Hi Gray,

If its ok with you i will answer with a PM on that one due to i think this thread has turned a little too negative in a few areas.

Then don't purchase study sims.

This is reality - there is no such thing as bug-free software once you've moved beyond the day-1 Hello World. That's just the way it is.

And personally, I recall BS1 working quite fine, no gamebreakers I recall, and it was even given a new sound engine for free previously. But if the presence of bugs - ANY bugs - offends you, then shut your computer down and never use one again. That's just how it is.

The presence of bugs that are fixed for a price was the discussion. Bugs....not new features.

So if the bugs were left to remain you would have been fine?

You act like this is some sort of new phenomena. I remember all the way back to 1942 PAW Gold having bug fixes that were never addressed in the original 1942 PAW game. Even the various versions of US Nave Fighters all the way through Fighter Anthology had patches for bugs in previous games. I can go on, Strike Fighters 2, Longbow 2, add on content for Rise of Flight, Steel Beasts 2.6. Eventually code becomes legacy and support stops. Sorry but your 45 bucks can only go so far.

There is a certain life cycle for certain games. Companies that patch old games and don't develop newer versions or updates will end up out of business and will never be able to create new titles. BS1 is a four year old product, understand that. The development cycle for that title is long gone.

Yep.

And despite BS1 being a 4-year old product, it's still supported; while it isn't for free, if you are a fan of this heli, the cost to upgrade to BS2, and to be included in DCS: World and be tied in with all the other modules, as well as getting upgrades to the environment, is costing you a twenty. Over four years. That's four years of huge amounts of development for $20.

Understood. I guess the backlash from longtime simmers here and at the DCS forums when the BS2 surprise was announced was completely unfounded? This coming from a community that is well aware of the facts you stated above. Being a long time simmer myself....I guess I just won't get used to the pay for patch model. That is ok though, I have started branching more into other areas of gaming since the flight sim business model is circling the drain. They are making a niche' genre even smaller with poor communication and nickel and dime practices IMO. When flight simming hits rock bottom, the lack of simmers will be a contributing factor.

People's fond memories of days distant are really funny. Jane's titles - really great and fun. Patched once or twice..then nothing more. No add on planes. No add on theaters. No interoperability. Falcon 4. Released, patched once. Then that was pretty much it from the developers. No add ons, no interoperability, no additional theaters.

So don't let your fond memory of old sims cloud your judgement of what business models DO work (ie: making enough money to pay your employees to keep building a solid lineup of products that should appeal to a very broad spectrum of people..)

Every single time I fire up A-10C I shake my head in wonder that it only costs $50 (or $39 or $24 depending on when you got it on sale..) I'm the biggest fan in the world of Longbow, Jane's F-15 and JF-18..but I try to keep my memory based in the reality of what they were and how they turned out (from a business model standpoint) in the long run.

ED has found a successful formula and I commend them for it.

Backlash to what exactly? Some people complained that it was a pay-for upgrade. (By the way, it was something around 2GB over BS1. Not very patchy). A bunch later posted that the upgrade was worth their money. A few thought otherwise, but I imagine they will change their mind once integration into DCSW is complete.

There are those who objected to the sudden announcement, rather than the price. For the most part, they said their piece, and IIRC, Jim Mack made an apology for that, but maybe I'm not remembering correctly.



Nothing is circling the drain. According to what I've heard, sales have been alright so far, though it isn't as if difficulties don't happen. But that's just what I've heard.

I'd like to see your rant on the games you're branching into ... by all accounts, it might be hard to find something that would satisfy you. After all, all game series are just 'pay-for-patches' in the end if one follows your logic.

I guess the difference Beach is the "production values" you got for your initial investment. Falcon while not supported for very long, had enormous value to it. People still play it today and other forms of it that were modded for free to be probably the best sim available right now in the form of BMS. DCS may model planes well, but there is no immersion of being a pilot, isn't that what we are trying to simulate? IE: Promotions, medals, squadmates you care about etc. For the folks that like the way this model works for them....that's fine. If you can understand why some don't like it....even better.

No immersion in DCS? That's a good one.

We are all experts aren't we.


I'm officially out, this argument is going nowhere quickly.

/chews popcorn

I will freely admit that I have been out of the loop for awhile with DCS....I haven't done much flying since the BS2 deal. So tell me what changes I have missed out on for the offline immersion.

Do your AI wingmen have names and carry through from one mission to the next?
Do you have the ability to rank up if your performance over the course of your missions has earned it?
Can you be awarded medals for outstanding performance?
Can you be captured if you bail out?
Is there a leaderboard for kills in your squadron that you can compete with?
Is there any kind of feeling that you are in a continuing war?

I'm sure there is some stuff I'm leaving out but if any of these things have been implemented for the offline player since I stopped, maybe I will have another look. A quick glance at DCS and lock on files doesn't show much in the way of created campaigns or missions so I'm skeptical.

Good idea!

Has been implemented since black shark and probably even since the LO days, but i can't comment on the latter as i never player it.

Everyone - how much is *YOUR* time worth? What would you charge for an hour of your time? How much time do you spend on your computer? Planning it, buying it, building it and using it, and stocking it? (And complaining about software upgrade costs?)

$20 vs. ~$10,000 ? $69 vs. ~$5,000 ?

And then there's the beer and soda and smokes.




Also, I write software for a living. It's never bug-free. And sometimes bug fixes just have to go with a new version; sometimes the bug doesn't get to the top until a lot of work has gone into the next planned release. It is just not practical to patch up code that is months (or years) old - and spend the release costs - when all the resources are going to improving the product and getting the next release out as best as possible.

WC

I dont think people expect software to be bug free (too complex these days and not enough effort put into testing properly)

But what I think annoys people is that the longest and earliest supporters of ED
are the ones who got the shaft , we should NEVER have had to pay for the BS1-> BS2 patch

We already paid for those improvements when we bought A10C and now with DCS World being modular even less of a reason to screw us twice

BUT what ever you do , dont say that on ED forums , it might get you banned.

Yep the early adopters are the ones to face the most problems , for me I cannot play a game
I paid (BS2) for because my BS1 has run out of activations , I raise a support ticket 36 Days ago but
they cannot be bothered to reply ...... not exactly great customer service.

I do understand that their customer support side is under strain .... but it was their own poor business decisions
that put them in that position, why should we suffer ?

I agree, DCS is all about simulating airplanes, so when missions run out, people start flying under bridges and doing all sorts of experiments and goofs to keep them entertained. Crosswind carrier landing being one of them. You don't see that in BMS, since there's always a unique mission ahead. If you get bored, it's usually the difficulty not set high enough.

Even with FA18 or mudhen, it'll be the same kind of terrain and missions, UNLESS they come up with DC engine. Imagine the campaign being dead-is-dead. You'd only get one airplane and you must take care of it. Get killed, campaign over. Like in ROF. Career mode. Adding kill marks on the side of the plane after each mission would be icing on the cake.

Sounds more like CoD/CSS/BFBC2 etc to me. Arcade game stuff.

These are the kind of things that make me avoid titles.

Yes, I've been simming as my main PC entertainment since 1985 and have a few hours clocked up.

It's real life. Pilots all over the world have a name, a face and a background story. They get higher ranks, compete on leaderboards and getting decorated.

Ofcourse it sits low on the priority list, but seeing this stuff in RoF, it really pulls you into the game.

Whatever.

I get plenty of 'immersion', as do very many others (look in the AAR section and in stuff like eno's firehouse thread). Some things might make it better, sure - but everyone would probably have their own ideas about what they like/want for that.

Pilots also do lots of other mundane things - as do soldiers, sailors and policemen, but not to have them included does not mean there is no immersion in a sim or game.

I'm so pleased you can bless us with your worldly opinion of life as it's lived, though, as we are so unexperienced in these things.

How many military aircraft have you flown? How many wars have you fought in? How many years have you been a groundcrewman?

Yes - I have done all three (two of them as a trained professional) and I find this sim, amongst others, very immersive - but the things mentioned are unnecessary for that and the last 3 just ego-buffers.

But please, do tell me more about life?