Tank sim?
 

Looking at the pictures of the tanks and other ground vehicles I wonder if a tank sim is in the making? Reminds me of Buddy Hackett's comment (I think it was Buddy Hackett) that he went to a fight and a hockey game broke out!

This might make good economic sense for 1C. Look at the sales of Call of Duty and the like compared to what I suspect are sales of IL2 and other flight sims.

Merging ground combat with air support anyone? :cool:

Well if they're going for anything, my suggestion would be a sub sim.

Silent Hunter started out broken and has only gotten worse. Sub sim AI is easy to codify as well -- keep most escorts on the 270 deg forward arc, spread one or more (depending on assets available) 15-20km ahead in fair-weather daylight reducing the distance with diminishing visibility or in darkness. Throw in a few attack algorithms and that's it. It would even be possible to model the late-war hunter-killer 'circle of death' tactics (though frustrating to play against I'm sure).

I'm pretty sure 1C could torpedo the opposition handily. Maybe some smart person could license the engine for these purposes?

dduff

Hi there

Don't know if there working on a tank sim but from what I've read over the years is that all vehicles in BoB can / could be controlled by the player, all they need is some one to make the interior for the vehicles.

Quote from SimHQ Interview with Oleg 2009 by Doug Atkinson

One for the sandbox!
 

Im thinking more in the way of a Dinky Toys simulator.

Fun!

Viking

If it's possible to create merged installations of titles based on the same engine but done by different developers, we could be in for a treat.

Imagine that they license the engine to a studio that wants to make a ground combat game for example. Now imagine you can merge this ground combat game with the same installation as your regular flight sim SoW, just like we used to do with the different IL2 expansions. Voila, you have ArmA 2 in world war II but with better physics and more in depth simulation ;)

What i would be interested to see is a port of "over flanders fields" (the CFS3 total conversion mod that deals with WWI air combat), as they have done an enormous amount of research over the years. I think they have the most accurate timelines for each individual squadron regarding plane types, ace rosters, aircraft skins and airfield movements, plus archives about what the weather was like during each day, but CFS3 is a very old engine. I'd love to see the result of it done on the SoW engine.

I would buy a ground combat sim in a second with those graphics. I was a better tanker in BF '42 than pilot in any flight sim I have played lol.

The thing about a tank sim in that a choice would have to be made. For a true sim, the tank would require at least two players in the tank as driver and gunner (even that's not enough for a true sim). Or, as would be my choice, you could do the tank sim with just one player per tank which would take more skill....driving and shooting at the same time is like patting your head and rubbing your tummy at the same time.

I could see this engine working on the ground. Hit boxes, foliage, roads, terrain, ballistics modeling....it's all already there.

Usually, a game that combines air and ground focuses on the ground action with flight models and planes being very unrealistic. It would be interesting to see a game that started as a flight combat sim and then added ground combat.

Splitter

Oleg hinted in 2004 or 2005 that he was interested in a tank sim - however he has more recently said that his primary and central focus will remain flight-simulators.

The capacity seems mainly focused on the 3rd party, but I wouldn't be surprised if Oleg licenses the engine at some point.

Oleg has hinted a very long time ago that a general war sim is possible with the SOW engine. What you could see over the years are vehicles, tanks, and ships, etc becoming more controllable over the years of addons to the SOW series. When all the SOW air war theaters are complete years from now, and computers have become much more powerful....you could see them develop a complete combined forces addon to the SOW series.

There are a couple games out: T-34 vs Tiger and Steel Fury: Kharkov 1942 by the same developers. Steel Fury has a demo and is entirely single player.

Steel Fury plays like the developers ran out of money which is a pity. The player can use all the tactics he wants but the other forces on his side just trudge suicidally in a straight line towards the enemy. Often, the player unit is the only one left at the end.

dduff