Now see what moding does for a game and company!

[Jones]

Originally Posted by EJGr.Ost_Caspar

Cannot imagine a better way.

Very much in agreement.

[CWMV]

Very much disagree.
More content from more creators means more choice for the end user, which is never a bad thing.

[MaxGunz]

It depends on the standards of the content, which is what Daidalos is about.
This ain't CFS where anything goes.

[Bearcat]

Originally Posted by K_Freddie

Maybe a bit of history...
Oleg resisted any mods for as long as possible as he had a clear concept about IL2. It's main function was a online 'competitive' air combat game, and in this he achieved his aim. He resisted any code/model disclosures to the public for years and this is to his credit - keeping the 'modifications/updates' within a small trusted team.. currently TD.

For all it's short-comings IL2 un-modded was better than any other flight-sim (including extremely modded ones -> FSX) in terms of DM, FM and a lot of other features, over its first 6-8 years. It was a niche market and very successful. Since the cracks and mods have appeared that online popularity has definitely waned.. and Oleg has 'left the building'.

There will not be another sim like this for a long long time... another PERIOD.

Spot on.........

Originally Posted by CWMV

Very much disagree.
More content from more creators means more choice for the end user, which is never a bad thing.

I'm more in line with Caspar on this one.. Consider this.. Had the standards set by 1C been different or had the sim been hacked earlier .. or had the sim been open from the beginning the mods we have would not be what they are. I believe the even modded IL2 is what it is because of what it was.. the fan base.. the way most of us think about the sim... this is because of the way it was.. the fact that for a long time IL2 was the only sim out there that you could get online with and be pretty assured that the only difference between the plane that the pilot A was flying and the same plane that plot be was flying .. was the pilot.. That fact raised not only the expectations of the community to a new level.. one not possible before IL2, but it also, merely by virtue of raising said expectations, raised the standard for what was "acceptable". The way this community has handled mods has evolved over the years but had it not been for the difficulty of the code.. which right off the bat eliminated a lot of potential "kiddie hackers" and the standards set by the community based on the original product, I think we might have seen a lot more cr@p mods.. More than we did.. and there were some.. I think that having TD is the only way to even have a chance at establishing a standard if you will..

[CWMV]

That's just it though, I see no need for a standard.
For that matter I have no faith in the people who set the original standard. The bias that the original game came with was so overwhelming, and the way they handled any critique or request for investigation/revision (like it was a personal insult/ban them!) inspired me with little faith. Rocket powered Lavochkins anyone?
That being said TD has done a pretty good job.
Let there be a plethora of choice, and let each player choose what suits him best.
That being said I simply do not give a rats rear end about online play so your whole argument is neither here or there for me.

[Jones]

Originally Posted by CWMV

That being said I simply do not give a rats rear end about online play so your whole argument is neither here or there for me.

And that's the rub. You can play pretend airplanes with arms outstretched in your back yard and call it a perfect air combat simulator for all anyone cares or should care. It's a free world after all. But on-line is different. Would anyone even consider playing chess against a human opponent if they did not know their opponent was using the same pieces and following the same rules? Obviously not.

We owe Oleg and 1C a big thank you for enabling the on-line community that existed a few years ago before the game was hacked. TD are now the keepers of that particular faith.

[Bearcat]

Originally Posted by CWMV

That's just it though, I see no need for a standard.
For that matter I have no faith in the people who set the original standard. The bias that the original game came with was so overwhelming, and the way they handled any critique or request for investigation/revision (like it was a personal insult/ban them!) inspired me with little faith. Rocket powered Lavochkins anyone?
That being said TD has done a pretty good job.
Let there be a plethora of choice, and let each player choose what suits him best.
That being said I simply do not give a rats rear end about online play so your whole argument is neither here or there for me.

Anytime there is competition .. in anything.. there must be a standard and a baseline for rules otherwise you have no real "competition" .. to say you don't give a rat's ear about online play is like saying I don't give a rat's ear about baseball.. so who cares if guys use steroids.. Your individual preferences really don't add up to a rat's ear in the bigger scheme of things in relation to IL2 simply because ..

Originally Posted by K_Freddie

Maybe a bit of history...
Oleg resisted any mods for as long as possible as he had a clear concept about IL2. It's main function was a online 'competitive' air combat game, and in this he achieved his aim.

and

Originally Posted by Jones

And that's the rub. You can play pretend airplanes with arms outstretched in your back yard and call it a perfect air combat simulator for all anyone cares or should care. It's a free world after all. But on-line is different. Would anyone even consider playing chess against a human opponent if they did not know their opponent was using the same pieces and following the same rules? Obviously not.

Regardless to what many have said over the years about online play vs offline play IL2 is where it is today because of online play.. both in terms of overall use and in terms of modded use. Even if many prefer offline to online.. most got their feet wet in the online aspect.. and then decided they preferred offline.. As for rocket powered Lavochkins.. while some of the Russian aircraft may have been modeled more optimistically for lack of a better term .. I still say that in spite of that ... there was still a level of overall fairness.... I knew people who .. if flying their chosen pre modded mount whether a 109, a 190, a P-51 or a Hurri or a Ki-61, one on one, more often than not, the average and certainly the noob was going down in flames.. no matter what they were flying.. There were guys back in the day who were killers in the P-39 of the original IL2.. which was probably the most challenging plane to fly in the original, even against Yaks & Las.. because the nature of the beast was such that there was room in the individual FMs to master just about any AC and overcome it's limitations ... Banning? Totally irrelevant to this discussion ... anything that went on on the UBI boards other than interaction with Oleg is ... and as far as banning goes.. oftentimes the decision to ban or not ban was a moderator on the spot decision that often had less to do with what was said but how it was said.. Not too many people were banned simply for complaining .. otherwise the forum would have been like it is now yeas ago.

[MaxGunz]

Originally Posted by CWMV

The bias that the original game came with was so overwhelming,

In your view by what you 'knew'....

and the way they handled any critique or request for investigation/revision (like it was a personal insult/ban them!) inspired me with little faith.

and yet many critiques and requests did get acted upon without a fight.

Just perhaps rude loud demands for what was easily shown to be incorrect, suspect or outright wrong got nowhere?

Notable error on Oleg's part was over the 151/20. But what happened? Again and again it was said the gun wasn't powerful enough and 3 variations on that theme with specifics all WRONG. Time and time again people working on the next patch took time out to dig and check just to have the specific claim prove wrong. By the time Tiger Talon was able to show what the REAL problem was, the mountain of ill will that the rudeness of certain forum members had built up took months to get past. A bunch of us sent emails asking please and explaining clearly why to check this different thing and then the switch was made.
But it was never an easy thing and the rudeness that was directed at Oleg and Maddox Games was constant and heavy. Perhaps a very rude simpleton would say it was obvious and simple but then why didn't the rude simpletons get the right answer right away?
Point at the wrong thing and yell FIX IT! Answer is that if where you point is not broke, it is not fixed. In time the mechanics don't even look at the demands from so many rude, ignorant adolescents and delinquents. If you think they should then I can only wonder how you are treated, either very badly or spoiled rotten.

Rocket powered Lavochkins anyone?

And a dozen other small perceptions turned into loud whines even when shown wrong again and again.

Facts are not decided by votes.

EDIT: line removed to preserve some folks tender sensibilities

[RPS69]

I must agree on Max statements in general, but the qualification of other people is unnecessary.

What all this forums always lacked, was a hard moderation, not on banning people, but just removing insulting posts, or those who clearly are out of the question.

Bashing other people comments is more common than desirable on any proper proactive discussion.

BTW, as an example to Oleg's good will, will be .50s issue.
There was a thread as big as the 190 bar, about the .50s dispersion. Because of this they achieved a solution to avoid dispersion... all .50s will fire synchronized!

Later, this was found to be not satisfactory, and Oleg claimed that changing this will be bad for frame rate... well, never realized if frame rate was affected, but the synchronized effect was lost, still, no one tested the dispersion again from my knowledge. Still, Oleg answered to people requests twice. Good or bad, he used to care.

Right now TD is following Oleg's behavior, but whit far better coding background.

The only thing that keep on and on, is the bashing. And also the counter bashing. Both useless.

[MaxGunz]

In the 90's I saw two good dev teams and a sim -ruined- by the same behavior that finally drove Oleg out of the business. How nice should I be? Those are the guys that put a gun to our hobby, not somebody's little angels. They -never- were the least bit polite about it, that's what killed the good will. And yet hey let's treat them kindly, eat smores and sing kumbahyah to show how good we are up front to hide how we really feel.

And in San Fran they've had parades celebrating suicide bombers....