Total War news

FatJoe has been a betatester for Forgotten Hope for a very long time and he has done many of our promotional images and even some vehicle skins. Now, he is officially developer. Welcome FatJoe

You may have already guessed the first of our renders today, as this vehicle was added to the website's 'vehicle' section last week. Of course, you could only see a small picture then, now you have the full resolution render of the M4A1(76)W Medium Tank. It was modeled and skinned by Toddel.

The M4A1(76)W Medium Tank is quite like the regular M4A1 Sherman in most respects, but it has one major advantage - its 76mm M1 gun. Firing the same projectiles as the M10 Tank Destroyer, but using a different casing, the 76mm M1 gun had penetrating capabilities comparable to the 85mm gun on the Soviet T34/85. This large improvement over the regular 75mm Shermans and even the M10 meant that this Sherman was much more of a match against the heavy German Panthers, which were very common in Western Normandy.

The next render is of the American AN-M14 Thermite Grenade and it was made by Toddel.

These Thermite Grenades are the ones that were used to disable the guns at Pointe Du Hoc. They entered service in 1943 and are still being used by the US armed forces today (though with a different thermite compound). The thermite reaction causes no explosion, so it can be used quietly. Instead, the reaction creates such high temperatures that the metal parts of whatever is being disabled are welded together. Disabling an artillery piece with one of these grenades can be done in various ways; The grenade can be inserted into the breech, making it impossible to load. Another way is to drop it down the muzzle, where it ruins the barrel, causing any rounds that are fired to get stuck and blow the gun to pieces. One last way to disable the gun, is to use the thermite reaction to weld together the traversing and elevation mechanisms, making it impossible to aim the gun.

Although our betatesters are always working hard to make us get rid of all the bugs, here's one that we think they won't mind. The Volkswagen Beetle, imported from Forgotten Hope 1.

Our final item of today is seventh and last map of Forgotten Hope 2.2. There are, of course, many more maps being worked on, but they will not be ready in time for the coming release. This map is about Operation Totalize and it was made by Fenring.

Operation Totalize was the breakthrough attempt of the Canadian First Army towards the city of Falaise on August 8th. After the success of Operation Cobra and the American advances to the west, the British and Canadians were desperately trying to break through the German lines to cut off their route of retreat and encircle the German Seventh Army. Although the Canadian forces had tried to break the German lines before, in Operations Atlantic and Spring, these efforts had been unsuccessful. Operation Totalize wasn't as much a success as the Allied planners had in mind, but it certainly accomplished more than the previous attempts. In just five days, the Canadian forces had advanced 14 kilometres, stopping only 11 kilometres short of Falaise. Operation Totalize was immediately followed by Operation Tractable (starting August 14th), which again brought the allies to the outskirts of Falaise and much closer to cutting off the retreating German army.

As usual, you can find this map's minimap in the 'maps' section in the menu to the left.