Moa

TSSAA = Transparency Super-Sampling Anti-Aliasing Improves the edges of objects with partially transparent textures ('billboarded' trees, airfield fences, radar lattice structures etc). Can be quite expensive on framerate but looks great. Refer: http://developer.nvidia.com/object/transparency_aa.html http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2006/04/07/transparency_adaptive_aa_explained/1 http://www.gamecritics.com/demystifying-anti-aliasing-on-nvidia-8-series-video-cards Note: HDR doesn't cause smearing in itself, it just preserves 'overbright' light values so that when they are later convoluted they are blurred a bit - rather than being clipped early and looking less realistic (your eyes introduce the blurring over overbright sources in real-life).

Mate, building software is hard. It always takes longer and costs more than anyone expects. The most difficult part of software development is not the tehnical parts like coding but is estimation, almost no-one gets it right. The companies who are better at it have people whose sole job is to estimate software effort - although they often get it wrong (since such professional 'projetc managers' don't always know code anymore so they where the complexity and risk are so can't get the estimates right in every area they consider) - and keep track of where the time was actually spent so they better estimate the next project. It is clear that building complex sims like LockOn FC2 (complex for a lot of reasons even if medium fidelity), BlackShark and Warthog is very arduous and difficult to estimate the effort required. While the intent of ED and TFC was to reduce price for you if the project allowed (a noble goal, how many other companies would even mention this?) I don't think the reality is shaping up that way - even with good developers it is harder than non-developer's think (for reasons non-developer's don't always understand). I'm also sure that ED&TFC are building these great sims with far fewer resources than you imagine, or are used to with $US 100 million Electronic Arts titles that are not nearly as innovative (I still can't get over night missions with NVG and flares - love it!). While the ideal price for some might be $0 it turns out that US $60 is probably the minimum ED&TFC though they could charge without risk of making a loss. If they could charge less they probably would, since this results in more sales to Average Joe and possibly increased profit, but at increased risk that they make a loss if Average Joe decides it is not to his taste. So, perhaps some of us have to go without going to the movies for a while, or fewer friday beers (gasp!), or wear last season's fashion, or hold our breath until to our next birthday or Christmas (here soon). All of this makes getting it all the sweeter (plus, everyone else has gone through the debugging process for you, so you see only the final fully-polished product). I'm sure ED&TFC would like to make such a great profit that reducing the prices of additional modules is possible. However, economic realities are merciless and game development is risky and hard - the earlier ED post was optimism, not a deliberate ploy to mislead. Imagine if ED built this product as Open Source and gave away for free (although charging for Open Source is perfectly permitted). Since no one paid for it there would be no money for doing the hard, boring stuff, like writing nice manuals with basics like landing. Only volunteers would do the work and if they couldn't be bothered doing something, or fixing bugs, or decided to go play StarCraft with all their time there is nothing you could do about it. With paying for the software they get money to make the next one (F-16 or F-18 pleeaaaze) and will monitor these threads and answer the same n00b questions again and again and fix bug with our weird hardware setups - and we get to play the game for as many hours as we want (some people have thousands of entertainment hours for a mere $60 bucks - Hollywood doesn't give that value, nor does the Madden series). Worth every penny methinks.

Umm, is "Eugenics" what you're suggesting? I suggest you research this. The movie Gattica (with Tom Cruise) also explores this issue somewhat. Evolutionary theories suggest that a diverse spectrum of capabilities is what is required. What is optimal for one set of environmental conditions (massive and lethal dinosaurs) does not necessarily mean that superiority will continue in other environments (eg. weaker mammals were better in changing conditions). For humans, genomic diversity is important for disease resistance etc (eliminating 'dropkicks' is bad as they might possess viral resistance in particular cases, if not social skills or high intelligence). Plus, we *all* have our strengths an weaknessess. For some of us our strengths are recognized by others and some are not so visible - nobody is 'worthless'.

> 4. May cause the ever elusive and rare spotted owl to lose its way if to close to magnetic field. LOL. rep inbound.

I have a Radeon HD 5970 and it gave me intermittent bluescreens with the 10.9 driver. Checked thermals etc, all good. Switched from Win XP to Win 7 (by luck, just in time to try A-10C beta too) but still got intermittent crashes (but improved frame rates). The hotfix driver (10.9a) listed earlier in the thread fixed it for me. So it appears to be a general ATI dual-GPU hotfix and not just for the Radeon 4xx0 series. Thought that might help someone out there also with a dual 5xx0.

Slainte Nate! Handy having the manual to read while we wait for the program to download.

Me too. Nice avatar - seeing the Falcon 3 MiG-29 box brings back many fond memories ... though A-10C is gonna make many more.

As you have found with LockOn it depends far more on the 'initial conditions' as for who wins. For simplicity we mostly choose to debate merits when considering a 'neutral' start. However, even an A-10 can mug a Flanker if the Hog is at 300 knots and it stumbles on a Flanker low and slow. Similarly Aircraft A can best *any* Aircraft B if A starts with a significant angles, altitude, or speed advantage (despite pilot or aircraft performance differences). Don't be surprised if your pet plane (whatever that may be) is fragged in actual on-line combat even by supposedly inferior aircraft - all due to the situation you find yourself in. This is why the endless debates on 'which plane is better' all make huge, often unstated assumptions, about the starting conditions (which is why the debates aren't that applicable to much except 'tournament ladder' style engagements) and is really akin to debating the "number of angels that would fit on the head of a pin" (kind of interesting, but actually a waste of time when you could be considering/learning 'realistic' situations and tactics/team tactics instead).

Good work ED. I hope you guys get Naturalpoint to update their drivers (good luck). Shouldn't be too hard for Naturalpoint since the TrackIR software uses OpenGL, which is very portable (incidentally, not only to Windows - but they probably will never take advantage of that).

Both 32-bit and 64-bit can be installed (simultaneously it appears).

$60 is very reasonable given the relatively smaller user base and complexity of the sim (long development time). If you were a military quartermaster you'd be paying a *lot* more per seat for essentially the same thing. Now, time for ED to let us know what comes next in the DCS series (just kidding). Also please remember this is a beta release. Bugs *are expected* so report them calmly and precisely so they can get fixed.

Great stuff ED and Testers. Thanks for the enormous hard work and being more open (we didn't expect open beta) - you've certainly got my money and help where I can (bug reports).

Pure genius, Viper. This series replaces my previous favourite screenshot series - also by your talented hand (http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=45638). n.b. the images on the first post have been removed by the host :(

Nope, can't maintain lock while notching. Neither can your enemy. Force them (Su-27 ) to notch and their missiles are defeated since they are semi-active radar homing. Fortunately you have AIM-120 which are active in their terminal phase (10 nm). You support them until they reach that time and then you are free to maneuver. In this game (not real life) the R-27 series are significantly faster than the 120, so you must time everything carefully. Again, there are variations on this that allow greater finesse (which is one reason online squadrons do so well - they're not cheating, just using a pool of knowledge and a lot of pratice). You can't 'know', you must 'guess' based on timing and what your opponent is doing. Takes practice. By the time you see a missile and have enough energy you might defeat one, but rarely two. Try not to let the missiles get that close. When in doubt, stay safe, a kill is never worth getting shot down for.

It's easy to mix them up since the game engine itself works in the more rational SI/Metric system (at least what we can see from the Simple Flight Model) as this simplifies things. The engine would be a nightmare of conversion factors if Imperial units were used instead (except converted for final display on your HUD).

The F-15 is not designed to turn with the Su-27 (more correctly, the Su-27 is designed to beat the F-15 in a turn). So how do you beat the Su-27? Don't turn with it. Fire your missiles, guide them until they go active (learn how to use your radar), and run away before his missiles get you. There are subtleties and variations on this, but you'd have to join one of the "knowledgeable squadrons" to find out. If you are getting close enough to the Su-27 to worry about your turn rate relative to his then you are not doing it right - there is a classic quote about USAF pilots being trained in BVR to "run away like the girls they [REDFOR] are", extend and then re-engage away from close range (maximizing the advantage of the F-15s superior radar and missiles). Keep your distance (if you are in the Su-27 you usually want to do the opposite, survive long enough to close the distance). You'll also learn how to time your defensive turns to defeat their missiles. Search these forums for discussions on 'notching'.

Flaming Cliffs 2 uses OpenGL (appears to be via Lua bindings for GLUT) for the menu screens. It uses Direct3D (part of the DirectX family) in-game for the 3D. Please make sure you have OpenGL drivers installed for your graphics card (should be part of the ATI install bundle) and no weird OpenGL settings (as well as the Direct3D/DirectX drivers). The OpenGL driver for ATI is called atioglxx.dll if I remember correctly. Note: if you have a FireGL card you have better support for OpenGL and need a slightly different driver than if you have a Radeon (although the Radeon driver can be shoe-horned to work with a FireGL card).

If it uses global exports, than yes. Operating the radar requires information about other players. If it wasn't for the damned cheaters who exploit such information we'd be able to use a lot more good stuff on more servers (LEAVU2, ERI etc).

Yes, but with VNAO or EFA mods you can fly an F/A-18F or F-14D that appears as such to other players. With this cockpit it finishes the last piece of that - making the aircraft look like an F/A-18F to yourself. With the data exchange pioneered by Yoda's Leavu2/ERI it will work with LockOn (subject to some limitations, no player usable AGM-88, Harpoon, Maverick-D [but working Mav K] etc). Shows how opening up LockOn & DCS to modding is producing good fruits.

As an alternative, the lottu (LockOn Two Track Utility) tool provides one click replay (via program association) and a GUI interface for simplicity: http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=53348

Jerec, amazing work. Is there any chance the source will be made available? There are some F-16 cockpit textures I'd like to try putting in LockOn using your technique.

Thank GGTharos. Yes, I've already recanted my original conclusion - although the shorting of range was intentional it seems, but probably not the other two issues. Would be a great thing if this was addressed (if the decision is made to patch FC2 - although we understand such a patch may never eventuate).

If it was only the ranges that were reduced then we wouldn't gripe so much (as yes, we are griping a lot). It is the fact that when you finally guide the seeker to the target of interest (wrestling with the acknowledged 'dog-leg' slew bug) the seeker will decide to jump some where else - like to a cool patch of ground nearby. That's the real problem that has not yet been acknowledged. So, to clarify the situation, the Maverick D seeker seems affected by the following things: 1) Slewing bug. The seeker does not always slew in the commanded direction. Acknowledged as a bug. Hopefully fixed one day if the decision is ever made to patch FC2 (not decided at present, although there are several factors against it happening). Please do not re-report this bug as it has been acknowledged by the ED team. 2) Range restrictions. Made to make seeker lock ranges more 'realistic'. Only affects some targets and not others (eg. can lock HMMWV but not Avenger despite them having similar IR profiles) and does not appear to affect the Mercury pod - so of dubious benefit to realism considering the ranges would be more affected by meteorological conditions (eg. haze, low cloud) than anything else. 3) Seeker lock bug. Seeker jumps to random location (sometimes another object, sometimes not) and not the target in the cross-hairs. Not acknowledged as a bug as it doesn't appear to affect the ED testers (at least according to their reports) but affects us badly as shown in the submitted videos. This is the most critical bug IMHO but is not yet acknowledged by ED developers or testers as existing. Unfortunately, it appears the only way we can get such acknowledgment is continual griping on this forum - which is something I didn't really want to do, but I would like the problem to be at least acknowledged (then we'll shut up).

Ask ruggbutt. IIRC it was his work. Looked great though, just as this does.

Thanks for the tip Viper. For me, lock problem is at both magnifications - but it might work for someone else.