Friday 2010-10-08 Dev. update and Discussion

[Oleg Maddox]

Don't post please before you'll see two parts of screen shots.

Pilots are sitting at the moment a bit lower moved a bit back in cockpit, than should be. But its what is in correction plan. Anyway you may see some details that heads of pilots are moving... not like in IL-2.

Also you may see some nice details on the airfields that makes it looking lifelike. Some of details with the future development of the series we plan to use as active (say training targets for the training novice mode or for the user made story like scenarios...)

Differneces of the sides ratio due to different resolution or aspect ratio of monitors.

[Oleg Maddox]

Some nice details of the _flight sim_ that help to feel the flight at some altitude like you see real picture (repeat, from altitude).
Would like to point for your attention that smoke and water steam from the tube of steam looks isn't correct (will be more dark and present more black at the acceleration of the steam. It is working, but smoke dencity isn't right yet. We put such things and other similar "bugs" to tune in final).
I think such details would show already now how the series maybe branched(or united) in future.

[NSU]

wauu it this Foo.bar`s work?

[shane]

The side panels of the spit looks nice, (some emboss) and the grass seems more integrated on the ground.

what is the plane on the third screenshot ?

[Bloblast]

Nice reflection on the spit.

The grass and the runway are excellent!

[Oleg Maddox]

wauu it this Foo.bar`s work?

Yes, German steam, etc is his work. Superb isn't it? ;)

[352ndBushpilot]

Great pictures!

BP

[=XIII=Shea]

Thanks so much for the update oleg what terrific detail:):)

[JG52Uther]

Obviously some can't read!
Anyway,now you have posted both parts,I think it is looking great Oleg! :)

[T}{OR]

Maybe you should put it in bold and bigger font, it looks like some people need reading glasses when it says 'wait for part 2'. :)

In any case, nice update. I am eager to see how will it look when it is polished for the final thing.

[speculum jockey]

Don't post please before you'll see two parts of screen shots.

Reading comprehension on these forums if pretty bad, sorry about that Oleg!

Question: In the head-on view of the locomotive engine there is a reddish brick building in the background on the left. The first floor wall texture is blurry while the second floor texture is crisp. They seem to be the exact same distance away, what is causing this? Usually you see a difference on buildings closer and further, not the same distance.

Thanks.

[Dano]

Looks like AA on a couple of shots :)

Bloody marvelous!!! I'd quite like to drive that train around for a bit myself :)

So many different types of vegetation on the ground, it'll be a real shame if we don't get some sort of ground action at some point :)

[BP_Tailspin]

Thank you Oleg and have a great day.

[first-things-first]

Looking very nice.

Some people will always complain about the resolution or the blurriness of the ground or objects - it must be a toss up between performance and looks. The "gravel" rail embankments for example.

Oleg - are they archery targets in image 4? I saw an image saying that archery was a popular pastime for pilots between missions. Might well just be propaganda.

[Flying Pencil]

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/attachment.php?attachmentid=3585&d=1286542873


OMG, this scene is stunning!!
Maybe I will get the game just tp play trains!! ;)
Once again you surpass expectations!!1!one!
Thank you. :D


Oleg, did you consider my offer?
It is a very sincere offer.

See this site for more info:
http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/london/news/article.cfm?headline=Dornier%2017%20Underwater%20S urvey%20Now%20Available%20to%20View

[zapatista]

nice to see the train rails now raised above the ground, will make it look much better from the air !

will rail lines be 2 way rails next to each other like it is in modern times, or a single rail line ? (i would have suspected in 1940 to have 2 rail lines next to eachother in england, but not sure what is historically correct)

the train looks great :)

[Skarphol]

I'm so amazed by lighting and shadows in this sim!

And the level of detail is ashtonishing!

I'm going to spend days just flying around low and slowly, taking in the beauty of it all!

Skarphol

[Richie]

The Spitfire and steam engines are great! The trains will look fantastic going down the tracks.

[Daniël]

Very nice! I love the shadows.
A few questions:
Will pilots, but also other people change expression? Like scared or happy?
Will your flight leader tell in the debriefing what you did good or wrong in a dogfight?

[kestrel79]

I want to say that's a Beaufighter? Not sure...

Oleg great images! The Hurri parked next to the hanger looks great, that was my fav from the first batch.

Second group I really love the elevated train tracks! That is so cool, and makes the ground seem less flat.

I'm sure seeing this in motion is just amazing. Witht he smoke billowing, the trees slightly blowing in the wind....can't wait to play this team keep it up.

[335th_GRExandas]

The second part is the most important i think BoB will have 10 times more immersion than il2.

It would be very difficult to find bombing position for train running through a forrest.
Is there going to be smoke form the train at least Mr Maddox ?:grin:

[PeterPanPan]

Holy cow! This is all looking soooo good now. All too exciting IMHO!

Given you can actually see different type of leaves (e.g. the oak leaf) I wonder if the FMs of ladybirds and other insects will modelled!?!

Thanks Oleg

PPanPan

[Sutts]

Very very nice pics. Those trains are gorgeous and very real looking.

Notice the real oak leaves too and varied vegetation.

I'm sure that Spit must have AA turned on now, very smooth outline.

Thanks for update Oleg, made my day.:)

[ATAG_Dutch]

what is the plane on the third screenshot ?

It looks like a Beaufighter in nightfighter camouflage to me.
Great prospects for some night flying.:grin:

As always the shots show some superb aspects of the sim.
The ground details astound me more each time I see them.
Target training at an OTU anyone?

[335th_GRExandas]

The second part is the most important i think BoB will have 10 times more immersion than il2.

It would be very difficult to find bombing position for train running through a forrest.
Is there going to be smoke form the train at least Mr Maddox ?:grin:

Sorry forget that didnt notice trhe photo!!

[ECV56_Guevara]

Can´t believe it! Awesome work!!!
Thanks! A new era is coming!
PD: Oleg can we see (if possibly) in next updates some mission builder features?

[Qpassa]

:o
awesome :)

[Flying Pencil]

Those arrows, pointers to enemy units?
http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/attachment.php?attachmentid=3584&d=1286542020


And I see one of the difficulties of rendering smoke, or maybe bad design of the British carriages ;) , smoke inside.
http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/attachment.php?attachmentid=3588&d=1286542919


I don't mind, unless I was a virtual passenger, LOL

[Tempest123]

Wow, looks fabulous. I love the last shot of the train with the steam coming off, excellent!

[Avimimus]

of the _flight sim_

Right... Oleg... you know many of us don't believe you on this one point. ;)

Anyway, I'm astounded by the new shots (in particular the variation in ground cover - implying some vaguely ecological approach to the landscape - even though we've been told that the trees will be uniform).
However, I'm not surprised by them given Oleg's track record of having astounding details appear unexpectedly. :D

[Hecke]

I'm sure that Spit must have AA turned on now, very smooth outline.




Oleg can you please tell us if theres AA on in some of the shots?

[No457_Squog]

Goggles! yay!

[robday]

what is the plane on the third screenshot ?

It looks like a Bristol Beaufighter MK IF to me.

[maclean525]

That Spitfire looks incredible, the reflections look spot-on.

[Mat72]

Fantastic shots, thank you. Was wondering if you could elaborate on the structure of a typical "day" in the game? For example, if not at dispersal, will there be the option of "free time" to just fly about or practise aerobatics, separate from the QMB?
Thanks again. :)

[=WF=RAW]

Isn't Spitfire sshot was made under DirectX10?
And i noticed some square shadows from wing on bottom Spitfire's radiator - bug?

[Feuerfalke]

Awesome!

Thanks Oleg, thanks Foo!

[Flanker35M]

S!

Thank you for the update, things seem to shape up nicely :D HAve a good weekend!

[BadAim]

My first impression of the pilots was "they look like kids".......but then they were, weren't they?

This update is most impressive. Your really creating a world here, one to which we shall bring much destruction.

I can feel a prolonged illness coming on, I think it will strike the moment the mailman brings my copy of SOW. I'm afraid I'll be laid up for weeks!:P

[Asheshouse]

Its looking great.
The quality of the train models is tremendous.

The raised ballast under the track rails looks just right on level ground but much of southeast England has tracks on embankments or cuttings to cope with the hills.
Will these features be modelled too?
Will there be realistic looking rail bridges -- not like IL2 with steep ramps.
Will there be rail tunnels?

Most tracks in the southeast were at least doubled and as you approach London there would many more as the tracks merged together to approach the rail terminals. Only the smaller branch lines were single track.

[ChrisDNT]

It's beginning to look really good, even the colors, the green which looks much less vivid.

[Oleg Maddox]

Oleg can you please tell us if theres AA on in some of the shots?

Yes on the planes. It was done on the card that has such a feature. Other shots on another PCs with the old cards.

I simply can't do it all the times. Due to the fact that these PCs are overloaded by programmers... My target today was to say that we have it as it was promised more earlier. But it doesn't means that I will post such shots all the time.At least untill the time when my or some other PCs will have the same type of cards.

[ChrisDNT]

Btw, what impressed me really on this update are the shadows here...

http://i51.tinypic.com/20b26gm.jpg

... with their smoothness : this seems to indicate that the render engine is very capable.

I can't wait to see more screenshots with a graphic card of this century ;-)

[pupaxx]

Oleg please,
Stop the Friday dev. update...my heart can't sustains the waitin'.
how many fridays ahead until SOW release? it's a drip!

yes I know, my request will costs to me a FATWA from the community!!!:-P

Another GREAT WORK!!!' for you and your team!
Thanks again! Ciao

[Viking]

What can I say?

Viking

[Baron]

Thx Oleg.

Looking good. The planes details is amazing.

[Oleg Maddox]

It's beginning to look really good, even the colors, the green which looks much less vivid.

Some are too vivid anyway. Simply painter see it by other way than photo. Here were a lot of discussions in that theme. Now we are correcting them all step by step.
As it was promised in the past we will get all them in time more close to photorealistic than fancy colors.

And you all should understand that with thousands such small details even some small change of one texture may have effect on the overal image... that is a huge work to tune all things that should look like photorealistic (at least from the bird's flight!)

[lbuchele]

Oleg please,
Stop the Friday dev. update...my heart can't sustains the waitin'.
how many fridays ahead until SOW release? it's a drip!

yes I know, my request will costs to me a FATWA from the community!!!:-P

Another GREAT WORK!!!' for you and your team!
Thanks again! Ciao
FATWA?
Just wait for the car bomb...:mrgreen:

[335th_GRExandas]

I cant stand I will ask.
Do you now (with all the bugs of the game) play
dogfights inside the office through LAN and who is the best dogfighter among you ? :-P

[holdenbj]

Hi Oleg,
Thank you another excellent update - Fridays are good.:grin:
Hurricane screenie is my favourite - shadows on hangers are excellent too.

[JVM]

nice to see the train rails now raised above the ground, will make it look much better from the air !

will rail lines be 2 way rails next to each other like it is in modern times, or a single rail line ? (i would have suspected in 1940 to have 2 rail lines next to eachother in england, but not sure what is historically correct)

the train looks great :)

Most of the lines were single tracks in France or Belgium. Only the main ones were double tracks.
In England, I suppose the situation may have been similar.

JV

[JAMF]

IMHO the steam from the train already looks good, for a train that was using no fire in the boiler.

I don't know if these questions have passed here already, or if they have been answered, so:

- Will we see raindrops on the windscreen, like in the original IL2 demo?
- Will we see rivets on the wing and would they be bump- or normal-mapped?
- Is surround gaming (3 screens) being taken into account in development? Flexible FoV?
- Is the SoW engine ready for future 64Bit development, so it can use more than 2GB and load everything into memory on systems that have the memory? Like load all LoD models and all textures into memory to fill up 8GB?

[matsher]

I have one development question / wish / request that has always been on my mind, and I have never come across anyone else asking about it... So here it is

Full cockpit vs Wonderview:- In IL-2 there is either Full cockpit or gunsight and sky. Nothing inbetween. It would be so good if there was a third option.

To Oleg- Will/can there be a player defined option to set the in-cockpit view at 65% (or so) opacity, to make it semi-transparent?
So pilots can still have more "sky" but also can have the feeling that they are still flying in a beautifully rendered fighter plane?

The cockpit opacity settings would be amazing to have... No longer will we have to choose between dynamic gameplay (Wonderview) and immersion (In cockpit)... We could have both.


ADDITION: I asked the the guys on the forum to give suggestions and Xnomad made a simple and clever one... There were concerns that an inbetween view would cause less FPS... Xnomad suggested that we keep the cockpit on 100%
and keep tracking the ememy ID through the cockpit... I have made samples of both suggestions and I'd like to ask you Oleg and team to PLEASE answer this question/ request.

I have also added some direction and lead markers...
Notice how the direction and lead markers fade the further distance
away the target gets...



I'd be happy with an answer like:-
1. Yes, we have planned something like that
2. No
3. Maybe, in a future update

Not too sure what the technical implications of this request is but I had to ask anyway.

The updates are looking better and better every week.Have a great day and
thanks you for making this sim happen...

[Insuber]

Oleg,

Thank you for your dedication. I appreciate your work. I'm sure that when it will be out it will be the best video game ever, all categories.

As far as the screenshots, they start to give a lively feeling of immersion in a real world.

Cheers,
Insuber



Some are too vivid anyway. Simply painter see it by other way than photo. Here were a lot of discussions in that theme. Now we are correcting them all step by step.
As it was promised in the past we will get all them in time more close to photorealistic than fancy colors.

And you all should understand that with thousands such small details even some small change of one texture may have effect on the overal image... that is a huge work to tune all things that should look like photorealistic (at least from the bird's flight!)

[dduff442]

Oaaggghafafafafanaghabaaaa!

Can waiting for a game to come out cause seizures or other medical emergencies? I can't stand much more of this!!

dduff

[JVM]

Hello Oleg!

I like very much what you have shown us today...but I cannot help wondering if the track ballast would be candidate for use of tessellation in DX11 mode?
I understand showing ballast and sleeper relief is exactly what tessellation is useful for and the rail track would look stellar instead of just great (knowing about the ensuing drop in performance in such mode if you do not have the proper hardware!)..

Thank you for everything!

PS

I hope being able to supply the full set of 1940 Pas de Calais K5/K12 military tracks as well as the Calais and Dunkerque harbor networks this week end. I still hope you will find a way to use this, at one time or another...It is not lost data anyway! :-)

[Forgottenfighter]

If this sim gets any more realistic people will be afraid to fly in it :grin:

Seriously, Oleg, you rock! Thank you for posting the updates so consistently.

[rakinroll]

Thank you.

[chiefrr73]

Oleg and team,
thank you very much for the update, we do appreciate it a lot!!
It s nice to see that you have a lot patiance with us. The pictures are looking very nice, and i am sure that this game will be a new good aria, like IL 2 was and still is. I have a lot of confidence in the work you are doing, you proved it allrady with IL 2.

[krz9000]

oleg, why not just tweak saturation as a post-effect? to do it on texture level is a huge job i guess.

[sorak]

My dreams are coming true right before my eyes

Oleg and your team: You guys are incredible..

For the future of this game.. Do you think you will add more of the first kind of Jets?

[Oleg Maddox]

I'd be happy with an answer like:-
1. Yes, we have planned something like that
2. No
3. Maybe, in a future update

Not too sure what the technical implications of this request is but I had to ask anyway.

The updates are looking better and better every week.Have a great day and
thanks you for making this sim happen...

We have really better option of half trasparent gauges customizable by position and size. We have 3 sets at the moment of such indicators - British, German and Italian types.
User may select which are important for him... say depending of difficulty settings...

As for the transparent cockpit... say it is possible to make with 2D cockpit... But with our technology where all is 3D just making trasparent textures of the panels and frames will make visible other details behind them - structure of the nose with all its details in 3D, including details of engine and propeller, etc... Then we should make them also trasparent... etc... this means great impact to the frame rate and it became not interesting for the implementation due this fact.
And it isn't interesting to add special 2D half trasparent cockpt - this will be looking like the game cockpit of 80th or beginning of 90th.... due to the switching of views.. or wird moving of 2D frames of polygons.

[Peffi]

Excellent update, again! And this is a flightsim...?! :confused: I am starting to believe that flying a Lysander low between these trees and and hopefully not hit a train would be a thrill... :grin: I know Oleg will not go Gold before he feels ready, but these shots look really ready to me. Its a game, not reality, and I believe some "of us" are asking for too much. If the smoke from the lokomotive doesn't look absolutely right when it leaves the train, who in his RIGHT mind cares? Sort out the BIG bugs that can hamper gameplay and ignore the ignorable ones at this stage, is my opinion. It's not possible to get everything perfect anyway, no matter how much you try and how much time you spend trying. And someone will allways "complain" and point out that this and that should be better. I can imagine Oleg is really looking forward to a well deserved vacation now. I hope it will be a x-mas vacation... :grin:

[FS~Hawks]

I like the Spitfire. I like the update Oleg thank you very much and we love you for giving you time for us to enjoy :grin:

[Oleg Maddox]

oleg, why not just tweak saturation as a post-effect? to do it on texture level is a huge job i guess.

Colors of the vegetation are reading from the texture where they are... :) oops... I said some secret. So some time they originnal basic color maybe incorrect and looking vivid. Its what we are tuning.. relly ins't easy some time to get all looking right. But I hope we will get it finally... too many new technologies that were developed intially for this projet are going now at once.... Same was with Il-2 where about 20 new technics and technologies were presented for the first time in the world working right and without bugs.... :)
Hope to get the same with this project... but its more harder to to greater overal complexity...

[robday]

Yes, German steam, etc is his work. Superb isn't it? ;)

It certainly is! The detail in that side on shot of the M7 is fantastic, right down to the sanding pipes. I've seen examples of Foo'bar's work before but I thought he only did European railways. He must have done a hell of a lot of research to get it so good.
BTW Oleg, it was a legal requirement right from the start of railways in Britain that their boundarys were marked by a fence. I would guess that it's too late to add them now?

[sorak]

Excellent update, again! And this is a flightsim...?! :confused: I am starting to believe that flying a Lysander low between these trees and and hopefully not hit a train would be a thrill... :grin: I know Oleg will not go Gold before he feels ready, but these shots look really ready to me. Its a game, not reality, and I believe some "of us" are asking for too much. If the smoke from the lokomotive doesn't look absolutely right when it leaves the train, who in his RIGHT mind cares? Sort out the BIG bugs that can hamper gameplay and ignore the ignorable ones at this stage, is my opinion. It's not possible to get everything perfect anyway, no matter how much you try and how much time you spend trying. And someone will allways "complain" and point out that this and that should be better. I can imagine Oleg is really looking forward to a well deserved vacation now. I hope it will be a x-mas vacation... :grin:

It may not be possible to get everything perfect, but if your a perfectionist.. you will try really really hard to make it perfect and will not ignore anything.

[Oleg Maddox]

It certainly is! The detail in that side on shot of the M7 is fantastic, right down to the sanding pipes. I've seen examples of Foo'bar's work before but I thought he only did European railways. He must have done a hell of a lot of research to get it so good.
BTW Oleg, it was a legal requirement right from the start of railways in Britain that their boundarys were marked by a fence. I would guess that it's too late to add them now?

Its not ignored... simply too much details... for the render.

[zxwings]

Thank you Oleg for the update! It's a happy thing to see the new screenshots every week!

[Foo'bar]

It certainly is! The detail in that side on shot of the M7 is fantastic, right down to the sanding pipes. I've seen examples of Foo'bar's work before but I thought he only did European railways. He must have done a hell of a lot of research to get it so good.


Like Oleg said I did only german railway vehicles with some exceptions: LNER A4 steamer and french SNCF 040.D steamer. Feel free to check all SoW dedicated stuff on my blog, just click my sig.

Collecting all required references was a heavy (and a expencive) job indeed.

[robday]

Most of the lines were single tracks in France or Belgium. Only the main ones were double tracks.
In England, I suppose the situation may have been similar.

JV

The majority of railways in britain were double track, even down to secondary routes. Single track lines were mainly rural branch lines

[speculum jockey]

This is not a complaint, or a nitpick, just a question.

http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/3905/shot1f.jpg (http://img297.imageshack.us/i/shot1f.jpg/)

Uploaded with ImageShack.us (http://imageshack.us)

In this pic, you can see the difference in detail in the house texture. The top floor is more detailed than the bottom floor. This is usually a result of draw distance of Level or Detail (LOD) settings dictating the detail dropping off at a distance, like in the below shot.

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/4336/shot2o.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/i/shot2o.jpg/)

Uploaded with ImageShack.us (http://imageshack.us)

As you can see, the detail in this shot is dropping off the further away you get from the building and the texture.

My question: what is causing the lower LOD in the first shot? The top floor and bottom floor appear to be the exact same distance away from the camera, so why the two different levels of detail? Does it have something to do with the shadows being cast on it by the building itself?

Thanks.

[dduff442]

Colors of the vegetation are reading from the texture where they are... :) oops... I said some secret. So some time they originnal basic color maybe incorrect and looking vivid. Its what we are tuning.. relly ins't easy some time to get all looking right. But I hope we will get it finally... too many new technologies that were developed intially for this projet are going now at once.... Same was with Il-2 where about 20 new technics and technologies were presented for the first time in the world working right and without bugs.... :)
Hope to get the same with this project... but its more harder to to greater overal complexity...

One problem is when it looks *real* it won't look *right*. 1940 was a hot summer and SE England doesn't look very English in late Aug - early Sep. The faded, brown-tinted colours are just right for leaves in September.

dduff

[dduff442]

Like Oleg said I did only german railway vehicles with some exceptions: LNER A4 steamer and french SNCF 040.D steamer. Feel free to check all SoW dedicated stuff on my blog, just click my sig.

Collecting all required references was a heavy (and a expencive) job indeed.

Many thanks!

[Hunden]

Hi Oleg update looks great. One question will aircraft VORTEX be modelled?

[robday]

Its not ignored... simply too much details... for the render.

Understood. Thanks for the reply.

[Asheshouse]

Regarding single and multiple tracks.

The 1940's Ordnance Survey maps show which lines are single track.
The majority in SE England are multiple tracks
Maps can be viewed here http://visionofbritain.org.uk

On single track lines the track would usually be doubled through the stations to enable trains to pass.

[Oleg Maddox]

The faded, brown-tinted colours are just right for leaves in September.
dduff

Sorry, where is such leaves?

[Bloblast]

Like Oleg said I did only german railway vehicles with some exceptions: LNER A4 steamer and french SNCF 040.D steamer. Feel free to check all SoW dedicated stuff on my blog, just click my sig.

Collecting all required references was a heavy (and a expencive) job indeed.

Foo'bar thanks for your contribution to the sim.
Will we also see your Kubelwagen in SOW?

[Oleg Maddox]

This is not a complaint, or a nitpick, just a question.

http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/3905/shot1f.jpg (http://img297.imageshack.us/i/shot1f.jpg/)

Uploaded with ImageShack.us (http://imageshack.us)

In this pic, you can see the difference in detail in the house texture. The top floor is more detailed than the bottom floor. This is usually a result of draw distance of Level or Detail (LOD) settings dictating the detail dropping off at a distance, like in the below shot.

http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/4336/shot2o.jpg (http://img100.imageshack.us/i/shot2o.jpg/)

Uploaded with ImageShack.us (http://imageshack.us)

As you can see, the detail in this shot is dropping off the further away you get from the building and the texture.

My question: what is causing the lower LOD in the first shot? The top floor and bottom floor appear to be the exact same distance away from the camera, so why the two different levels of detail? Does it have something to do with the shadows being cast on it by the building itself?

Thanks.

This all means that is done on low power PC. Program try to optimze for the acceptable frame rate and good overal picture around.
However second shot maybe from early shots. Do not recognize this.

[Flying Pencil]

Like Oleg said I did only german railway vehicles with some exceptions: LNER A4 steamer and french SNCF 040.D steamer. Feel free to check all SoW dedicated stuff on my blog, just click my sig.

Collecting all required references was a heavy (and a expencive) job indeed.

EXCELLENT WORK, Foo'bar!!

Those trains are anything BUT FUBAR! ;)

[Old_Canuck]

Heh heh .. cheers Oleg.

[KOM.Nausicaa]

Actually I think red points to british (allied) units and blue will be axis. That would be like it was in IL2.

Awesome update -- it looks all superb. Many thanks Oleg.

[C_G]

OMG ! OMG ! OMG ! OMG !

<reaches for paper bag to reduce hyper-ventilation>

- raised railway bed!
- train engine steam which changes colour from sooty black to water vapour white as it gets going! (and the reference to it's opacity as a "bug", LOL)
- sweeeeeeet looking trees!
- issue of hurricane pilot head position being addressed...
- bushes, grass next to the tracks, shadows... all these things are adding to a very "real" virtual world experience where the objects look natural rather than plopped onto the screen.

I no longer have any doubt that my present computer is not going to be up to the task of rendering this at it's full potential...
I also no longer have any doubt that SoW:BoB is going to be a quantum leap ahead of IL-2 '46 and that I'm going to be BLOWN AWAY by it!

Am I in the throws of full-on fanboyism? You better believe it!

Special thanks to Foo'bar for expending his time and money to assist Oleg...

C_G

[Peffi]

It may not be possible to get everything perfect, but if your a perfectionist.. you will try really really hard to make it perfect and will not ignore anything.

True. If Oleg was not a perfectionist, this sim would probably not be nearly as great as it most likely will be. But a perfectionist must some time in time tell himself, in time: "This is it". If not, perfectionism will be diagnosed as an obsession. But as I also said, Oleg is ready when HE is ready :) I read he has skipped the British railroad-fences. Good! But someone is complaining that the grass in Britain was more yellow in 1940 due to the dry summer. If this is a "bug" that HAS to be corrected, I am truly starting to see obsession. (Please Oleg, don't get me wrong... you're the boss :cool: )

[Urufu_Shinjiro]

This is not a complaint, or a nitpick, just a question.

My question: what is causing the lower LOD in the first shot? The top floor and bottom floor appear to be the exact same distance away from the camera, so why the two different levels of detail? Does it have something to do with the shadows being cast on it by the building itself?

Thanks.

I think it's not so much a lower texture quality as an effect. Look closer at the building, the second floor is actually overhanging the first, so it seems the lower detail is more due to lower lighting/shadow than a texture issue.


Edit: Woops, Oleg posted while I was typing. It does seem though that the engine chose to use a lower texture to save frames on surfaces that are lower lighted or in shadow. Nice work if so.

[Old_Canuck]

OMG ! OMG ! OMG ! OMG !

<reaches for paper bag to reduce hyper-ventilation>

- raised railway bed!
- train engine steam which changes colour from sooty black to water vapour white as it gets going! (and the reference to it's opacity as a "bug", LOL)
- sweeeeeeet looking trees!
- issue of hurricane pilot head position being addressed...
- bushes, grass next to the tracks, shadows... all these things are adding to a very "real" virtual world experience where the objects look natural rather than plopped onto the screen.

I no longer have any doubt that my present computer is not going to be up to the task of rendering this at it's full potential...
I also no longer have any doubt that SoW:BoB is going to be a quantum leap ahead of IL-2 '46 and that I'm going to be BLOWN AWAY by it!

Am I in the throws of full-on fanboyism? You better believe it!

Special thanks to Foo'bar for expending his time and money to assist Oleg...

C_G

Welcome to the new fanboy. I've been an unapologetic fanboy for 8 years. SoW will take many years to explore but IL-2 will never die :-)

[Oleg Maddox]

Actually I think red points to british (allied) units and blue will be axis. That would be like it was in IL2.

Awesome update -- it looks all superb. Many thanks Oleg.

Yes, like in Il-2. Some of features that we think was very good done in Il-2 are going to the new one, however I would say that any of such things anyway has own changes. Probably in better side. :)

[Oleg Maddox]

SoW will take many years to explore but IL-2 will never die :-)

Probably you are right. Il-2 looks now like flying encyclopedy... But I hope that Sow will be the same in future but on another level.
But it will be possible only with the help of thid party, fans of aviation and users of the sim...
I hope all understand what this means.

Our team is still small. Way smaller than some of the teams making more simple games.

[krz9000]

ha if i get you right you are pulling the overall colors of vegetation from an underliing orthophoto or from a custom painted map? ...thats brilliant! (lets keep this a secret :) )

[Oleg Maddox]

ha if i get you right you are pulling the overall colors of vegetation from an underliing orthophoto or from a custom painted map? ...thats brilliant! (lets keep this a secret :) )

:) shouldn't say it... but anyway all will understand it when will begin the research of features in nearest future.... :)

On one of exhibitions in the past, when Il-2 was shown one of the first times one guy was all the time crashing in the forest... I was asking why he is doing it... the answer was simple: would like to understand the technology (he was developer of other flight sim).

[Il2Pongo]

"I think such details would show already now how the series maybe branched(or united) in future."

Yes I can see it, and when you post the interior of a panzer III, it will be confirmed.

[Avala]

So, we will do a lot of crashing on the forest then :)

It looks like you and the team yourselves are not yet fully aware what your engine can do. Which is very good thing and promises very good simulation IMO.

Great update!

[infirebaptize]

I have a question, would the pilot turn his head as we do using TrackIR. Would it be implemented in the future if not already?

Thanks.

[F19_lacrits]

Thanks Oleg! These screen shots are excellent.. !!!!!!!! :)

[julien673]

Thks for the update :D , i only have one question, can we see if the pilot is hurt ex: blood or somethink like that ?

did know that sow is train sim lol, look really great :)

[Bloblast]

Oleg, can you tell something about the campaign in the game?
Will it be like the dynamic campaign in IL-2 ?

[chiefrr73]

One question Oleg,
you said that the quality of graphics of BoB will be like cinematik. So it will be possible for moviemakers to make dokumentations for example Battle of Britain?

[julien673]

:) shouldn't say it... but anyway all will understand it when will begin the research of features in nearest future.... :)

On one of exhibitions in the past, when Il-2 was shown one of the first times one guy was all the time crashing in the forest... I was asking why he is doing it... the answer was simple: would like to understand the technology (he was developer of other flight sim).

What happend to him ? :rolleyes: ;)

[chiefrr73]

I mean like dokumentation on History Channel?

[winny]

I love the work so far.. I've adjusted the spitfire shots saturation (sorry!) just to show everyone how subtle the colouring is.. really nice!

http://i822.photobucket.com/albums/zz147/winistrone/SoW/sow9.jpg

[Sutts]

I'd like to see SoW used to reproduce historic battles for TV and I hope Oleg would get some decent royalties from that. I know the history channel has already done something on dogfights but the simulation was very poor compared to what Sow has to offer.

[dduff442]

Sorry, where is such leaves?

It's looking much more like summer than the early updates. A few trees will stay very green (e.g. Yew), but many more English species don't like the weather too hot.

dduff

[Oleg Maddox]

I have a question, would the pilot turn his head as we do using TrackIR. Would it be implemented in the future if not already?

Thanks.

Maybe in future. Right now it is doing only AI. This was in plan, but.... anyway it is still in plan for further developmetns

[Splitter]

Amazing. I am going to be spending some time just flying low and slow to see "everything". I am hopeful that the gameplay measures up to the graphics. If it does, I may have to clear a month of my calendar lol.

THANK YOU, Oleg and team!

Splitter

[jony_md]

I love the work so far.. I've adjusted the spitfire shots saturation (sorry!) just to show everyone how subtle the colouring is.. really nice!

http://i822.photobucket.com/albums/zz147/winistrone/SoW/sow9.jpg

Oleg, you are a small team, but are the best. Much
I encourage everyone and thanks for your work.

The capture is great, thanks mate!

[Oleg Maddox]

It's looking much more like than the early updates. A few trees will stay very green (e.g. Yew), but many more English species don't like the weather too hot.

dduff


Ok. I think we have good mix. We are not doing simulation of leaves and their changes during some months. Maybe in future we may do such things, but not now.

And I think you can't probably name me any other flight sim that has the same level of detail on the ground... And its only beginning of further developments in future... of course if this one first in a series will be successful.

PS. You can name some that are using satellite maps... But I don't think that with the close look they looks really nice in both ground and object details. At least any that are released.

[trumps]

looking Fantastic Oleg, from what we are being shown it will be well worth the wait, and you and the team will be well rewarded.
i have a quick question regarding the AI.
In Il-2 they always seemed very canned with the attack profiles they would use when commanded by the player, for example i am leading a flight of fighters on a bomber intercept mission, i would usually if possible meet the bombers head on or slightly oblique and make a firing pass. i could usually take out a bomber or at least severely damage one on this merge, but the rest of my flight no matter what command i gave them would never fire on the merge and then just make stern attacks and get shot down very easily. will player controlled flights have more advanced, and aggressive attack profiles in SOW?

thanks
Craig

[DD_crash]

Looking great Oleg. I just love Fridays :)

[nearmiss]

I believe you answered an important question for many of us today, even though it wasn't posted.

In the first screenshots I drilled down for image sizes and came up with

1680x 1050 and 1920 x 1080

Each rendered shot looked very good.

The best part is - 1080 divided by 1920 translates to .5625

1050 divided by 1680 translates to .625, which means alot to me. I recently purchased a 1920 x 1200 resolution monitor.

1200 divided by 1920 translates to .625

In other words monitors with .5625 or .625 should work well with SOW.

I really don't care if I have a black panel and top and bottom of the screen.

I've been watching wide screen movies for so many years... LOL

[Oleg Maddox]

Oleg, you are a small team, but are the best. Much
I encourage everyone and thanks for your work.

The capture is great, thanks mate!

The saturation of colors depending of the human eye working in different lighting conditions. ... that we are trying to model.

[dduff442]

Sorry, where is such leaves?

Ok. I think we have good mix. We are not doing simulation of leaves and their changes during some months. Maybe in future we may do such things, but not now.

And I think you can't probably name me any other flight sim that has the same level of detail on the ground... And its only beginning of further developments in future... of course if this one first in a series will be successful.

PS. You can name some that are using satellite maps... But I don't think that with the close look they looks really nice in both ground and object details. At least any that are released.

No complaints here!

[Oleg Maddox]

I love the work so far.. I've adjusted the spitfire shots saturation (sorry!) just to show everyone how subtle the colouring is.. really nice!

http://i822.photobucket.com/albums/zz147/winistrone/SoW/sow9.jpg

It looks more like some artphotographers like to make underexposured shots. I agree that sometime it is very nice. Doing myself such things sometime in photo.

[Oleg Maddox]

Ok, I must going at home to visit my parets that was very bad for some time.... Now all is Ok.
Will be reading on Monday. Need some relax.

[Splitter]

It looks more like some artphotographers like to make underexposured shots. I agree that sometime it is very nice. Doing myself such things sometime in photo.

The rippling effect on the skin of the plane is what gets me. If it wasn't there, I probably would not notice it. But after having seen in, the effect certainly makes the planes look realistic.

Splitter

[Avimimus]

The saturation of colors depending of the human eye working in different lighting conditions. ... that we are trying to model.

Will this be open to modification? I know I perceive the world with a greater colour contrast, but with less colour saturation than is typically rendered by computer games/monitors.

[Oleg Maddox]

The rippling effect on the skin of the plane is what gets me. If it wasn't there, I probably would not notice it. But after having seen in, the effect certainly makes the planes look realistic.

Splitter

We tried to make it really looking realistic, but not overdone by some modern and by incorrect using effects.... ;) Aerodynamics should be right :):):):) Even looking right.

[Sutts]

Ok, I must going at home to visit my parets that was very bad for some time.... Now all is Ok.
Will be reading on Monday. Need some relax.

Have a good weekend Oleg, glad all is OK now.

[Feuerfalke]

Thanks for your time, Oleg!

[Tigertooo]

. of course if this one first in a series will be successful.


You must be joking Mr Maddox, of course it will be successful:-P

[Freycinet]

Oleg, what do you think of the DCS A-10C business model? Pre-paying the sim has given everybody access to downloading the beta.

[infirebaptize]

Oleg, what do you think of the DCS A-10C business model? Pre-paying the sim has given everybody access to downloading the beta.

took my wallet out and holding credit card :cool:

[Jaguar]

I first want to say to Mr. Oleg and his team keep up the excellent work. I might just buy four copies just to help with the future deveopments (add ons) . If anyone has seen any of the history channels seies about how a famous actor changed the world. I want to put my vote in for how Oleg Maddox changed the world. You have encouraged multitudes of hobbiest to go to the library and read a book. Dvd sales of all things about world war II have increased. I have not even touched upon the whole gaming industry, video cards, memory, and the list goes on. I am glad that the IL2 series reminds you of a encyclopedia. Hey thats another idea, Aviation history by 1C publishing. I'd put that on my shelf in a heart beat. With the development of the SOW seires, I want to thank you in advance for the quality of those third party additions. I have purchased about all of the third party add ons to IL2 that were in English. From Aces Campaigns to Wings Over Jungles. I have enjoyed them all. Some have been better than others, however, I am looking forward to the next new generation of add ons. Keep them all up to your standards of care. Il2 has become more than a video game. It has changed my view on history and thus changed my world!

[scrope]

I first want to say to Mr. Oleg and his team keep up the excellent work. I might just buy four copies just to help with the future deveopments (add ons) . If anyone has seen any of the history channels seies about how a famous actor changed the world. I want to put my vote in for how Oleg Maddox changed the world. You have encouraged multitudes of hobbiest to go to the library and read a book. Dvd sales of all things about world war II have increased. I have not even touched upon the whole gaming industry, video cards, memory, and the list goes on. I am glad that the IL2 series reminds you of a encyclopedia. Hey thats another idea, Aviation history by 1C publishing. I'd put that on my shelf in a heart beat. With the development of the SOW seires, I want to thank you in advance for the quality of those third party additions. I have purchased about all of the third party add ons to IL2 that were in English. From Aces Campaigns to Wings Over Jungles. I have enjoyed them all. Some have been better than others, however, I am looking forward to the next new generation of add ons. Keep them all up to your standards of care. Il2 has become more than a video game. It has changed my view on history and thus changed my world!
Ditto Jag, nice to see some positive and well deserved comments to a superb team,

[ChrisDNT]

Some are too vivid anyway. Simply painter see it by other way than photo. Here were a lot of discussions in that theme. Now we are correcting them all step by step.
As it was promised in the past we will get all them in time more close to photorealistic than fancy colors.

And you all should understand that with thousands such small details even some small change of one texture may have effect on the overal image... that is a huge work to tune all things that should look like photorealistic (at least from the bird's flight!)

Thanks for these infos, I'm really looking to fly over the British countryside in your sim :-P

[MD_Titus]

my word... i'm lonvign that shot of the spit, the pilots head position looks so natural, the bump mapped rivets, the AA the lighting... just wow. cracking update.

It looks like a Beaufighter in nightfighter camouflage to me.
Great prospects for some night flying.:grin:

As always the shots show some superb aspects of the sim.
The ground details astound me more each time I see them.
Target training at an OTU anyone?
you can see the radar ...prongy thing... sticking out the front of the beaufighter as well. and the pilot appears to be leaning to one side. or pushed by flight manoeuvre to the side. *drools*

as for the ground details, at a wild guess, and based purely on the tech demo of the dx11 tessellation, those stones on the track may appear more 3d under dx11 rendering.

beautiful work foo.bar, quite beautiful. and for a flight sim!

and the targets... one for using with the flak guns perhaps?

the level of details is frankly astounding.

Ok, I must going at home to visit my parets that was very bad for some time.... Now all is Ok.
Will be reading on Monday. Need some relax.

glad things are on the up oleg, sounds like you've had a lot on your plate recently. hope you have a good weekend with your folks.

[Romanator21]

That Beaufighter looks MEAN!! :grin:

Thanks for taking the time to post, given last week's fiasco. I don't know how it's possible, but the updates just keep getting better and better each time!

[Towarisch]

Hello Oleg. My words are ....nothing. But these pictures are all. Great work. And thanks to all the people who worked at this GREAT GAME. And a nice weekend

[RedToo]

and the targets... one for using with the flak guns perhaps?


Are the targets in the fourth screen shot for syncronising a fighters guns?

RedToo

[MD_Titus]

oak leaves are overmodelled...

:mrgreen:

[Avimimus]

Oleg, go visit your parents - We'll see you when you return.

[MD_Titus]

Are the targets in the fourth screen shot for syncronising a fighters guns?

RedToo

could be... would need a bench or some kind of frame to lift the tail of the fighter. whilst cool, would it really add anything for such a feature, that is to say - would it be used more than a couple of times.

[kristorf]

Thx for the update gents

[IceFire]

Thanks for the update! Superb screen shots... I have to show my dad the train pictures. He'll love that :) He'll be asking for a train simulated based on Storm of War before long. Just you wait! :)

[Necrobaron]

Beautiful! One of the best updates to date!
________
Buy Bubblers (http://bubblers.net/)

[Splitter]

could be... would need a bench or some kind of frame to lift the tail of the fighter. whilst cool, would it really add anything for such a feature, that is to say - would it be used more than a couple of times.

I would have to say that is what those targets on the ground are for. Archers usually do not want to shoot their precious arrows into wood :). Bails of hay and the like are preferred.

Splitter

[322Sqn_Dusty]

Amazing detail..even on the Spit's radiomast. Almost a shame to target it all :) ..I'm off to earn more money to buy myself a new rig when it's out ;)

TY, Keep it coming!

[LukeFF]

Yes, German steam, etc is his work. Superb isn't it? ;)

Yes, it looks very good! :)

[Borsch]

Wonderful screens!

BUT! The icons are still the old type- numbers and text that will ruin the immersion! Dear Oleg, please see the thread with suggestion of using more inventive ways to help people spot targets! Text and numbers are are not good enough for icons in this game!

[OSSI]

You got my emails?:confused:

[Allen63]

I'm impressed by the locomotive, the tracks, the terrain surrounding it -- all to be viewed from a few hundred simulation-feet or more while traveling over 200 simulation-mph. Astonishing attention to detail in a flight sim.

[BG-09]

Foo'bar deserves a "Medal of Honor", or "Pour Le Meritt" at least!
Oleg, great job...have no words...I do believe that these pictures form the "Update", are from some recent airshow...maybe Duxford...I dont know...
~Cheers!

[_ITAF_UgoRipley]

...say training targets for the training novice...
What what what ?????
:grin:

[Kudlius]

That Spit looks great

[Hecke]

It looks awesome.

What do you think about the runway in this picture?
Is that the way runways looked like?

For me the runway looks blurred and like a texture of an old game. Actually it looks the exact same like in IL-2.

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/attachment.php?attachmentid=3584&d=1286542020

[Pahvi]

Thank you for your update and for your answers.

[LukeFF]

For me the runway looks blurred and like a texture of an old game. Actually it looks the exact same like in IL-2.

Give it a rest already. :rolleyes:

[Ikarus]

thanks for the news oleg.good work!!!
Always wand to ask you about that(heads of pilots are moving... not like in IL-2)but i speak no good englise.
can you tell us the head turn is the direction where i look or just turn?Anyway is very nice if this hapend!!!
tnx again.

[The Cheese]

I have one development question / wish / request that has always been on my mind, and I have never come across anyone else asking about it... So here it is

Full cockpit vs Wonderview:- In IL-2 there is either Full cockpit or gunsight and sky. Nothing inbetween. It would be so good if there was a third option.

To Oleg- Will/can there be a player defined option to set the in-cockpit view at 65% (or so) opacity, to make it semi-transparent?
So pilots can still have more "sky" but also can have the feeling that they are still flying in a beautifully rendered fighter plane?

The cockpit opacity settings would be amazing to have... No longer will we have to choose between dynamic gameplay (Wonderview) and immersion (In cockpit)... We could have both.


ADDITION: I asked the the guys on the forum to give suggestions and Xnomad made a simple and clever one... There were concerns that an inbetween view would cause less FPS... Xnomad suggested that we keep the cockpit on 100%
and keep tracking the ememy ID through the cockpit... I have made samples of both suggestions and I'd like to ask you Oleg and team to PLEASE answer this question/ request.

I have also added some direction and lead markers...
Notice how the direction and lead markers fade the further distance
away the target gets...



I'd be happy with an answer like:-
1. Yes, we have planned something like that
2. No
3. Maybe, in a future update

Not too sure what the technical implications of this request is but I had to ask anyway.

The updates are looking better and better every week.Have a great day and
thanks you for making this sim happen...

I believe that the issue of no cockpit view was shown in an update maybe a year or two ago. If I remember correctly, we'll be able to have realistic-looking dials, we'll be able to move them around on the screen, resize them, choose which dials we want, and we'll be able to set their opaquity. So if this hasn't changed since then and I'm remembering correctly, then that's what you can expect.

[swiss]

For me the runway looks blurred and like a texture of an old game. Actually it looks the exact same like in IL-2.


Yeah, right. Almost "like drawn by child - in watercolors" right?
:rolleyes:

S-T-O-P I-T!

You don't know what is WIP and what not. Oleg has the right sense for polishing the details, he just proved that with todays screenshots.
However, it is possible, and in your case very likely, that you'll not be satisfied in whatever form this game hits the shelves.
But don't despair, there's help:
First: You don't have to buy it
and 2nd; a piece of Yoda's advise:
"shut the f*** up - you must, young padawan."

Cheers.

[major_setback]

Well done Foo'bar!!!! Nice trains:-).

Conkers!
This looks like it might be a conker tree (correct name - horse chestnut)...they look like conkers, even if the leaves don't look exactly right.

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y129/major-setback/album%202/shot_20101007_172134ed01.jpg

http://static-p3.fotolia.com/jpg/00/01/47/40/400_F_1474082_nXipLeoxcmRbTdnbkuQjOhqVoyGZsW.jpg

[infirebaptize]

thanks for the news oleg.good work!!!
Always wand to ask you about that(heads of pilots are moving... not like in IL-2)but i speak no good englise.
can you tell us the head turn is the direction where i look or just turn?Anyway is very nice if this hapend!!!
tnx again.

check this out:
http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showpost.php?p=188193&postcount=104

[Old_Canuck]

What happend to him ? :rolleyes: ;)

He's still looking for a way out of Siberia.

http://michaeljosephtherapy.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/siberia-russia-2.jpg

[Hecke]

Yeah, right. Almost "like drawn by child - in watercolors" right?
:rolleyes:

S-T-O-P I-T!

You don't know what is WIP and what not. Oleg has the right sense for polishing the details, he just proved that with todays screenshots.
However, it is possible, and in your case very likely, that you'll not be satisfied in whatever form this game hits the shelves.
But don't despair, there's help:
First: You don't have to buy it
and 2nd; a piece of Yoda's advise:
"shut the f*** up - you must, young padawan."

Cheers.

Don't quote if you don't know where it belongs to.
Your post count was increased by 1 post. Congrats.

[Old_Canuck]

These parties always get rough near the end. Actually that might not be a runway Hecke. It could be a pathway to the beer locker. The pathway coming out is not so straight.

[Splitter]

It looks awesome.

What do you think about the runway in this picture?
Is that the way runways looked like?

For me the runway looks blurred and like a texture of an old game. Actually it looks the exact same like in IL-2.

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/attachment.php?attachmentid=3584&d=1286542020

Notice the tire track/rut in the surface of the runway? While I have not taken the time to examine grass runways in IL-2, I don't recall seeing ruts. Maybe they are there, maybe they are not. Maybe in SoW tires leave tracks in grass, maybe not.

I just did a little research on how grass runways were maintained with very little luck. It appears that the grass was mowed somehow and kept shorter than the rest of the airfield. I would also suspect that the grass/dirt was "tamped" with some sort of roller to compact the soil (just a guess). It also appears that some chemicals were used to retard but not eliminate grass growth.

So how exactly would the short grass be portrayed in a computer program? If it was somehow mechanically "laid over" (like with a roller), how should that be portrayed? What about all the ruts from landing on wet ground?

And is it really that important? :).

(BTW, the grass runway maintenance thing is bothering me now....I must know how those runways were built and maintained lol.)

Splitter

[baronWastelan]

Oleg: congratulations on completing 7 years of SoW development! I'm looking forward to the next 7! :D

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6076412.html

[Peffi]

Notice the tire track/rut in the surface of the runway?

Who says it is a runway...?!

[major_setback]

Oleg, what are the targets for?

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/attachment.php?attachmentid=3584&d=1286542020


[EDIT] For archery? I found this:

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y129/major-setback/album%202/arch01.jpg

[ATAG_Dutch]

What happend to him ? :rolleyes: ;)

you'll find him on hyperlobby.

[Fafnir_6]

Oleg, what are the targets for?

Go here:http://www.luftarchiv.de/index.htm?/bordgerate/waffen.htm and scroll down to the first colour picture...

Cheers,

Fafnir_6

[scrope]

Who says it is a runway...?!
That "RUNWAY" is the Peri track, i would'nt like to sit in a flight hut, gooseneck store or any hut that close to a runway no matter how good the pilots were.

[Blakduk]

Well done Oleg and crew- these pics keep getting better. It's good to see the progress you're making.
The picture of the Spitfire pilot is brilliant- i cant wait to see an animation of the pilot moving after seeing this one with the 'natural' tilt of his head.

[philip.ed]

Oleg, very nice update.

In the first set of shots, the RAF pilot looks like he's wearing his goggles down with no oxygen mask. By all means a pilot might have done this, but really they would have the mask and have the goggles up unless they enjoyed having their vision distorted.
I could go into more detail, but I don't want to bore the rest of the community :P Of course there are loads of combinations for the way a pilot could wear their headgear, but such a set as you have posted seems very unusual to me.

:D

I must add though that it's great to see that you've used the research I sent you for the helmet and goggles! The goggles you have moddled were only used by a few (no pun intended) RAF pilots in the battle, so although it's correct if you want to get really picky the Mark III(a) goggles would be better :D I'm sorry for sounding like such an anorak; it's only a cosmetic detail, and by all means just put this at the bottom of that ever-lengthening-list.

[smink1701]

Oleg,

How about the video you promised???

Oh yeah...that was last week. :grin:

Looking really great.

[ATAG_Dutch]

That "RUNWAY" is the Peri track, i would'nt like to sit in a flight hut, gooseneck store or any hut that close to a runway no matter how good the pilots were.

:grin::grin::grin:

You tell 'em mate. Bloody know it alls.

This week has to be the most positive response to an update for months (so far). And I don't mean because people are feeling guilty.:rolleyes:

I recently bought 'Kursk 1943 - Theatre of War', a ground based tank/infantry strategy game published by 1c games.
The level of detail available in this game as published is vastly inferior to what we've seen in the screenshots shown by the team developing Storm of War.
In this, I mean that the level of detail in the ground objects shown by Mr Maddox is vastly superior to that shown in a dedicated ground warfare 'game' only recently published by the same company.
Yes, I also have Crysis Warhead. It's pants.
I have an intel i7 860 / 6 gig RAM / AtI 5770 set up, @ 1920x1080 which runs the Kursk game only 'ok' on full graphics settings.
I'm looking forward to spending some cash.
Bring it on.:grin:
(actually that contradicts something I said in another thread, but what the hell, I'm feeling good today).:grin:

[SlipBall]

In the first set of shots, the RAF pilot looks like he's wearing his goggles down with no oxygen mask. By all means a pilot might have done this, but really they would have the mask and have the goggles up unless they enjoyed having their vision distorted.
I could go into more detail, but I don't want to bore the rest of the community :P Of course there are loads of combinations for the way a pilot could wear their headgear, but such a set as you have posted seems very unusual to me.



Your post seem's a bit odd to me, the goggles look to be perfectly centered and square to the pilots face. Regarding the mask, unless at 10,000 feet and above, there is no need for it. And would therefore be an option for the pilot...I still hope for a pure positive reaction from you one of these weeks, I know that you mean well, but the goggles are not worn low in that shot.:confused:

[SlipBall]

Thank you for the up-date Oleg, hope that your parents are well...Foo, excellent work!:grin:

[Osprey]

If anyone slags off these pics I am personally going to hunt them down.

This looks AMAZING, and I can't wait for the release!!!!

[Splitter]

:grin::grin::grin:

You tell 'em mate. Bloody know it alls.

This week has to be the most positive response to an update for months (so far). And I don't mean because people are feeling guilty.:rolleyes:

Hey, just to be clear, I wasn't criticizing at all! I was responding to someone saying the runway didn't look any better than IL-2. I was defending the way the runway looked....if it's a runway :).

You you are right, I doubt they would have targets and such sitting so close to a runway. But I think I am seeing a tire track in that shot....if tire tracks are present then the movement of ground units is going to be interesting.

My interest about grass runways is still piqued. I'm trying to dig up some info on them but still not having luck.

Splitter

[Codex]

Wow ... Oleg ... The details your putting into those environments is creating a realistic atmosphere of the 1940's. Something I always felt was missing with the IL-2 series, yes I understand that IL-2 had it limitations but the SoW models and textures are awesome.

[Chivas]

Things are looking very good. I especially like the raised railroad beds which should flow nicely with lowered riverbanks making bridges with large banks unnecessary. This will also give the terrain a much needed depth perception.

[Skoshi Tiger]

It looks awesome.

What do you think about the runway in this picture?
Is that the way runways looked like?

For me the runway looks blurred and like a texture of an old game. Actually it looks the exact same like in IL-2.


I 'think' (and I have no way of knowing how SOW is actually coded) it has something to do with the angle at which we are seeing the scene.

Here are two picture from ROF (with my new 'Pup' by the way) one picture shows the scene from above showing good ground texture, the other from a shallow angle showing the blurred texture.

High View Angle
http://i1042.photobucket.com/albums/b423/Skoshi_Tiger/Flight%20Sim/2010_10_8__23_52_19.jpg

Low View Angle
http://i1042.photobucket.com/albums/b423/Skoshi_Tiger/Flight%20Sim/2010_10_8__23_52_27.jpg

If you see the grass in taken from the low angle, the 3d grass (under the Pups starboard wing) shows the different rendering style for the 3d image.

I 'think' that's what we're seeing in the SOW image. The grass and the track look like they are being rendered differently so at the low angle we see a contrast.

Of course I could be completely wrong! The two sims work completely differently to each other. But it is interesting to see that a 'Work In Progress' SOW compares favourably with a completely up to date and patched ROF!


Cheers!

[IceFire]

In all 3D engines, whenever something is rendered at an extreme angle to the camera the textures tend to look blurry. Anistropic filtering at higher levels makes this go away almost completely by resampling the textures. Most of the screen shots we're seeing have basic filtering and no anti-aliasing so you'll see artifacts like this on the development screen shots. You might see them if you run low settings on your own systems but start tweaking the settings and these things go away.

[ElAurens]

Amazing update Oleg.

You have once again gotten the majority of the BlitzPigs talking about virtual flying again. For this alone I am grateful.

Your posts reveal your own excitement at the progress and level of you and your team's work on the new sim. These good feelings raise all our hopes for the success of Storm Of War.

I cannot wait to settle into the cockpit and fly out over the Channel.

If the BlitzPigs can be of any help, please feel free to let us know.

Thanks again.

[BP_Tailspin]

You have once again gotten the majority of the BlitzPigs talking about virtual flying again.

Whats a Blitzpig ?

[Skoshi Tiger]

In all 3D engines, whenever something is rendered at an extreme angle to the camera the textures tend to look blurry. Anistropic filtering at higher levels makes this go away almost completely by resampling the textures. Most of the screen shots we're seeing have basic filtering and no anti-aliasing so you'll see artifacts like this on the development screen shots. You might see them if you run low settings on your own systems but start tweaking the settings and these things go away.

Good call IceFire!

Here is another screen shot of my scene taken with 16x Anistropic filtering (set in Nvidia control pannel). As you said it cleared up the ground textures quite a bit.

http://i1042.photobucket.com/albums/b423/Skoshi_Tiger/2010_10_9__0_46_22.jpg

Thank you!

I guess the following quote is quite relevant for all of the WIP screenshots taken by Oleg&Co!

Oleg -
Yes on the planes. It was done on the card that has such a feature. Other shots on another PCs with the old cards.

I simply can't do it all the times. Due to the fact that these PCs are overloaded by programmers... My target today was to say that we have it as it was promised more earlier. But it doesn't means that I will post such shots all the time.At least untill the time when my or some other PCs will have the same type of cards.


It's encouraging to see that the programmers are getting a higher priority on the development resources over the boss of the company! It shows that things are full-steam-ahead at Maddox games!
Cheers!

[Necrobaron]

Whats a Blitzpig ?

The mortal enemy of Polish Sausages I'm sure.
________
Oregon Medical Marijuana Dispensary (http://oregon.dispensaries.org/)

[Cap'n Crunch]

Man, I hope the new track player has a time line slidda built in. It's beautiful, perfection on a big screen TV.

[dflion]

Thanks Oleg,
With these excellent pics you are starting to feel the real atmosphere in 1940 England.
I am really looking forward to having an accurate map of the 1940 Battle of Britain landscape to work with. I can't wait to get my hands on BOB-SOW when it is released
Your small team is doing a magnificent job.
DFLion
PS Foobar, can you twist Olegs arm to show some pics of your LNER A4 Pacific steam engine racing along the English countryside?

[ATAG_Dutch]

Hey, just to be clear, I wasn't criticizing at all! I was responding to someone saying the runway didn't look any better than IL-2. I was defending the way the runway looked....if it's a runway :).

You you are right, I doubt they would have targets and such sitting so close to a runway. But I think I am seeing a tire track in that shot....if tire tracks are present then the movement of ground units is going to be interesting.

My interest about grass runways is still piqued. I'm trying to dig up some info on them but still not having luck.

Splitter

Huh?
I quoted some bloke called 'scrope' or some such.
It's that young geezer Hecke that prompted my comment.
Wasn't referring to your comments, Splitter.
I thought your observation of of the tyre tracks was spot on.
I didn't see it!
Review please!!
Ta!:grin:

[Splitter]

Huh?
I quoted some bloke called 'scrope' or some such.
It's that young geezer Hecke that prompted my comment.
Wasn't referring to your comments, Splitter.
I thought your observation of of the tyre tracks was spot on.
I didn't see it!
Review please!!
Ta!:grin:

ROFL, my first comment was directed at Hecke too. I misunderstood who you were calling a know-it-all :).

And it's "tire" not "tyre"....when will you people get the language right :). Next you will make up your own name for "truck" ;).

I LOVE that there has been very little unfounded criticism in this thread. The screen shots were that good. Check out the markings on the plane in the first shot, tons of detail.

Splitter

Now let's all sing kumbaya

[ATAG_Dutch]

And it's "tire" not "tyre"....when will you people get the language right :). Next you will make up your own name for "truck" ;).
Now let's all sing kumbaya

The word you're looking for is 'Lorry'.
And personally I prefer 'Row, row, row your boat'. Not.
Bloody yanks.

But yes, I noticed the stencils too.

That's attention to detail.

[Blackdog_kt]

First of all, i have to say the updates keep getting better and better.

Second, the developer actually answers to the noise made. See what the guy said, "today i show you screenies with AA because so many people cry about them and i want to show them the engine is up to it".

Third, in the same quote (as someone else posted), the high end PCs are reserved for the coders to work on and compile faster, not for the lead developer to take pretty screenshots and show to us. Good to know the equipment is being put to proper use.
When coding is finished and promotion material is needed i'm sure we'll see the full detail of the sim but for now what matters is to make the best use of the team's budget for completing the simulator. Let's think about this next time we feel the urge to go all "how hard is it to see a few DX11 shots with filters." It's not hard, it's just that the dev team has their priorities set straight...finish the game first, sell it afterwards.

Fourth, i'm very excited and encouraged to see how crazy and excited they are about making this and how frank and open they are on their interactions with the community. This alone scores the biggest points for me.
Say whatever you want about how much you like the screenshots or not (it's a matter of personal taste after all), but one thing that must be said is that these guys might be inaccurate with release dates but they've never given us bullsh*t about the features that will make it into their titles. It might suck to know next to nothing about so many things that will or won't be in the sim, but up to now i've never seen them say "this is doable" and not see it come up at some point.

Finally, it's sometimes easy to forget that we are all people here, hiding under these nicknames. I hope you now understand how much pressure mr Maddox was under last week, with his relatives facing health issues, an office move under way and all of us here demanding an update and when that comes along, a few have to spit it back in the guy's face after he had to juggle his real life commitments to make it happen. True, we couldn't have known about the guy's other life problems, but i think it's better to give them some slack and avoid the uncomfortable discussions and guilt, than verbally beat them into a pulp and then go all "sorry, i didn't really know".

Personally, i'll just say thank you to the entire development team for creating something so immense for us to enjoy. Mr. Maddox enjoy your weekend, good health wishes to your family and if i ever met you in real life i'd buy you a few shots of Ruskiy Standard Vodka (it oh so very much rocks by the way, best vodka i've ever tasted in my life).


Honorable mention in this thread for Skoshi Tiger and his pilot's name in RoF, Lord FlashHeart. "Welcome to the 20 minuters....let's do-ooooh-it!" :-P

Go here:http://www.luftarchiv.de/index.htm?/bordgerate/waffen.htm and scroll down to the first colour picture...

Cheers,

Fafnir_6

What's nice is that you can see how thin the tracer lines look. Of course it's all dependant on the camera used to take the photo and ambient light, but it still seems near identical with the tracers i saw when firing 20mm AA guns in the army a couple of years ago. It seems the tracers we're getting in SoW are closer to reality than many of us initially thought :grin:

[ElAurens]

Whats a Blitzpig ?

HEE!!!

:grin:

[Exothermos]

The Stressed skin / embossing effect on the Aircraft skins is a fantastic touch, and is something that is nearly always missed by Sims (and modelers too!). It really adds something. Also, the trees are really starting to look great .

[MD_Titus]

The mortal enemy of Polish Sausages I'm sure.
superb!

[ATAG_Dutch]

Dutch....


RRR capable = refuel rearm repair....


RRRR = refuel rearm repair reliquor

Like the liquor bit.

[Ctrl E]

Any word on whether this beautiful map will be populated? Will there be people walking around? Or in the vehicles?

[Robert]

I love the work so far.. I've adjusted the spitfire shots saturation (sorry!) just to show everyone how subtle the colouring is.. really nice!

http://i822.photobucket.com/albums/zz147/winistrone/SoW/sow9.jpg

If I didn't know any better I'd swear you just got a hold of a long lost box of Koda-Chrome slides from 1940 and put up a picture of that Spitty.

[Blackdog_kt]

Yes, it does really look like an old photo. Just imagine what will be possible with the built-in modding support, having for example the ability to apply filters on pictures or tracks from within the playback interface of the simulator.

Any word on whether this beautiful map will be populated? Will there be people walking around? Or in the vehicles?

I would guess it all hinges on frame rates. I don't know about people, but at some point they did say the engine is capable of having moving buses on a schedule or even cows in the fields. Will we see it in the first version? It's anyone guess and my personal guess is probably not, but i won't mind if having it enabled will bring an i7 based PC to its knees. Plenty of time to enable extra eye candy during the life of the series as we get faster PCs :grin:

[Tree_UK]

Thanks for the update Oleg, some wonderful shots and the spitty looks almost real. One question though, would it be possible to have another look at the panal lines on the nose of the Hurricane (see link).

many thanks



http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?p=175379#post175379

[Foo'bar]

PS Foobar, can you twist Olegs arm to show some pics of your LNER A4 Pacific steam engine racing along the English countryside?

Only Oleg will decide what to show in fridays updates. I even don't know if the A4 will make it into initial release.

[Richie]

Thanks for the update Oleg, some wonderful shots and the spitty looks almost real. One question though, would it be possible to have another look at the panal lines on the nose of the Hurricane (see link).

many thanks



http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?p=175379#post175379


Find a pic in here Tree..

http://s58.photobucket.com/albums/g260/restranger/?start=0

[Richie]

I found a good pic.

I don't know why they made so many little panel lines but I'm sure it will be fixed

[Tree_UK]

Thanks Richie, you can see in the link i put up some examples as well. :grin:

[Richie]

Thanks Richie, you can see in the link i put up some examples as well. :grin:


Oh...dah... I should have checked lol

[JQB]

Oleg, if I may add a couple of suggestions:

1. This was vaguely suggested already but a layout and ambience of the menus and UI to be as atmospheric and remeniscent of the 40s era as possible, to get player in the right modd from onset. Briefings as close to what real breifings were as is practical.

2 have information available to pilots similar to info a real pilot would have, eg. esential stats for the plane such as take off speed, stall speed, approach speed, best glide speed etc. Maybe have a cheat card for lower level of difficulty. IL2 lacked this a little...

Awesome progress, by the way. Hope your weekend was good and your parents are healthy.

[leggit]

I'd like to see SoW used to reproduce historic battles for TV and I hope Oleg would get some decent royalties from that. I know the history channel has already done something on dogfights but the simulation was very poor compared to what Sow has to offer.

Dogfights does not use simulated cuts....just animated scene there is little concern for realistic flight modelling. They're more concerned with illustrating what happened in a given situation.

[philip.ed]

Your post seem's a bit odd to me, the goggles look to be perfectly centered and square to the pilots face. Regarding the mask, unless at 10,000 feet and above, there is no need for it. And would therefore be an option for the pilot...I still hope for a pure positive reaction from you one of these weeks, I know that you mean well, but the goggles are not worn low in that shot.:confused:


You have completely misread my post mate ;)
Firstly, the goggles position is fine. But a pilot would be a bit of a dunce if he chose to wear his goggles down like this. By all means they might have liked to have done this, but it would distort vision and be a general nuisance.
Indeed, the pilot here has no mask connected to his helmet. It's possible it's hanginge from one of the lengths of the wiring loom, but it'd be a bitch to put on if he chose to go to a higher altitude.
Generally, I have only seen a couple of pictures of pilots wearing their goggles down like this. It's quite rare for the reasons I previously stated.
Even the lack of an oxygen mask is rare. Even if he had no need for oxygen, the mask contains the microphone. This pilot may be testing a larangyphone (sorry, I know I've spelt this wrong) but I doubt that.
He may be using gosport tubes, but again I doubt this too. So this pilot seems to be using no microphone, and there are no visible wires going into his b-type helmet to show that he has the c-type radio eaerphones installed ;)

This may all go over your head mate. This is hardly a neccessity for SoW, but for future patches I think this is quite important. I have supported my criticism with information, but I will add that posting pictures will be hard as there were so many mask/goggle/helmet combinations available (although for this period there were only 4 types of goggles, 1 mask, 1 helmet (I'm not including the 1930 pattern) and 2 mics in use)

;)

[stu babes]

The side panels of the spit looks nice, (some emboss) and the grass seems more integrated on the ground.

what is the plane on the third screenshot ?

it is a beaufighter

[RedToo]

Goggles - AFAIK some fighter pilots wore goggles etc. in combat at any altitude (and gloves) because of fear of cockpit fire.

RedToo.

[winny]

Maybe the pilots just took the masks off for the 'camera'... so we can see them smiling!

(maybe not)

[philip.ed]

Goggles - AFAIK some fighter pilots wore goggles etc. in combat at any altitude (and gloves) because of fear of cockpit fire.

RedToo.

No question about it. It was down to personal choice.
Geoffrey Wellum had his ground-screw make him up a blast-shield (to act as goggles) out of celluloid which looked like a modern-day visor for a bone-dome helmet. The idea was clear; it would provide a clear view and serve to protect the pilot.
Alas, this was not so. The celluloid was used for the lenses of the mark III and IIIa goggles. It scratched easily, was prone to distortion and, in the word's of Wellum, 'burned brilliantly' when he was shot down in flames in the battle. He always wore goggles after this event, but made sure they weren't made from celluloid. Luckily he never had cause to use them, as he kept them on top oh his helmet as most pilots did.
I am writing this from memory, but I am sure that what I have written is correct. It's very interesting to me, so I'm sorry if my interests are lost on anyone ;)
By all means, a pilot might choose to wear his goggles down on his helmet, but I can't see the merits as although the goggles modelled currently in SoW don't have celluloid lenses, I have a pair of these goggles in my collection (they are mark Iv's by the way) and they are the most cumbersome goggles ever designed. They're heavy and extremely awkward. I have just tested my pair to make sure I am writing this from experience, and wearing it over my b-type helmet it is a) difficult to get into place and b) provides very poor visibility. It really does make one feel quite hemmed-in. If my plane was hit, I would (of course) wear the goggles, but in a combat situation and in a pre-combat situation, I'd much rather rely on my own eyesight.

Going back to this pilot, maybe he is smiling for the camera! (:D) and if so then kudos to Oleg for showing the excellent pilot-animations, but I can't see why he has no R/T accessibility at the very least.

Thanks, again, Oleg for an excellent update. I can see we are very close now. Don't let my view here get in the way of release.

[SlipBall]

You have completely misread my post mate ;)
Firstly, the goggles position is fine. But a pilot would be a bit of a dunce if he chose to wear his goggles down like this. By all means they might have liked to have done this, but it would distort vision and be a general nuisance.



The point seems trivial to me, but what do I know about it...when all I want is just to take a flight:grin:

[matsher]

I believe that the issue of no cockpit view was shown in an update maybe a year or two ago. If I remember correctly, we'll be able to have realistic-looking dials, we'll be able to move them around on the screen, resize them, choose which dials we want, and we'll be able to set their opaquity. So if this hasn't changed since then and I'm remembering correctly, then that's what you can expect.

Yeah, on release we will have the new WW view and cockpit view that is certain. The new WW view is a quantum leap ahead as far as looks and
customization goes... Although... It is still Wonderview... Albeit a fantastic version. The thinking was to have a third option to go with full cockpit and wonderview. The inbetween view...
Oleg very kindly responded to my post and explained that it is very possible to
create a semi transparent cockpit view, but it'd have to be created as a 2D rendering and wouldn't look good (To Olegs high standards) he reckons it would look like a sim from the late 80's or early 90's... And that's a fair comment...
He also said that they couldn't render a semi transparent cockpit with the fully 3D system in which they created the planes, cause we'd see everything else as well... engine, struts, fuel tanks, etc etc...
So that option is clearly a 'CANT DO' area... Which is also fair enough...

He sadly didn't comment on Xnomad's suggestion of keeping the cockpit fully on
and having the enemy/friendly iD markers and direction indicators visible in cockpit... This was the one I was really hoping he'd have a look at cause it addressed all concerns about Lower FPS and not being able to make the beautiful 3D cockpits semi transparent...

I personally don't need a view like the I'm suggesting... It is more for new
flyers to help with lead shooting and combat maneuver training...
eg. You're descending fast on a fighter... your first shots miss... the fighter sees you and banks hard left, you perform a high yoyo to reduce your speed and get a little height - This is where this view comes in - when you exit your high yoyo you'd want to train to exit the maneuver so you're again in the perfect firing position... (so not pulling out too soon and also not loosing too much altitude.)
It will help to get timing, control input and correct positioning of maneuvers without being forced to use external views...
There are literally dozens pf examples where an inbetween view could help...
Carrier landings, straffing, cross-wind landings, formation flying as well as the aforementioned combat maneuvering etc.


All these are easy to do with WW view and external cameras, but the aim is to get pilots to appreciate being in cockpit and having the immersive feeling if flying in a beautifully rendered fighter, without having to sacrifice on dynamic gameplay (WW View) for the sake of realism.

For those of you who don't know what we're talking about I'll include the mock-up from pg 3. This feature could be disabled outside of a predefined view distance (maybe 500m or 1km) so as not to disrupt... It could be a "strictly within kill distance" feature... or something like that.

And guys, please don't slate me for making this suggestion now... I know it won't be made for release or anytime soon, I am just putting it out there and
hoping for some insightful, relevant input from my fellow airheads.


Oleg, if I may add a couple of suggestions:

2 have information available to pilots similar to info a real pilot would have, eg. esential stats for the plane such as take off speed, stall speed, approach speed, best glide speed etc. Maybe have a cheat card for lower level of difficulty. IL2 lacked this a little...


This above point is also a very important thing to have for new pilot training,
its a real bastard to land any plane never mind a 40's fighter / bomber... And without these essential figures it makes learning to fly these planes exponentially more difficult. Just knowing the stall speed (under different loads) of each plane would help... New pilots always have a tendency to come in for landing too high and too hot... And knowing your best glide speed to get the best Horiz m/s for the least Vert m/s loss is great when your engine has been shot out.

I am sure Oleg and team would include these figures on release, fingers crossed.

[Osprey]

And it's "tire" not "tyre"....when will you people get the language right :). Next you will make up your own name for "truck" ;).


Colonials..........

[philip.ed]

The point seems trivial to me, but what do I know about it...when all I want is just to take a flight:grin:

I thought as such ;) But each to his own, eh mate? ;)

[swiss]

Alas, this was not so. The celluloid was used for the lenses of the mark III and IIIa goggles.

?

Why did they use celluloid instead of glass?
What were motorcyclists lenses made of?

[MD_Titus]

tire is when you get fatigued, tyre is what goes on wheels.

[choctaw111]

Amazing as always. I am greatly looking forward to seeing some in game movies.

[philip.ed]

?

Why did they use celluloid instead of glass?
What were motorcyclists lenses made of?

I don't know really. The Mark II's had laminated glass, the mark 3 series celluloid, and then the mark IV's laminated glass with split lenses (which became quite a fashion for subsequent goggles).
This is why the mark II's were quite popular with many pilots, as the lenses didn't scratch easily, and didn't distort their vision ;)

[Splitter]

tire is when you get fatigued, tyre is what goes on wheels.

The language may have been invented over there, but we perfected it over here....ain't I right? :grin:

I know a lot of goggles were disposable. Weight would also maybe have been a factor. Glass would have shattered if struck by a fragment. Maybe some services/pilots went for lighter weight? On the other hand, cellulose is very flammable and I would hate to have it so close to my face.

Another one of those cool little trivia mysteries from that time.

EDIT: I missed Phillip's post prior to this post, good info there. He answered the quesstions I asked here beffore I asked them lol.

Splitter

[swiss]

.

[Igo kyu]

This heretic prefers diesel shunters, but his (nice, fairly big when you click on the thumbnails) pictures show the track fenced off from public access.

http://www.hondawanderer.com/Class_08.htm

This appears to be all youtube stuff, I don't do flash so I haven't seen it, but it appears to be all steam trains.

http://steamontheweb.co.uk/GWR/Gloucs%20&%20Warwicks.htm

This is the homepage, notice the fencing in the (fairly small) picture:

http://steamontheweb.co.uk/

[peterwoods@supanet.com]

Regarding tyre tracks - they don't have to be aircraft. They could be from any wheeled vehicle.

Re runways - most fighters airfields were grass, no defined runway as such (check out contempory newsreel movies with up to 6 aircraft in line abreast takeoff. Couldn't have been done with tarmac runways!). This permitted takeoff/landing directly into wind. Hence the need for a windsock showing current wind direction. Hope that will be modeled accurately or one could really be in the poo.
Pete

[Insuber]

I like a lot the details of the Spitfire, like this one (I don't care about the dented shadow, as I assume it's a WIP issue):



http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v20/Insuber/Untitled-1.jpg

Radiator fins and internals, half open damper in the back, wheel well in 3D ...

... a real artwork ... passion is behind all this, not business!

[_AH_Prop]

Hello Oleg and 1C group!

Awesome awesome awesome looking update so far. Just rendering the screenshots makes my computer want to melt down :grin:

I have some questions about the damage model, but I'll save that for when more updates are shown with damage. Thanks a million for all your hard work!

[Osprey]

The language may have been invented over there, but we perfected it over here....ain't I right? :grin:



Actually no dear chap. The main reason that our spelling is different is because in Britain the english language continued to evolve throughout the 18th, 19th and even 20th centuries, a living language, from cultural influences of mainland europe, in particular the French.
When the english language arrived in North America through the 17th century it was before these influences and shielded from them, in effect separated. So we see words like centre and center, colonise and colonize etc. Unfortunately globalisation and American made computer companies are teaching much of the World the Americanised spellings.

Of course this has little bearing on grammar and I have no doubt made many mistakes of my own here, however "ain't I right?" is surely in breach of many rules of english. ;)

Languages in use change and evolve, dead languages, like latin, are a constant.

[Chivas]

Questions for Oleg...

How big will you be able to model new maps?
Will the other theaters be a series of small maps? or
Will you be able to model the whole Mediterranean Theater with one large map?
Will you be able to model a map from England too Germany for a Bomber Campaign?
Or will all this have to wait until computers are powerful enough to handle large highly detailed maps. Although by the time you are able to make these theaters, computers may be strong enough.

[DoolittleRaider]

http://i440.photobucket.com/albums/qq121/Doolittle81/SpitPhototoMumsy-1.jpg

[jj_bravo]

Yes on the planes. It was done on the card that has such a feature. Other shots on another PCs with the old cards.

I simply can't do it all the times. Due to the fact that these PCs are overloaded by programmers... My target today was to say that we have it as it was promised more earlier. But it doesn't means that I will post such shots all the time.At least untill the time when my or some other PCs will have the same type of cards.

Let's help these guys and raise some graphic cards :-P
Anyone??

[Splitter]

Actually no dear chap. The main reason that our spelling is different is because in Britain the english language continued to evolve throughout the 18th, 19th and even 20th centuries, a living language, from cultural influences of mainland europe, in particular the French.
When the english language arrived in North America through the 17th century it was before these influences and shielded from them, in effect separated. So we see words like centre and center, colonise and colonize etc. Unfortunately globalisation and American made computer companies are teaching much of the World the Americanised spellings.

Of course this has little bearing on grammar and I have no doubt made many mistakes of my own here, however "ain't I right?" is surely in breach of many rules of english. ;)

Languages in use change and evolve, dead languages, like latin, are a constant.

Two countries separated by a common language :). "Ain't I right?" also breaks several laws of physics, that's why I used it :). At least we're not the Scots....we go see a band every year called Albannach and I can't understand a word they say! (The music is awesome though)

I hope they get the accents right in SoW. I hear VERY American accents when flying for the RAF and I doubt many Yanks were flying for them in the South Pacific (could be wrong but I would be surprised). And the Geraman ground control always sounds angry.

BTW, if you don't like the way we have messed up the language thus far, wait until our kids come into their own...they're worse than the Scots :).

Splitter

[Insuber]

tsk tsk ... try harder, you are not enough OT yet ... I suggest treating your last holiday trip, or your preferred soccer team ...

[jj_bravo]

Thought I'd share a couple of pics from the local airfield. Got so inspired by this game so I had to go support them as they work of donations.

Spitfire Cockpit (http://img841.imageshack.us/img841/7888/049hm.jpg)
Spit props (http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/4091/058s.jpg)
Spit and B-25 WIP (http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/1482/059eo.jpg)
Spit 2 (http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/3256/060nt.jpg)
Spit Pictures (http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/4514/061ce.jpg)
P-51 (http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/5961/062oz.jpg)
P-51 Front (http://img40.imageshack.us/img40/9638/066xc.jpg)
Jeep (http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/930/071uu.jpg)
BOB Map (http://img149.imageshack.us/img149/1673/074c.jpg)
Canadien 242 July 1940 (http://img543.imageshack.us/img543/6126/076nv.jpg)
WW2 Gas Mask (http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/3442/078lp.jpg)

[julien673]

Actually no dear chap. The main reason that our spelling is different is because in Britain the english language continued to evolve throughout the 18th, 19th and even 20th centuries, a living language, from cultural influences of mainland europe, in particular the French.
When the english language arrived in North America through the 17th century it was before these influences and shielded from them, in effect separated. So we see words like centre and center, colonise and colonize etc. Unfortunately globalisation and American made computer companies are teaching much of the World the Americanised spellings.

Of course this has little bearing on grammar and I have no doubt made many mistakes of my own here, however "ain't I right?" is surely in breach of many rules of english. ;)

Languages in use change and evolve, dead languages, like latin, are a constant.

Not true, its from the 11th century, when Guillaume invade the island, is just that usa ( i dont like to said amerain .... ) elvove in other direction

Sry for the english agains.

IF the game is playable ? ? Just to know how good is the AI :) I hope we can do surprise attack, from behind ;)

[zapatista]

Goggles - AFAIK some fighter pilots wore goggles etc. in combat at any altitude (and gloves) because of fear of cockpit fire.

RedToo.
fire was a real danger and probably one of the biggest fears of aviators at the time, but they wore eye protection for more general reasons then just specifically fire protection. like fluid/fuel/coolant leaks potentially splashing them in the face, or a broken canopy splintering or exposing them to very cold air (at high altitude).

goggles however reduced their vision and slightly blurred their vision to, hence many pilots didnt always like to wear them all the time, particularly in close dogfights. preparing to dive on an enemy bomber formation would be a time most would put them back on

similarly with gloves, their purpose was more for general hand protection used while operating machinery (the aircraft) and the cold air, rather then specific fire protection gear (which was an added bonus)

[zapatista]

Radiator fins and internals, half open damper in the back, wheel well in 3D ...
... a real artwork ... passion is behind all this, not business!

i am seeing the exact same thing :)

the current business model for the last 20 yrs in the west has now become making a product as cheaply as possible to maximize profits (while at the same time trying to maximize wages for the executives and managers that run the company), and "marketing" has become a tool to sell something to the public which they might not want or need. the quality of the product has now become a very secondary focus

good to see oleg and his group focus on the quality and detail of the product they are making, and then marketing that end product to the consumer as the best they can make it with current resources (and limited time) at their disposal

[Blackdog_kt]

Yes, i think that's one of the things that makes simulations special compared to other games today. Maybe 10 years ago most games were driven by the same things, but today it's only a handful of titles each year that stick to that old method of making something in a way that you would enjoy it yourself if you were a customer, instead of just making it in order to milk a cash-cow franchise through sequels.

I was talking to a friend who's into graphics programming and he told me that he e-mailed mr Carmack of ID software himself with some coding questions. The guy is probably a millionaire but he took the time to respond to my buddy because for him making games is not just a job, it's also a hobby.

I think this is also the best anti-piracy method available, make something good, maintain a healthy community connection and sell it at a reasonable price so that the true hobbyists, those who maintain each particular genre, would feel guilty not to buy it :grin:


Questions for Oleg...

How big will you be able to model new maps?
Will the other theaters be a series of small maps? or
Will you be able to model the whole Mediterranean Theater with one large map?
Will you be able to model a map from England too Germany for a Bomber Campaign?
Or will all this have to wait until computers are powerful enough to handle large highly detailed maps. Although by the time you are able to make these theaters, computers may be strong enough.

Some interesting questions here. While i think they are not to be answered by the first release in the upcoming series, it still is an intriguing topic. I suspect i'm not the only one who would be interested in a 1:1 map of most of Europe, or in a similar fashion an expansive map depicting part of the pacific theater of operations.

My guess is we'll see things like that, just not now but in the future, probably midway through the life-cycle of the series as it would be pretty taxing on PC resources.

Cutting up a theater into pieces worked well enough for IL2, but i think where big maps would come in handy for Sow is the possible addition of an improved multiplayer environment. For example if people could fly an online dynamic campaign spanning a few weeks or even months, bigger maps would really add a lot to it. I tend to think this is not doable with current PCs, but i'd still be interested to know if there's a provision for it in the simulator engine for when stronger PCs make their appearance.

[GengisKhan]

http://thelaughingmarcus.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/so-much-win.jpg

[Peffi]

Questions for Oleg...

How big will you be able to model new maps? etc etc
Or will all this have to wait until computers are powerful enough to handle large highly detailed maps. Although by the time you are able to make these theaters, computers may be strong enough.

I think you don't know too well how computers work. How big and detailed the maps can be depends on how much time one is willing to put into the modelling of the map. If the level of detail is the same, it doesen't matter if the map is of some small part of England only or the whole world. Only the parts that the player can see and only the details you can see is in the RAM at any given time. The size of the map depends on your hardrive or internet connection if some parts of the map is on a server. You don't need a Cray-computer for a world map. Look at MS FS.

I may be wrong but I think I'm not.

[AndyJWest]

Only the parts that the player can see and only the details you can see is in the RAM at any given time.
This approach works for MSFS because it only needs to model a single aircraft. An air combat simulator needs to be able to model the details for each aircraft independently, or at least give a realistic approximation for such modelling - you can take some shortcuts where the action is well separated from human playersb but even using such techniques a simulation can only cope with a finite number of aircraft on a finite map. Not that I'd use MSFS as a good example of how to model even the limited world-representation it does...

[Xilon_x]

Dear OLEG MADDOX I ask to you if the next week e' possible to see cracking(cutaway) of an airplane in order to understand like e' fact within.

http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/2250/cantz1007alcionebiscopi.jpg

this is italian reconnaissance aircraft in battle of brittain


it would appeal to also to see to me l' airplane with all the open doors
door of the open motor
door open crew enter pilot
door of the space open radio and comunication.
door of the open space bombs
door of fuel open
door of amunition open
ec.ecc.

[Peffi]

[QUOTE=AndyJWest;188560]This approach works for MSFS because it only needs to model a single aircraft.QUOTE]

? AFAIK MSFS can have a multitude of aicraft in the sky at the same time. I still believe I am right about how big a map can be. If Oleg wants to cover Tellus to put in the game it is possible but it will take him a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong time. How many airplanes that can be in the sky at the same time was not the question and is another question.

[Osprey]

Not true, its from the 11th century, when Guillaume invade the island, is just that usa ( i dont like to said amerain .... ) elvove in other direction

Sry for the english agains.


You missed the part where I said that english language evolution continued from the 17c, where 'US english' was protected from that.

English is a bastardised mix of everybody who has invaded the island since the Romans, not starting from 11c. The true language of this island is closer to welsh if anything, the only part that was here first and didn't get wiped out totally by invaders.

[Osprey]

http://i440.photobucket.com/albums/qq121/Doolittle81/SpitPhototoMumsy-1.jpg


lol, nicely done but where did he get the Spitfire from? Did he nick it? :D

[philip.ed]

fire was a real danger and probably one of the biggest fears of aviators at the time, but they wore eye protection for more general reasons then just specifically fire protection. like fluid/fuel/coolant leaks potentially splashing them in the face, or a broken canopy splintering or exposing them to very cold air (at high altitude).

goggles however reduced their vision and slightly blurred their vision to, hence many pilots didnt always like to wear them all the time, particularly in close dogfights. preparing to dive on an enemy bomber formation would be a time most would put them back on

similarly with gloves, their purpose was more for general hand protection used while operating machinery (the aircraft) and the cold air, rather then specific fire protection gear (which was an added bonus)

They'd be lucky to get the goggles in place when diving on a bomber formation! It really is not as easy to put the goggles on as one would think.

[FG28_Kodiak]

Questions for Oleg...

How big will you be able to model new maps?
Will the other theaters be a series of small maps? or
Will you be able to model the whole Mediterranean Theater with one large map?
Will you be able to model a map from England too Germany for a Bomber Campaign?
Or will all this have to wait until computers are powerful enough to handle large highly detailed maps. Although by the time you are able to make these theaters, computers may be strong enough.

You should read earlier post's from Oleg:

The size of the map could be unlimited (sphere) but with small amount of detail and decreased resolution.
So will be limited map.

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthread.php?p=169015#post169015

[Peffi]

About the map size, I guess I repeated just what Oleg said before. Possible with unlimited size but restricted due to the work Oleg would have to put into making it with desired detail-level.

[Insuber]

Oleg said also that user-developed maps will be limited in size, smaller than the official ones.

Cheers,
Insuber

[ATAG_Dutch]

English is a bastardised mix of everybody who has invaded the island since the Romans, not starting from 11c. The true language of this island is closer to welsh if anything, the only part that was here first and didn't get wiped out totally by invaders.

I've not been on the forum for a couple of days, so hadn't noticed the debate a bit of humourous (humorous:)) banter caused!
Osprey is correct, although where the original pictish and celtic folk who populated the Island came from I don't know.:confused:
We really shouldn't criticise our colonial friends for corrupting the language, as the language is a corruption in itself. But I can't help doing so and it amuses me.

@Splitter, I always assumed the American accents in RAF missions were supposed to be Canadian.
Was I wrong? And have I just made another social 'faux pas'?!:rolleyes::grin:

[Splitter]

Aw heck, Dutch, now I am going to have to listen to the chatter more closely! Canadian is possible, but I am not hearing the "eh?" at the end of sentences....."Stay with your leader, eh?" :). Canadian accents and northern midwest US accents are pretty close in some ways, but the "eh?" is tell tale.

German and Japanese voices in games usually have that "angry" tone and I think that comes from the movies (where they are always angry).

Splitter

[Richie]

That's BS we don't have accents just Newfies. I don't say boot instead of boat.

[Friendly_flyer]

German and Japanese voices in games usually have that "angry" tone and I think that comes from the movies (where they are always angry).

I've always liked "Control Tower Fritz, allways sound like he has beer and sauerkraut ready for me when I land.

[Splitter]

That's BS we don't have accents just Newfies. I don't say boot instead of boat.

Easy Richie, we have different dialects down here too. New York and South Carolina sound like different countries. The upper midwest has their accent, New England has its' own, Texas is different from other southern accents, California does its' own thing. And there are others. (But yes, we can usually also pick out Canadians in any event....they are the ones with the funny looking money :) )

I do hope some care is taken when presenting the radio chatter in SoW. Not every American pilot was a good ole' southern boy nor a Blue Blooded New Englander. Not all Brits sound like a member of the royal family nor a working class Londoner.

We talk about immersion and hope the engine sounds are good....but what about the language and radio chatter? I don't "think" it would be that hard, or that expensive, to put some variety into these things for SoW.

Maybe this is already taken care of. We have no way of knowing since we have not heard any voice audio. Is it of "initial release" importance? Probably not, but it would be nice.

Splitter

[ATAG_Dutch]

Aw heck, Dutch, now I am going to have to listen to the chatter more closely!

Go to the 'samples/speech' folder in the programme's files and listen all day long if you like!:grin:

I love searching through those for bits to use in short films.
There's quite a lot of swearing and blasphemy in there that sounds quite genuinely RAF banter.
'Bloody Hell' , 'Sod it', 'Christ' and 'Bugger' spring immediately to mind.
Believe it or not, 'Pull your finger out!' is also in there.
It's a hoot.:grin:

[DD_crash]

I've always liked "Control Tower Fritz, allways sound like he has beer and sauerkraut ready for me when I land.
+1 HaHa :)

[BG-09]

Oleg, what are the targets for?

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/attachment.php?attachmentid=3584&d=1286542020


[EDIT] For archery? I found this:

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y129/major-setback/album%202/arch01.jpg

Hey Major, the archery at the flight field is perfect way to learn and feel the balistics for the unexperienced pilots...Oleg have to include such tuition for the novices...it is historical.
/I know I will be banned for Couterstrike trolling.../
~Regards!

[Richie]

Your answer Major!! In the motion pictures


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbDmMKMy6TY

[MD_Titus]

tsk tsk ... try harder, you are not enough OT yet ... I suggest treating your last holiday trip, or your preferred soccer team ...
HERESY!
You missed the part where I said that english language evolution continued from the 17c, where 'US english' was protected from that.

English is a bastardised mix of everybody who has invaded the island since the Romans, not starting from 11c. The true language of this island is closer to welsh if anything, the only part that was here first and didn't get wiped out totally by invaders.
no surprise - who'd want Wales?!