Hardware, software and the future of flight combat sims.

[flyingblind]

With the sad demise of CloD a thought occured to me. What is the future for realistic combat sims?

All serious simers want ever more realism and deeper immersion. Up until now the limiting factor has been the hardware. Even way above average home computers simply did not have the power to cope with photo realistic video, complex interactive objects plus processor hungry systems like lighting and partical effects and weather on their own let alone online with a whole bunch of players and AIs.

This is all now rapidly changing. CloD has shown that even a home PC is reaching the point where they can indeed handle that level of complexity. The problem with CloD was not the code as such as the problems could have been fixed or even better code written. The problem was that there was simply insufficiant funds available. Or rather the amount of money required was too large to see a return on the investment.

So my point is - are computers now so powerful they hold out the prospect of unbelievable realism and complexity but the cost of developing the code and the modeling to realise this is so prohibitably expensive that developers are reaching a point where a profit cannot be made if hardware coming out now or the near future is to be fully utilised.

If this is the case (and please feel free to disagree) then what are the solutions?

Is this as good as it will get for some time? 777 Studios have already stated quite bluntly that they will be taking a few steps back from CloD purely because of time and cost constraints.

This also has serious consequences for hardware manufacturers and vendors. As long as they are playing catch up with PC users asperations they have a ready market for their wares but if those asperations are being thwarted by the developement cost of games then the point and need for upgrades vanishes.

Thoughts anyone?

[SlipBall]

There are extremely strong computers coming in the near not to distant future...if there is demand, software will still be coded for flight combat

[baronWastelan]

You answered your own question with: "Is this as good as it will get for some time? 777 Studios have already stated quite bluntly that they will be taking a few steps back from CloD purely because of time and cost constraints."

They know how many "serious simmers" there are, did the math and determined the potential pay-off from catering to this market.

[SlipBall]

Originally Posted by baronWastelan

You answered your own question with: "Is this as good as it will get for some time? 777 Studios have already stated quite bluntly that they will be taking a few steps back from CloD purely because of time and cost constraints."

They know how many "serious simmers" there are, did the math and determined the potential pay-off from catering to this market.

Yes I think that you are right on...lack of objects, now thats another story

[flyingblind]

Yes, thats my point. If there is enough demand. But if the cost of writing the code becomes greater than the demand can support then no one will write it.

It is why console games do so well. Because the power of a console is limited in comparison to a good PC there is no point in producing large, complex maps and all the other things simers expect plus the users are quite happy with the limited input of their controllers. If it can be done on a PC people want it but they will only get it if developers get a return.

[SlipBall]

Call me crazy but If Oleg could have delivered (everything), I would have payed much much more.

[JG52Uther]

IMO people are too greedy these days.I'm sure a lot of people who bought CoD were new to the il2 scene, perhaps younger, and, because they owned an o/c i5 2500k etc simply expected to wind the settings up to max and play. It took me several years before I could even fly il2 at max settings.
il2 was always like that for me, the game was far above the tech available to run it at full whack, and I was constantly upgrading just to get a few more FPS.
Things have changed somewhat now, and there is some fantastic tech available, but after CoD, I think things will be simplified, people expect a game to run flawlessly these days (and why wouldn't they TBH) but it was never my experience.I'm probably just too old, and remember the good old days.
Games like WoT, WT etc have great graphics, but are 'sim lite' and will sell millions, and have thousands playing.That seems to be the future.

[SlipBall]

When I first bought Il-2 I could not play it, took me a year to get a decent rig it sat on the shelf

[flyingblind]

Which seems more than a little sad to me and what I was getting at. Is it really the end of complex sims like CloD as we all drift back to simpler but unsatisfying games?

But has anyone any thoughts on solutions? Maybe rather than every team of game developers building their own complete world from the ground up some form of universal standard environment could be developed that contained all the physics and effects needed and which could accept third party plugins like Speed Tree or the lighting used in CloD. That way a developer could just concentrate on the models and game play needed for their own particular scenario. More of a collaboration of the whole games industry and even hardware manufacturers.

What is the point of powerfull computers if there is nothing to use them for. I am sure games are the major reason for home users wanting to upgrade. Everything else can be run on an ipad these days.

Not sure if the vested interests of competing developers would ever allow that to happen though.

[SlipBall]

I could be wrong big time, but I don't think a guy like Oleg with a vision, is ever gonna show up again...maybe luthier if someone would back him