Hello hunters, here’s what we’ve been up to:
Improving guests’ experience
Yesterday we rolled out what may be one of our biggest updates ever, aimed at significantly improving our guest hunting experience. Guests can now hunt five species (Whitetail Deer, Pheasant, Snowshoe Hare, Cottontail Rabbit and European Rabbit) with their 12GA Single Shot Shotgun which they can grab in the store for free (in addition to .243). All three types of 12GA ammo now automatically replenish for all players, which will come in handy for other 12GA shotguns too. If you still have some friends waiting around to join in on the hunting bonanza, now’s the time to bring them along to the EHR! To ease the transition between Mule and Whitetail, Mule Deer will remain free to hunt until February 3rd. The overall community reaction to this update has been overwhelmingly positive, which has made us super happy. As always, we value a community thumbs up for important changes.
Planning ahead
Yesterday’s update aside, the EW team has spent this week preparing for the big server move, working on the new animal functionality (it will be slightly different from what you are used to), as well as planning the development for 2016. We thought to give you a small sneak peek into how we work with planning. So, yesterday the team got together and spent two hours brainstorming and then voting for ideas. All ideas were organized into six main buckets: Reserves, Animals, Features, Improvements (of the existing content and functionality), Events and Items – and weighed against three main criteria: 1) Must be fun for players / requested by the community; 2) Be in line with the existing tech (our engine limitations put constraints to a lot of cool ideas); 3) Be fun for the team to work on.
Ideas with the most votes landed on producer’s and game designer’s desks who will make the final call after having done another reality and community check. You’ll see the first results of this planning exercise in the second quarter of 2016, since everything up until March has already been decided upon.
Ask Us Anything update
We’ve received oodles of questions from you in the Ask Us Anything thread, and I am still busy organizing them into a comprehensible format before sending them over for the team members to answer. I don’t have an ETA when replies will be published, but we’ll do our best to do it soon.
Stock up on unique items
Good news for those of you who like hunting from towers – tomorrow, on January 29th, we’ll be kicking off a weekend membership campaign: when buying a three month membership or a Wayfarer bundle you’ll get a new Deployable Hunting Tower – Bare Wood (won’t be released in the store), when buying a 6 months membership or a Pathfinder bundle – 2 Bare Wood towers and a classic tH t-shirt (won’t be available in the store any more), when buying a 12 months membership or a Trailrunner bundle – 3 Bare Wood towers, the classic theHunter T-Shirt and a skunk hat (not buyable). The promotion will run until Monday, February 1st, so hurry up, this is a good chance for you to stock up on some unique items for free while prolonging your memberships. Make sure to follow our updates to know when this campaign kicks in and please note that this offer is only valid when buying memberships via www.thehunter.com (not Steam).
News from the EW squad
Today we are welcoming yet another new team member. His name is Greg and he is our new sound designer, read his intro below and say welcome in the forums, he has already started to lurk around and is very impressed with the quality and passion of discussions. We are also on the lookout for more awesome people to join our team – check the openings on the Avalanche homepage (look for Expansive Worlds) and if you or someone you know fit one of the openings, we’d love to hear from you!
One of the EW team New Year resolutions has been to hunt more on the live server, so we did an impromptu hunt last Friday. Some people were able to join and we had a blast. We’re planning to run those from time to time, mostly on Friday afternoons, and everyone is welcome to join. Keep an eye on the Multiplayer section of the forum to know the date and time 😉
Meet Greg
Hi everyone!
My name is Greg and I am happy to start off this year 2016 as part of theHunter Team, where I will take on the position of Sound Designer. I was born in Northern France and I moved to Stockholm in 2011 after having lived a couple of years in Barcelona.
Usually I spend my spare time playing music or trying to decide if my favorite beer is the Grimbergen or Brooklyn IPA (probably the Grim, let’s be honest). And I really like to hike as well, thanks Sweden for your amazing lakes and forests!
I am looking forward to making your game experience even more awesome!
Cheers!
That’s it from us for today!
Happy hunting!
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