Non-Friday 2010-05-24 Dev. update and Discussion Thread

[Flyby]

Originally Posted by Oleg Maddox

Game conference was nice.
One of the photos from there:

http://maddoxart.net/index.php?optio...atid=10&id=301 The photo is for boys over 18 age!

wow! glad I'm over 18! She can go "postal" on me any time! BTW, when I pressed the translate button, the page opened up with a few more selections. Guess which one interested me more!
Congrats on the progress. The smoke above the Spit looks great. The ground shots are looking great too. How much detail are you turning down to get smooth frame rates now days? (I think you've probably coded SoW for a PC of 2025 spec-ulation)!

enjoy your vacation. try not to think of work!
Flyby out

[choctaw111]

Thanks, Oleg, for another wonderful update.
These screenshots are amazing.

[domian]

Hi Oleg,

thanks for the update. Hope we can take off this year. Sure the most asked question ist that one for the release date.

So i don´t ask for the date, but is 2010 reasonable?

Thanks

Domian

[Avimimus]

Originally Posted by Novotny

The sunbeams are quite a common feature in FPS games these days.

And in SoW apparently. If I recall one of the first development updates showing in engine shots (of the "pterodactyl" island) had them...

Go look, find, be merry

[Friendly_flyer]

Is it just me, or do the Spitfire look awfully dark compared to the 109?

The ground shots look great! Some hedgerows, and it will start to look like "Foils War"!

[kendo65]

Originally Posted by zapatista

couple of quick questions:

2) will we be able to fly some "non combat" missions with some of the aircraft that affect overall gameplay ? in particular using VFR navigation to get to specific targets, such as:

a) photo reconnaissance over enemy territory, and then make the result photo's available in the mission briefing rooms for all other pilots to see ? some old il2 fans would really enjoy the challenge of an unarmed but high risk flights like that over enemy territory as an alternative to dogfighting. if their efforts are then productive and helping the side they are flying for online, and get recognition for the benefit created from their mission, some people will really enjoy just that aspect of the "sim world" in BoB

b) fly supply missions to heavely damaged airfields to help them rebuild faster then "default rate" for repairs (many airbases in the south of england were under constant attack for some months, and the ballance between out-of-action and operational was very fine, which could have been a deciding factor in the BoB outcome had goering not switched his attacks to london),
- or also to provide supplies for ground troops by flying into forward airbases near the front (those forward airbases were constantly being created near forward moving troop lines to keep getting supplies to them in the european theater as the frontline moved forward/backwards).
- one perfect example for this was Stalingrad and the airbridge that the germans tried to keep open, the rate of supply planes arriving directly affected the ability to fight on the ground, and russian combat aircraft were constantly hunting for those supply aircraft in the sky. it would be great if in BoB we can fly some type of missions like that already, but flying the cargo aircraft's side !

c) fly to rescue downed pilots, either from the sea (by landing near them on the water in a float plane), or by landing near them in a field where they have just landed by parachute

those types of missions were an important part of real life aviation in ww2 and so are part of an "aviation combat sim" environment . in my opinion it would take very little effort/time to implement, since all elements are already in the sim. a little "lateral thinking" in mission creation for BoB, and making sure some minor elelments are coded into the game from the start, can attract a whole new element of customers, people that are between air-quake and ms-flightsim types in temperament, and they would enjoy many hrs of flightsim to fly just such missions. it would give the sim an added realism that does not exist anywhere else (maybe an idea for Luthier to look at ?). many of those missions were also dangerous because there are plenty of enemy and friendly combat aircraft flying in the same sectors, and you could/can get bounced anytime.

Like the photo-recon idea. Would be really good if something like this could be done.

Not sure if air-resupply was that big an issue in the Battle of Britain. Most replenishing of fuel, ammo, supplies would come through the road network. The big (and important !) exception would be supply of replacement aircraft which were ferried from the factories to the RAF bases by ATA (civilian) pilots many of whom were women. Believe the planes were unarmed, and that the pilots' skills were not always that highly regarded by regular RAF airmen!

Take your point though about having these kinds of factors built into the campaign engine - useful in Stalingrad-type scenarios.

[mazex]

Bones thrown high and low! Lovely!

The ground shots have really become good now - just as promised when we saw those first lime green shots that made quite a few here shaky...

I just try to imagine if I could send that me-109 shot back to myself in front of my Spectrum 27 years ago... I never would have believed it I was dreaming of loading screen image quality back then

[katdogfizzow]

Awesome stuff...Loving #4

Any chance of seeing some birds? that would fun to see at takeoffs

[Insuber]

Mazek,

A tear dropped from my eye when I read the word Spectrum ... I remember the first "flight sim" on it ... the steady fart sound from the spectrum "speaker" ... it was a wonder then.

Originally Posted by mazex

Bones thrown high and low! Lovely!

The ground shots have really become good now - just as promised when we saw those first lime green shots that made quite a few here shaky...

I just try to imagine if I could send that me-109 shot back to myself in front of my Spectrum 27 years ago... I never would have believed it I was dreaming of loading screen image quality back then

[Bearcat]

Wow... the lighting in that shot with the clouds & the tail ended 109/Spit are great!!