Last Monday, 110 years ago, the German order was given to attack the Russian forces, which would start one of the most decisive battles of World War I: The Battle Of Tannenberg. The following day, the battle officially commenced.

This battle is renowned for demonstrating the effectiveness of the German military strategies and highlighting the Russian’s weak command structures and poor logistics.

These differences in leadership and logistics became even more apparent after the battle had concluded. The Russians had suffered heavy losses, with up to 50,000 killed and 92,000 taken prisoner. The Germans in the meanwhile lost only about 20,000 men.




In-game, the Central Powers still haven't managed to snag a victory in the campaigns. However, their difference is starting to shrink. Last year, they had around 50,000 more casualties. In the Battle of Verdun Campaign, the difference was only about 7000.

Starting today until September 5th, you can play participate in The Battle Of Tannenberg campaign. All casualties in Frontlines & Maneuver game modes in both Verdun and Tannenberg will be added to the total losses. The winning side will be whichever side suffers the least amount of killed and wounded soldiers!

So, will the Central Powers come out victorious this time, or will Entente walk away with yet another victory?



Next week, Isonzo receives the Solstice Update! The Austro-Hungarians will charge the town of Nervesa della Bataglia from the banks of the Piave. Montello features many burning forests, trenches, farms and ends in urban warfare for control over the train station.

Alongside Montello, included are the M.91 Russisches Repetier-Gewehr (Mosin-Nagant), Schwerhandgranate and the Shellshocked Units Pack DLC with all the blood and bandages you would never wish for. Check out the full announcement:

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1556790/view/4249790899170884237

We made some improvements to the TAA Anti-Aliasing setting, making edges of objects (including foliage) look more smooth.

The patch download size is expected to be around 17 mb.

This Sunday 110 years ago, the first World War had officially begun. At the time, no one could've predicted just how large and significant this conflict would become, how many lives would be lost or changed forever.

Every year we commemorate this day, and as customary we've enabled the Film Memoir mode for free on PC. While normally exclusive to the owners of the Supporter Pack DLC, everyone on PC can now enable the Film Memoir mode in the popup window or by going to the Options, then Graphics. It'll be available until August 5th!


This year however, there's more! Let's take a moment to stay away from the bloodshed and instead put our focus on the footprint of WW1. This war left a mark on the continent, much still visible to this day.

We invite you to take the best possible Film Memoir screenshots of the environments in Verdun, Tannenberg and Isonzo that show both the beauty of the many theaters of war and the marks WW1 left behind. Think trenches, barbed wire, craters, destroyed trees, you name it! Remember that Film Memoir needs to be turned on and we highly recommend you disable the UI.

You get two entries for this contest: 1 by posting a screenshot on Discord in the dedicated channel and 1 by posting a screenshot on Reddit with the Memoir Contest flair. These should not be the same screenshots! We'll select 5 winners on Discord and Reddit each, who'll win a DLC pack for Isonzo or the game itself if they don't own it yet. One person cannot win on both platforms and the contest will be closed on August 5th. Good luck!



As a little extra, here's a small preview of the flyover for Isonzo's next map: Montello!

So ends another campaign. It was a closely fought battle, with 538,375 Central Powers casualties to 528,779 Entente losses - a difference of less than 10,000. The Entente came out on top again, but not by a huge margin. In the historical battle there were probably somewhat more losses for the Entente, but the overall outcome of the battle was complicated. Parts of the French army actually made some of the largest advances since trench warfare began in earnest, but nothing close to what General Nivelle described before the battle. He claimed that a breakthrough could be achieved within two days, which absolutely did not happen.


A village devastated by fighting during the Second Battle of the Aisne.

The morale impact of this failure, alongside heavy casualties, led to French mutinies and Nivelle's replacement. While the new commander-in-chief General Petain immediately established a more defensive posture and took time to restore morale among his troops, the British continued offensive action for the rest of 1917. Later in the year there were some limited French offensives such as the successful Battle of La Malmaison, which built on ground captured during the Second Battle of the Aisne.

From today until next Friday 24th, the Second Battle of the Aisne Campaign will be running in Verdun and Tannenberg. Will the Entente or the Central Powers emerge victorious in this epic battle of attrition?

For those who haven’t fought before, our campaign events are special multi-front battles in Verdun and Tannenberg, where every kill is tallied up, and the side which manages to lose the least troops wins. You can earn a medal for participating in the campaign, with a shinier medal for fighting on multiple fronts. The Second Battle of the Aisne Campaign will run from Friday May 17 and end on Friday May 24.



French General Nivelle planned the Second Battle of the Aisne as a breakthrough offensive for early 1917, following the major battles of Verdun and the Somme in 1916. He expected the German Army to be exhausted. His vision was for a decisive victory in 48 hours, and he put his reputation on the line by threatening to resign if the offensive wasn't approved.

It involved a massive coordination of troops, starting with British attacks towards Arras, then French forces beginning their assault further south in the direction of the Aisne river. Ultimately the battle was not a clear defeat for the French, but Nivelle's grandiose claims about achieving a decisive victory made it feel like that for the soldiers suffering massive casualties in the battle. Morale fell throughout the French Army, with units starting to mutiny - often taking the form of holding a defensive position but refusing any orders to attack. Desertions also increased.

Nivelle was fired and replaced with General Pétain, who moved quickly to stamp out mutinous sentiment with a combination of carrot and stick - though mostly carrot. A small number of soldiers were shot for mutiny, but he mostly put effort into improving food, providing better equipment, increasing pay, and allowing for more leave. This worked, and the morale crisis was defused.



Interestingly, there is some debate as to when the Second Battle of the Aisne officially ended. While mid-May is commonly taken as the end point for it (along with the wider Nivelle Offensive itself), some historians have argued that the Battle of La Malmaison in October 1917 should be considered part of the battle as well, since it built on ground captured during the action in April-May. That would matter because the Battle of La Malmaison was actually a clear victory for the French - credit for which should partially go to Nivelle, if considered part of the Nivelle Offensive.

In the East, the Russians were no longer fighting under a Tsar - the February revolution had dethroned Tsar Nicholas II, and since March 2 the country was governed by the Russian Provisional Government. There would be no grand Russian offensive until the Kerensky Offensive in June, intended to knock Austria-Hungary out of the war. Instead it would effectively break the back of the Russian Army. But that's a story for another time.


The Tsar blessing troops earlier in the war.

However, it wasn't all revolution and disaster in the East. The Romanians successfully fought off a major German - Austro-Hungarian offensive from July to September, halting the Central Powers advance and inflicting heavy casualties.

Under pressure from France, Italy would launch a new offensive in mid-May to try and build pressure on the Central Powers. Italian Chief of Staff Luigi Cadorna obliged with... the Tenth Battle of the Isonzo. In fairness, this was not entirely Cadorna's choice, with the idea of an offensive along the river suggested by the French. He attempted to change tactics, aiming for an advance across a broader 40km front in contrast to the smaller, shorter actions planned with the previous three Battles of the Isonzo.


Artwork portraying battle between Italian and Austro-Hungarian soldiers in an earlier battle.

Where the Second Battle of the Aisne was a mixed bag in terms of results, the Tenth Battle of the Isonzo was a clear Austro-Hungarian victory. Key objectives were not achieved, and an Austro-Hungarian counter-offensive (launched even before the Italians had ceased their own attacks) would recapture almost all the lost territory.

The Ascent game mode brings mountain climbing to our Italian Front FPS Isonzo, with a team of Alpini needing to scale a sheer cliff face and capture an Austro-Hungarian outpost. Climbing is freeform so you can choose your own route up the mountainside - and you'll need to make use of that to try and catch the defenders by surprise!

The Austro-Hungarians will need to stay vigilant against sneaky climbers assaulting or bypassing their forward positions lower down the mountain. Piles of rocks will provide excellent improvised weapons to use in situations where a rifle might not be handy.


Read more about the Ascent mode on last week's blog, which goes in-depth on how the special mechanics work.

The Ascent event is free for all Isonzo players to join, and will run until April 24th. If you don't own Isonzo yet, now's the perfect time because it's on discount!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1556790/Isonzo/

We'll see you on the cliff face, soldiers.

This update should make your connection less prone to third party outages.

• Fixed certain connectivity issues with Epic Games Services.

The patch size is expected to be around 20 mb.

Historically with the Battle of Verdun the Germans hoped to inflict heavy casualties on the French by taking vital ground and then smashing their counter-attacks. This plan failed, with both sides suffering enormous losses over the course of one of the longest battles in history.

In our games, so far the Entente always win the campaigns, so we challenged the community to see if they could give the Central Powers an ahistorical victory, with the potential prize a teaser about the upcoming new Isonzo game mode. The result…

It’s not so easy to change the course of history. But, if you look at the numbers below you’ll notice the Central Powers only lost around 7000 more troops during the campaign. In previous campaigns the difference would usually be closer to 40-50,000 more Central Powers casualties.


The final results from the campaign.

It’s still a good performance, and while you couldn’t quite beat our challenge we’ve still decided to share a very mini-teaser with you:


There will be a bigger teaser coming in next week’s Isonzo blog! If you don't own Isonzo yet and want to explore some higher altitude environments, including the famous Ice City of Marmolada, the game is currently on sale:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1556790/Isonzo/

It’s the 21st of February, 1916. The German 5th Army has commenced their assault on the fortifications in the region of Verdun, after a small delay due to bad weather conditions. They moved for Fort Douaumont, the largest and highest fort of the region. This attack kicked off the longest single battle of WW1, lasting 9 months, 3 weeks and 6 days until December 18th. A true battle of attrition.

source: https://www.iwm.org.uk

In the end, the Battle of Verdun resulted in a combined total of an estimated 714,231-976,000 casualties, about 306,000 of which did not survive. It ultimately resulted in the victory of the French over a weakened and spread-thin German army. The French forces managed to retake much of the lost ground and key points during their counteroffensive in late 1916.

source: https://wereldoorlog1418.nl


Now, during the Battle of Verdun, heavy fighting was happening on all fronts. Starting Friday, February 23rd a weekend campaign will start in Verdun and Tannenberg. The Allied Powers versus the Central Powers, all casualties will be kept track of and added to the total losses. Whichever side suffers the least amount of casualties during the campaign will be victorious!



However, the Central Powers haven’t been able to secure a win so far! So, to give them a little bit of a push, let’s up the stakes a bit this time around: if the Central Powers manage to come out on top, we’ll give you your first big teaser for the upcoming new game mode in Isonzo!

The campaign will run through the weekend, until Monday morning. Time is of the essence, so get ready to head for the frontlines!


https://store.steampowered.com/app/242860/Verdun/

https://store.steampowered.com/app/633460/Tannenberg/

2023 has been an eventful year for the WW1 Game Series, with special Christmas Truce and Wolf Truce events in Verdun and Tannenberg, and Verdun appearing in a French museum exhibit! The series also celebrated our 10 year anniversary, since Verdun entered Early Access back in 2013!

Our latest game Isonzo has naturally taken center stage, with multiple free expansions adding maps and weapons. Thanks to support from the community, it also won the IndieDB Indie of the Year 2022 award! Let's take a look at everything that's been added to the game this year...

- 4 Huge New Maps!
- 8 New Weapons!
- 2 Cosmetic DLC Packs!
- Mac Support!
- Much more!

If you haven't yet felt the crunch of Alpine snow beneath your boots, Isonzo is currently 67% off with DLC up to 30% off until January 4th.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1556790/Isonzo/








We completed a lot of our roadmap milestones in 2023 just as planned, and there are plenty more coming in 2024!

There'll be a new map, more weapons, additional cosmetic DLC packs... and a special game mode! We're maintaining radio silence about the new game mode for now, but keep your ears to the ground and you might pick up some teasers.


Go behind the scenes with map designer Kian as he discusses the creation of Marmolada in this YouTube video - including almost 1000 reference images!



In the aisles of the History Center of the Notre-Dame-de-Lorette Memorial'14-18 you’ll be able to find a special exhibition! The War games. Playing with History exhibit allows visitors to immerse themselves into WW1 history, by having 10 games available to play. We’re very pleased that Verdun is one of those games!

The exhibit runs until May 2024, and entry to the museum and exhibition are both free. If you’re in the area, check it out!



The Christmas Truce is live once again in Verdun, and you’re able to participate in multiple activities together with other soldiers who joined the Christmas Truce. Join a friendly match of football, have a snowball fight or just take a nice relaxing stroll and enjoy the winter scenery.

The Truce event runs until January 7th!



In October, the wolves returned to the forests of Tannenberg, asking the question: would you cease fire with your human foes to battle a new enemy? Some of you will have managed to hold a successful truce to fight off the canine aggressors, and others, not so much.


https://store.steampowered.com/app/633460/Tannenberg/

We're extremely grateful for all the support from our great community this year, and it's been wonderful to see people enjoying themselves with our games.

We can't wait to show you what we have planned for 2024! On that note, we'll end with a little Isonzo WIP image...