ok. I have always kept the latest full version on an external hard drive,(latest full and probably the last is 1.0.4.1 released yesterday.).
then install it. patching was never an issue with me ,always smooth and trouble free.I do sympathise with others who have probs with logging in/out patching etc and i always felt it was an ops. misunderstanding caused by gajiins mixed up way of doing it but maybe i was lucky:).

Graphics and smooth gameplay and quick MP fix are what sold it for me,im not a simmer so the fact that it is criticised for that didnt bother me,loved playing with friends on teamspeak in the first 6 months of release it was so much fun,not so many people online thesedays but i can nearly always find a game to join,if not i make my own and its rare to not be joined within 10 mins by afew others,

No its not perfect but ive had so much fun and pleasure from this game that i cant wait to ALPHA test World Of Planes the new upcoming game .

The review was fair and to the point but WOP im still playing whereas ROF and CLOD and IL2 1946 are no longer on my drive.

ssssssssssssssssssnake

Spot on review, but I found the constant use of "console port" annoying too. One can't help but feel like you're venturing into PC Elitist territory there.

Hi PFunk,

Perhaps I should add that the game also feels amazing and very immersive due to its graphics. You get a feeling of flying as I haven't seen in any other flight simulation game yet, and you get the airplanes to do what you mostly would expect them to do. In more ways than not, the FMs are correct, especially as far as performance parameters are concerned.

The way the FMs achieve this isn't always what you would expect in a real airplane, but this is probably not that noticeable for a wider audience. Since you mention IL-2, the original Wings of Prey flight models were licensed from IL2-1946 version 4.0.5 there and have since been further developed.

No doubt some things could be better, but I have to admit that I'm perhaps more critical than most since I'm a real life pilot.



MAC

Nice review! Enjoyed reading it.
Actually a bit of a shame that this game is even better than Clifs of Dover

Where'd the Forums go? After the article read - It had me interested, but I see nothing to follow-up with.

For me, "console port" implies a few things:

A menu system that can't be used with a mouse, just keyboard or gamepad, or the mouse is enabled but works poorly.
The ubiquitous "don't turn off your PC while you see this loading symbol" message that ONLY makes sense on a console.
A game tuned to a more visible reward system to get you to keep playing, the implicit message being that just playing the game alone won't be enough to hook you (note that there are PC-only games that do this, but it's far more common on the console side).
A tendency to "hand hold" the player thru most aspects of the game in lieu of letting them figure it out or (heaven forbid!) read a manual.
Overall limits on the technical aspects of the game that come from being designed to run on the (now very) dated hardware of the consoles.

Not every game I would label console port has all these things, but usually they have a majority.

I don't have WoP, so I can't say if it does or doesn't, closest I got was the BoP demo off XBL. That DID feel like a console game like Blazing Angels or Ace Combat as opposed to a sim like Il-2 or CFS, but I know BoP and WoP aren't identical.



The Jedi Master

In fairness, PFunk stated he doesn't like IL-2's FM's, so no suprise he didn't like WoP's!

I can't speak to the rest, as I didn't get past the demo; just wasn't my cup of tea.

Good to hear from a REAL pilot, Macademic, that the FMs in WoP are good. PFunk seemed to have an "agenda" in his review. That's the feeling I got reading it. At least WoP actually works, i.e., is exactly as pre-advertised, unlike ClOD. If one doesn't like WoP, well some don't like chocolate chip cookies. It's a matter of taste. But it least it provides exactly what people who waited for it and play it were looking for--the natural successor to Janes WWII Fighters, which is exactly what I was lookinng for (for years) and is exactly what I got.

CLoD on the other hand, is nowhere close to what it was advertised to be and what its fanboys were looking for. 40% from GAmespot and 45% from the best and most respected flight/racing sim reviewer on the planet, Andy Mahood, is brutally telling.

Well I do appreciate Macademic's feedback and comments here at SimHQ, especially from a piolt... but in fairness you really should identify who you are in relations to this game and the development team... if you are so connected.


Pfunk and I have never seen eye to eye on games and reviews... but a review is the authors opinion... it's not a statement of fact... his reviews or mine... you got to know the reviewer and know if you agree with him most of the time to take a review to heart... Pfunk has many readers here who agree with his opinions and articles, and some that don't... same with me... many agree with my tactical reviews and articles, many don't... you weigh your virtual relationship with the writer to help make up your opinion about a game.

so no review is right or wrong... sure you readers have a right to voice your own opinions and ideas, agreements and disagreements... but to simply say a review is "wrong" or the reviewer "had a bad day" is BS... be more constructive, will ya.

...um ... ... didn't there used to be a forum topic for WoP under the WWII era Flight Sims?

There's a Gaijin forum now, since they've got not only WOP but 2 more titles in the works. Best way to do it, too many forums anyway. LOL Now if the IL2 forums could just get combined...

Accusing an agenda is at best, rude and at worst defamatory. That's a classless thing to do, and it's a review, so of course it's opinion based.

Also, CoD being 'bad' doesn't make WoP 'good', and it's laughable that keeps getting brought up.I don't know why you'd even want to come to a sim review site or forum if you start with the broken attitude that other people's opinions are always wrong.

Like Magnum said, why so negative all the time?

This game may be for some, but it just wasn't for me, for the reasons I've outlined.

I like that they tried and I wish them luck on future endeavors, but it simply didn't meet the criterion I have to label something a sim, which makes me something I really hate admitting, a hardcore acolyte...of sorts. There's certain things a title has to do and WOP just didn't do it. Worse, it didn't work. Buyers purchasing the package are thinking the Luftwaffe content is included, and in my case, it wasn't. That alone gave it a real black eye for me. Your product needs to work out of the box, it just has to function, or you're asking for trouble. Look at the launch of Cliffs of Dover if you need any further evidence of that.

You didn't really write anything particularly out-of-line with SimHQ's core audience - a quick look at the forums main page and the 'viewing now' numbers show what people are playing and what's interesting to them.

The WoP sequel looks really promising, but WoP itself struggled to establish itself (rightly or wrongly) as a sim.

Lionpride, the Gaijin consolidated forum is here:
http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/forums/189/1/Gaijin_Flight_Series.html

A reminder to everyone that PFunk reviewed the Collector's Edition, which was just recently made available, and not the original WoP release. To receive a boxed, retail DVD then have to download gigabytes to get it current on a 3 month old release is just wrong no matter how it is sliced.

Plainsman... agenda, huh? PFunk and I were both surprised at the outcome and frankly going in, we both expected it to show better than it did. No agenda.

I think the game's biggest problem was that it failed to match the mission balance with the level of realism. IE, the campaign was unplayable on anything but arcade, and the single missions were only sometimes tailored for simulator or realistic modes. On top of that, the AI, which needs a giant helping hand in arcade mode as the player is neigh invincible, retains all kinds of advantages in the harder modes which make them too godlike when the player is subject to more lifelike restrictions.

I found the review very fair and PFunk shares my own experience with WoP. Probably the most beautiful looking Flight Sim on the market, but let down by the gameplay.
I still have the game but very rarely fire it up.

I just hope WoP 2 pulls everything together.

Again, I don't understand the "CoD sucks, so WOP is better" rationale. They BOTH have serious problems, neither one does what it said it would.

Neither one really amounts to a sim because in my opinion FOR RIGHT FRICKIN' NOW neither one does what it was intended to. WOP isn't a sim because it doesn't act like one. It acts like a game. COD isn't a sim because it isn't finished.

So people will understand where I'm coming from, let me explain my background so you can see what I think a sim is. My first flight-themed PC game was Chuck Yeager's Air Combat, shortly after that, I spent way too much time on MicroProse's Stealth Fighter 2.0. So I go back a ways.

Every flight sim has a following, a 'camp'. You have Falcon fanbois, Jane's F-15 and F-18 guys, and so on. Everyone thinks 'their' sim is the best. I am a Flankerite. I consider it a sim. I consider IL-2 a sim. I consider MSFS a sim. You beginning to see a trend?

Those are all sims because I think they mimicked flight to a proper degree that puts them in that category. Also, they worked.

WOP is not a sim. It remains to be seen if COD will ever become one.

Gee I hope you had in-flight service

PFunk - absolutely agree, well said.

I regularly play IL2, WoP, CoD, RoF, FSX, DCS:A10, DCS:BS, BC2, BF2 PR, ArmA2, a whole bunch of RTS's and way (way) more console titles. They are all different and they are all good at what they do. Picking one as a 'mortal enemy' or one as some sort of 'promised-land' makes no sense.