Reviewing Luthier's roadmap

[ATAG_Dutch]

Originally Posted by Blackdog_kt

I have a bucket load of things i would like to see fixed, but my description of the issue is generally a bit more eloquent and detailed than "plz fix the crap ai/sounds/green fields/flavor of the month whine".

You know, the kind of laziness where i want things to work without any intervention from my part as an end user but at the same time i hypocritically rely on a bunch of other people getting knee dip in it

Not to say a little verbose. - Sorry mate, you know I respect your views.

What we're talking about here is a piece of computer software. If you'd paid Norton or McAfee some money for a piece of software, you'd expect it to work out of the box, without any input from any kind of 'community', yes?

Imagine describing 'bugs' to the Adobe company. Are there 'bugs' in photoshop? I don't know. But I'm a consumer, not an unpaid worker for a software development company, and if I was as positive in my approach to the problems with 'Cliffs' as various members evidently are; sorry but I'd expect to be paid for my services.

The work being done by the community in researching online bugs, offline bugs, and designing and building the kind of campaigns I expected when I purchased what was purported to be a 'Battle of Britain' simulation is exemplary, and indicative of the dedication of the community's enthusiasts.

I wish I could be one of those people but unfortunately real life takes up most of my time.

When I want to escape from real life, I'd like to be able to turn to the same software company I've relied on for the last ten years of good times, especially as they promised to produce 'Storm of War - The Battle of Britain', a subject very dear to my heart.

I'm still waiting patiently for this to happen.

[Skoshi Tiger]

Originally Posted by Dutch_851

Not to say a little verbose. - Sorry mate, you know I respect your views.

What we're talking about here is a piece of computer software. If you'd paid Norton or McAfee some money for a piece of software, you'd expect it to work out of the box, without any input from any kind of 'community', yes?

It doesn't, it is continually getting patched just like anyother peice of commercial software. These companies continually seek information from the community to keep their products up to dates with bug logs and beta programs.

Originally Posted by Dutch_851

Imagine describing 'bugs' to the Adobe company. Are there 'bugs' in photoshop? I don't know.

I use CS4 at work, Adobe Photoishop has ongoing patches just like any other peice of commercial software.

Originally Posted by Dutch_851

But I'm a consumer, not an unpaid worker for a software development company, and if I was as positive in my approach to the problems with 'Cliffs' as various members evidently are; sorry but I'd expect to be paid for my services.

The work being done by the community in researching online bugs, offline bugs, and designing and building the kind of campaigns I expected when I purchased what was purported to be a 'Battle of Britain' simulation is exemplary, and indicative of the dedication of the community's enthusiasts.

I'ld say very little work is being done by the community on this forum. And the problem is that the format that the critics are using to state their problems is next to useless to the developers.

As with the beta patches, Luthier was quite specific about HOW to report the bugs with log files, hardware, software and the setting that the issues. All we got were endless pages of whining.

Originally Posted by Dutch_851

I wish I could be one of those people but unfortunately real life takes up most of my time.

When I want to escape from real life, I'd like to be able to turn to the same software company I've relied on for the last ten years of good times, especially as they promised to produce 'Storm of War - The Battle of Britain', a subject very dear to my heart.

I'm still waiting patiently for this to happen.

I share your frustration over some issues but I don't consider myself wasting time, I'm having a hoot playing the game. But there are plenty of other good sims arround! If you think your wasting your life here why continue?

Maybe there are alot of people who stay around here our of loyalty for the "last ten years of good times"? If so many have a very funny way of showing it.

Cheers!

[ATAG_Dutch]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

It doesn't, it is continually getting patched just like anyother peice of commercial software. These companies continually seek information from the community to keep their products up to dates with bug logs and beta programs.
I use CS4 at work, Adobe Photoishop has ongoing patches just like any other peice of commercial software.

Hmm, ongoing patches to keep this type of software improved or up to date isn't really the same thing as bugs and probs in 'Cliffs', but maybe the comparison wasn't ideal.

Let's alter the analogy to something more appropriate.

Dateline - July, somewhere in England.....

After warming up the engines for what seems like an age, you trundle down the runway and the Blenheim reluctantly leaves the ground, slightly crablike. You should have dialled in a bit more rudder trim. Gear up, throttle back, coarsen pitch, let her gain some airspeed and then settle down, set course and trim for a gentle cruise climb.
After what seems like no time at all, you're halfway across the channel, worrying about engine management, because they're sensitive these babies. You're really worried about whether you'll get hit by flak, or whether the fighters will find you. The tension rises as the target area approaches. You give the southern area a wide birth because that's where the flak seems most intense, and turn precisely in order to line the crate up for the best angle to the target. The tension is growing, the moment of truth is upon you. The flak intensifies and you're getting very nervous.

'For God's sake this flak is heavy - and oh my goodness there're two 110's in the sun!!'

Your gunner shouts - 'Drop the bombs! Drop the Bombs and let's get out of here!!'

Then your Bomb Aimer comes through on the intercom;

'Sorry skip, looks like the ground crew forgot to load the bombs!'

You immediately turn away, the sweat is streaming down your neck, your heart feels like it's going to burst out of your chest any moment, but you're getting away. Suddenly a flak burst on your port side. 'Jesus! there's a hole the size of a dustbin lid in the port wing!' After trimming her out as best you can, you nurse your damaged Blenheim back across the Channel and back to base. You wrestle with the controls, the trims won't compensate for the hole in the wing, but you line her up adequately and come in for a bouncy but safe touchdown.

'Where's the blasted ground crew, I'll tear their silly heads off!'

You run across to where the ground crew are on their third cup of tea of the day and scream,

'We just went through hell over the Channel! We got hit by flak, the 110's almost got us, the engines were overheating all the way back, and you bunch of fools had forgotten to load the blasted bombs!!'

The ground crew don't even look at you, they just stand up, turn around and walk away.

Then you feel a tap on your shoulder, it's that pretty girl from the NAAFI that makes such wonderful buttered scones, and she says;

'What you need to do is go into the Full Mission Builder, find the Blenheim in the objects viewer, select the Blenheim, go the armament bit and change the default loadout to the weapon of your choice, not forgetting to select the correct fuse type, make sure you click save, then go back and do the whole mission again'.

'Thanks darling' you say 'But I would have been far happier had the ground crew loaded the bombs in the first place. Are you doing anything later?'

'Well I'm going to go on the RAF forum and have a damn good moan, fancy coming along?'

'You bet, I want to see if other squadrons are as fed up as we are. I'll get a few cans in first.'

[Skoshi Tiger]

Originally Posted by Dutch_851

Hmm, ongoing patches to keep this type of software improved or up to date isn't really the same thing as bugs and probs in 'Cliffs', but maybe the comparison wasn't ideal.

Let's alter the analogy to something more appropriate.

Dateline - July, somewhere in England.....

After warming up the engines for what seems like an age, you trundle down the runway and the Blenheim reluctantly leaves the ground, slightly crablike. You should have dialled in a bit more rudder trim. Gear up, throttle back, coarsen pitch, let her gain some airspeed and then settle down, set course and trim for a gentle cruise climb.
After what seems like no time at all, you're halfway across the channel, worrying about engine management, because they're sensitive these babies. You're really worried about whether you'll get hit by flak, or whether the fighters will find you. The tension rises as the target area approaches. You give the southern area a wide birth because that's where the flak seems most intense, and turn precisely in order to line the crate up for the best angle to the target. The tension is growing, the moment of truth is upon you. The flak intensifies and you're getting very nervous.

'For God's sake this flak is heavy - and oh my goodness there're two 110's in the sun!!'

Your gunner shouts - 'Drop the bombs! Drop the Bombs and let's get out of here!!'

Then your Bomb Aimer comes through on the intercom;

'Sorry skip, looks like the ground crew forgot to load the bombs!'

You immediately turn away, the sweat is streaming down your neck, your heart feels like it's going to burst out of your chest any moment, but you're getting away. Suddenly a flak burst on your port side. 'Jesus! there's a hole the size of a dustbin lid in the port wing!' After trimming her out as best you can, you nurse your damaged Blenheim back across the Channel and back to base. You wrestle with the controls, the trims won't compensate for the hole in the wing, but you line her up adequately and come in for a bouncy but safe touchdown.

'Where's the blasted ground crew, I'll tear their silly heads off!'

You run across to where the ground crew are on their third cup of tea of the day and scream,

'We just went through hell over the Channel! We got hit by flak, the 110's almost got us, the engines were overheating all the way back, and you bunch of fools had forgotten to load the blasted bombs!!'

The ground crew don't even look at you, they just stand up, turn around and walk away.

Then you feel a tap on your shoulder, it's that pretty girl from the NAAFI that makes such wonderful buttered scones, and she says;

'What you need to do is go into the Full Mission Builder, find the Blenheim in the objects viewer, select the Blenheim, go the armament bit and change the default loadout to the weapon of your choice, not forgetting to select the correct fuse type, make sure you click save, then go back and do the whole mission again'.

'Thanks darling' you say 'But I would have been far happier had the ground crew loaded the bombs in the first place. Are you doing anything later?'

'Well I'm going to go on the RAF forum and have a damn good moan, fancy coming along?'

'You bet, I want to see if other squadrons are as fed up as we are. I'll get a few cans in first.'

Did you check in the bomb bay for a receipt from M&M enterprises for "1 Bomb Load"?
But, Hey! I've had similar expriences in IL-2 but couldn't blame it on a bug in the software!

Hopefully it's on the short list for things to fix.

Cheers!

[ATAG_Dutch]

Originally Posted by Skoshi Tiger

Did you check in the bomb bay for a receipt from M&M enterprises for "1 Bomb Load"?

Catch 22 is the perfect book to quote mate, given the circs.

where's all the cool stuff that has always been in IL2 that not in this game, like blowing wings off and the airframe ripping apart. I have seen 1 wing get blown off in over 70 hours worth of play and i havent seen anthing disintergrate like in IL2 46, those were features that i felt were great!
Dont get me wrong i love the dmage models we have now but it feels like the weapons cant do nearly enough damage to see the extent of the damage experience.

[Zorin]

Originally Posted by BigPickle

where's all the cool stuff that has always been in IL2 that not in this game, like blowing wings off and the airframe ripping apart. I have seen 1 wing get blown off in over 70 hours worth of play and i havent seen anthing disintergrate like in IL2 46, those were features that i felt were great!
Dont get me wrong i love the dmage models we have now but it feels like the weapons cant do nearly enough damage to see the extent of the damage experience.

I think that given we mostly have small caliber MGs and 20mm without mine load it is about right. Once the 20mm is fixed and the first Fw190 makes an appearance things will start to be torn apart with no problem.

[furbs]

Or ...

"And there goes my 145th kill, now home!" you say into the radio to your wingman.
"you see fritz, i told you all you have to do is wait for the spitfires to disengage then you can fly right up behide the whole sqd and shoot the whole lot down with out worrying!"
The trip home was uneventful until your wheels touchdown on the runway, when the rest of your flight piles into the ground in a huge ball of flames for no reason.
you shrug your shoulders and sigh "oh well, that always happens"