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#3821708 - 08/13/13 05:30 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: wheelsup_cavu]  
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Pizzicato Offline
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Originally Posted By: wheelsup_cavu

The video arcades took a big bite out of my pocket in the 1980's too. It was almost impossible for me to go through less than twenty or thirty dollars in a weekend.


Wow... $20-$30 bucks per weekend would have been pretty serious money in the 80's. It would have been for me as a kid, anyway. I would have been lucky to see $5 per week back then. biggrin


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#3821710 - 08/13/13 05:35 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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Man, was there a better feeling than being a 10 year old kid with 10 dollars worth of tokens in your pocket back around 1980 or so? Man alive, I remember that at most arcades you got like 50 or 60 tokens if you put $10 into the token machine, instead of the usual 4 for a dollar.

Oh man, walking around with pockets bulging with 40 or 50 or 60 tokens...that was living.

Great post votacx!

Last edited by toonces; 08/13/13 05:35 AM.

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#3821711 - 08/13/13 05:37 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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That's actually a really timely post. I picked up Dragon's Lair off of Steam the other day for $5 because back when I was a kid there was just no way I could afford to finish the game at $1 a play.

Remember that?

Finally 30 years later I can find out what all the fuss was about!


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#3821712 - 08/13/13 05:41 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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wheelsup_cavu Offline
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Originally Posted By: Pizzicato
Originally Posted By: wheelsup_cavu

The video arcades took a big bite out of my pocket in the 1980's too. It was almost impossible for me to go through less than twenty or thirty dollars in a weekend.


Wow... $20-$30 bucks per weekend would have been pretty serious money in the 80's. It would have been for me as a kid, anyway. I would have been lucky to see $5 per week back then. biggrin

Lol, I was in High School so I had a job and I was spending my money foolishly. If it had been up to my parents to give me the money I wouldn't have got 5 bucks a weekend.


Wheels


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#3821758 - 08/13/13 11:11 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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PanzerMeyer Online centaurian
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But if you were really good at the arcade games you played you could get extra lives and hence get a lot more play time out of your quarters. I remember a few rare occasions where one quarter gave me about 30 minutes of playing time.


“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”
#3821825 - 08/13/13 02:39 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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I rarely went because I rarely could play the few games that interested me. Usually they were always taken. So I was playing the Atari 2600, then the 800, then our 8088 PC.




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#3821869 - 08/13/13 04:27 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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I never had much money for arcade machines back in the late 70s and early 80s, since I was never given an allowance. I depended mostly on birthday and Christmas money as a kid.

I remember finally getting a chance to play Space Invaders (or maybe Asteroids?) in a Hills lobby during a weekly family shopping trip; my grandfather caught me and chastised me up and down for wasting my money, though in total I probably only spent about a dollar in quarters. (He grew up during the Great Depression and was notoriously thrifty his entire life.)

I remember Dragon Lair too, and how much I wanted to play it as a kid. It looked like the greatest thing in entertainment since the invention of the television. Alas, I had to content myself with watching the demos, or perhaps gameplay over somebody's shoulder.

Fortunately I was able to take advantage of the decline of the Atari 2600, when new game cartridges costed as little as $2 at my local drugstore. I built up a pretty sizeable collection of games, mostly titles by Activision and Intellevision. I remember a couple of them even came with special controllers...

Ahhh, good times. Good times. smile


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#3821875 - 08/13/13 04:35 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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PanzerMeyer Online centaurian
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In addition to Dragon's Lair there was also Space Ace. Both of those cartoon-like games were fun and tough.


“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”
#3821997 - 08/13/13 08:15 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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Dig Dug, Defender, Berzerker, Pole Position, Gauntlet and Red Baron got my quarters. I used to go to this bar and they had a Mz. Pacman that they sped up to twice the normal speed. I couldn't play it at normal speed for the life of me, but twice the speed I played forever.

#3822011 - 08/13/13 08:38 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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JEEEEZUS!!! Are we really ALL middle-aged men, or what!? Seriously, I'd forgotten all about Dragon's Lair.

Toonces, I think its terrific that you are learning LUA with hopes to develop some sort of DC engine for DCS. At Microprose, wasn't that job done by just one guy? So it's doable. The problem with DCS may well be the large GPU demands. If there are more than 3 planes in my field of view at an airbase, the game turns slideshow. Falcon was behind it's time graphically but (guessing here) because of that it seemed to go pretty smoothly MOST of the time, even with the low processing power of the period. If they can get a DC engine to work and if EDGE adds better terrain AND things run with suitable smoothness, it will be revolutionary.

#3822018 - 08/13/13 08:55 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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PanzerMeyer Online centaurian
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It was my understanding that DCS World was much more CPU intensive than GPU intensive. I've noticed that missions with large numbers of units tends to bog down performance and something like the number of units is handled by the CPU.

Last edited by PanzerMeyer; 08/13/13 09:05 PM.

“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”
#3822059 - 08/13/13 11:20 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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One thing that is definitely not sobering or new is developers whining about making flight sims. The more they whine...the less I care...it's getting old. I'm not going to start handing over money in the hopes that someday you will create something full featured like we used to get. I fell into that trap already and I'm done with the blind support. If it really isn't profitable than they wouldn't be doing it. Are we supposed to believe they are doing this out of the kindness of their hearts because they love us so much? Doubt it...we hear a lot of threats of "we're not gonna make anymore if <insert reason>"

With the way sims are stripped of offline features nowadays...I'm done buying them anyway...sooo the sobering insight is a lot of us just don't care anymore. I give my money to other genre's of gaming now...lot's of it.

I know it's a downer post...but....it's the same damn sob story we've been hearing forever from devs.


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#3822074 - 08/14/13 12:28 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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I'm with Jedi: make the games fun first, then add the rivet-counting stuff. "Fun" does not have to equal "dumbed down". Fun means to give the user an incentive to sit down and play the game. And that would make such a simulation game more accessible for a much broader audience, hence more copies are being sold, hence more money to reinvest into making the product even better - or add more depth.

Flaming Cliffs (whatever it's called right now) like fidelity with an interesting story/campaign in a (or several) interesting theaters (look at the old Microprose games like Gunship, F-19, M1 Tank Platoon), and maybe more western hardware, would be more than sufficient to draw larger crowds to the genre. A-10 C like fidelity can always be added at some later date.

On the other hand, if some keep designing systems simulators that are about as fun as creating Excel sheets, you've already cut down on your potential user base. Only very few people (compared to the potential global market) have the time and energy to come home from a long day at work to sit down for hours in front of their PCs to learn how to ramps-start a SU-25 (without labels of course, cause that would kill immersion; instead they also book an online course to learn Cyrillic). That, by definition, is called a niche market. smile



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#3822124 - 08/14/13 03:39 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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I'm waiting for the next generation of hardware, full 3D goggles in HD. Can't overlook the hardware angle, it can give a massive boost in fun. I doubt Il-2 would have had the success and following it did had the TrackIR not appeared at the same time. It was made for that game.

I'd have walked a long time ago were it not for the advancements in hardware. TIR, HOTAS, MFD's, extra throttle quads, and now integrated touch pads. It's the tech that's bringing the flight experience closer. Can't wait for the day I can fly and fight in a 1 to 1 scale HD 3D world, and not some zoomed out 2D flattened distortion, where visuals require zooming, labels, and other training wheel views to see only specks with limited SA. Put me in the cockpit and world totally, that will bring to life any flying combat game.

Seems much of the flight equipment today is high end, or crap, not much between. It's surprising the amount of high end flight sim equipment out lately, must still a viable market.

#3822170 - 08/14/13 08:30 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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The rivet-counting system simulation is the comparatively easy part of simulation development, and it's the safest method to get the hardcore simmers on your side in the leading marketing campaign. Developers who do not have the resources to do both will do the rational and reasonable choice to concentrate on an engine that produces nice screenshots and of turning the aircraft technical manual into a mathematical representation.

You get what you get because no indie developer can afford to do it all. Actual game developers hired by a big publisher won't touch the subject even if they could make it "more fun" to begin with (partly because they are more experienced in the "fun" business) because they see no market potential in it. There you have, in a nutshell, the situation. I've hinted that in 2005 already.

Some way want to judge the developers' situation assessment from 2005 in all parts:
Part 1 (3 pages)
Part 2 (3 pages)
Part 3 (4 pages)
Part 4 (3 pages)
Part 5 (3 pages)


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#3822186 - 08/14/13 10:20 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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You might want to title the thread combat flight sim?

Also worth noting that as it stands at the moment in the 'now' we have more choice in flight sims and hardware across the board from high fidelity to relaxed realism to arcade than we have ever had before EVER.

#3822188 - 08/14/13 11:05 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Lewis-A2A]  
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PanzerMeyer Online centaurian
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Originally Posted By: Lewis-A2A
You might want to title the thread combat flight sim?

Also worth noting that as it stands at the moment in the 'now' we have more choice in flight sims and hardware across the board from high fidelity to relaxed realism to arcade than we have ever had before EVER.
I think the main complaint from many here is not the lack of flight sim titles but the lack of Flight sim titles that have the same level of immersion as the flight sims from the 90's. I really do think it's a cultural thing. What Eastern European developers think should be designed and how it should be designed in a flight sim doesn't quite match with what Western gamers want and expect.

Last edited by PanzerMeyer; 08/14/13 11:06 AM.

“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”
#3822194 - 08/14/13 11:35 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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Guys, DI - Tornado's Campaign. Seriously. I WISH DCS had that. In complete truth.
Beginning with simulator time to get your hands on the real one...
With the right FX you could even make graphic to look like a '90 Military Flight sim.

*Sigh*

A man can still hope, right?


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#3822195 - 08/14/13 11:43 AM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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the only flight sim that is really thriving today is FSX - the others survive.

I used to be mainly a LockOn fan, but since 2008 I am in FSX and as a skin maker I am 90% FSX because there is where the demand is, the blame for the sad state of flight sims is due to the developers lack of focus and overblown ambitions, Eagle Dynamics is at least on the right track with FC3.

#3822251 - 08/14/13 02:25 PM Re: A sobering insight into the world of flight sim development [Re: Pizzicato]  
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Originally Posted By: Pizzicato
I just saw this link in a discussion over at the Il-2 Battle of Stalingrad forums and thought it was really poignant:

http://bbs.thirdwire.com/phpBB3w/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=9420&p=59528#p59528

It really puts into perspective all of the uninformed vitriol I've been reading on these forums recently:

"Flight sim developers are just trying to gouge us with their nickel and diming business models."

"I want everything, but I'm not paying $50. That's outrageous."

"I'm not buying if it hasn't got a cutting edge graphics engine, dynamic campaign, dedicated servers, historically accurate flight model and clickable cockpit."

It seems abundantly clear that our hobby - a hobby that's kept me entertained for over 30 of my 41 years is close to being done and dusted. Eagle Dynamics and 777 seem like pretty much our last hope, but there are still far too many of us that are taking the "I demand features A, B, C all the way through to Z, but I'm not buying until it goes on sale for less than $20" attitude.

I don't expect this post to have much of an impact, but I do hope it inspires some people to take a more considered view of where our hobby is really at and what the stakes are. If we genuinely care about this pastime, we need to be supporting it. I, for one, don't want to see this genre vanish forever.

Just my 2 cents.



T.K. has always had to put up with a lot over the years.

People also dont realize.. TW is a SMALL team. TW should just release the source code to the modding community.

Last edited by SkateZilla; 08/14/13 02:27 PM.

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