Insurgency: Sandstorm Pre-Order Beta 2 is open!

Date: Thu, 13 Apr 2023

Genre: Action, Indie, Strategy
Developer: New World Interactive
Release Date: Wed, 22 Jan 2014

Hi everyone,

We are excited to announce that the second Pre-Order Beta of Insurgency: Sandstorm is now open!

You can jump into the Beta and play right now by pre-ordering the game on Steam at a 10% discount. Owners of the original Insurgency, which now boasts a player population of over five million, will receive an additional 10% loyalty discount, available through the end of the year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DheJOeInks
Pre-Order Beta 2, which is now live, features two new maps compared to the first Beta, for a total of four maps and four modes, including offline coop, from the final version of the game, character customization, dozens of weapons, and hundreds of loadout options (including explosives, armour, and ammo carriers).

Thanks to all the positive feedback Insurgency: Sandstorm received during the first Pre-order Beta earlier this month, the team will be using your feedback to continue to polish and optimize the game up until launch and beyond. We are now happy to let players experience the the intensity of modern combat in this Pre-order Beta phase.

Beta 2 is still a development build of the game and an on-going work in progress. We use betas as an important tool for gathering player feedback, studying system performance, and balancing the game. As such, it is important to stress that this is not a representation of the release version of Insurgency: Sandstorm.

As you can see in the Pre-Order Beta 2 changelog, the team has worked hard on this new version, but you may encounter, bugs, balance and/or performance issues. We encourage all participants to use the and forums to report any issues so that our team can continue working on them for the release.

Before playing, please check out:

Join us to celebrate the Beta 2 launch with a Dev Q&A and giveaway at 18h00 (CEST) on www.twitch.tv/focushomeinteractive

There are no NDAs or streaming restrictions on this test, and we're greatly looking forward to getting feedback from all across the gaming community as we work on the launch build. Pre-Order Beta 2 will stay open until the release of the game, September 18th.

Insurgency: Sandstorm releases on Windows PC in September 18, with Linux and Mac support coming later, and on PS4 and Xbox One in 2019.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/581320/Insurgency_Sandstorm/

Please find the Pre-Order Beta 2 Changelog below.

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Insurgency Sandstorm Pre-Order Beta 2 - Update 30/08/18

Optimization

Large reduction in draw calls across all maps to improve framerate.
Full LODs added to all cosmetic characters & gear.
Full LODs added to all 3P weapon and equipment assets.
Full LODs added to all props in the world.
All maps actor-merged.
Large particle optimization pass, set proper render bounds, LODs and tick rates on all particle effects.
Nativize most Unreal blueprints allowing them to run faster.
Improved bot spawning timings for Checkpoint.
Bullet projectiles now trace against lower LOD collision meshes.
Vastly reduced triangle counts on many larger environment rock prop sets.
Gunship and Support Helicopter rounds now use a simple collision trace.
Changed player spawning, to spawn one player per tick instead of two players per tick.
Improved material instances for various cosmetics.
Reworked the bullet hit validation.
Increased performance for player movement in water.
Ensured character cosmetics are not being spawned multiple times per cosmetic slot.
Characters now use data-only blueprints.
Items no longer tick by default.
Reduced the amount of times cosmetics spawn and despawn.
Made weapons only tick when equipped.
Interactable gear now use timers instead of tick functions.
Allowed only certain crew member characters to tick in helicopters.
Utilized texture atlases for certain cosmetic items to reduce draw calls.
Doors and Supply Crates only tick when they are in an opening or closing transition.
Destroyed prop vehicles will now extinguish their flames after 40 seconds so the fire/smoke particle doesn’t stay forever.

New Features

Doors can now be breached by being kicked down.
Added visual feedback system for Commanders, Observers and teammates to indicate where Fire Support is being called in and what type of Fire Support it is. Colored smoke appears on the target area.
- Security
  - Gunship - Green
  - Autocannon Strafe - Yellow
  - Explosive Artillery - Red
  - Smoke Artillery - Blue
  - Minigun Support - Purple
- Insurgents
  - Rocket Barrage - Green
  - Bomber Drones - Yellow
  - Explosive Mortars - Red
  - Smoke Mortars - Blue
  - IED Drone - Purple
  - Chemical Mortars - Pink
Servers will now kick players who have been idle for 2 minutes and 30 seconds.
Tessellation has been added for improved terrain visuals. The quality/performance of this can be scaled by adjusting the effects quality in your video settings.
New Local Play experience which allows you to play solo with AI teammates. This game mode is based on Checkpoint, but adds objective-based reinforcement wave gaining similar to as in Push.
Lesson system including browsable menu texts which explain game mechanics and video hint pop ups when performing certain actions for the first time in-game. The full collection of Lessons will be added during Pre-order Beta 2.
Add game options for the following:
- Always show compass.
- Enable and disable contextual key kints for use and vault.
- Enable and disable in-game Lesson hint pop ups.

New Content

New maps “Crossing” and “Summit”
New Greased Bolt upgrade option for bolt action rifles under the new “Chamber” upgrade category.
Added Hoodie Camo cosmetic and variations.
Added Leather variations.
New optic rail for AK’s.
New water explosion particles for artillery shells.
Proper third person meshes for C4, IEDs and detonators.
New bus model and textures.
New music for the Loadout menu.

Gameplay Improvements

Player Movement
- Reworked character equipment weights which impact top sprint speed and stamina.
- Reduced top sprint speed for characters by 5% before weight and stamina based slowdowns are applied.
- Removed sprint speed increase for players when they were in a suppressed state.
- Slightly reduced standing movement speed.
- Reduced standing move backward speed.
- Decreased sliding speed.
- Increased slow walk speed.
- Increased slow crouch walk speed.
- Slightly increased jump height.
- Slightly increased vault radius.
Characters
- Increase the brightness of certain Security camo textures for gameplay balance.
- Removed black and dark grey variations from Insurgents torso and leg items for gameplay balance.
Weapons
- Increased ADS speed.
- Increased 5.56 and 5.45 top damage slightly.
- Reduced effectiveness of hip fire by increasing free aim recoil and radius slightly.
- Balanced FOVs for optics when using Focus to be more consistent between low and high quality scope options.
- Increased G3 recoil slightly.
- Decreased FAL recoil slightly.
- Decreased AK-74 recoil slightly.
- Decreased UZI recoil slightly.
- Increased reload speed for the M249 slightly.
- Decreased lateral recoil on the MP7 slightly.
- Increased lateral recoil for the AKS-74U slightly.
- Increased Mk 14 EBR’s supply cost to 5.
- Increased supply cost of Extended Magazine for MP7 from 2 to 3 supply.
- Adjusted Mosin and M24 penetration power to be more balanced.
- Vehicle mines are now throwable.
Gamemodes
- All Modes
  - Removed Mk 14 EBR from Advisor class for gameplay balance.
  - Team kicks for team kills will now use the cooled down value instead of the total value when defining if a player has killed enough teammates to warrant a kick.
- Skirmish
  - Increased match length by adding a second round, with a team swap beforehand as in Push.
- Checkpoint
  - Added all available weapon upgrades to all Insurgent coop classes.
  - Ensured Security Coop classes get all Insurgent weapon upgrades.
  - Added Flashbang to all Insurgent coop classes.
  - Added M4A1 to Rifleman, Demolitions, Commander, and Observer
  - Insurgent Coop classes.
  - Added M870 to Breacher Insurgent Coop class.
  - Add M249 to Gunner Insurgent Coop class.
- Versus Firefight
  - Match length is now 6 rounds, with a team swap after 3 rounds.
  - Reduced player count to 24 players.
  - Removed Commander, Observer, and Demolitions classes.
- Competitive Firefight
  - Increased supply costs for various weapons and upgrades.
  - Added more primary weapons to the Assaulter class.
  - Added 1x and 2x optics for the Sharpshooter class.
  - Removed Mk 14 EBR and SVD from the Sharpshooter.
Explosives
- Tweaked explosive penetration.
- Frag grenades now only penetrate weaker materials.
- Fire Support will still penetrate most surface types, but deal reduced damage.
- Increased time taken for Incendiary and Molotov grenades to detonate cache objectives.
Fire Support
- Gunship
  - Increased autocannon burst cooldown to 4 seconds instead of 2.
  - Decreased minimum and maximum burst times.
  - Increased flyover time to 15 seconds from 10 seconds.
- Bomber Drones
  - Increased explosive radius slightly.
  - Improved positional audio.
- IED Drone
  - Increased explosion radius.
- AI
  - Bots who are directly exposed at mid range will crouch and fire at their target instead of rushing to cover.
  - Bots suppressed in cover will reload if there's a larger magazine and they haven't fired recently.
  - Bots should turn slightly faster.
  - Bots should react slightly faster.
  - Bots will fire in a much tighter cone before zeroing on target.
  - Increased target zeroing time by a few seconds.
  - Reduced accuracy of suppressed bots.
  - Encouraged bots to sprint to objectives if the round timer is low allowing bots to arrive faster during counter attacks.

Updated Content

Animation
- Updated animations and blending for character movement.
- Reworked ragdoll physics to use correct weight and limb rotation limits, resulting in more natural looking ragdolls on death.
- New animations for characters using bipods.
- New animations for characters using binoculars.
Weapons
- New model and texture for the M9 pistol.
- New smoke effect for rocket and grenade launcher barrels.
- Improved textures for the M249.
- Improved textures for the rail mounted pistol laser.
- Added drum magazines to the following weapons
  - AKM
  - AK-74
  - AKS-74U
  - M16A2
  - M16A4
  - M4A1
  - Uzi
  - L85A2
- Added grenade launcher sight for the M16A2’s M203.
- Compensator and Flash Hider upgrades will only use a mesh if it’s meant for that weapon.
Cosmetics
- Updated cosmetic costs and rarities to be more based on the item rather than its colors.
- Improved dirt layer on all cosmetic items.
- Added gender switch button.
- Added ability to save a preset of a character’s cosmetics.
- Updated camo scaling to be more consistent across all cosmetic items.
- Renamed DPM camo to Desert DPM.
- Improved glasses under Insurgent Headgear.
Gear
- Made Gas Mask goggles less opaque.
Audio
- Improved audio experience in Loadout rooms for all maps.
- Added muffled effect for players wearing a Gas Mask.
- Sprint breathing and Focus breathing with and without Gas Masks are now character voice specific.
Vehicles
- Disabled leaning out of vehicles.
- Disabled the use of all weapons in vehicles except pistols.
- Melee can now be used in vehicles to break vehicle glass.

Fixes

User Experience
- Taglines now populate correctly into the player’s profile.
Characters
- Characters seen at longer ranges through scopes should now tick at the correct rate.
- Fixed an issue where a ragdoll’s skin tone would be set incorrectly.
- Removed hit reactions from fire damage, preventing characters from bleeding when damaged by fire.
- Fixed player’s camera from clipping into their head if they had the Loadout menu open when spawned.
- Fixed finger posing on the Binoculars to prevent fingers clipping through gloves.
- Fixed certain torso cosmetic assets that had clipping issues.
Weapons
- Fixed weapon audio breaking if previously killed by a headshot.
- Fix an issue where the weapon overheat audio would not be terminated when exiting the Gunner seat.
- Prevent cases where weapons get multiple Foregrip, Compensator or
- Suppressor options.
- Fixed Laser Sight not working correctly when equipping a grenade launcher.
- Fixed AR Scope not showing correctly on the M16A2 world model.
- Fixed Hunting Scope not showing correctly on the Mosin world model.
- Fixed 2x Kobra Sight not showing correctly on the AK-74 world model.
- Fixed Mk 18 CQBR secondary magazine showing during the up and down animations state when using a Foregrip.
- Fixed some optics not being correctly aligned when in ADS.
- Shells and secondary magazines on weapons should no longer show in the Loadout selection.
Explosives
- Updated Molotov and Incendiary grenades to they align properly to surfaces and leave the correct sized scorch marks.
Voice Over
- Fixed a bug where flying vehicle pilots would not play their “Leaving” lines.
- Fixed a bug where objective destruction lines were not being played.
- Fixed a bug where helicopter radio events continued playing after the helicopter had left or crashed.
- Create a queuing system for both proximity and radio VO.
- Melee VO lines will now only play if an enemy is in front of you.
- Fixed suppression response VO for machine guns and snipers.
- Fixed a bug where enemy bot VO was showing in the chat menu for dead or spectating players.
- Fixed a bug where death VO would not be attached to the ragdoll of the dead player or bot correctly.
AI
- Removed grenade launcher bots.
- Bot will no longer flee from grenades they can’t see.
- Bots now have very short visibility inside smoke.
- Various bot pathing fixes.

User Interface

Penetration is now represented as “PP” (Penetration Power) instead of “Joules” in the Loadout menu.
Rearranged the upgrade category order in the Loadout menu.
Movement and vehicle controls can now be bound to the same key.
Weapon in the Loadout menu can now be rotated slightly.
Added generic Extended Magazine description.
Added weapon selection icons for the GP25 Explosive and GP25 Smoke.
Compass can now be toggled on and off in spectator mode.

Map Balance & Fixes

Crossing
- Actor merge pass.
- HLOD pass.
Farmhouse
- Actor merge pass.
- HLOD pass.
- Made minor gameplay tweaks.
- Tweaked Checkpoint scenarios.
- Tweaked restricted zones for Push scenarios to add a bit more breathing room for defenders to set up a defensive perimeter.
- Tweaked playable areas.
- Adjusted spawn locations and spawn point angles in all scenarios.
- Tweaked Checkpoint scenarios.
- Tweaked interior lighting throughout the map.
- Small adjustments for global lighting.
- Fixed several issues across all scenarios.
- Particle gameplay/optimizing pass.
- Blocking volume pass.
- Road fixes and polishing.
- Made foliage placement tweaks to improve readability.
- Visual polish interior and exterior.
- Soundscape polish.
- Loadout selection room polish pass.
- Decal polish pass.
- Fixed miscellaneous issues to improve both gameplay and visuals.
Hideout
- Reduced sun flare effect.
- Actor merge pass.
- HLOD pass.
- Made minor gameplay tweaks.
- Tweaked Checkpoint scenarios.
- Tweaked restricted zones for Push scenarios to add a bit more breathing room for defenders to set up a defensive perimeter.
- Tweaked playable areas.
- Adjusted spawn locations and spawn point angles in all scenarios.
- Tweaked interior lighting throughout the map.
- Made small adjustments for global lighting.
- Fixed several issues across all scenarios.
- Particle gameplay/optimizing pass.
- Blocking volume pass.
- Road fixes and polishing.
- Foliage placement tweaks to improve readability.
- Visual polish interior and exterior.
- Soundscape polish.
- Loadout selection room polish pass.
- Decal polish pass.
- Blocking volume pass.
- Fixed miscellaneous issues to improve both gameplay and visuals.
Summit
- Reduced sun flare effect.
- Actor merge pass.
- HLOD pass.
- Decal polish pass.

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