777 Studios

Is this wild speculation or a tease... pics or GTFO

Pics/Video or it's not happening lol! That would be awesome though, I really hope this see's the light of day.

Sorry folks, I have to politely deny this speculation.

Aaaarrrgh.

Got anything else for us, then?

That´s too bad...
I´m always hoping for you guys finding a publisher to found your project.
I´m sure it will be a great addition to the flight sim world.

Well we can still speculate on other publishers since he said "deny THIS speculation"! Ubisoft with an always online connection required and monthly subscription fee?

Well, I think it's time to reveal what's happening regarding publishers. We've been contacted by nearly all known publishers around, some of them quite big... But they're only interested in knowing if we have a complete product in hands so they can publish it through their methods.

The fact is that if we finish the product by ourselves, without the financial help of a publisher, in this current era of rising digital distribution platforms and self-publishing methods, we would probably drop it on Steam or similar as an independent release (I know the service very well, I have a friend selling two game products through it right now and he is happy with the service so far).

But without financial help this is nearly unachievable, for example, at the moment our (2) programmers are involved in serious "crunch time" periods in the respective studios where they work full-time in the games industry, so JT is nearly stalled at this point (again). the Financial help is needed so a counterproposal is made for them to leave those jobs and be full-time in JT. And after this, there is the issue of the licensing costs of real aircraft brands such as "Harrier" (Boeing Corporation in the US own the rights) and this costs serious money as well.

This sum ups very well and briefly what happens concerning publishers, but there are always a glint of hope and light at the end of the tunnel if we carry on feeding the dream.

Dante, thanks very much for the disclosure. Definitely a real chicken-and-egg problem, if the chicken were a jet fighter!

Are there perhaps government/cultural grants that can be applied for in the U.K./Argentina? I know it's a stretch, I just heard that 1C has tried something similar in Russia.

Certainly the time is ripe to invest in high fidelity flight simulators (compared to, say, 10 years ago), but try convincing publishers of that in the age of X-box and GTA. >:(

I've been watching your progress since 2005. Haven't given up hope of someday having this on my box!

Yes, we're aware that Oleg is attempting to raise funding from government in Russia (http://www.next-gen.biz/news/russian-government-may-fund-patriotic-game-series)

He is asking US$ 24 million, which will be distributed into 6 combat sim projects, according to the article above. This gives US$ 4 million of funding for each project(finishing of SOW probably included), and it gives a good idea of the costs of developing a high quality flight sim product.

UK and Argentina, I'm pretty sure that if we approach UK government we'll be ignored, but Argentina is another different matter, there's a decent chance, although at the risk of having the project lean to one side (bias)...

Argentina, I can see that. For them, the issue never really went away:

From Wiki...
"The initial invasion was characterised by Argentina as the re-occupation of its own territory"
"However, as of 2010 and as it has since the 19th century, Argentina shows no sign of relinquishing its claim"

So interest in the project and the potential for bias could both be likely. I wonder though, in what ways a country could lean a project like this toward their interest, or to a more favorable perception of that country in the historical sense.

Also, if the project was funded by the Argentinian government, would UK be more, or less, willing to license intellectual property required for completion?

All kinds of questions start to come up when you look at national involvement.

Dante thanks for the informative posts, I hope you understand my post was in jest. It's nice to know how hard you guys have worked on this project and we all hope it will see the light of day. Keep up the fight guys and good luck on the obstacles ahead!

The EU offers grants to indie game developers, once every 6 months if I remember correctly.

EDIT: I believe you need to have a company registered within the EU to be eligible.

Good luck Dante.

Cheers

Jebus, not this crap again. I thought there was a way around this issue? Can't it be called something else in game?
Either way, looking forward to this when it works out.

Why not ask Boeing to support your project?

Ripcord

BlueHeron: there will be a lot of interesting developments in the political side of things. We still keep it discreetly, but the argentinean government *already* is supporting us. I think it was 2005, Ariel Cancio from Thunderworks together with a delegation from ECV56Condor online squad members went into a field photo and research trip to the Tandil Military Air Base, Buenos Aires Province, where they're able to get all photo material we ever dreamed, including switched on systems in cockpits HUD/radar displays, Ariel had 1 hour of stick time in the actual IAI Dagger (Finger) training simulator and a ECV56Condor member (Cazador) earned a backseat ride in a real plane!

HitchHikingFlatlander: no problem sir! It's one of my tasks, to communicate to the community what is actually going on.


AD: thanks for the heads up, actually the company has a branch registered in the UK, so this might be something to look at. I was also pondering about this.

tagTaken2: name change doesn't works, check this

One of several examples around, since 2008 this has been happening, with increasing frequency.

The solution, is to get decent funding, and properly license the stuff. I own Ace Combat and HAWX for console and although I can't post a pic right now, I can see clearly in one of the frontend/credits screen the several aircraft company logos (LM, Boeing, Dassault Aviation etc) and trademarks clearly visible - which means, Namco and Ubisoft properly licensed($) the stuff. No fuzz.

Ripcord: It would be cool to have USMC AV-8Bs in a modern setting, wouldn't?

Owning the Trademark for a product name doesn't mean you have a blanket ownership of the name. There are tons of companies trading products under the name of Harrier, Toyota is one of them! Unfortunately for Boeing, they don't own Computer gaming/Simulation trademarks.

We were concerned about using the name Apache and Apache longbow, but after thorough research we found that while Boeing owns the trademark under several categories, Helicopters (REAL helicopters that is), plastic models, watches etc, their application for a trademark under the Flight simulation and game category was rejected. Why? Most likely because they don't have a product to trade. Have you checked the US patent office website?

Frankly, if you're expecting to license the name you'll be waiting an eternity. After Boeing told us we'd have to license the name (AH-64D/Apache/Apache Longbow) we requested licensing information. That was several months ago, as yet, no response.

Cheers

This is indeed a terrible part of the combat sim development job. I know that even studios working in FPS games like Modern Warfare have whole legal teams working around the clock in the licenses of military equipment such as Colt AR-15s, Humvees, even military knife's brands... these legal teams do phone calls in a daily basis to the owner of the rights, etc, to make the process move forward on schedule. It's an utter despair.

Which just shows the utter imbecility and greed of those companies.

When I was working, ages ago, in the Marketing department of an Airline, I remember overhearing a conversation between two of the senior Managers , one was griping about how to prevent Passengers taking with them utensils with the Company logo, the other one replied that he must be an Imbecile, that that they were doing, was free advertising for the Airline.

Same with a M-4 rifle, they should want their product to be in a game.

Interesting. I never dreamed their could be so much problems with just creating a game.

I absolutely agree. 'Nuff said.

Yea, seeing as I work with them, I think it's a damn good investment.

I wouldn't have thought Boeing had anything to do with the name 'Sea Harrier' and couldn't claim anything to do with it for copyright stuff either, or simply an FRS.1 or GR3, again, absolutley nothing to do with Boeing..... more BAe Systems than Boeing... after all, Boeing didn't invent the thing to begin with... so who are they to say who can use those names..
is it not just the Harier II they own the name of ? As I can't possibly see how they can copyright the name Harrier in any way shape or form.... Boeings aircraft is the Harrier II, and not the Harrier

Hawker Siddeley is a predecesor company to BAE systems - be surprised if any rights to the Sea Harrier or Harrier GR1-3 name were sold off to Boeing

rename it Seahawk FSR1 with user options to rename it and VOILA! no need these stupid greedy rights...

Dante have you looked into having a payware beta/demo release? Mount and Blade did that a while ago, I don't know if you're familiar with it. In short the first playable version of the demo/beta (not a whole lot of functionality) was priced fairly low (I think $12-$15), to generate revenue to allow the project to continue. Each successive version of the demo/beta with added features and such was more expensive up till the last one before release (I think it was at about $25-$30). The inducement was that whenever you bought in you didn't have to pay anymore as the demo updated, and when the game finally released. Basically my $15 investment got me the game (retail was I think $35 or so), for half price. I'd be more then willing to do that for Jet Thunder.

-Jenrick

Regarding the copyright and IP - interesting I have been speaking with someone regarding this as they are in the process of setting up development team.

One of the interesting things I learnt was http://www.bistudio.com/ at the start of ARAM2 have a disclaimer regarding weapons, vehicles, and aircraft within in and it's legal as long as you do not use copyright and trademark names.

C-130J interestingly enough is in fact copyrighted...

Call the harrier by its prototype name 'Kestral'..

But yeah I will defentaly pay into the beta of this game.

Lets hope a Beta is in the pipeline. Hope the devs going well?

I can never understand how any entity, Government or otherwise needs revenue from an image of an airplane in a video game. I mean it's not like they're going to make or lose any sales from it.

Could even be free advertisement, imagine your average third world dictator playing the game. He might like it enough to buy the plane (Just Kidding here ofcourse)