Community members! As we have in the past, with the Scorched Earth expansion on the way, we’d like to detail some of the future content. As usual, we mix in some studio news as well.

SP campaign

The Scorched Earth SP missions (4 for USSR, 4 for Germany) can be added to the Ostfront campaign. As you may know, we want our SP missions to be like re- enactments; we use the historical locations for each of the battles, and satellite data for the height maps. A blogpost on our website reveals just how we work to get these missions as historically accurate as we possibly can.
In this blog, we re- visit a sort of tradition of ours, which is to dive into the history of one of the missions. Today, we will show you a new Soviet SP campaign mission.

Königsberg

East of the Gdansk bay, at the estuary of the Prgolja river, lies modern day Kaliningrad. If you were to take a walk in the center of town, there is little that reminds you of what happened here in 1945; there is no trace of the utter destruction that followed one of the bloodiest sieges ever, and yet it took place here, in early 1945.
Kaliningrad was called Königsberg then, and it was the capital of East Prussia. It had already been heavily damaged in allied bombing raids in 1944; and in spite of everything that had happened in the weeks and months before the red army arrived, the local “Gauleiter” had not organized any civilian evacuation. When the red army arrived in january 1945, the city was crammed with at least 100 to 120K refugees. Once the city was encircled, there was no way out at first. But when a German counteroffensive from the direction of Pillau punched a corridor in the Soviet- held territory, many refugees were able to get away to Pillau by road. Pillau was still in German hands and evacuation by ship was the only way to escape the hell of Königsberg.


Refugees boarding a ship in Pillau, 1945

The Königsberg garrison was left behind, and ordered to fight to the last bullet and the last man, as usual in those days. They built barricades, using rubble from destroyed houses, and manned the forts.
The forts were not entirely modern, but usable for the defense. There were several concentric rings of interconnected forts and fortifications, all built in 1888, a total of 15 forts defending the inner city.
The Soviets brought plenty of artillery to the siege; in some places they had 250 guns in a single kilometer of frontline. For no less than 4 days they pounded the city. Then, on April 6th, the bombardment stopped. What was to follow was hell on earth, fought in ruined streets and against fanatical opposition.


ZIS-3 in action in Königsberg

The battle in Gates of Hell

This mission will - as always - come with a briefing to set the scene for what’s to come.


The lagoon south- west of Königsberg is called “Frisches Haff”

On to the mission itself then.
It’s April, and the stranglehold on Königsberg is getting tighter every day. The massive attacks on the outer defense lines have been short but fierce. Now, the city proper lies ahead; your sector is on the edge of the built- up area around the central railway station.
Your commanding officer tells you that your orders are clear; fight your way to the central station, clear the entire area of enemies, then link up with 31st guards rifle division who are advancing on your right flank.


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You will have to deal with those barricades and built- up defenses first! You have a choice of equipment at the start; if you pick the right doctrine you get equipped with our latest tanks and assault guns. Your assault sappers are armed to the teeth and several of them carry flamethrowers.
This should be sufficient to get you to the station, but don’t take anything for granted! Those fascists seem to grow more fanatical every day, and they will take every opportunity to slow you down.


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Once you have established contact with 31st guards and cleared out the station area, you will probably need artillery support to take on the fortified redoubt Haberberg, which dominates the other side of the station. As soon as you have neutralized the entire area, Stavka will allocate a heavy artillery unit to you. Smash them to pieces!


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Once the Haberberg position is neutralized, you cautiously advance into the city center to achieve your main objective for today, which is to take control of the greater Thorner Strasse and central station area, to clear the way for the assault wave, which will attack across the river.
Write your farewell letters and get going….


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Development

We’ve got our heads down to test the Scorched Earth package in our CBT, and as you can see in this blog, this is ongoing right now. It follows the work & CBT we did on Content Update 4, which has already been tested.
In parallel, we’re working on the next faction.
As always, we continue to work on quality at the same time; your input is appreciated & we use it to constantly improve the game!
On another note, we have translated our manual. It is now available in Russian as well. You can find it on the Ostfront store page, check the image below:



That’s it for the moment. If you want to be among the first to play the missions, be sure to wishlist the Scorched Earth expansion; for now, thanks for stopping by, and see you on the battlefield!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2123890/Call_to_Arms__Gates_of_Hell_Scorched_Earth/

Did you know?

• The 3rd Belorussian front deployed no less than 1.500.000 men to East Prussia
• Many refugees chose to cross the frozen “Frisches Haff” on foot, only to find there was no friendly territory on the other end anymore.
• The ships that took refugees out of Königsberg and Pillau usually returned with supplies for the army
• Unlike bedsprings, AT meshes offer some protection against AT projectiles.
• We regularly discuss battles like the Königsberg siege on our Discord server.