Wrapping up 2025

As 2025 comes to a close, I wanted to updated you on the developpement that occured these passed few months, from October until today.

For a summary of the work that was done earlier in the year, please refer to the 9 months in development article!

As you can see, gameplay and content were the main focus of these past months. Content will be even more important next year, since gameplay is getting quite close to complete.

You can find all these updates weekly on the game's Discord sever if you prefer.

On a more personal note, I just became a father, and will spend some weeks focusing on family life. Hopefully, next year will be an eventful one for Ballistic.exe! Thank you for your continued support.

Gameplay

• Meta events manager and implemented first meta events ( events triggered by player progress, related to story/lore of the game )

• AddedTeleportation logic and shadersa special target can be shot (with enough energy) to teleport yourself to a new location in levels

• Updated target management, using target pools to handle what targets are available after teleportation

• Improve and fix random sway, removing a small drift that happened over time while aiming

• Getting close to a final list for the game's weapons, at least the weapons that will take you to the game's "ending" (there may be more weapons to unlock after that, including post-launch content)

• Use a distributed sway randomness, sway will have the same range but favors smaller movements

• Spotter cards now correctly notify when impact could not be spotted (mostly when it is behind an obstacle)

• Use interaction logic in shooter pawn to switch to Spotter or Computer Console, instead of dedicated inputs

• Allow manipulated parts to snap when within a small threshold - for example, avoids the Air pistol to fail firing because the barrel is only 99.9% closed, which can be frustrating and confusing

• Graduated targets grant a different reward for each concentric region

• Light bulbs can be shot! This will not help (https://x.com/gabriel_d_L/status/1982404919434133659)

• Target center can now be manually specified, avoiding incorrect target center calculations in certain cases

• Big refactor of the unit conversions and display, as a C++ plugin for Unreal Engine. It is released freely on Github (https://github.com/Elbriga14/* TicTacToeUnitConversionAndFormatting) (still WIP though, with only US Imperial, Metric, and some British imperial units supported.) Can't wait to add all kinds of units to this.

• Cartridges can now be unlocked, a special target may be marked every once in a while in the range, and shooting it successfully unlocks a new cartridge type

• Expanded TicTacToe's Unit Conversion And Formatting

• Spotter now has a laser that can be toggled if you want to mark a location (such as last impact)

• Reworked timings and UI for focus system due to user feedback

• Match view rotation with aiming rotation when exiting aiming

• Cartridges that are not fired are now refunded when exiting range either through "finish session" or quitting game

• Weapon templates now are saved and reapplied when switching weapons, instead of reverting the weapon to defaults everytime

• This also allows for weapon configurations to be saved between game sessions! I think this will increase the feeling of really owning one of each weapon and making modifications to it

• Opens the door to saving different configurations per weapon later on perhaps

Content

• Improved main hub environement and optimisation of existing geometry

• Blocking of the game's first level

• First level environment and level design, a number of assets have been made ( Floodlights, Crates, Trucks, TirePiles, sandbags, Tents, Bodybags, Watchtowers, Barriers, tables, barrels... )

• Improve front sight models for Sten and Air gun

• Add MOA accuracy characteristics to cartridges

• Improvements to the small swimming pool map

• More updates to small swimming pool map

• Add 3 new pellet types for air pistol: Round nose, hollow hornet, solid hornet

• Adjust air gun manipulation values

• Remove multi-hit challenge from fruits (could come back as a challenge that is only possible with smaller calibers, since higher calibers make fruit go splosh)

• New version of the end-level reward sequence, still WIP but feels way more... rewarding!

• Improved swimming pool environment

• FixedNew parts for Air pistolWooden ergo stock, fixed sight, flip-up sight, fluted barrels

• Weapon parts setup (prices, properties)

• Improve reward sequence animations, meshes and shaders, add background environment

  

• Setup navigation mesh in stadium map

• Setup tiers for lasers and foregrips

• Move first quest to first level instead of valley map

• Added a new weapon to the game, I won't say what it is though 🤫

• Quest areas level improvements

• First quest dialogue updates

• Wrote up script for next video

• Set values, prices and progression for a ton of parts

• Wrap up build candidate for testing

• Add plastic training ammunition for 9x19mm caliber

Graphics

• Add ambiant post process material per zone of levels

• Glass shader for hub level

• Environment is muted during weapon manipulation to make it more readable

User Interface

• Show attach item type in shop thumbnail

• Update pistol rear sights with HUD UI

• Reworked Ammo dispenser UI

• Changed the UI used for cartridges in the inventory ; now cartridges are represented with an abstract symbol, each cartridge type having its own symbol

• Objectives are now represented not as text, but with pips like illustrated, avoiding localization problems

• Unit preference system:

Angle units : MOA, miliradians, and mils - and you can choose between the OTAN mils, Russian mils or Swedish mils

Metric/US can be set independantly for weights and distances

And if you prefer your cartridge load and bullet mass in grains, but still use the metric system, you can!

Temperature: Celcius, Kelvin and Fahrenheit

And pressure: Pascal / PSI

• Spotter now displays distance to target

• Spotter now displays estimated accuracy at distance

• Spotter now has a toggleable accuracy overlay

• Scroll log to last entry

• Display units according to player settings in several more palces

• Target types now correctly displayed in hit cards

• Reorganized the workshop UI

• Weapon edition mode now shows value differences with previous configuration

Optimisation

• Implemented a metadata asset system for more efficient loading of purchasable items when approaching shop

Tooling

• Setup system for rendering ammo thumbnails

Sound

• Started adding ambiant and UI sounds

Fixes & maintenance

• Fix weapon drifting with use when shouldering while recoil is applied

• Generalize pawn interaction logic into its own component

• Fix interaction prompt UI and logic during aiming and manipulation

• Remove air gun muzzle flash

• Many fixes leading to a test build sent to a few close colleagues for testing

• Manipulation of rotating parts was significantly improved

• Cleanup hard references in the code for cleaner memory management

• Fixed soft lock when pausing when in hand position mode

• Setup attach type and categories for all existing weapon parts

• Fixed critical bug when objective completion and token rewards are not saved at the same time, leading to buggy save files

• Fix teleportation controller orientation

• Fixed an issue with the way weapon templates are created and saved behind the scenes, resolving issues where setting an attachment to nothing would sometimes not register