥模式(3V3)。
2.修正新手教學角色腳下的辨識環會閃爍的問題。
3.修正新手教學的受身關卡中，小兵偶爾會無法造成擊飛的問題。
4.暫時關閉大廳聊天。


※遊戲模式相關：
1.調整玩家VS電腦(初階)的獎勵公式(獲得最低獎勵門檻降低為150秒，獎勵為一般死鬥的50%)。
2.強化玩家VS電腦(初階)中，小兵隊長的AI邏輯。
3.新增玩家VS電腦(初階)角色：芙蕾雅(電腦)。
4.新增玩家VS電腦(初階)中，AI電腦現在會有個性化的ID。
5.調整死鬥模式(1v1)的最低獎勵門檻為120秒。
6.修正練習模式一定時間後會自動跳回首頁的問題。


※遊戲操作：
1.調整新手訓練、訓練模式下的角色生成的面向，將初始面相改為面向右邊。



※美術、UI、文本、聲音更新：
1.更新部分卡梅爾的技能名稱，以便辨識攻擊以及輔助招式。



※遊戲性調整：
§角色：
馬汀：
1.角色模型外觀重製。

卡梅爾：
1.調整普通攻擊的判定位置，避免有時會打到背部的問題。

As we get closer to the end of a project like Mask of the Rose, we shift our focus from making new things to improving the quality of what’s already present. Some of that takes the form of subjective polish; for example, tweaking a character’s art a little to make them more expressive (or dreamy 😉). On the writing side, we might make changes such as altering the pacing of the game in response to a playtest.

However, a large (perhaps larger, by time spent) aspect of quality is less subjective; bugs! QA is particularly important when it comes to getting to grips with this latter category. During a project we test work continuously, typically performing testing of each new feature or chunk of writing, along with periodic regression testing (playing through the game to check if anything has broken). Normally some of the issues detected during development can be deferred (i.e. don’t have to be solved immediately) because they are dependent on other features that will be done later or because some functionality is intended as a placeholder. We still record everything, because we don’t want bugs to slip through the net; but later on in the project is when programmers tend to focus more and more on eliminating bugs, and spend less time on new features.

In Mask of the Rose, for example, all of our planned feature programming is complete. For example; all the UIs are in place; the game save system is implemented; and an audio system manages sounds and music.

That does not mean the work is over! For the last couple of months our core Mask programmer, Séamus has been working closely with Lesleyann, our Principal QA Tester, to tackle bugs and improve performance. In fact, their work has been centred on a very specific purpose; Mask is the first Failbetter game that will launch simultaneously on PC/Mac and console (Switch).

It’s been important for us from early on in this project to always maintain a working build of the game for the Switch. There are a few reasons for this.



The Switch, being effectively a mobile platform, acts as a hardware baseline; even the more modestly specced PCs and Macs that Mask targets have more usable memory, hard drive capacity and CPU power than the Switch. This next point is oversimplified, but in essence; if we can get Mask running well on Switch, Mask will also run well on lower-end desktops and laptops. Therefore it “keeps us honest” about how complex features like graphical elements can be.

It also keeps us honest with regard to gamepad support. Historically, Failbetter titles have been primarily developed for mouse and keyboard control, with gamepad support either added later or not given the same level of focus. In Sunless Skies, we weren’t happy with how gamepad support turned out in the initial PC release, so when we set out to publish our own console ports (also a first for us) we were keen to take the improvements from console and make sure they made it back to PC and Mac in the Sovereign Edition. However, because we hadn’t given gamepads equal weighting from the start of Sunless Skies, there were technical compromises we did have to make to give gamepad and console players a better experience. In Mask, maintaining a build on Switch forces us to focus on the quality of both the gamepad and the M+KB experience.

A final reason to build on Switch early is because shipping a game on console is a unique challenge. Platform holders have extensive lists of technical requirements that games must fulfil. For example, most consoles limit the frequency to which we can write to the storage memory, to prevent physical wear to the drives. Another requirement might be to only use specific, authorised terminology to refer to the console’s controllers.

Before we can release the game we must check that it is compliant with these requirements, fix any issues, test everything, and then submit builds to the platform holder to perform their own testing. That means the release process on console must start earlier than on PC, and this is what Les and Séamus have been focusing on recently; getting to the point we can submit a build to Nintendo that gets the famous “Seal of Quality” from them!

Our other area of increased QA focus is writing. Here, also, Mask presents new challenges. In previous Failbetter titles, writing was very modular. In Sunless Skies, for example, a story can be tested as a stand-alone unit. This is because the player has lots of discrete, self-contained experiences as they visit different ports across the High-Wilderness. Stories tend to only act on each other indirectly; such as via the resource economy, or the completion state of an earlier story. It is also quite unlikely for a writer to accidentally trap the player in a dead end. Because of these properties, we know that bugs introduced by adding a new story will normally be confined to that one story, and the states of the playthrough that could affect the story are less numerous, making testing simpler.

But if Sunless Skies is like a short story collection, then Mask of the Rose is closer to a novel; every character and storyline is interwoven. Mask is also the first time we have used the Ink scripting language instead of our in-house content management system. The Ink script in Mask is fiendishly complex, reactive and programmatic; this is the most player-responsive title we’ve ever made.

Furthermore, with no way to “escape” faulty content (think about how you can simply leave a port in Skies if a desired option is unavailable), we have to work hard to spot the type of critical writing bug that can cause the game to “dead end”.

This has meant that we’ve had to rethink how we perform narrative testing, and are deploying automated narrative testing for the first time. Séamus has developed a tool that allows the writer to run a piece of content thousands of times outside the game engine before it’s integrated. This acts as a first line of defence against the dreaded dead ends, because we can tell if one of our randomised, automated runs gets stuck on a particular version of the script.


A graph illustrating the player’s routes through Mask of the Rose (simplified)

This approach isn’t bulletproof, because there can be differences between how the testing tool behaves and how the game engine behaves; there are often serious bugs at the interface between tech and writing. A purely stochastic tool will also make arbitrary decisions, which result in many runs that represent an atypical player experience. To bolster our approach we’re also performing extensive manual, in-game testing, and are working on a few ways to extend the capabilities of our autotest tool; for example, to allow writers to specify different “player profiles” that make the computer player focus on certain human-like behaviours such as pursuing a particular romance option.

Every game comes with its own set of challenges for the developers, not least in QA. However it’s easy to overlook this discipline from the outside, because QA work is invisible until something goes wrong. I hope this blog gave you a little peek under the mask! Thank you for coming on this journey with us as we extend the capabilities of our studio to tell a very different tale to the stories we’ve told before.

Hello everyone!

It's been a chaotic release for us, due to various bugs, performance issues and balance problems.
We've already taken care of some of it and I do still have quite a list of bugs ahead but I can only fix them one at a time. That being said, we have one (hopefully) final patch regarding The Great Forge coming in the next few days. It will fix Performance issues for the most intensive builds such as Ray of Obliteration + Arcane Clones or any build using Vindictive Slam, along with the vast majority of bugs and issues regarding Runes.

On a positive note, we're pretty happy with The Great Forge. And from what we've seen from our Discord, players seem to be having fun building massive War Chests, which is nice.

Once the final Great Forge patch has been released, we will be able to move on to new horizons.

Now feels like a good time to release the new Roadmap. Nothing has been added or removed from the old one, this is basically us taking a fresh start in our Early Access.

With this new Roadmap also comes the intention of deploying Updates much more often, even if it means releasing less content at a time.

I have to say that working for 5 months on the last update has been pretty hard. Despite the amount of content that was added, we've made almost no progress on the roadmap itself and it feels bad.
So right now, we want to go for the exact opposite: Making smaller yet impactful updates, and ticking things off the Roadmap.

And after so much time working on the same thing, we're super excited to work on new content.

Now Behold!



This new Milestones / Features gives us a bit more freedom regarding what we add and when we add it. The Milestones row is what we plan to follow, meaning that the next update is "The Luxuriant Update I", while the Features row is what we plan to add at any given point in-between updates.

We are also done with adding new layers of customization or new mechanics for a while. Our goal is to focus on what we currently have and work on it. This means reworking what needs to be reworked and grow on existing layers such as adding Environments, Enemies, Slorm Reapers, Ancestral Skills and Legendary Items.

We actually plan on finishing all these layers before even considering adding something entirely new. As for the last 2 endgame modes mentioned in the Road Map, both are based on existing mechanics that simply needs to be polished and fleshed out.

In the near future, for the next 5 to 6 months, it should all be about building content for what we already have. This usually requires very little brainstorm or tests, which was the most time-consuming thing for our Slorm Temple and Great Forge updates.

Half our team (so 1 person) is already working full time on the new update, while I'm still here fixing bugs, writing devlogs and stuff. And while we have nothing absolutely new to offer, here are a few (fairly old) screenshots of what's coming: The Luxurious Gardens.







That's about it for now!
Cheers!

Added:
[Onboarding] What's new panel to improve new features discoverability
[Onboarding] Rename old Welcome to "Home screen"
[UI] Resolve scaling issues for high-DPI screens
[UI] Avoid persistent error messages in the UI
[UI] Rework save menu
[UI] Save and Export/Share UI layouts
Add copy/paste actions for blending modes/opacity of a layer
Apply blending mode/opacity to all channels of a layer
Reload mesh with a keyboard shortcut (CTRL+SHIFT+R)
Reset Substance parameters to default
Reset paint brush to default
Right click to reset individual Substance parameters to default
[Assets panel] "Pin" favorite assets to appear on top of asset panel
[Assets panel] Delete, reload and rename assets
[Color Selection] Add blending modes to Color Selection effect
[Layer Stack] Add blending mode and opacity on filters
[Layer stack] Allow tiling values bigger than 128 for fill layer/effects
[Layer stack] Cylinder caps for cylindrical projection in fill layer/effect
[Log] Show an error message if mesh part are in negative space when trying to create a UV Tile project
[Project] Indicate version in error message "data too recent" when opening a project
[Viewport] Allow to light the mesh from underneath
[Viewport] View R, G, B and Alpha in viewport (solo display mode)
[Shader] Allow to set User channels as RGBA in Material Layering shaders
[Export] Allow to export textures as SBSAR
[Export] Expose 16bit option for EXR file format
[Python] Add event to know when Texture Sets are modified
[Python] Allow to get and set Mesh Map resources in Texture Set settings
[Plugins] Remove option to get other JS plugins
[Content] Add new Roblox template and export preset
Update Substance Engine to last version (8.6.3)
Optimized build for Apple Silicon chipset (Apple M1 / M2)

Fixed:
Crash when using 16k exr
[Crash] Ctrl Z After deleting a shader instance
[Iray] IoR is blocked to 1 for some shaders
[Win][Baking] Some high poly fail to load
[Color Management] Incorrect color space name in UI with filters
[Python] Resource objects returned by import function don't have a type

Known issues:
[Color Management] HDR color space conversions with ACE on Linux produce clamped colors
[Layer Stack] Input source not saved per layer
[Painting] Temporal anti aliasing causes artifacts when painting in some cases
[Export] 2DView exports randomly uniform map