DCS 2.9.6 Delay

[tripod3]

There is no such place in existing terrains. Germany or Kola?

[Raptor82]

On 7/5/2024 at 11:02 AM, Graphics said:

 

05 July 2024

Dear Fighter Pilots, Partners and Friends, 

The next DCS update, version 2.9.6, has been delayed and is currently in heavy testing and bug fixing. We sincerely apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused. It is very important for us to release updates with as few issues as possible and this extra time is genuinely required to deliver a quality product.

Our initial aim was to release this massive update on 26 June 2024 and the announcement was made in our 29 March 2024 Newsletter and 19 April 2024 Newsletter.

Despite the short timeframe for such a large release, we were confident we could do it based on past development experience. Indeed, we reached our internal goal and completed the roadmap that we set for ourselves and even added additional functionality to both the DCS: CH-47F and the DCS: Afghanistan map. However, some unforeseen events prevented us from meeting the schedule and we would like to share with you what caused the current delay.

As you may know, we generally release one new aircraft module or map per DCS update, rarely more. In general, it takes about a month between releases to prepare for the next one. Starting in May, we released products twice a month: DCS: Kola, DCS: F-4E Phantom II, and the DCS: OH-58D Kiowa Warrior. These were planned to be topped with DCS: Afghanistan, DCS: CH-47F, and Flaming Cliffs 2024 with each product having their own specific features requiring careful integration into DCS. This is on top of the new Air Boss station for DCS: Supercarrier, many new module features and bug fixes, as well as substantial improvements to the DCS core. We overestimated our capacity to meet the challenge we had set upon ourselves but we are hopeful that you will understand our decision. 

Here is the event timeline for the delayed DCS 2.9.6 update:

We announced the delay in the 21 June 2024 Newsletter. The decision to postpone the release was made based on 19 critical issues (stoppers) related to the DCS Core, Supercarrier, CH-47F, F-16C, F/A-18C, and F-4E. Normally, we have 5-8 stoppers a week prior to a release.

By 26 June 2024 the list of stoppers had increased to 25 related to the above products, in addition to DCS: AJS-37 Viggen, DCS: F-5E Tiger II, Flaming Cliffs 2024, and the new Launcher. By Tuesday, 2 July, a tremendous job had been accomplished by the team and most of the issues were resolved. Nevertheless, the decision was made that the DCS: CH-47F should have additional time for content preparation and more detailed testing.

Everything was moving smoothly when a new set of issues reared their heads. These were subsequently resolved on 3 July 2024 and we were poised to deliver the update together with the full list of fixes, improvements, and new products. However, by the morning of 4 July 2024 our QA team reported new stoppers related to AI aircraft in addition to a broken campaign and so the decision to further delay had to be made.

We know that this is a very eagerly awaited update and that it will provide a lot of new and great stuff for you, including a fix to the DCS: F-15E Strike Eagle radar. However, in good conscience we simply could not let the it go out as is. 

A new date will soon be announced on our Discord and other social media channels once we have very high confidence in it. We would like to thank you and the Community, our third party developers and especially Heatblur for their cooperation, rapid feedback, and updates on their aircraft.

The whole team at Eagle Dynamics apologise for the inconvenience and undertake to do their very best. 

Thank you again for your passion and support, 

Yours sincerely,

 

Personally I appreciate the transparency, thank you for the update 

[Nightdare]

On 7/6/2024 at 12:09 AM, =DROOPY= said:

Not that I'm planning on purchasing anything coming in this update, or even know how to write code, but just wanted to say 'Thank you'!  for providing some background into the unforeseen issues. 

@NineLine @BIGNEWY

Thank you guys for all you do.

You have a difficult job being the ED Forum punching bags, all the while remaining positive and professional.

I'm absolutely *not* jealous of your tasks here.  Id rather eat crunchy dog poop than be a ED Forums moderator...

 

 

 

 

 

 

[pat.]

vor 5 Stunden schrieb tripod3:

There is no such place in existing terrains. Germany or Kola?

Does anybody know the name of the airport / airbase?

[Raisuli]

25 minutes ago, pat. said:

Does anybody know the name of the airport / airbase?

German jet.  Colors on the right stabilizer are also German, and on the left that's Luxembourg to me, and a NATO star.  I've been patiently waiting for a central Europe map but I'm not going to get my hopes up.  Is there that much green anywhere in Afghanistan?  Update to Caucus?  Just showing off the new MiG-29A?

Edited July 7, 2024 by Raisuli

[tripod3]

9 minutes ago, Raisuli said:

German jet.  Colors on the right stabilizer are also German, and on the left that's Luxembourg to me, and a NATO star.  I've been patiently waiting for a central Europe map but I'm not going to get my hopes up.  Is there that much green anywhere in Afghanistan?  Update to Caucus?  Just showing off the new MiG-29A?

 

Some people said that it’s Fulda Gap (Cold War Germania) map 

[Raisuli]

1 minute ago, tripod3 said:

Some people said that it’s Fulda Gap (Cold War Germania) map 

They've thrown a few teasers about Fulda, but as with most things I'll believe it when I get a release date.  Don't care how much they push the date back, but if they post one at all it's in the late stages of development.

Until then it's just a rumor 

[pat.]

vor 12 Minuten schrieb Raisuli:

German jet.  Colors on the right stabilizer are also German, and on the left that's Luxembourg to me, and a NATO star.  I've been patiently waiting for a central Europe map but I'm not going to get my hopes up.  Is there that much green anywhere in Afghanistan?  Update to Caucus?  Just showing off the new MiG-29A?

 

It's a MiG 29G from the german luftwaffe. And it's a Fulcrum Farewell USA 2003 painting on the jet. But i can't identify the air base.

[Raisuli]

8 minutes ago, pat. said:

It's a MiG 29G from the german luftwaffe. And it's a Fulcrum Farewell USA 2003 painting on the jet. But i can't identify the air base.

Laage Fliegerhorst <edit> Nah, not quite right.  Lemme dig a bit more </>

Edited July 7, 2024 by Raisuli

[tripod3]

Flughafen Berlin-Schönefeld 1985 (see historical photo in Google Earth)

[tripod3]

[Hammer1-1]

that airport does resemble the one in the google map above, but it isnt...and fulda gap has been kicked around since they announced the CH47 teaser...pre-berlin wall collapse?

Edited July 7, 2024 by Hammer1-1

[MiGCap1]

4 minutes ago, Hammer1-1 said:

that airport does resemble the one in the google map above, but it isnt...and fulda gap has been kicked around since they announced the CH47 teaser...pre-berlin wall collapse?

 

 

Would be a dream come true.

[YoYo]

Yep, it was  Berlin Schönefeld Airport!

https://www.mil-airfields.de/de/berlin-schoenefeld-airport.htm

The picture was done from this side:

Looks like version is from 1980-1990. Also notice the very distinctive taxiways and the two angled strips at the top.

A little modern:

Edited July 7, 2024 by YoYo

[vvm13]

I'm probably going to express an unpopular opinion, but I'm very sorry that Open Beta has ceased to exist. Or I would like some Closed Beta and a list of known bugs in it to be available to me. I could already fly in Afghanistan, and I would try not to run into known bugs. But no, you have to wait.

[Raisuli]

6 minutes ago, vvm13 said:

I'm probably going to express an unpopular opinion, but I'm very sorry that Open Beta has ceased to exist. Or I would like some Closed Beta and a list of known bugs in it to be available to me. I could already fly in Afghanistan, and I would try not to run into known bugs. But no, you have to wait.

This.  No particular mod, just in general.  I've done QA on pre-alpha and alpha software for years and don't bat an eye when a bug comes up in DCS.  There's so much to do and so many places to do it I really don't even care; note it, move on to something else.

Of course the hard part is distinguishing between bugs and loose nuts behind the stick...

[lead dispenser]

1 hour ago, Raisuli said:

This.  No particular mod, just in general.  I've done QA on pre-alpha and alpha software for years and don't bat an eye when a bug comes up in DCS.  There's so much to do and so many places to do it I really don't even care; note it, move on to something else.

Of course the hard part is distinguishing between bugs and loose nuts behind the stick...

The problem is for every 1 chill player that can handle a bug or 2 there are a 100 who scream like banshee,s  that ED is the cause of all their problems an why their wife is having an affair why their car wont start ,why they get bullied at school ,why girls think they look like a predator. its all .  ED,s  fault !!,.

even if the base game was free they would still complain .......oh right..

[vvm13]

As I understand it, the point of the Open Beta was to separate those who can tolerate a certain amount of bugs from those who cannot. If the idea fails, then this again has to do with communication. It was necessary to write in big red letters near each date that this was only an assumption and the likelihood of a change was obvious. And write next to each Beta in big red letters that there must be bugs and this is not for gentle souls.

[Ala13_ManOWar]

Yeah, the idea might be that one, the reality though was we all installed open beta just to see the latest content sooner while those banshees forgot it was an open beta like 1 minute after install and howled all around all the time. I don't think they are that much, not even the majority of people, probably even a just few, but howled quite aloud making a deep earworm in those who heard them.

 

BTW, don't know when, but amazing news about that middle Europe map!! makes all the sense with the incoming MiG-29A!

Edited July 8, 2024 by Ala13_ManOWar

[draconus]

@vvm13@Raisuli They didn't just hold the whole update for "some bugs". They were critical, stoppers and probably crashes all over.

And no - they tried but the beta didn't work out as intended thanks to users who didn't understand it and MP server owners who also pushed for OB.

[BIGNEWY]

open beta or stable version the result would have been the same, a delay. 

Having one public build now is the best option, it brings the MP community together and you have more choice for servers, it is better for testing teams and development, and everyone gets new content at the same time. 

thank you 

[Eldur]

On 7/5/2024 at 6:29 PM, YoYo said:

I know, probably yes, but they wrote clearly:

so that's why few pople are surprised .

For me Discord its a waste of time for scrooling and chat only. Good for possibly quick information, with lots of LOL, ROFL and WTF, thats all.

 

Same. Useless junk which barely even works (phantom notifications, anyone? No, not about the Ph-4! Also, that complete and utter POS - Piece Of Software - is unable to save most of the settings. Once I log out, they're gone and I have to reconfig almost everything again everytime, it sucks! Also, sound quality typically reminds me of good old Roger Wilco. Anyone still remember that from the 56k age?) that is for me, and to be fair, it's literally a glorified IRC with mediocre voice chat and slightly less mediocre than Microsoft Teams video streaming bolted to it. Oh, and it's Discord. Same goes for Asocial Media (somepone has to spell it right!). But well, classic forums apparently don't appeal to hipsters these days. It's boomer stuff...

 

And to be fair: It happened before. I clearly remember having heard of ED's smaller news bits dropped on Discord and or Elon Musk's massively overrated 𝒫яØи site 𝕏itter (IPA: /ʃɪt.ə(ɹ)/) only a lot previously.

 

I can patiently wait for the update, got enough other stuff to do and I'm waiting for my Moza AB9 FFB base (= sAlVaTiOn! Finally!) anyways.

[vvm13]

In the case of Afghanistan, I would be happy with a Closed Beta. And I wouldn’t complain about the crashes, and I wouldn’t tell anyone. It's still better than waiting.

[shagrat]

Am 6.7.2024 um 20:25 schrieb Hammer1-1:

is it? is it the reason why this patch was delayed? they way I understand it and the fact that there are 2 mods that fix the issue, its just a file that needs updated.  why would a file that pertains only to the F-15E radar break other aircraft or DCS as a whole?

 

Because, that file, may be multiple files, does exist in a framework and uses an API to get/send data from/to the DCS environment etc. or a bunch of other potential issues... 

[Gierasimov]

19 hours ago, pat. said:

Does anybody know the name of the airport / airbase?

Where is that banner from? Is it real or fake?

Edited July 8, 2024 by Gierasimov