Intel Report #030: Road to V1036 (Pt. 2)

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Hello!

We’re back with another Intel Report filled with dev news and sneak peeks for our upcoming release GROUND BRANCH V1036.

Today we’ll go over some details on new game systems and mechanics — including AI — as well as another map reveal, some brand-new character art for a new enemy faction, and finally some more player customization options. Let’s get to it.

Upcoming systems and mechanics

Though we aren’t able to do a proper visual showcase of these updates just yet, we thought it would be nice to take the time to talk about some of the changes and additions currently being worked on by our programmers for game systems and mechanics.

Here are some recent developments on the coding front:

AI

In V1036, we’ll be bringing significant improvements to enemy AI beyond new art assets.

💡 New dev team member Zachary Ledbetter is working on our enemy AI while Chris pivots over to focus on the friendly AI and Extraction (aka PvE Hostage Rescue — more on that soon!).
Grenades

In addition to AI grenade usage being reined in — no more spam, with better judgment on when and where to throw — enemies will also have a dedicated “flee” state when overwhelmed or suppressed, taking cover intelligently both indoors and outdoors. Smoke grenades are being more fluidly integrated into AI behavior, ensuring they’re thrown as enemies move into cover rather than awkwardly interrupting fleeing or other actions.

Awareness

The enemy AI is also being programmed to more contextually and accurately react to player presence, refraining from all rushing to the source of shots and instead holding position more often. This will allow their hearing detection range to be increased considerably, mitigating the now-common situation where enemies remain oblivious to firefights that are happening at pistol-shooting ranges.

Enemies will also react to being shot by suppressed weapons when far enough away for the shot itself to not be heard. Even if they don’t hear the shot, they will still run to cover and begin their cautious-and-alert logic trees, further improving our stealth gameplay to be more rewarding and less fish-in-the-barrel hunting.

A cartel member on upcoming map Border — new faction assets to be revealed in the future!
Coordination

Coordination between bots is also being improved in a few ways.

Dead bodies will no longer be repeatedly searched when discovered — once a fallen AI’s body is inspected, it is marked as “discovered” to all enemies. No more conga lines of first responders.

New to V1036 AI is also the ability to detect when lights have been disabled or shot out. An AI patrol will come out to inspect the breaker and turn it back on. If it’s been shot out, the patrol will alert and notify their allies as well.

Hit reactions

We’ll also be introducing hit reactions, i.e. flinching animations for when characters are shot but not killed — during which most actions (such as returning fire) will be interrupted.

In this first implementation, hit reactions will be 4-directional for upper body hits, with an additional animation for lower body hits. They will also be contextual, not necessarily happening with every shot, and depending on ballistics aspects such as caliber (larger rounds will be more likely to generate hit reactions than smaller ones).

Door locks and types

The long-awaited door lock system is finally making an appearance in our next release. How they work is simple: when a player goes to interact with the door, they will be given feedback if the door is locked. Regular doors will be breachable by destroying the door handle, while reinforced doors will require a larger breaching charge.

A key consideration in the design of our locked doors was to avoid players getting completely stuck on a map. Even if a player runs out of breaching tools, they can still shoot at the handle of regular doors with a regular firearm to break through, and buildings with reinforced doors will always allow at least one unlocked door to enter/exit from if no breaching charges or other explosives are available.

Our door system will allow mission designers to either set locked doors manually, or use a system to randomly lock a specified number of doors. Here’s a quick visualization in which the system is being told to lock 5 doors of a total of 10:

💡 We will continue to test and prototype the door system with our AI and tester feedback to the find the optimal amount of doors locked for our missions.

Remaking Rundown

Those of you following GROUND BRANCH for a while know that we’ve been overhauling John’s original maps over the years to update visuals, improve or expand layouts, and thematically integrate them with the campaign stories that are being worked on behind the scenes.

In our last Intel Report we showcased Airbase, a full remake of the 747 map, now set in Libya. This week we’re revealing Hospital, a complete rework of CQB favorite Rundown that is being helmed by level artist Elliot.

📋 A derelict Soviet-era hospital just over the Russian border now serves as a command center for PMCs.

The design philosophy behind the Rundown update was all about improving the close-quarters battle experience, while giving players a more organic and intuitive structure to fight through. To achieve that, we’ve opened up the exterior a bit to create more space and angles from which players can approach the central building — which has itself been transformed from an abandoned school into a deactivated hospital.

The first step in that transformation was moving away from the overused asset pack that so many games rely on for Soviet-style structures, so we built our own from the ground up. The surroundings now better reflect the campaign’s location and tie into the story far more cohesively than before.

The basement has been expanded into a fully fleshed-out play space, complete with multiple entry and exit points. Up top, the roof has been reworked into a viable defensive position, giving teams a solid foothold to hold and fight from. To help players keep their bearings, each floor now features a consistent wall paint scheme that makes it easier to tell what level you’re on. Elliot also introduced a clear visual distinction between the front and back of the building, making callouts and communication much more effective.

We’ve also given the garage some love — it now includes a playable second and third level, complete with windows that offer firing angles to defend the structure or provide overwatch for teammates pushing toward the hospital.

💡 Creek is also receiving an overhaul that we'll showcase in a future Intel Report (there's a small sneak peek further below!).

New enemy character assets

Another set of character assets that Pau has been working on more recently is a Western PMC faction, which will be known in the story as Citadel Research Group.

📋 Citadel Research Group is a risk management company that specializes in maritime security in and around the Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf. We will learn more about them in Operations mode.

As explained in Intel Report #029, Pau has been creating character assets for the enemy mobs over the last year (see the full post here for more details and previews). Much like the MENA faction from our last report, these assets can be mixed-and-matched to create more variety.

For these assets, we have also created a number of accessories that can be used to add visual interest to loadouts, like the carabiner, radio PTT and knife seen above.

💡 One idea we have for the future (post-V1036) is allowing players to add these types of small accessories as cosmetics to customize their platforms (helmets and vests).

Since a handful of these assets are unspecific (as in unmarked with the “Citadel” logo), they are also being used to compose a more generic militia faction that will be replacing the old “Riot” assets in non-campaign maps like City, Creek and Small Town. Here’s an example on the overhauled Creek map:

More customization

Though our next release is far from focused on cosmetics, character customization is always welcome in GROUND BRANCH and V1036 will be sure to deliver quite a few new items to the menu, ranging from character appearance to outfit variants.

Without getting into specifics too much (we like to keep a healthy level of suspense), we’ll be adding new hair and facial hair styles, kneepad variants for most pants, a new shirt type, a drop-leg holster, running shoes, fingerless gloves, and the neck gaiter, among other things. These conceptual shots by Rangda showcase some of the new cosmetics (and a few additions that aren’t purely cosmetic) in a sensual — but still classy — fashion:

💡 GROUND BRANCH V1036 will feature more than enough new weapons and attachments to keep the armory interesting as well. Stay tuned!

This has been Intel Report #030!

As always, thanks for making it to the end of the post and keeping up with GROUND BRANCH. We hope you enjoyed this dev blog, and we’ll have another one for you soon enough.

We’ll go back to getting this thing done now. Until next time!