Greetings Onward Players! We have received a lot of positive feedback about the slower paced movement speed when playing. We know that it will take a lot of getting used to and we are confident that this will bring some improved tactical strategies to your gameplay. We also understand that it has not been well received by everyone, especially for game modes like Assault, and we are reviewing this feedback. Hotfix 1.11.1 helped resolve a large portion of the issues people were reporting when 1.11 released. However, we know it didn’t fix all of them. One of the features that unfortunately was not able to be fixed was the gunstock calibration. We understand a lot of you use this feature and we are on track to have this fixed in the next update. We will be providing updated details about that feature in the Dev’s Desk. Also included in the Devs’ Desk are replies to some of the top feedback we received about Update 1.11 and details about our major focus(s) for the next update. The next update, 1.12 is already in the works and we know you are excited to hear about it, especially since you have been anticipating what might be coming after the Quest 1 drop. We won’t be able to talk about everything this month, but we hope what we do provide will give you an idea of what is in the works. [b]Important Reminder: We will no longer support Quest 1 devices as of July 31st, 2023.[/b] For more details about this please see our [url=https://onwardthegame.com/quest1.html]FAQ page[/url]. [h2]From the Devs’ Desks:[/h2] What we have planned for Update 1.12 is going to be for the long haul of the game. It will not be a full graphics overhaul for the game that some people might have been hoping for with the support drop of Quest 1. What it will be is the starting point to make a major needed and required update that will lead us towards the direction of being able to update graphics and features. What exactly does that mean? For Update 1.12 a major undertaking for us will be updating Unity by several major versions. But before we get to that we wanted to give you an update about some feedback and reports that have been sent to us about Update 1.11. [h3]Maps[/h3] Thank you to everyone who took the time and sent us videos of different locations where maps are not behaving as they should. There are different reasons this can be happening in the environments, one of which includes the feature we included to fix exploits in the last update. We are looking into each of these reports and addressing them. Please feel free to continue to report any locations you find with images or video in our Discord. We are additionally making sure to closely review our maps and fix as many of these types of issues as soon as possible. [h3]Connecting to Friends[/h3] Connecting to friends easily is a very important feature. After the launch of Update 1.11 we started receiving reports of the “Find Friends Only” lobby filter as well as the direct invites not working. We quickly looked into this and a fix has been set for Update 1.12. In the meantime, please continue to use the Server ID system to get your friends easily connected to your lobbies. [h3]Gunstock Calibration [/h3] There is a lingering question about the Gunstock Calibration feature and when it will be fixed since it wasn’t included in Hotfix 1.11.1. We are going to be completely re-doing the Gunstock Calibration feature. We know that it may come as a shock to the people who use it, so let us provide you with some background information. One of the reasons it didn’t correctly work at launch with update 1.11 was due to its connection with the character rig (or rather, lack thereof). It used a different type of character rig in the tent to hold the gun and after Update 1.11 it didn’t quite match the character model you played in-game, where you are going to use the gunstock. Currently we are redesigning the feature to move the gunstock calibration process from the tent into the game. In the tent the setting will tell you to spawn and use your tablet. Your tablet will have a button to enter gunstock calibration mode, at which point you can no longer move and your controller sticks will move the gun. This enables you to be able to calibrate in the same character model that you play in-game. This will make the gunstock calibration work as expected in every circumstance with none of the oddities you may have experienced before. This update also gives us the opportunity to include Y axis calibrations. That’s right, the highly desired functionally is to have the ability to calibrate horizontally and vertically. [h3]Unity Update[/h3] Onward currently runs on an older version of Unity game engine. Our team has been working hard on upgrading to a newer major version of Unity. When you think about software versions, this is a pretty big jump that will give us a lot more than we can go over here, but let’s quickly go over what it is going to do for our ability to improve things like the graphical quality of the game. One of the things updating Unity gives us is the ability to turn on Vulkan, a more efficient alternative to the renderer we’re using now. The other important thing it gives us is access to a tool that “arranges” things more efficiently for the GPU to render. To put this simply, these two improvements will increase our rendering power significantly, giving us the headroom to make the game look better while maintaining performance. This Unity update gives us a lot more than these two things, and we’re excited for you to see what this allows us to do to make the game better over the next few updates. Now, given this work and us dropping Quest 1 support, we know you guys want to see some graphical improvements. You will see a few small graphical improvements in 1.12, but you’ll see the more drastic improvements over the next few updates into next year. These things take time, and we are working on them as quickly as we can. Let’s talk about the graphic improvements you will see in 1.12: [list][*] NEW Main Menu environment (This gives you a taste of where we’re going with our environments) [*] NEW higher quality glove models, a different pair for each faction [*] Something really cool for our new 12 player game mode[/list] Did we just say new game mode? We sure did! [h3]New Game Mode[/h3] Update 1.12 will be introducing a whole new game mode we’re calling “Fire Fight”. Keep an eye out for more information about it coming soon. We are still in the early-ish phases of defining a lot of Update 1.12 features and updates going into it. We will make sure to provide you more next month. [h2]Community Center:[/h2] When playing Onward we want you to have the opportunity to connect with other players and have a great gameplay experience. We are continuing to work on our commitment to you about addressing player toxicity. We have been closely reviewing and monitoring the effects of the in-game reporting system and it has led to us making additional improvements related to the feature. [h3]Player Reporting & Banning Update[/h3] We are introducing warnings and temporary bans to players earlier on in the reporting process to help those players understand their behavior is not desired and they are at risk of being permanently banned. If players continue to receive reports after warning or temp bans it will lead to a permanent ban from multiplayer. In the next couple weeks, we will be rolling out this expansion to a percentage of players over time. Based on some players' current reports, as this rolls out, players may start to see warnings, temp bans, or permanent bans applied to their account when they next log in. Warnings and Ban timers will start when the player next logs in. Please make sure to refresh your familiarity with the community [url=https://onwardthegame.com/community-guidelines.html]guidelines here[/url]. [h3]VR Charity group Summer Tournament Update[/h3] Congratulations to the champions, team CTRL ALT DEFEAT in the VR Charity group Summer Tournament! While competing, The VR Charity group raised [b]over $2,600[/b] for the Make a Wish Foundation, making us the largest fundraiser for their Summer of Wishes program this summer! Thank you to all the participants and supporters for helping make these events happen. To find out more info about taking part in the VR Charity effort, connect with them in their [url=https://discord.gg/cSSf6S8U5T]Discord[/url]. High-Speed Ahead