So, with that story you're telling us we should, with a smile, accept the failures of modules and world every.frigging.time.they.ship.some.new.update?
Cockpit textures missing replaced with a green/green splinter (see Panavia Tornado) or complete skins and weapon layout pictures? but wait - that's DCS Viggen so let's blame Heatblur, isn't it awesome to arrange this 3rd party setup so we can blame someone and they can blame ED into never.frigging.ending circles?

Except.......game breaking bugs from ED are not one-offs.

Not the case, though. They maintain a pool of volunteer closed beta testers.

https://forums.eagle.ru/showgroups.php

Thats very awesome to list a bunch of names but my opinion still stand, ED does not have any beta testers. Basta.
Just because you sport a title doesn't mean you carry the weight.

There, fixed it for you



Yeah but to get 500-1000 people on a closed beta would mean they'd have a better product once they go on open beta.... and would likely be able to hit a 1-2 week target between open beta and release. Get 500-1000 people on closed beta and they'd get a better idea of the state of their program and thus be able to decide not to make release promises at such an absurd point in the program's development. TL;DR -- they'd look like they know what they're actually doing



In that case, WTF have these guys been doing?? Might need to refresh the pool.



Totally willing to accept the "it happens, it's rare" bit and nobody's calling for a 100% bug-free product, but with the case of ED, it happens, it happens a lot, and they don't even seem fazed that their rep is taking a hit. I wonder what you'd say if you knew what the ED testing team was doing or how they're doing it



Like moderators who are more like the company PR than a proper forum moderator?

I can't get same effect, maybe campaign, mod(i don't have any or has never been) or something else is different.

https://youtu.be/ceyhw68fy58

The business around Dcs ww2 and Kickstarter.

One of the shonkiest things I’ve seen in computer games.

Never forget!

I put it out there as I recognize that almost all PC titles that aren't backed by a major producer (Ubisoft, EA, Activision, etc) are WAY too small to have a true QA department. The folks in their beta testing program are highly unlikely to be professional QA folks either. To be completely honest for the scope of an almost sandbox title of like DCS in the fidelity it is in, you'd need a major house like Ubi or EA to have a chance in heck of doing a solid QA job. The only saving grace to all of this is that DCS has been around in one form or another for over a decade at this point, as such there has been enough time iron some things out with the project. I look at DCS and see just exactly how bad it could be, compared to what it is. It's surprisingly stable, optimized, and featured compared to what it honestly should be for the size of the dev team and the resources they can call on.

I get that a lot of people feel that way they paid for is not what they got, but I'm not gonna go down that rabbit trail as I'm looking at it from a QA perspective and how bad it could be.

-Jenrick

I couldn't disagree more. It's very clear that ED are totally inept in planning and managing DCS World. This flows through to to the integration and testing because such obvious issues get through their testing every single time yet ED and their community are more than happy to make excuses about it being an evolving product that is almost impossible to baseline.

ED have had more than long enough to establish a core engine baseline and a method of properly integrating and creating modular components to add to a baseline build, they have however failed in every respect which only makes life difficult for themselves when trying to control the functionality and release management of each patch/update.

It's not rocket science yet they repeat the mistakes over and over again. That makes them incompetent in their core business.

And from a QA perspective, could they not have hosted a closed beta with 500-1000 unpaid community testers? You see how bad it could be (could have been?), but what if it was actually BETTER?

What would have a small closed beta do better that a large open beta wouldn't do? It's a beta, it's not supposed to be finished.

Call me a glass half full guy I guess. I've certainly gotten my monies worth out of DCS World (it's free after all). I've also gotten my monies worth out of the couple hundred dollars I've spent on products since LOMAC, including some current early access projects.

-Jenrick

Thing is, some of us haven't. Hence the great longtime hope for improvements and to some, heated/toxic/uncalled-for/childish disappointment when new updates keep on failing.
Many great white knight defenders and apologistas have short time with DCS or very few hours put into it contrary to some big complainers that've spent hours and hours trying to get AI do as told or find workarounds to all kind of bugs be it World or a module.

So, there will always be some who are settled and some who aren't depending on what they want to do in the simgame at this less than average quality - I've noticed online airquakers are the most easily appleased since their needs do not extend outside the cockpit.

Yeah, but do you want the public testing an EARLY beta build or a nearly-finished beta build? Do you want the public to see 90% of the bugs or do you want them to see just the last 15%? Which scenario do you think would make their company look better to the public?


If that's the logic, then everybody has got their money's worth out of DCS World, even those who have never played it.


Now think about what you could actually be getting if ED did a good beta run first before releasing anything!! If you're a glass half full guy, imagine if the glass was 3/4ths full to begin with!

Using that one word, "optimized" in relation to the current version 2.5... is just wrong. They have been working on 2.5 for how long? When it finally releases it definitely has some type of major memory issue, and you want to say it is surprisingly optimized compared to what it should be according to the relative team size and budget.



C'mon Man!!!

Please realize that my next statement isn't a personal attack on you , but merely a natural reaction to what you stated. That is maybe the most ignorant comparison analysis statement I have ever read relating to DCS World. I am starting to wonder if you maybe are Nineline, formerly Sithspawn under an assumed name here? I won't debate the rest of what you said, but DCS is DEFINITELY NOT optimized right now.

S!Blade<><

While a beta can certainly serve as a PR tool, the fact of the matter is that a beta is commonly considered to mean a non-feature complete, or not fully functional software build. Expecting anything else and being upset about it seems like a case of self delusion. If I am releasing a beta for testing purpose (rather than PR purposes), what advantage does a small closed beta have over a large open one? There are none from a pure software testing perspective. Considering certain segments of the DCS user base has been howling how long it's all taking, if you're responding to them why would you run a small closed beta that will be far less efficient in terms of bugs reported per time released, requiring a far longer time period to achieve the same results as a large open beta?




I wouldn't be getting anything right now as it'd still be sitting in a closed beta for 3-6 months.



So DCS apparently can't code it's way out a simple counting loop, but apparently they have the foresight to register a set of assumed alias on various sim sites 15 years ago,? Obviously I'm joking, but it's a realistic answer to you over dramatic pronouncement. Secondly if you're going to call someone or their statements ignorant, you should provide some evidence to articulate that fact, as you can almost guarantee they will provide a counter.

I can run DCS 2.5 on my 6-8 year old desktop (various part all land in that range) with most settings turned up pretty decently, I can run it on my general purpose non-gaming laptop, and I can run it on my purpose built gaming rig fairly maxed. How well did FSX run when it first came out on even top of the line hardware? If you don't remember it didn't do real well, and very few people ran it at anything approaching maxed. I can sit here and list a bunch of other titles with the same issues that didn't run any better at release on high end hardware at their launch as DCS does right now. Those were for released published titles, not beta releases. Does DCS have issues, absolutely. Could it be better, absolutely. Is it anywhere near as bad as it could be, no.

I'd highly recommend if you don't want to deal with the sausage making that is software development, don't buy anything that isn't a full finished released product. So with DCS stick to 1.5.8 and a few of the modules that are done and you'll be fine (or have justifiable complaints).

-Jenrick

Yes, but there's still a difference between 90% non-feature complete and 15% non-feature complete I'm not disputing the definition of a "beta release," but you will have to admit that this software is a good ways away from actual release status.

As for responding to DCS users, well, the project is delayed anyway, so why not just ride that wave until you're closer to a more feature-complete build? Why add a beta period that's got many issues to the list of things that DCS users can complain over? Why give them ANOTHER thing to complain about? Remember, ED initially estimated Release to follow 1-2 weeks after Beta! Naturally, people were expecting a more closer-to-complete build because of this statement. Heck, the original promise was to RELEASE 2.5, not release a BETA 2.5!


Source


I find it confusing how you can say a small closed beta has no advantage over a large one.... is a group of 50 testers (I'm guessing it's that many on that page linked) small? How about my suggestion of 500-1000? Surely they do not have to test their beta on the ENTIRE population of DCS users. They could send out a survey asking people about hardware specs and use that to make sure they're testing amongst a wide variety of hardware and not just the most rabid fans with 1080Tis and 32GB RAM and 1TB SSDs.



And being an unpaid beta tester, after being fed false info (1-2 weeks between beta and release) is better?


Bottom line, 2.5 release could've been when ED stepped up their game, blew everyone away, and prove the naysayers wrong. As with everything else, looks like they botched this one too. Maybe see a proper Release build in 2019 after Wags makes another promise?

No Drama here Sir, just the facts jack. First I wouldn't run FSX if you payed me, non combat, Blah, Blah, Blah, its BS. Please list more. Other than CLOD, which I never bought until TF patched it, I have never had a CFS that had a memory leak like this upon release. What did it take, 1 or 2 years for ED to release 2.5? For Ed to have worked on the Caucus map conversion to complete version 2.5 to bring DCS World under one roof and release it with a memory problem that requires 16Gb Ram to run a mission with 14 or 16 WWII planes only, nothing else going on, is not optimized. Explain how that is optimized, please, or maybe you would rather explain how going on MP requires 32 Gbs of Ram Memory to join a server?

Your statement that DCS 2.5 is optimized is made from pure

ignorance!(now that is DRAMA pal).



I have run 2.5 with and without Process Lasso and it uses right at 16 GBs of memory. I am attaching a picture, which I posted 2 days after the 2.5 release, in the Screenshot thread on SHQ, which is pictorial proof, evidence, exhibt A or what ever the F#%& you want to call it. I am also posting a picture of the required and suggested Ram to use DCS 2.5. So again when DCS won't even run on the minimum, 8Gbs of Ram, how is that optimized? I am not sure what world you live in, maybe the Social Media World, where if you say it Loud enough and over and over and over then people will eventually believe it is true, but I don't accept that BS, so please prove me wrong? How about you present some evidence that 2.5 is Optimized?

DCS 2.5 Screenshot Thread

S!Blade<><

Ps: I want ED to fix 2.5 because I Love the WWII Combat, but people like you going around writing that 2.5 is well Optimized is not helping to let ED know there is a problem.

Pss: I am posting thes pictures nice & big so you won't miss them, like you missed the poor optimization of 2.5. You can thank me later.

Have a go at this...Amen Skate is not the 'official' PR rep for ED\TFC\Belsimtek....who knows what law suits would follow



Source

@Winfield: sadly perceptions typically change, once you become an employee.

What The Feck is Going On With Capitalizing every few Words Anyway?

Because FSX/P3D, Win7/8/10 have bugs, that justifies them for having bugs? Yeah, but we don't wait 4 years for Win10. Then we don't wait 4 more years for bugs to be squished and features to be complete. I love how they now try to hide behind OTHER software to justify their own. Some people may not care about bugs in FSX or P3D simply because they're not interested in those things. Don't make it a requirement for us to complain about THOSE before we complain about DCS. It isn't.

Besides, I think for people who do own FSX and P3D, I think it's none of ED's business whether they complain about FSX/P3D anyway.