Tank Squad Tactical WW II Realtime.

[Asid]

Development Status #85
Fri, 16 January 2026



Dear Tankers!
Welcome to our 85th Development Status.

new year, new development status and new goals. We set some plans already with the team for this year but to make it possible we have to make some changes in the project itself.

For example switching to the new multiplayer system Fusion 2 that will enable better stability and more possibilities or making some overhauls in UI like in the main menu.


UI overhaul
Let me tell you what we have been doing during the last days and nights.




Info: Button sounds click/hover are just placeholders, we are testing them so they are about to be changed.

Why "new" UI. We would not call it new but rather improved. We have to make some adjustments here and there to be able to add features like matchmaking, workshop support or in future better organised battle maps with the whole map on a screen like in other tactical games that could include adding waypoints, orders on a map essentially more tactical tools - but that is melody for next months. Let's go back to the main menu?





On a matchmaking screen you will be able to find desired sessions playing specifying campaigns or skirmishes. Also you will be able to find sessions playing arcade or simulation modes enabled.



Rest of the menus are also here, like Session Browser, options to host sessions or play campaign / skirmishes alone as a ?single player?.



Another UI that needs to be improved is Battle Summary. Currently its a bit of a mess. Imagine having a mission with like 20 objectives and having to see every objective summary progress one after another during the mission summary. We have to change and actually we have a plan for it.



To summarize the new Battle Summary - it will be more simplified. It will show of course all important information, score, statistics but on a single page/single animation. More user friendly - at least we hope so.



Also having a new UI in the game gives some more freedom to create things in different ways. That should do the trick for next QoL improvements in the game.


Optimization progress

We are rewriting our networking system to be more optimized as we?ve upgraded from Fusion 1 to Fusion 2. This brings us new options to implement, such as host migration, match making etc. but we?re still very busy with making all of the game work as it was + work better/load faster etc.

Another part we wanted to overhaul was vehicle physics as this was the biggest CPU drain during battles. We tried two new approaches, both failed, they did not bring any optimization. In the end, we?ve switched and tracked down other optimization problems and we have good results here, with stress test scene set up for 30 tanks, 200 infantry and 30 static guns (so totally 440 infantry as 150 tank crewman (30 tigers, each 5 crewman) and 90 static guns crewman (each 3).

With very simple optimizations we managed to decrease the animator cpu requirement from around 6-8 ms to manage idle soldiers to about 2 ms. There?s still room for more but these are very recent changes.

The same goes for vehicle physics, we managed to find different and this time working optimization methods that help the situation - but do not yet totally solve it. We still have a lot to do here.



Thank you and have a good weekend!
DeGenerals

[Asid]

Development Status #86
Fri, 30 January 2026



Dear Tankers!
Welcome to our 86th Development Status.
Another development status update this month. We would like to share with you what has been happening with us recently.


Optimization and bug fixes progress
We've nailed down a few more areas of the game where optimization is possible. Some of following have been already done, some still to do:

  - infantry animations when more than 100-200 can take 5-10 ms. We already have an asset that should help us here and we will optimize it
  - VFXs - it turned out each burning tank or tank shot or tank dust from exhaust was staying forever on the scene - taking up precious CPU computations where it was no longer needed
  - dead infantry - the same, some calculations were still active long after infantry was dead
  - vehicles displaying maximum tracks details even very far away if we had max zoom on
  - various memory issues that caused the game to use more RAM than needed


There were a lot of other small improvements and in the end the game runs better and is more stable. The last big issue standing is netcode optimization, as the amount of stuff each player sends and receives still uses too much CPU. We need to take care of it before the next patch.

Watch YouTube Video


Overall we're fixing and progressing everywhere, especially we want the enemy AI and our AI to work better. To react accordingly to the situation, use less CPU when static and guarding etc. We're reaching an optimization wall here so AI must be correctly utilized and not just be there standing and watching as they can't move.


Further UI overhaul
Let me tell you what we have been doing during the last, weeks, days and nights.



As for the interface, work is continuing to improve the appearance, clarity and functionality of the panels and their elements. After completing work on the main menu, the idea arose to try to redesign the Battle Map.

The first idea was to make the mission map full-screen so that you could have a better overview of the scenario and plan your troops' tactical movements, especially since we will be adding the ability to issue orders on the map in the future. In the previous form, when the map was a small square in the middle of the screen, this would not have been convenient.

Additional aspects, small details that make a difference, are that the margins at the edges of the screen have been reduced, so that the panels can be made slightly smaller and the information displayed is not so overwhelming. The idea is to apply the principle of 'less is more' to try to remedy the chaos in the UI - this applies to changes in the game's UI in general, not just in this panel.



I started by redesigning the left side of the screen, hiding the panels with the legend and mission description. They can be closed and opened at any time, allowing you to see the map unobstructed. In the photo above, the right panel has not been touched yet. The buttons that correspond to the connections have animations and are interactive. When you hover over the icon, text appears with information about what the panel is - we don't need to see the panel name all the time. Similarly, on the left side, we have information typically related to the mission, the name of the game mode or the name of the scenario, and on the right, we have information typically related to the battle, i.e. what tactical unit we are operating, what forces and units we have, and what troops we have at our disposal.

Watch YouTube Video



The plan is to make the icons on the map, e.g. respawn markers, interactive. For example, clicking on the Abel point on the map rather than in the list will mark it as a respawn point. Similarly, clicking on a vehicle that operates in Multi Crew mode, for example, will open a small menu next to it with a selection of slots in the tank, allowing you to respawn inside it.

These are, of course, plans, but they are slowly becoming a reality. Perhaps further development of this topic will be included in the new roadmap as soon as we finish the current one. At the moment, we have a lot of work to do on optimisation, with the new campaign in Ponyri, and I myself have to continue working on Ferdinand.



Let's go back to the changes and what has been happening in the UI over the last few days. The next step was to tackle the right panel. I started by adapting it to the new style, making it interactive and allowing the panels to be hidden separately. That is, the respawn points and available units.



The next experiment was to create new tank icons and replace the white ones. The white icons worked well on smaller UI elements. Since the new ones look better on a larger scale, the idea arose to try something new, and so we are currently testing and playing around with versions where there is a panel at the bottom with a selection of units. There is also a little less information here, the main important information being



  - what kind of unit it is
  - its icon/something that represents its appearance
  - which unit it belongs to, if applicable; here, simplicity is key, there is no unit name, which can be long, we don't need it here
  - the emblem is enough
  - the type of vehicle, whether it is a heavy tank, a light tank or, say, a truck


We won't show the appearance of the unit selection because I don't have a corrected version and the current one looks terrible. The current element also has too much information.

What do you think about this concept? Which is better? Give us your opinion in comments



Thank you and have a good weekend!
DeGenerals

[Asid]

Development Status #87
Fri, 13 February 2026



Dear Tankers!
Welcome to our 87th Development Status.
In this status update, we continue the saga of UI changes, but we also describe new features related to modding. We have enabled and are testing mods on the Steam workshop.

Modding
The last two weeks have also seen the development of tools for the Workshop. We have developed a tool for Tank Squad to support the creation and uploading of mods to Steam. We have also written a PDF with documentation.



As we mentioned earlier, and as stated in the roadmap, we are starting modestly by adding only a few options, including decals/unit/division emblems, camouflage, and side numbers. Over time, we want to add more features, and our dream is to include a mission/scenario editor. Time will tell.






Further UI changes

Battle map changes & map selection

Since the changes to the Battle Map described in the previous Development Status #86 were mostly received with enthusiasm, we have added a few more extras to the Battle Map. A new element for selecting units to spawn, similar to the units at the bottom, but showing larger icons/pictures of the tanks that are in that unit.



We have added a larger range of movement on the map. We noticed that if mission objectives or respawn points are close to the edge of the map, it is difficult to zoom in or move the map so that you can see them clearly. The larger range helps you move the map further, so that you can easily move things on the edges to the center of the screen.



Another thing is that when you click on a task in the list, the map will automatically move to the location of the marker. The same thing happens when you click on a respawn point – the map will move there and gain focus.


Widescreen support

After receiving your reports about the UI not working on widescreen displays, we checked our code and the logic that was supposed to detect the set resolution and switch the UI scale in the game. Unfortunately, it turned out that the methods were not being called—they may have worked in the editor, but not in the game.




UI scale match option in game settings

We restored their functionality in the game, and this week was marked by UI fixes to prevent the interface from stretching on large widescreen resolutions. It takes a bit of gymnastics to get everything to work together, but we are well on our way to preventing menu and in-game elements from stretching.

In addition, we also support resolutions on Steam Deck devices, because we want to finally add support and pass verification. Thanks to continuous optimization changes, we managed to reduce the game's RAM consumption even further.

We have added a slider to the game options that allows you to scale or, more accurately, adjust the aspect ratio of the interface. For example, the default value in the editor is 0.5 for a resolution of 1920x1080. With UI sizes such as 5120x1440, this value must be 1.0 so that the UI elements are not proportionally large. Setting the value to 0.0 for a resolution of 1280x800 (Steam Deck) will ensure that the interface is displayed correctly.




Main menu

At the time of writing this status update, the "scaling" modifications and corrections already cover the main menu, including the Settings screen. The settings screen in our game is common to both the main menu UI and the game itself, which are two different "ecosystems" in our case.



Headquarters
Yesterday, I started reworking the in-game elements, including the HQ panel.



The next panels are waiting in line, and I hope that we won't see any more dramas like the one in the picture below in the game. And if, by some miracle, it still happens, let me know and I'll fix it.




Optimization and bug fixes progress
We've found another few places where the game could run better and already fixed them. They were connected to how the game handled physics and terrain shaders.

We still have infantry animators to optimize and some netcode bandwidth to fix but we won't make it on time next week - it will be optimized and added in a patch after 20.02.

The game runs much better than it had a few weeks ago and after fixing the topics above we are coming to a wall - to optimize the game further we are going to need much more time and probably a new engine version - which must wait.

Unstable branch update
We've uploaded the current build to an unstable branch, check the link above for instructions on how to access it and what is the changelog

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1498130/discussions/0/601910715107996635/


When we can expect new patch 1.2.0?

•     We plan to release the update 1.2.0 on February 20th. This will be the sixth anniversary of the release of our first game on Steam. But to do that we still need to make a finalization of the 2025 roadmap.
•     One last big thing left is to add Steam Workshop support and give you tools as a "starter pack". Starter pack will include possibilities to add mods like decals, camos + damage taken in battle (visuals) visible in the repair section.
•     Next big thing is solid optimization step up. We removed some unused meshes from memory there should be again less RAM usage.
•     And at the end mentioned mentioned above - UI overhaul for main menu and few other menus like Battle Summary.
•     UI fixes and changes, especially support for widescreen displays
•     QoL fixes to Battle Maps

Thank you and have a good weekend!
DeGenerals

[Asid]

Update 1.2.0 + Modding tools & Roadmap 2025 finalization
Fri, 20 February 2026



Dear Tankers and Mechanics!

News in Patch 1.2.0
Of course, there are plenty of changes, fixes, and improvements in terms of game performance. Please see the more detailed description below, where we discuss the most important things we have done since December. At the very bottom, you will also find a changelog with all the changes.


UI overhalul
We described the changes to the UI in previous Development Status reports #87, 86, and 85. First and foremost, the changes affected the appearance of the main menu and in-game elements. The new Battle Map design comes to the fore here, where the map is rendered across the entire screen and the selection of units or troops has been completely reworked.



We have also improved the overall support for widescreen displays. The game should now correctly adjust the UI to the given resolution.



The main menu and Battle Map are just the beginning of bigger changes. You can expect further improvements to the interface in upcoming updates. We take your feedback and reports seriously. If something isn't working, we try to fix it, and if something isn't working at all, we try to change it for the better ~Dev Michal "Winters"




Roadmap 2025 & Steam Workshop & Modding tools
With the release of patch 1.2.0, we would like to finalize and summarize the 2025 roadmap that we published shortly after the game's release in May. During this time, in addition to working on the game itself, improving performance, and actually fighting with the project and Unity itself, we managed to bring the game to a state where it can be played with decent FPS. It's still not perfect, but it's definitely better than it was in May when we had to release the game to survive as a company.



We released the Soviet campaign, added the missing tutorial and periscopes to tanks. We added several new static guns and two versions of the KV-1, thus expanding the pool of Soviet tanks.

The last few weeks have been marked by UI improvements, further optimization efforts, and literally squeezing every last drop of performance out of the engine by performing some design tricks.

We added basic support for the Steam Workshop. We added a tool that allows you to create and upload mods to the workshop. We described what and how in the PDF documentation, which can be found in a folder in the game's installation directory on Steam.



That's not all. We have more ideas in mind, including your suggestions for the game's development. After the patch is released, we want to sit down and work on a new roadmap, and as soon as it's ready, we'll publish what we'll be cooking up over the next few months. We hope you'll stay with us, but we also hope that new players will join us and that those who doubt us will see that we're trying our best to fix this game and make it better.

Optimization
We managed to improve the game's performance even further by implementing a few tricks. Among other things, when the player's camera is not "looking" at units, their animations are disabled. This trick allowed us to increase the FPS. In addition, we made changes to the rendering distance of track animations in order to improve the performance of tanks on the scene.

We still have two open issues ahead of us, which should further improve optimization in the future, but we are reaching a certain wall that we cannot overcome without a revolution. The issues mentioned above are infantry/crew animations, which start to put a heavy load on the CPU when there are many of them on the screen, regardless of how far they are from the player's camera, and the optimization of the amount of data that the game sends during battle to synchronize gameplay.

What next?
We are preparing plans for a new roadmap. We are continuing to work on Ponyria, procedural missions, an editable force pool, and new vehicles. You can expect more information about these issues in future development status updates.

TMS 02/20/2020
Exactly six years ago, we had the opportunity to release our first game, Tank Mechanic Simulator.



Game discount
Today we are launching a discount on the game. The 25% discount will last for the next 7 days.




Changelog 1.2.0
Below is the list of changes being made:

Added:

•     Added behaviour for enemy units to shoot while moving and replaced Pak40 with Pak38
•     Waterbox to the lake on C1M6 environment scene
•     Swamp area for navmesh for C1M9/C1M10
•     Terrain Tesselation Quality as video setting option
•     StuG to Proving Grounds force pool
•     [UI] Localization for new Main Menu items
•     [UI] Main menu click & hover sounds
•     [UI] Click & hover sounds to various panels
•     Synchronization of direction of penetrating shot as well as direction of ricochette
•     [UI] KW IS(r) icon
•     [UI] Main menu overhaul
•     [UI] Battle Map new design
•     [UI] BattleMap SpawnSelector, WreckSelector, OffmapSelector buttons & animations backend added
•     [UI] In-game panels (wide screen support)

Modified:

•     Game version from 1.1.2 to 1.2.0
•     [UI] HQ improvements over wide-screen
•     [UI] Intro improvements over wide-screen
•     Optimized C1R1 scene (german repair section)
•     [UI] Spectator
•     [UI] Pause Menu
•     [UI] Battle Map before more drastic changes
•     [UI] Battle Progress
•     Drastically decreased CPU needed for animations
•     Counterattacks and hunting should now be more aggressive
•     Movement speed for units
•     Reworked how ai calculate destination points
•     Optimizing character animators when we can't see them (performance boost)

Fixed:

•     [UI] Play commander VO is now shorter
•     [UI] UI Scale changed to UI Scale match; moved slider to VIDEO tab
•     [UI] Intro canvas scaler
•     [UI] Engine icon fix
•     Vehicle being able to run down player disabled on repair scene
•     Vehicle flip-death logic disabled on repair scene
•     Wooden barrack won't be destroyed by MG fire
•     Binocular item now disables properly after reentering a tank
•     Removed too many captured tanks from german campaign captured platoon
•     KV-1C GER black interior placeholder no longer visible outside
•     Tiger I H1 radio and driver hatches material
•     Main menu UI bug with locked tutorial button after leaving Steam lobby
•     [UI] Battle Map bottom buttons scaling on low resolutions (Steam Deck etc.)
•     [UI] Weird looking player details panel after selecting one of them
•     Ammo bug for bought wrecks or captured vehicles
•     Vehicle Customization menu now correctly keeps the icons loaded if you re-enter the menu
•     Shadows of various tanks should now be better balanced
•     Increased distance of last Level of Detail for T-70
•     Issue with shadow cascades not working as they should in custom video settings
•     Decal on the front of the Stug is reversed

Thank you for your support, we are working. See you next time!
DeGenerals

[Asid]

Game Update 1.2.1
Tue, 24 February 2026



Dear Tankers and Mechanics!

Situation report
After releasing the big patch 1.2.0, several bugs appeared that we had to fix. Over the weekend, a new build was released, actually two, but there was no event. Today we made another build with fixes marked as 1.2.1. This week you can expect another update with more fixes - there is a lot to improve.

Changelog 1.2.1
Below is the full list of changes being made:

Added:

•     Small push when tank gets hit
•     Battle exit points for SM1 and SM3 scenario

Fixed:

•     Fixing varius issues
•     Issues with custom settings not properly managing shadow quality settings[Fixed] After crew repair tank, driving forward at full speed Fix
•     Destroyed vehicles slipping on ground
•     Fixed vehicle keep position after repair
•     Fixing tanks not shooting issue + ammo being restored on despawn
•     AI movement bugfixe
•     Stug III G, Panzer IVH customization issues
•     Counter attacks now should work
•     Game correctly removes destroyed vehicles points from capture zone
•     Issue where modded content with many textures in single mod didnt properly synchronize on multiplayer session
•     Issues with a modding

Modified:

•     AI speed modifier on different surfaces

Removed:

•     Offset from setting destination on ground

Sale
Our game is now 25% off. The sale will last till 27 February.

Thank you for your support, we are working. See you next time!
DeGenerals