ATS: Screenshot teasing

Last week we released a short cryptic video, giving you a clue of what map expansion will be arriving later this year for American Truck Simulator.

With many of you making guesses on what could be next, we are excited to share with you a new batch of screenshots from this work in progress project.

We are sure you will spot a few clues which might give you the answer of where our next map expansion will be. One thing is for sure that this state is very diverse in its landscapes. From red rocks to thick forests to great lakes, this state seems to have it all!

Where have these shots been taken? All will bee revealed in the future...

Crossing the gap

Following the latest mini-update for 1.35 and the recently released Washington map expansion and Forest Machinery DLC, we think that it is time to highlight the most important feature extension.

Since the announcement of Beyond the Baltic Sea, you have been speculating on how we are going to solve the issue that arises when someone owns a map expansion that is without a direct connection to the base game map (and possibly other map expansions one may have). The release of Washington marks the first time that this has happened in the history of our games (if a player did not already own the Oregon DLC).

Right from the Closed Beta for the 1.35 Update, you've had the option to buy garages online. This is tailored mostly for our seasoned gamers who already have the required number of garages and some spare cash. New players will have to work to unlock this privilege.

For new players who are just getting into our games, we're adding a second option based on a wider range of Quick Job starting locations. This allows for a new trucker to explore any part of the map (enabling one to purchase a garage there) and to then teleport between purchased garages. We hope that this resolves the issue caused by unconnected map expansions for everyone, both for now and for the future.

In more news, we have just added new Steam achievements for the Forest Machinery DLC (you didn't think we'd leave you achievement-less, right? :) ).

SCS On The Road - Truck Event Austria

That's right - our sim trailer is repaired and ready to roll out again! And the first destination we're going to is Truck Event Austria, which is happening at Wels, this Saturday, on June 29, 2019.

Just a reminder if you haven't seen our previous post - you can look forward to an area of 27,500 m² with more than 500 polished show trucks with their proud owners from Austria, Germany and Switzerland, plus lots of different attractions and activities for everyone, be it for a kid or a seasoned trucker. Just check out last year's video! This year they are planning to go even bigger than what you can see here! Are you going to be there?

If you can't make it to this event, check out our calendar below for other opportunities to meet us. See you soon!

Road To The Black Sea: Border Crossings

Across most of Europe, you will find that a majority of countries share open inter-state borders as part of the Schengen Agreement. This allows for a free flow of people and an easier flow of goods between nations, which makes those long-haul journeys a little bit easier; however entry for the Balkans region from Hungary into Romania is much stricter.

After our first iteration of border crossings outside of the EU's Schengen area in Beyond the Baltic Sea, our teams have made improvements to create a more functioning border for our players to experience.

In our upcoming map expansion, you will find two border crossings between Hungary & Romania, three between Romania & Bulgaria and two of the largest and most complicated crossings between Bulgaria & Turkey.

These borders represent our first implementation of creating a more realistic border experience, which has been created using unique assets, and with new procedures in place; with plans to improve them further with future development and expansions.

We look forward to sharing more information about this upcoming map expansion, just remember to have your truck in order before crossing the border... Papers Please!

Careers at SCS Software

Having a fan community as great as the one we have brings many benefits. You may have noticed that there's a good number of people on the SCS team who were hired from the community. They ended up working full time on what was once “only” their favourite game. We're sure that names like 50Keda, SiSL, Mandelsoft, LondonLad, RootKiller, Natvander, Oscar and others are well known to many among you - and every single one of them has brought a unique approach to help our games grow.

We have had great experiences with modders and content creators joining our team. As we still continue to grow in the effort to improve the quality and scope of future projects, we've decided to approach you, our community about our open job opportunities. If you have ever given any thought about joining SCS Software team, now's the best time to do that!

Currently, we have 9 open positions which you can browse in detail on our company career page. For each of these positions, we are open to accepting more applicants. Let's introduce the 3 main openings!

World/ Map designer

We are looking for talented Junior and Senior map designers. Right now we're looking for a good number of both, as we're trying to expand our map teams and speed up production. So if you already have some game design experience or better yet, experience with making/modifying maps for our games, or you simply feel you got the talent and love for our games, you're who we're looking for!

3D artist

We're also looking for Junior and Senior 3D artists. If you have working experience in Maya, Photoshop and a portfolio featuring your professional or private 3D work, do not hesitate to contact us. There's a wide variety of possible work specialisations and we'll be happy to go through them with you to find the one that interests you most!

Programmer

There are two options for you. As a "regular" programmer; you are strong in C++ and well versed with common development tasks such as debugging, profiling, and VCS management. You can focus on a specific part of our game development; one which is best suited to your skillset (see "Considerable pluses").

Or if your interest is programming and also graphics, you may be suited for the position of Maya Specialist. You will be working in close cooperation with our graphics team to create new tools and improvements, giving them more and better options for future projects!

Languages used in our office are Czech and English, so the ability to speak one of them well is needed. However, the most important part is the passion for our games.

All these positions are full-time and based in our Prague studio, we'll be happy to give a hand if you need to relocate. After all, living in one of the most beautiful and safest cities in Europe while working on something you love sounds like a great idea, right? :)

Creating some buzz

Would you beelieve us if we told you there is more to come?

With another map expansion in the works for release later this year, we thought to tease you a little bit with this short video before we make any sort of official announcement.

SCS On The Road: FIA ETRC Hungaroring

After a two-week break, it's time to hit the road again! Our next destination is the famous Hungaroring in Hungary.

If you plan to be attending this round of the races on the 22nd and 23rd of June, be sure to stop by at the Fan Village to take a ride on our 4D Motion Seat, which is a must-try experience! You also may find yourself lucky enough to be walking away with a piece of our merchandise for free.

You can find us under one roof with our partnered company GRAMMER, with whom we are teaming up with for all of the FIA ETRC 2019 events. Be sure to look out for the ETS2/GRAMMER themed container.

Also, if you've missed out on some of our posts from our Instagram or Twitter profiles, on-location from events we've participated in recently, you can catch up with our photo albums on the SCS Software Facebook page, or you can watch this short recap below. We hope that this video will inspire you to meet with our On The Road team at future events.

We also had the exciting opportunity to be able to be a part of the Scania Driver Competitions Finals in Sodertalje in Sweden! It was a lot of fun to be among all the visitors and finalists of this amazing trucking event.

We also had the opportunity to meet with some of the most skilled truck drivers found in Europe, who also enjoyed trying out our simulator. Our congratulations go out to the winner of the event, Andreas who was representing Norway! Your skills and pace were unmatched!

With many more exciting events planned this year, you can find a list of where we will be attending on our SCS Calendar. Be sure to check if we are visiting near you soon! 

Washington: Community Showcase

With the recent release of Washington for American Truck Simulator, many of you have been actively engaged in sharing your photos and videos, on your journey through this new map expansion.

With so many to choose from, we've decided to showcase a small handful of the images which you have captured in this slideshow below.

Along with these beautiful screenshots, many of you have also decided to record your journeys on YouTube and give your first impressions and thoughts on Washington. Here is just a small selection of our community's creative work!

We love all the pictures and videos you send us, and thank you for your hard work in creating them; and look forward to seeing many more as you explore more of this beautiful state.

If you want to see many more screenshots and videos like the ones featured below, you can find more of them shared on our Twitter, Instagram and Facebook!

#IDriveDAF competition: results

After our previous contests, we were sure that you won't let us down when we started the #IDriveDAF competition - and you didn't. There were over 3,000(!) valid contest entries on specified social media, and a lot more posted on the World of Trucks galleries, community sites, FB fan-sites, and other places.

Judging this many entries was a very hard task. With the "semifinal" pick counting more than 100 pictures, we felt bad for every single one of those discarded as we moved towards the final selection. Pretty often a dozen of you had the same idea for the shot and having to choose only one was very difficult. Sadder still was to exclude wonderful pictures, where the author forgot to tag SCS software or DAF trucks and unfortunately didn't qualify. Nevertheless, we had to choose some winners - and here they are!

First place and winner of the DAF miniature truck (large) + SCS hoodie,
T-shirt and hat is:

Michael Snippe

Second place and winner of the DAF jacket + SCS hoodie and T-shirt is:

eurotruckdriver2

Third place and winner of the DAF travel bag + SCS T-shirt set and hat is:

杨胜秋

Fourth place and winner of the DAF polo shirt + SCS mug set de Luxe or travel mug set and lunchbox is:

ArikTheBuilder

Fifth place and winner of the DAF miniature truck (small) + SCS bag and lanyard is:

jecafm

All the winners above will be contacted shortly via the same platform they entered through;  if you're one of them, do check your messages! They will also receive a Steam key from our catalogue of their choosing.

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We and DAF Trucks both are very happy that you guys have enjoyed the contest so much - and thus we've decided to reward a few more of you, in addition to the original 5 winners, so here are some honourable mentions picked from the huge number of other wonderful screenshots that didn't make it to the top.

Those who submitted these selected images will receive a Steam key from our catalogue of their choosing. Perhaps you would like to express your love for these pictures too; the names are hyperlinked, so you are welcome to click on their names and give them a like! Some were really creative, especially on the start of the contests, when hunt for the locations from the video was most intensive! :)

So in no particular order, here they are: Vyacheslav88 ; transnet_group ; sendlok_pl ; mrandytf ; NIHONSAKARI ; Evisson Santos ; SimülasyonTÜRK ; Rikard Johansson ; Christopher Stolzke ; n.anderson

Despite the careful pick from both SCS software and DAF trucks, there are still many more amazing pictures - so if you want to see more, just search for #IDriveDAF!

We would like to express a massive thank you to all participants. Keep on trucking!

Black Sea: Turkey

With players of our American Truck Simulator busy with Washington and Forest Machinery, it's time to show some more of the next expansion for Euro Truck Simulator 2. This time, Turkey!

Turkey is a pretty big country (783,356 square kilometers) with a population of more than 80 million people. However, Road to the Black Sea will feature only the European part. This part is bordered by Bulgaria and Greece. It says something about the history of this region - from Ancient Greece, through the Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire and Ottoman Empire to the modern Republic of Turkey, this land has seen it all.

Thus, you'll find a solid number of landmarks, historical buildings and remnants of the past. Edirne, for example, one of the first cities you'll encounter upon entering Turkey, was founded by the Roman Emperor Hadrian, on the place of the ancient Thracian settlement and later served as the third capital city of the Ottoman Empire.

Trucking-wise, Turkey is a great country. The profession of a truck driver is one of high esteem there so anything connected with trucking is usually of a high standard - be it truck stops, gas stations or anything else. But that is a theme for future blog posts. For now, we offer these early screenshots, but we can't wait to reveal more!

Washington Released!

We are excited to announce the official release of our newest map expansion, Washington for American Truck Simulator!

We also have more surprises under the hood today, with the release of the Forest Machinery DLC.

This brand new trailer pack offers new and unique trailers for drivers to deliver to throughout Oregon's and Washington's logging industries and includes:

Towed Forest Machinery:

•  Forwarder
•  Log Harvester
•  Log Loader
•  Log Stacker
•  Mulcher
•  Stumper

Specialized Trailers:

• Tub Grinder
• Knuckleboom Loader

Truck Accessories:

•  Headache Racks (2 versions for each cabin type)
•  Hanging Chainsaw toy

With the release of these new add-ons, we have created a 'West Coast Bundle' which includes The base game of American Truck Simulator, Oregon and our latest releases, Washington and The Forest Machinery DLC. This special bundle offers great value on these products when purchased together.

You can buy this special bundle on Steam by clicking on the image below! 

American Truck Simulator Update 1.35

We've completed the testing cycle and American Truck Simulator Update 1.35 is now live!

First off, let us thank all of you who helped us with your bug reports, opinions and general feedback during the Experimental and Public Beta phases. The changelog is really huge and testing it would have been much harder without you. Its size is also the reason for why we won't describe all the details here again (please read the Public Beta article).

Most of you have already noticed that since a few days ago, a GPS voice navigation function was added to the Public Beta build of American Truck Simulator. For the initial phase, you can choose from 9 different language options (English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Turkish and Mandarin Chinese). As with most of the new features, you can expect more options and improvements in the future. And while we have already amassed a considerable amount of feedback from the 1.35 update for Euro Truck Simulator 2, don't be shy to add your own feedback on our forum - the more the merrier!

Now here's a short recap video to help you navigate through all the changes and new features before Washington arrives tomorrow! Are you ready to truck on?!

To enjoy the 1.35 update, make sure to OPT OUT of beta branches and your game will be automatically updated on Steam.

Some mods, however, may not have caught up yet - this update can effectively break them; remember that you can always stay on 1.34 or an even older branch. Follow these instructions to access and select them: Steam client → LIBRARY → right click on American Truck Simulator → Properties → Betas tab → select the version you want.

Also, check our modding wiki to get details pertaining to mods for the game.

Changelog:

MAP

• New roads: OR-58 (Oregon DLC), CA-299 and another segment of OR-140
• Arizona signage improvements
• Traffic lights improvements (all states)

VEHICLES

• Purchased container trailers
• Purchased B-double trailers (all types)
• Purchased chip van trailers
• Specialized boat trailer
• Browse purchased trailers & accessories
• Saddle-mounted truck transport (KW T680)
• STAA doubles in traffic
• Adjust purchased trailers without service visit (extendable trailer, sliding tandem)
• Copy truck/trailer configuration across fleet
• Wiper settings improved

FEATURES

• GPS Voice navigation
• Use your own purchased trailers in External Contracts (WoTR)
• Online garage purchase
• Emergency refuelling service
• Input improvements (Steam controller support, Tobii eye tracker support, controller hotplug support, better FF on Linux)
• Razer Chroma support (RGB)
• New options: truck stability, truck suspension, dual localization of names in map
• Faster job generation for hired drivers
• Lots of new drivers to hire
• Experimental DX11 support

MOD

• Curve item (new editor item)
• Walker/mover item improvement
• Multiple LODs for models
• Modded trucks support (in-game function)
• Traffic data improvement
• Vehicle data improvement (COG, wipers, transmission names, bracers sound)
• Randomized cargo model (eg. container color)

Washington: Infrastructure

As we near the release of our upcoming map expansion for American Truck Simulator, we want to focus on some of the areas that truckers will use most on their travels around Washington and the west coast.

An essential part of any long-haul journey are Truckstops and rest areas, an area where a driver can take a break from the road. Whether you are taking a snooze, filling up on fuel or even weighing your load, with 10 Truckstops, 4 Rest areas and 13 Weigh stations in Washington, you will never be too far away from a stop to take a 10-100.

With the states many connecting highways and interstates, you'll be sure to find many unique junctions along the way. With traffic passing over and under you, these art-like road networks serve the purpose of connecting you to your destination.

And if you enjoyed that glimpse into Washington, we are hosting a special Washington stream today from our SCS Studio (on both our Twitch and Steam.) Featuring interviews with developers who were involved in the creative process of the map expansion, a Q&A session with CEO Pavel Šebor, a chance to win a new Washington bundle and much more. So make sure to tune in from 5pm UTC today!

Black Sea: Bulgaria

While the news this week has been dominated by the upcoming release of Washington, we have not forgotten our dedicated Euro Truck Simulator 2 fans. Following the release of the 1.35 Update for ETS2, let's keep the ball rolling by talking about the Road to the Black Sea. Next on our list of country profiles; Bulgaria.

Bulgaria is a medium-sized Slavic country (110,994 square kilometers) bordered by the Black Sea to the east, and Turkey to the south. Its location at the crossroads of Europe and Asia has led it to serve as the staging ground for multiple cultural and strategic shifts over the past centuries and millennia. As the birthplace of the Cyrillic alphabet in 9th century AD, it was also part of the Byzantine and Ottoman empires, and then the Soviet-led Eastern Bloc, before finally becoming an independent parliamentary republic in 1991. Relics of this amalgamation of cultures can still be seen throughout the country as you drive along its winding country roads, bustling cities, and serene coastal roads.

While we can't wait to show you much more in the coming months, here's a collection of a few work-in-progress screenshots to whet your appetite; this time featuring some rustic localities and Soviet-era architecture.