Contrails in 12 high?

[Jochen]

Now, because Aces High supports only DirectX and Direct3D API's, there is no need for supporting older '3D challenged' systems limited to pure 2D. Also the new engine might be more optimized than in the other game, allowing more details.

All this gives new graphical possibilities...

Contrails. When planes fly high enough, they leave contrails. Lone B-17 can be hard to spot in the other game but I bet in reality it could be easier to see because of contrails. To make matter more exciting, contrails should appear slightly different altitudes dependind on time, maybe forcing bombers to come little lower to avoid them.

Exhaust smoke. If it could be in relation to power output of engine, you could see when enemy plane cuts it's power and tries to force an overshoot. Also small blue flames from the exhausts pipes in WEP would be neat...

Clouds. These must be the most neat and wanted addition. Good places to slower and not so maneuverable planes to hide. Or bombers might need to divert to secondary target when there is low clouds over primary target.

Of course there are many computers with different capabilites. That's why this eye candy could be made optional. Those who have faster computers and display cards could enjoy it while those who haven't can still play.

One of the unfairest thing in the other game was advantage enjoyed by 2D players. In 3D some planes are very hard to spot against ground, not so in 2D. This is one thing that we don't need to worry with Aces High!

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Obfr. jochen 'Stern von Afrika' 2./ Jagdgeschwader 27 'Afrika'

[Jochen]

What, nobody else want's eyecandy besides me?

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Obfr. jochen 'Stern von Afrika' 2./ Jagdgeschwader 27 'Afrika'

[Vermillion]

I'm all for it, as long as a respectable fps can be acheived.

One place I disagree with is the Clouds. If they are to be used effectively, they can't be considered "eye-candy" but a required feature and NOT be disable on the user FE.

Because the first thing people will do is to disable clouds so that other planes can not escape from them in the clouds.

Good Ideas tho !


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Vermillion
WB's: (verm--), *MOL*, Men of Leisure, Goldlandia
AW's: (verm) ACCS, Aerial Crowd Control Services, Cland

[ccasey]

To be honest clouds do not really use up too much processor time. Even the nice clouds in Janes WW2 (really nice eye candy) ran pretty smooth. the only thing that slowed JWW2 down enough to care was other 3d objects. Or if needs be, I would settle for the clouds that AOTP/AOE have. not as nice looking but they get the job done nicely. I do not know the limits of HTC's engine so I can't really say much more.


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ccasey

[Belgar]

Even in European Air War the Contrails
are visable from over something like 20k high

so yes i would like to see it, i mean you see it nearly everyday when you look up in the sky and see a passenger jet flying by with the trails behind him would be the same for the bombers....also what about the fighters
i remember my grandmother use to say how you can see a dogfight miles away from the Contrails they leave behind with there twist and turns
so for added realism im all for it  

Belgar

Member of 617 RAF [TANGMERE WING]
"The Damnbusters"

[shdo]

contrails - some days you have them some days you don't.

a contrail is formed from the heat of the engine causing water to condinse in the air as it passes by.  depending on the temperature you might have them and you might not.  also the number of engines you have does not matter to having a contrail only the size of it.  there are quite a few reports in WWII about bombers changing altitude only feet to stop the formation of contrails.  i have also read acounts where a bomber box had to climb 200feet above another box and all the guns in the planes froze due to the extreme cold.  

shdo

[Thermo]

Yep.....no CS,  (contrail suppressant) systems in any of the production WWII aircraft....

CS in aircraft really came alive with stealth technology....

I remember the LIB-28 system on B-2......Lee I. Barker's 28th attempt at making it work....

JHL