Maybe real life pilots just don't understand that the 'steps and procedures' which they make a part of their career life, and feel nothing special about it, is in fact a source of lot of immersion for those who don't get a chance to sit in real planes.
I can understand some of you here with a lot of piloting experiences feeling indifferent, and even tedious towards to such things - hey, you do it all the time. It's nothing but a part of safety measures you have to always take, in the act of flying a plane which you always do. You'd rather lean towards the part of flying fun which you cannot do in your real lives - namely, exotic and sensational air combat. I understand that.
But please bear in mind that to the rest of us who are all simularly engaged and fascinated by WW2 vintage aircraft, can only just imagine what it would be like
How would it feel to be seated in your own craft.. knocking switches, pulling levers.. locking tail wheels, starting the plane in careful procedures.. engaging fuel switches, magnetos.. starting the engines and here we go~ woohoo!
I have a feeling a lot of real pilots would have felt that sort of feeling in your first solo flight. Recollect on that experience when you didn't know how to fly so well, and you'd understand.
Immersion starts with imagination. Sometimes that imagination does run wild, like the many famous debates on 'over-realism' issues where people start to think 'hard=real'.. but sometimes, taking heed to what people like to imagine does increase the experience forthe majority - while unfortunately, the people who have experience in real aircraft would think of it as more tedious than interesting.
I don't think the difference in what people want cannot be amended. There's always a middle path that can be chosen, and always room for improvements. It's just that we all have to understand that staying where we are may not be the best for fun, nor moving to somewhere else would always necessary mean advancement of fun.
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In that sense, I think some parts of 'realistic' categories can be adopted and integrated very naturally to AH. The increased difficulty in take-off sequences as shown in AH2 beta seems to be one example that shows amendments aren't impossible.
When it comes to formal landings on runways, or ditching on rough ground, it became even harder than Forgotten Battles.. I don't think I've ever survived a ditch with damaged/no gears in AH2B.. maybe it's a beta-issue and would be looked into in the real game, but as it is, landing things in AH2B would be just enough to satisfy both parties without major gripes.
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The radar and icon issues, even if I consider myself one of those 'realism junkies', I support what current AH has to offer - especially since AH2Beta also brought some positive changes to the icon system.
Also, I've experienced first-hand what 'over-realism' in fiddling around with icons can do in Forgotten Battles multiplayer rooms. No-icon games, or 'tampered' icon games with almost sadistic settings, makes the game literally 'realistic' - 5~6 sorties with no enemy contact. And then boom! in the 7th sortie, you're dead.
Realistic? Yup.
Fun? Well, it's fun in it's own way, but nothing that you may expect to become the norm in a MA style game.
We have to realize the fact that in dealing with icons and radar settings, if you want realism to work out, then you have to expect the people to work together in realistically organized manner - they report everything to the HQ, the HQ confirms each organized flight's positions and relays the info to you, and each enemy contact must be immediately transmit so that people can be directed to fight. (<- hey, isn't this what our radar does?)
In a free-style multiplayer game with people looking for some action(which, could be viewed as a sort of a H2H game with a really large map), the setting of no-icons and no-dar, just absolutely killed the gameplay in FB.
Short icon distances of 3.0 in Combat Theater works well, and is a reasonable compromise. Will it ever make it in the MA? I don't think so, though.
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Engine management is also a part of the game that can be looked into - people requesting for it aren't necessarily saying that they want to flick every switch in the cockpit. Just a few basic things would be enough.
In my opinion, FB has done that - people refer to the system as 'complex engine management', but I dare say it's neither complex nor realistic.
All it has done, is categorize the engine system into two different types requiring a little bit of different handling. One system works in a typical CSU style that is identical to AH, and the other is just a RPM/throttle interlinked system. Besides that, all you have to do is just put the right supercharger according to altitudes. Is that something that utterly complicates the game for people that it can be called 'over-realism'? I don't think so. It's just a dumbed-down version of reality that just needs one or two more key inputs. I for one, think the price of one or two extra key inputs for more immersion, is a fair tradeoff.
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I'm sure something can also be worked out with overheat issues, too... although I hardly think it would mean anything anyway, as long as the concept of engine life expectancy isn't present in the game.
Maybe just tinker with the system a bit? Get rid of the automatic WEP ON/OFF feature, and implant some gameplay devices to make it work better. Is it realistic? I don't think so. But the funny thing is, a small tinkering in unrealistic departments can sometimes bring the same level of satisfaction as seeing a complex, real system.
You can blow the engine if you want to, but once the needle passes the 'red zone', it will heat up at an accelerated rate, almost equal to when you have radiator damage. If the needle passes into the 'red zone', it will take what, 1.5 times more time to cool up than normal?
Ofcourse, running at 100% power without WEP, will keep the needle under the yellow zone at all times.
There, that's it. A system that gets rid of the 'auto', and yet, prevents people from abusing the ability to go to the red zone on their will. They may use WEP for an elongated duration(all the way from start of 'yellow zone' to nearly the end of the 'red zone') once, but once they do something like that, they'll probably never be able to reuse WEP effectively for the rest of the engagement.
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There could be room for improvements that are satisfactory to both sides. Let's just keep ourselves open minded. I mean, if HTC ever chooses to suddenly implement more realistic stuff, where will all you guys go? To WB?
