WARWAKE

What it is

Built around three things. Stubbornly not much else.

1. 01

   Direct control of WWII warships

   You drive the ship. Rudder, throttle, turret traverse, the long lag between giving an order and the hull actually answering it. Not a menu with a battle happening somewhere behind it.

2. 02

   Fleet coordination and large-scale battles

   One ship is a duel. A line of them is a problem. The interesting part of naval warfare is what happens when several hulls have to move as one thing and someone gets it wrong.

3. 03

   Fast, cinematic — without losing the weight

   Shells take time to arrive. Ships take time to turn. Everything else should be quick: get in, get shooting, get a result. Weight where it earns its keep, speed everywhere else.

Where it goes

Three stages. Only one of them has a date.

A game this size gets built in pieces or it doesn't get built. Each stage has to stand on its own — something you can look at, and eventually something you can play.

1. 01

   Prototype

   Now — in progress

   One class of ship, one ocean, and the main battery. Ships steam, turrets train, shells land, and the water knows they're there. Everything else is placeholder.

   You can see this today, in the gallery below.

2. 02

   Playable

   To be announced

   The first build somebody other than me can drive. One hull, one sea state, one opponent. No campaign, no progression, no economy — just the helm, the guns, and the time it takes for either to answer.

   A date goes here the moment it survives a week of my own testing.

3. 03

   Fleet

   To be decided

   Several hulls moving as one thing, and the ways that goes wrong. Fleet orders, the tactical plot, screening, and battles big enough that the line matters more than any single ship in it.

   No date. One person, and this is years of work — I'd rather say nothing than put up a number I can't keep.

In engine

It runs. That's the whole claim.

Everything in this block is captured out of Unreal, not rendered offline. It's rough, most of it is placeholder, and the UI barely exists — but the ships move, the guns fire, and the water knows they're there.

Under the paint

The hull, before it got wet.

These three are offline Blender renders from the modelling pipeline — not gameplay. Included because the asset work is where most of the hours went, and it's easier to judge a hull in flat light.