Official Fulqrum Publishing forum - A new article in SimHQ about Cod

Official Fulqrum Publishing forum (http://forum.fulqrumpublishing.com/index.php)

- IL-2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover (http://forum.fulqrumpublishing.com/forumdisplay.php?f=189)

- - A new article in SimHQ about Cod (http://forum.fulqrumpublishing.com/showthread.php?t=25646)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt (Post 327195)

Guys, we're going around in circles here while things are dead simple:

a) 1C had a set amount of money to spent and a finite amount of people to work on a new project.

b) They could either do the same solid stuff that they had done in the past or try and add something new in it, but there was not enough money over time and people to do both at the same time.

c) They decided to do the difficult part first and lay down the foundation for the new stuff, then add the rest they already knew how to do from their past work as time goes by, simply because it's easier to do it in that order rather than the other way around.

If you build the game engine so that it works like IL2:1946 and missions can use up to 1000 objects,it's difficult to modify the engine at a later date to include CEM and load 15000 objects in a single mission.

If you do it the other way around and build an engine that is modular and can support a lot of objects, you can release it with some placeholder modules and then start adding to it as time goes by without having to once again code the basic engine in the future.

It's exactly what's happening as we speak: new graphics and new sounds are coming, sometime later we'll get new water and dynamic weather, etc. You can't just cram a new module into a game engine if it's not built from scratch to support certain features. If it was possible they would have just modified the old IL2 engine and not spend time and money to create a new one, since they didn't i guess it's not possible.

It was a choice between "let's build something that we can add to over the years at the cost of some technical troubles early on" vs "let's build the same thing we did in the past with better graphics and have it working right out of the box".

They went with the first choice and i'm absolutely thankful for that, i can't spend another 10 years flying in a sim where people can abuse their airframes and engines as they see fit for no penalty and all aircraft perform to the top of their capabilities without any reflection as to how hard it was in reality to make them perform that way. And in return for a departure from those habits during the lifespan of the series, i'm willing to take a few months of initial teething troubles.

It's that simple, new and untested vs repeating tried and tested stuff, some people prefer one method and some prefer the other.

By the way, i'm not pulling random numbers out of my head here. The map running on the ATAG server has 15000-20000 objects and 5000 of them are flak guns (ask Bliss about it if you don't believe me).
Good luck even getting a mission to load with so many AI units in another simulator, much less play through it.

I think the main problem here is the lack of communication from devs, not only an unfinished product. If they said : "ok guys, we need your help to finish it... please be patient... we admit the product is unfinished, we will work on it and keep you informed on every progress" then probably the things were different... people would not be so aggressive and impatient.. but if you give half of what a customer paid, and then don't answer the phone and hide yourself, I think the customers have all the rights to be upset.

Quote:

Originally Posted by albx (Post 327199)

The publishers may also play a part in this, in a normal business the public would only here from the publisher not the Devs, so it may be that they are only allowed to say certain things, I must say it is difficult to understand why they have taken this path of silence otherwise, it sure isn't helping game sales.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tiger27 (Post 327202)

probably yes you are right, we can't know all the aspects of this question, we are only speculating... who knows probably can't talk... :|

Where's the news? Three items, I guess:

- SIMHQ feedback thread on the actual Tom Cofield article is 2.5 pages long versus this one which is 11 pages. I find it funny that the senior editor at SIMHQ writes an opinion piece which actually stimulates more business on the manufacturers site than his own :)

- Tree pretty much did say the same thing as Tom (although he did say it multiple times per day). Maybe it's not "what" you say, or even "how" you say it - we've evolved (perhaps devolved) to how many times you do say it - that causes one to get banned these days.

- Luthier isn't talking to Tom. He has no inside "scoop" on the most significant WWII prop sim development since Il2. Notice I didn't say "good" or "bad" - I just said significant. If it wasn't significant, there wouldn't be so many threads about CoD being thrown about and we would not have waited for so many years for it.

Look, on a typical day - there are more SIMHQ readers in the CoD forum than there are in the RoF forum. As we've been in a dry spell lately, the numbers are very close.

Let Luthier post a one-liner over here (notice he doesn't post at SIMHQ) - and whamo - the CoD forum at SIMHQ has 2X, 3X or more readers than the ROF forum. The funniest thing I've ever seen in my time in simulations was the infamous "Banjo Video". That was awesome. The negative posts after that were priceless.

You have to ask yourself at some point "How bad do I really need Luthier to come back in here and tell me what his last post said?"

I don't think I need it, and I don't think thousands of other users do either. It does seem however, that the tiny percentage of the actual user base who can't seem to stop posting when "no new info" is available do.

With all this said (most in jest) - I am looking forward to Dart's review. Not because I don't know this product - but I'm curious to see Dart's take on it, as a fellow simmer and how he will write it up. He's more like the folks I fly online with and I like him. You actually see him online in the sims we fly.

East Coast Earthquake, record rain, Gadhafi and Condi, double dip recession, etc....

And this is what some of you insult each other over? An opinion at SIMHQ?

Next you'll be fighting about the demise of the UBI boards....

I know, I know... it's something to do while passing the time :)

S!

Gunny

As I just posted on the SimHQ forum its old news and constantly repeating it doesn't help the future of CoD or 1C. Its not that critical articles aren't welcome, its just getting a bit boring reading the same old stuff and I'm fed up with the drip drip drip moaning about the same old things. What value is there in that article? All that stuff was written by others months ago.

Hopefully the same critics will give a good and loud review if/when 1C manage to get the game fully back on track.

Quote:

Originally Posted by albx (Post 327199)

I think they've stated this multiple times, especially immediately after release. I distinctly remember Luthier saying "you guys have every right to be angry but we're going to be working on it and fixing things" or something similar, then we got a roadmap, a few quickfix patches, then an expanded roadmap for the more long-term patches that will remake entire modules of the sim (like the graphics and sounds patch being currently worked on) and so on.

I understand what you're saying, it just seems to me that they've already done and are still doing much of what you suggest. I'm genuinely confused :confused:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tree_UK (Post 326928)

lol, yes its been a while, the mad thing is that noone even noticed the post i got banned for, even one of the mods contacted me and said he couldn't believe I had been banned for such a post. :grin:

Surprised as well I must say. What's the point of having this secondary forum over there, I thought it's meant to allow more critical voices?

MAC

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt (Post 327244)

yes.. you are right, I forgot this, sorry my mistake.

Quote:

Originally Posted by klem (Post 327225)

+1 Klem

I first read the SimHQ article a few days ago. I've just went through it again sentence by sentence and I'm amazed that anyone here can be critical of what is said in it or view it as an attack piece.

First up - it's NOT a review - the title is: 'IL-2 Sturmovik: Reflections on the Past and Questions for the Future'. There is also the word 'Commentary' in nice red letters in the top left corner.

The opinions throughout seem balanced and strongly grounded in fact.

And check out this quote:

"I do believe that the team will try their best to fix this game. If IL-2 has shown me anything it has shown that the 1C team is a team of flight simulation enthusiasts that really love the genre. Knowing that; I am willing to give the team the chance to bring this title up to the standard that the first title was."

Those opposed to the opinions expressed either criticise the individual's background (not a game developer! So, none of us is allowed to have an opinion on COD unless we've taken our own flight-sim from inception through to production!? What about films or music - can we have opinions on those if we're not Hollywood producers or Grammy-winning recording artists?) or imply that no-one should be expressing a negative opinion.

I'm afraid to say that the 'D' word raise its ugly head here - Denial! Plain and simple.