Yes the Community Development Team is alive and well, admit it you were getting worried. Have no fear though, as we have been working tirelessly in the background on some exciting new things! Over the past few months we have continued to expand our thoughts and plans for the continued support and evolution of NS2 and you can see those ideas on our Trello Board. Currently we are putting the final touches on our CDT Build Server, this will allow the CDT more control over the build and testing process for NS2 moving forward and will also help streamline our pipeline and our long term plans. This is being worked on by McGlaspie and his big efforts are finally paying off. But what else are we doing? Why hasn’t there been a patch recently? and just How many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop? Build 275 This patch was slated to be released back in January but we found potential fixes to a few bugs that have been a nuisance for some time and decided to hold off on the release until our new build server was online. In the mean time, Matso, fsfod and a few of the programmers have been converting NS2 to compile on Visual Studio 2013, rather than the current Visual Studio 2005 NS2 currently compiles on. This will bring some real benefits and further optimize the NS2 experience. With our big upgrade and bug testing on hold for just a couple more weeks, we are hoping to get this patch out to you soon. And by soon, we mean when its ready :) On the Horizon We’ve mentioned our Trello Board many times before, but we continue to hear from around the community that they have no idea what we are working on or planning. Well I’ll just say it again, please check our Trello Board or email us with suggestions, we are always happy to hear from others in the community and we hope to find ways to solve issues that are found. That being said we have some hopeful and exciting plans for the next few months. We will be looking at a main menu refresh as well as more customization options for player and weapon skins, potential new models, maps and even possibly some new game modes. Only the Shadow Knows… One question we hear a lot is, When will we get the shadow Fade and Onos? The answer I am happy to say is SOON! Super Community Artist Rantology (official title) has been hard at work and we now have UWE approved concepts and are beginning to work with model/animators to get these finished and hooked up in game. See the final concepts below and stay tuned for more info!

A Dereliction of Duty der·e·lic·tion ˌderəˈlikSH(ə)n/ noun the state of having been abandoned and become dilapidated. I thought it prudent to add the definition for the word Derelict because it really does get to the point of why this next item is called what it is. Derelict is the newest member of the NS2 map pool and we are super excited to bring you something not only new but different than the other maps before. I won’t go into details just yet (I know you hate me for this), but let me tell you this, Derelict is visually stunning and we couldn’t be more excited. See a sneak peak at one of the rooms below, we promise more will be revealed shortly...