Development update 2020-11-23 (Patreon)

Hello, and thank you for your continued support!  The GHPC team has been hard at work preparing several new features for upcoming patches.  It's taking us a bit longer to complete these than we anticipated, so we want to communicate the latest progress and keep all of you in the loop.  

First of all, GHPC will now have a day/night cycle, with manual time controls so you can test out night optics.  The night cycle includes realistic sun/moon orbits and even moon phases that change every day.  

Accompanying the day/night cycle is the addition of night vision optics.  For now, the intensification type (traditional night vision) is implemented in the T-55A and T-72M1, paired with infrared searchlights ("Luna") that help the optics resolve enough detail to be useful.  If you've played the old demo of GHPC, you may remember this feature from the T-72M in that demo.  This time around, it's using our improved reticle system and rendering stack for some added realism.  

We're also still working on thermal/FLIR optics (which will be needed for the M60A3 TTS as well as some future vehicles), but the development lead time on those is greater, and they might not be ready by the next patch.  If this is the case, we'll add them as soon as possible after that, as well as releasing incremental improvements to the thermal system over time.  

Major development effort is also currently focused on getting the fire/explosion system up to speed.  The new system includes features like fire propagation, delayed cookoff, and munitions poking exit holes in compartments.  We're excited to get those turrets flying again soon.  

In parallel with all the new feature/code work, our team continues to prepare for the future.  New vehicles and infantry assets are working their way through the pipeline at all times, and we're also making huge strides on the Fulda map.  We try to keep most of it close to the chest, but here's an example we're willing to show off: Soviet infantry soldiers from the 1980s.  You can see more here: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/kDe5Ly 

The final barrier to re-introducing combat missions to GHPC is, of course, artificial intelligence (AI).  The tactical and gunnery AI systems are crucial to the gameplay experience, and as such, we want to make sure they're done right.  Our current internal goal is to get combat missions in the Patreon build by the end of the year.  To be perfectly candid, this is ambitious.  It requires that all our feature efforts go smoothly from now till then.  Nevertheless, we're giving it our best shot, and we thank you sincerely for your support as we work to bring these features to GHPC.  

Some of the features listed above are nearly complete and should be ready for a patch by the end of the month.  Keep an eye out!  

- ActionScripter