As 2023 winds down, we wanted to give everyone a final update on development for the year, including information on the next minor update as well as an early look at what's to come beyond that.
The team has worked tremendously hard this year shipping four updates including Naval Warfare and needs some down time to be with their family and friends over the holidays. While our live and moderation teams will still be supporting the game throughout this time, most the dev team will be taking some well deserved time off for rest and recuperation. If we are quiet, rest assured that we'll be heads down looking at feedback and working hard on the next update when the new year rolls around.
We hope everyone has a safe and happy holidays. See you all in 2024!
Roadmap
As mentioned previously, the plan was to do one more minor update before the end of the year.
After Update 55, we will continue to expand on the Naval game that was introduced back in October. In the new year, Update 56 will arrive and will add new naval vehicles for each faction. A Frigate class ship will be added to the Warden navy and a Submarine class vessel will be added to the Colonial fleet. We’re excited to provide each faction with the gameplay that is currently only accessible to one side or the other.
Throughout next year, the plan is to go back and refine various parts of the game, iterating on existing features rather than building entirely new systems. We know that QoL is a top priority for the community so that’s something we’re also going to be working on.
In terms of the bigger picture, up until now we’ve been working off of an internal roadmap that included Trains, Facilities, Towing, and a Naval revamp. It was extremely challenging pulling off major updates year after year but we really wanted to get Naval Warfare in to complete the roadmap as it’s always been to us a foundational part of the persistent war, not to mention one of the most highly requested features from the community. With that final piece of the puzzle in place and the internal roadmap complete, the team will be taking a break from major updates to focus on refreshing, but not reinventing existing systems for awhile.
Make no mistake though, we are developing a brand new roadmap for the next phase of development but it will take some time. Major updates will be part of that next phase and we're in the early stages of planning some big exciting things but don’t expect that to arrive any time soon. The Foxhole development team will continue to grow and updates will continue to be delivered for many years to come.
Update 55
There is some important context to keep in mind for the changes going into Update 55. First of all, this will probably be one of our smallest updates of the year. Between supporting Update 54 and the work that will come in Update 56 in the new year, the scope of Update 55 had to be small.
The main focus has been on addressing an internal backlog of fixes and tweaks that have accumulated over the last while as we focused on the naval update. It's important to understand that the changes that end up in updates like this aren't always based on what is deemed the highest priority feedback to action but rather on current team resources available and other circumstantial factors.
Update 55 will have game balance changes, a lot of bug fixes, and a handful of small improvements such as those shown below. For the full list of changes, look out for the dev branch release notes which will be launching later today.
We understand that there are many other changes the community is requesting based on the current war. We also know there have been requests for more QoL features. We are looking into addressing more of these issues in the updates coming in the new year.
 Hotkeys for tab selection |  Build ghosts now start rotated to the camera orientation |  AFK players are removed from queued regions |
 Improved vehicle tooltips with more information |  Additional vehicle protection for disconnects and recovery mode |  Processed Construction Material production without Components |
 Engine Reversal maneuverability significantly increased |  All gunner positions now show remaining ammo in inventory |  Shippage storage UI improvements |