Current State of Affairs...

[NHawk]

I have been advised not to post this, however I personally think it reflects the general feelings of the more seasoned flight simmer...

Many people have noted a sense of anger and frustration in Aces High as of late. I am so disillusioned by the current state of affairs in AH that I may actually cancel my accounts. Certainly at the very least, I won’t be a two account accessory to HiTech Creations’ current approach to their game.

To those of us who have been around since the pre-AOL Air Warrior days of online flight simming, it is painfully obvious that the same thing that slowly destroyed AW is now hard at work in AH. The very thing needed to stimulate progress in the creation of the upcoming AH2, money, has prompted HTC to utilize the very thing that will destroy the integrity of the game itself; specifically, attracting a mass excess of 'game players' (NOT flight simmers) to an imperfect sever setup with increasingly buggy software that was never designed to handle the load. This is accompanied by the inevitable lack of arena discipline and control created by such an influx, to wit, a general failure to understand the game parameters and the unchecked ability of players to insult or harass other players with impunity.

This situation has already cost AH some of the more purist members. Recently I’ve noted many people logging off in frustration on numerous occasions with 'technical or questionable play' issues. In the past month or so, many of us have noticed many more 'invisible' planes and 'unexplained' deaths that do not appear to have any connection with warping or connectivity issues. Until recently, most of us have felt that AH was generally immune to 'hacking' (or cheating as some call it). Now we are not so sure....... Many of us have had some rather odd occurrences but nothing we can absolutely attribute to illegal play. I don't think anybody in their right mind will make such claims until they can prove them. We all know this buzz has been making the rounds with other more experienced players too.  In addition, I have noted the lack of attendance by many of these veteran players.

We play AH for pure pleasure and derive from it a sense of accomplishment and fraternity. It is fulfilling and challenging. However, I personally do not like the direction Aces High is clearly going and know there is nothing I can do to prevent it. Many of us are finding much more pleasure in off line games (or other online games) at the moment and a nearly equal sense of satisfaction without the unpleasant aspects.

All in all, many of us are not very happy with AH and I am unsure what that will lead to.

[Chairboy]

NHawk,

I understand some of the frustrations in your post, but I'd like to take exception to one of the points you mentioned, mainly, that the incursion of the 'unwashed masses' (my interpretation of your description) is a bad thing for Aces High.

Flight Sims are a difficult market today.  For every IL2, there's 20-30 First Person Shooters or Command & Conquer.  A business that caters only to its core audience may have temporary success, but that's no strategy for building a succesful business.  Flight Sim enthusiasts (like any game genre) 1. lose interest in a sim for months at a time, 2. eventually wear out, 3. die, 4. move on to something else.  If HTC _only_ catered to the current AH audience, their revenues would inevitably sink as more of the players wandered off.

By opening the doors to people who aren't already hard core simmers, they create an opportunity to replenish and expand the paying user base, a move that helps them stay in business profitably and keep making a great game for us.

Finally, I hear objections on Channel 1 about how the newcomers are 'quakers' and people make cracks about how some of the people come from arcade style flying games.  This might be true, but the important fact of the matter is that these playes are bound by the same flight physics as we are.  It doesn't matter what games people played before, they aren't going to 'infect' Aces High with their presence, so welcome them with open arms.

One final comment on the current state of affairs, we need to do whatever we can to ATTRACT the new players.  This means that when a new player asks "how to I put out a carrier hook?" or "What's the key to cycle between secondary weapons?", we should help out and give them the answer.  Every time someone asks, I see some jerk say 'Alt-F4'.  That's a stale joke that can only really be funny when used against obnoxious players (eg, the ones who ask 'what key turns on cheatz?'), but it hurts the sim when you tell genuine newbies that because they find themselves at their desktop and are a lot less likely to come back in.

When you answer an honest question with 'Alt-F4', you're hurting Aces High.  

THAT is the real current state of affairs.

[Chairboy]

A quick aside, btw:  In your opening paragraph, you say that your post reflects 'the more seasoned simmer'(s).

I've been flying sims for years.  X-Plane, MS Flight Sim, SWOTLW, all the way back to Falcon on the Atari 520 and Flight Sim for the Apple ][, so I consider myself a somewhat seasoned simmer.

Your post does not represent my views of the current state of affairs, and I imagine I'm not the only person who feels this.

[NHawk]

My statement comes from discussions with quite a few flyers. I didn't intend to say everyone would agree with what I was saying.

[honda346]

Chairboy is right on the money on every front...  How will the HighTech crew test the limits of their engine and where they need to go without pushing the envelope from time to time anyway?  If you want them to stay around we better hope they keep growing...

[Zanth]

"Certainly at the very least, I won’t be a two account accessory to HiTech Creations’ current approach to their game. "

Being a multiple account holder places you in a rather distinct (and small) demographic and suspect as a representation of the majority view.  You might have to ask yourself if you are taking this game a bit too seriously.  Paying for Aces High twice would seem a bit excessive - if not indeed obsessive.

[NHawk]

Originally posted by Chairboy
we need to do whatever we can to ATTRACT the new players.  

I DO agree with this statement. But, not at the sacrifice of performance/game integrity. We may be better off with smaller arenas than we are with one huge one that has difficulties.

[joeblogs]

I think the trick here is to provide enough arenas to allow players to sort themselves according to their own tastes and ability.  How much of this is done depends on how many people you can attract because someone has to pay the development cost.

To me the crucial element of an online game is the degree to which tactics and coordination matter.  If it does not matter at all, the game is not very interesting.  If it matters too much, the game becomes so hard to play that very few play and product improvements cannot be funded.  

-Blogs

[gofaster]

Yes, I agree completely.  This situation has gotten completely out of hand because there are too many airplanes and not enough ground armour.  We need more ground vehicles in Aces High.  I suggest the M4 Sherman Caliope, the M7 Priest, the German Wirblewind, and a .50 cal armed jeep.  If these were introduced, then Aces High would be a much better sim for all of us.

And, one more thing, we need player-controlled destroyers and more ports, too.

[Tarmac]

Nobody is born as an uber flightsim purist.  Everyone starts somewhere, and that may very well be in AH.  The solution is to make the newer people feel accepted, teach them, and fly with them, so that they stick around long enough to move beyond the quake-suicide-jabo style of play.

If a player feels that they can never survive a sortie because they have little knowledge of ACM, they'll be drawn to suicide jabo and other activities considered "dweeby," where they can at least feel like they've done something before they auger.

[gofaster]

Originally posted by Tarmac
Nobody is born as an uber flightsim purist.  Everyone starts somewhere, and that may very well be in AH.  The solution is to make the newer people feel accepted, teach them, and fly with them, so that they stick around long enough to move beyond the quake-suicide-jabo style of play.

If a player feels that they can never survive a sortie because they have little knowledge of ACM, they'll be drawn to suicide jabo and other activities considered "dweeby," where they can at least feel like they've done something before they auger.

Yes, exactly, which is why we need more tanks and ground vehicles.  Knowledge of ACM not necessary, and it does allow folks to contribute to the war effort.

[Tarmac]

Originally posted by gofaster
Yes, exactly, which is why we need more tanks and ground vehicles.  Knowledge of ACM not necessary, and it does allow folks to contribute to the war effort.

Interesting point.  Never thought about it like that.  I'd be all for more GVs.

[SlapShot]

Originally posted by NHawk
I have been advised not to post this, however I personally think it reflects the general feelings of the more seasoned flight simmer...

How long does someone have to play flight sims before they are excepted into this "seasoned" club ? Does one have to have played all those other, now ancient, games to really have a vaild opinion such as yours. This statement smacks of elitism.

Originally posted by NHawk
... specifically, attracting a mass excess of 'game players' (NOT flight simmers) to an imperfect sever setup with increasingly buggy software that was never designed to handle the load.

This reminds of the day after we launched the first tomahawks at the "target of opportunity" in Iraq, and a press reporter asked Rumsfeld the next day as to why they deviated from the War Plan. Rumsfeld looked over the top of his glasses and asked the reporter something like ... "and you have a copy of the War Plan ?"

Did HiTech send you his code and did Skuzzy send you the server architecture documentation ? Without both of these, your statement is completely conjecture, a guess, and I think your wrong.

This statement also smacks of elitism. So Aces High should only really be made available to pure "flight" simmers. What would be the test for this .. a questionnaire, and if you don't answer all the questions correctly you can't install/play Aces High.

I came to Aces High from mainly flying Space Sims, so really I shouldn't have been allowed to play this game and become the avid "Flight" simmer that I am now.

[Hooligan]

You are jaded.  When somebody first starts flying on of these online sims the level of excitement and interest is incredible.  After a while not every fight is a huge challenge, you notice the twits spewing crap on the open channel, and the lack of "newness" removes a lot of value from the game.

HTC can't really do much to fix this absence of "newness".  And the arenas aren't really that much different than they were 6 years ago.  If HTC wants to make me happier then they will allow range channel mute, permanent squelch list (too many morons out there talking) and make bases closer together and much easier to capture so the flow of conquest moves rapidly (high action anti-boredom changes hopefully).  Nonetheless I must admit that the player base has constantly grown since I've been here.  They are doing something right.  More and more players like the game:  There is no denying this.

I have a list of changes they could implement to make this jaded old curmudgeon a bit happier, but it is really not clear that this will make any particular other jaded old curmudgeon any happier.

Maybe HTC will be kind enough to give us permanent squelch and range channel mute.  Perhaps if you are more specific on what you really want it can be added to the upcoming feature list.

Hooligan

[crowMAW]

I also think that the influx of newbies is a good thing.  All of the "core" players were newbies at one point in time.  In the last month I have seen many old AW players, who left air combat online sims when EA killed AW, return to fly in AH.  Partially attracted to test AH during the open flight period that HTC, but also by the fact that AH is no longer $30/month.  The great thing is that several of these experienced pilots have stayed on to become paying customers and good members of our community.

I do think many of the issues with crowding in the MA will be reduced when AH2-TOD comes online and many core players move to that arena.

The solution to Ch1 is .squelch!  Which is one of the first things I do when I log in to the MA.

As far as hacking...I'm not convinced.  Aside from known bugs and warpy behavior, I cannot say that I've been engaged by any aircraft that did not perform the way I expected it to perform.  

There is one issue in this thread that does bother me and that is the subject of multiple accounts.  To me, this is an extremely tempting cheat that just happens to benefit a whole country rather than an individual.  I personally cannot see a valid reason to maintain two accounts other than to spy.  I know this issue has been discussed before, but I'm starting to think that this is a growing problem that HTC needs to address soon to save the integrity of gameplay.