The Sun

[rust]

I had a dream I was flying Aces High (that's how you know you've flown too much) and I was chasing a bandit across the sky and when he went in front of the sun my screen was totally whited out- I couldn't even see the instruments- for just a few seconds and then it was past and I kept fighting.  Go out and look at the sun.  It is impossible to look into it for more than a second and you really can't see anything while you are staring at it.  A realistic sun would really add a lot to the game.  It would be such a cool tool for offensive and defensive manuvers.  A bandit's chasing you- pull into the sun and radically manuver when he's behind you.  That couple of seconds of blindness could save your life.  Attack fighters out of the sun where they have extreme dificulty in seeing you and, of course, you have no icon.
I read that a pilot's trick was to put his thumb in front of his face to block out the sun and, thereby, see around it somewhat better.  With our virtual cockpits, this is what the struts could do.  You could move your head until a canopy strut (sorry P51s!)was blocking the sun, thereby somewhat bettering your view (but not by too much).  With the amazing 3d lighting already present in the game, imaginee how cool it would look with the dramatic shadows and sunlight playing all over the cockpit as you loop around the sky.
No other sim has it... let's see what we can do about that.

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RUST
 


[This message has been edited by rust (edited 07-30-2000).]

[Jekyll]

Agreed.  Probably the biggest disappointment I had with AH was when 1.03 was released and there STILL was not a realistic sun glare.

[moose]

Indeed

One of the few good things of Janes WW II Fighters is the really  BLINDING sun !!

It would be awesome if he had that in AH

We could then attack from "out of the sun"  

Moose_EAF322

[Mitsu]

I really love Mig Alley's white out effect.  

Mr. Hengist will probably think so too.  

-Mitsu

"Mew Mew to War!"

[danish]

Hear, hear.

danish

[Hristo]

Right, Jane's WW2 Fighters sun was amazing. We should have it here.

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Stoickov
JG54 "Grünherz"

[wolf37]

HI ALL:

add a thumb up key command, then you could put your thumb up to block the sun, or you could use it to thumb another pilot.  

wolf37
C.O.
THUNDER BIRDS

[SOB]

If we get a thumb command, can we get a finger command too?  

[1776]

HE heeee, I think you would find keyboards all over the world with the key or keycombo broken the "finger command" was assigned.

What needs to be added to the readio is the "Smilies"!!!

[Dago]

WB 2.0 had a strong sun effect, and I didnt like it.  Nobody did.  They scaled it back, it was better but still a pain.

I would rather see development time put in to new planes and features rather than sun effect.

Just my opinion,
Dago

[moose]

Dago..why didn't they like the blinding sun ?

Ok..its not easy to fly..but that is the realistic part of it.

And you can use the sun effect, choosing from which angle you attack.
The defender has a disadvantage then...but that was also in WW II.

Moose

[fradim]

I remember most people didn´t like sun glare then. I guess real wwii pilots didn´t either. But it was there. And many pilots used it as an advantage against careless pilots. I´d prefer a more realistic sun here too, though I am not sure if it´s gonna work so well w this icon system.

[danish]

Dago wrote:
"...I didnt like it. Nobody did. They scaled it back, it was better but still a pain"

Cant remember one player complaining about the sun - except of course when he was blinded and subsequently killed ;=)
Indeed to claim that "noby liked it" is rubbish.


That feature will open new possibilities in the ACM, both offensive and defensive.How high it should be on the list is another question.

danish

[Dago]

Danish, I gotta wonder if you were playing WB at the time it switched from the 1.x version to the all new 2.0?

If you did, you should know, that the sun was a big problem and virtually everyone complained non-stop until they scaled it way back. If you werent playing then, you really can't comment.  If you were and you dont remember, think back.

The sun effect in WB is much less now than what it was. It is a minor effect now.

Using the sun effect in the game, while sound really cool and we love to blab about how the real pilots did it, is nowhere near as easy to use in the game.  This is because it is much tougher to orient yourself with the sun at your back then it was in real life. It was much easier when you had the real view, not pushing all kinds of buttons.  With the sun effect in wb, it was actually pretty rare that someone used it in the attack mode. Some might try to claim they did, but it was still rare that it was actually done. It was most often useful to climb into when you had a con chasing you to try and blind him.  Then, all he had to do was change relative position with you and the sun and he could see you anyway.

Sun effect is okay, and I dont really care if it's institued, but at this point, knowing HTC has a very limited development staff, I still would rather see their time invested in adding new aircraft, developing new terrains, fixing bugs, and adding more interesting and exciting features, stuff like the mission planner, terrain editor, etc.

Dago

[Vulcan]

If they change the sun can they fix the ground too?