MMORPGs

Wargaming lets players construct their own warship and prepares for a 24-hour Christmas stream to raise funds for Save the Children charity

Christmas is coming early to World of Warships as players can build their own warship in the new update 0.8.11, as well as find a host of presents and rewards. Wargaming prepares to keep on giving with a planned global charity stream for Save the Children, set to kick off across all its territories on December 19th.

A new video for update 0.8.11 can be viewed HERE.

Keeping the season of giving close at heart, Wargaming will begin a Save the Children 24-hour charity stream, aiming to raise $25,000 dollars before the clock runs out. Players can donate by buying various in-game items, from premium ships to rare camouflages, with the proceeds going to charity.

One of the biggest new features of update 0.8.11 lets players build their own personal warship. The premium Tier X Puerto Rico large cruiser is waiting to be finished in the players’ Dockyard. They can complete the warship in stages, from laying the keel to installing weaponry and other equipment, by spending special Shipbuilding Tokens found in the new Event Directives. Each completed stage nets the player various rewards, with the ultimate prize being the Puerto Rico itself.

A new Shipbuilding Collection, with 20 new collectable elements, is featured in the new update. Each completed subcollection will reward you with 1 day of Premium Account. Also introduced are Snowflakes, holiday victory bonuses with large rewards, which can be encountered blowing off on all ships of Tier V and above.

Wargaming keeps on improving the visual fidelity of World of Warships with the Trident and Neighbors maps, as well as the Hamburg and Marseille Ports having been reworked in update 0.8.11. Special attention has been given to the sea with more realistic surface and enhancing the wave action.

Further details on the Update 0.8.11 can be found here.

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

European line gets major boost with new Tier III-X destroyers from Swedish navy, as well as Austrian-Hungarian Tier II destroyer and Polish Tier I cruiser

World of Warships welcomes a major influx of new researchable European ships to its supertest environment today, allowing them to be tweaked and receive balance adjustments before their full deployment to the popular navy combat game in the future.

The new Tier II-X destroyers, a special Tier X destroyer, as well as the Tier I cruiser in the European line represent not only the introduction of a sizable in-game force of Swedish warships but also the Austrian-Hungarian and Polish navies, bringing with them their own set of unique gameplay mechanics and features.

The new ships available in today’s supertest session are:

• The Swedish navy destroyers Romulus (Tier III), Klas Horn (Tier IV), Visby (Tier V), Västerå (Tier VI), Skåne (Tier VII), Öland (Tier VIII), Östergötland (Tier IX), and the Halland and Småland (Tier X).
• The Tier I Cruiser Gryf from the Polish navy.
• Tier II destroyer Tatra from the Austrian-Hungarian navy.

The new ships in the European line bring their own specific characteristics and playstyles, such as:

• They carry very fast torpedoes with long range but low damage.
• The artillery is similar to American destroyers, being quite effective in close combat, but weaker than those of dedicated artillery-focused destroyers.
• The Tier VII to X destroyers have a relatively low top speed which can be increased by an Engine Boost consumable.
• Starting from Tier VII, the AA defense of European destroyers has a larger area of effect and deals good damage.
• Starting from Tier VIII, the new ships are equipped with Surveillance Radar with an action time of 15 seconds and a range of up to 7.5 km.
• The ships lack a Smoke Generator but have a relatively high detection range. When engaging in combat with other destroyers, it’s better to rely on the Surveillance Radar and fast torpedoes.
• Starting from Tier V, the destroyers are equipped with the Repair Party consumable.

Further details on the new ships in the European line can be found here.

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

See in the New Year with a special event that will spread festive cheer

World of Tanks is ready to see in both Christmas and New Year with its biggest in-game event of the year: Holiday Ops 2020. It’s all about baubles and battles. From 13th December to 14th January, players will be able to spruce up a new in-game garage, which is better suited for the upcoming holidays, and earn great rewards. It’s something that would even put a smile on Ebenezer Scrooge’s face!

This new garage features an interactive Christmas tree, a feast, an installation and a yard, all ready to be adorned to your liking. There are more than 300 different decorations to be found and 4 collections to be completed (Christmas, New Year, Magic New Year and Lunar New Year). So, get ready to deck the garage with bundles of decorations, fa-la-la-la-la, la-la-la-la!

Normally at Christmas, only the best behaved get rewards, but not with Holiday Ops; players will receive decorations for causing destruction, creating their own New Year’s firework display and completing special missions in Random Battles. By putting up these ornaments, tankers will increase their Festive Atmosphere and each new level will bring special rewards!

Once players reach level 5 of Festive Atmosphere, they will be introduced to a brand-new Holiday Ops 2020 mechanic: the ability to create their own dream team of vehicles that will earn additional bonuses in battle. The machines chosen will become Holiday Ops vehicles and depending on their class, they will earn extra Battle XP, Free XP or Crew XP. Tankers will initially start with one Holiday Ops vehicle slot at level 5, but with each level increase, a new slot will be unlocked. The Festive Atmosphere level that unlocks a new slot corresponds to the vehicle tier which can be placed there; level 5 is for Tier V vehicles, level 6 for Tier VI, and so on.

There are a lot of festivities going on, but players won’t be doing this alone: they’ll be guided through Holiday Ops 2020 by the Snow Maidens. Every day they will gift players a present that features one random decoration and personal missions for 5x XP. The Snow Maidens will also be rewards for hitting certain levels of Festive Atmosphere so tankers will be able to keep them as crew members for good!

“2019 has been a great year and Holiday Ops is the perfect way to not only end it, but also to kick off 2020,” states Max Chuvalov, World of Tanks Global Publishing Director. “We hope our players love the festive mood we’ve created and the fairy tale nature of the event as we wanted to give them something they’d never forget!”

And there’s even more! The holidays are a time of giving and Holiday Ops is no different. Whether they’ve been naughty or nice, from 13th December each tanker will get a special present that contains the Tier II French Premium light tank, the F42 AMR, 3 decoration boxes and one Charge (a special item that can be used during Holiday Ops). Thanks, Santa!

Watch the Holiday Ops 2020: Unwrap Your Presents and Get Bonuses video HERE.

For more information on World of Tanks, visit the games official website.

Update 0.8.10 rounds out final part of the new Italian cruiser branch with new in-depth historical collection and unlockable Italian commander, as well as visually updating ten maps and two ports, while also paving the way for the kick-off of a new Ranked Battle Season

Wargaming has today released Update 0.8.10 for World of Warships, completing the full branch of the Italian cruisers with the introduction of a new themed collection and the unlockable historical Italian commander Luigi Sansonetti. The update also brings a host of visual enhancements to ten maps and two ports, and prepares the game for the arrival of a new Ranked Battle Season.

A new video for update 0.8.10 can be viewed here.

The second installment of the Italian cruisers event kicks off by allowing everyone to research the new warships, all ten of them, while also introducing the “Resolute and Rapid” themed collection, dedicated to highlighting the history of the Italian Navy.

Finishing the whole of this collection grants the unique Italian navy historical commander Luigi Sansonetti who possesses special and powerful in-game effects. His talents activate by achieving specific battle goals such as destroying an enemy ship which will extend the maximum fire range of the main battery guns.

This commander also boasts two enhanced skills: Expert Loader and Torpedo Acceleration. Much like other unique historical Commanders, Luigi Sansonetti comes with specialized personalisation options: a broad pennant, colored shell tracers, and a signal flare that’s fired over the ship when one of his talents is activated.

A new Ranked Battles Season is set to commence in the middle of Update 0.8.10 featuring matches with Tier X ships in an 8v8 format. Only one aircraft carrier per team can be brought, with the total reward for reaching the 1st Rank being 5,500 steel.

Wargaming continues to update the maps and ports in World of Warships so that they make full use of the latest advances of the new lightning model and enhanced HDR technology. Ten maps and two ports, including Solomon Islands, Ring, Two Brothers, Shards, have been updated, as well as the Ocean and Saint Petersburg ports.

Further details on the Update 0.8.10 can be found here.

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

Wargaming has teamed up with Lionsgate to promote the new Midway film, premiering worldwide today, by offering a host of special combat missions in the popular naval combat game World of Warships.

Until the 5th of December, World of Warships players can try their hand at special battle missions which, if successfully completed, grant them the IJN Kaga aircraft carrier and the IJN Saipan. Furthermore, selected cinemas in Poland, Czech Republic and Romania will be offering invite codes giving access to valuable content in-game to visitors of a Midway screening. World of Warships trailers will also be shown ahead of the Midway movie in partnership with Cinema City.

Players can jump into the online free-to-play combat game to relive the pivotal Battle of Midway, which saw the United States Navy decisively defeat an attacking fleet of the Japanese Imperial Navy near the Midway atoll in the Pacific Ocean. This decisive engagement of World War 2 has been recreated inside World of Warships with meticulous attention to detail, with players able to command 30 historical ships that took part in this massive naval battle.

Wargaming and its dedicated team of historians and game designers pride themselves on carefully recreating history by using archival documents and official blueprints with each individual warship in World of Warships and its console companion version, World of Warships: Legends.

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

Dozens of other new vehicles introduced in the Shark Attack Update include the legendary HMS Belfast cruiser

Gaijin Entertainment announces the release of a major Content Update “Shark Attack” for the military online action game War Thunder. Players will be able to try the Ka-50 “Black Shark” and the Mi-28 “Night Hunter” helicopters, the legendary British light cruiser HMS Belfast and the first fighter planes for a new nation tech tree that represents Sweden.

Named after the Swedish word for “barrel”, based on its shape, the J29D Tunnan was an awkward-looking machine, but one with superb flight characteristics for the time, enabled by its swept wings. J29D and the Finnish fighter VL Pyörremyrsky are available as a part of Swedish tech tree preorder packs. The closed beta testing of that tree will start later, with the release of the next major Update.

Watch the trailer HERE!

The Shark Attack update also adds new modern ground vehicles for several nations. For example, the Chinese tech tree now has the ZTZ96 with its powerful 125mm smoothbore cannon supported by an autoloading mechanism and new composite armor protection, and US armed forces fans can now use M1A2 variant of the Abrams tank with depleted uranium armor components. The Soviet tech tree now has the BMP-3 – a lightly armoured and vast vehicle with a diverse set of weapons. Its 100mm primary gun can also be used to launch ATGMs, while a 30mm automatic cannon paired with the primary gun has high-explosive incendiary, tracer, armour-piercing, and APCR shells that can take down enemy helicopters and light tanks. There is also a 7.62mm PKT machine gun.

Larger-sized ships are gradually coming to War Thunder – this time the star of the show is the American heavy cruiser Pensacola, the first rank V ship in the game. Military history fans should also try the British light cruiser HMS Belfast. During World War II it was used to escort the Arctic convoys to the USSR and to provide cover for the troops in the famous D-Day landings that took place in Normandy. Since 1978, the light cruiser Belfast has served as a self contained exhibit for the Imperial War Museum and is permanently moored on the river Thames in London.

The full list of the new vehicles and other updates is available at the official War Thunder website.

Update 0.8.9 sees early access launch of new nation, while also kicking off Halloween celebrations with return of Saving Transylvania and Sunray in the Darkness Operations

Wargaming has today rolled out the latest update for World of Warships – 0.8.9 – which sees the launch of the brand-new Italian cruiser line into early access of the popular online naval combat game. The introduction of the Italian cruisers comes with new mechanics, a game event with new directives, the new Taranto Port, and much more.

A new video for update 0.8.9 can be viewed HERE.

Update 0.8.9 also kicks off the Halloween celebrations with the return of the popular Saving Transylvania and Sunray in the Darkness Operations. The second Halloween phase will be available from October 31st and will bring to light a new game mode “Raid for the Filth” allowing players to do battle against otherworldly forces while their own ships slowly transform from man-made machines into gigantic sea monsters.

A new developer diary taking an in-depth look at update 0.8.9 including the new cruisers of the Italian Navy and the Halloween event, can be viewed HERE.

The Italian warships included in update 0.8.9 present the first researchable branch of the Italian Navy. Players can now get early access to the first Italian cruisers with the introduction of the Raimondo Montecuccoli (Tier V), Trento (Tier VI), Zara (Tier VII) and Amalfi (Tier VIII). The new cruisers are notable for their maneuverability and powerful 203 mm guns on Tier VI ships and upwards. Two new mechanics are also introduced:

• Semi-armor-piercing (SAP) shells combine certain characteristics of both AP and HE shells to steadily inflict large amounts of regular damage to enemy ships, but are unable to start a fire.
• The Exhaust Smoke Generator is a unique consumable that can conceal a player’s ship without it having to reduce speed.

A new game event gives players the opportunity to earn special rewards, including new containers and a new temporary resource: Italian Tokens. These can be exchanged in the Armory for permanent and expendable camouflages, signals, days of Warships Premium Account, credits, Random Bundles or event containers for a chance to unlock early access to the Italian Cruisers. Finally, players will have the opportunity to admire their recently acquired ships in the brand-new Taranto Port.

The spookiest day of the year, Halloween, will see the start of the new “Raid for the Filth” game mode. Players will be able to research and command magic-infused ships across three different branches: destroyers, cruisers, and battleships. They will face off against other human opponents as well as hordes of dark forces controlled by AI. The main objective is to gather Filth, a special resource, both from set locations or from defeated enemies before escaping through a centrally situated portal. Filth can then be exchanged in the Armory for valuable rewards such as credits or random bundles for new permanent camouflages, signals, XP and much more.

Finally, in Update 0.8.9, players can keep on celebrating Halloween as long as they want with a new set of creepy, monster-styled permanent camouflages.

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

New kind of ray tracing technology developed by Wargaming and Intel will improve the visual fidelity of World of Tanks on any PC supporting DirectX 11 and above; even on notebooks with the latest generations of Intel integrated graphics

Introduced in March 2018 as part of Update 1.0, the Core graphics engine significantly improved the visual fidelity of World of Tanks. Now it’s time to move forward and integrate new technologies into the core engine. One of them will be a new form of ray tracing that will bring close to displaying real-life shadows that can be run on any graphics cards that supports DirectX 11. That means that it could be even enabled on the latest notebooks with the latest generations of Intel integrated graphics without a special graphics card with hardware ray tracing support.

The correct implementation of shadows has been one of the industry’s biggest problems for a long time. In Wargaming’s case, it was implementing correct vehicle shadows and being in a constant balance between quality and performance. At one point the vehicles in World of Tanks became more detailed than their shadows and it was time for a change.

Intel had a library called Intel Embree for a long time. It specializes in quick BVH building and has been mostly used in offline applications, the movie industry, computer-animated films and so on. During the collaboration and consulting Intel’s advanced rendering team, Wargaming comes with a solution and implemented the multi-core technology and solutions for concurrent rendering in update 1.4, the Intel Embree technology which took less than a week.

It visually will get close to displaying real-life shadows as they will be sharp or soft in those very places where they should be, as they will try to mimic real-life shadow behavior. “Ray tracing is a true revolution in video game graphics that is happening before our eyes—and we at Wargaming are among the revolutionaries,” says Bronislav Sviglo, World of Tanks Render Team Lead. “The development of ray-traced shadow tech with the help of our partners from Intel is just the beginning. Take a look at the fruits of our labor today—download World of Tanks enCore RT!”

These shadows are only the start and much more can be done with the help of this new technology. Realistic reflections ambient occlusion, global illumination and the whole frame, in general, can be generated using it, but billions of rays for one frame need to be processed to do so. Currently no computer can do it in real-time and it will be a long time until it’s possible, but you will be already able to enjoy the ray-traced shadow in World of Tanks in the very near future.

We decided to use World of Tanks enCore as we did before the update 1.0 release. World of Tanks enCore will now let our players try ray tracing in-game, you can already download the World of Tanks enCore RT app. Launch it, adjust the rate tracing quality, check if your computer can handle it and see the visual difference.

From October 15, World of Tanks enCore RT will be available to download at: https://wotencore.net/en-eu/

Take a look at the video where those behind the ray tracing tech explain how it works.

For more information on World of Tanks, visit the games official website.

The new event will allow players to obtain rare military vehicles by performing well on the battlefield

Gaijin Entertainment announces the start of the Operation Shipyard event in the military online action game, War Thunder. Participating players will be able to get four rare vehicles – an MBK-161 armoured boat, the VT 1-2 SPG, a Whirlwind P.9 fighter and the H-34 helicopter.

The most interesting prize is the German experimental VT 1-2 self-propelled gun that was developed in Germany in the early 70’s as part of the replacement program for the more traditional tanks. The VT1-2 has two powerful 120 mm guns without any conventional traverse – the cannons are rotated using the whole hull via the tracks. As was the case with the actual constructed prototype, the in-game version of the VT1-2 has been modeled without the use of armoured steel, so it does not have much protection and the players would be better to rely on its firepower and mobility.

While Operation Shipyard runs, players will get materials and blueprints they need to produce the armoured boat parts and assemble the whole vehicle. For a completed MBK-161, players will get vouchers that can be exchanged for event vehicles or sold in the market. In order to get access to the VT 1-2 and H-34, players should also collect tank blueprints. There are two ways for those who want to get the new vehicles as fast as possible: players can either play well and finish their battles in first place more often, or purchase the missing items in the Market.

The full details of the Operation Shipyard event are available HERE.

For more game information and to download War Thunder, please visit the official War Thunder website.

Update 0.8.8 brings two new battleships and in-game rewards ahead of birthday stream on September 20 featuring sneak peek into future plans

Wargaming is celebrating World of Warships’ fourth birthday with the arrival of update 0.8.8 today, which brings two new ships next to a variety of rewards for dedicated players of the popular online game to unlock. To keep in the festive mood, the renowned developer and publisher has also announced that a global birthday stream, lifting the veil on future plans, will go live on Friday the 20th of September at 16:00 UTC time.

A teaser video can be viewed here.

World of Warships celebrates its 4th anniversary by giving players the opportunity to earn supercontainers for their first victory aboard Tier X ships in the new update 0.8.8. First wins on lower tier ships will also give players valuable rewards, such as special signals and an exclusive Anniversary camouflage. New combat missions have been added for the occasion, and completing them will reward prospective commanders with three additional supercontainers, as well as a container unlocking a random Tier VI Premium ship.

Update 0.8.8. also features two new Tier X ships: the British Thunderer and the American Ohio battleships. The Thunderer is an alternative take on its close cousin, the Conqueror, and sports 457 mm guns with very high shell damage, have good accuracy and a fast reload time. The new British battleship comes with a less effective Repair party consumable than that of the Conqueror but will be able to use it once more than its sister-ship. The American Ohio battleship features eight 457 mm guns and powerful secondary armament. This, combined with a shorter reload on the Repair Party consumable, as well as its decent armor make the Ohio a well-suited ship for close to medium range skirmishes.

Furthermore, update 0.8.8. features two Ranked Sprints, each allowing players to earn up to 10 000 coal to be exchanged in the Armory for Premium ships. Clans will also get their share with two Clan brawls opposing teams of 3 players on smaller maps for especially intense naval combat. Finally, a host of modifications and improvements are included, with a massive overhaul for the sound system for more realistic and immersive battles, a large increase in the Armory’s stock with the addition of multiple premium ships, and updated maps with new lighting models.

A global birthday stream for World of Warships will go live on Friday the 20th September with a fun retrospective on the past year, as well as a sneak peek on what’s to come for World of Warships. For the anniversary, multiple gifts will be given out during the stream, with a chance for players to earn a premium ship. The global stream can be watched from 16:00 UTC time on World of Warships official YouTube channel.

Further details on the Update 0.8.8. can be found here.

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