Author: Donster

Just Announced Hardware for 20 July 2021

Check out these latest hardware announcements for today from around the web. Also included are some hardware news bits, and on some days, a few rumors tossed in for good measure. Click on the links below to read the official press release, visit the products web page, or to an independent news source.

Hardware | Donster | July 20, 2021 |

Company of Heroes 3 Announced

Join the fight on CompanyOfHeroes.com and play the Pre-Alpha Preview today!

The legendary strategy franchise is back, combining heart-pounding combat with new layers of strategy in a breathtaking Mediterranean setting. Relic Entertainment™ and SEGA® Europe Ltd. are thrilled to reveal that Company of Heroes™ 3, the latest instalment in the critically acclaimed strategy franchise, is coming to PC in 2022! Those eager to get their hands on the game won’t have to wait until then – visit CompanyOfHeroes.com to join CoH-Development and get access to the Pre-Alpha Preview for Company of Heroes 3 via Steam right now!

Watch the announcement trailer HERE.

Watch the gameplay reveal trailer HERE.

Mediterranean Theatre & New Features

Company of Heroes 3 is bringing the series’ intimate boots-on-the-ground storytelling to a brand-new theatre of war, unlocking authentic new tactics, factions, and a wealth of untold stories from World War II. The Mediterranean is a place of immense variety, from windswept Italian mountain passes to harsh North African deserts and coastal vistas. On this new frontline, intelligence trumps speed.

In Company of Heroes 3, the critically acclaimed Company of Heroes gameplay has been enhanced with authentic new features, making for the deepest tactical experience to date – all powered by the Essence Engine 5, the latest evolution of Relic’s proprietary real-time strategy technology. On the Dynamic Campaign Map, players command ground, air and naval forces and build supply lines as they lead the Allies’ campaign to retake mainland Italy from the entrenched Axis forces. The long-term choices you make here will affect not only the battles you fight, but the story of the war itself.

In single-player modes, Full Tactical Pause gives players a new level of tactical control over the pacing on the battlefield. By freezing the action, players who choose to employ Full Tactical Pause will be able to coordinate all their actions at once, thinking through every move in detail without the pressure of doing it all in real-time.

“We’re really excited for players to experience Company of Heroes 3 right from the pre-alpha stage and to receive their valuable feedback,” said Justin Dowdeswell, General Manager at Relic Entertainment. “We’ve been co-developing the game with some of our fantastic community members for years now, and they have been instrumental in providing consistent and meaningful feedback at every step of the development process. We are ready to expand that program in a massive way with our fans around the world via our CoH-Development program, which has been made possible by Amplitude Studios™’ superb Games2Gether platform.”

Company of Heroes 3 Strategy and Wargaming | Donster | July 16, 2021 |

Dutch Cruisers Available in Early Access in World of Warships

New ships will feature a new type of armament – Airstrike

World of Warships, the widely popular free to play naval combat game from developer and publisher, Wargaming, has released Update 0.10.6 making available Dutch Cruisers in early access, two seasons of Brawls, and more visual and technical improvements.

Watch the update video HERE.

The main event for Update 0.10.6 is the addition of Dutch Tier IV-IX cruisers in Early Access. These mighty ships have high caliber firepower, rock solid armor at high tiers and great maneuverability, but a short firing range.

Starting from Tier VI, they will come equipped with a brand-new type of armament – Airstrike. Based on real world examples of the low altitude bombing principle, it will allow players to call in aircraft and have it bombard the specified area with HE bombs. These explosives are equipped with drogue parachutes to slow their descent, and prevent planes being hit by the shrapnel.

The AI controlled aircraft will have a maximum operating distance of 10–13 km and it won’t be able to spot enemies. It will however be highly effective against low-mobility targets such as battleships and large cruisers. This ability gives players a fresh way to strike enemy ships hiding behind the cover of islands.

To access new Dutch cruisers for free, players will need to complete combat mission groups and earn a new temporary resource – Dutch Tokens. The same resource will be available in free daily bundles, random bundles for doubloons, and in bundles for community tokens.

Besides the ships, players are able to obtain the Kinderdijk Windmill patch, a commemorative flag and themed camouflages.

Finally, to celebrate the event the historical Rotterdam port has been added, which authentically recreates the look of the famous harbor city from the 1950s.

Update 0.10.6 will also feature two seasons of Brawls. All players will be able to participate in 3 vs 3 battles on Tier VI and Tier VII ships.

A number of visual and other enhancements have also been made, including the updated AI that will result in more realistic behavior of bots. In addition, a Hall of Fame tab has been added to Clan Battles, showcasing the winners of previous seasons.

Visit the official World of Warships website now for more game info and to sign up to play World of Warships for free!

MMORPGs World of Warships | Donster | July 16, 2021 |

Attack at Dawn: North Africa – Interview, Gameplay Video and Maps

attack-at-dawn-north-africa The Strategy Wargamer has interviewed Tomislav Čipčić, the lead designer of the game. In this episode of the Jean’s podcast you can find more details about: map design, hex-and-counter games, turn-based and real-time systems, AI programming and more.

You can listen to this interview HERE

New Gameplay Video
Panzer Division Games has released a second part of their gameplay video for Attack at Dawn: North Africa. In this video, the designer plays a game scenario “Battle of Alam el Halfa”, trying to win the day. The video shows new, illustrated unit counters, fast switching between Turn-Based and Real-Time modes of play, reworked AI and more.

You can watch the gameplay video HERE.

Map Series
The gameplay is followed by the battle map series, exploring the battles and operations that took place during the WW2 North African Campaign. The scenario shown in this gameplay video is Battle of Alam el Halfa. It was the last big Axis offensive in the Western Desert Campaign, and it took place between 30 August and 5 September 1942, at the El Alamein line. It was an Allied victory, and a prelude to the Second battle of El Alamein.

For full article describing the battle – you can go to the game’s website.

About The Game
Attack at Dawn: North Africa is an operational level wargame set in WW2 North African theatre. It features 3 campaigns, and 15 scenarios which can be played in solo or multiplayer modes. It can be played as a real-time, or turn-based (WeGo) game. The game begins with the German troops probing into the Libyan region of Cyrenaica, and finishes either with the total defeat of German-Italian Panzer Armee, or with the British loss of Egypt and their retreat across the Suez Canal.

For Steam website and wishlist, visit HERE.

Attack at Dawn: North Africa Strategy and Wargaming | Donster | July 16, 2021 |

Field of Glory II: Medieval – Swords and Scimitars Coming Soon

Field of Glory II: Medieval returns with its second DLC “Swords and Scimitars“. Set in the 11th to 13th centuries AD, the game focuses on the Crusades and the Byzantine Empire’s decline from their previously strong 11th century position.

In 1071, the Empire suffered a catastrophic defeat at the hands of the Seljuq Turks at the Battle of Manzikert. These recently converted, islamic nomads took nearly all of Anatolia under Alp Arslan’s expert leadership.

As the Byzantine Emperor Alexios Komnenos struggled, an appeal to the west for mercenary support was seized upon by Pope Urban II. In 1095 he called for a Crusade both to recover holy land and to further his own ends at the Council of Clermont.

The timing was fortuitously right, as the mighty Seljuq Empire had begun to fragment, allowing the First Crusade to eventually capture Jerusalem in 1099. The creation of “Crusader States” following on from this success would lead to two centuries of bitter conflict.

Several major Crusades were to follow, as the Crusader states fought for their existence against a succession of resurgent Islamic states.

Meanwhile, further East, a far greater threat to Islamic civilisation was emerging. The rapidly expanding Mongols had destroyed the Khwarazmian Shahdom by 1231, the Christian kingdom of Georgia in 1239, and the Seljuqs were defeated and forced into vassaldom by 1243.

In 1258 the Assassins of Alamut, and the vestigial remains of the once great Abbasid Caliphate, had also been conquered. Only the Mamluks of Egypt were able to finally bring the Mongol advance to an end, with their victory at Ain Jalut in 1260.

In the Balkans the Byzantine Empire had retained some of its former glory until 1204, when the Fourth Crusade broke the back of the Empire, leaving them a minor state shattered into four fragments.

These are the backgrounds, stories and wars that lead to the new DLC, which will include:

20 more nations and factions covering South Eastern Europe and the Middle East from 1040 AD to 1270 AD. These include Arabs (Syria/Iraq), Armenians (Cilician), Bulgarians, Byzantines (Main Empire, also Nikaia, Epiros and Trebizond), Crusaders, Cypriots (Lusignan Kingdom), Dailami, Fatimid Egyptians, Georgians, Ghaznavids, Ghurids, Indians (Rajput, other Hindu, Muslim), Khwarazmians, Latin States in Greece, Mamluk Egyptians, Mongols (Ilkhanids), Pechenegs, Seljuq Turks, Serbians and Syrian States.
35 more units (11 brand new, 24 new to Medieval), allowing the troops of all of the new factions to be accurately represented.
41 more army lists allowing historically realistic armies for each of the above factions and their allies at different dates during the period.
8 more historical scenarios covering key engagements of the period on an epic scale. These include Manzikert 1071, Dorylaeum 1097, Ascalon 1099, Sirmium 1167, Arsuf 1191, La Forbie 1244, Homs 1281 and Kili 1299.
4 more historically-based campaigns covering major leaders and conflicts of the era: Alexios Komnenos, The First Crusade, Manuel Komnenos, Saladin.
Sandbox campaign expanded to include all the new army lists.
Time Warp custom battles modules expanded to include all the new army lists.

Field of Glory II: Medieval Strategy and Wargaming | Donster | July 16, 2021 |

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.7.1 Released

Source: TechPowerUp!

AMD has released the latest version of Radeon Software Adrenalin. Version 21.7.1 beta introduces optimization for F1 2021, with a 6% performance improvement seen at 4K UHD on an RX 6800 XT, over the previous drivers. Support is also introduced for the new Radeon RX 6700M and RX 6600M mobile GPUs.

Among the issues fixed are an Oculus service error preventing the Oculus Link setup from running on machines with RX 5000 and RX 6000 series graphics cards; lighting corruption noticed in Apex Legends with Radeon Boost enabled; AMD User Experience Program consuming abnormally high memory; driver version mismatch between Windows Store and AMD Support versions; high memory usage on some running 3DMark Time Spy; and an image corruption in Carrion with AF enabled.

The Radeon Software Adrenalin 21.7.1 drivers are available online at the AMD driver download page.

Hardware Video Cards | Donster | July 16, 2021 |

Just Announced Hardware for 16 July 2021

Hardware | Donster | July 16, 2021 |

Panzer Corps 2 goes to the Pacific

panzer-corps-2-pacific For the first time in its 10 year history the Panzer Corps series is going to thoroughly explore the Pacific theatre of operations in the Second World War. This DLC is the first installment in a new series of campaigns which will portray the dramatic events of the Pacific War.

In this new expansion players can enjoy many new scenarios, be immersed in a completely new set of terrain graphics, new game rules and a new major faction. Pacific is still the good old Panzer Corps 2 game which fans enjoy and love, but at the same time it’s also a new, different and original experience.

At long last Japan has been added to Panzer Corps 2. With the introduction of Pacific, Japan is playable not only in a new campaign, but also in random scenarios and in Multiplayer. It is also fully available to modders and designers of custom content. In addition to that, the USA faction has also received many new units, with a particular focus on famous carrier-based aircraft. Overall, 70 new models will be added to the game.

In the Pacific theater naval warfare played a prominent and critical role, and thus the naval aspect of the game needed to be expanded and have depth added. For this reason, naval game rules have been significantly revamped and extended. All the existing content has also been tested and tweaked to work with the new naval system without any glitches.

The new Pacific campaign represents many famous (and some not so famous) battles which took place between 1941 and 1943, among which are Guadalcanal, Midway, Wake Island and Tarawa. As players have come to expect, after finishing this campaign, it will be possible to save core units and bring them to the next part of the series.

We will reveal and show more of Panzer Corps 2: Pacific and disclose the release date in the next few months. More information can be currently found on its product page.

Panzer Corps 2 Strategy and Wargaming | Donster | July 9, 2021 |

Panzer Corps 2: Axis Operations – 1942 Released

panzer-corps-2-axis-operations-1942 The Panzer Corps 10th Anniversary is coming soon, and we will start our celebrations with the release of the new DLC Axis Operations – 1942.

Axis Operations – 1942 continues the Axis Operations grand campaign to the pivotal year of 1942.

The 17 new scenarios will have you face the Red Army in some of the largest battles in all of World War II. From Rzhev to Stalingrad, your actions will decide the outcome of the war.

In fact, for the first time in the Axis Operations series, the 1942 campaign will have multiple endings and your performance as a general will matter more than ever.

Additionally, it introduces new units, new historical commanders, a new mission type… in short, it’s a must-have for all players of Panzer Corps 2.

Watch the new Panzer Corps 2: Axis Operations 1942 in 2 minutes video HERE.

Celebrate 10 Years of Panzer Corps with us.

As you may know, this weekend we will be celebrating 10 years of Panzer Corps.

Tune in to us tomorrow, on Friday 9th July, on our Twitch channel at www.twitch.tv/slitherinetv at 4 pm BST / 5 pm CEST for an exclusive stream. Alex Shargin, lead developer and designer of Panzer Corps, will be interviewed live, and we will be going through the past, present and future of the Panzer Corps saga.

Panzer Corps 2 Strategy and Wargaming | Donster | July 9, 2021 |

Microsoft Flight Simulator Update 5 Improves Performance Tremendously, Available July 27th

Source: TechPowerUp!

The upcoming Update 5 for the Asobo Studio-developed Microsoft Flight Simulator will be a welcome boon to any and all players of the simulator. The development studio has issued an update via YouTube describing the performance improvements they’ve seen with their latest work into the game engine, which has integrated DX 12 capability – taking advantage of its “closer to the metal” capabilities so as to improve performance.

The update is dropping on July 27th, the same time that the game will be made available on the Xbox family of consoles. One can easily construe a scenario where Update 5′s DX 12 and performance optimizations were made mostly as a way to make the game perform better on Xbox console hardware – the game is absolutely capable of bringing the most powerful graphics cards in the world to their knees at high resolutions and highest quality settings. With the same hardware, quality settings and playable scenario, average performance went from 32-40 FPS before the update up to the 55-60 interval post Update 5 optimizations. The update sees CPU utilization dropping by 25%; memory usage drop by 50%; and GPU utilization climbs from 75% up to 100%. Look for the break for a video showcasing the latest version of Microsoft Flight Simulator – with Update 5 applied.

Flight Simulation Microsoft Flight Simulator | Donster | July 9, 2021 |