Being outlined before, these changes had to come asap. Today, May 17th, all the servers will be down beginning at 1:00 PM PT making it ready for the game update. The downtime will be approximately 6 hours.
Now, speaking about the Gunplay and Hitreg updates, the game focuses on improving and optimizing both of them. By gunplay is meant on lag compensation, trajectories, and projectile tracking.
All the lag has been optimized to provide a better and more accurate player positioning knowing that this works best for players with low ping. The Projectile tracking is now registering the hits faster and consistently. Players will be able to shoot an object without blocking the firing completely. Previously we all know it was blocked from firing on objects, now, it’s completely the opposite, making the animation go through.
Shotgun Tweaks
As a bigger update, shotguns will receive their change too, making sure they will do their join in close range fights. That’s why the pellet spread is now with some given variance instead of random. Also, the pellets number is increased, however, the damage per pellet is decreased. The normal damage fall over distance is removed as the new spread mechanic is going to reduce the number of pellets calculating by how further away your target is.
Arena Changes
Globally, their arena has been changed including a major update which should fix some lighting issues, terrain changes, and new POIs.
H1Z1 needed this kind of changes knowing that their competitor PUBG starts to take a bug chunk of H1Z1 King of the Kill players.
Besides the three new POIs, there are going to come nine additional loot spots and small residential areas southeast of The Villas, together with roads that are connecting Hillside Villas and Morton Distribution.
Decreased fog, small outline on lootable objects at close proximity and remove of fire extinguishers are now removed from the Arena. One of the best changes are probably the shadows, which are not lightened for better visibility, knowing that the game received a lot of negative critics for this.
Vehicles
H1Z1: King of the Kill will receive some vehicle changes too which are going to spawn randomly in the Arena making it easier to spot from parachutes and distinguishing them from non-drivable vehicles.
Character and Inventory
The inventory and the crafting panels are now combined becoming it manageable in one window, knowing that this is probably the most needed change in order to have a successful H1Z1 game session.
That’s not it, bug fixes are going to be deployed today too. H1Z1 should overall become a better game to play, knowing that we’re speaking about some big time changes. As of this time, the game servers are probably down applying those changes, we hope that when everything’s back and running, players will be more than happy to play H1Z1 King of the Kill.
Bug Fixes
- Crafting & Healing timer has been moved so it no longer obscures the crosshair.
- Items from the Weekend Challenge (5/13 – 5/14) will be granted with this update.
- When using classic hit markers, the marker will turn bold for headshots.
- Incoming hit sounds should more clearly distinguish headshots from body shots.
- In team games, teammate chevrons have been removed to lessen the visual distraction they were providing. Activate free look (default: alt) to see teammate nameplates at unlimited range.
- Body armor (laminated and makeshift) now always show up on top of parkas.
- Players can now disable vehicle degradation sound effects in the useroptions.ini by editing the VehicleDegradationVolume=1 line.
- When you get a kill, there is a new UI element that will indicate the name and tier of the player you killed as well as any XP gained as a result.
- Icons on the Main Menu have been added to let you know when you have a new item in your character inventory or when there is a sale in the Marketplace.
- To make navigation easier, we combined the Unlocked and Locked Crates into a single view.
- Items in the Appearance menu now show how to acquire the item (Crate, Scrapyard, etc).
- Ping display in the HUD will update more often than it used to.
- The Inventory “More Info” panel will now be closed by default.
- Parachutes should no longer spin when starting a match.
- Removed collision from arrows once they’re stuck in a target to prevent them from blocking other projectiles.
- You should once again be able to use voice chat after dying using mouse buttons.
- Stun grenades will now affect players in vehicles.
- Adjusted the model of the taxi to more precisely match the police car (the collisions were already identical).
- Fixed camera issues that could occur when entering a vehicle while prone or crouched.
- Fixed the Twitch Prime offroader skin not correctly applying in-game.
- Fixed several HUD elements that were displayed incorrectly in some languages.
- Kill feed should no longer overlap the score elements in team matches.
- Region should no longer change itself after selecting one then accessing Settings.
- Fixed an issue where right-clicking on a skin you don’t own could cause the item you previously had highlighted to be scrapped.
- Button prompt to open/close Inventory will now update based on keybinding selection.
- Pressing escape will now cancel a change in quantity on Inventory stacks.
- Stack-splitting will no longer lose functionality if the menu is exited after changing quantity.
At last, do not worry, skirmishes have returned back in King of the Kill and will be available on weekends with rotating game types on regular basis. This Update should pretty much revive the game a little bit after PUBG’s big swing. Tell us your thoughts on this update in the comments down below. Do you think that this update will bring H1Z1 King of the Kill back to number 1? In approximately 5 hours from now, we’ll find out what’s going to happen!
Previously written H1Z1 related articles:
H1Z1: King of the Kill Update 4/6 Adds Team Follow Camera & New Hit Feedback
H1Z1 King of the Kill: January Test Servers Update
