[WoT] JWoT 2

This is going to be even less about tanks and WoT then the previous entry.

Today was the first public day with lots of visitors and cosplay festival. To the pictures!

Japanese are queuing for WoT PC and Xbox 360

WG booth staff

One of Girls und Panzer gals is playing WoT

Crowded

Now to the cosplay!

Funny creature!

Sad creature..

It was the device that got my attention. 360deg tablet holder

[WoT] JWOT

Well, the breaking news (as promised) from Tokyo Game Show 2013 is obviously the announcement of Japanese tech tree. A good English source would be here.

Tech tree itself.

And some other images to go with the above.

TGS has begun.

The main entrance

WoT banner

Type 95 and its crew

WG Japanese office

Dream team

WoT target audience in Japan (PC)

Target audience as well, even though somewhat older (Xbox)

WoT has met Girls und Panzer. What would be the outcome?

Honestly, this was the best Gree had at its booth

Banned!

[WoT] Update 8.8

What's your opinion on the newly-released 0.8.8 for World of Tanks? Online numbers, CCUs and such stuff across all regions, were a good indicator that the update was well received, however the devil is in details. What you liked and what you didn't?

• New mission interface in garage
• New statistics tabs
• National voiceovers
• Tundra map
• Redesigned Komarin, Swamp, and Serene Coast
• New Soviet medium tanks
• New German tanks and rebalanced VK30.01 and VK36.01
• New Chinese tanks (anyone?)

Anything else?

PS: I'm in Japan now, expect some interesting pictures and breaking news.
PPS: Rolling out 0.5.3 for World of Warplanes for RU/CIS region. EU and NA to come.

Churchill in Action

When you mention the name Churchill and World War Two people will always think of the British prime minister. Or if not that, then the tank. However there is a third Churchill from the Second World War. He was sometimes mistaken for being a relative of the prime minister. In 1944, he was sent to a concentration camp by the Germans for being a political prisoner. He promptly escaped. His full name was John Malcolm Thorpe Fleming Churchill, also known as "Jack Churchill", or "Mad Jack".

Jack Churchill was commissioned in to the Army in 1926 and served with the Manchester Regiment during the Burma Rebellion of 1930-1932. In 1932 the Regiment returned to Britain. However, as is often the case with men of Churchill's character, he became bored. One parade he made the sin of showing up carrying an umbrella. When his commanding officer asked him why he was carrying that item, he simply replied "Because it is raining". As You can imagine his army career took a down turn during this period. Eventually in 1936 he resigned from the army.

To keep himself occupied he took up archery, fast becoming an expert, and eventually representing the UK at the World Archery Championships in 1939. However as the Second World War started Churchill immediately re-enlisted with his old unit.

Churchill at the Championships in 1939

The Manchester's were sent to France as part of the BEF. Churchill, a dyed in the wool eccentric normally carried his Longbow and a Scottish broadsword with him in place of the normal equipment. When his commanding officer asked him why he carried the sword he got the reply "In my opinion, sir, any officer who goes into action without his sword is improperly dressed."

 

In 1940 during the German Blitzkrieg Churchill secured his place in the history books, and started a war long career of daring deeds. At the village of L'Epinette Churchill's company was assigned as rear guard. The job of rear guard is always a difficult one. You have to hold off a much larger force while all your mates run for safety. But if you hold on too long the larger force will squash you.
Churchill's company set up an ambush and waited. Soon the Germans approached and were sheltering behind a stone wall. Churchill opened the ambush with a prearranged signal. He shot the German NCO with his long bow. As the German fell Churchill's men opened fire from two directions catching the Germans utterly off guard and driving them back.
When the Germans attacked again The British fought them off, with Churchill personally manning two of the companies machine guns. However as night fell the company was surrounded. Churchill's inspiring Leadership allowed him to lead the company in a break out attempt, and they managed to get through the German lines and rejoin the Regiment as it retreated to Dunkirk. For his actions at L'Epinette Churchill was awarded the Military Cross.
In the fierce fighting at Dunkirk Churchill was hit by German machine gun, luckily it was only a single bullet in his shoulder.

Back in England, another long spell of boredom appeared to loom on the horizon. When Churchill saw a call for volunteers go out. It gave no details, just said the duties would be extremely hazardous. Churchill lept at he chance, and found himself joining the Commando's. Churchill had many exploits with the Commando's. Far too many for this article, so I might come back to some of his other adventures in a later article. I do however want to skip ahead to his actions at the Salerno Landings, which won him a DSO.

Churchill on the Far Right of the picture.

The Germans held the village of Pigoletti. No2 Commando was tasked with capturing the position. Mad Jack led the attack. In the darkness Churchill and one other man, a Corporal Ruffell, became detached from the main body, but they carried on advancing.Two German Sentries enjoying a smoke were horrified and surprised when a sword swinging lunatic came tearing out the darkness yelling "Hands up!"
In shock both Germans immediately surrendered. Seeing some Germans in a nearby courtyard Churchill left Cpl Ruffell to cover him and the prisoner's and charged the Germans alone. Again shock and Churchill's overwhelming presence caused a whole German mortar crew to surrender.
Churchill then took one of the German sentries and led him around the village. Every time a German position or another sentry would challenge them Churchill's captive would give the password. The password allowed Churchill to approach the new German and pounce on them causing their surrender with his sword. At the end of it all Churchill, almost alone had captured 42 Germans plus a full Mortar position.
Before you judge that German Soldier too harshly remember its very hard to resist when an unpleasant person with mean intent is prodding you in the kidney's with a 3ft sword!
Returning to friendly lines with all those prisoner's his Commanding officer asked him how he'd done it. Churchill gave a reply that reflects his world view:
"I maintain that, as long as you tell a German loudly and clearly what to do, if you are senior to him he will cry 'Jawohl' and get on with it enthusiastically and efficiently whatever the situation."

Churchill's exploits continued until Germany's defeat. But what about the Japanese! Time for some Katana Vs Scottish broadsword fighting? Churchill got himself posted back to Burma. However as he got off the train in Rangoon the news of Japan's surrender arrived. Churchill joked to a friend "You know, if it hadn’t been for those damned Yanks we could have kept the war going for another ten years."

After the war Churchill continued his adventures. Such as becoming Jump Qualified on his 40th birthday and leading a Parachute regiment. Or learning to surf and building his own boards, eventually becoming the first person to Surf the Severn River and its tidal bore.

[WG] Interview with Slava Makarov: What’s Ahead.

The 3rd interview of the series.

— Slava, what’s your role in WG now and how did you become part of the company?

— I joined Wargaming 4 years ago and I was one of those who initiated World of Tanks. Now I am VP of Producing (Head of Producing Department) of the company (and my boss - Overlord). My major task is to make sure that our new projects reflect the global strategy of the company and satisfy the quality standards of Wargaming. To put it short, I make sure that all our games are cool!

— Where are you heading now? All your “Worlds…” are well-known and the plans regarding them are pretty clear: new vehicles, new modes… What about World of Tanks Generals, for example? 

— It’s more difficult with Warplanes and Warships than it seems. The games differ not only in terms of vehicle types. They both have their unique battle pace and the gameplay itself. World of Warplanes is the most dynamic out of the three. 3D battles require good reaction and the ability to adapt to a fast-changing situation. World of Warships is a more strategic type of game with relatively slow gameplay. When all the three projects are out, every user will be able to satisfy their preferences.
The success of Tanks was partly due to the fact that we slowed down comparing to Counter Strike and shooter fans found something slower and more technically accurate than CS. Now we have two new products – one of them is faster than Tanks, the other one is slower. Warplanes are more about skills. Warships are about strategy. Thus we tend to widen the horizons of game experience for our players.

— Do you think this choice might lead to the audience’s splitting age-wise? Warplanes’ players will be younger than the ones playing Tanks and those who prefer Warships will fall into an older category. 

— I am 100% sure that the Warplanes’ audience will be younger than the current Tanks’ audience. And it’s okay. I don’t see a problem if Warships will attract an older audience than the Warplanes. By the way those who came to like Tanks in 2009 will have grown 4-5 years older when we release the Warships. Hopefully they will be old enough to appreciate the Warships’ appeal. I personally prefer World of Warships because I am pretty old now ☺
I’d say that World of Tanks requires a lot of strategic elements to play successfully. However, we do understand that “digging” into strategy we would ruin the good old gameplay. It’s unlikely that most players will be happy about that. That’s why we’ve decided to develop a completely new project where strategy is crucial.

— What about WoT Generals then? Are they for grannies?:)

— Nope! The uniqueness of WOT Generals is in its individual confrontation with other players. In addition, this project is aimed for less powerful devices.

A lot of users wouldn’t mind playing something related to Tanks but they can’t do it during breaks of a working day for example. For them we are going to offer World of Tanks: Generals and World of Tanks Blitz. These projects will be available on tablets and smartphones and in any browser. The main goal is to minimize playing time. If a player wants Tanks, some kind of them will be available all the time.

— Wives will start hating you! You will occupy all the niches of a player’s life! 

— Is there anything bad about it?:) We have got our load of comments from angry wives with World of Tanks already. A little more of hatred won’t worsen our karma seriously.

— All the Worlds… are using the same engine - Big World. What about WoT Generals? Anything new will be used for them? 

— The “exterier” – something that a player sees – it’s not Big World, it’s a browser application on HTML5. It was chosen because we are more or less sure that all browsers will support this version in a few upcoming years. One can’t say the same about Flash, on the other hand.

— There quite a few browser games where outstanding things are made using Flash? 

— Nobody knows how many years they will support Flash in Safari for Macs and other devices. The confrontation of Apple and Adobe Flash is no secret. The interest of other companies to the multimedia platform has faded greatly. We don’t want to face the situation when we lose audience just because they cannot play because of technical reasons.

— You have recently made a few big acquisitions: studios with good expertise which developed popular games. Are they going to work on porting your World of trilogy and WoT Generals to different devices or are you going to use their potential otherwise? 

— Our acquisitions is a different story. We felt that at some things we are not as good as we’d want to be. The first issue was definitely the engine. We needed full control over the server part of the technology to ensure stability. Big World was an expected and reasonable purchase. Acquiring Day One Studios is also about technology. The studio can boast great expertise developing multiplatform projects. They guys know how to develop games for different platforms, devices and controls.
It’s different with Gas Powered Games though. First of, they are a source of gamedesign expertise for us. They have great experience in world-renowned titles development and they simply know a lot about about game development as such. The aim of all these purchases is expanding the company’s knowledge base. Possibly as a result we will have other projects that are not Tank-related. Sooner or later they will be announced.

— Gas Powered Games included?

— Gas Powered Games included. Chris Taylor smiles all the time he is interviewed. We are not announcing anything as we are still discussing with Chris what kind of game we are developing in detail. It’s not a two-week discussion. Everything has to be counted accurately: cost of development; whether we have enough resources and whether we are professional enough. If all goes well, we’ll come out with a few products that will blow the industry!

— One question only: reality or fantasy? 

— No comment.

— Talking about Gas Powered Games… World of Tanks as well as other Worlds are European games mostly. The topic of World War II is not very popular in the US. Maybe you acquired Gas Powered Games to learn to develop games for the USA? 

— As I have already mentioned, we want to boost our expertise, including the regional markets specifics. We are currently working on organizing the process of how to teach our teams  those things which the US guys – old good developers - are good at. The reciprocal training process is currently going. We aim to increase the professionalism of all our teams.

— How do teams from different countries interact? Their mentalities are different as well as their experience. How are the new teams doing? 

— I went to the US where I communicated with the Chicago team from Day One Studios and Chris Taylor. They are very cool and comfortable to work with. Seriously! I’d say that the barrier between the American mentality and ours is exaggerated. On condition of mutual respect and understanding, everything goes perfectly well.

Of course there are some specific moments. For example, I tend to be outspoken and they used to think that I was being aggressive. It might be not our national mentality but my personal feature. WOT team had to also get used to this characteristic of mine. To tell an American that their idea is not that great means to give offence to them. We should be softer. In my case everyone had to adapt. The guys understood that my criticism doesn’t lead to firing someone. And I also started to be more attentive when I had to say something which was not a praise.

— What about the contacts between teams? Do they communicate via a top manager? Or is there a horizontal scheme of communication? 

— The devs communicate with each other directly, they discuss technological issues using their own language that only they can understand. Managers communicate directly too as well as game designers. There are not many horizontal contacts on day-to-day basis, but it hasn’t been long since the acquisitions took place.

— They say that in Wargaming America employees attend the Russian Language courses?

— Yes, there are people learning English. For instance I work directly with Chris Keeling, a western game designer who has been cooperating with WG since Operation Bagration. He speaks a little bit Russian.

We mostly communicate in English with our colleagues. Our European and American offices employ Russian speaking colleagues too. It’s nice and somehow useful in terms of building rapport.

— Shall we expect a new WG title about gigantic marching warrobots – Massive Assult resurrection or something like that? 

— I’ll give you our traditional answer – we’ll let you know ASAP ☺

Originally posted here. 

The Real Operation Sealion

Disclaimer: The following article is a hard one for me to write. Almost every account I have found has had some errors in it, and many vary wildly from each other. Some of the accounts are from sources that I wouldn't normally give credence to, and may well have an agenda.
So if hard evidence later shows up pointing to a particular comment of from this article being wrong, then bare the above in mind. I suspect that the actual truth lies somewhere in the middle ground.

As we all know Operation Sealion was the German's plan for the invasion of Great Britain. There is no question that such an operation would have been utterly crushed within 24 hours. However some say that there was a battle between Germans and British forces, on the ground during 1940. So today we take a look at that encounter.

On September 27th 1940 things were beginning to look up for the men of A Company, 1st Battalion, London Irish Rifles. The Invasion scare was over, They were winning the friendly rivalry between units about who could capture the most shot down German air crew. At least two German bombers had crash landed in the Marsh near their billets. To top it all they were billeted in a Pub on the edge of Graveney Marsh. Of course the concern about the developing Blitz aimed at London may well have played on their minds. So the Troops just remained watchful and occupied a working bar.

Things should have been as rosy for the crew of a JU88A5 some miles away. The wireless operator, Unteroffizier Erwin Richter,  a knights cross winner, which he was able to wear to his recent wedding. Equally they were flying a brand new aircraft, which had only been in service for two weeks. However on the morning of the 27th, I Gruppe, Kampfgeschwader 77 had launched 55 planes against London. The JU88A5 was flown by Unteroffizier Fritz Ruhlandt, and nicknamed Eule. As it flew over Medway the German formation was fired upon by flak. With a bang, one of the engines of the JU88 was damaged. The crew of the bomber watched the other planes from their squadron fly past, as they slowed. During the battle which followed KG77 lost another 5 planes. But for the moment Eule was on her own.

Unteroffizier Ruhlandt

Unteroffizier Richter at his wedding

Unsurprisingly she was soon found by fighters from the RAF. In this case No66 and No92 Squadrons. However the planes didn't immediately try to destroy the JU88A5. Orders were to try and capture one of the new bombers for study, and the pilots had identified the wounded bomber as the new model. Although the rear gunners Gefreiter Reiter and an unnamed airman tried their best to keep the fighters away the fighters put in an attack as Ruhlandt tried to dive away from them. The bursts of machine gun fire from the RAF planes knocked out the bombers last engine, and wounded Richter in the foot.

Hearing the commotion the men of the London Irish Rifles looked up to see the damaged JU88A5 splat down into the marsh only a short distance away. Grabbing up their rifles about 12 men rushed from the bar and headed across the boggy ground to capture the German airmen.
Ruhlandt might not have seen the approaching soldiers, however he knew capture of his plane was inevitable, and its secrets lost. Luckily German planes were equipped with demolition charges for just such this eventuality, the crew quickly set the timers.

As the British soldiers approached the plane a sustained barrage of gunshot rang out from the downed German plane. Here's where all the accounts differ. Some say the Germans were shooting at their own plane to try and cause more damage, others say they where engaging the British. Even the weapons used vary, from one machine gun (still mounted in the plane) to several machine guns, dismounted from the plane, and a sub-machine gun. Either way the London Irish Rifles believed the shots were aimed at them, and dived prone in the swampy ground. One group set up a base of fire shooting at the Germans, while another used a nearby dyke as cover to close with the plane. The crawling soldiers found themselves about 50 yards from the German plane.
When this second group opened fire the Germans were pinned in a crossfire and quickly surrendered, with another one of their number having been shot in the foot.
The British troops moved forward and found and disarmed one of the demolition charges and marched their captives off towards their billets.

Again things become confused in the historical records. What is certain is one of the Germans made a comment to the rest of the crew about how the plane would "Go up at any moment". One of the British soldiers spoke enough German to know what he had said. What is also certain is that Captain John Cantopher found out about it, and raced over to the stricken plane. He hunted through the foreign plane and not knowing exactly what he was looking for, but knowing it could explode and kill him at any moment.
Eventually he found the second charge set under the wing near one of the fuel tanks, grabbing the ticking time bomb he raced away from the plane and heaved it into a nearby water filled ditch.

Location of the bomb?

Cpt Cantopher then rejoined the POW's and their captors in the Pub, where pints were ordered for all. The Germans sold items such as badges to the soldiers to get the money to buy their pints.
The JU88A5  was taken to be studied at  Farnborough, and was said to have "provided highly valuable information". For his actions in ensuring the pinnacle of the Luftwaffe's technology was captured intact Cpt Cantopher was awarded the George Cross.