oleg, you better hurry, RoF is releasing a ww-2 sim next

[zapatista]

Originally Posted by Feuerfalke

It's definitely fun and it's something new. It just get's old a bit quickly

you've just summed it up pretty well, the problem is however that "thats all there is" and after a few days you have already seen its limitations. however nice it might look, its unfinished in much of its content and many of its game aspects (online play, stand alone missions, campaign, coop etc..)

now just remember that this has been sold to you at full game price, under the illusion that you would get a fully functional and completed product, which it clearly isnt

and from now on, just keep your wallet open, cause you are about to go on a long drawn out ride where they will keep stringing you allong to extract more and more money from you at each step.

Originally Posted by Feuerfalke

but that's when we start playing online

except of course that this is EXTREMELY limited, no 24/7 dogfight servers for global players to meet on whenever they feel like playing their game, no decent campaigns, coops, or new series of missions to dld either.

now is that really the level of quality in a new flightsim product you will accept from all new flightsim products from now on ? i doubt it, or you have set your standards really low, and in many regards it is a significant step back from the good flightsims from the last 10 years (mig alley, falcon 4, ms-flightsim, il2 etc...)

now also compare what you have now to the long list of exiting features and content that in the last few years you were led to believe would be included, any sense of feeling conned or fooled by the old bait-and-switch trick yet ?

[Chivas]

zapatista

39 dollars isn't full sim price...I paid alot more for IL-2, OFF, CFS, and FSX, etc
The addon aircraft cockpits, FM, and DM's are cheap by any standard if you so chose to buy them.

I guess you missed "Rise of Flight Vision Statement" that indicates that ROF was released early to generate funds to continue development of the sim. All aspects of the sim will be improved over the life of the sim. I would image if you enjoy the sim the cost per hour of usage will be measured in pennies. Hardly a deal breaker.

Chivas

[zapatista]

Originally Posted by Chivas

zapatista

39 dollars isn't full sim price...I paid alot more for IL-2, OFF, CFS, and FSX, etc

Chivas

we resolved that before in this same thread chivas, RoF is being sold as a full price normal game, and is roughly equal in price to most other flightsims.

have a look at these prices from one of the RoF "officially recommended sales points" in north america (http://www.fspilotshop.com/index.php...a5cd2c1a262cc3)

Condor: The Competition Soaring Sim $49.95

DCS: Black Shark $49.95

Falcon 4: Allied Force $29.95

Flight Simulator X (FSX) Gold Edition $39.95

Rise of Flight: The First Great Air War $44.95

X-Plane 9 (PC) $49.95

Originally Posted by Chivas

I guess you missed "Rise of Flight Vision Statement" that indicates that ROF was released early to generate funds to continue development of the sim. All aspects of the sim will be improved over the life of the sim.
Chivas

now that is a very different perspective, and not one that is openly recognised by the hysterical RoF fanboys that still keep pretending everything is perfect with RoF and whom with a cultish zeal keep trying to ignore all problems with it.

you and some other keen flightsimmers might see that as good enough reason to send the RoF devellopers some pocket money, and hope that enough will trickle in to keep them going a little while longer. this is of course presuming the RoF folks will actually use that breathing time to fix the main glaring current problems with it, rather then mainly work on other "for sale" addons or a next product of the same poor quality ( as i postulated could well be the case in starting this thread by indicating they are already working on a ww2 sim). your decision to support this for-sale-beta is a decision you are making on trust and hope, not based on fact or an obligation or garantee that RoF will ever have its main problems fixed, or that if they flop you will even still be able to play the game in its current form.

and RoF doesnt openly state that "pay us to finish this beta, this is not a full game" at the current sales points for their product either, and neither is it clearly labled on the product box when you look at the item ion the shop shelf, or on a website that sells it.

does it mean there are no positives in RoF, yes there are a couple

so should the average flightsimmer support RoF right now by buying it and seeing their $$$ payment as a virtual donation to the RoF team in the hope they will as a priority address its most glaring current problems ? no not in my opinion. one of the main reasons is that when the RoF project flops you will be left with absolutely nothing (your game wont even work in its flawed current form), and the fiasco itself will again give future flightsim ventures a reduced chance to get decent $$ backing for any similar products

there are some solutions to this, but looking at how RoF managed the whole project it is unlikely they can make the mental leap required to address those (so far we have had misleading information during devellopment, bait and switch marketing, taking the worst sales aspects from several game genres to solely focus on revenue income, and not having a core quality product at release time, premature release of an unfinished beta pretending it is a full product, not addressing the main complaints etc). there is no doubt some of the game FM DM and grafix people have talent, but they have been shafted by thier own marketing greaseballs, and the way it stands right now it is going the way of the dodo's (and extinct NZ flightless bird).

[Chivas]

Originally Posted by zapatista

we resolved that before in this same thread chivas, RoF is being sold as a full price normal game, and is roughly equal in price to most other flightsims.

have a look at these prices from one of the RoF "officially recommended sales points" in north america (http://www.fspilotshop.com/index.php...a5cd2c1a262cc3)



now that is a very different perspective, and not one that is openly recognised by the hysterical RoF fanboys that still keep pretending everything is perfect with RoF and whom with a cultish zeal keep trying to ignore all problems with it.

you and some other keen flightsimmers might see that as good enough reason to send the RoF devellopers some pocket money, and hope that enough will trickle in to keep them going a little while longer. this is of course presuming the RoF folks will actually use that breathing time to fix the main glaring current problems with it, rather then mainly work on other "for sale" addons or a next product of the same poor quality ( as i postulated could well be the case in starting this thread by indicating they are already working on a ww2 sim). your decision to support this for-sale-beta is a decision you are making on trust and hope, not based on fact or an obligation or garantee that RoF will ever have its main problems fixed, or that if they flop you will even still be able to play the game in its current form.

and RoF doesnt openly state that "pay us to finish this beta, this is not a full game" at the current sales points for their product either, and neither is it clearly labled on the product box when you look at the item ion the shop shelf, or on a website that sells it.

does it mean there are no positives in RoF, yes there are a couple

so should the average flightsimmer support RoF right now by buying it and seeing their $$$ payment as a virtual donation to the RoF team in the hope they will as a priority address its most glaring current problems ? no not in my opinion. one of the main reasons is that when the RoF project flops you will be left with absolutely nothing (your game wont even work in its flawed current form), and the fiasco itself will again give future flightsim ventures a reduced chance to get decent $$ backing for any similar products

there are some solutions to this, but looking at how RoF managed the whole project it is unlikely they can make the mental leap required to address those (so far we have had misleading information during devellopment, bait and switch marketing, taking the worst sales aspects from several game genres to solely focus on revenue income, and not having a core quality product at release time, premature release of an unfinished beta pretending it is a full product, not addressing the main complaints etc). there is no doubt some of the game FM DM and grafix people have talent, but they have been shafted by thier own marketing greaseballs, and the way it stands right now it is going the way of the dodo's (and extinct NZ flightless bird).

We never resolved anything in earlier posts.
In Canada I paid these amounts when the sims were released, not after they were in the bargain bin.

FSX Deluxe over $60 Canadian
OFF $50
IL-2 well over $50 for most installments ( IL-2, AEP, Pacific, FB, PE-2, IL-2 1946 )
CFS again well over $50 each for CFS1,2,3
EAW can't remember
ROWANs Battle of Britain over $50
BOB WOV over $50
ROF ......$39 Canadian is hardly full price.

Most of these sims were ok, but IMHO only two of them have a decent feel of flight and one of them is ROF.


There's nobody in these forms saying the sim perfect and ignoring the problems. Most everyone flying the sim, know its a WIP, and many are enjoying what content there is, understanding that the issues and content are being worked on. Will they be just adding paid content and not fixing bugs, not likely, as the people building the sim are enthusiasts not bean counters.

The only thing your right about is ROF is not a full game, but everyone knows that.

What you can't seem to grasp is this game is a Work in Progress, released early to generate funds, and the 39 dollar price tag reflects that. As a work in progress you can expect bugs and some missing contant will be added for free. Of course there will be paid content as well, how else do expect them to stay in business. We will likely pay as much for this sim series as we paid for other flight sim series depending on ROF's quality and longevity. This sim could generate a sustainable business or fail based the quality of the work. The existing ROF WIP is very good base to build on, and most simmers realise what it is.

Could the sim fail and you are left with nothing, yes, but the more likely scenario... the DRM would be lifted, and the community would work on the sim.

It would be interesting to see what people would think about DRM and other copy protection if it was their own project and monies on the line.

[Blackdog_kt]

Copy protection is never a solution, it's merely a deterrent. Especially in niche games like flight sims, where the fan base is usually dedicated to a larger extent than in other games, piracy is not so much of a problem. In games where it is a big problem, the publishers are usually big software houses that can absorb the piracy hit, plus they never manage to keep it under control anyway. The sole purpose of copy protection is to make sure the game won't be freely available during the first weeks of release, because that's where most of the sales occur and the biggest potential for financial damage resides.

Almost everyone has illegaly downloaded games and the reason is simple. There are too many games that don't justify a full price, there's not a demo or people are not sure if they are going to like it enough. The real distinction between a pirate and a customer is the receipt. A person who buys is not a pirate, plain and simple. He may not like the copy protection and used a cracked version of the game, or he may have played a few hours with an illegal copy before deciding to go out and buy it, but anyone with a legally obtained disc and a receipt in hand is a customer, plain and simple.
A friend of mine downloade Empire Total War, he tested it for a week, decided he likes it and then went ahead and bought it. He's not a pirate, he's a customer.

That game is an interesting example for another reason as well. It's a game that requires online verification, much like RoF but a bit more hassle free. It's based on Steam and that platform gives you the option to run your game in offline mode, because as a primarily online platform they know that networks are so multi-layered that there's too many random things that can go wrong and deprive you your enjoyment of the title if they tie it to an online connection at all times.

Guess what happened, the cracked version was out within a week of release, packed with a custom installer and working offline. My friend did buy the game in the end, but a lot of people didn't. And the copy protection was inadequate to deal with it as well. Similar examples are Spore and The Sims 3, supposedly online activated yet freely circulating the internet in illegal copies. Even the addon content for the Sims 3 is available in pirated copies. If EA can't put a stop to that, what makes people think that Neoqb will? The only reason RoF hasn't suffered a similar fate is not because their DRM is good, it's because flight sims are unpopular with the masses. You can be sure that if it grows in popularity everyone and their dog will be able to obtain an illegal copy of the base game, possibly even the add-on planes. So in the long run, the only thing the DRM does is p*ss off the few people that were actually willing to make a legitimate purchase.

Now where is the line drawn between games like these and flight sims? Simple, flight sims have fanatical audiences who realise that in order for them to have something to fly, the developers have to make money. Flight sims are also usually the products of small studios, making the above even more pronounced. Someone might not feel as guilty ripping off a multi billion dollar franchise, but if they are flight sim fans it won't really sit well with them doing the same to a small developer.

Last but not least, in fact it's the most important factor, flight sims are complex enough to not appeal to a massive audience, and hence unpopular for cracking and illegal distribution.

All the above leads me to believe one very simple thing. The vast majority of people who would pirate a flight sim title are not lost sales, but people who would never buy it anyway. They are not lost sales, they were never sales to begin with because they don't care enough to learn a complex game. They will spend two days downloading an illegal copy, go through a couple of missions, uninstall and delete.

Imposing the hassle of such a DRM method on a legitimate customer when your game is hardly as attractive to the pirate audience as the latest first person shooter is unecessary, a simple disc check would suffice and the counter-piracy effect of any method would be the same anyway. It's also simply shooting oneself in the foot and the reason for that is very simple. The people who would pirate it if they could would never buy it anyway, plus you lose a good chunk of potential customers who would make a purchase but are turned off by the DRM implementation.

This is not entirely my own line of reason mind you. It's the model a very succesful and small developer house is using to calculate their business growth and potential. They released some niche games and the only protection was a CD-key during installation. Was it pirated? You bet. Was it pirated more than more popular games? Not by a long shot.

In fact, the company stayed focused on delivering content to the people that they knew would buy their games, instead of wasting time embarking on a wild goose chase against the people who will never buy anything anyway and they did very good as a result. If anyone is interested to read about it, google up Stardock games (the company) and Sins of a Solar Empire (one of their games).

A few quotes from Wikipedia:

Stardock was one of the first companies to distribute its software via a free digital distribution program. The first one was called Component Manager. This was later replaced by Stardock Central. In 2008, Stardock released a third-generation digital distribution platform called Impulse, which allows streamlined patching and the ability to download purchased games to another computer owned by the user for free. Stardock Central is in the process of being phased out, and new patches are now only available through Impulse. Stardock has agreed to publish some games containing certain less intrusive versions of SecuROM on Impulse, although Stardock has a principle of releasing all of its own games with no DRM.

Game publishing

In 2006, following the commercial success of their first self-published game, Galactic Civilizations II, Stardock began publishing games developed by third-parties.

The first third-party game Stardock published was Sins of a Solar Empire. The publishing arrangement worked out between Stardock and Ironclad Games was unusual in that the two companies integrated their teams at every level.The game has an average score of 88 on Metacritic and is a top seller at retail.

Yup, a game with no protection whatsoever is a top seller at retail, because those guys are simply focused on providing quality entertainment for their target audience. On his SimHQ interview, even Oleg Maddox said he would prefer not to have DRM. He's also spot on about the correct way to use an online authentication system. Instead of being online all the time, recurring activations at set time intervals would both reduce piracy a bit and they wouldn't leave you high and dry in the case of network troubles. Here's the page in question from the interview: http://www.simhq.com/_air11/air_341d.html

[tagTaken2]

You know what would have been fun...

the moment RoF announced that they would require constant connection... organise protest. Everyone who would have purchased without requirement puts $50 into escrow account and RoF get a visual on money that they're missing out on. Money gets released back to each flight simmer at 6 month mark if RoF still requires connection.

I read yesterday that they've apparently said they'll patch for offline if the company goes under. First time I've had a vested interest in a flight sim failing

[ElAurens]

Take of distances are only too long if you don't know how to take off in a WW1 style tail dragger that has a skid instead of a tail wheel.

This is pilot error not a game engine problem.

Once folks were shown the differences in take off proceedure that WW1 aircraft need it stopped being an issue of contention.

Next.

[virre89]

Originally Posted by zapatista

you've just summed it up pretty well, the problem is however that "thats all there is" and after a few days you have already seen its limitations. however nice it might look, its unfinished in much of its content and many of its game aspects (online play, stand alone missions, campaign, coop etc..)

now just remember that this has been sold to you at full game price, under the illusion that you would get a fully functional and completed product, which it clearly isnt

and from now on, just keep your wallet open, cause you are about to go on a long drawn out ride where they will keep stringing you allong to extract more and more money from you at each step.



except of course that this is EXTREMELY limited, no 24/7 dogfight servers for global players to meet on whenever they feel like playing their game, no decent campaigns, coops, or new series of missions to dld either.

now is that really the level of quality in a new flightsim product you will accept from all new flightsim products from now on ? i doubt it, or you have set your standards really low, and in many regards it is a significant step back from the good flightsims from the last 10 years (mig alley, falcon 4, ms-flightsim, il2 etc...)

now also compare what you have now to the long list of exiting features and content that in the last few years you were led to believe would be included, any sense of feeling conned or fooled by the old bait-and-switch trick yet ?

Says the guy, who don't own the game and seemed to know everything 1 year ahead of everyone..lmao

We where well aware of what we were getting Neoqb haven't fooled anybody on purpose. IL2 consists of many expansions and updates, stop comparing it to RoF it's just ridiculous besides IL2 doesn't really have the proper tools for multiplayer either... it utilize a 3rd party tool for server browsing, something that would leave a lot of players out of the online community.

And IL2 wasn't exactly rich on content at initial release either.

[JG52Uther]

I wonder,neoqb showed a lot of stuff which looked totally finished when Rof was called KoTs.Did they take it all out just so they could sell it as add ons?
Imagine Oleg releasing SoW with one flyable 109 and one flyable hurricane,no campaign,very limited SP,broken MP (can't host behind a router,just go in DMZ and open all your ports to the world,don't worry...),and a dead environment.
Then said don't worry,everything else you need will be available to purchase at the store soon.
I think RoF looks good,but will not buy it until it is improved by several patches to bring it up to something other than a beta,and an early beta at that.
Everyone raves about the DM of RoF.Screenshots of,and reports of planes flying around with no wings,or most of the wings gone don't impress me that much.Planes crashing from hundreds of feet and just doing a little bounce on impact,and looking a little crumpled???

What is it with the fanboiism of RoF? Are the people who brought it slightly embarrassed about it,and need to keep defending their purchase,even though deep down they know its not good enough just now?
Visit simhq and if you complain about RoF,even people who brought the game,get ripped to pieces.Then again some of the fanbois appear to be on the neoqb payroll,and belittling anybody who dares to complain seems to be a valid tactic of defence.
Some even purport to speak for the developers (they are working on ....... and ..... now,so shut up etc) but that seems to be a trend that infects a lot of forums these days.

[Chivas]

JG52Uther if your not interested in supporting ROF at the moment and prefer to voice your inexplicable wonder at those that do, its your choice. We all understand that the sim is unfinished and has bugs and anomilies but the community can see that the ROF team is talented and could use our support. Especially in the early stages of development in these tough economic times. If the community withheld their support, I have no doubt there would be considerable pressure to close the doors. We have too few talented combat flight sim developers to let that happen. Thirty-nine dollars is a very cheap investment in the possiblity of much greater things to come. Although I realise that quite a few people have there own financial problems and can't afford to invest in an unfinished sim.

Luckily it appears that many in the flight sim community are able to support the sim, and it should give the company enough of a financial boost to continue development to a stage where it could attract many more gamers.

Its not like early adopters are having to wait for the sim to flesh out. There is huge entertaiment value in what there is in the sim now, and it gives me something to do until SOW comes out.

Chivas