New Game Mode, Graphics Overhaul, and BattleRank System are Go!

Old recruits, new recruits, stand to attention! Players of Bulkhead Interactive’s ambitious old-school WW2 shooter Battalion 1944 are about to feel the force of a fairly hefty ammo drop, opening up a new game mode, a slick new graphics overhaul, and a brand new free progression system called BattleRank, amongst scores of other major updates.

Rolling out on 12th July 2018, this package of updates is the latest in a line of tweaks and improvements being worked on by the Bulkhead Interactive team as they continue to manage the game’s run through Early Access – a process bolstered by the team’s decision to solicit feedback from the Battalion 1944 community, helping to improve the game’s stability by testing the latest version.

Leading the line is a brand new competitive game mode Wartide 2.0, a new matchmaking system, a complete visual overhaul (including brand new character models, an impressive graphics revamp, and a total rework of character movement), a new map, a new sound engine, and a massive rebalancing of the game’s weapons.

This new update will also see the launch of BattleRank, which is designed to make Battalion 1944 an even more engaging and rewarding prospect. Split into seasons of roughly three months each, BattleRank will unlock new exclusive rewards and weapon skins that can only be acquired during that period. Continued play will enable gamers to build up their experience points (XP) in order to unlock new levels of rewards. Unlike ‘battlepass systems’ in other games, however, BattleRank will be free.

“This is the biggest round of updates we’ve released for Battalion 1944 to date, and is the result of our mission to make the game as absorbing and captivating as it can possibly be,” says Joe Brammer – Studio Lead at Bulkhead Interactive. “We’ve been listening to our players and taking their feedback into consideration as we look to build the game in a way that both meets their expectations and offers a few surprises for them along the way, too.”

The update follows on from Square Enix Collective® and Bulkhead Interactive’s previous unveiling of a four day long, $50,000 tournament, set to occur September 27-30 of this year. The best Battalion 1944 players will head to the Esports Game Area to compete amongst open qualifiers victors and an invited team for an opportunity to win prizes from a total prize pool of $50,000.

Click here for the full changelog and view the new Major Update 2 trailer.

Battalion 1944 is currently available on Steam via Early Access for $14.99/€14.99/£11.39.

First of Three Major Expansion DLC Packs Planned for 2018 To Launch Alongside Update 2.0

Independent developer Obsidian Entertainment, in partnership with indie powerhouse publisher Versus Evil today revealed the release date for the first major DLC expansion pack, titled “Beast of Winter”, for Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire. Players will be able to enjoy the expansion pack on August 2nd.

Upon receiving a missive from an isle of worshipers to the god of entropy and disaster, Beast of Winter takes the Watcher and his crew to the southernmost reaches of the Deadfire Archipelago. The Watcher is thought to be the harbinger of the end of all things and worshipers of the god of cold and decay, Rymrgand, have called upon the Watcher to fulfill their destiny. Alongside the Beast of Winter DLC, Obsidian is also releasing the next major update to Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire with their 2.0 patch that will be free to everyone alongside their next free DLC, the “Deck of Many Things” Pack.

Along with a host of bug fixes and balance improvements, update 2.0 brings new challenge modes to Deadfire. These challenges will test player’s mettle in unique and interesting ways to play through the game. The “Deck of Many Things” pack is the largest free DLC to be released yet and has the mysterious merchant ship, The Deck of Many Things, arriving in the Deadfire looking to sell magical items its crew found on its journeys to the East.

The Beast of Winter expansion, update 2.0, and the Deck of Many Things Pack will all be available on August 2nd.

For more information on Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire, visit the games official website.

Source: TechPowerUp!

AMD has rolled out the latest version of Radeon Software Adrenalin. Version 18.7.1 drivers come with optimization for “Earthfall,” with up to 28 percent more performance measured on Radeon RX Vega 56 and up to 28 percent more performance to be had on the RX 580 8 GB, at 1440; and up to 27 percent higher performance measured at 1080p, on the RX 560 4 GB.

The drivers also address a number of bugs, including random crash noticed in “Fortnite Season 5,” when rendering throwing stars. Flickering noticed on “Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice” has been fixed. The drivers also fix a bug of not all compatible display modes appearing in Windows; slower than expected performance in Corel Draw, and black screen noticed during boot on displays connected via DisplayPort. A bug with memory clocks remaining high (i.e. not spooling down at lower power states), when changing resolutions or refresh-rates, has also been fixed.

The new Radeon Software Adrenalin 18.7.1 drivers are available online at the AMD driver download page.

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.

• Cougar Introduces the Turret Mid-Tower Case With Vortex RGB Fans
• Spire Introduces the First Model of HUSKY series PC Cases
• Sharkoon Announces Skiller SGH3 Gaming Headset With External Sound Card
• Raidmax Intros the X08 Tower-type Open Air Chassis
• Corsair Launches Hydro H100i Pro w/ Zero RPM Mode
• Thermalright Releases Silver Arrow TR4 Cooler For Ryzen Threadripper
• GIGABYTE Readies a Pair of Aorus Branded AMD B450 Motherboards
• Philips Releases 278E9 Monitor with Curved VA Panel
• Lian Li to Release Strimmer 24-Pin ATX Extension Cable with Addressable RGBs for Pre-Order
• Cooler Master Releases CM310 Gaming Mouse
• SilentiumPC Introduces The Sigma Pro Corona RGB 120 Kit

ETA discuss the 120 ships and planes available on launch in their upcoming Real Time Strategy

“In planning Victory At Sea Pacific we knew we wanted sizeable fleets that players could build from,” said James Carroll, Director at Evil Twin Artworks. “The original Victory At Sea ended up with 80 ship classes, but due to the huge difference in scale we knew we needed to give the player greater options in Victory At Sea Pacific.”

Evil Twin have so far created over 120 ship classes and plane types for launch and are already developing more.

“This game has some unusual ships coming, including the Japanese I-400 submarine,” continued James. “It was the largest Submarine of WW2 and was capable of launching planes!”

To find out more and see the list you can visit the blog here.

About Victory At Sea Pacific

Victory at Sea Pacific sees you engage in tactical search and destroy naval warfare across WWII’s Pacific ocean in this huge open world Real Time Strategy. From commanding the entire Pacific Theatre to zooming in to take control of individual planes and ships, Victory at Sea Pacific puts the player in the heart of one of the most desperate campaigns of the Second World War. In Victory at Sea Pacific you can covertly recon enemy positions and launch large-scale amphibious assaults by sea and air against the chosen targets.

The Steam page for Victory At Sea Pacific can be found here. Get more game info on the Victory At Sea Pacific  official website.

It’s time to turn the tide of the war, once and for all! Are you ready to lead your brave soldiers in the early hours of the biggest airborne and amphibious assault ever made?

Matrix Games announce that Normandy, the second expansion of the acclaimed tactical wargame Tigers on the Hunt, is now available.  Tigers on the Hunt: Normandy contains 2 Campaigns and 6 different battles, for a total of 8 challenging scenarios!

The scenarios feature many historical tactical situations from the Normandy Landing, ranging from the heroic deeds of the 6th Company C of 2nd Ranger Battalion at Pointe de la Percée, the British fighting at Le Hamel, Pegasus Bridge, and more!

To celebrate this important milestone, the base game and the Kursk DLC are getting a nice 50% discount!

Hurry up, the offer ends on Thursday July 12th!

Tigers on the Hunt: Normandy is a DLC of Tigers on the Hunt , and requires the base game to be played.

By Hilbert Hagedoorn @ Guru3D

So like be quiet! felt a need to improve on their flagship chassis, the ‘new’ Dark Base Pro 900 v2 on the outside looks similar to the one released two years ago – but they applied some tweaks and improvements. Dark, style and feature-rich and obviously silent with the help of noise dampening are just a few features that come to mind. The 900 Pro once again has been fitted with a coated tempered glass, the chassis will offer noise isolation thanks to padded dampening, well that and the use of some faster spinning Pure Wings 3 fans (three of them). As such we review the updated revision 2 be quiet! Dark Base 900 Pro. Their case has been overhauled a bit with a new fan controller, new Silent Wings 3 fans, a PSU shroud cover, USB 3.1 Gen 2 support as well as 12V LED strip compatibility. The Pro model still retains that sweet Qi wireless charger for your phone. So yeah, silent fans and improved fan controller and LED support. Have a peek at the product we’ll review today.

Read the Review Here

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.

• EK Water Blocks Releasing a New AM4 Monoblock for the MSI X470 Gaming M7 Motherboard
• Lian Li Releases Maximum Airflow with PC-011 Air Chassis
• GIGABYTE Launches the Aorus P7 RGB Fusion Mouse Mat
• EK Water Blocks Expanding its Portfolio of Kits with Two New RGB Versions
• GIGABYTE Lights Up DRAM Market With AORUS RGB Memory
• ID-Cooling Presents DASHFLOW 360 RGB Liquid CPU Cooler
• EK Releases Complete RGB Upgrade Kits for Existing Water Blocks
• Noctua Expands 5V Fan Line-up
• GIGABYTE Intros CMT403x Series M.2 PCIe Riser Cards
• AOC Announces New Super Slim 3 sided Frameless FreeSync V2 Series Monitors
• Seagate Launches the New Barracuda SSD Lineup – 250 GB Through 2TB Capacities
• Cooler Master Announces the Master Case H500 Chassis
• ASRock Rolls Out its Phantom Gaming Radeon RX Vega Series Graphics Cards
• Dark Base Pro rev. 2 Case Announced by be quiet!
• Deepcool Gamerstorm Launches Threaderipper Cooler The Fryzen For $89.99
• EVGA Launches the BR Series Power Supplies
• Noblechairs Launches the New HERO Series Gaming Chairs
• Thermaltake Announces Core P5 TG Ti Edition ATX Wall-Mount Chassis
• Razer Launches Huntsman Keyboard Featuring Razer Opto-Mechanical Switches

Finland – Winter Storm brings sub-zero conflict to Kalypso’s strategy heavyweight

Kalypso Media is excited to announce the release of the next chapter in its World War 2 strategy heavyweight Sudden Strike 4. Finland – Winter Storm releases today on Steam and GOG, and is based on the events of the Russian advances on Finland during and after the Winter War, up until the Vyborg Offensive in 1944.

Offering two new mini-campaigns and six missions, the DLC faithfully recreates some of the war’s most important conflicts between the Finnish and Soviet forces. In the Soviet campaign, players will attempt to capture the village of Suomussalmi, protect the railway to Murmansk against a German-Finnish offensive and break through the Finnish defensive lines during the Vyborg Offensive. In the Finnish campaign, you must retake and hold the village of Suomussalmi while crushing Soviet reinforcements, seize back the Lähde sector and hold the final defense line in the Battle of Tali-Ihantala.

Alongside the new campaigns, Finland – Winter Storm also introduces three new doctrine commanders to choose from; artillery expert Vilho Petter Nenonen, tank general Ruben Lagus and renowned general Karl Lennart Oesch, all of which introduce new strategic options for tackling this latest set of challenges. You’ll also have 19 new vehicles to deploy, including new rescue vehicles, the Russian KV-1 and BT-7M, and the Finnish Stug III G and Flak 36.

Finland – Winter Storm is available now on PC (Windows, Linux and Mac via Steam and GOG) and will be included in the upcoming release of Sudden Strike 4: European Battlefields Edition on Xbox One on 26th June 2018.

To celebrate the release, Kalypso has prepared a new trailer showcasing the new DLC in all its glory.

New Aircraft sounds & Modern-Era Tanks Roll Out in War Thunder’s Latest Project X Update

Gaijin Entertainment has today released Update 1.79 ‘Project X’, the second massive update to the military vehicle combat game War Thunder this year. With more than two dozen new and reworked ground vehicles and aircraft, a massive new location based on the Italian peninsula for combined arms battles, a new map titled ‘Lagoda’ for aerial battles and a complete rework of the game’s sound effects for all aircraft, ‘Project X’ adds a vast amount of new content to the game.

1.79 update also expands the selection of modern era vehicles available in War Thunder to the early 90s. The most modern tanks in the game now are Japan’s Type 90 Kyū-maru and late modification of the German Leopard 2A4. France takes delivery of the AMX-40, and the Soviet Union adds the T-62M-1. Britain now fields a modernized version of the Centurion AVRE engineering tank, while the US sees the two competing XM-1 prototypes from Chrysler and General Motors, one of which would later evolve into the famous M1 Abrams that is already available in War Thunder.

In the hangar players can now utilize “Protection Analysis”. This function allows players to choose a tank and check the vulnerability of any part of it. For the attacking side players can set a model of a tank, a type of shell, distance and direction of a hit. A complicated algorithm will show the chance of a ricochet, penetration and which modules of the attacked tank will be damaged by the hit.

‘Project X’ brings many new aircraft to the fray such as the US’ FJ-4B ‘Fury’ naval jet, the Soviet Union’s IL-28Sh jet bomber, the German twin-boom heavy fighter Bf 109Z ‘Zwilling’ , as well as the game’s first indigenous Romanian fighter aircraft, the I.A.R. 81-C .

War Thunder aviation now features a completely new weapon – remote control bombs, whose flight can be slightly corrected to hit targets more precisely. A perfect weapon against ships.

All aircraft in War Thunder, from biplanes to jets, now have new sound effects for engines, weapons, mechanisms and more. Sound effects now vary realistically depending on player point of view and actual vehicle position. Closed cockpits now properly muffle exterior noises, allowing pilots to hear the distinct inner workings of their machine, while bullets and aircraft whizzing by leave lasting and recognizable impressions.

For more detailed information about War Thunder Update 1.79 ‘Project X’ check out the official announcement trailer and the detailed changelog on the game’s website.