Dev Update

[Furball]

We had our convention this past weekend which gave us the chance to speak with players in person and talk about the future of AH.  We’ve been thinking about how we were going to move forward and came to some conclusions that we decided to announce at the convention.

The main news is that we have decided to put Combat Tour on an indefinite hold.  The reason for this is that we have decided that it is better to steer our development in a way that allows us to implement our CT developments first as part of the regular game. 

The way we’ve been going has been like trying to fight a two front war with only one army.  It’s stretched us too thin and has hurt our overall level of productivity.  It also has handcuffed us in a lot of our development decisions by forcing us to indefinitely postpone a lot of other things.

Our biggest obstacle with CT is in breathing life into it to make it fun and immersive.     While a basic structure is there, there’s a ton of detail work to be done to reach that end goal.  Without it, it just has too much of a cardboard cutout feel that’s not going to engage players and hold their attention for long. 

What this all means for now is that we are going to focus on core game development.  We’re going to pull the CT AI mission system and redevelop it for use by CM’s in scenarios and special events.  We’re working on new terrain upgrades in both the technology and the art used.  We want to implement a character animation system.  We want to bring back the old 8 player H2H but expand it both in the number of players and with additional gameplay capabilities.  There’s a lot of systems in the game engine that are dated and in need of overhaul.

In hindsight, this is how we should have approached it from the start.  This will keep us heading in the right direction while getting improvements out to our current players and speeding up our development.  It’s really a chance to reboot our process to get back to our old development cycle that saw things moving at a faster pace.

Sounds good HTC <S> 

[Spikes]

<S> Guys, good insight.

[Stang]

Yup, exactly what I wanted to hear.

 

[mechanic]

hopefully 'pull the CT AI mission system' does not mean stop us being able to create offline missions on a regular players machine.

[Bronk]

Yup, exactly what I wanted to hear.

 

P-63 ?  

[scot12b]

Nice

[Babalonian]

From the other thread:

I took the time to read it fully, it sounds like they're going to give AH a lot more love, and fold what they really wanted to out of CT and into AH... turn AH into a bigger and badder contender.  It sounds awesome to me, can't wait to see some of these changes take shape and see what the development team has hidden away to surprise us all.

[Furball]

What i would love to see now is a development blog, even if certain items are kept secret for those nice surprises which are often included in patches.  It can be quite frustrating being kept in the dark, also it can appear that HTC are neglecting their product.  I would hope that it would make members of the community appreciate the work which goes into the game a bit more too.

[uptown]

  thanks for the post 

[Max]

So we're getting the B-29 and teh NOOK?

Fixed 

[Bronk]

Fixed 

You said the secret word...now you must pay.

[Furball]

Oh noes.

noOkiE!!!1!1!

I think the second one i did with the spin on the Nath/Birdo incident was better, and Birdo KS himself on Nath's tank, but i don't think that survived anywhere

[Bronk]

Oh noes.

noOkiE!!!1!1!

Are you sorry you made that yet ? 

[Furball]

I have been for about 3 years 

Every time a B-29 post comes up i cringe.  I guess that pic is my AH legacy and will remain here long after i go!

[bobtom]

I am really happy about this update, I would much rather have our current game improved to the max more than an entirely new game.

WTG HTC!!


I see HE-111s in the future........