Version 1.33 has now gone into Open Beta testing, and brings with it another significant update to our decade old game. The new and improved infantry models not only bring WWIIOL more in line with modern MMOs,  they also look pretty freakin' sweet.

In 2010,  the massive WWIIOL:Battleground Europe arena was upgraded with new terrain, trees, buildings and weather patterns. The update was impressive and met with great enthusiasm from the player base. The new world was visually appealing and the realism factor jumped. The world was beautiful and immersed players on a much higher level...until they'd spot a fellow infantryman. The disparity between our spiffy new world and the 5+ year old infantry model was jarring.

After the introduction of PPO's and other new game mechanics in 2010, the decision was made to  completely replace our outdated infantry model. “The decision wasn't too hard to make”, says Dana “GOPHUR” Baldwin. “Infantry hadn't been touched in over five years, the last pass was an update to the 1st person animations”.

So planning began. The first step was to set a realistic schedule and completion date. As always, allowances have to be made for other work to fit in, including fixes, updates to other features and routine maintenance. Next, extensive research had to be conducted. Our community contains some of the most hard-core WWII history buffs and we had no problems tapping into that vast pool of knowledge to make sure that our infantry looked as authentic as possible. Once the research team was done, the style guides that they created were passed over to art. While the art department is small by industry standards, they put out a massive effort and got a huge work load done in record time. After art worked their magic, it was over to the coders to take the new infantry and library of animations and make them work in the game world. New ragdoll treatments, animations and a kit attachment system were added to complete the project.

Research

Rat HQ has a pretty impressive reference library, one that's been built over the last 10 years by staff and gifts from players. For this project, more was needed. Steve “BLOO” Daniels, tasked with gathering as much information as he could, turned to the closed Beta team, members who have proven their in depth knowledge of all things WWII many times in the past. “While the whole team provided an incredible amount of information” BLOO says, “I really want to thank three people in particular: Pachy, Jwilly and especially Hchris”. This team not only scoured books, documents, websites and film, they also visited a multitude of WWII museums overseas in the hunt for as much information as they could get their greedy little hands on. A visit to the closed Beta forums shows nearly a hundred separate threads containing hundreds of posts, images and specifications.

Presented with a mountain of reference material, it then fell to BLOO, DOC and a few others to choose which pieces fit best with the early to mid 1940's time frame for all three countries currently in game. “That's why the German trousers are the Stone Grey rather than the Field Grey” Bloo explains. “The former fabric having been manufactured in such large quantities that it was overstocked until mid-war”. The British paratrooper helmet chosen was the most commonly seen of the four styles available.  Other factors in the final decision was making sure that each country had a unique look. “We decided not to use the Free French model for the paratroooper, which was essentially identical to their British counterparts”. Individuality was the same reason that extra time was taken to model the French greatcoat. "Because we wanted to make sure the unique French uniform design was in, with that great coat, we needed to be efficient elsewhere, which is why the German M40 tunic has the flat pocket tops for now."

The base uniforms were only part of the project; A wide range of kit options also needed to be decided on. Each unit of each country also needed to be fitted with distinctive set of attachments which best represented their function. Packs, holsters, pouches, webbing and miscellaneous tools all needed to be modeled as individual items so they could be swapped out rather than 'baked on' to the texture.

Once the final decisions were made, BLOO gathered all the information and created a Style Guide for each model that was to be created. The mountain of reference material was boiled down into a  finished guide that was then handed over to the Art department. The research hasn't stopped, however, the team is still gathering information for possible use in future updates.