So the game has been out for just over a week now. It’s getting good press and the reviews on Armor Games have been good if not all too often incoherent.

I have to admit, I loathe the first few days after a release. I’m generally exhausted having been up until 5am a few nights in the week prior, only to be confronted with thousands of people filling my comments pages with bugs and ‘glitches’ (I hate that word). Then follows the week of fixing, more late nights, the constant urge to keep checking the score, plays, comments.

As it stands though, the rating is 9.2 and it’s had over 1 million plays during this first week, but it’s raised a few concerns about the future. Why? Well there’s a few reasons…

Expectation.
It’s a curse. A lot of initial reactions were that the first game was better, too many bugs, didn’t live up to what was shown off. I’m not really sure how to handle expectation at the moment, especially with a third Last Stand game on the horizon. In Warfare’s case I think that it had a bit of an impact because it was only a sidestep from the original, so the two were comparable but not identical.

Complexity.
Really, Warfare 1944 is pretty basic as far as Real Time Strategy goes, but it seems it went waaaaay over the heads of a lot of people. I’ll admit there is a fair chunk of assumed knowledge in there, short of delaying the play of someone for 10 minutes while you explain it all, I’m not sure how much more I could have laid it out.

On top of that, the game does force you to actually play it though, unlike 1917 and it’s passive sit back and spam away tactics. It’s more challenging and makes you think, unlike 1917 where you didn’t have to consider resources or micromanage units. As far as I can tell from the polar nature of internet comments, some enjoyed it, some hated / were confused by it.

What I’ve learned.
I need to address all of my audience and cater to them. Some of them are a hell of a lot younger than I had counted on. I think I can safely say that a majority of my future games will have difficulty settings, different play modes and other functionality to broaden the play opportunities for everyone.

- Con

I released a small update today to deal with some small issues, heres the rundown:
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Current quick fix (v1.01):
- Assault troops got a health and damage buff
- Units running over trenches should be less apparent
- Upgrade panel graphical errors fixed
- German MG34 teams had damage lowered
- Air Support damage to tanks reduced

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Here’s what’s in v1.1:

General
- Difficulty options when starting a campaign
- Autosave notifications
- Fix for some Objective based missions not reseting properly

Units
- German tank damage fixed (was too low)
- Tanks now concentrate fire on dangerous targets (bazooka’s and other tanks)
- Increased Tank armor for both sides
- Better A.I for Bazooka / Panzershreck teams with regards to tanks
- Reduced buffer at edge of screen to help block flanking troops at last minute
- Reduced Officer cost
- Reduced Air Support cost
- Reduced Bazooka / Panzershreck resupply time slightly

Cover
- Fix for A.I loading cover with more than one team - This’ll have to wait until the next version.
- Fix for units jumping out of empty cover

Upgrades
- Fix for discount upgrades (such as “In Good Supply”)
- In Good Supply lowered to 20% cost reduction from 25%

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There’ll be another version in a few days with some bigger changes. Got most of the issues sorted. Keep the feedback coming guys, thanks again! Head over to Armor and check out the new version.

PLAY WARFARE 1944 v1.1

It’s finally out guys and gals. Not much to say right now as it’s 2:30am 4am here…enjoy!

Update: Problem with the first level on SLOW computers it seems, making it IMPOSSIBLE. Also, people think the first level is hard, toning the difficulty down a bit. It’ll be back soon, promise.

All is well, play on! Leave your feedback on balancing and stuff here or over at Armor Games.

PLAY WARFARE 1944