Oleg's Sims 10 years from now...

[dduff442]

Well I tend to agree with you that from the player's perspective there's little point in merging, say, a sub sim with a flight sim.

From a developer's perspective it makes a great deal of sense, however, and could permit the delivery of games that have more depth and realism and/or deliver them more cheaply.

To illustrate, SoW will include ships and it's as easy (maybe easier) to implement these via a simple physical model as via a series of kludge factors (as in Silent Hunter). The ships will include ship-borne weapons and will have damage models. The ballistics of different shells in air and (presumably) in water will be modelled, as will their effects on armour of different sorts. If you take all these factors together, you're half way towards making a sub sim already. Submarines are just another kind of ship from the viewpoint of physical modelling. AI routines written for such a sim might be usefully ported back into SoW.

So... you're probably right that aiming for some over-arching universal simulator is pointless. The underlying engine should still permit the rapid development of other sims, however. Hopefully, 1C's licensing arrangements will enable everyone to win -- 1C, 3rd party developers and players -- and we can look forward to a new generation of sims of superior quality. I say go for it... the competition is mostly very weak.

[whatnot]

If we're talking about today's technologies then I have to agree that making a combined sim isn't something that we should expect some company to take on. But as we're talking about future fantasies here I definately think it's a possibility worth concidering.

How I see that being realized is that there would be a basic environment engine with decent graphics, physics and a lot of flexibility to mod and plug-in different features. Take outerra (.com) for example: pump that on steroids and develop it for 10 years with sim's as your target and we could have somethign pretty usable in our hands.

Then different developers would 'plug-in' their products developed for that engine and voila there is the starting point for something pretty cool.

An ofcourse on scales like that we're talking about procedural creation.. both with the landscape and buildings etc. It's crazy to even think about manual mapping except to create the create the foundation based on which the procedural generation builds on.

The scope of the battle would have to dynamically scale based on the number of players online to keep the world 'alive'.

I'm puzzled by the comment of an fps player player in a ditch oiling up his mg and getting nailed by typhoon after which he'd never come back.. That's exactly what happens in titles like BF2 hundred times in a round. You're wiped out by a bomb, artillery or whatever and don't have a clue what happened and it's one of the most popular games out there. It's pretty far from a sim ofcourse but proves the point that it doesn't make the gaming experience bad in any way. War wasn't fair and no one warned the guys who were shelled to bits and pieces.

[BaylorMax]

In ten years? Still waiting for SoW!

I just couldn't resist!

[zauii]

Not really interested in any type of combined simulation, i prefer a flight sim for what it is, AKA a good replication of the birds of war. If I want a sub sim i'll go play Silent Hunter, not BoB.

[whatnot]

Originally Posted by zauii

Not really interested in any type of combined simulation, i prefer a flight sim for what it is, AKA a good replication of the birds of war. If I want a sub sim i'll go play Silent Hunter, not BoB.

I'm surprised about lack of interest on this.. probably because this is a flight sim forum.

I however love the idea of playing against humans compared to some lines of script regardless if they're on planes, tanks or just ditch grinding GI's. The feeling I get out of it is completely different!

Even the idea of a dynamic well coordinated MMO style front of combined arms with correct military hierarchies, tactics and strategies just blows me away!

[Necrobaron]

Well, as an aviation buff, I'm primarily interested in complete, well-rounded flight sims but I do tend to see the ultimate goal of simulations being the inclusions of all aspects of whatever event/incident is being modelled. For example, rather than having a WWII tank sim, or a WWII aviation sim, etc., I'd like to see a WWII sim...period. In other words, a sim that accurately models every aspect of WWII (or WWI, or the Korean Conflict, etc.) in high fidelity with no corners cut. Something of this magnitude might be a 100 years away, but I do see that as the ultimate goal of simming.
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