What will it take to get this game selling like hot cakes?

[Uriah]

I think what the group is doing for this game is great but I would love to see a lot more people interested in it. I'm thinking massive multiplayer would be a hit but understand that is a huge task to make work. Anyway, I bought a new copy of the game at 'half price books' for just $7 - just so I have a second copy or a copy to give to someone.

Uriah.

[Buddye]

Thank you Uriah, it is a super thing to do and I personnally recommened it for our other loyal players. I have given away copies of BOBII to family and friends as well. Just make sure they have a gamers PC that can really run BOBII well and give them help and advice when needed. Like you, I always purchase a copy of BOBII when ever I find a copy at a bargin price at stores or online.

IMHO, BOBII s the best "off line" Dog Fighting Flight Simulation game so I tend to agree with you. If we had multi player so players could team up and fight the AI and each other the fun factor would go sky high. I think a new BOBII game would sell if we only had Multi player and some new landscape enhancements. Players do enjoy dog fighting but as you guys know players want everything in a flight sim.

With only two people doing part time coding and providing new features and fixes for BOBII at the present time, it is just just not enough coding manpower or experience to attack all the possible fixes, request, and enhancements that BOBII requires (like Multi Player).

We do have many super and skilled people doing art, landscape, texture fixes, enhancements, documentation,testing, planning, and analyzing a very large, complex real time game for the BDG. They are all volunteers and work for the love of the game. We also have a outstanding and very mature community here for working on BOBII.

Shockwave (now A2A) developed BOBII back in 2005 but it lost money (did not recover the expenses). A2A is still trying to pay off the debt racked up by BOBII's development with it very sucessful FSX addon's so from a pure dollars point of view BOBII was a very bad idea.

[Bostjan42]

Sad to hear that A2A lost money on BoB2, but I guess these are the times now when fast dumbed-down action sells and long lasting fun doesn't. Glad that you are here to support the sim regardless. I salute you.

Regadring multiplayer: not my cup of tea but I do think that if anyone does seriously think of doing a MMO sim, they should consider that they will fall in the same pit with other "realistic" MMOs without radically changing the gameplay model (I mean that the excelent BoB2 AI acts like real people and you don't get that in a MMO, at least from a historical perspective. The inability to actualy die from a virtual death really spoils the atmosphere.. I suggest severe penalties as a substitute (really dying would be too harsh... )... otherwise you get what you have in online FPSs: I mean when did the army or special forces teach hopping like a madman as part of defense strategies training)

[PV]

I really don't understand why there aren't more volunteers to work on this sim. When you look at how difficult it is to get under the hood of the Il-2 series games, yet the A^3 crew seem to have literally dozens of modders contributing; while with this sim, it is fully open, any volunteer coder can get completely into the guts with full CVS support, and we BDG folk bend over backward to make it easy for people to contribute, and fold their work into official patches, yet our group at any time typically consists of about six people actually making content (plus another six or eight infinitely valuable unsung beta-testing heroes who go out relentlessly repeating mission tests in support of Buddye's work).

Man if we had a quarter of the contributors they get, we could really do some miracles with this product.

[PappyCain]

PV,

I can suggest what I have been told by a few great modders of other flight sims. If the sim where not controlled by a for-profit-organization they would volunteer.

Independent modders like to make their mods (and hard work) available to a free wheeling and open community to select a whole variety of mods as opposed to a centralized committee releasing a official new version or patch. Not do-able in BOBII.

S'
PC

[Uriah]

"The inability to actualy die from a virtual death really spoils the atmosphere.. I suggest severe penalties as a substitute"

Well maybe setting up some kind of severe shock when you get 'killed' would add a little 'realism'.


Uriah.

[stalkervision]

"The inability to actualy die from a virtual death really spoils the atmosphere.. I suggest severe penalties as a substitute"

Well maybe setting up some kind of severe shock when you get 'killed' would add a little 'realism'.


Uriah.

I suggest a severe scolding by the squadron chief. My Panzer Elite game gives me a severe dressing down when I lose..

[PV]

PV,

I can suggest what I have been told by a few great modders of other flight sims. If the sim where not controlled by a for-profit-organization they would volunteer.

Independent modders like to make their mods (and hard work) available to a free wheeling and open community to select a whole variety of mods as opposed to a centralized committee releasing a official new version or patch. Not do-able in BOBII.

S'
PC

Just shows a misunderstanding of how the BDG works. You join, you contribute, you get at least as much say in how things go as anyone else, and generally, if it's your area of interest (and your content production), you get to decide what is included in official release. For mods that don't have to be unique, which is most of them, we are happy to provide all the alternatives. So far, there hasn't been anything much in the way of conflicts, as the scope of the moddable territory is so large, and there have been so few of us occupying it that we pretty much never overlap. Also, we are all clear that the object is as accurate a representation of reality as possible, so we are united in our vision to that degree.

I can't see where the "controlled by a for-profit-organization" comes into it, in that, for a start, A2A is only a benevolent supporter of our work, never a director. And that can hardly be said for the Il-2 series, which is also most assuredly "controlled by a for-profit-organization", and that is the example I was comparing to.

[Buddye]

I have never seen anyone's work (if it is quality and historic) turned away from BOBII.

The BDG has its leaders but everyone in the Beta forum has a equal vote as far as I have "ever" seen.

The leaders and experienced guys opinions weigh the most but that is just normal for any team in my experience.

A2A (Scott) does not get involved with BDG plans or decisions. Scott has "never" interfeared with the BDG in any manner since he took a back seat after the 2.04 update.

Scott shares work with the BDG and we share our work with Scott. Scott host the Beta forum for the BDG for free. It is a super deal for both parties, IMHO.

[PappyCain]

I certainly understand that but it is a perception by independent modders. The BDG keeps refering to 'Customers' (for profit) and not club members (not for profit). It might be overcome by a push to express below statement by Buddye when recruiting. If it were me I would send complimentary disks out to known modders (3D, utilities etc.) to pull them in. Leading the horse to water might help. Goodwill hunting. You may recall I suggested that tactic way back and you may recall the chilly response from the Owner in the BDG, the door shut and locked. Hmmm.

"The BDG is a mature/friendly “G” rated freeware group (we do not get paid by anyone) and we really answer to no one. We work on the BOBII projects that interest us and help out where we can. It is a “no pressure” approach and each BDG’er does what ever they have time for. We all work part time and we all have real lives that take priority."

S'
PC

[ICDP]

IMHO it needs totally new terrain engine, the current engine was and is just ugly no matter what the DBG team do to it. It was ugly when it was first released back in 1998 and it is ugly 10 years later.

No sense of 3D depth, no proper forests, no proper towns and awfull terrain textures. Not a good terrain engine in any way shape or form, it is the only reason I don't have BoB WoV on my PC anymore. Every new patch makes lofty claims of an improved terrain but it is just the same ugly bird with different makeup. No matter how much you polish a turd it is still a turd. The AI and campaign are second to none, the 3D models are up there with the best and the imerssivness is again second to none. Just the terrian is so off putting I cannot stand to fly the sim. When people post screenshots of the terrain I cringe

I know there is no 3D terrain coder so we are stuck with the current terrain but the question was "What will it take to get this game selling like hot cakes?". The truth is the terrain looks absolutely abysmal and is a massive turn off to most potential buyers. You want this sim noticed get new terrain.

[ICDP]

I am not dissing the BDG guys who do a magnificent job. I am just stating my opinion that the terrain engine needs a 100% overhaul.

[stalkervision]

Up a bit high the terrain is really really excellent. I just love it. Down low,well....

[Osram]

I disagree. It does not really matter how good your terrain engine is. The only thing that matters is thsat the (potential) customers think the result looks good (at reasonable FPS). Look here:

http://a2asimulations.com/forum/viewtop ... 23&t=11391

People write positive about that! I didn't count each tree on there 8if anyone wants to, he is welcome), but guess there are about 3000 - 5000 visible objects in there. This, in DX9, even WITHOUT using instancing would lead to ok, but not great FPS on a modern gfx card. The Il2 people say the mod achieves exactly this. So, IMO, that terrain engine uses neither instancing nor object merging, just like BoBII does right now. If we had a tree placer/terrain (texture) modder that would take a small piece of land and put in even only a few 100 to 1000 hours, we would (apart from the shadows) have exactly the same terrain screenie as in that screenie, without change to the terrain engine. Obviously changes to the terrain engine are planned, as the level of detail of that screenie is of course not enough for next gen.

[stalkervision]

The close up terrain has never bothered me that much. There is just so much more to this game that I love.