Mini-Update, 10 August 2007

Currently the team is testing build 33 which added a new airfield to the simulation world and increased the height field and texture resolution of large portions of the map (most evident in the mountainous areas). The Mineralnye Vody area has a particularly detailed height field. We’re also been adjusting the world shaders for a more contrasted image. Personally, I think it looks better. We’ve also incorporated the tree edits by our newest test team member, TekaTeka.

The mission editor is progressing nicely and I had a chance to take a look at a test build this past week. The new map technology and scripting ability will be a pretty dramatic change from previous Eagle products. Since coming to work with Eagle since my Jane’s F/A-18 days, I’ve wanted to have much better mission scripting tools. This ME is a huge step in that direction. Hopefully within the next couple of weeks the ME will be available to the test team to start banging on.

It looks like we’re nearing the homestretch for the Ka-50 modeling. A few items with the fire suppression system, auto-pilot modes and caution/warning system remain, but on the whole things are starting to look pretty solid. The flight model will probably continue to be tweaked but right now it feels very tight.

Given the nature of helicopter combat, a great deal of time has been spent working on the helicopter and ground vehicle AI. This work continues, particularly because the AI helicopters now use a much more advanced flight model and this needs to be accounted for by the AI.

That’s it for now; I’ll try to do another update in a few weeks after ME and campaign system has been integrated into to the code base.
__________________
Matt Wagner
Producer, TFC/Eagle Dynamics

IT'S ALIIIIIIVE!

if this new ME has not a backwards compatibility with 1.1



it is dead.

I will continue with building missions for 1.1, not going to start from scratch.

keep it going. Hopfuly i'll be around to see it.....

Awesome news. Thanks for the update Matt.

Overall, I'm looking forward to an improved mission and campaign experience. Updating the ME would offer a lot that I could play with. Especially some variability of mission timings. Most likely I'll focus on the new Editor and the BS helicopter and leave FC behind.

But I would like mission loading of the FC missions so we could convert them to the BS system. It's really going to depend on the compatability issues for creating new FC Su-25T missions. I might want to have TWO separate installations with FC and BS - but the copy protection systems might screw that up.

And I hope they keep in the campaign-movies feature. Even though only my campaign with movies comes to mind, it was a nice cool feature that, with an increased interest in the campaign, could offer cool stuff and better immersion. And they don't need to be full "Top Gun" features. I just had a guy talking and some maps & photos. And the movies didn't need to be "Top Gun" extravaganzas; I had a guy talking with maps & photos - see My Sims Page in my sig for a sample.

This new Mission Editor will only interest a couple of dozen people - you and me included, who create missions.

I am working on a new 20-30 mission pack - I've invested a lot of time on many packs, I would not switch to 1.2 which as we know is only about the Ka-50 with no improvements for fixed wing flyables just to get more trees and terrain.

To translate the missions is easy if you know how.

I think a tad more than 24 people will be intrested in a new ME - being it will enable much more dynamic missions.

For every one who says their not buying Black Shark because it is focused on the KA50 Helicopter, there is another who is buying it just for that reason.There is a Dormant DI Hind/LB 1-2 /EECH crowd floating out there that is just waiting for the chance to fly a title like Black Shark...

Numerous 'Rotor heads' will be coming over to this community once Black Shark is released and we will all benifit from that.

You got me wrong,I meant people who really do mission building , not the occasional ones or those that make a few and had enough.

Most people can't fly their own missions because they build them linear and get bored quickly, and they want to be entertained and not do the hard work of 1 mission a week routine.

If you make the old Missions unplayable, two years from now you will see twice as many 1.1 missions as there are now and a few 1.2 , I doubt I'll make any.

Just check Lockonfiles to see how few Su-25/-25T missions there are , we are doing a huge effort to make the Su-25T more popular with the Crimean Air Wars mods, and this is two years after the Su-25T was released.

Most people in the US and Europe who post on the English language boards prefer to fly Western aircraft. I don't see that changing and I don't see BS being any more popular than the SU25T FC pack was outside Russia.

I have Lock On FC, the Su25T is beautifully modelled and I have spent some time in it. Unfortunately it just doesn't draw me back to the game like an AFM A10 or other Western ground pounder would.

I know this is flogging a dead horse.

I started with the A-10 and F-15 and moved on to the Su-25T and Su-27 , there is indeed a tendency towards flying US - but once you master the Su-25T you never lose trim or deep stall and you learn the wonderful array of weapons you have at your disposal, with the Su-25T you can indeed make more complex scenarios to fly, I started on the Su-25T last November and got hooked.

The thing I'm looking forward to is what I think it happening with the clickable cockpit. If what I saw was true, I think it represents a huge shift in clickable cockpit technology. Normally with such a cockpit you have to move the mouse and click something. Some controllers have built in pointers, but they are essentially digital controllers and not analog which means that the speed you move around is constant. So what do I think I saw?

It looked like if you are equipped with TrackIR you can move your head to look around the cockpit. Pretty regular stuff but it looked like there was a crosshairs in your view which you could override with your mouse if you wished. But, you could move your head and "look" at the switch you wanted to manipulate and then click a button on your controller which may act as a mouse-click, activating the thing you are "looking" at.

It this has been discussed before, I apologise. If not, and I am correct in what I saw - that's an incredible method of manipulating the cockpit and everybody should emulate it. If I'm not correct and came up with this idea on my own, then it should be emulated.

You can never get bored with watching the Vikhr's spiralling towards a target.

Sounds like a good idea for a clickable pit where you have to move a mouse around. Instead you'd move your head around(with TrackIR) and tap a key on the keyboard when the cockpit cursor is over the correct button. But TrackIR might be to jiggly. Something to look at.

I think when you need finer control, you can just move your head a little closer and make the object bigger. That may solve the control issues.

counting the seconds to the kill ...

Or they could add some light 'snap' to the cross hair.

That too is a possibility but I do wonder how effective that would be in a tight cluster of switches. I wonder if a person would need even finer control of their neck to go from 'snap' to 'snap'.

I had a similar question a few months ago... It actually came to mind while I was flying some of the missions in FSX ....
I was having a hell of a time getting my visuals to center on the click-able buttons while using TIR 4....
I began to think that if this was happening in FSX, BS would no doubt be even harder to get a stable view..So I posted this question in the forum and even asked Oleg, who is one of the systems designer and also a personal friend....
apparently the giggling effect is not as pronounced in Lock On as it was in FSX, alot of the beta testers have no issues with this... But I was told that if this causes some inconsistancecies, the best way around this is to use the Pause, Center, and Precision functions to help with the button clicks...
I also would like to add that there is a patch that came out for FSX that seems to have eliminated most of the jiggling.....

~S~

Blaze

From watching the Edge video it looks to me like he's still using the mouse to move the crosshairs for switch selection. Take a look at it again Corsair. Maybe I'm wrong but that's what it looks like to me.