Friday 2010-09-03 Dev. update and Discussions

[Blackdog_kt]

I think it has to do with the inclusion of clickable cockpits as an option.

If the virtual legs are in the way, there might be some switches you can't operate.
If you can't click on the switches, you'll want to map them to keyboard or HOTAS.
If you map everything to keyboard or HOTAS, you might run out of buttons

Look at Black Shark for example. Every single function has a keyboard shortcut and can be mapped to a joystick button. The reason people use the mouse is not because it's intuitive or realistic. Actually, using keys/buttons is more realistic, as in reality even when driving your car you rarely look at which button to press to turn on the air-conditioning, you remember its position, fumble about a bit maybe and flick the switch.

However, unless we have custom made sim-cockpits or expensive HOTAS sets with good profiling software, we will soon run out of buttons to map. Mapping everything to HOTAS also presents another problem...using the same key for many different things depending on shift toggles and profile changing switches doesn't help muscle memory a lot, in fact someone might be unable to avoid looking at his HOTAS, so that to make sure he has the right profile selected before pushing the button.

That's why the mouse is used increasingly in flight sims as a control input, at least for the non-critical controls and i guess that's why even sims that display a pilot have the option to turn him off, so that you can click what you need to click.

[major_setback]

Ooooooh!

Here the road is a wide as (the length of) a railway locomotive:

[Igo kyu]

Originally Posted by major_setback

Ooooooh!

Here the road is a wide as (the length of) a railway locomotive:

Yeah. Notice the gates on the level crossing.

That is a pretty short locomotive too, probably a shunter/tank engine.

[AdMan]

As a video game player my whole life I can honestly say 95% of all video games suck, I've never played a "perfect" video game, the closest I think was Medal Gear Solid on PS1. Even the greatest video games (except for the 8bit classics) I can pick apart for hours on imperfections, things that could have been done better. I only play the best games because they are the only ones worth the time. That's how I was led to IL2, I wanted the best WW2 flight sim, I did my research and bought it - For people who are only flight simmers you can put the blind faith in SOW because, frankly, there is no competition in the genre. But for people like me who will gladly move on to another genre if the quality is not up to par to the best games out (of any genre) I'm not so blind. I do give Oleg and the crew serious props for giving these screens in the WIP stages - most studios would never release screenshots that look like these, because even a few bad screenshots could be suicide to the hyper-critical gamer such as myself.

[d165w3ll]

That looks like Saxmundham in Suffolk. Is it?

[Skoshi Tiger]

Of interest to note is that in the upcomming DCS A10 sim they a planing to include a pause mode that will allow users to pause the sim while they perform complex tasks.

Cheers!

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

I think it has to do with the inclusion of clickable cockpits as an option.

If the virtual legs are in the way, there might be some switches you can't operate.
If you can't click on the switches, you'll want to map them to keyboard or HOTAS.
If you map everything to keyboard or HOTAS, you might run out of buttons

Look at Black Shark for example. Every single function has a keyboard shortcut and can be mapped to a joystick button. The reason people use the mouse is not because it's intuitive or realistic. Actually, using keys/buttons is more realistic, as in reality even when driving your car you rarely look at which button to press to turn on the air-conditioning, you remember its position, fumble about a bit maybe and flick the switch.

However, unless we have custom made sim-cockpits or expensive HOTAS sets with good profiling software, we will soon run out of buttons to map. Mapping everything to HOTAS also presents another problem...using the same key for many different things depending on shift toggles and profile changing switches doesn't help muscle memory a lot, in fact someone might be unable to avoid looking at his HOTAS, so that to make sure he has the right profile selected before pushing the button.

That's why the mouse is used increasingly in flight sims as a control input, at least for the non-critical controls and i guess that's why even sims that display a pilot have the option to turn him off, so that you can click what you need to click.

[Novotny]

Bloody good post Adman.

[Richie]

Agree