Dear MG

[kendo65]

Originally Posted by Sternjaeger II

you see Kendo, this is exactly the point. First of all, Luthier himself is the only person responsible for this, since he's the one that went silent and didn't bother listening to the wise bunch of forum members who say "we know you can't fix it all in one go, fair enough, but for pete's sake keep us updated on what's happening, if anything to show some respect to people that have waited for this and supported your work for years".

The reality of software houses nowadays is one of extreme interaction potential: the reach out for info, documents, manuals, pictures etc is virtually limitless, using this potential is something that could achieve great, great results. I personally provided docs to Oleg himself during the early dev stages of CoD, found some more material for a friend at Daidalos, got in contact with museums, found pics, documents, with no need for compensations or recognitions, just for the sake of the sim's quality.

A development team that doesn't interact with the community, esp in the field of simulation, is a team that will make mistakes, which then will take time to fix. Oleg's leaving was already a bad sign, but I thought I'd stop being pessimistic, if anything it was Luthier the one that kept the communication channel opened, but this new attitude of theirs shows only poor managerial skills, it's a true shame, above all the fact that no matter how often we tell them "hey, some of us can help with our competence for free", they simply don't care.

And please remember that I still really really hope to be wrong.

I know, and I agree with everything you say. It just seems that Luthier has tired of getting burnt by the responses here (and I know the argument that it is their responsibility, that they're professionals and should be communicating, etc, and that members of the community such as yourself were actively involved in providing info and help). I'd like to hear what the situation is too, but it'll only happen, it seems, when the devs are ready. The situation (both with the game and the communication) is far from ideal, but the constant clamour for news is not working.

It has developed into a bit of a stand-off between some members here and the devs. I think the effect of confrontation here is similar to anywhere else - if people feel they're not being respected they dig the heels in and become less compliant - that goes for the devs too, who despite agreeing that things need to be improved are probably sick to the back teeth of reading the comments here.