Starship Troopers: Extermination Devs Have No Regrets Moving To Unreal Engine 5

Peter: I am the Project Lead responsible for the Starship Troopers: Extermination team. I get the privilege to lead an exceptionally talented and passionate team of developers on this game. Our team is made up of a group of amazing and diverse people who love and respect the Troopers Universe dearly, and that clearly shows in the game we have made and in every update we add to it.

Peter: The game idea was born during an in-studio mod creation session for our hugely successful PC game Squad. A few teammates made a rough mod using Starship Troopers influences and realized it was a fun experience; they then went back to the drawing board and pitched the idea to the studio, then Sony Tristar, and the rest, as they say, is history. We believe the game during early access has lived up to the film, and we will continue to deliver on this pre and post-official launch.

Peter: We are a community first here at Offworld, and engaging and supporting the community are things on which we pride ourselves. We are actively involved in all our official channels, discussing the game, their feedback, and sharing info on upcoming game updates. We have recently released our Beta playtest on Steam and are actively receiving feedback on all upcoming updates well before they are released. The community feedback was a big part of how we approached our new class redesign; they told us what they liked and did not like about our original 3 classes. We used this feedback to craft the 6 existing classes, and we continue to look to the community for their feedback as we work with them and look to create new class archetypes in the future.

Peter: Honestly, any time a game enters early access, it is met with a myriad of fan expectations, as many studios treat early access differently. For us as a studio, our goal for early access was to finish the game with the community, ensuring we engaged with the community at every opportunity to stay on course and realize our vision for the game. Did we meet fan expectations? I think we delivered early and often since going into early access, with homages to the film lore and the introduction of fan-favorite weapons and bugs. The one area we want to improve is bringing more iconic moments from the films into the game; we have big plans for this at launch by introducing a terrifying bug from the movies.

Peter: The inspiration for the game came from the film’s reverence within the studio and how much fun it would be to play in that world. Of course, the game’s roots came from another Offworld game called Squad.

Peter: We want to be where the players play. We launch the game out of early access for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S consoles on October 11, 2024.

Peter: It was a long road through the upgrade process, and we are still walking down and learning at every stop along the way. It was the toughest decision we had to make early in development but one we do not regret. In order for us to make a living, breathing, compelling game, we needed to get on the latest and greatest tech from Epic!

Peter: Moving Engines was a monumental task and one that everyone on the team felt we needed to do, but at the time, we were not prepared enough for the amount of problems and technical challenges we would have to overcome. The transition of the engine needed to be done at that time because the game was not completed, so it was still small, and some of the bigger features we wanted to do down the road were just not possible on the existing engine, so it made sense to do it early in development. These features include carnage, nanite, lumen, and Galactic War.

If we had not done it, we would not have been able to do it later as the task would have been too technically challenging for us to do, plus we would have had to change the game’s vision. The transition was one of learning and opportunity for us as a small team to grow from. It was and continues to be a challenge for us. However, we have dedicated an entire sub-team to help us through these, and we are turning the corner on the performance and learning sides. Our team is really coming to grips with the new systems that the updated to 5 system afforded us. We use Nanite and Lumen’s power in every aspect of our art pipelines. We are seeing the fruits of these laborers with the upcoming 0.8.0 update.

Peter: We have many major updates coming to the game. The next big one coming is 0.8.0 Carnage on Planet X-11; this update introduces a swath of performance improvements and game optimization.

Peter: I think the success of HD2 is good for the industry in general; we are forging our own path towards release, and we wish nothing but success to all our fellow developers in the industry.

Peter: Nothing comes to mind; we have an internal feature roadmap that has been going on for many, many years. I can say this: if you have seen something in the movies, there is a good bet it will show up in the game down the line!

Peter: Thanks. Get ready for more Bugs, Planets, Classes, and more as we reach the official launch and beyond!