Development Update and Roadmap – April 14

[Riksen]

Thxs! Nice to see u guys are still working hard on it, but any chance we could see a fix in FFB any time soon? Or fix the level stabilizer in the bombers?

This is probably a ways off in the distance, but when you have DirectX 11 support built in, what kind of FPS increases are you expecting? With a current DX11 card would you say 10fps+ increases? Or are they quite marginal?

I remember you saying that DX11 would be a priority due to some performance gains due to it being more efficient than DX10.

[erratik]

hopefully this will be a decent performance update for majority of users systems if it's how it sounds (more use of CPU and stutter fixes).

I think they got their priorities right so far. don't know why people are complaining about SLI/crossfire so much right now..surely they need to fix problems for 1 graphics card first before moving on.

[Heliocon]

Originally Posted by luthier

Sorry I haven't posted in a couple of days, I waited until our progress was a little more clear. We are up on here a lot, and your feedback and reports are extremely helpful. Thank you all for your support!

We are planning another patch for this coming Monday the 18th of April*, with a beta version of the patch this Friday the 15th. The beta version will be the same as before, manually extractable to your game folder, then automatically overwritten by the release version of the patch.

Before I get more into the patch, I want to discuss the sfs – mod situation a bit. First of all, the data you’re accessing was never intended to be hidden from the user, but rather accessible as part of our larger plans for SDKs and user mods and expansions. It’s just we planned to open it up ourselves eventually, once the SDK was ready, but our enterprising fans found a way to do it earlier.

Most importantly, I need to mention something about Valve anti-cheat. Valve has their standard feature running on top of multiplayer, and we have some of our own additional checks. The way it works is not an automatic immediate server ban, but rather a data-gathering and review process resulting in eventual account ban from all multiplayer for the game.

So while many of you may enjoy playing around with game content, please do so offline. We do not yet have the user interface for switching between modified and stock files, nor do we have the server GUI to allow/disallow custom content so that makes things a little more difficult for the players. We’re probably going to ignore any infractions before today, but we’ll become more aggressive in the coming days. Please be warned. There will be a wide-scale account ban once we identify a large number of culprits. Everyone will be banned simultaneously, with no prior warning or chance for redemption. If you do not wish to be made an example of, please do not use ANY modified files in any online matches.

After all, cracking the game is against the EULA and theoretically we could ban everyone who has ever tried any mod, but that of course would serve no purpose. Once again, we do not mind you fiddling with your own game on your own machine, as long as you don’t use that ability to try to give yourself an unfair advantage online.

And now, the patch.

1. Further improvements to framerate in regards to the terrain engine. The improvement promises to be the most drastic yet, but since it’s currently split in half between two different machines we won’t have a more precise idea of the FPS gain until later today or early Friday.
2. SSAO is optional, a checkbox in Video Options.
3. Texture manager split into a separate core, which does wonders for performance on 4+ cores but offers no improvement on two cores.
4. Texture quality slider added to video options.
5. New Steam Lobby feature as an alternative to existing Server search.
6. Improvements to the Quick Mission Builder feature.
7. Large number of various changes in aircraft and cockpits

Future plans and roadmap:

1. SLI / Crossfire support (had to temporarily halt development due to ongoing work on FPS and texture manager)
2. Improvements to the campaign engine, including a rank and awards system.
3. Changes to multiplayer interface to better deal with the mods
4. More FM and DM tuning
5. Finally, documentation on dedicated server and campaign interface that should allow more meaningful 3rd party content!

Great update Luthier, we are all very glad to hear what is happening there behind the scenes, this update and other news is really making me
I would like to thank you on behalf of me, the community and my ego for the update.

Also while I am at it, when you were discussing the tree hitboxes/dmg and that you would need to run it on an additional core/thread, why not implement that as an option (which means retaining the minimum specs). I mean if its working on its own thread without reducing game performance for quad core (or 8 thread) machines, I think we would all like that as an "option" for those who can run it now, and for those who will run it in the future.

[lothar29]

Thanks Luthier, as not is that des that have changed the team not me just work as well as with the other, now use an Intel I7950 3. 06GHz and I have a lot more stuttering than before with the intel core 2 Quad 9550...


By the way, someone could tell me whether it is better to let on or off the Hyper-Threading in the bios options?


Thanks a lot

[Wolf_Rider]

< pacing nervously in the waiting room >

[jibo]

Originally Posted by lothar29

Thanks Luthier, as not is that des that have changed the team not me just work as well as with the other, now use an Intel I7950 3. 06GHz and I have a lot more stuttering than before with the intel core 2 Quad 9550...


By the way, someone could tell me whether it is better to let on or off the Hyper-Threading in the bios options?


Thanks a lot

now that's interesting a lot of people have complained about poor performances on core I7 9xx

[Kankkis]

Originally Posted by jibo

now that's interesting a lot of people have complained about poor performances on core I7 9xx

Yeah really intresting, CPU is much better.

what an anxious bunch we are. and simply for the love of the game. love it !

[Fall_Pink?]

Yes, please I have virtually an 8 core cpu, so let's make use of all that horsepower Good to hear this kind of solution (i.e. assigning other cores), is easy to implement in CoD.

Rgs,
FP