I started flying AW 93/94, and the shift occurred, IMO, with Gamestorm and the BIG PORK. Gameplay remained somewhat constant with the move to AOL, and I took part in the initial Gamestorm "Big Week" crash fest mission, with an additional 1-2 sorties in the beta arena, then took a year off. My first experience on return was following a high P-51 x2 sectors into the "rear" waiting for him to engage. He eventually died to ack on a lone bombing run at an undefended field with no practical value of any sort while I watched trying to catch him in his dive. A year previous and he would have engaged -- not might have engaged -- would have engaged.
I quickly found that this was the way the game was played now, with groups of milkrunners off in separate corners on the huge map avoiding anything but the highest favorable odds and porking the fuel away from any resistance at least two sectors deep. A2G and the "War" was more important than A2A in a game where A2G had consistently been nothing more than a means to more A2A previously (at least in FR, can't comment on RR).
Obviously, the big change was numbers. IMO, the earlier game was populated by people who had a passion for WW2 aerial combat, and were willing to pay the dues to emulate their heroes of that conflict. For example, by 7th grade I could rattle off the top speed of most of the famous fighters of WW2. My first big save-up purchase as a kid was Edward Jablonski's "Airwar" which had taunted me from the publications section of Wings and Airpower magazines for several years. And regardless of the overwhelming contribution of strategic and tactical bombing, and the support role of A2A fighters, it was the A2A combat that captured the imagination. Bong, Hartmann, McGuire, Foss, O’Hare, MCCampbell, Boyington, Tuck, Bader, Galland, Rudel -- all names I knew well before I entered High School (and I’m sure I was not alone).
The dues were spending a year learning to get a consistent positive k/d in an environment populated with sharks who knew e-management and had tuned situational awareness far beyond the AI in some boxed game. Tough, ego bruising stuff, but worth the effort if you wanted to be a virtual Robert Johnson. I think the game is populated today with gamers who have, at best, a limited appreciation for history beyond the occasional show on discovery wings. An LA-7 is nothing more than a plasma cannon, the Tempest a BFG9000, the MC202 a pistol. Success is measured by winning the war, with the ego is protected by achieving the bigger goal (a base capture and a few vulch kills with a bunch of buddies) rather than winning a hard dogfight.
AH has now arrived at the big pork. It is still easier to find a fight than the big pork days of AW -- still a higher percentage of fun factor -- but it can be discouraging. I don’t have any real disrespect for the new “gamers” but I suppose I do wonder about their choice of game. AH is the Ferrari of virtual WW2 A2A combat simulators, but the strategic component is nothing more than steamroller tic/tac/toe - a Yugo by comparison. There are numerous war games and “god” games out there that provide much better strategic gameplay. Hell, online chess is readily available and is much more sophisticated. It probably gets back to the ego thing there too. Those tend to be 1v1 games (without the gang of buddies to help) and when you lose, you got beat.
Charon
