Another year is already almost over. Like last year, we want to give you an overview of all the important things, that happend in your favorite game: Forge of Empires!
January: The year began with the update to Version 1.221. Like always during that time, this update included changes from 2 versions, because our developers had some time off during the Holiday time last year. In this month we announced, that we have discontinued the Event Hub.
We also made some smaller additions to the game: A new Multi-Reward window, you probably see quite often nowadays, improved the zoom in the app and based on player feedback, moved the Heal All button in the Army window.
And don't forget about the Forge Bowl Event! We introduced the all new Event Pass, which was also added to almost all Events later on, and also added the Fiore Village. Initially not liked a lot, because it did not provide Forge Points, but we adjusted it during the Event on the Live Servers thanks to your feedback!
February: In this month the world was shook by Russian invasion of Ukraine. We as InnoGames have taken position to support Ukraine and later implemented some changes in the game, replacing the Russian flag with a Ukrainian Peace flag, and some more changes.
Apart from that, we provided our Castle System with 5 brand-new levels with something new: 3 expansions were added to these levels! The St. Patricks Day Event made a return as well with the Celtic Farmstead.
At the end of the month our newest event saw the light: The Anniversary Event! That's right, we celebrated our 10th Anniversary with a brand-new Event, where you could move your play figure across a board leading you through the ages of Forge of Empires! As a reward, you received a new pair of King and Queen, a much liked Daily Special, the Stage of Ages, buildings from the Spring Event, since we skipped it, partying avatars and the Golden Orrery!
April: Even though we started our anniversary Event in March already, our 10th birthday was only this month. Thanks to everyone, that supported us for all this time, we are really thankful, because thanks to you players, our game could still be running strong after over 10 years of active development! We also wanted to hear your Forge moments, so we created a contest and got a lot of stories from you. You can find the best ones in our YouTube playlist here (make sure to activate subtitles)!
But it does not stop there, we have introduced the next Age: Space Age Jupiter Moon with new units, goods, a great building giving you a boost for special goods and a guild goods production and new stories to discover.
At the end of the month we also introduced a new Feature: Forge Plus. Initially launched with 1 package it now has a No Ads package and options to buy the current Event Pass.
.png)
.png)
.png)
May: One of the bigger changes we did this month was to remove the happiness modifier from battles, meaning your current happiness does not influence the amount of battle points you receive anymore. You always get the x1.2 modifier. We also did more performance improvements to the Guild Battlegrounds, bringing the performance to a very good level again for mid and high-end devices. We have also added 6 new diamond expansions for Space Age Jupiter Moon.
In addition, we also updated our Daily Challenges with some new tasks, new rewards, the option to pick tomorrows rewards or to skip some tasks.
Our Archaeology Event returned as well, this time with no major changes, but a new set building!
June: In this month we mainly introduced bug fixes, but we also activated a change that now displays, whether you buildings are connected to the Townhall or not already in the Reconstruction Mode.
At the end of the month, we introduced the possibility to watch Video Ads for rewards on mobile. On browser you can even collect the same rewards without watching an ad! Together with this we once again introduced a feature requested for years: the Aid All button!
Event-wise we had the Soccer Cup with an improved Match mechanic for the Tournament. Gone are the days with only chances to win, you now know when you can win, draw or lose a match. We also displayed this result before you even began your match, so you could choose an easier opponent, if you needed to.
July: This month began with the return of the Wildlife Event. It saw some minor tweaks, but most notable was the addition of Leagues and that it was only active for 14 days, instead of 21! We have also decided to remove the military building rewards from the Daily Challenges again, and made the Video Ad chest incidents count for Quests too.
We ended this month with a new Event: The Fellowship Event! Since we skipped the Spring Event, we wanted to make sure you still had the same experience, so we introduced this Event with the same mechanic, but some additions, like the Heroes (similar to Coaches from the Forge Bowl Event) and 3 new buildings, with the Heroes Tavern being the main prize!
August: During the beginning of the month our Fellowship continued to run. We have unified the display of boosts in the army management, added a new part to Forge Plus, so that you did not have to watch ads anymore to receive the rewards and added a new feature to the Inventory to open multiple items at once in preparation for the Summer Event.
September: Speaking of Summer Event, this month started with it! Quite late, but you know the saying: better late than never! We have added a piratic Piggy Bank, similar to the Reindeers from the Winter Event. The Event also introduced the Boathouse with a new feature: It produces a box at the highest level, meaning you could collect it and open it whenever you want!
But that's not all: The Event Pass included a new type of buildings: Limited Buildings. In this Event you could get the Forge Fountain, boosting your Forge Point production by 10%.
We also now allowed units to be doubled by the Blue Galaxy and added the production carousel to Military Buildings in the app.
Lastly, we added new worlds to many markets for you to enjoy!
October: In real life the prices in Europe increased due to inflation. We were also hit by this and because prices in the App Store were increased, we had to increase the ingame ones as well on the app.
On a happier note, we fixed an issue in GvG that many of you reported. It was not easy to find the cause, but we did it and everything was back to normal.
A bit late, but our Fall Event started at the beginning of the month! It was also shortened to 14 days only, but it still provided some good rewards and a new limited building: The Cobalt Blue Lagoon, doubling the next 2 collection!
At the end of the month our next Event, the Halloween Event was released. It received a new item to use on the fog, better chances for Daily Specials and 2 new limited buildings, the Haunted Tree providing a large amount of Forge Points and the Daunting Tower, providing a massive attack boost for a very short amount of time. We also brought back some older avatars from historical questlines!
November: In this month we stopped the support for devices running iOS 10 and lower to ensure we could use the newest technology to further improve our game!
We also improved the limited buildings, so that they didn't require a street connection anymore and once again fixed a lot of issues.
This month may not have been as exciting for you all, but a lot has happened in the background. You will soon see the fruits of our labor!
December: This month started with the Winter Event! We made some visual changes, replaced the Reindeer Collection with an improved version and for the first time introduced a building, that over time helps you build another one. Once you placed your Chocolatery at level 8 or above, it will start producing Fragments for the Nutcracker Guardhouse!
We have now also released a new option in the shop allowing you to subscribe to a No Ads package, as a part of the Video Ads test.
Lastly we brought back some rewards to the Antiques Dealer and worked on a bigger feature, not yet released!
All in all, we had 25 updates this year, with Version 1.245 being the last one released this year!
And that's all! Our team has worked on a lot of things behind the scenes. Some of them you might not notice, and for some you will see the results soon enough!
But of course the development does not stop, so we already have some exciting stuff from our Beta Server!
Beta: Most recently, we have released the Forge Bowl Event, introducing the Pergola to the game and many new rewards! Be excited for a special Selection Kit, Next and Special Age Goods rewards and new rush rewards to finish the production of Goods and Special Buildings!
We continue testing a change in for the Guild Battlegrounds, that changes the behavior of Siege Camps and Watch Towers. This change has to be tested over an extended period of time, and we will let you know as soon as we have any updates.
In addition, we have also improved the Browser Push Notifications, and can hopefully bring them to you next year!
2022 was a very eventful and challenging year. Our hearts are with the Ukrainian people, who lost their homes and loved ones during Russia's invasion, Corona is still a thing and changed our lives forever, the passing of the Queen of England led to a global mourning and the Soccer World Cup in Qatar was one of the most disputed ones ever.
These are only some of the many things, that happend, however we hope we could make you just a little bit happier with all the things we implemented this year, so you could enjoy playing our game!
But lets have a more positive outlook for the next year! We wish to extend the Guild Expedition by a brand-new extra level and build it differently compared to the previous 4 levels. We also want to have a look at our early game and make it easier for new players. Also, since you liked our Anniversary Event this year, we want to host a celebration Event again but also try something new for our 11th birthday! We hope to bring improvements to the current content and some great new additions!
Now we come to an end, so on behalf of the whole Forge of Empires team, we want to wish you all Merry Christmas! We hope you can get close to your families, enjoy the holiday time, and celebrate a Happy New Year!
Your Forge of Empires Team