Yesterday, SSI, publisher of FLANKER , announced Monday that the much anticipated add on would be issued to the Flight Sim Communtiy free of charge.
Excellent news, but sad also. It is a commentary on the state of the genre and what we as desktop pilots can expect. I would like to air my thoughts on the matter for what it's worth.
I've observed flight sims go from the days of the old 8 bit machines and such programs like Sid Mier's Hellcat Ace, Spitfire Ace, MiG Ace, F-15 Strike Eagle opened the world to us. These programs were cutting edge technology for the early 80's. Those wire frame MiGs were a bear to shoot down, but I gave that old Atari 800XL a work out. I think I killed 4 joy sticks on that.
As time wore on and the computers evolved into the 386, 486 P1, the sims got better and more challenging. The aircraft resembled the real things and behaved more like them. F3 and its addons, Flight Simulator , all pushed the ebvelope further, and different ages of air sims came into being. Some were junk and some are remembered as hits.
Some of these like Red Barron were upgraded to run with the more powerful computers that we have today with some degree of success. Some didn't quite measure up to their forebearer and nearly killed them. Sierra/Dynamix's absymal Red Barron II comes to mind They repaired it but soon it became apparent that things weren't right.
Looking back at the July 1997 issue of Computer Gameing World, there were a wealth of sims coming down the pike.
Let's take a look at the list and see what's still around.
Jane's F-15 EA Stiil in stores / can be found in the Classic and Bundled collections
Falcon 4.0 MPS Still in stores/ being sold in box w/1.08 patch
Sabre Ace Virgin Dead - premise good, but turned out to be a arcade
Flying Nightmares2 Eidos Never saw light of day. Eidos decided to chronicle Lara Croft..(not too bad...wait for the movie)
Fighter Duel 2 Infogames Can you say...Vaporware?
Jetfighter III Mission Studios Not too bad, can still be found in some form or another.
F-22 Lightening II Novalogic Couldn't handle DiD's F-22ADF, though they tried with a improved version with nukes!
Fighter Squadron Activision Relaeased with JWWII Fighters, CFS1. Came in 3rd and still can be found in the bins.
iF-22 Raptor Interactive Magic Just like Novalogic, they tried again but ADF/TAW still killed it.
Jane's Longbow EA The Yardstick of Helo sims. hard to find.
It's now 2001 and the glory days are behind us. Gone are marques like Dynamax, DiD, Activision, Virgin, Interactive Magic, Looking Glass Jane's, and Microprose
Jane's F/A-18 Hornet, Gunship! and B-17 II being the last three programs from two of the biggest names in the community.
And what is the cause of this?
It's a combination of alot of things. Cost of development, consolidation and mergers of companies, complexity of the sims, the community itself.
For example,we look at the boxes with the screenshots of a Falcon, loaded for bear coming directly at us and start drooling. We put down our $60.( that was what EB was charging for it in Dec98) run home, open the binder, put the sections together, load up the disk and then we try to fly it and the bugs start coming out. We start to complain and the developers start putting out the patches. We still complain and soon the sim starts to get a bad rep and sales start to drop. Within a sort while you see the sim which you paid $60. being sold for $15-20. and soon we have put the cd in with the old programs and go on to the next thing and repeat the process.
A lot of us expect alot from the developers, that the screen infront of us should be the real thing and when it's not some of us start up the hue and cry. From what I've seen over the years, we have to assume some of the blame.
The Publisher has to assume some of the blame. F4 for example, costed MPS about several mil and 4 years to develop and even though it sold well, it didn't recoup some of the development money, where Hasbro made $ off transporting it's board games to the computer. Even so, Hasbro still was bleeding red ink,and recently sold all it's Interactive assets to Infrogammes. Whether or not, Microprose will rise from the ashes remain to be seen. Still it's a matter of economics. If a product isn't selling enough to warrant continued development, then one must toe the bottom line: profit.
Developers have to share too. Some of these sims have a steep learning curve. It takes time to learn F4 for example. I can remember the shock of opening that binder up and seeing 4 sections + 4 apendices and a smaller instruction book . I thought I had picked up a genuine NATOPS book! It's been 3 years and I'm still learning it, and this doesn't take in the RP4.1 manual. Sometimes you can make things too realistic. But I wouldn't want to fly Interactive Magic's version of the F-22 all the time.
Is the genre dying?
No.
Will it get better?
Yes.
But it will not be at the same level as it was. Sims like the upcoming I L-2 , CFS2, will continue the intrest . The continued refinement of F4 by the eRazor Team, RPGroup, F4Alliance and others will continue the interest. The release of Flanker 2.5 patch later this month will also keep the genre alive. But it will take all of us to keep it there.It will take us to cut the criticism down a notch.It will take the developer to come up with good planes to model-to give the community interesting planes and periods to fly them in and to give us the features like Mult player, internet play, an easier interface,clearer manuals that we as players and consumers want and expect.
It will take the Publisher to listen to the community. If they do this , then the sims will be successful.
It's going to be a cooperative effort all around. All you have to do is look at how far F4 has come. In Computer Gaming World's 200th issue , pg 63 sums it up pretty well: "Falcon 4.0: It wasn't perfect when released, but the community that has arisen around it has turned it into the MOST HARDCORE,REALISTIC simulation ever. For those of us who can't spend 6 years in the Air Force, Microprosegave us the next best thing." High praise for a sim that many thought was dead when Hasbro pulled the plug on 7 Dec 1999. If any sim has earned the title of the simulation that refused to die, It's this one.
I enjoy flying. The comaradierie among flight simmers is almost like being in the military.We all share a love of flying and shooitng down a enemy plane.By climbing into the cockpit of a computer F-16 and going "downtown' with a full load of GBUs dodging SAMs and MiGs, we somehow share withthe guy that's actually doing this. We get a picture of the complexity of flight, the danger and exhilaration of combat and the rush of as well as the feeling of loss as we get as we have to punch out of our wounded bird. This is the closest some of us will ever get to a Falcon.
That is why I will continue to enjoy this genre and why I think it won't go away.
But I think that a very basic premise is being overlooked, which is not covered in your artical.
We, the flight sim community...particularly the combat flight sim community....are consumers. As such we have a basic right to expect a product that is sold in the market place to work. And work well. Consumer laws all over the world protect that right.
Critical? Damn right! The publishers are selling goods, without any warning that it may not function as planned. So we buy that product in good faith. If it doesn't work then they had better expect some quite vocal complaints. And those complaints will continue until the game is fixed. Hence the patches. Please note that I am not talking enhancements.... just that the product perform as promised!
Now if the companies cannot turn a dollar making these products then ...dont make them. If the companies feel that they are being unjustly criticised then they need to sit down and rethink their
marketing approach and customer service philosophy. Pull out of the market. Get into something else. Hasbro was correct to consolidate as they did. I have no problem with that. Yes, it is sad and depressing to see it happen. But I would rather see that than continue to buy crappy products.
So choice becomes limited? That is market forces in effect.
I dont think we should apologise for demanding a good and solid product. I do think that we have every right to expect the best. More importantly, I believe that we should not drop our standards.
Microsoft failed with CFS 2. Hasbro failed with B17 II. Rowan has (so far) failed with BoB.
Hopefully Blue Byte wont fail with IL 2. They have a great community feedback system in place at present, in fact have had it almost all the way through the development process. Something that each of the above mentioned companies failed to do. They have exhibited a true marketing approach ie find out what is wanted and make it.
If IL2 fails commercially then.....it could be the final nail in the combat sim coffin. Time will tell.
Hunter, I get great big warning flags in my mind when someone suggests lowering of criticism levels. It equates to lowering one's standards.
Rather, I think it better to present criticism up to the level of quality that one is expecting from the product.
Does one's critique sound like whining, or does it sound like a realistic and constructive suggestion? Merely griping and bitching that a product is buggy or not quite right is useless. If one is going to bemoan a particular issue, it should be specific. That is how developers truly know what to fix. And that is how we, as consumers and virtual pilots, can join together to support the industry that feeds our need for speed and lust for aerial destruction.
In this way, the sim enthusiast and the sim developer form a * team,* and to borrow an acronym from my employer - Together Everyone Accomplishes More. Good, well thought out criticism is feedback, and the more of that one gets, the better.
