I agree with Feathered and agree also with Virre89.
More realism in flight and in combat, no need to show yourself while drinking a beer at the airbase bar... :)

Maraz

Still not getting through. :mad: I take it as a given that all aspects of flight and fight dynamics will be taken care of. I trust Oleg on that. What quite possibly will not happen is that any kind of soul will be added to the experience. Luthier said a couple of days ago that he's, "doing things like radio comms, training mission, dynamic campaigns, GUI design, and generally participating... as a sort of an added brain." How much thought has he given to the greater realism and immersion of the sim, outside of fight/flight dynamics? So far, all I've heard is that he championed the running from your aircraft to an AAA gun. :!:

And do not forget to think about all the tidbits given these last years...

- What OM seems to aim for is a quasi cinematic experience with the ability to make professional-level movies out of the SoW engine...this implies very high level of detail in all areas, it goes much beyond just simulating flight and dogfight!
If you were to watch a "The Grand Circus" movie-to-be-filmed, would you prefer to experience scrambling to your Tempest out of your tent in the muddy and destroyed world of Rheine airbase ina Gotterdämmerung ambience, or to teach flying the Tiger Moth in a OTU in the middle of the english green grass countryside full of nice flowers and yellow planes?
Or would you prefer to have marvelous airplanes and clouds and land on a IL2 type landscape? That would not do it for any movie-goer...This level of details has to be prepared from the get go: good money will depend on it and so will the future development of the SoW series!
Imagine knowing that maybe in the future you will get a full detail flyable-as-crew B29 because some great director needed it in a movie about war on Japan...and paid in full for its development!

- on the other hand Luthier is believed to dream about an Air/Sea/Ground (at least Air/Ground) combined set of simulations...This would be the Holy Grail of all simulation games...and again if prepared with the proper care may not be that far away...
It may not be so difficult as this is more about two or three different simulations with common aspects: each player chooses to play one of the sim (I think it would be next to impossible to develop one unique sim for the three branchs...but there is no need, actually!)
The naval and ground sim must be able to show and react to the aircraft of the air sim, based on position status and a adapted LOD sent by the air sim players; the air sim will need the same from the naval and ground sim again with a adapted LOD for the landscape and object. full level of detail would be only for the player of a given sim. That would need a mightily robust netcode (among other things): what a luck that IL2 had all the fundamentals in place already!

Imagine being able to impersonate a Tiger commander trying to survive the attacks of a pair of Typhoon in the Falaise pocket...flown by two of your pals somewhere on the net...to look for a usable 20mm vierling at your friendly Flak battery nearby and get rid of those pesky attackers by yourself...or to request a torpedo attack on a Japanese troop transport ready to invade your island...

And so many people are still asking why it would take this long to forge the socle of all this gaming and filming goodness? Dream and wait...I suspect we will not be disappointed!

Cordially

JVM

No more FM/DM but lots more immersion is needed, if IL-2 is the model. While it did well, this is the only reason why it was not a blockbuster title.

I do think this has to do with the Eastern European thought on producing these games. Engineer them to death but forget about creature comforts. ( I say this as a Eastern European and Engineer)

Let's face it, we won't know for sure if we are flying a Bf109 or Spitfire!

the main aspects that i see lacking to bring the sim alive:

- in dynamic campaign mode you should see a mission room where different missions are being tasked as the campaign is unfolding, similar to how falcon4 does it. you should then be able to choose a mission you prefer (escorting bombers, flying CAP, flying a bomber, ground attack, roaming air patrol etc). once you chose your mission you go to the mission briefing room to get further details (similar to how il2 does it now).
- missions that are critical to how the campaign unfolds could even be color coded, for ex letting the german AI attack the British radar stations would have the desired historical effect, and the campaign would continue along historical lines, but if humans fly that mission and mess it up, the campaign could sidetrack and diverge into a non historical outcome (ie the germans might succeed in gaining air supremacy over england etc..). there might only be 5 or 10 critical turning points in the whole 3 or 4 months normal campaign mode, but it could be a way to implement the degree to which your actions can influence the overall outcome of the campaign..

- once you are sitting in your cockpit at the airfield, there should be AI activity around you, like refueling trucks and jeeps driving around the base. trucks with munitions driving to hangars etc.. maybe an ambulance or fire truck on standby when a plane crashes or the base gets raided. if a base has been damaged by a raid or explosion, then there should be some basic "road crews" at work (once the xyz correct time has passed for the runway repair to be completed, the road crew drives back to its hangar). all this doesnt have to take much cpu power or be to complex, currently the better mission makers have versions of this already working in il2.
- there should also be tower radio chatter if other planes are taxing, taking- off/landing, or from planes flying nearby asking for landing clearance. this radio chatter shouldnt be mindless wav files like we have now, but should represent what is happening around you (ai plane taxing being given takeoff clearance, nearby planes asking for home vector directions, weather report and wind direction, etc..). we also need a windsock and a few flags fluttering in the wind, showing correct wind direction.
- a few other automated animations. like when you come in on short final to land and forgot to lower your landing gear, the tower could shoot a red/green flair in your direction to get your attention and wave you off etc..
- you should be able to fly some of these cargo supply missions yourself, and also be able to select unarmed reconnaissance missions, flying unarmed replacement aircraft to forward airbases (and if you get shot down or mess up the landing and damage your aircraft, then this affects the aircraft available at that base etc...) many il2 users would choose to fly those types of missions, it doesnt have to be shoot-'em-up dogfighting all the time. similarly like others mentioned already, there could be pilot rescue missions, night missions to parachute secret agents over france, landing in a field next to a friendly pilot who parachuted to pick him up etc..

- once airborne, there should be both civilian and military AI trafic in the air. for ex small groups of fighters (unarmed ?) being flown from their factories to the forward airbases, either to provide replacement planes for those that have been destroyed, or to provide new plane types as models get upgraded over time (and those planes again become available to people joining that server and looking at possible plane models to select). military transport aircraft should be shuttling parts and personnel to various bases.
- this again can be done with simple ai routines. for ex each airbase gets X amount of transport aircraft or new replacement aircraft per Y time period. if a base has been attacked and equipment lost/damaged, then this ai traffic should increase accordingly, and only make fuel, munitions, plane models available once they have been resupplied.
- this also means that as a friendly/enemy airplanes are flying in that area you'd have to identify these aircraft as friendly/enemy when you encounter them, before simply shooting at anything that moves like we do now.

- when flying low you should see some civilian and military traffic on the roads. a few tractors in the field in summer, some civilian buses or cars on country roads. truck convoys on roads with fuel and munition supplies.. (and destroying these convoys would result in their intended destination base to run low on fuel and munitions accordingly). mig alley already had that in their campaign 10 yrs ago, it doesnt need to be as complex as some people might believe. simple ai routines with truck/train/car objects moving around on predestined (or random) routes, and a xyz value they represent in fuel or munitions supply.similar to ms flightsim you should be able in the preferences/options to select high.medium/low AI traffic or activity, depending on your cpu and gfx card.additionally your own pc should only model/display those objects within a specific radius from you (for ex 5 km), and only when you fly low enough to be able to see them, so that no pc resources are being wasted on items you are not able to see.

- whatever amount of plane models and numbers are available at an airfield should be represented as the same static object at that airfield, if they are then destroyed by an air raid, then whatever models are destroyed should not be available anymore to select for flying at that airfield till new replacement aircraft arrive, or those with minor damage have been repaired.
- if an airfield has just been raided you should not be able to magically spawn to a brand new plane from that location, neither should there be fuel available if the storage tanks were destroyed, same with ammo supplies to rearm your plane. if a runway was bombed, then it should take xyz time for it to be repaired before you can use it again, and trying to take-off/land on that section of the runway should damage your plane accordingly.


once you add elements like that, you are suddenly flying around in a world that is alive, and the actions you take have an effect on the unfolding campaign.

i feel at the very least what is being said now about 3rd party tools, then all of what you say could maybe be implemented if not by oleg then by 3rd party kind of like Traffic for fsx, correct?

Strongly disagree. Being able to choose missions from a number generated (just as in Falcon 4) is one of the biggest immersion killers I know. You want to fly? Then you're a pilot and part of a military. That means you get orders and you must try to fulfill them - it's not a "I'd like to do this mission now" free choice thing. You want to give orders? Then you're a general and aren't flying anymore. That part is for a strategy game and not a flight sim. Being able to choose missions is a no no in my book. http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/images/icons/icon13.gif

Full ack.

Don't think there would be civilian air traffic in a contested zone - nobody would be dumb enough to fly there in a civvie aircraft. Rest ack.

Ack.

Ack.

csThor, I await your inspiring and imaginative solution with the greatest anticipation. :rolleyes:

I've said before that I favor the "Red Baron II" style for a campaign. I don't really want "roleplaying" in the sense of the word, but I want to play the role of a pilot in WW2 - I get assigned to a unit, I get my mission orders, I fly, I try to stay alive and I rise though the ranks.

Maybe ingame voip for online could be nice , still most people sit on Ventrilo or Teamspeak like any other game with their friends , clans :).

Well as you put it i dunno , you seemed like you wanted the game to recon everything and be voice controlled, it would add quite alot but getting such things to work with anyway usually ends up buggy.

Idd id love it but it might be somthing more for SinglePlayer Campaign which i dont care jack about, hoping for a great mp experience and that they seriously fix the UI INTERFACE so it get's abit more friendly and also adds servers browsers , lobbys and a decent chat system.

What happens if you rise in rank? Will you just get a warm fuzzy feeling and fly at the front of the group? Would a rise in rank from Staffel Kaptain up to Kommodore be completely meaningless in your SoW? How should such a promotion effect your game? How would it effect, "the role of a pilot in WW2"?

Rank per se doesn't mean you get more previleges. I mean you can be an Oberleutnant, but you're not Staffelkapitän when there's a Hauptmann leading it ;)
Responsibilities should depend on position - wingman, element leader, flight leader, squadron commander, Gruppenkommandeur, ...

However with virtually nothing known on the campaign I prefer to keep myself from dreaming. Not expecting anything cannot get you disappointed ;)

I think everyone is losing sight of the fact that this a Battle of Britain simulation. Taking place in a very short time period, only a few months at most.
So ranking up etc would seem a bit of a major stretch.
One would hope the SOW features stats recording server side and that this is expanded expecially as more campaigns (expansions) are added.
I honestly expect to see life (active ai) around the airfields in the initial release as this is a next gen flight sim and something that would be expected.
What is the point of running to AA guns if you are not protecting a living vibrant airfield.
Again this is purely a Battle of Britain thing where airfields were mostly permenant structures.
I would obviouly expect a pilots log book and lists of claims, confirmed kills etc.
But all this is purely me, me, me and somehow I doubt Oleg really cares what i want :grin:
This sim has been many years in the making and I trust the developers, publishers all know what works and what does not.
A sim like WOV Bob while stunning too look at, failed because they ignored the online community.
While it may be fun to shoot down ai at some point you will want to take down your fellow human and with the proliferation of broadband that is now possible.
I fly ADW from South Africa with a ping of 250-290 and still enjoy the ride. I shoot people down and get shot down often. Honestly once I flew online for the first time I never touched the game offline much again.
The only time I do is to practice take-off and landings in various planes and bombing practice.
This I can mainly attribute to IL2's totally lacking "soul" in offline play as one poster posted previously.
All

"Rank per se doesn't mean you get more previleges. I mean you can be an Oberleutnant, but you're not Staffelkapitän when there's a Hauptmann leading it
Responsibilities should depend on position - wingman, element leader, flight leader, squadron commander, Gruppenkommandeur, ...

However with virtually nothing known on the campaign I prefer to keep myself from dreaming. Not expecting anything cannot get you disappointed"


I know what you mean there. ;)

I'm hoping that by keeping it in circulation, the powers that be might consider some wider options.

I guess being a Kanone of greater rank would have bestowed some perks that would translate nicely into a flight sim. Getting priority on equipment, aircraft and the like for the unit. A well serviced personal aircraft with less chance of mechanical failure than the latest sprog's. The chance to request a transfer (and maybe even have it granted). Or the chance to poach experienced pilots from other units. Your input on a tactical level would be respected and considered before a mission...

It's details like that that I support, certainly not cliched roleplaying, and geeforce-resistance player powerups and whatnot. :)

Bobb4, you are right about Il-2's offline experience lacking soul. That is why so many onliners are coming in here to say how much they don't care for it. They know it sucks and so do I.
I just don't think it has to be that way, and I don't want to see Luthier produce a half-hearted, makeshift, campaign experience for SoW.

I recall an old Avalon Hill Sherman Tank board game "simulator" from the late '80's which had a campaign. You started out as a nobody in the company, in the lousiest Sherman version in the company, and, if you survived, did good, and rose in rank, you received a better Sherman versions. Exactly what F_IV is urging here. The best you could achieve was command of the company, and a late-model Sherman, with the 76mm gun, and the superior suspension.

Oleg, seeing as you are around a little bit at the moment, is there anything in this thread that might work it's way into the SoW series?

wow
 

Wow, interesting thread! Lots of great ideas.

CS thanks for explaining the mentality behind IL-2 and Oleg.

I would want BOB SOW to give us a new level of DM, FM, bullet / round physics (and other weapons like bombs, napalm, rocket, flak, AAA physics too)

And keep its strengths (that IL-2 is known for). Add some great sounds (like DB engine sounds like one, the merlins sound like the ones at the airshows etc) along with the new hotness graphics . . .

I'd rather have a solid WW 2 sim along the lines that IL-2 was known for than have a BOB SOW having a watered down FM (or a rehash of IL-2's) or planeset because time was spent developing RPG elements.

I wouldn't want BOB SOW to lose out many of the core strengths that IL-2 had, in place of "fluff" stuff like RPG officer and a gentleman, or mechanical / inventory management / squadron planeset lobbying / air field design simulation / personnel allocation. Leave that to RPG's, RTS, or games like Civilization or Empire series . . .

If a game tries to have too many elements it becomes a jack of all trades and a master of none, and its mediocre. Like Transformers 2 movie, tried too many plot elements and it just became a big fat mess instead of the blockbuster it was anticipated to be.

For roleplaying game stuff or FPS stuff, there are dedicated games to that will do those elments better than a flight sim could ever dream of.

We're pilots here. Not Generals. If you want to do that, I hear Star Craft 2 is coming along nicely.

I do agree with Feathered in that it would be nice to fly a variety of missions like recon and if you fly recon and something slips in or you didn't get the right area, this will have an effect in future missions or what not if you've got a dynamic campaign. Or maybe a test pilot, testing a "new" prototype.

Provided that this variety it is within the combat flight simulation realm. Sure, trying to fit as many planes inside your escort carrier via tetris style rearragement can be fun, and it is plane related but puzzles aren't really a flight sim element.

Also it would be nice to have the interactive air / ground / sea previously mentioned.

Like say if you and your dive bomber squadron got lazy flew over a Japanese airbase enroute to bomb some troop transports, several minutes into the mission, the Japanese would launch fighters to catch you.

But if you coordinated with your buddies from the army and a that base was bombed and cratered, you might just get flak as a greeting.

Or if a carrier group gets jumped by torpedo bombers, they start to zig zag etc . . .


Yes to the AI being improved and better. But AI will always be AI, and until humanity advances to where we have autonomous robots like Star Trek's Data or Ghost In the Shell SAC, you'll have AI that doesn't use tactics or does repetitive and predictive actions.

I also agree in providing the best method and in game tools for players to design their own campaigns and have control over AI and many other features so they can get the campaign clockwork perfect.

I'd say that option for briefing, but that's is paperwork and boring (like in role playing games to improve axe skill you have to chop 20000 logs). No one wants to play a game to grind endlessly. Or having to click the ground crew and get planes ready and you have to get things in order like playing a session of Myst or some other adventure game.

It is interesting to some, but BOB SOW is about flying.

A great sim, and great "RPG-ish peripheral bits", aren't mutually exclusive. What is needed is the ability for third-party applications to "watch" what the sim's doing and possibly feed back into it. Then imaginative new stuff can be handled by community-built applications. Will there be a SDK for SoW??

To be honest, I wish in the end we see a lot of RPG elements in the game.
They "cost" nothing, but they add a lot to many of us.

I really enjoyed the scenario in one of the COD's (or was it MOH?) where you were an air crewman that got shot down and had to find your way home (actually in that instance, it was finding help to get home) but that would be something interesting as an option. Actually from what I have seen I don't see why that couldn't happen or even be part of the development. Alternately you could, say land and finish off the guy you just shot down with your pistol (or strangle him if your flying red). :)

The guys that code this game are smart. I think if great apps like DCG can be designed w/ little or no help from the developers, I have no doubt with minimal resources, 1c could create a more immersive campaign driven environment. Hell, they should just reverse engineer some classic games and just 'borrow' stuff. The problem BOB will face is a far smarter audience that have grown accustomed to tight story/campaign driven games thanks the explosion of consoles like xbox360 and ps3. I could list a ton of games that have awesome campaign based content but like others have said, you have to have creative folks involved in the process and not just lab coat wearing pinheads that know 1s and 0s and code in machine language. Nobody will argue the simple fact that the 1c guys are flight sim geniuses. They are but have zero creativity. Just bring in a few creative gurus and it's game on.