A short and sweet one today as it’s all-go here in the office, but you’ll have one from TK to look forward to next day (if he’s up for writing one already on his first day back! hehe).
So, on we go!
Rusa Deer Missions
As promised, we continue to flesh out our mission packs, this time on Piccabeen bay. Grab your water flask and best warm-weather gear and enjoy some warmer weather whilst it’s still so cold outside! These missions are available for play now.
Weekly Sale
Another reminder that weekly sales now run Wednesday through Sunday, so you have even more time to snag a bargain. This week, of course, the offers are focused on useful equipment for hunting Rusa.
Free Species Rotation
And the last appearance from the Rusa this week, in this week’s free species rotation! If you’re still in a warm-weather mood after ticking off all of the competitions then why not head to Bushranger’s Run for some Red Kangaroo?
Trophy of the Week
Big congrats to lazygirl5 for this monster of a Blacktail. Considering that Black Bear was the aim of the hunt at the time it goes to show you should always keep your eyes open for what else may appear!
Rare of the Week
This week’s Rare of the Week nod goes to ARMAGEDON187 for this lovely leucistic Canada Goose, great work with the trophy shot!
Again, TK is back in the building next week, so be sure to give him a warm welcome! Before then, you’ll catch me on stream tomorrow trying my hand at some Rusa Deer missions. Let’s hope it goes better than my competition endeavours last week…
Welcome to our first “proper” Status Update of 2019! We of course had some information out last week, but this is the first one in our traditional format.
We’ve starting slipping some real-world hunting footage into our Status Updates of late, and hopefully an opportunity to learn from someone else’s mistake (this kind of mistake it’s generally safer for someone else to do the learning for you!). REAL LIFE HUNT FOOTAGE, Do not click unless you wish to see this type of content: WATCH
New “Engraved” 9.3x74R O/U Break Action Variant
This subtle, refined, and very stylish, variant of the 9.3x74R O/U is available for purchase now, look for it in the store now! Tune in to tomorrow’s stream to be in with a chance of potentially getting your hands on one.
Ptarmigan Competitions Are Here!
Big thanks to Andhii for helping us put together this exciting bundle of Ptarmigan competitions. The first of these new competitions will go live today; and then continue to be rolled out, one every other day, over the next week. In conjunction with this we’ll also have all Ptarmigan types as our free species this week.
Keep your eyes open for several other new species receiving competition packs in the coming weeks!
Free Species Rotation
As per above, this week’s free rotation is all about Ptarmigan of all types, so our guests are welcome to get out there and get competitive!
New Schedule for Sales
A special entry regarding sales today (which coincidentally are ALSO all about Ptarmigan!). From today all sales will be running Wednesday through to Monday, so be sure to take a peek at our sales section of our store page a little earlier from now on.
Game Update
Today also sees various bug fixes and quality-of-life improvements landing in the EHR as well as cleaning up the last bits from our Holiday Event (looking at you Rudolph!).
Additions:
Added 9.3x74R Engraved O/U Break Action Rifle
Changes:
Removed Rudolph population.
Bug fixes:
Fixed ptarmigan scoring issues in multiplayer.
Wolves now lay down when shot in the spine, instead of just standing still.
Fixed a multiplayer issue where players who had certain items equipped would not synchronize their animations to other players.
Waterfowls will no longer sink through the water and then slowly come back up again.
The feedback message that shows up when you try to place a Scout Bolt Action Rifle on too steep ground will no longer show up for other players in a multiplayer session.
Trophy of the Week
This week’s Trophy of the Week goes to LimJahey. A little shy of the top 100, but still a beautiful Blacktail all the same, congratulations!
Rare of the Week
Rare of the week goes to IanBiel (with a little help from their friend KBCAO) for this gorgeous piebald deer. Well done!
And that about wraps up our Status Update this week, don’t forget to tune in to tomorrow’s stream!
Please see below the changes that were made yesterday, the 17th December. Apologies for the late posting of notes here, there was a hosting issue with the website that had to be resolved.
Changes:
Slightly lowered the horizontal aim allowance of the Scout Bolt Action Rifles.
Bug fixes:
Fixed a bug that was sometimes preventing players from looking slightly downward when in prone.
Fixed issue with Dall Sheep getting stuck when spooked while climbing.
Naming a new dog is now possible again.
Pulsar Bows no longer unnecessarily reload a new arrow when holstering and unholstering or swapping weapons back and forth.
Water Buffalo should no longer idle in the water while spooked.
The inventory image for the Scout Bolt Action Rifle should now show up properly.
Fixed invisible scope issue for the Scout Bolt Action Rifles.
As some of you may know Mat is currently en route to New Zealand to enjoy some (much deserved) extended time off with his new addition to the family, as such I’m filling in for him over the next 6 weeks. This will also in fact be our last Status Update, as well as Trophy/Rare of the week, until the New Year as next week most of the Devs will power-down their computers and go and spend time with friends and family over the upcoming holidays. Holidays or no I’ll still be holding half an eye to all of our channels though, so can be reached if needed, fear not. It should also be mentioned that this week’s stream (tomorrow) will be our last until the New Year as well., normal service should be resumed around the second week of January!
Unfortunately I have no exciting pictures of archery progression as with TK’s status update last week, I just got back from two weeks away in the Caribbean so my bow went on the shelf for a bit. As much fun as it sounds I doubt the use of compound bows is accepted on cruise ships! 😉
7mm-08 Scout Bolt Action Rifle
This week’s big bit of news, and our last “proper” update before the holidays is in my mind a great one, the new Scout rifle! This is another “advanced rifle” and offers some nice perks with it’s dual ammunition options as well as retractable bipod, and it was of course released in a caliber chosen by you, the community! I’m pretty certain it’ll be a favourite for a lot of you now that it’s available for use in the EHR.
IMPORTANT – There are two variations available, the “Standard” version or the “Elite”. As well as the differing aesthetics the Elite version comes with an upgraded magazine size, 10 rounds instead of 5, and is only available for a LIMITED time. It will be given away as a prize for our Holiday promotion or on general sale up until the 20th of December only. Be sure to grab one before then to avoid disappointment!
Holiday Event
As I just mentioned it I should take the opportunity to remind everybody that it’s currently ongoing., our Holiday Event! With plenty of activities to take part in, and plenty of goodies to be won, now truly IS “the most wonderful time of the year”.
Park Ranger Competition Winners
Winners have been chosen, and for your viewing pleasure posted below. Big congrats to RegimentsTyp2, JaggyBunnet and OrLoko (in order of images posted below) for all picking up a snazzy special variation of the new Park Ranger 4×4!
Trophy of the Week
This week the congrats go to ‘Der_Jo’ for this HUGE Moose, scoring 241.173, very well done! Congratulations, 500em$ coming your way.
Rare of the Week
As we mentioned in the past, photo composition can count for a lot in our Trophy/Rare of the Week comps, and this one definitely gets bonus points fo ingenuity. 😉 With a beautiful albino Blacktail draped across the bonnet of the Park Ranger as if it were in a car advert, this weeks prize goes to Ardillamente. Job well done!
Free Rotation
This week Bison and Dall Sheep are free to hunt, good luck!
As ever, thanks for reading! We look forward to picking up where we left off in the New Year!
Hi all!I just wanted to give you a short update in place of the normal Status Update whilst TK is enjoying some well-earned vacation. You all might have heard of a little thing called “Generation Zero” that’s been keeping me particularly busy, so unfortunately it’ll have to be short and sweet. Normal service resumed next week!
Halloween 2018 Teaser
The whole team are working hard to give you an extra special Halloween event this year. Once the finishing touches are in place we will release the full details along with the Status Update next week. Until then, build up your hunting skills (and your nerves!) for one of our most spooky events yet!
Free Species
This week it’s all about bunnies! Small, but challenging, they’re at the complete opposite of the spectrum to what you can expect to hunt next week. 😉
Community Competitions
These have had to be put on hold this week. We’ll do a double-draw next week, one for each time period, so if you got an extra-special trophy this week don’t worry!
Stream Tomorrow Cancelled
Again, as Mat is on R&R the stream will be cancelled this week. But, the good news is we are back next week with an extra-special spooky Halloween stream featuring our Game Designer Patrick, and Call of the Wild Community Manager AC. Tune-in then, it’s going to be awesome!
Welcome to another Status Update, and the last one from me a little while in fact. Next week Mat will return from his time away and he’ll continue to keep you all updated whilst I disappear for some rest and relaxation for a couple of weeks.
As I’ve mentioned (a few times now!) this is a slightly calmer time period for us in development terms due to holidays and the like, but we still have plenty to talk about here!
First up…
It’s Coming Home!
Yeah…sorry about that headline, maybe I’m showing some bias?! There’s just a few days left before the end of the World Cup, and more importantly the end of our Football Jamboree! We’ve just three teams left in the running, France, Croatia, and England, by the end of tonight it’ll be down to two, France and Engla…well, we’ll wait and see. 😉 Best of luck to your chosen team coming in a winner (as long as it’s England) and you hopefully winning a pretty sweet limited edition 10 GA shotgun. That damascus barrel, gorgeous!
Don’t forget that you can see our full Football Jamboree run-down here.
Aaaand on the topic of football…
Show Your Colours! We’ve dusted off a whole load of football goodies from previous years and they can currently be found under the “Events” section of our store here. We have caps, shirts, and of course this year’s pants all for the taking!
COMPETITION – Pointer Perfection
Last week we introduced you to the latest addition to our line-up of canine hunting companions in the form of a German Pointer. Now it’s time to put him/her to work!
This competition is quite freestyle and offers lots of space for interesting entries, simply put we want you to share an image of you out on the hunt with your new “best friend”. We’ll be judging on the following:
Aesthetics – Does it look good?
Uniqueness – Maybe your pooch lead you to an albino or a monster buck?
Creativity – Maybe you showed something “unique” in your composition?
Storytelling – Maybe you want to do a short (emphasis on short, just a few paragraphs max) write-up of your adventures?
So, plenty of ways to make your entry stand-out this time around, so no need to get concerned if you aren’t normally the artistic type! As is typical for most of our competitions of this type, please do not edit any pictures, they should be taken in-game using only our existing filters etc. Don’t forget to link to a hunting log if your picture is showing off a particularly large trophy!
Aaaand again with another perfect segway…on the topic of dogs:
Pointers on your Pointer – An Instructional video
Our wonderful art team have taken the time to put together this handy tutorial video to guide you around the talents and inner workings of the German Pointer. There’s a lot of useful info that applies to all of our dog breeds, so it’s worth a look!
Sneak Peek – Community Competition
I thought I’d include a little hint as to what we have coming up soon. Our wonderful Italian theHunter community have regular competitions in partnership with an Italian ammunition manufacturer, Fiocchi Munizioni (you may have seen us wear some of their merch goodies on the stream in the past). Now they are opening up a special event for our entire community to take part in!
This one is going to be extra special with some awesome physical prizes to be won in addition the normal em$ prizes you’ve come to expect. I’ll say again, this is a biggie! Watch for more news from Mat next week.
Rare and Trophy of the Week This competition has become so popular that we have decided to make it a permanent feature and it’s here to stay for the foreseeable future! So, if you have shot a rare or high scoring animal from this week and want a chance to win, then share them in the correct thread on our forum, don’t forget to mention the score!
We were sure to dig a little further back this time around to take into account missing a week with Mat’s daddy leave etc.Also, because I’m feeling generous, this week I picked out two of each category!
This Weeks Winners
Rares of course involve a good solid dose of good ‘ol luck alongside your hunting skills. What’s luckier than starting off your hunt to find an albino Roe parked up right in front of you?! Congrats to you Nathan112244!
Winner number two is RavenousFox with this beauty of a (white)Blacktail. That’s a fine looking albino!, and some equally fine dress sense! Final score: 159.293
AlphaSwan just snuck into this week’s bracket with this cracker of a Gadwall. With a final score of 1399.965 that’s straight to the top of the leaderboard for you sir!
Sometimes hard work pays-off, and for XxStrong1xX this tough hunt resulted in the #9 spot of our Boar leaderboard, tallying in at a score of 1244.314
IMPORTANT: Please respond in the forum thread for this Status Update with your in-game nickname so I can get your prize to you. Just a favour this time to speed things up and stop me digging around to find your original posts again. 😉
Thanks for taking part everybody!
Free Species Rotation
And to sign out this week’s Status Update, we have this week’s Free Species Rotation, you’ll be able to hunt these license-free from tomorrow
That about wraps-up our Status Update for this week. Stay tuned for the next one from Mat!
I’ll be covering for Mat again with this Status Update whilst he continues to enjoy some quality time with his newly-expanded family, if you didn’t send your congratulations yet feel free to go and say hi in our forum thread here.
Otherwise please read on for some info on the goings on both recently and in the near future!
Good Shot Old Chap!
The EHR is soon to get that bit classier as it’s filled with dashing ladies and gents wearing this new beautiful herringbone tweed hunting outfit. Not only does this outfit guarantee to get you the best table in any post-hunt restaurant you visit, but it also provides extra camouflage when hunting deer or rabbits. Jolly Good! Look for the “English Hunting” items in store.
Rare and Trophy of the Week
This competition has become so popular that we have decided to make it a permanent feature and it’s here to stay for the foreseeable future!
So, if you have shot a rare or high scoring animal from this week and want a chance to win, then share them in the correct thread on our forum, don’t forget to mention the score! Rares go into this thread and trophy animals into this one. We currently don’t have a competition for Non-Typicals, but they go into this thread.
We were sure to dig a little further back this time around to take into account missing a week with Mat’s daddy leave etc.
This Weeks Winners
This week’s Rare of the Week goes to “Essacksumra” for this beautiful piebald blacktail! With such a nicely composed trophy shot this one just about nudged out some other excellent contenders to take the win. Final scoring was 78.111.
And our Trophy of the Week just HAS to go to this whopper (seems weird to use that descriptor for a Roe Deer) of a trophy! “Vanndy” took themselves straight to the top of the leaderboard with solid score of 261.027, Big congrats to you!
Free Species Rotation
This time around you can take your pick between wild boar or reindeer. Best of luck to all of you!
Fixed Issues With Hunter Score After .300 Merge
The issue known as the” missing HunterScore due to the merge of the .300 rifles” was resolved last week. The servers should at this point have recalculated all scores, if you continue to notice something appears off please do let us know!
Summer is Coming!
Those of you who’ve been around a while will know that Sweden has pretty awesome employment laws when it comes to vacation, and we also have about two weeks out of every year to actually see the sun. As such, things will start to slow down a little over the next weeks as people start to head away for some well-earned R&R, we’ll have a full studio shutdown for the last two weeks of July in fact. So don’t panic if things seem a little slow, we’ll be back filled with new energy and raring to go!
Thanks for reading, and see you all next time! Comments
Graham here standing in for Mat as he undertakes some essential beard maintenance (facial hair that magnificent takes a lot of work!), as such this Status Update will just be a short mention on today’s store changes, normal business resumes next week!
So, on with the news:
.30-06 Fiesta!
Cast your memories back to last year’s Summer Fiesta, you’ll remember a very special Forest Camo variant of the .30-06 lever-action rifle which only a few had the opportunity to win. Today it’s been opened up for general sale to everybody!
As always, our stream kicks off on twitch tomorrow at 16:00 CEST (twitch.tv/expansiveworlds), we are hopeful we have something extra-special to show off this week, but more news will follow on Thursday.
