Russian dominance in flight sim development

[Maximus_G]

Additionally, I own 4 businesses and work about 120 hours per week.

Now that's hard! I always wished i'd find a job which would be so engrossing :)

[pbsmgm]

Now that's hard! I always wished i'd find a job which would be so engrossing :)

 

I suppose the venting got to me...correction, avg 100.:helpsmilie:

Edited April 7, 2009 by pbsmgm

[Zakk]

I played the HAWK demo and it reminds me of the crap they are producing over here so I automatically assumed that it was an American development--I bet it sells the MOST copies over here as well.

 

10 years ago M$ Flight Sim got me so interested in flying that I went down to my local airport and started taking lessons. I don't think I ever would have taken up this endeavor had it not been for all the pc flying. And you know what, I found it easier to fly a real plane than the simulator.

 

And this brings me to my last point--it is possible that Guitar Hero may instill some to pick up the real thing. I've only been trying to play for 2 1/2 years so yes, EVERYONE is better than me. From what I understand, the real pro's are consumed everyday with the axe and have to be for them to be at the top of their game.

 

Maybe I do watch too much TV--I skip all the commercials with the 30sec skip button on my DISH remote so I don't become infected with all the crap they are pitching. I watch UFC, Hells Kitchen, lots of Discovery, History channel and OPB; I take in a little FOX and local news but thats about it.

[SwingKid]

The rise of Russian-developed flight sims comes with the death of dynamic campaigns.

[spyda]

I suppose the venting got to me...correction, avg 100.:helpsmilie:

that's 14 and a half hours a day??? how do u find time to post on a forum?

[uhoh7]

Well if there's no demand, then there is no product. Then we can assume there are demands for high-fidelity simulations in Russia and CIS, so that developers like Maddox and ED are interested in this market.

 

I think this is the great myth.

 

Think about other industries: skiing, for example. There was no demand untill ski resorts were built.

 

With DCS you might say: hey look, a good fidelity study sim with niche market sales. It must be a niche market.

 

On the other hand, imagine F4 with fully udapted avionics, cockpits, multiple flyables, state of the art graphics and good online performance. Such a game could sell one million copies. Or more, if you could integrate stratgey control, and ground forces.

 

Imagine logging in and then choosing whether to fly an F16, Drive a T80U, or join a combat infantry platoon.

 

You don't think that would sell?

[EvilBivol-1]

Of course, somebody has to actually make it, before they can sell it.

 

IMHO the problem for flight sims is not on the market side, but the production side. Under the right conditions, calculations and luck, the market volume is there to support a successful flight sim developer. It's the creation of a successful flight sim that's the hard part, after which you are still left relying on a good bit of right conditions, calculations and luck. The failure of any of these can be enough to ruin you, which makes flight sims not only technically difficult, but also financially risky.

 

And therein lies the answer. Russian developers are able to tackle the production challenge. They've got the interest, the know-how and the lower cost. It's a combination difficult to find elsewhere.

Edited April 7, 2009 by EvilBivol-1

[uhoh7]

Of course, somebody has to actually make it, before they can sell it.

 

IMHO the problem for flight sims is not on the market side, but the production side. Under the right conditions, calculations and luck, the market volume is there to support a successful flight sim developer. It's the creation of a successful flight sim that's the hard part, after which you are still left relying on a good bit of right conditions, calculations and luck. The failure of any of these can be enough to ruin you, which makes flight sims not only technically difficult, but also financially risky.

 

And therein lies the answer. Russian developers are able to tackle the production challenge. They've got the interest, the know-how and the lower cost. It's a combination difficult to find elsewhere.

 

Well said, sir. I think one idea in this climate would be to involve the universites, both on the programing side and the physics/flight aspect, with the promise of a share of the profits should the project suceed. Then you might be able to attract graduate students and get a bigger bang for the outlay. Security is always an issue, but that could be reduced as a risk by compartmentilsing development, so that even if code was leaked, it would only represent a part of the whole.

Edited April 7, 2009 by uhoh7

[experimental_pilot]

Well, Fighter Ops is coming...

[Safari Ken]

10 years ago M$ Flight Sim got me so interested in flying that I went down to my local airport and started taking lessons. I don't think I ever would have taken up this endeavor had it not been for all the pc flying.

 

Touche! :D

[EtherealN]

In the same way, arguably, that flight sims get in the way of people learning how to actually fly. You know, why pay all that money and risk dying and whatnot, when you can just jump into MS Flight Sim?

 

I disagree there, both from personal experience and papers done on the subject.

 

The soaring teacher's associations here have noticed their students learning how to handle the aircraft a lot faster now, on average, than 20 years ago. And the pattern has been that the students have spent a lot of time with simulators at home - and very often it's the simulators that sparked their interest.

 

I played the HAWK demo and it reminds me of the crap they are producing over here so I automatically assumed that it was an American development--I bet it sells the MOST copies over here as well.

 

You made a blind assumption and was proven wrong - and then immediately jump to another blind assumption. That's not the way to do it.

 

HAWX sells very very well here in europe as well.

 

To me it really looks like you are just looking for reasons to bash the US and fall victim to confirmation bias. There is indeed a lot of things wrong with the US of A and it's culture, but guess what: there's a tonne of stuff wrong with the cultures in europe, russia, south america and asia as well. So far (having been in most of those places) I cannot say that there would appear to be more wrong in any place other than the other - it's just different things being wrong or bad.

[Yskonyn]

Of course, somebody has to actually make it, before they can sell it.

 

IMHO the problem for flight sims is not on the market side, but the production side. Under the right conditions, calculations and luck, the market volume is there to support a successful flight sim developer. It's the creation of a successful flight sim that's the hard part, after which you are still left relying on a good bit of right conditions, calculations and luck. The failure of any of these can be enough to ruin you, which makes flight sims not only technically difficult, but also financially risky.

 

And therein lies the answer. Russian developers are able to tackle the production challenge. They've got the interest, the know-how and the lower cost. It's a combination difficult to find elsewhere.

 

And the financially risky part is the winner here, I think. In combination with the higher cost of production and development in relation to Russia we have a circle again.

In the 80's games were fun, but hardly a big cash cow. This has changed dramatically (or perhaps evolved is a better word) over the course of time and now the game industry rivals the movie industry!

The emphasis on spending money to make more money is much more pronounced now as it was in the days of pac-man. People might still create games because they love to, but they want (expect) to be paid for it as well. Just look at the decline of quality, not only in games itself, but also in the packaging we brought up earlier. Gone are the days of nicely printed manuals included with every game, gone are the days of installing and playing without first having to download several hundred megabytes of patches before it even works remotely as intended.

All traces of getting to the cash as quickly as possible with the lowest cost for the producers, resulting is bigger profits.

Make no mistake. It all revolves around money. How many (smaller) game companies are shutdown at the moment. Loads. Due to the big one's being too much of a competition, but also because certain projects are not financially viable anymore. A game takes several years to create and if the shit hits the fan in between you have a few years of work lost and no market to sell it at. Risky indeed.

 

Now with the statement EvilBivol made I think a point has been made; the combined factors in Russia are ideal still for creating a full detail flightsim, while it remains financially viable to do so.

Hopefully for a long time, but wealth and economies have undulating paterns. Who knows! ;)

[BRraptor]

So far (having been in most of those places) I cannot say that there would appear to be more wrong in any place other than the other - it's just different things being wrong or bad.

 

Indeed - traveling around the world you can understand how your home country isn't as bad as you thought, and the foreign country is not as good as you thought.

 

 

 

As for the topic, the complexity of making a sim in todays standards is so big, that companies don't even bother. Long ago I was completely ignorant regarding it, but once I discovered how things work inside a "software simulation of flight running at interactive frame-rates", I started to respect much more those who do it.

 

Only if MSFS had a combat-side...

[uhoh7]

The object lesson in my mind is what has happened to Steel Fury: Karkhov 1942.

 

You got the makings of the IL2 of tank sims there, yet now the surviving forums are barely visited. That is one sad story.

[goon3r]

Very interesting thread you guys have started.I know the discussion has gone slightly off topic, but I have been living in the US for a few years now and I think the fundamentals of the problem go deeper than just gaming preference.

 

I think the decline of education in the US plays a large part in what we are seeing in gaming. Console games are being geared more towards an age group that is between 11-17 years old, i.e. school kids.

 

The decline in the education in this country has been well documented, kids don't want to learn how to read or write, they don't want to do math or science they simply aren't being challenged in our schools or groomed by their parents. It should be no surprise then when many of these same kids are turned a way by something as "brain intensive" as PC Gaming, let alone a PC sim? They simply don't want to spend the time learning PC games past an FPS.

 

Coincidentally, the workforces in places like India, China, Russia and Romania are very well educated and becoming ever more technical. These places have seen tremendous growth in programming jobs in the last decade or so.

 

I'm really not trying to bash these kids, the consoles or the US. The consoles have pretty much been shoved down our collective throats. Build it and they will come and play.I own all three consoles and they all have their place and time. The PC remains king though.

 

I guess its evolution, but I can't help but be concerned for both this country and PC gaming.

[th3flyboy]

the main reason all the good sims are coming from eastern europe is that the west is more focused on creating run and gun cod clones...

[Zakk]

the main reason all the good sims are coming from eastern europe is that the west is more focused on creating run and gun cod clones...

 

Yeah, and I can't wait for DICE (Sweden) to pump out BF1943--It's going to be great! It will help calm my nerves while we all wait for the Warthog :megalol:

[Safari Ken]

I can't help but be concerned for both this country and PC gaming.

 

Don't be too concerned. People have been calling PC gaming dead for years, and our education system has been terrible for decades. Nothing too much has changed.

 

Part of the thing about PC gaming being dead is, as far as I know, the top sellers lists STILL don't include anything but retail sales, and only from certain chains. They don't include digital distribution, and they don't include MMO monthly fees (the MMO thing I can at least understand, since it's not game sales).

 

Personally, I've bought a bunch of games in the last year, and exactly one of them was from a retail store (that was Fallout 3, cuz I wanted the bobblehead and lunch box :thumbup:). So that was the only one that counts toward the sales charts. As broadband becomes more common, digital distribution will become more and more of a factor, and I wonder how long it will take the "elitist sales chart fat cats" to figure that one out. Or maybe Sony pays them extra to leave that stuff out, to make the PS3 look better. :smartass:

[blaster454]

Extraordinarily interesting discussion for a sim board :smartass: .. I'm enjoying it

 

As food for thought, would it not be interesting if the flight sim developed similarly to the operating system (ala MS or Apple or <<cough>> Linux)?

 

Suppose there was a powerful enough factor within the flight sim development world with the resources (meaning capital and talent and vision) to develop and support a flight sim set of interfacing rules. A flight sim OS, so to speak, which took the overall design and broke it down into specialties and then defined the rules to glue it all together.

 

Further suppose that this entity was able to foster the development of splinter development groups who specialized in various aspects of flight sim development. I'm thinking here groups doing graphics engine development, flight model design, avionics design, weather design, terrain mapping, modeling, .... With each group being satisfied to take their piece of the economic pie (guess that sounds socialistic but maybe not evil ;)) and continue to develop and refine their specialty area.

 

And all developing to a set of accepted specifications that would insure "minimal" effort at putting all of this together into a major flight simulation program :pilotfly::joystick: .

 

Historically, this is how world standards groups developed over time. The issue would be on how to grow the marketplace so that it could become self sustaining and profitable to all.

 

Is this so far fetched?

[Lav69]

Very interesting thread you guys have started.I know the discussion has gone slightly off topic, but I have been living in the US for a few years now and I think the fundamentals of the problem go deeper than just gaming preference.

 

I think the decline of education in the US plays a large part in what we are seeing in gaming. Console games are being geared more towards an age group that is between 11-17 years old, i.e. school kids.

 

The decline in the education in this country has been well documented, kids don't want to learn how to read or write, they don't want to do math or science they simply aren't being challenged in our schools or groomed by their parents. It should be no surprise then when many of these same kids are turned a way by something as "brain intensive" as PC Gaming, let alone a PC sim? They simply don't want to spend the time learning PC games past an FPS.

 

Coincidentally, the workforces in places like India, China, Russia and Romania are very well educated and becoming ever more technical. These places have seen tremendous growth in programming jobs in the last decade or so.

 

I'm really not trying to bash these kids, the consoles or the US. The consoles have pretty much been shoved down our collective throats. Build it and they will come and play.I own all three consoles and they all have their place and time. The PC remains king though.

 

I guess its evolution, but I can't help but be concerned for both this country and PC gaming.

 

By the way I started this thread not you guys. An American educated in America.

 

Writing code is writing code, whether for a sim or fps. I think you are reaching. I would give credit to the American youth for writing code for games that will sell. That is the capitalist way.

 

My initial question was in prose and asking why the Russians not the East, are interested in spending their time developing sims instead of other fodder.

 

I have 5 and 7 year old boys and they want nothing more than to spend their time on my PC not their consoles. PS2, DS, PSP and WII. And they read and write just fine for their age. Americans want immediate gratification and that is the attraction to console gaming. It has nothing to do with their intellect. We are a community of convenience. We introduced this to the rest of the world (like many many things) and you all are eating it up.

 

Complacency and apathy are king not PC gaming.

Edited April 11, 2009 by Lav69

[leafer]

They are dedicated. They are overly qualified for their job. They labor for much less, but still, they take pride in what they do.

[Yskonyn]

(...) Americans want immediate gratification and that is the attraction to console gaming. It has nothing to do with their intellect. We are a community of convenience. We introduced this to the rest of the world (like many many things) and you all are eating it up.

 

Complacency and apathy are king not PC gaming.

 

I agree. It has nothing to do with intellect at all, but not only Americans want immediate gratification, I think the shift over the years has made most people in general -in western countries as least- want immediate gratification.

There was a thing on the news here a few weeks ago that the age group of 30-40 has serious 'what next?' issues. They generally have a great job, own a house, have a wife, children, big car, big kitchen, SLR camera, etc etc... and they have trouble dreaming about what they still want instead of going out to the shop and just buy what they want.

They raise children who in turn get something of that pie in their perception of whats normal, so they get saturated with instant gratification as well by getting all the toys they want, consoles at young age (even cellphones!), you name it. As long as they are happy, paps and ma are happy.

Then we frown when those children have short attention spans... We are emerging from an era where we have been spoiled and hopefully the recession will temper that and open eyes here and there.

 

But we might shift the topic here a bit too much. However I do agree that the (flight)sim player demographic (for the lack of a better word) shows a lot (and I don't say all, mind you) of 'mature' people. (18+)

So the market to sell to is quite different that what the big software companies aim at (teens). But that would be the same issue for any developer taking flightsims as their projects, Russian or other.

 

I still think the money machine is the biggest factor in why it's still viable to produce flight sims in Russia, for several reasons stated earlier in this thread by several people.

 

EDIT: And yes I do understand I've been horribly generalising people in the first part, but in light of the arguement I thought it was authorized. :P

[eldiablo155]

I think that they find in us kind of way to spend our money, and we are all pleasant to do that for a passion that really make us a blast ... thanks at them for make the flight sims , thanks at us for purchase them :thumbup:

[Lav69]

Coincidentally, the workforces in places like India, China, Russia and Romania are very well educated and becoming ever more technical. These places have seen tremendous growth in programming jobs in the last decade or so.

 

It was Ubisoft Romania that put out the garbage that is Hawx.

[empeck]

It was Ubisoft Romania that put out the garbage that is Hawx.

 

And Silent Hunter too :music_whistling:

 

It's internal Ubisoft's studio - Ubisoft says to internal developer: make me arcade flight game, and developer makes Hawx :thumbup: