The Frost Giant team have rolled out a brand new December update, revealing a little more about the technology behind Stormgate, as well as some concept art. Let’s take a look at the Stormgate December update.
Stormgate’s ‘SnowPlay’ Engine: Supporting High Unit Counts and Rollback Netcode
The December kicks off with a little more information about Stormgate’s gameplay engine, Snowplay.
The engine is specifically designed to create “fast, smooth, and responsive gameplay”, aka, a fun game that reacts to the buttons you press as fast and accurately as possible. This is achieved by simulating the game based on player inputs, rather than traditional processes like calculating unit states through the client and server.
In fact, Frost Giant’s James Anhalt even claims that Stormgate will be the “most responsive RTS game (he’s) ever worked on” – which includes Starcraft 2!
SnowPlay will also feature a rollback netcode, which “simulates the game even in the absence of player input and can rollback to the time that inputs happen and simulate quickly to catch back up.” Essentially, this means the game will feel more responsive and will help minimize issues with latency.
Last but not least, it was also revealed that Stormgate servers will run at 60 tick, meaning players will receive updates from those servers 60 times per second. For comparison, Starcraft 2 currently runs on 22.4 tick, making Stormgate much more responsive.
Stormgate In-game Mass Spectating
Another amazing feature that was revealed in the update was “mass spectating.” This is a feature that will broadcast only the player inputs and resimulate the game for anyone to spectate, without affecting the match that is being played.
For players familiar with Dota 2, this sounds similar to DotaTV, which allows players to watch ranked matches and esports live events in-game, without having any impact on the performance of the match.
This is an amazing feature not only for Esports, but for any fans of the game who want to watch some action without the hassle of creating custom lobbies or worrying about poor internet affecting the match as a spectator.
Stormgate Human Resistance and Infernal Hosts Concept Art
The update closed out with a few pieces of Stormgate concept art which may or may not be featured in the game. Regardless, it’s an awesome display of what may come – check it out below:
Human Resistance Concept Art
Infernal Hosts Concept Art
