Virginie

OH OH OH! MERRY CHRISTMAS PLAYERS!

NEW CAPTURE THE FLAG MAP

We release a new Capture The Flag: CTF-Collider.
It’s a small CTF map dedicated to public fun games! Up to 6 players!

Available now on our servers! Again, Merry Christmas to everyone!

***

See you next year for more content <3
Have a good weekend, have a good game, and have fun!

If you have any bugs, issues, or suggestions, do not hesitate to discuss them with us on discord. Feel free to invite your friends to join us, share, and like on socials networks.

See you in-game, Master Arena Dev Team.

Hello everyone!

It’s update time! This update mainly concerns the DUEL mode with DUEL-ROSS updated, perks balancing, as well as weapons! Are you ready?

MAPS

• DUEL-ROSS: We are releasing a new version of the map, with no structural changes but graphics update.

The previous version:

And the current version:

• DM-BlutArena: Collision fix + items location rearrangement.
• DM-Mars:  items location rearrangement.
• RC-FasterThanTheMist: Collision fix.
• RC-Overpath: Texture loading fix.
• RC-Grindstone: Added energy items.

GAMEPLAY

DUEL

The duel mode can be played on maps intended for the “deathmatch” mode. The “carnage” item was then deactivated, leaving an important place on the map empty. So we implemented the following:

• When the game detects a carnage item in duel mode, it will replace it with a rocket launcher slot.
• If there is a rocket launcher item provided on the map, it will then be replaced by an item of 50 HP.

PERKS (GAME TYPE: DUEL)

• Freon: The freezing time has been reduced by one second + fixed an issue where the freon perks weren’t deactivated when the enemy was hit (it deactivates automatically).
• Gas: New balance, you will now have two grenades.
• Smoke: New balance, you will now have two grenades + an additional functionality: when your enemy enters the radius of the smoke, you can see their points of life.
• Teleporter: Reduced the number of teleportation and the expulsion force on the teleport point.
• Ghost: Balanced against the X-RAY asset. The X-RAY can no longer detect a robot whose “ghost” attribute is active.

WEAPONS

• Electrogun: Increased damage frequency.
• SMG: Reduced spread and primary fire rate.
• Shotgun: Ammunition number reduced to 8 (previously 12).
• Rocket Launcher: Ammo count increased to 10 (previously 8).
• Flashrifle: Combo damage reduced to 150 (previously 200).
• Sniper: The rate of fire is now slower (2 previously 1).

FIXES

• Fixed menu return when connecting to a server.
• Fix for “hidden weapons” functionality.

***

We look forward to seeing you at Christmas for a content update 🙂
Have a good weekend, have a good game, and have fun!

If you have any bugs, issues, or suggestions, do not hesitate to discuss them with us on discord. Feel free to invite your friends to join us, share, and like on socials networks.

See you in-game, Master Arena Dev Team.

Hello everyone!

After one month since the release, your feedbacks about the game are fantastic and help to improve it. Thanks to you, we discovered a lot of bugs and adjustments to make.
You also created your maps using the map editor and steam workshop! We have also discussed esport and defined a plan for next months, premium game problematics against the free to play invasion and the game promotion.
So in this dev letter, we will announce pricing update, game update, reveal concept arts, and a new trailer!

Are you ready? Let’s go!

PRICING

First, pricing! We updated the pricing for everyone. The game is now available for $9.99 with a regional adaptation.
For our first supporters, we plan to give you future cosmetics for free (maybe a future battle pass? Feel free to suggest).

GAME UPDATE

FIXES

About the game update, we have to speak about bugs!
We created a free google sheet to reference all identified bugs. You can follow referenced bugs, priorities, and what is pending review.
You are welcome to report bugs on Discord. There is a dedicated channel for it.
Feel free to give us a maximum of information. How it’s happening, a video or screenshots.
The google sheet is here, and you can check what was fixed.

NEW: PERKS on DUEL and FREE FOR ALL!

On duel, official servers are available with character selections (light, standard, heavy) and perks. So now, you are free to select a fast “low HP” robot, a standard robot, or a slow “high HP” robot. Like on Capture The Flag, three perks are available per character. During a game, after the character selection, you are limited to its perks:

Perks are tuned to be playable with this game type, so reload delay and advantage effects are customized.

On Free For All, we just added The same perks already available on deathmatch! Our objective with this game type is to have more fun. So adding perks to a game type with 30 players seems an excellent way to improve it 🙂

NEW: NO TEXTURE MODE

It’s a graphical feature with the least amount of textures possible loaded into your graphics hardware. This feature can help some players with old GPU or without! To enable it, go to the display menu and set to the “No texture mode”.

NEW: MENU SOUNDS

We added sounds to the menu buttons. Listen to this:

NEW: FOOTSTEPS

New footstep added for “Basketball” environment. You can listen to it here:

NEW: UI

Spectator view:

• Stamina bar added on duel mode.
• Perks UI replicated to the spectator.

Effects:

• Teleporter: effect added for the alternative fire.
• Freon: effect added when a freon plasma bullet hits a player.

UPDATE: HEALTH POINTS AND WEAPONS BALANCING

We updated player default heal and weapons balancing. Right now, player respawn health is 150 HP, and weapons damage are as described in the document here.

UPDATE: MAPS

• DM-BlutArena: Some collisions reworked.
• DM-Mars: Some collisions reworked.
• DM-Vertigo: New respawn distribution and fog updated.
• DUEL- Foragepit: some weapons pickups redistribution.
• DUEL-Creuset: Lights and fog updated.
• DUEL-Fuse: Lights and fog updated.

COMING SOON

So what can you expect in next months’ updates?

In priority, we focus on bugs. Secondly, we will add missing things like settings, UI/Menu, and localization. Third, game improvements and adding content (clan arena?).
Today, on early access, all characters are the same with a different scale. In the future, we plan to implement a design by robot type. So, what are they going to look like?

Here is the design of the light character.

And here is the heavy character.

The standard character is the current robot implemented in-game!
Do you like them? Feel free to discuss it on Steam forums or Discord!

Finally, we created a new video to show everyone the feel of the game with perks implementation. It’s here, and we hope you will like it.

***

Thanks for your support and passion.

If you have any bugs, issues, or suggestions, do not hesitate to discuss with us on discord. Feel free to invite your friends to join us, share, and like on socials networks.

See you in-game, Master Arena Dev Team.

Hi everyone,

We are back with an update for the Steam Game Festival. During this event, we will do 4 game sessions and a developer Q&A on Twitch. The first session will be today. If you have any questions, join us on Discord, and ask them in the channel #game-festival, we’ll answer them during our Q&A.

For more information on the game sessions click here, and here for the developer Q&A.

PERKS

We updated the perks selection menu. From now on, the setup of your robot is done in 3 steps:

• Select your size (light, standard, heavy). The bigger the robot, the slower it will be but the more life it will have.

• Select your perk. Now, the choice of perks depends on the size of the robot chosen. There are 3 perks available per size.

• Select your inventory. Now, by default, the players spawn with the basic inventory of the classic modes such as deathmatch (it means that the players will have the sword, the plasma, and the SMG in their inventory). Then, you are free to choose other weapons, additional health points, or more or less respawn time. This setup impacts on your stamina. The more weapons and/or health points you have, the slower you will be. It’s your call!

• Take care to select the robot size you want for the round because although you can change your perk during a round, you won’t be able to change your size. It will be available before the start of the next round (the menu is automatically loaded after the scoreboard is displayed).
• There are some adjustments/modifications made to the perks. However, we’ll let you discover by yourself.
• Finally, regarding the Capture the Flag mode, some adjustments were made:
  • When a player takes the flag, his perk is deactivated, his life is fully regenerated, and he’s moving more slowly.
  • Weapons no longer reload automatically over time. You must now go through a supply point to reload your inventory.
  • And to finish, health pickups are now available on CTF maps.

MAPS

UPDATE: DM-MARS

• Complete redesign of the map: The layout is nearly identical to the previous version, but the design is a new environment.

UPDATE: CTF-BASKETBALL

• Optimization and a slight redesign of the center of the map and the side corridors leading to the bases.

UPDATE: DUEL-CREUSET

• Lighting correction

UPDATE: DUEL-FUSE

• Map recoloring: we went from a green-tinted map to a more whitish map with a green accent.

WEAPONS

PLASMA

• Modification of the secondary fire. From now on, when you will hold the secondary fire button (right mouse button), the plasma loads and fire when you release the button. The projectile will be more or less big depending on the loading time (max duration: 3 seconds). This plasma ball explodes in several projectiles after a few seconds (the bigger the plasma ball is, the faster it will burst).

FLASHRIFLE

• Update of the secondary fire. From now on, when you hold the secondary fire button (right mouse button), the flash rifle loads and fire when you release the button. The energy ball will move more or less quickly depending on the loading time. The less you load, the faster the energy ball will move.

HUD

The HUD has undergone some corrections to improve its readability.

• The perk loading icon was moved up and sized bigger.
• The speedometer is no longer at the center of your screen, but just above the inventory.
• For the timer, its background color and the text color were changed.
• The perk icons have been redrawn for better readability.

PICKUPS

The pickups still have the same design, but the material is new to highlight them.

***

If you have any bugs, issues or suggestions, do not hesitate to discuss with us on discord. Feel free to invite your friends to join us, share and like on socials networks.

See you in-game, Master Arena Dev Team.

Hello everyone!

During this last month, you might have seen several updates that we didn’t announce. We were testing some maps and gameplay optimization before making any announcement. We want to thank all the players who participated in the various playtest organized during March. It was a huge help for us during this test period. So thank you. If you missed the playtests and want to play in the next ones, don’t hesitate to follow us on Steam where we announce every event. If you want an Alpha access key, just click here.

Let’s see what we have been working on.

MAPS

NEW MAP: DM-VERTIGO

UPDATE: DM-CREUSET

UPDATE: DM-PLAYGROUND

UPDATE: CTF-BASKETBALL

GAMEPLAY

• Damage from falling were reactivated

Sound

• We added a sound to warn you that you no longer have ammo when playing with the insta-rifle.
• A sound was also added to indicate when your stamina is depleted.
• There is now a sound when you take the health pickups dropped by a player.

Announcer / UI

We added several announcements depending on the type of kill done:

• Head Hunter: do 5 headshots
• Combo: I think the name is self-explanatory…
• Combo Master: do 3 combos
• Air Rocket: do 1 frag with a rocket launcher when the player is airborne
• Rocket Master: do 3 air rocket
• Eagle Eyes: do 1 long-range frag
• Sniper: do 1 long-range headshot
• Revenge: when you kill the one who just killed you.

HUD

New information is displayed in the killfeed :

• a player kills himself falling
• a player kills himself with his weapon
• a player does an air rocket
• a player does a combo
• a player telefrags another

The crosshairs are now outlined. They should be visible no matter the display colors you choose.

MENU

• We minimized the number of restarts needed when changing your options.
• Fixed the option “Draw FPS” (which wasn’t working properly).
• Fixed the opacity of the speed value.
• Fixed the “Invert wall-dodge input logic” option.
• Added an option to force the color of the enemies in Deathmatch games. Should you enable the option, your adversaries will all be displayed according to the choice of color you made for the “Red character”.

LANGUAGES SUPPORT

The game can now support Japanese / Chinese / Korean language. So if you are interested in helping us translate the game in one of those languages, don’t hesitate to contact us on our Discord (@Dev_Jerem or @Dev_Virginie).
In the new font, we wanted to add some emoticons. You’ll find, on the picture below, how to write them using the keyboard shortcuts.

EDITOR

For those interested in creating maps, two things:

• We added a tutorial about “How to set up a map for Capture the Flag“
• You will find in the editor, “new” statics mesh. By “new”, I mean already existing meshes but in 6 or 7 color variations. So you can create maps as colorful or austere as you want. We also added tags, organized by types of environment, to every static mesh in the library. We hope it will help when you are creating a map 🙂

OTHER UPDATES/FIXES

• Sound of the exit of a teleporter not working correctly each time it’s used: fixed
• Carnage pickup sound sometimes heard from the start of the game: fixed
• Carnage pickup: reduction of the idle sound radius
• An error screen should now appear if you are disconnected
• Crash of the game when there is a map switch on CTF mode: fixed
• The game can now download a new community map between levels
• Particle of the plasma: the design of the projectile has been updated. It’s now smaller and creates less distortion around it. Please note that this modification is solely visual.
• Electrogun hit sound: fixed

***

If you have any bugs, issues or suggestions, do not hesitate to discuss with us on discord. Feel free to invite your friends to join us, share and like on socials networks.

See you in-game, Master Arena Dev Team.

Dear Community,

After several weeks of waiting, we are pleased to officially released Master Arena’s Alpha 2.0!
We want to thank you for your patience, and now, let’s review its content.

PERKS

Yes, the first version of the PERKS is finally here! To get to the heart of the matter, here is a screenshot showing the menu displayed in-game.

In the display order, here is a description of the available perks:

• Blinder: able to fire a flashbang
• Invisible: able to turn oneself invisible for a short lapse of time
• Gas: able to fire a corrosive gas grenade
• Teleporter: able to teleport oneself using a modified flash rifle
• Freon: able to fire a squall of freon grenades
• Healer: able to heal with its regeneration sphere and a modified plasma gun
• Shield: able to generate a protective sphere around oneself for a limited time
• Slo-mo: able to fire a grenade slowing down everything within its range
• X-Ray: able to see through the wall for a limited time
• Smoker: able to fire a smoke grenade

Those perks are available depending on three sizes:

• Runner:
  • Small-sized robot
  • Max health: 150HP
  • Base speed: 1000
• Standard:
  • Medium-sized robot (similar to the one used for the game modes without the perks)
  • Max health: 175HP
  • Base speed: 950
• Tank:
  • Large-sized robot
  • Max health: 200HP
  • Base speed: 910

Keep in mind that the power of dodges, wall-dodges, and bounces is also affected. So, for example, a standard robot will not be able to catch up to a runner with the same running path.

Depending on the selected size, several respawn delays are available. Once the time is selected, you can adjust your cash and stamina gauges. The longer the delay, the more your cash and stamina gauges will be filled.

With the cash, you will be able to customize your inventory. Do you want a rocket launcher? OK guys, it will be 200₿. Would you like to respawn with more HP? Well, just make your choice.

Please note that the perks system is currently only available for CTF game mode. These are the beginnings of the gameplay we want to incorporate in the game. Our wish is to make this mode more balanced and tactical than a “normal weapons” mode. So major changes will occur such as the removal of some perks, the creation of new ones, the introduction of items and tactical areas, and we are not afraid to completely review the concept. It’s only the beginning!

Message from Dev_Jerem about this game mode:
Let’s see if it works. After all those years developing Master Arena, it’s finally time for the perks! It’s a real pleasure to code this part. I just hope I’m not doing anything wrong. 🙂

EFFECTS

Headshot

Now when a headshot is made, the robot’s head breaks off.

Gib and oil decal

When a robot explodes, you will now see its libs bounce on the ground and the walls, leaving behind traces of oil from the massacre.

MAPS

UPDATE : CTF-BasketBall

Structural change of the map, the bases are now asymmetric.

UPDATE : DUEL-FUSE

Structural and graphical update.

NEW TRIAL MAP : RC-Overpath

NEW TRIAL MAP : RC-TownCenter

TUTORIALS

For those who want to create maps with the map editor included in the game and share them, we realized a series of tutorials here. We show you how to set up different types of light, movers, spawn points, and how to go about sharing your map on Steam Workshop.

Other tutorials about how to set up your crosshairs and your HUD will be available in the next few days.

GAME / EDITOR & DEDICATED SERVERS

With this update, once you’ve downloaded Master Arena, you will be able to launch the game, the map editor and a dedicated server without needing to download anything else. Moreover, the next patches might be smaller because this update allows simple file replacement to fix bugs.

WEAPONS BALANCING AND DAMAGE

Here are the changes regarding weapons balancing:

• Electrogun:
  • A 5HP decrease in head damage
  • Increase of ammo (50 vs 30 previously)
• Plasma:
  • A 5HP increase in damage
• Rocket Launcher
  • Increase of ammo
  • Secondary Fire : Increase of the damage radius, doesn’t use ammo
• Flash Rifle
  • Increase of legs, torso and head damage
  • Secondary Fire : The speed of the flashball was reduced and its damage increased
• Sniper Rifle
  • Increase of the damage for each body part.

You will find more details here.

The damage detection method is now faster and more precise.

Message from Dev_Jerem:
With this new balancing, the goal is to have adequate time to kill for each weapon. The next steps in the development will be the air rocket (which doesn’t take into account the height of the player) and most likely an adjustment of the Shotgun.

TEAMMATE & SPECTATOR X-RAY

The X-Ray for the friends has been added. From now on, you will be able to see your teammate through the walls (they will be in green).
For the spectator mode, this effect has just been updated for easier reading.

EDITOR

For those who want to create some maps, we tried to make the search for static meshes easier in the editor by adding tags.
First, the static meshes are sorted by type of environment (01 for a grey metallic one, 02 for a basketball type, and 03 for a white industrial environment).
Then they are by type which can be a wall, a ground, a light…
There can also be several tags for one static mesh. For example, in Environment_02, every static mesh is categorized by type (ground, wall, deco,…) but also by color (orange, red, blue,…)

***

This update is important for us for some technical points. If you have any bugs, issues or suggestions, do not hesitate to discuss with us on discord. Feel free to invite your friends to join us, share and like on socials networks.

See you in-game, Master Arena Dev Team.

Dear Community,

Thank you for your patience and your support. Today we release our major update!
Master Arena development is still in progress and it will not be abandoned. We hope this update reassures you. The development is still ongoing and other major changes will come with the next update.
In the meantime, here are the changes for today.

The User Interface has been completely redesigned and we added some settings. Overall, we tried to increase the menu’s readability.

MENU

Play Menu

Solo : simplification of the choice of mutators (multi-selection easier) and more game modes available. Duel, Deathmatch and Trial games can currently be launched. As for the CTF mode, it is playable but bots are not ready so you will only be able to run around in the map. Other modes will be available later.

Tutorials

They are now accessible directly from the main menu page.
There are fewer tutorials than in the previous game version but “only” the weapons tutorials were deleted (we are still working on the secondary fire for some weapons so the tutorials will be available when everything is neat and tidy).

Customization

There is now a color scale for the customization of the blue and red character.

Statistics

Nothing added, just a redesigned

Settings:

• Display: FOV max at 130 (120 previously)
• Audio:
  • Wwise sound engine removed (Due to online replication issue and the use of an old version of this sound engine, we decided to remove it and use the Unreal Engine sound system. It does not mean we will not use Wwise in the future, but for now, we prefer to use the classical way to produce sound in Unreal Engine while we don’t have a specialist for this subject).
  • Added volume control for Weapons / Movements / Items / Ambient / User Interface
• Crosshairs: all the crosshairs have been redrawn to be sharper, less blurry
• HUD: some settings were moved into the “Advanced Settings” page where you will find a lot more options for setting your Game Interface

IN-GAME MODIFICATIONS

Game UI:

We redesigned in order to increase the readability. The bottom right and left objects were deleted. All the important information are now located in the bottom middle.

End Game player stats

Redesigned and new stats

End Game Scoreboards

Nothing changed except for the color (to be more in tune with the general feel of the new menu)

IA

Some IA fixes, they are more reactive on normal weapon modes.

Localization

As the main menu was reworked, the localization was reworked too. All objects are now localizable.
Some languages are not fully translated, so if you select another language than English you might still see English words or sentences.
The game localization was made possible with your help. So, thank you to all contributors.
We are open to add other languages, to contribute contact us on Discord 🙂

NEW FEATURES

Map Editor

We decided to remove our “in-game editor” for an indefinite period in favor of the Unreal Editor. The game is compiled including the map editor. So, you have access to all game assets and maps. Please note that only map creation is supported, not mods creation.
To launch it, select “Unreal Editor for Master Arena” when launching the game from steam.

We will post some tutorials to help you use it. Meanwhile, you can search on youtube “UDK Tutorials”. If you need help or if you have any problems, please contact us on Discord. We will help you.

Workshop

Steam workshop is now available! You can upload and download maps made by the community.
The workshop functionality isn’t yet fully integrated, some features like “in-game automatic download” from the workshop are not available. But, if you subscribe to a map, Steam will download it and you simply have to start the game to test it from the solo game menu.

To upload your map to Steam workshop:

• Go to “WorkShopTool” directory located in \MasterArena\UDKGame\.
• Open “YOUR_WORKSHOP_MAPS” directory
• Set your files in corrects folders. Don’t forget to setup a .vdf file (check the example file).
• You need to edit UploadToWorkShop.bat to set your Steam logins and set the correct name for your .vdf file, and then run it.

For servers with custom maps, you can use RedirectToURL feature to permit players to download your maps faster. It is located in UDKGame.ini in [IpDrv.HTTPDownload] section. You simply need to change the redirect URL. By default, it is as below:

[IpDrv.HTTPDownload]
RedirectToURL=http://masterarena.com/CustomMaps/

(If you don’t have a web server, please contact Dev_Jerem from #shared-media channel on Discord, he will add your map to our web server)

Capture The Flag

Here are some important changes.

The round score system has been removed. Now captured flag corresponds to a point. The game is still supporting rounds but its use is focused on the team side switch. Previously when the game switched you to the other side, your team color switched too. Now, you don’t change color anymore. The arena switches its colors with you. So now, if you start in the Red team, until the end of the match you will only play with Red players against Blue players.

The round transition was reworked. Now there is a summary with a flag capture timeline:

Movements

A movement was added, the slide. Now on a ramp, if you press “jump button” when landed, you will slide.

***

This update is important for us for some technical points. If you have any bugs, issues or suggestions, do not hesitate to discuss with us on discord. Feel free to invite your friends to join us, share and like on socials networks.

See you in-game, Master Arena Dev Team.