Some new CS screenshots

[Crossroads]

Don't like the colors in the toolbar. Why don't you just use one color for all the games?

You mean East Front? 

Each game has a holistic color scheme, it is not just the Toolbar but windows, frames, dialogs, sidebar art and so forth. 

Color schemes were picked per a camo scheme of the era, so for instance Middle East has Field Drab + Sand, and Vietnam currently has a Green Drab scheme. Olive Drab was tested as well, but it is very dark, so washed out green was considered more in the tune. 

For EFIII, Feldgrau was tested together with Panzergrau, and the latter was picked, not least for the quite menacing effect it has, but also as EFII used grey in its art as well.

As for Toolbars, the icons in them remain the same: white for unselected, yellow for selected. Button rows will follow the game color scheme, as you can compare between Middle East and East Front. Vietnam screenshots are also available at the Matrix Middle East forum, as well as at the Gallery section of our website, see the link below.

[Crossroads]

I'm not liking the look of the terrain ... at all.

The toolbar looks like a mock up and will be refined in a future presentation?



HSL

You mean the East Front 2D terrain? It is not that different from the Mediterranean 2D terrain in Middle East at the moment, but in due time there's subtle differences I hope. That is a temperate forest map, but for Taiga for instance forests will be fir forests and so forth. 

Good news might be that I am sure there'll be mods to replace it soon enough, for instance I would not bet against Mike releasing one of his textured terrain mods once the game is out   

As for the Toolbar, that's the real deal. The design was to have full options for the three ways to access game functions: game menu, hot keys, and toolbar icons. Toolbar is quite maxed out though, if something wants to be added, something else should come off, imho at least. 

Three sizes, that's Large there, there's also Medium and Small, and None too in case it is not needed per use of hot keys or menu for instance.

[Herr Straße Laufer]

No, the CS terrain in 3-D is better than your terrain above.
Obviously you have the in between "closer 2-D" (which was one of the only things I liked about ME) in your picture which JTCS does not have (nor will ever have as you abandon it further).

I think that terrain is too "Tiller" Panzer Battles"ish". Just personal opinion of course (which also does not matter at this point).



HSL

[Crossroads]

That's actually a new 2D Zoom-In view available as of Middle East 2.0 engine, there. It is 50% larger than the Zoom-In view of the Middle East 1.x, which is now called 2D Normal view. Right click the image to open in a new tab to see it in actual size.

I am really liking the new Zoom-In views both for 3D and 2D, so much larger, they bring the tactical feel back to CS in many ways, as displays and screen resolutions have gotten bigger and bigger. With them, you can really concentrate at Coy level tasks again, as that is what you see in the display, like with the EF screenshot.

[Big Ivan]

Hello Battle Kat,

Some feedback if I may,

I like the toolbar. Panzergrau background with white and yellow highlight is great on my old eyes.

The 2D icons have the 3D symbols where you can see direction unit is pointing, not bad. Would like to see 2D black unit profiles like was presented eons ago in PB, PL and AIW. That look has always been my favorite especially in CSME just my preference though!

Notice you have the Wehrmacht German Cross and Soviet Red Star. Think the Red Star could be a bit larger, can't really see it behind the truck symbol. German cross looks OK as is.

Question, will you do the classic SS runes(lighting bolts) for the SS or something different? Thought I remember seeing the runes were illegal in some countries.

Curious, who are the guys(Nation) in the blue platoon bottom center?

Finally the 2D terrain is not bad. Maybe the buildings in the villages could be darkened just a little bit. But the river and stream contrast well as do the major and minor roads.

Thanks for the post and the look ahead!

ItB

[Crossroads]

Good call on the Red Star having room to be larger! I'll add it to my task list.

As for black 2D unit profiles, that's what they'll be, in one form another.

Mike did a tremendous job on CSME with the color profiles, but the hours are just not there to repeat that any longer.

Black profiles are camo neutral, which makes them more reusable: Pz III in Poland'39, France'40, Russia'41 and Tunisia'42 will all be served with the same profile.

There won't be swastikas in the game, and likely no rune graphics either. They will be substituted with something that are not against the German law. Easy to mod for those "Historical Flags" purposes by community, but as a commercial game they won't be included.

Finally, the guys on Blue are Finns, on their tentative chit. I was considering grey first, but thought why not make them properly blue instead.

All chit colors there are placeholders at the moment, I have chits themselves, insignias, and stat backgrounds all on separate layers on my graphics file, so can alter them at will.

[Aces8]

I think the East Front stuff looks pretty good.

[Big Ivan]

I think the East Front stuff looks pretty good.

+1 Aces8

Have to agree with you, so far not bad!

ItB