(this announcement is now outdated)

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2078450/view/515210714689832129

Hey folks.

Today we officially launched Warhammer 40,000: Speed Freeks on Steam, and whilst the game is now officially out of Early Access, we know the transition has not gone smoothly for many of you.

Connectivity problems caused by our shift from dedicated servers to a player-hosted system have made it difficult for players to find and join matches consistently. We deployed an update shortly after launch today in an attempt to address some of these issues, but unfortunately it did not resolve the core problems.

The development team is working through the night to bring the game back to full online functionality as soon as possible and fully focused on identifying and implementing a reliable fix.

We’re hugely grateful to the community for your patience, feedback, and support. Every bug report and shared log is helping us move faster towards a solution.

We’ll continue to provide regular updates as work progresses. Please do continue to report bugs, issues and any hiccups you have had so far & we'll continue to answer questions in the discussions as we see them.

Thank for your your patience.

We’re pumped to announce the 1.0 launch of Speed Freeks, meaning the game is leaving Steam early access - a period in which we gathered and implemented so much valuable feedback from our dedicated players.

We thank each and every one of you for putting even a bit of time into playing the game and telling us about it, it truly made the game so much better.

Developing this game has been a hell of a turbulent ride with it not only being an ambitious project for our small team, but also working with the big, awesome IP that is Warhammer 40,000.

In addition to this, we’ve had to hastily partner with a different publisher since our last announcement, that publisher being Wired Productions. They’re picking up the torch from PLAION, who helped us get through most of development so far - almost all the way up to launch. We thank PLAION for their support of the game, and Wired for jumping in to take it to the 1.0 finish line.

We understand that it’s been a while since we last dropped news or an update, but we’ve been spending our time converting the game to its new format, getting the planned content in-game, and getting accustomed to things.

This 1.0 launch marks not only the important milestone of leaving early access, but also a switch from the Free-to-Play model to a more traditional priced one. This is something we’re very excited about since it allows us to focus more on the features that players want. For instance, as opposed to the F2P version, the game now has:

• Player-hosted servers with custom settings
  
• A game browser
  
• Solo play option
  
• 150+ items to unlock that are included in the base game (not behind a paywall as with F2P)
  
• No 3rd party account requirement (!)

These are things that the community has been hoping for, and now we can actually say they are implemented - thanks to us being able to leave F2P behind.
And that’s not all! This 1.0 update comes with a wealth of new stuff for you’z ta sink yer teef into. Here’s the biggest changes/additions, with full changelist further down in the announcement:

Get da boyz into the back and wreak some havoc!

This vehicle is packed full of Orks, packing a real punch with its crushing ladder slam and especially the dakka overdrive ability. A fearsome ambusher, the Trukk is able to swing a battle by coming in and suddenly laying down a ton of firepower.

This mode allows players to create a match on any map, without an overall game mode, free to drive around and experiment if they wish. But they can also place waypoints in succession for custom races, which allows for a ton of creativity and experimentation for new racing routes.

Our prettiest levels yet, Da Dust Up and Da Gorge are thematic maps that change up the play style for both Deff Rally and Kill Konvoy modes. Both maps have vastly different lighting versions, as well.

“Wot’z a zoggin’ Pit Boss”, you say? We’ve added a bunch of mean looking Orks to the game for players to unlock and customize. These Orks show up in the screen shown to your enemies when you kill them, plus the end sequence of each match, and in the main menu - adding plenty of character to your krumpin’.

This game-changing feature allows players to create their own private or public lobbies with custom settings

And the new Game Browser helps people find lobbies instead of just matchmaking

One thing we came very close to adding for launch is the game’s Warbands system, which is essentially a clan/club system where players can create a Warband, have other players join, use a tag, and unlock exclusive items through progression. This feature will be coming relatively soon after launch.

The full changelist for the launch version can be found here:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/2078450/discussions/0/591772052728326325/

--------------------------------------------------------
As usual, we’d love to hear from our community about this update and your thoughts on our new approach to the game, so please drop us feedback on the official Discord:
https://discord.gg/mk2w9rMY
--------------------------------------------------------

And just a note that for launch we've also got the previous shop item Supporters Pack on Steam (the only DLC right now). It'll be dropping next week if you or your mates want to wishlist it 👌
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3750860/Warhammer_40000_Speed_Freeks__Supporters_Pack/