Answering to the OP's question:

NO, I am NOT going to buy it! (neither the Hornet and neither the map)


P.S. - This is a Hornet fan "speaking"

1C/777 - you must remember the total debacle of the initial BoS campaign release - see the IL2 Extended Discussion forum
Sim155 - CAP2 has been in development for so many years. Is still not complete with no timeline to make it complete
Laminar Rearch - slightly different story. Still owned & driven by the guy who developed the original program - sims written this way can be amongst the best. Oleg Maddox & TK are other examples. Given time, CAP2 may become great on the same basis - however such reliance on a single person does not make a viable/expandable software business.

Re your comment on scope - isn’t this exactly what ED are doing with the F-18 by taking out many radar mode?. What went wrong was initial over-ambition in scope - the reality of complexity eventually tripped them up. All software houses have to be a viable business & make a profit - otherwise this hobby won’t exist. They can only spend as much on any module as they have/will receive. Reality is that any obligation they have is limited by this.

Other than 3rd party projects, I can’t see any real difference between ED funding model and 1C/777. Both pre-sold, both had major problems on release - just EDs problems are fresher. 3rd party projects are an interesting difference. History seems to show these can only work when the base code is stable - FSX for example. This is not where ED have been - their ambitions to expand the base have tripped-up 3rd party projects & Hopefully ED have learnt this lesson now.

Exactly. You're trying to put a value on another person's time. You simply can't do that.



I've already done so in the past, you probably didn't accept it because it was contrary to your points.



And I didn't accuse anyone of doing so. You have to look at things industry wide to determine what is good, bad, normal or abnormal. You claim ED is doing a terrible job overall. But how is that possible if we don't compare it to other companies with similar products?

I'm doing the same in regard to Early Access. You can't complain about Early Access without looking at the industry as a whole. Complaining to one small developer who didn't allow the practice to become acceptable in the first place won't accomplish much if anything. You're going to have to make the model so toxic that all the small developers follow along. Can ED really be bad, slow or substandard if many other games follow the same business model?



Not really, there are a number of other games that come to mind easily.



Star Citizen is an entirely different topic and situation. The game is a pure marketing campaign used to drive sales, while claiming they don't have to pay traditional publishers for marketing. Yeah they don't... but how much do those fancy renders, promotional videos, sale customer service, brochures and whatnot cost? That is all marketing. I do believe they set out to make a good game, but now they're simply a marketing machine selling ideas and concepts to keep their business afloat. Their selling of concepts & dreams is keeping them afloat before they even deliver a playable game (the tech demos don't count as a game). Absolutely crazy! I'd never drop a cent on that game until it comes out.



Onto the map itself, my very brief observations:

- Performance is horrific over the cities. Can't be more than 30 frame rates, maybe less. 16GB RAM, SSD, GTX 1070 + OC, Ryzen 1600 at 3.8GHZ. Not playable in its current state.

- Building/structure texture pop in is bad. It is very low resolution until you get very close.


We'll see how it goes over the next week or so, but it needs some major work as of now.

*** I recall reading that you may need to delete a configuration file for the new lighting engine. Maybe my old configuration file from a beta build years ago is causing these problems. I'll check back.

I’d agree that the extra time spent on 2.5 would likely have taken funding from other module pre-sales. With so much invested in 2.5 they may not have had any other choice. But I don’t think they would intentionally mis-sell modules that they have no intention of completing to fill the funding gap.

Comes back to my view that developers are as passionate about the genre as we are, but get tripped up by complexity & over ambition.

I think strictly speaking, the coders for ED are talented and passionate and we can see that in the product itself, in the potential that we see and that we've seen in DCS even years ago. It's the higher ups, whatever they're called in the game development world, that get tripped up by feature creep, incompetence, and a myriad other factors.

Hmmm.... I dunno.
Spend 1 hour now learning a module that's 40% complete and is almost guaranteed to change drastically during development
Spend 1 hour later learning a module that's 80% complete....

I think it's clear to see how one has more value than another.



You do know that saying "I've already done so" isn't exactly the same as giving proof, right? Please be so kind as to link me to these instances you claim to have done as you say you did.



Then why bring it up? Nobody was talking about creating or popularizing pre-orders until you brought it up. The issue here isn't about the fact that ED offers items on pre-order, the issue here is ED and their track record of their products and how they're abusing the pre-order system.



Yes. Compare ED to Frontier, Laminar Research, 1C/777, HBS, etc. etc. Heck, you don't even have to do that! ED fails by ED's own metrics! Having to "promise" a release date because your customers no longer take you seriously? Stating a 1-2 week gap between open beta and full release and missing that deadline by miles? Admitting to a memory leak then no, it's a memory allocation? Heck, compare your Persian Gulf performance vs. your Black Sea performance numbers? Is the building pop-up in Hormuz as bad as in Nevada or Normandy or Caucasus?



The business model of pre-orders is fine and I've stated that I even supported that model at least twice in recent game releases, so the industry as a whole and pre-orders as a whole is fine. It's when ED does it that it becomes an issue for reasons cited ad nauseam.



None of which you've named but sure, let's add those games to the pile. The fact that they exist does not excuse ED's actions.

I guess you've been proven wrong Flogger, the numbers Ice presents is proof he can put a value on other people's time /Sarcasm off /

Oi oi oi Ice

I'd love to know how spending 1 hour on a 40% complete product is a better value on your time than spending 1 hour on the same product on a more completed state? No sarcasm there, genuine question.

We can do FAM today. The general topography isn't going to change; there are some bugs to be dealt with, but it is EA. As a terrain available to fly in, so far it's great. The Persian Gulf map that is.
In other words, there is a sufficient level of completes to 'do stuff'.

I expect that the worst bugs (potential crashes, certain AI not spawning correctly on certain airfields etc) will be dealt with reasonably quickly.

To whoever was having performance issues, I have a pretty decent setup (6700k, 1070, 16gb ram) and I am getting 100+ away from the cities, and 60-65 low over downtown. I get very similar frames to what I see in NTTR and Vegas. I'd say something is probably wrong if you are seeing drastically worse performance in PG vs Nevada. This patch has introduced more than a few bugs, the mirror on my M2KC was showing the moving map image, water drops on the hud glass, apparently the MiG21 wont load up on it, etc.

As far as resource management, it was using about 6gb of VRAM and about 10gb of RAM when flying a mission online. Settings may have an affect on this.

With all that said. PG looks like it will be a lot of fun with a carrier group and some hornets.

Who's interested in an argument simulator so you can go back and forth over nothing for hours on end? Maybe get your money's worth out of that.

Why? You'll probably just ignore it. You'll side step it like usual. Recall the time you made up the claim that I messed up my Falcon 4 install. And then asked me to find proof that I messed up the install, claim you made.



That is your job. Keep it consistent. If you made up a claim and then make me look it up, then you should do the same when the positions are reversed. I'm making a claim so why don't you hold yourself to the same standard? Look it up yourself.

Besides, a quick search about Early Access games should get you plenty of information. I even gave you an example of a simulation which has a forum on this very site. Should be enough of a hint for one title.



Because Paradaz did. Did you read what I had quoted?



Unfinished crap = Early Access. You won't stop it until you start making some significant change. Crying about a niche developer on a forum won't do anything. You're going to have to take down the industry leaders if you want the model of "unfinished crap with no intent to ever iron out bugs" to die.



If you compare ED to only ED they are the best developer in existence, and also the worst.

Hence why everything they do must be compared to others. More on this below in bold.



ED doesn't do pre-orders, they do Early Access. Get the game early, finish it over the next 3-12 months. With a pre-order you're supposed to get the final product day one. I'm not sure why you're bringing up pre-orders though?



I did.



Probably why you don't recall.




As for the map, rename your old config folder. Copy your input folders for HOTAS bindings. I had forgotten I had a beta install from years ago. You need to remove the graphics setting files and some other things and allow the game to build new files from scratch for the new graphics engine. Once that is done performance is similar to NTTR. I'm getting around 60 or so frame rates at 1440P with 4x MSAA over Dubai.

"Another nonconstructive post by the nonconstructive member." oi oi oi bisher

Are you still carrying a grudge from a Falcon 4 install issue with Ice from 1998 all these years? let it go son...just let it go. Move on.....more to life than attempting to dispute something from the bygone era.

Focus on something from today's times.....It's like Skatezilla and his effort to bring up past productions by asking me to tell him where in the world is Carmen Sandiego. A complete fail attempting to mix the past with the present and pass it off as a valid argument......

This being stated in this forum at SimHQ is one of the funnier things I've read in a long time. Ah the entertainment

I guess you have nothing after all. I've asked you twice now and instead of simply providing quotes and links, you instead insist on pointing fingers and [such irony!!] accusing me of side-stepping. I don't think asking you a third time would do any good so I'll simply stop asking and let your actions speak for itself.



Clearly you still don't understand burden of proof. Look it up yourself.
If ever I made a claim then YOU looked it up, that's on you buddy. I'm not really keen on making the same mistake you did.

Out of curiosity, where is this instance where I made a claim and made you look it up? Source/link?



O RLY? Where? Definitely nothing in what you had quoted.



Nope. 1.5.XX was "release" but it was unfinished crap. 2.5 is now "release" but it's still unfinished crap. A bunch of other modules have been "release" status for years now but still unfinished crap. By contrast, the early previews of games like BattleTech and Steel Division were clearly "early access" but showcased the game in such a way that early backers cannot wait for the end product so those early access copies were clearly unfinished but were nowhere near crap.



Are you trying to pull a David_OC here? The best and also the worst? LOL! ED cannot even compare to it's own targets; how can they be anywhere near "best"? Unless it's the "best in being the worst!"



Please do not put ED in fights it has no hope of winning. It does nothing for ED and it does nothing for your position.



Apologies for the confusion and read that as Pre-Orders = Early Access. I use them interchangeably because normally, doing a pre-order allows me closed/early beta access; at least it did for Guild Wars 2, MWO, BattleTech, and Steel Division; it was this early access/beta access period that allowed me to decide that GW2 and MWO were not shaping up to games I would want to play and backed out and luckily was given a refund of my money.



Where?


Flogger, we've danced this dance many times before and really, it's getting tiring. I will bow out of this thing before we make more work for Force10. If you do make a coherent, adult reply, I'd be happy to continue the conversation but I have no more interest in playing a game you clearly don't know the rules to. Have a nice day.

To be fair, it wasn't back in 1998, this was recently and he is referring to Falcon 4 BMS, not the original Falcon 4.0. IIRC, he was trying to say that BMS was broken because his copy of BMS was broken, so my reply was that BMS was not broken but he probably borked his install thus explaining his issues.... or something to that effect. I've no interest in digging up the thread here in the DCS sub-forum but do have a read of this thread:

Clicky!!

*yawn*

My quick $.02 on the Persian Gulf map.

ED did pretty well with this one. I was truly surprised. I flew it for several hours on Wednesday night with few from our group. Harriers, Mirages and F-5s all together. Relatively smooth on my VR machine. A few stutters down low, but manageable. Looking forward to more additions.

And Al Dhafra looks pretty close to the real deal. Its missing a few things I remember being there, but one of our guys is doing it right.

wainting for a bundle with the map + F-18

The Hornet is a ED in house project set to become their seminal acievement and flagship product....of course it will be finished.