World of Aircraft...vs...Aces High...We need to WIN

[ink]

Yes, it's all made with the Blender 3D a year ago. The video is recorded from build-in Blender Game Engine at run-time.

Not bad for the open / free source application suite, is in it?


All excellent visuals(3d model designs, textures, UV mapping & visual effects coding)  are made by the Lithuanian Blender Artists, Mr. MartinSH.

I made a simplified FDM-code with the python at time.

Ive used Blender quite a bit...awesome program...what you are working on is just friggen great man

[MrRiplEy[H]]

I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment, for my style of play.  As far as I'm concerned, having air to fly in and bases to move between is all I require.  The rest is irrelevent.

However, I would point out there is a sizable group of people who for some reason, choose to sit in tin cans on the ground and wait to be shot or bombed.  They're not moving around much at all, and certainly not at 200mph.  When you spend a lot of your time hiding in a group of trees or behind hills, you spend a lot of time looking at those trees and hills.  I can see how one might notice the details more at that point.  With the new focus on more GV oriented stuff, more people spend more time looking at the scenery.

*shrug*  I get the reasons Skuzzy outlined for why they keep the game small, it's just an unusual thing to do in the gaming industry these days.

Wiley.

One would think that the GV portion of the game could use the same online engine but have totally different graphics. What's essential for gvs is only performance hit from air and vice versa. Of course it's again a question of resources and business viability.

[TexMurphy]

Skuzzy

I think you describe the stengths of HTCs offer very well. Not many companies have maintained support for one product for such a long period of time with continous updates to that products years and years after release. But Im not sure if it is a strength in fact I think it might be one of the biggest problems with AH.

Im a senior software architect and developer my self and I have very good understanding for what it takes to maintain an application and how the life cycle of an application looks.

There is a point where you really need to rebuild or make a huge refactoring. When doing this you really need to cut away with the old stuff because if you dont its only gonna weigh you down and slow down your development process resulting in longer and longer turnaround cycles for each change that is to be implemented.

In general it is my experience that its the legacy code that drives the costs in regression testing. The more new and fresh code there is the more agile the implementation process can be. Ultimatly one would want to shift old code out as new code comes in obviously that cant be done because you need to support some ammount of legacy as the customers will never accept loosing functionality as they gain it on a 1 for 1 ratio. But that said I still think there are times in a products lifecycle where one should seriously consider the tradeoff between removing the heavy burdon of legacy (inorder to increase productivity and decrease regression test times) and customer satisfaction. My experience is that the intial hit in lowered customer satisfacation is quite soon forgoten when the customer see the increased productivty.

Ive obviously not seen your code but I would be suppriced if removing all old planes/vehicles (and at the same time stream lining the code to just support one generation) wouldnt increase the pace in which stuff could be implemented.

I know that most the time invested in a game is content creation and not code. But given the size of your team I think all increases in productivity are important.

This leads me to a question I have. Your new models are absolutly stunning. But I wounder if they arnt over worked. Prio one should always be the stuff that you can see. Honestly how important is it to make absolutely gorgeus fuselages on fighters when the sky looks like crap? Cockpits are obviously key as that is the thing you see the most. But other then that I would say that the sky is what I look at the most while in AH.

You say that nice graphics arnt about coding but about content creation. Well I work on enterprice scale backend systems so I wouldnt know. But explain to me why the coulds in AH consist of just textured low polygon models and dont have any volume, fog or particle effects to them or why is the sun just a textured disk and cockpit windows have no glare effects. Ive got a hard time beliving that its just about making different 3d models and textures to make it look nice.

Sorry to say it the sky with the clouds, moon, sun and lack of weather makes AH feel like the what 12 year old game it is.

Id rather see all the old planes and all the support for all the legacy computers gone out of the window if the tradeoff would be a modern sky and weather experience and shorter release cycles of patches.

Thanks for reading.
Tomas

[Skuzzy]

TexMurphy, there are things I cannot talk about and there are things I can.

I recall HiTech saying one time there was not much of the original game code left in Aces High.  It is just the way HiTech does things.  You cannot 'dogpile' code and have it run efficiently.  From time to time you have to do a ground up rewrite and HiTech does.  The constant updates insure those coded systems are kept up to date.

I am familiar with code and projects that get 'threaded' from too many fingers being in the pie.  In our particular environment that is not an issue.  We are much better off with the constant updates than most companies would be.

As far as what part of a model gets better looking.  Well, the big adder in the next release is bump mapping, which adds a lot more detail to the models.  If they only bump mapped the yoke, the same amount of resources would still be used, so it makes no sense not to do the entire model.

I cannot address the environmental stuff as that would require speculation on the future, which I am not privy to.

[Shuffler]

I spend my time looking at other planes fighting.

[ink]

TexMurphy, there are things I cannot talk about and there are things I can.

I recall HiTech saying one time there was not much of the original game code left in Aces High.  It is just the way HiTech does things.  You cannot 'dogpile' code and have it run efficiently.  From time to time you have to do a ground up rewrite and HiTech does.  The constant updates insure those coded systems are kept up to date.

I am familiar with code and projects that get 'threaded' from too many fingers being in the pie.  In our particular environment that is not an issue.  We are much better off with the constant updates than most companies would be.

As far as what part of a model gets better looking.  Well, the big adder in the next release is bump mapping, which adds a lot more detail to the models.  If they only bump mapped the yoke, the same amount of resources would still be used, so it makes no sense not to do the entire model.

I cannot address the environmental stuff as that would require speculation on the future, which I am not privy to.

this is AWESOME

[SilverZ06]

I downloaded the beta and I saw no improvements with the bump map enabled. All it did was change some lighting on the gauges. Of coarse the high res pack was not finished self downloading so I can only hope its in the hi-res pack that really makes the difference.

[ink]

I downloaded the beta and I saw no improvements with the bump map enabled. All it did was change some lighting on the gauges. Of coarse the high res pack was not finished self downloading so I can only hope its in the hi-res pack that really makes the difference.

pretty sure just the 51 has the Bump mapping as of yet

[Kazaa]

I agree with Tex. Aces High's environment looks extremely outdated.

[Tank-Ace]

I agree with Tex. Aces High's environment looks extremely outdated.

So? Unless your a tanker, you shouldn't really be have a whole lot of time to notice it. And for tankers (if they're doing it right) they should be too busy keeping an eye out for enemy tanks on the ground and aircraft in the skys.


IMO, graphics are of tertiary importance. If it has good gameplay is of primary importance, with accurate modeling being secondary.

[TexMurphy]

So? Unless your a tanker, you shouldn't really be have a whole lot of time to notice it. And for tankers (if they're doing it right) they should be too busy keeping an eye out for enemy tanks on the ground and aircraft in the skys.


IMO, graphics are of tertiary importance. If it has good gameplay is of primary importance, with accurate modeling being secondary.

But graphics do also affect game play. Clouds and weather are graphics but they defiantly affect gameplay. It's also a huge part of aerial combat, a part that is totally missing.

I'd like to be able to climb into the cloud layer to loose my enemy. I'd like to use it to attack out of. I'd like to se storms roll into a combat area totally changing the fight. I'd like low cloud layers pushing the fiht up of the deck or vise versa.

There is so much gameplay that is missing due to our uggly static sky with 2d clouds.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

But graphics do also affect game play. Clouds and weather are graphics but they defiantly affect gameplay. It's also a huge part of aerial combat, a part that is totally missing.

I'd like to be able to climb into the cloud layer to loose my enemy. I'd like to use it to attack out of. I'd like to se storms roll into a combat area totally changing the fight. I'd like low cloud layers pushing the fiht up of the deck or vise versa.

There is so much gameplay that is missing due to our uggly static sky with 2d clouds.

That would spawn new whines. "Cloud hugger" "Storm chaser!" "WTF no way u could bounce me nobody was near under that cloud" etc.

True clouds would of course bring a bit more realism since in many recorded fights hiding in clouds was the tactic of choice.

[ink]

 

but why would you want to hide......... in a combat game....this confuses me to no end


maybe those that like that kind of stuff should play the game "sniper ghost warrior"  awesome graphics...kill from hiding....beautiful clouds....

I play it once in awhile....but NO GAME has ever made me shake with adrenaline the way AH has.....from fighting..... not hiding or running or ACK hugging or Vulching or ganging...

the clouds are fine the way they are.

But graphics do also affect game play. Clouds and weather are graphics but they defiantly affect gameplay. It's also a huge part of aerial combat, a part that is totally missing.

.....

 

[MrRiplEy[H]]

but why would you want to hide......... in a combat game....this confuses me to no end


maybe those that like that kind of stuff should play the game "sniper ghost warrior"  awesome graphics...kill from hiding....beautiful clouds....

I play it once in awhile....but NO GAME has ever made me shake with adrenaline the way AH has.....from fighting..... not hiding or running or ACK hugging or Vulching or ganging...

the clouds are fine the way they are.


 

Same reason why people run into ack. Except that is unrealistic because friendly ack was known to blow everyone out of the sky once they thought they were under attack. No icons...

However clouds were commonly used as a means for survival when the odds stacked against the combatants.

[Skuzzy]

I downloaded the beta and I saw no improvements with the bump map enabled. All it did was change some lighting on the gauges. Of coarse the high res pack was not finished self downloading so I can only hope its in the hi-res pack that really makes the difference.

The only plane with full bump mapping in the beta is the Storch.  I am not sure the 51D has a complete bump map added.