Hello and welcome back to another update of Forgotten Hope 2. After two weeks without news it is time to show you a little more of the mod's progress.

The Flugabwehr-Kanone 18, probably the most well known artillery piece of the war, is technically an anti aircraft artillery gun, but that is an oversimplification. Like its opponents, the Wehrmacht of 1939 had underestimated the need for powerful anti-tank guns and equipped its anti-tank units with weapons that proved too small for their job. Unlike other armed forces, it had a ready substitute for the underpowered AT guns already in place -- the notorious '88'.

Although designed for an anti-air role, and deployed in large numbers by the Wehrmacht, which emphasized the tactical use of air power in its doctrines, its high velocity projectiles were also deadly to enemy armor. While the armies of other nations struggled to play catch-up, Germany had an effective anti-tank weapon avaialble in abundance from the start of the conflict. Also useful as direct support artillery it was a flexible and justly feared weapon that deserves much of the credit for creating the legend of German armored prowess. Arisaka created the model and the paintjob is by Jimbob.

Presented for the first time in our last update we lost little time bringing the Universal Carrier into the game. It is ready for action as you can see on the following screens shot by German intelligence. Built in huge numbers, the Universal Carrier was used for a multitude of roles. Several Bren Carriers were captured by the Wehrmacht (many after Dunkirk) the war and refitted with German markings and weapons. The Universal Carrier was modeled by OMNI and Toddel, got its wheels from Rad and was coded into game by ctz.

Where the big guns could not reach, the 'flying artillery' did the job. The Junkers Ju 87B2 'Stuka' was a siren-equipped dive bomber capable of carrying up to 500kg bombs as well as two 7.92mm forward machineguns 17. For self-defence it carried one additional 7.92mm rear MG 15, which was modeled by K96 and skinned by ctz. The aircraft model itself was made by K96 and skinned by K96 and AceS. Say thank you for the code to ctz. All the renders can be found here.

Protecting the humble Universal Carrier form the ravages of Flak 88s and Ju 87s, we offer the ingame version of the Supermarine Spitfire. In total, 6.479 of the Mk V took to the skies during WWII. Considered to be one of the best fighters of the war, its armament consisted of four .303 machine guns and two 20mm Hispano cannons. The Spitfire was modeled by Rad, skinned by Toddel and coded by ctz. For the renders have a look here.

That's all for today, but be sure to come back for another Forgotten Hope update. And don't forget to join us on IRC. Feel free to visit our public forums to discuss this update or other news.

Hello and welcome back to another update of Forgotten Hope 2.

First up this week are ingame shots of the German light armoured reconnaissance vehicle Sd.Kfz. 222. Driven by a Horch 3.5 petrol engine its 90 horsepower allowed a maximum cruising speed of 80 km/h and a cross-country speed of 40 km/h. The Sonderkraftfahrzeug 222 was armed with a 2 cm KwK 30 L/55 autocannon and a 7.92 mm Maschinengewehr 34 machine gun. It was modelled by Lude, Rad and AceS, who did the skinning and created the old SdKfz 222 for the BF1942 version already. And last but not least it was deployed into the game by ctz.

Some people wonder about the name seeing the size of the Universal Carrier. But size does not always matter. Often referred to as the Bren Gun carrier (although not always carrying a Bren) this small vehicle showed as very reliable, multirole vehicle. Wether you needed a troop transport or just a machine gun platform - this vehicle could deliver and in the end it was the most numerous armoured fighting vehicle in history with more than 113,000 built! Usually it came along with a 0.303 Bren Gun or 0.55 in Boys anti-tank rifle. Its maximum speed was 48 km/h. The Universal Carrier was modeled by OMNI and Toddel, got its set of wheels from Rad and was coded into game by ctz.

Our last subject is the AEC 4x4 Armoured Command Vehicle. Nicknamed the "Dorchester" after the luxurious London hotel, it had a maximum speed of 60 km/h with a total weight of 11 tons driven by a AEC 187 6 cyl diesel engine delivering 95hp.

This vehicle will serve the commander as another access point to his special abilities. He will only be able to make use of these features being seated inside the Dorchester or at a radio, which were shown before in a previous update.

Today we present the original British version and additionally one of the three captured by the Germans, who called the vehicle Mammut ("giant"). Two of them, named Max and Moritz (which you see here), were employed by Rommel and his staff throughout the campaign. The Dorchester was modelled by ctz and Toddel, skinned by Toddel, and the wheels were created by Rad.

That's all for today, but be sure to come back for another Forgotten Hope update. And don't forget to join us on IRC. Feel free to visit our public forums to discuss this update or other news.

Hello and welcome back to another update of Forgotten Hope 2. It's been a while since we last showedcased new stuff. Today the time has come to change that. We would like to introduce a few features of the gameplay, 2 new vehicles and 2 handweapons.

First up this week we have some details of some of the gameplay features you will find in Forgotten Hope 2.

Push Mode
For those who have played the original Forgotten Hope, this will be a well understood concept. In Forgotten Hope 2, there are many improvements and refinements. Most notably, the avenues of attack and contention of capture points is shown and updated on each player's minimap. This provides clear and simple feedback on the progress of the map and is a great improvement on the confusion occasionally caused by Push in Forgotten Hope, or large volumes of text instructions seen in other mods which implement variations on this concept.

Artillery Reload Times
In Forgotten Hope 2 artillery reload time is controllable by mappers. In Battlefield 2 mods released so far, this has been fixed at 60 seconds. This allows us to implement realistically powerful artillery shelling, without destroying gameplay.

Kit Limiting
Kit limiting is an important feature in Forgotten Hope 2, allowing mappers to control numbers of specialised or powerful weapons. This, in turn, allows these weapons to be realistically lethal and accurate.

A mapper defines a percentage for each limited kit. For example, if 10% is applied to the Bren MK1 kit and 25 players are on your team, 3 Bren MK1s will be available for use.

This system also restricts an Officer kit to use by fireteam leaders and commanders. This acts to make your commanding officers more recognisable on the battlefield by having more mature faces, different headwear, different uniform markings, and so on.

Spotting
The spotting system has been overhauled. Grunts yell out loud. They do not communicate their discovery of enemies to their team via radio, nor is a red marker placed on the unit. Fireteam leaders do communicate spots using the radio. Markers are placed on enemy units using the binoculars.

This provides increased atmosphere in two ways: much less radio spam, and soldiers close-by yelling to communicate.

Next up! This supply parachute is based on the British X9 parachute. It was modelled, skinned and coded by ctz. The British X9 and German RZ20 parachutes will be shown later.

Both weapons we would like to showoff today are limited in range but make all up with their devastating effect. First item we have is the German Geballte Ladung coming along with 3kg of explosives. It was made by Knoffhoff and will serve you well against anything even medium tanks. But use them wisely. The danger of friendly losses is high if used wrong. The charge was coded by ctz and skillfully animated by Killi Vanilli.

There's an interesting german propoganda film over at YouTube showing use of this and other infantry anti-tank weapons.

The second weapon is all against tanks. The British GS Mk. V AT Mine was created by ctz including the code and animated by Killi Vanilli.

Time to move on quickly with the vehicles. And there is no better choice than the 80 km/h fast Marmon-Herrington Mk. III A. Toddel designed this armored reconaissance vehicle. The version you see is non-standard equipped, carrying a single Breda 20mm machinegun, which should be able to deal with any infantry threat encountering you. The reason for the armament upgrade, were dire supply and ammo shortages, as it was common in the African theatre. This vehicle can act in anti-aircraft, anti-personnel and limited anti-armour roles, not only due to the code written by ctz.

Our last vehicle for today is a little slower than the first and not really armed any better. The Italian Carro Armato carried a 20mm Breda M35 and an additional 8mm Breda M38. Its maximum speed on road was 42 km/h. The light tank was modeled by Lude and Montoya. The paint was delivered by Toddel.

That's all for today, but be sure to come back for another Forgotten Hope update. And don't forget to join us on IRC. Feel free to visit our public forums to discuss this update or other news.