Pacific Fighters Bombed - inadequate maps

[Former_Older]

No matter what happens, somebody will ask "Why was Z plane included but X plane was left out"?

We can only speculate, but we've known for some time that at least part of it is: does somebody want to model it?

I personally would like Oleg and his team to think like simmers: what can we do to make this more correct? Where should we look for reference? Who has documents that could help us? How can we create a more believable simulation?

[tater]

csThor, the "incident" you mention happened AFTER PF was released. The only changes would have been to stuff that they expected to patch in after the "gold master."

BTW, Trademarks do not protect a company from anyone using the mark as long as the mark is not used to deceive. Meaning you can use another's name, and even profit off of it, as long as it is clear your product is not actually authorized/produced by the holder of the mark. Ie: "Charger works with Nokia™ phones" is fine. Both the package, and it actually working with a proprietary product. Copyright is another issue, you need to make damn sure you don't claim to own their name on the box. If my box has a ©2001 TaterFactory Inc. All Rights Reserved on the bottom, AND has copy on the box that says "chThorCo ButcherBird fighters included!" without remarking that csThorCo and all rights belong to csThorCo... then I am very much F-ed.


tater

[csThor]

Actually it happened one week before release. And yes it was Ubi's faux pas ... but then PF was not the child of MG but of RRG. I guess the equation had a lot of variables in it, most of which we don't even know about.

[tater]

Bottom line is that 1 week before release it didn't change the content any, the masters were already printed.

[Former_Older]

Originally Posted by tater

Bottom line is that 1 week before release it didn't change the content any, the masters were already printed.

100% true! But of course this also had a time-released effect in that it nixed future efforts as well- whether or not future efforts would have included things like a Flyable TBF or F8F, etc, is speculation I think

[Golf Pro]

I think the Pacific Air War is difficult for anyone to do well, because with the exception of a handful of frenzied battles, there wasn't much of a competition at all. Basically, after 1942 the theatre was dominated by the Allies (i.e. the USA) with Japanese opposition varying from ineptly weak to non-existant.

There were a couple of exceptions (Phillipines and Okinawa) but generally the pattern was for TF58 pull up next to an island, destroy all enemy air opposition in one or two days, then the marines land 6 months later with no fear of aerial opposition. Campaign-wise most of the maps in PF are good for about 3 days of air-to-air action. From then on most aerial activity was of the ground attack sort, which again can't be replicated because instead of attacking tanks, trains and road convoys, the F4U's and F6F's spent most of their time routinely bombing caves and anonymous bits of jungle on the remote chance that they might kill the occasional jap.

For all the glamour of the photographs, B-25 gunships, PBJ's, P-38's, Mustangs, F4U's, F6F's etc. spent most of the Pacific war travelling huge distances to do fairly mundane (though dangerous) work. A historically realistic Pacific simulator would probably be a very dull affair.

I sometimes think that all 1C should have done is create the Coral Sea map for the famous carrier battles (Midway, Marianas, Leyte Gulf) and one generic (but well done) island map and be done with it. It should have been biased to online and offline single missions. By trying to create scenarios for "campaigns" they fell between two stools - a true Pacific campaign needs lots of BIG maps with long distances so that players can replicate all the dull stuff that happened between the 48-hour Zero-massacres. They should just have just concentrated on the latter.

[nearmiss]

Originally Posted by Golf Pro

I think the Pacific Air War is difficult for anyone to do well, because with the exception of a handful of frenzied battles, there wasn't much of a competition at all. Basically, after 1942 the theatre was dominated by the Allies (i.e. the USA) with Japanese opposition varying from ineptly weak to non-existant.

There were a couple of exceptions (Phillipines and Okinawa) but generally the pattern was for TF58 pull up next to an island, destroy all enemy air opposition in one or two days, then the marines land 6 months later with no fear of aerial opposition. Campaign-wise most of the maps in PF are good for about 3 days of air-to-air action. From then on most aerial activity was of the ground attack sort, which again can't be replicated because instead of attacking tanks, trains and road convoys, the F4U's and F6F's spent most of their time routinely bombing caves and anonymous bits of jungle on the remote chance that they might kill the occasional jap.

For all the glamour of the photographs, B-25 gunships, PBJ's, P-38's, Mustangs, F4U's, F6F's etc. spent most of the Pacific war travelling huge distances to do fairly mundane (though dangerous) work. A historically realistic Pacific simulator would probably be a very dull affair.

I sometimes think that all 1C should have done is create the Coral Sea map for the famous carrier battles (Midway, Marianas, Leyte Gulf) and one generic (but well done) island map and be done with it. It should have been biased to online and offline single missions. By trying to create scenarios for "campaigns" they fell between two stools - a true Pacific campaign needs lots of BIG maps with long distances so that players can replicate all the dull stuff that happened between the 48-hour Zero-massacres. They should just have just concentrated on the latter.

I often equate the management of war with the management of business.

The constant referrals to acceptable losses and collateral damage make it all seem very non-personal.

Yet, as we play the game we are not aware of those two little management verbalizations. A 25% loss rate of aircraft was horrible in real war, and we experience much higher loss rates everytime we fly in this sim.

So, I say enjoy the sim, make what you like of it and great maps make it all more immersive fun. Large maps and long air flights would bore the pants off most of us, this is about enjoyment. Most of us have no desire to sit in front of the screen watching our 1s and zeros fly the plane for couple hours across the constant view of the Pacific. (binary code)

Funny thing is.. if you read some of the accounts of real pilots during the war many trimmed their aircraft carefully and took a nap on long flights. Pappy Boyingtion mentioned it in Baa Baa Black Sheep as I recall.

I love history and have a strong penchant for historical accuracy. I have a stack of WW2 books I've read. However, I realize historical accuracy is null and void with the IL2 series. We don't even have a decent Full Mission Builder to perk up our missions. We know exactly what is going to happen, because the mission builder tools are prs-set for the conflict engagement before we even live the hypthetical ground. LOL

So, don't even think to discourage mission builders or mod builders. These are the people that are keeping this sim alive. I look for new mods everyday, and I'm very anxious to acquire "The Slot" when it's released.

[Golf Pro]

Deleted double post!

[tater]

The SWPA and Burma (really CBI) are the best suited for il-2.

Papua/New Guinea was in play from early 1942 til the middle of 1944. Sure, there were some places that were total slaughters, but there WERE effective japanese units (even if on the defensive) well into 1943. PNG would take maybe 2-3 maps to do properly.

The Solomon Islands is another map. Guadalcanal to Bougainville will fit on one, and Bougainville to New Britain/New Ireland (both complete islands) will fit on another. That gives action from Spring 1942 til 44.

[csThor]

PF was essentially an orphan - it wasn't Maddox Games's "brain child" but RRG's. However things didn't work out as planned (hence the "orphan" title) and so the product always felt more like an alpha than a full release title.

But idiosyncratic map placement isn't confined to PF - it's been a problem ever since Il-2 came out. Looking at nearly all Eastern Front maps (minus those made by Ian Boys, the slovak team and the new Bessarabia map) from the perspective of historically relevant operations it's amazing to note that the maps exclude important areas of operations and limit the usefulness for historical campaigns (e.g. Leningrad map should have been released in two parts - one for the Finns going up further north to include Immola airbase and one for the germans to include the area down to Lake Ilmen). And of course the lack of several maps such as Brest-Litovsk, Beresina crossings, Kharkov, Mius front & Taganrog, Rostov ... Of course I know that the initial maps were very much limited by the computing power available at that time but the trend to leave out relevant areas is almost characteristic for MG maps. Weird ...