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Hello there!
With this post, version 1.6 finally arrives — also known as the one where The Colorado Connection DLC gets released!
Well… sort of. As tradition demands, the DLC will first be available to those who bought it on Kickstarter during the Legendary Box and Cranio’s Expansion Pack campaigns; so if you are one of these players, keep an eye on your inbox (and spam folder) in the coming days.
If you bought the game during the latest Earned Authority campaign, you’ll have to be a bit patient, because I’ll receive the list of backers only once the late pledge is closed.
Now, a heads‑up: due to the copious amount of changes this DLC introduces under the hood, I might extend the backers‑only access a bit longer than usual — just enough to make sure the public release flows smoothly and with as few leaks as humanly (and digitally) possible. I also need a little bit of time to correct a few blatant misplays by the AI with the new content.
About what will come after the release of The Colorado Connection, I have a long list of things to tackle — like finally addressing the incorrect implementation of the game start, where all game components should be revealed and visible during Company selection. I actually began implementing the change, but couldn’t finish it in time to make the cut for this update.
The main focus, though, will be getting The Duel DLC released during the summer, bringing to a close what was promised to the people who backed the project on Kickstarter.
Once that is done, I’ll finally have the time to breathe and put together a proper schedule for the future.
I know that this choice of powering through the DLCs first might be controversial, but it’s paramount that we deliver what was promised — and we have to do it within the budget that was set long ago — for the people who supported the project well before it was released.
Long story short:
keep an eye on your inbox in the next few days if you are a backer
add the DLC to your wishlist if you’re planning to buy it as soon as it is released to the general public
The Duel DLC implementation marathon is about to start
Before closing, I want to thank once again all the wonderful people who supported the project, reported bugs and issues, and left nice reviews — every little bit helps!
Thank you all for the amazing support!
Have a dam great weekend!
Cheers,
Cody
Hello there!
I hope you are all well and fine in these trying times; Cody here with a small update on the state of the project.
As you might know, I'm currently working on The Colorado Connection. I'm aiming for an early‑May release so, as always, the schedule is tight, but confidence is high.
The Steam store page of the DLC is now online, so if you don't want to miss the release, you might want to add it to your wishlist!
The Colorado Connection will introduce a new map with two new dedicated mechanics: building bridges and activating productive settlements.
If you bought The Leeghwater Project, you'll also get a new private building, the Heliport, and three new External Works that synergize with the new mechanics.
As with The Nile Affair, I had to change the visuals of some elements to better fit the digital adaptation.
In particular, the Productive Settlement Tiles are no longer categorised as A, B, C, but with a “distance” value of 1, 2, or 3, represented graphically by a proportional number of “wheel” icons.
The image of the Bridge Tiles has also been changed in order to have a more plain background and increase the readability of the rewards.
As with the previous DLCs, The Colorado Connection will first be released to everyone who bought it through Kickstarter, and then to everyone else.
Once again, I would like to close this post by thanking everyone who keeps supporting the project!
Have a great dam almost‑weekend!
Cheers, Cody
DAM!
As you might have guessed by the title of the post, just a quick FYI: the multiplayer server crashed for reasons still unknown. Everything is now back to normal but unfortunately the online games that were running have been lost.
Sorry for the inconvenience.
Have a nice day!
Cheers,
Cody
Hello there!
Cody here, with some good news! With this post comes version 1.5, and with it The Nile Affair DLC.
Initially, it will only be accessible to those who backed the project on Kickstarter, and in about a week it will become available on the store to everyone else.
So, for those who backed the project, keep an eye on your inbox — you’ll receive your key within the next 48 hours.
For everybody else, be sure to add it to your wishlist so you’ll get a notification as soon as it’s out!
This week I'll be on hotfix duty, plus some tweaks on the AI, so as always, don't hesitate to write on the forums or at "digital \ craniocreations.com" if you run into issues or bugs.
If it's not too much to ask, please attach a zip with the game files when writing to us for an issue. That way I'll have more chances of identifying the problem ( hopefully ).
Depending on your operating system, you can find the the game files at one of the following paths:
- Windows: Users\\\\AppData\\LocalLow\\Cranio Creations\\Barrage
- MacOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Cranio Creations/Barrage
Have a dam great week!
Cody
Hello there! It's a bit late, but happy new year everybody! Today I'm here with a quick update on the upcoming DLC The Nile Affair. The Steam store page went online a few days ago, so if you don't want to miss the release, you might want to add it to your wishlist!
Work is proceeding: I'm currently defining the tutorial contents and getting ready for its implementation. After that, I'll have to localise all the new content and tweak the AI so that it can handle the new mechanics. Last but not least, as much debugging and bug fixing as possible. Still quite a lot to do but, all in all, the DLC should be on track for a release at the end of next month.
For those that are not familiar with the boardgame, The Nile Affair will introduce a new map with a dedicated new mechanic: irrigation. If you bought The Leeghwater Project, you'll also get a new private building and 3 new external works that synergise with the new mechanic. For those of you that are familiar with the boardgame, by looking at the screenshots on the store page, might notice a few small tweaks compared to the physical version.
For example, the graphical appearance of irrigation tiles has been altered to better fit the digital adaptation, and their irrigation value has been changed from a number to an icon for increased readability.
As with The Leeghwater Project, The Nile Affair will first be released to everyone who bought it through Kickstarter, and then to everyone else. Before closing this short update, I want to thank everyone that sent feedback and contacted me about bugs and the like. The fixes are not out yet, I'm keeping a list I will tackle as soon as I'm done with the Nile. Have great dam week! Cheers, Cody
Hello there!
I just wanted to let everyone know that we are having a weird issue with our ISP and as a consequence of that the Barrage server is temporary unreachable. Sadly the issue is out of my control and I'm not sure how long is going to take to resolve. Offline playing is obviously unaffected.
I'm sorry for the interruption.
Cheers,
Cody
Hello there!
I hope you're all okay and doing great!
I'm here today, not to announce the release of The Leeghwater Project DLC as I would have hoped, but to bring you up to speed with development progress.
In short: I'm almost there.
I'm currently working on the tutorial for the new features. Once that's done, the remaining tasks are:
Finalising the layout of the 5-player map
Localising the new content for all supported languages
Testing and bug fixing
I'm sorry I haven't been very active on the forums—I know I still have a couple of posts to reply to. I've just been super busy trying to bring the development of TLP to a close.
On the plus side, I managed to sneak in a couple of nice quality-of-life improvements for the DLC:
A floating zoom to help you see things better
An animation speed adjuster to make things faster
I'll leave you with a little sneak peek of what's coming.
Please don't hate on my limited video-editing skills :)
Have a dam good rest of the week!
Cheers, Cody
Hello there!
I hope you had a great summer! Before we begin, a big thank you to all of you for sticking around, giving us feedback, and leaving kind reviews! It all helps!
As you might have guessed, this post announces the release of a new AI in Barrage—the very originally named Medium AI!
While it’s not strong enough to challenge experienced players, I think it’s a solid improvement over the current Easy AI. It’s not 100% finished yet—there are still a few things I need to tweak, some situations to address, and a few XOs to implement. At the moment, the AI won’t take advantage of Mahiri, Dr. Octavious, and Amir - its ability to use Wu Fang is also limited.
Not to worry though—work on the AI will continue, albeit at a slower pace, as it’ll be developed alongside other things.
A quick heads-up: the new AI is a bit slower than the current one, so in rare cases it might take up to 10/15 seconds to make a move. Anything beyond that could be a bug.
As always, if you encounter any issues, feel free to reach out on the Steam forums or email us at "digital \ craniocreations \ com".
If you’d like to attach a specific game that’s causing problems, you can find the save files at:
Users\\\\AppData\\LocalLow\\Cranio Creations\\Barrage on Windows
~/Library/Application Support/Cranio Creations/Barrage on macOS
To round things out, here’s a quick rundown of what else is coming with this update—some bug squashing and a couple of quality-of-life improvements:
- AI_Easy – Fixed a bug causing the game to get stuck when the AI had to resolve an optional move, with the “Dam – No Engineers No Excavator” tech tile in the wheel and the “PowerPlant – No Engineers” tech tile available - AI_Easy – Fixed a bug causing a “CantPayBuildCost” error when the AI tried to build something using the last private action (thus needing to pay the action fee) on a red map slot, while only having 3 credits - Fixed machinery tokens getting stuck on an opponent’s player board when resolving a 2-machinery income on small boards - Fixed national resolution animations appearing at the center of the screen instead of on the board of the opponent who closed it, when playing with 3 opponents.
- When building a structure, the selected map slot is no longer reset when changing the tech tile—provided the new tile is compatible with that slot - Updated the toggle selection effect on the Machinery resolution popup (i.e., when choosing how to resolve machinery rewards).
That’s all for now!
Just for this one, let me bid you farewell with a Barrage-related picture from my small vacation ( a real life level 1 dam in the mountains ).
Have a good dam weekend!
Cheers, Cody
Hello there!
It has been a while - I hope you're all doing great and having a fantastic (too much?) start of the week!
I don't have a new version of Barrage for you today, but since I'll be taking 4 days off this week for a little bit of summer vacation, and since it has been a while since the last post, I wanted to keep you updated on what's going on.
As promised I am working on a new medium AI. It's going..okay.
It's not 100% complete but it's good enough to be released.
What's still missing is some optimisation and some code specifically designed to take advantage of more complex XOs—namely Mahiri (from the base game) and the promo XOs—which are currently being disregarded by the AI.
This is a bit of a compromise I had to make to stay on schedule, since I really want to release the first DLC by the end of summer (aka mid-September). As a result, the time I can dedicate to the AI is limited. I also have a list of bugs to fix and quality-of-life improvements to implement.
That said, I didn't want to release the AI and then ghost you all for a week, so it'll be released at some point between the 18th and 29th.
Regarding the in-game performance of the new AI, I was aiming for an average of 130 points in a 2-player game and 100 in a 4-player game.
Unfortunately, at the moment it's more like 100/110 ± 30 points in 2-player games and 70/80 ± 20 points in 4-player games.
There are still some situations that I'm trying to address, where it can get stuck and underperform but, all in all, it plays better and more consistently than the current Easy AI.
I know it's a bit of mixed bag situation but I wanted to be honest about it, especially because it's not a done deal yet. I will continue to work on it, every chance I get, alongside other tasks.
As stated before, the new DLC is on it's way and we are aiming for a mid September release.
We still have a few concerns about certain gameplay elements, especially considering all the feedback you awesome folks have shared with us, but we'll do our best to meet the deadline we’ve set—fingers crossed.
That's all for now, folks!
Wish you all a dam-tastic week—and happy summer vacations to the lucky ones!
Cheers,
Cody
Hello there!
I hope you are having a fantastic week! Once again, thank you for your support, feedback and positive reviews.
Today we are bringing you version 1.1 - introducing the custom game mode for the single player.
It's a pretty straightforward feature that lets you choose which assets will be available during the initial draft or, if you feel like it, you can assign assets directly to a player.
One quirk to be aware of is the First Player toggle ("1."). Its behaviour shifts based on whether you've manually assigned assets to a player. If no assets are assigned, the toggle determines who picks first in the draft. But if you’ve given any assets to a player—even just one—it instead decides who takes the first turn after the draft.
Another neat touch: we haven’t restricted duplicates. So yes, if you’re in the mood, you can stage full-on mirror matches.
Before I bid you farewell, here's a quick list of fixes also present in this build:
+ fixed a bug where the UI mistakenly considered Franz DeLasse as triggered in situations where he wasn't, thus showing the wrong energy value ( According to the rulebook, Franz DeLasse's ability is only active during "production actions" and not energy produced by other means, like tech tiles )
+ fixed a bug where Mahiri wouldn't work if Elon Audia was a possible target
+ fixed a bug where the objective tooltip could remain stuck open, even persisting in the main menu in some cases
+ fixed a crash occurring in the main menu when clicking the "Go Offline" button in case of a network error
As always, have a great dam rest of the week!
Cheers,
Cody
Hello everybody! Cody here to bring you a small—but not that small—update. A new build, v1.0 b946 is on it's way and here's what you get from it:
+ fixed map building slot tooltip appearing on slots where no building by the player was possible (e.g. opponent' or neutral dams, basins that already had a player dam or power plants complexes where the player already had a power plant in place) + fixed "southern" power plants' positioning so that they now are in front of "northern" ones + fixed bug where map tooltips remained visible until the mouse left the map or another map element's tooltip was triggered + fixed bug on UI where Viktor Fiesler was shown as active during Germany’s bonus production, causing a “NotEnoughEnergyToFulfillContract” error when attempting to close contracts that were incorrectly marked as available due to Fiesler's bonus + fixed Octavious' power being available during Germany's bonus production + fixed a bug where Germany's bonus production wasn’t triggered if the only water available to use, was added through the resolution of a contract in the normal production + fixed a bug where Germany’s bonus production wasn’t triggered if the only valid dam was a neutral one in the same basin where the player also had their own dam, and that dam had no water" + fixed a bug with Amir where, if two water drops were placed in the same headstream with different types (e.g., one stationary and one running), both were treated as the type of the second-placed drop + fixed bug on rules' optional actions detection method where, when checking for powerplants (and dams), the location of these was not kept in consideration leading to wrong placements being considered valid. This in tail was causing the AI to sometimes trying to act on those invalid placements, causing the "NotEnoughEngineersOrEquivalentsAllocated" error to be thrown. + AI - fixed a bug on optional actions where in some particular cases, with Anton Krylov as ExO, the AI would try to use the wrong tech tile for the optional action, causing "NotEnoughEngineersOrEquivalentsAllocated" error to be thrown. + fixed a bug preventing certains productions configurations from being selected - for example in the particular case that was reported, if the player had a dam placed in the same lake as a neutral and penstocks on both sides, it was not possible to select the neutral dam for the production
Now, for the juicy part! Here's a list of changes that I hope you will appreciate: + when producing with Octavious, all configurations now have the "X" button, not just the additional ones (Previously, it wasn’t possible to set 0 drops used in the “starting” dam, which forced the player to select another dam to avoid using drops from that one) + changed the alignment of water drop buttons in the production configurator from center to left + adjusted the layout of the water drops placement popup to give more room to the arrow buttons that change drop type when Amir is the player’s ExO. + the map dimming effect now remains locked-on during building and production actions. + removed the fade-in/out animation from “ghost” placeholders when hovering over empty building slots on the map + added a dedicated label during Germany’s bonus production to remind players of the bonus production rules Last but not least - what I think is the biggest change in this build - we reworked the building slot highlights on the map to (hopefully!) make everything clearer during production and building actions. That's all for today's update. Thank you again, everyone, for the continuous support, reports, feedback, and positive reviews! It means a lot to us! Oh, one last note before I salute you farewell: if everything goes according to plan, next week I'll be releasing the Custom game mode for single-player. It will let you rig the assets extracted for the draft, or skip it entirely (or partially) and assign assets directly to players. Once that’s released, I’ll really start cracking down on the Medium AI, and then shift focus to finishing the UI for The Leeghwater Project, which I hope to release before the end of summer. That's all folks! Take care and have a nice dam weekend! Cheers, Cody
About
This page aggregates Steam news feeds, patch notes, and developer announcements for Barrage, sourced from official Steam community posts.
Major updates, balance changes, and seasonal events often correlate with player-count spikes — cross-reference announcements here with the live charts on the main Barrage statistics page.
Articles link back to Steam for full changelogs. SteamScope refreshes news entries as new posts are published to the game's Steam hub.