Dev. Blog 2, Visuals, Part 2

In the previous part, we talked about the visual aspects of the game, changes to the map and the objects on it, and started discussing how the units changed over the years of development.

Let’s pick up right where we left off last time and talk about the visuals of the infantry and the game overall.

If you want details about other parts of Rearmed, like UI or gameplay features, do not fret! We will be going in depth on them in future parts of our blogs, so stay tuned!

Still, let’s start with an…

Infantry

Sadly, models from ToW1 were hopelessly outdated, with no chance of being upgraded or upscaled to a modern standart.

So a whole new slate of infantry guys was created from the ground up.

All in all, around 50 infantry models with new textures and animations. Talk about a herculean task!

nd because ToW is first and foremost a historical wargame, the developer relied on a huge amount of archival material and period photographs to recreate the uniforms as accurately as possible. Just look at how close he got !

Even though they will die in droves in your battles for battlefield supremacy, those guys will go down with immaculate and historically accurate drip. Something we know you appreciate. We know we do.

VFX

The new models are cool, but we understood that if the visual effects on them were from 2007, the overall package would still feel like 2007.

That’s why quite a few of them were upgraded or completely redone.

For example, tank gun and artillery shots. Now they create much thicker smoke clouds, which improve the overall feel of the battle quite a bit.

Combining this with new tracers gives a refreshed look to every engagement, no matter the scale.

If you are more of a small arms enthusiast, we’ve got you covered too! Your machine guns got an upgrade as well! Their gun bursts became visually denser for a better visibility.

The effects of fire from damaged vehicles have been significantly redesigned. Now those effects are more realistic, both in their nature and in how they behave over time. Take a look!

Old Fire

New one!

And last, but not least - blood and powder! To be exact, two new things were added. First, blood splatters. Before there was just an ambigious stain on the ground, which was… a bit anticlimatic.

And second now you actually see the bullets and shrapnel hitting your infantry. That will allow you to actually see where is the damage coming from and not do a immersion breaking guess work of “why the hell my guys are dying”.

Overall Improvements

There have also been a healthy amount of general visual improvements. Shaders of countless little things like water or normal maps were fixed or brought up in quality, shadows became longer and now actually account for a sun position and a bit of texture work on game maps, etc.

While every bit of this meticulous work does not look that significant on its own, combined together they are more than just the sum of their parts.

Conclusion

That was… a lot. We hope you enjoyed this showcase of just how much love, work, and time was put into this project.

But we’re not done yet! As we’ve previously mentioned, we have so much more to show and discuss, so be sure to check out our page from time to time. Or, if you don’t want the hassle of checking Steam, join our Discord server to get instant notifications about every ToW-related piece of news. Including upcoming playtests and the eventual release of the final version of the game!

And we will see you next time.