Wardogs developer BULKHEAD has given details as to why player progression will reset at the end of every season, outlining how the system will work and what players can expect to keep as the game continues through Early Access.
In the latest developer update released on Friday, executive producer Joe Brammer and UI/UX director Howard Philpott addressed some of the biggest concerns surrounding the game’s first season and the upcoming second season, including progression resets, rank disparity, and the lack of long-term rewards for players investing their time in the game.
While seasonal wipes are an established part of Wardogs’ Early Access plans, the developers acknowledged that the current system needs to do a better job of making players feel rewarded for their time.
At the end of each season, players will lose their accumulated cash and progression. However, any remaining savings will automatically be converted into gold bars based on their value at the end of the season. Those gold bars can then be spent on permanent cosmetic unlocks, giving players something to carry forward after a reset.
The developers also reiterated their stance on cosmetic monetization, explaining that weapon and vehicle camos will not be monetized. Instead, these unlocks are intended to serve as rewards for players who have earned them through gameplay.
Wardogs Will Preserve XP for Future Progression Systems
Although seasonal wipes will reset players’ current progression, BULKHEAD confirmed that XP earned throughout Early Access is being banked for future use.
According to Philpott, that accumulated progression will be retroactively applied to new long-term progression systems when they become available. These could include player skills, which the team is developing as part of its broader plans for Wardogs’ eventual 1.0 release.
They added that the current system does not provide enough persistence between wipes, making it difficult for players to feel that their time investment has lasting value. Improving that experience is one of the team’s goals as it works toward the full release.
For now, however, players should expect seasonal resets to remain part of the Early Access experience.
Why Wardogs Is Using Seasonal Wipes
It was explained that wipes serve an important purpose while Wardogs remains in development. Each reset gives the team an opportunity to address exploits affecting XP and the in-game economy, rebalance progression, and experiment with new features without permanently disrupting the game’s economy.
The team also pointed to the differences between players with vastly different amounts of playtime as another reason for resetting progression.
During the developer update, Brammer said that the team realized the existing progression system could not adequately account for both players with around 10 hours of experience and those with 300 hours.
The developers opted for a slower progression curve to preserve the experience of working through the game’s different levels, rather than pushing everyone toward the endgame more quickly. However, that decision has contributed to rank disparity, an issue the team plans to address through regular balance adjustments and a larger progression rework closer to version 1.0.
Wardogs’ first season was always intended to be relatively short, BULKHEAD says, giving the team an opportunity to observe how players interact with the game at scale and identify problems that weren’t discovered during earlier testing. Future seasons will be longer, though an exact time frame wasn’t mentioned in the video
Wardogs’ Season 2 update launches on October 15, bringing further balance changes and adjustments to progression as development continues. Patch notes for the update will come next week ahead of release.
What do you think of the plans for seasonal wipes in Wardogs? Let us know down in the comments and in the official Insider Gaming Discord.
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Mike has been covering the gaming industry since 2012, and has reported on some of the largest events in the industry while also working as an investigative reporter. Outside of…
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