Beefy's review of WW2OL Ver. 1.6

[Beefcake]

For starters I would like to say that this tread is not about comparing WW2OL to AH or other games, it is simply a tread to tell people (IMO) how WWIIOL has progressed in a year.

Also just so you know, here are my basic comp stats:
Compaq 5838 with an AMD K7 Althon 500mhz
Currently running Windoze(Windows) 98 2nd ED
512 RAM
GeForce 3 Ti200 Vid Card


Well let me get started. First of all, I have the very nice luxury of having Cable Internet, so downloading the 98meg patch was quite fast. I installed the patch without a problem, and went to run it in offline mode. After watching the neat little intro movie, I saw the first thing I liked....a REAL TIME LOADING SCREEN! Yes thats right, no more guessing as to how much has loaded. The screen it self looks like a gas gauge of some sort, with a neat little needle that moves from 0%->100% as it's loading. I might add it looks very nice too. It took about a minute and 40 seconds to load...IMO...that is a helluv allot better. (used to take 10 mins) Upon completion of loading I noticed the next nice thing.....and very nice interface. Rather easy to understand and looks very nice. I went though and began looking at the vehicles. This section was very nice as well. When you select a vehicle it gives you the stats along with a little summary of the vehicle. I selected the new Hoctkiss 25MM AAA gun, and clicked the launch button. I was a little disappointed..as it took about 30 seconds for me to spawn in the world. Upon spawning it took a few more seconds as my computer finished loading the map. Once this was done everything ran smooth. I played with 25mm for a few mins, deploying it and moving if from target to target. After a few mins I decided to exit. I returned to the vehicle select screen almost instantaneously. I then selected the new Panzer IV....but before I spawned I wanted to change and check some keymaps...which leads me to the next thing..the keymapper. VERY WELL DONE IMO! I will admit it is a little confusing at first but after I got used to it within a few minutes. It's actually really hard for me to explain it....more like you'd have to see it to understand but I can say it is nice and easier to use. After Remapping some keys I spawned my P4.....and I was amazed..I spawned almost instantaneous (within 3-4 secs) I guess that after loading the map the first time, loading gets faster. I drove around and played with the P4....very nice IMO but I can't say for sure till I take it up vers. some Chars . Anyway after playing around with the P4 I decided to try out the infantry.  I selected the British Rifleman and clicked launch and once again I spawned within a few secs. I ran outside of the barracks and fired my gun (lee rifle) once...........and I fired it again...and again....I rubbed my eyes to make sure I wasn't dreaming...I fired again...and.....yes...it was true....a VERY nicely done modeling of the gun recoiling...the bolt throwing back...my soldier recocking the gun.....I couldn't belive it. I hit the "Reload" and I was amazed as I saw my trooper pull the bolt back, put in a clip of 5 rounds (yes you could count them) and then recock the gun. I then pulled out my pistol....I was amazed to see the hammer on the pistol move as I pulled the trigger..again I reloaded and watched as my trooper pulled the clip from the handle and reload....very nice. I then pulled out a grenade. I loved the animation as my trooper pulled the pin out, recoiled and threw the pineapple as far as he could. Needless to say I played with the INF for quite awhile. After that I took up the new He111 and few around the map....though the FM is still a little funky, it seemed better. From the air you could see the BEAUTIFUL new offline map...which is VERY BIG. The offline map has several fields now as well as a port and 2-3 towns and about 10 miles of road.

Ok it's getting late so I better wrap this up. IMO, WW2OL Ver1.6 is VERY NICE. I highly recommend that if you can download the patch, do it and test it out yourself you may be surprised. Bare in mind that these are my own opinions so yours may vary.

(PS, please forgive all the typos and horrible grammer, it's 3:30AM here and lack of sleep is affecting my typing )

[Qnm]

Looks like what it should have been on first release. Might even make you want to try it if other reviews are this favorable.

[Fishu]

They still haven't fixed several birth issues of StuG
Im sad...  StuG is my favorite and they seemingly didn't drop a minute on it :I

[Regular]

Huh? I Enjoy this game. I have a fast PC with a fast internet connection...It's only fun with tanks...SO FAR????

[Kratzer]

I used my free month on 1.6, and unfortunately, though they've made some improvements, they still aren't anywhere near having a game that I want to spend time playing.  I don't need flashy graphics, but I do need USEFUL graphics (which AH has in spades).  When doing infantry, it just felt clunky as all hell.  When doing aircraft, there were a lot of loading stutters, it was hard to see anything, and Stukas were as manueverable as Hurricanes.

My biggest complaint is that because the map is so huge, you end up with 100 tiny little 3 or 4 vs. 3 or 4 fights, and no good battles.  I know they want it to be open ended and all, but the game would be a lot more fun, and take a lot less time to play, if they restricted the fighting to certain areas at any given time.

[Tac]

Beef, do us a favor and tell us if the Inf. Vs. Tank issue has been solved.

You can have all the eye candy you want, but if the inf. is still nothing but targets for BVR sniper tanks, its useless.

Also, get a friend to test this with you:

1 of you be infantry (best be you), and your friend be a tank.

Find a nice empty town, find a large building with a window. Have the tank range the window to 2000yds. Then have the infantry guy stand besides the wall so he can watch as bullets hit the wall. Then tell your tank friend to fire his machine gun at the window. It will take him a few bursts to get the MG ranged (bullet drop ranged that is). Once he gets the range, tell him to fire continously. You will see ALL his stream of bullets hitting the same spot in the wall..or if he aimed well, going through the window.

7.9mm MG... 2000 yds.. no dispersion. Laughable. And that is why the tanks murder the INF at unholy ranges. IF they fixed that, maybe they'll get some of us that left... until then, not a fricken chance.

[hardcase]

Rats are going to do their 2 week freebie thing and return of past customers for 1.60. Not sure when it is coming but prolly sooner than later. As a 'brownshirt" for CRS, i can still say 1.60 is a much needed improvement in all areas. IFN still only have sappers to kill tanks. I hope they have some longer range stuff soon, but just what did the inf have in May of 1940? I climbed a tree(certain kind) and from about 100ft up sniped 7 frenchie boys under the moonlight at Dinant when we lost it. Been playing inf since its release and I am usually a flyer. Inf has become fun.

If the pix post, it's me up a tree looking at Charville at sunset

 

[LtHans]

What would improve WWII Online to a playable state for infantry is to simply increase their power.

Instead of spawning as a single rifleman, spawn as a squad of eight or nine men, similar to what AH here is doing with bombers.

They just simply stay in formation and fire in the same direction as you.  You only "die" when you run out of men.

On top of that, spawn these men in a truck.  Drive to the fight, dismount (eject) and go for it.

That would also fix the problem with snipers, which was the talk of the infantry forum before the game was release.  Sure, go right ahead....spawn a sniper at any time if that is what you want.  You'll only get one guy though.  I get eight guys, two of which operate a machinegun, mortar, or rocket launcher when I spawn as a normal infantry SQUAD.

[Kieran]

I'm finding it a mixed bag so far. The flight model has been tweaked a bit, or at least aspects of it are. Ordinance weight has finally been addressed, and the days of the air superiority Stuka are over. 110s and 109s have been brought into historical perspective performance wise against the Allied aircraft, and I find no real complaints about the lethality of the modeled weapons.

I wish there was a French fighter represented. The MS 406 would be a good candidate. As it is, the 303s just don't have the punch to do much but snipe a pilot. Bringing an historical French fighter in would at least give the Allies a cannon-armed bird with which to compete on a more level (and accurate) playing field.

The biggest complaint I have is the drop in fps this version- especially when it was promised there would be an improvement. If anyone's fps has improved I haven't heard about it yet. I have a pretty good rig and I am seeing downwards of 14fps over a small fight. While playable, it is not pleasing at all. This of course occurs even though I have virtually every option turned off graphically.

I don't know if the game is for me, but I can honestly say now it is a game.

[Wingnut_0]

ugh..I'm not even going to answer Lt's post.


If people are not finding the battles on the live 1.6 server then I don't know what to tell ya.  I'm almost always in the air but usually spawn infantry, PII or opel when I'm on the ground.  I've been in some awesome inf-inf battles over the last couple days, and I love house to house fighting.  I've been a little more worried about bombs than Tank mg's lately.

The stuka's have enough juice to jink out of the way of incoming fighters over there but with the added bomb weight now you won't last long if you wanna keep your bombs on while being attacked.  Unless you got your obvious sucker hurri/hawk trying to slow down with you.  Not much difference to me between a stuka's handling vs. the actions of b26 and B17's  I've seen here over the years.

Overall I think it's a great improvement.  But I suggest anyone who actually wants to try it out not take my opinion or the opposite opinion and try it out yourself.  Game reviews are like movie reviews.  The bad reviews are usually the ones I like the best.


*and Tac, just like here, the person on the other connection will be seeing your rounds differently than you in alot of cases and as an added note, if you can actually hit ppl with Mg's at 2000 yards your best fediddlein shot I've ever seen, considering most ppl have trouble just seeing a tank at 2000 yards much less infantry.

[Tac]

No wing, you dont understand. The TANK can shoot out to that far with no dispersion. The inf wont see the tank of course, the tank MAY not see the inf out that far (but with optic zoom it probably will). The point is that the tanks can just find the range of a place and shoot at it from extreme long range and hit. There's only drop on the game. IRL a bullet stream from that far would put each bullet a feet apart or more.

When I was in a tank and we were to capture an Army field, we would put the Pzrs at a range where we were invisible to anyone inside the base, a light tank acting as spotter would get close to base and use binoculars to tell us where our bullets fell. Once each tank had an assigned place ranged (aka, 1 end of the inf. spawn or the enemy vehicle hangar) we'd stay there and fire away the mg until it ran out. Each "sortie" had use 100+ inf kills. I could barely see the inf. coming out, we just fired a short burst every 5 seconds. BVR killing .

When CRS adds Bazooka or ATR's or anything with which infantry can kill or at least disable a tank's tracks, it will be tank quake and nothing more.

[Wingnut_0]

Well I probably won't waste my time trying out your ?test? because I've never seen anyone ever try keeping an ab pinned from that far away.  Especially since it'd just tell my AT gun where your at.  How far ago did you actually try that when playing?

But like was stated, since you don't play the game, anyone that was reading the review should know that quite a few people don't see tanks as a problem.  When I see more tanks than infantry it's usually because the tanks have already won against any armor defenses and are moving in to secure.

If people wanna try it out or are curious they should still go do so and only take opinions with a grain of salt.  Only personal choice will decide whether you like it or plan on having an anurism over it.

[Kieran]

That's YOUR opinion.

[Tac]

Well wingnut, it seems you havent bumped into people that know how to do this.. or probably you havent noticed them. In any case I used to do that regularly. It worked best with the Pz3 (best optics imo). And as Kieren said, that's your opinion. And quite possibly, you arent seeing that many "tanks are a problem" opinions because probable these people, like me, have already left the game.

[Nashwan]

When I was in a tank and we were to capture an Army field, we would put the Pzrs at a range where we were invisible to anyone inside the base, a light tank acting as spotter would get close to base and use binoculars to tell us where our bullets fell. Once each tank had an assigned place ranged (aka, 1 end of the inf. spawn or the enemy vehicle hangar) we'd stay there and fire away the mg until it ran out. Each "sortie" had use 100+ inf kills. I could barely see the inf. coming out, we just fired a short burst every 5 seconds. BVR killing  .

It's not a far fetched tactic.

The British Army used Vickers machine-guns for beyond line-of-sight artillery barages, ranging in like artillery with spotters. It was supposed to have been fairly effective.