Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Wishlist => Topic started by: Clone155 on February 14, 2010, 02:47:39 AM
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When I was first starting in AH, I was clueless. I had a general idea, but that still couldn't keep me from crashing five seconds after wheels up. I didn't know how to fire, rudder, look around, or other basic things. I remember printing out a 50 page "how to guide" that covered everything from the clipboard to how to bomb.
My wish is for the newer fellas, and I wish for an extended tutorial option for the new beginners.
This would include a voice that tells you what each action does. It should inform you how to use the clipboard, how to select a plane, how to start up the engine, basic flight, controlling the auto pilot, and some targets to practice on with a nice "Way to go! You bagged one!" cheer when you get your first kill.
This doesn't sound too hard to implement, and I'm sure you can get help from the AH community if you need a voice. ♣
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It would have to be something like an offline mission, which would need to be kept up-to-date along with the client. Or, you can code separate program as this. It would be AH, and it would teach you you the basics. This would eliminate the need to update the tutorial (unless there was a major change), as the tutorial program would be separate from the AH client. I like this idea, as it would give the trainers in the TA more time to teach more advanced tactics and settings instead of having to train from scratch.
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You're asking for something that, 1 in 100 times, it would come off perfectly for the newer player, but the other 99 times it would be annoying and superfluous.
The problem is that any AI "voice" can't anticipate exactly what you're looking for. You say you wish for an AI "help" voice to help newer players in any wide variety of actions...how exactly will it know what a new player is trying to do at any given moment? Are they sitting in the main menu? Maybe they are trying to find the hanger, or maybe they are trying to find the audio settings, or maybe they are trying to read the darbars on the map. Can you imagine trying to predict what any given player is doing at any situation??? It's impossible. Surely you realize this.
Will an AI voice help, even if it does by some strange chance perfectly anticipate the needs of the player?? I doubt it. If a player is of the type to be able to take vague verbal instructions from an undisclosed voice, they are also probably the type of player who would take the time to RTFM on hitechcreations.com/trainers, or whatever the url is. The people who dont RTFM are also the type that are going to give a huge WTF to any strange voice that is abstractly telling them what to do. There is no traction to be gained on this idea's target market.
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Fugitives flash animations, they are on the trainers site. They are awesome.
Trick is getting the new guys to take the time to go find them.
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"Maybe they are trying to find the hanger, or maybe they are trying to find the audio settings, or maybe they are trying to read the darbars on the map. Can you imagine trying to predict what any given player is doing at any situation??? It's impossible. Surely you realize this."
I don't see this wish happening, but for the quoted part: If HiTech took the time to code it, maybe he could use a voice-recognition program? Say when a player is flying in Lancs and they now know how to get to alt and level out, but no clue how to open doors or calibrate. Maybe have it so they could say "How to Drop bombs" (or anything along those lines) and it would reply "Open Doors, Press the O key" then "Press F6 to enter bombsight" then it continues on to explain how to calibrate? Or if a player is in a tank and they can't see the enemy due to default zoom so they ask how to zoom and get a "Press Z to zoom and use the Bracket keys to adjust zoom level".
Just a though if HT ever decided it was worth the time to code in. I am no coader so I have no clue how hard this would all be. Also maybe when signing in a check-box next to the "Auto-sign in to Lobby" can be "Enable Audio Walk-through and guide" that way it would be auto-enabled for newer players but older people can disable it before signing in.
Of course we'd have better luck getting newer players to read the Trainers site then to get this. :)
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Fugitives flash animations, they are on the trainers site. They are awesome.
Trick is getting the new guys to take the time to go find them.
Thanks for pointing them out, but I can't find them on the training site. They must have gotten moved or something.
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"Maybe they are trying to find the hanger, or maybe they are trying to find the audio settings, or maybe they are trying to read the darbars on the map. Can you imagine trying to predict what any given player is doing at any situation??? It's impossible. Surely you realize this."
You're asking for something that, 1 in 100 times, it would come off perfectly for the newer player, but the other 99 times it would be annoying and superfluous.
I think you missed Clone155's point. He is not asking for an in game "Help" voice tutorial, but rather a "extended tutorial option for the new beginners"
This optional tutorial would be for someone that didn't want to jump right into the game. If all the tutorial did was show the new player how to located the tons of information already available would be a big help. It's been discussed before. I think it has merit.
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+1 for some sort of interactive visual training. What comes to mind is Microsoft Flight Simulator having a list of training missions you can fly. Not a priority but I know I've tried to teach some people the basics but it can be a bit overwhelming.
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I'm not sure what happened to my tutorials on the trainers site, but here are a few that I still have hosted.
Split "S" (http://webpages.charter.net/maddogjoe/cobra/splits.htm)
Dot Commands (http://webpages.charter.net/maddogjoe/cobra/dot_commands.htm)
Radio (http://webpages.charter.net/maddogjoe/cobra/radio.htm)
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You're asking for something that, 1 in 100 times, it would come off perfectly for the newer player, but the other 99 times it would be annoying and superfluous.
The problem is that any AI "voice" can't anticipate exactly what you're looking for. You say you wish for an AI "help" voice to help newer players in any wide variety of actions...how exactly will it know what a new player is trying to do at any given moment? Are they sitting in the main menu? Maybe they are trying to find the hanger, or maybe they are trying to find the audio settings, or maybe they are trying to read the darbars on the map. Can you imagine trying to predict what any given player is doing at any situation??? It's impossible. Surely you realize this.
I think he means there would be a list of options to choose from (boming, selecting a plane, basic flight, views, etc) and when you click on one, it would initiate a set of instructions, a voice start talking you through what you are trying to do, what you need to click would be highlighted (as far as the clipboard goes), and there would be text too.
They have something like this in Blitzkrieg, it helped a lot as far as controling units, and even tactics to some degree.
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Almost all of the things asked for exists in AH now!
If you take the time to go to the trainer website you'll find tutorials on almost everything ingame.
Oh right, my mistake people want the easy way and have someone explain it all to them so they dont have to read.... :o
:salute
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My bad Fugitive, they "used" to be on the trainers site before we had a hard drive melt down.
I'll see what I can do about getting them restored.
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I was thinking that it could be an option on the clipboard, perhaps were the "training" tab is? It would proceed to great you, welcome you to AH, then help get you started by asking you to click on the hanger option. Only when you click on the hanger would it continue to tell you about the P-51 as a starting aircraft, and then ask you to click on the runway. When you click on the runway it would show you all the controls (maybe at this step have a "next" button?) and gauges and so on.
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Almost all of the things asked for exists in AH now!
If you take the time to go to the trainer website you'll find tutorials on almost everything ingame.
Oh right, my mistake people want the easy way and have someone explain it all to them so they dont have to read.... :o
:salute
Some people are much better visual learners than text learners, it doesn't make them dumb, they just learn a new way. Years ago, reading was how you learned, but that is shifting. More and more of the younger generation learn best from visual hands-on experience. Again, it's not a matter of the younger generation being dumber, they just learn different.
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I've done everything I can to try to help here:
http://techvideoreview.com/FlightSimMovies/AcesHigh/Training/AcesHighTrainingByPeabodyPage01Full.htm
-Peabody-
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+1 on the OP.
I was thinking that it could be an option on the clipboard, perhaps were the "training" tab is? It would proceed to great you, welcome you to AH, then help get you started by asking you to click on the hanger option. Only when you click on the hanger would it continue to tell you about the P-51 as a starting aircraft, and then ask you to click on the runway. When you click on the runway it would show you all the controls (maybe at this step have a "next" button?) and gauges and so on.
I think that this should be given as a option the first time you load a map in a new installation of the game. Perhaps it could say:
"Are you new to Aces High? If so, it is strongly recommended that you watch our tutorial, which will teach you everything you need to know to get started in Aces High. If you're a returning player, just press 'No' to skip the tutorial. Please note that this can be accessed at any time from the tower via the clipboard."
If this, and a comprehensive tutorial were included, it would spell the end of most of the irritating questions being asked in the arenas. You'd also get far fewer people quitting the game before ever going online, just because they couldn't work out how to take off (I did just that the first time I found Aces High, and I don't give up on things easily).
There is no reason for this not to be added to the game. Yes, the trainers have done a superb job in everything, but all that's in vain if the poor noob never even finds out that they exist :P At the end of the day, there's just nothing like an in-built tutorial to get you on your feet.
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+1 on the OP.
I think that this should be given as a option the first time you load a map in a new installation of the game. Perhaps it could say:
"Are you new to Aces High? If so, it is strongly recommended that you watch our tutorial, which will teach you everything you need to know to get started in Aces High. If you're a returning player, just press 'No' to skip the tutorial. Please note that this can be accessed at any time from the tower via the clipboard."
If this, and a comprehensive tutorial were included, it would spell the end of most of the irritating questions being asked in the arenas. You'd also get far fewer people quitting the game before ever going online, just because they couldn't work out how to take off (I did just that the first time I found Aces High, and I don't give up on things easily).
There is no reason for this not to be added to the game. Yes, the trainers have done a superb job in everything, but all that's in vain if the poor noob never even finds out that they exist :P At the end of the day, there's just nothing like an in-built tutorial to get you on your feet.
I can think of one reason...... file size.
With box games you have almost unlimited space to add all the tutorials and training stuff you want. Run out of room, just add another disk. AH doesn't come on a disk.... unless you request one... so the whole think has to be kept small for downloads. Map size is limited because of this. If it wasn't you'd have all kinds of extra crap laying all over the ground.
The 6 little tutorials I made in a flash format take up 12 megs. They are pretty short and sweet with out too much eye candy. It is possible to make a full fledged tutorial to walk someone through all of the basics from logging in the first time to setting up a stick, mouse, buttons, pick a plane, launch, and fly basic maneuvers. It took me about 20 hours for each tutorial I did. To do a complete one would take months, and the file would be huge. The game download is at 155 megs now and that is WITHOUT all the maps, or the hi-rez pack.
You could read the trainers site in about the same amount of time someone on dial-up could download and watch a full tutorial.
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Some people are much better visual learners than text learners, it doesn't make them dumb, they just learn a new way. Years ago, reading was how you learned, but that is shifting. More and more of the younger generation learn best from visual hands-on experience. Again, it's not a matter of the younger generation being dumber, they just learn different.
While I agree with most of your statement I take exception with you infering I said they were dumb!
I was pointing more to the fact most are too lazy to read the imformation available now! Also that it's so much easier to just ask and have things explained with little or no effort.
I'm very much a visual learner myself,I also believe the best way to learn is do it yourself and learn from the mistakes.That doesnt mean I dont read or spend the time to gather the imformation I need to accomplish whatever task I may need to do.
I dont think the younger generation learns any different or arent as smart,I just think they've had everything handed to them and are at a loss to figure anything out for themselves or are just to "lazy"
:salute
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While I agree with most of your statement I take exception with you infering I said they were dumb!
I'm sorry, I wasn't inferring you said that, I just know that that is a common assumption for a lot of people. I just wanted to emphasize my point, that I was saying different, not wrong.
I just think they've had everything handed to them and are at a loss to figure anything out for themselves or are just to "lazy"
I agree with that wholeheartedly.
:salute
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np.
:salute
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I'm with Jayhawk on this one. I had trouble with some of the ACM's used in the game untill I saw some videos of how they are done. Had some help from my old squad CO too. Sometimes, I just can't take words on a piece of paper (or on the computer screen) and turn them into actions.