New Beta Update - November 8th

Hi all, I'm once again very happy to be able to share with you a post written by New World Interactive on what to expect for future updates, and what the team are currently working on.

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Hi everyone my name is Jon Higgins, and I am the Marketing and Communications Director here at New World Interactive.

In an earlier blog post, we went over some of the new features that our team have been working on since the last major update, including upgrading to Unreal Engine 4.20, working on our new map ‘Precinct’, further optimisation, improving the quality of character models, polishing animations, refining gameplay, fixing experience-breaking bugs, adding overall polish and working on community features such as third party dedicated server support.

This is a very large update and should bring around many improvements to the game. However, due to the enormity of changes the update is taking a little longer than we hoped. We are in final testing, but with the engine upgrade we want to put in some extra quality assurance and polish. While we had aimed for the end of October, the new release date will now be Thursday, November 8th.

While we appreciate many of you are waiting patiently for the next update, we assure you the additional development time will be worth it, and after we complete this engine update, we will be releasing more frequent patches and updates in the run-up to release.

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Below is an updated list of what you can expect in the November 8th update and a preview of some of the items.

  • Migration to Unreal Engine 4.20
  • A series of new optimizations to push frame rates higher and reduce micro-stuttering.
  • A new large-scale urban map ‘Precinct’
  • Alpha AK assault rifle weapon for the Insurgent Advisor class (and Security Advisor in Coop)
  • Community dedicated servers and server browser.
  • Improvements to the low-quality scope option.
  • New functionality for the Explosive Drone, which can now enter buildings through windows to be utilized as a unique interior-clearing fire support option for the Insurgents.
  • A new tattoo cosmetic option, with more varieties to come.
  • Additional Anti-Aliasing and graphics options.
  • Improved character models and animations, including caching of cosmetic items to increase performance, higher quality textures, and proportion adjustments. We will be making further improvements to characters after this update as well.
  • Numerous gameplay tweaks to movement speed, weapon mechanics, armour, fire support, map layouts, and hundreds of bug fixes and improvements.

Precinct – A new map for pre-purchasers which will feel very nostalgic for Insurgency fans. This map encompasses two classic Insurgency maps, District and Contact, in a single, massive urban environment – offering unique gameplay not experienced before in the Beta.

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The Alpha AK, a brand new weapon for the Insurgent Advisor class (and Security Advisor in Coop).

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We are also able to add more clarity on how we plan to reward players who pre-ordered the game and have helped provide crucial feedback during this extended beta testing period.

Although player profiles will be reset before launch, as previously announced, we decided that Beta testers will be rewarded with an exclusive tattoo cosmetic along with additional cosmetic appearance credits at launch. We can now clarify that the additional Day 1 credit boost for beta testers will be equivalent to 50% of the appearance credits you earned during the beta, rather than a flat amount. Essentially, the more you play the beta, the larger your carry over into release will be.

As always, your feedback and support are invaluable to our team. We’d like to thank each and every one of you who have joined the incredible number of players participating in this pre-order period and we look forward to seeing you in the servers during the next update on November 8th!

Many thanks,

New World Interactive and Focus Home Interactive

last edited by Iyagovos

Looking forward to getting in and playing it 😃

This is some good news! And the new AK is looking very good. Finally a new weapon for Insurgents!
I missed District very much btw so great that you will give us a newer version of it.
Looking forward to all of them changes! Thanks a lot for the intel!

last edited by banani2804

Oh god, that looks so cool ! Precinct sounds great ! Thank you guys !

whats happening to stop run and gun to objectives?

Thank you for the patch news !
So many promising bugfixes, adjustments and a brandnew map which was made out of 2 older maps which sounds awsome !!
I am very excited and can´t wait until it´s finaly relased.

What i am really wondering about is the AK Alpha.
The picture above shows a weapon which is not identical with the pictures provided about the AK Alpha on this website :
Kalashnikov USA
Am i wrong with this ?

It seems there are other versions of the AK Alpha, one is shown here in this video
!!! The loading lever can be changed from the ( standard AK ) right to the left side for easy and faster operation :
Youtube Video

This is another variant which seems to be totally different ( and this one looks similar to the published screenshot of the AK Alpha )
Youtube Video

last edited by GSG_9_LIGHTNING

@GSG_9_LIGHTNING

It's not the same AR, the AK Alpha depicted in the game is a reference to the russian counter terrorist force named the Alpha Group. The term AK Alpha is from this video:

Youtube Video

It become very popular and now many customized AKs (often AK-105) are called "Alpha" in reference to the ones used by the Alpha Group. It's some how ironic that insurgent advisors use this rifle with this denomination.

I like this modernized AK, but I kind a dislike the long zenit handguard on this one, I prefer short ones like this: [https://www.artstation.com/artwork/r5bmO](link url)

Anyway keep it up dear developers you are awesome, I love your game!

So I checked the wiki page of the alpha group: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_Group

Those guys have done some dirty works in the past and in fact the Alpha AK suit well the insurgent advisor very well.

Will "vote map" and "vote kick" be implemented in this update or is that for later?

Well you guys just made it tough for me to get any time in on Red Dead 🤣. This is all pretty sweet news just can’t get enough! Keep up the good work!

I'm very excited for this update.
The list addresses many of my concerns.
Keep up the good work 🙂

last edited by Benny

You guys are doing an absolutely bang up job! keep up the amazing work!😄

Wait is Precinct only a map for pre purchasers or will it be a map we will like because we played the original, I don't think that is a great idea considering that the Beta group is very small.

@john-edgell Precinct will be available to everybody once the game releases.

Are you buffing armor? Please don't buff armor.

What about old school maps like sinjar and almaden etc? It's hard to be excited about new maps and existing maps when you've completely left out some of the most iconic insurgency maps, many of the current maps are terrible for anyone with a magnified optic, the marksman class gets shafted in this regard, and with the "optic lag" it's suicidal trying to use the 2x-4x on existing maps, when can we expect a fix?

Also what about weapon attachments, when will we see the return of the glorious flashlight, and when will every class be able to install a bipod or foregrip on their weapons? When are you going to rebalance the weapon prices because why go for a l85 or m4a1 when you can get a sks with 35 rounds or a m16 with 35 rounds and more tactical options which is considerably cheaper and just as effective when it comes to time to kill?

If the bomber drones will now enter buildings are you going to make artillery/rocket barrage/gun ships rockets penetrate through buildings to equalise things or will you leave them as they currently are where you may be lucky and survive or you may be unlucky and somehow be clipped by the arillery or rocket bombardment and be blown up while inside a two story building on the ground floor?

last edited by Depleted

@iyagovos Any chance you can give a time for download and or update going live on the 8th? Lol. Just excite to play update ya!

Greatly looking forward to this update.
I'd like to also support the views of 'Depleted' and 'k0872'.

Hopefully there will be a way to adjust things to prevent this run-n-gun style of play.
-Perhaps a much larger increase in bot numbers and difficulty.
-Random spawn objective locations and bot locations on restarts/new games.
Its fairly predictable. Just like the first insurgency. Once your used to the map it becomes fairly linear again. Same cars in same locations. Same spawn points. Same buildings for objectives.
People are sprinting to the next objective knowing exactly where to go to get there first.
Maybe remove 'objective capture points' or apply a penalty to those for capturing before neutralizing all opponents.
-Have several key points in the town to be held at the same time before an objective can be achieved?
Current maps, even a 2x scope is limited. Can't see how anyone can be effective with long range scope on these maps.
But love the sounds and map details so much. Awesome effects. Great work on that.

@planetcanada The most I can say is that it'll be on the 8th, sadly, I can't give more detail than that

@iyagovos That’s fair. Appreciate the response!