As you know, we’re currently working on the upcoming Update 0.5.5 which will bring some long-awaited improvements and features to World of Warships. We’re also tirelessly tuning and tweaking the game client to improve performance wherever possible.
One of the major changes in 0.5.5 will be the introduction of a new file structure for the client, which is aimed at achieving that and more. However, this solution will affect all of our players in no small part, which is why we’d like to take the time and tell you exactly why and how, as well as what you can do to make the process as smooth as possible.
Why are we doing this?
The World of Warships game client currently consists of more than two hundred thousand individual files. This is a huge number and that puts a strain on your computer’s resources whenever the game needs to read or write a large amount of files, like when you’re installing, patching or loading a map.
By reducing the number of files your computer has to handle we will also significantly reduce the time it needs to do that, especially for mid- and low-end systems. This has the potential to make installations finish 2-3 times quicker and can improve battle loading times by 10% to 50%, though the benefit you will see depends on the system you’ll be running the client on.
What exactly are we doing?
We’re reorganizing and combining all the small data files the client consists of into packages, as well as changing the way we store certain data.
How does it help you?
Battle load time will improve
Every map is now stored in a separate package, while ships are packed by tier. As a result reading data from your hard drive becomes faster & the battle loading time goes down.
Installation time will improve for future updates
Once the patch download is complete, there will no longer be a need to copy a large amount of files one by one.
Please note that the size of updates is not affected by this structure change, just how quickly your system can process the installation after download.
What’s the catch?
Unfortunately, the client files you already have on your computer won’t magically change to support the new structure – they will need to go through a packaging process. It is totally automatic and will start after the patch is downloaded and installed, but it can take a fairly long amount of time, depending on your system’s specifications.
According to our internal tests the whole packaging process can take anywhere from 15 minutes to a total of more than an hour to complete for the average user. Also remember, that putting more load on your system while the process is running can slow down this process.
Process steps:
- The Launcher downloads the unpacked patch. [size is approximately 3Gb]
- The Repacker moves game content into packages.
- Once the Repacker is done, an integrity check runs to verify if everything went alright.
As an alternative, there is the option to download the full game client already including the new file structure and simply reinstall the game. The size of the full client is approximately 9Gb, so this option should be preferable for users with fast and unlimited internet connections.
Users with fast, high-end computers will likely opt to download just the patch (approximately 3Gb), since the repacking process is likely to finish in reasonable time.
Package compression and mods
It’s worth pointing out two more things. First, these new file packages are not compressed – we will introduce that in future iterations to reduce the amount of space the game takes up on your hard drive.
Second, packages in World of Warships cannot be read using conventional archiving software and require a special tool to see the contents. While this means that file access for mod makers is now restricted, we are open to sharing the necessary tools with modders from our community.
Well this sucks!
We understand that any patch process is annoying when you just want to click Battle! and enjoy your game. Not only is this a big download, but the packaging will also take its time. However, we firmly believe that doing this will make everyone’s experience that much better – for some immediately speeding up their loading times and for some reducing client size in the future. Not only that, but it will also help us better control access to the contents of our game – another step on our way to combat unwanted and game-breaking modifications.
To ease the pain that such a long update process may cause, we’ll be giving 3 days of Premium Account to every player who logs into the game from the time the patch is released until May 10th, so that you can quickly reclaim any progress you might have missed out on while the client was updating.
As always, we look forward to hearing your feedback about the packaging system and the other contents of Update 0.5.5. See you in battle, Captains.
