opinion Afghanistan user feedback

[Tinman]

Oof...that looks rough.

[Gunfreak]

29 minutes ago, markturner1960 said:

So, in tandem to the other thread, I cant say enough how dissapointed I am to have shelled out more money for the supposed "cutting edge" tech and latest improvements in DCS terrain rendering....to get what is simply put yet another example of blurry textures laid over terrain mesh with -really, definition points measured in the hundreds of metres rather than the centimetres that I was getting in FSX 15 years ago......mountain ranges with dead straight ridgelines hundreds of metres apart....mountain sides comprising flat planes with low res testures pasted over. Repetitive low res textures with detailed areas plonked over the top with no blending. Its really, really dissappointing after the same crap in Kola and SA. Check out these screen shots. Honestly, there are areas of the Caucusus and NTTR that look better than this. Is this really 15 years progress in scenery development in DCS? 

Why oh why oh why are the devs fixated in pumping out low res massive scale maps that are really terrible when they could make the map a quarter of the physical size with the same number of GB and have nice high res textures, more detailed terrain mesh and a lot more happy punters.......

 

Don't say that om Facebook. Or they'll say you are just making drama or have a potato  PC.

Flying 200 feet in the Kiowa a long the Helmand river i spot bad textures and broken terrain geometry every few seconds. Along the exact places you would fly helicopter missions in a British Chinnock pr Apache.

I can fly for an hour down low on Syria in the Kiwo and not spot a single terrible geometry abnormality. And the textures look good.

It seems DCS has decided that they to want to only be 10 000 feet and up simulator. And for Kola at least you knew what you had in store. You knew Orbix bases their products on satellites. And we could see from promo pictures what we got. Not so with Afghanistan.

 

[Branli]

57 minutes ago, markturner1960 said:

So, in tandem to the other thread, I cant say enough how dissapointed I am to have shelled out more money for the supposed "cutting edge" tech and latest improvements in DCS terrain rendering....to get what is simply put yet another example of blurry textures laid over terrain mesh with -really, definition points measured in the hundreds of metres rather than the centimetres that I was getting in FSX 15 years ago......mountain ranges with dead straight ridgelines hundreds of metres apart....mountain sides comprising flat planes with low res testures pasted over. Repetitive low res textures with detailed areas plonked over the top with no blending. Its really, really dissappointing after the same crap in Kola and SA. Check out these screen shots. Honestly, there are areas of the Caucusus and NTTR that look better than this. Is this really 15 years progress in scenery development in DCS? 

Why oh why oh why are the devs fixated in pumping out low res massive scale maps that are really terrible when they could make the map a quarter of the physical size with the same number of GB and have nice high res textures, more detailed terrain mesh and a lot more happy punters.......

 

Are you sure you are looking at the right spots? As mentioned in the notes, not every part of the Afghanistan map is high-res yet. Go checkout Herat. There is an additional shading technology to make the edges of the mountains much more natural. Still polygon edges are there, but its much less of an issue. Also more polygons will hit performance way more. This image below is taken nearby Herat airfield.

Many areas still need some polishing, but what do you expect with such a huge map. I am lost many times when I just go cruising with my camera over this immense map. Also as mentioned by ED, its still in progress and many areas are going to be added with a much higher resolution.

null

Edited July 12, 2024 by Branli

[Gunnar81]

I think it looks pretty cool for an early access map. Sure there are these hiccups here and there but this is literally its first iteration that is less than 1/4 of the finished product.

I saw a youtube guy reviewing the map outside the Southwest region just hating on it. Well no ****! Thats the unfinished part, its all unfinished at this point.

But hey, no need to be patient or positive when the pitchforks are handy by the door.

[inexus]

The map looks horrible. Likely the will not be no statement from ED apart from it it EA and it's not for everybody to use EA products. So even a promise of 'we will deliver the southwest area' doesn't have any min. bar for completeness. 

We are left wondering why ED is rushing out this map and the Chinook.

Edited July 12, 2024 by inexus

[Silvester.E]

I feel the same sadly, disappointed and refunded for now.
 

Looking at the quality from Mariannas, Syria, Sinai, Nevada and now Caucasus, this new standard used on SA, Kola and Afghanistan is something i personally don’t like.

 

Feels like flying over a stretched image with bad rendering and bad depth depending on altitude. Afghanistan is known for a lot of low level assets Rotary and even Fixed like A-10 in Air-Ground situations. On this one i have to stay at least above 15k without losing immersion.
 

I can fly hours on the other maps though, at low and high altitudes with great textures and immersion. Love ED but personally just don’t like the new technology building an map over image. 
 

As deployment to Afghanistan myself, i was looking forward on this one for many many years…
 

I do respect and understand people with different opinion and maybe like the new standard as used in MSFS and FS2004 for maps, i just don’t; feels like we are getting into the BMS style providing world map. 

Edited July 14, 2024 by Silvester.E

[TFS]

The people who are mortified, welp never buy it. To the rest who are enjoying it, it will only get better from here. I'm sorry I'm not having a bad time on this map, jeeze lmao. Sad this is so black and white for some. Areas that lack can be improved. Thought this video would make people happy. 

[Kang]

My two cents are, from what I gathered so far:
The issue here isn't that there are some issues with the map, certainly not that only a part of the 'full' map is done so far. Some areas evidently do look pretty good and some not so much. What bothers me is how that is reminding me a lot of simulators of my youth, that had one valley or one city done reasonably well, and the rest of the world was literally painted on, but that's a personal thing. More importantly it makes me wonder: why did ED insist on releasing this now. They already split Afghanistan in three separate stages, so they could be worked on one after the other and released as they complete. If there is so much work left to be done on this section, wouldn't it have been wiser to keep up developing for a while longer? Sadly we all know how long it can take ED to fix issues that are reported clear as day when they are busy chasing the next release and a lot of the points people point out aren't obscure and remote locations, but places right where you would expect people to set their missions often. Missions that are more likely than not starring helicopters and low-flying aircraft.

Yes... EA isn't for everyone. I'd like to see this improved and finished over time, but the first impression is a bit of a mixed bag.

[Gunfreak]

1 minute ago, Kang said:

My two cents are, from what I gathered so far:
The issue here isn't that there are some issues with the map, certainly not that only a part of the 'full' map is done so far. Some areas evidently do look pretty good and some not so much. What bothers me is how that is reminding me a lot of simulators of my youth, that had one valley or one city done reasonably well, and the rest of the world was literally painted on, but that's a personal thing. More importantly it makes me wonder: why did ED insist on releasing this now. They already split Afghanistan in three separate stages, so they could be worked on one after the other and released as they complete. If there is so much work left to be done on this section, wouldn't it have been wiser to keep up developing for a while longer? Sadly we all know how long it can take ED to fix issues that are reported clear as day when they are busy chasing the next release and a lot of the points people point out aren't obscure and remote locations, but places right where you would expect people to set their missions often. Missions that are more likely than not starring helicopters and low-flying aircraft.

Yes... EA isn't for everyone. I'd like to see this improved and finished over time, but the first impression is a bit of a mixed bag.

Both Afghanistan and Chinnock could have waited several more months. We got Kola, F4, and Kiwoa in about a month. Nobody would have battend a eye if both these came in October or november. Everyone was surprised when ED said than in a couple of months Afghanistan and Chinnock will be released. 

[Nightstalker]

31 minutes ago, Gunnar81 said:

I think it looks pretty cool for an early access map. Sure there are these hiccups here and there but this is literally its first iteration that is less than 1/4 of the finished product.

I saw a youtube guy reviewing the map outside the Southwest region just hating on it. Well no ****! Thats the unfinished part, its all unfinished at this point.

But hey, no need to be patient or positive when the pitchforks are handy by the door.

Dude, do you even read what you buy?  It's the S/W map that is the high rez area.  It's literally called, Southwestern Afghanistan if you bought the partial map.  ED has also stated that this is feature complete so....?

[Nightstalker]

41 minutes ago, Gunfreak said:

Both Afghanistan and Chinnock could have waited several more months. We got Kola, F4, and Kiwoa in about a month. Nobody would have battend a eye if both these came in October or november. Everyone was surprised when ED said than in a couple of months Afghanistan and Chinnock will be released. 

That is the problem with taking pre-orders.  Once you have people's money you are under the gun to deliver in the stated or at least near to stated time.  I wish they would just stick to early access discounts and stop the pre-orders.  It takes the pressure off giving out dates.

[Art-J]

57 minutes ago, TFS said:

The people who are mortified, welp never buy it. To the rest who are enjoying it, it will only get better from here. I'm sorry I'm not having a bad time on this map, jeeze lmao. Sad this is so black and white for some. Areas that lack can be improved. Thought this video would make people happy. 

Keep in mind guys who already bought it from ED shop based on cherry-picked teaser media published before, cannot refund it.

I'd say the issue is not the matter of "black and white" perception, but rather a question of what one gets for his money here compared to other products. It's one of the most advertized releases from ED and yet, many of current 3rd party maps (or even some older ED ones) are simply superior as far as low altitude quality is concerned (where it really matters for majority of players who are going to use it). And they offer that better quality for equal or lower price. Comparisons with other DCS maps are unavoidable then, especially when people expect ED to proudly lead in fidelity race rather than lag behind or even step back.

Granted, the region depicted is in EA phase indeed, so it can certainly be improved. However, if you stay with DCS as long as some of us, you will eventually notice that modules tend to stay in EA / "kinda-sorta-good enough" state for years, with only game crashing bugs being dealt with swiftly while the rest of the issues usually end up in "low priority" development barrel, rarely to be fished out of it again, if ever. At the same time bulk of ED workforce immediately moves to other projects (remaining Afghan parts, Iraq and WWII Marianas in this case I presume), 'cause that's what keeps DCS business running. As such, "it will only get better from here" should rather be rephrased as "it might only get better from here". But will it - remains to be seen, though everyone obviously hopes it will.

Still, If you enjoy the map already in its current state, that's the most important thing. Have fun!

Edited July 12, 2024 by Art-J

[Weta43]

I tried to find lots of ways to phrase this that were more polite, but it boils down to - why the F*** do people keep buying early access products - that are clearly labelled as unfinished - then go into emotional meltdowns and paroxysms of forum post rage when they discover the unfinished product they bought is ... unfinished?

All the maps were of poorer quality when released than they are now - ALL OF THEM.

Frame rates on the Mariannas map were so poor when it was released that after trying the day I downloaded I didn't even bother looking at it again for months & until it had been patched a few times. It's a nice map now, but wasn't when released. 

Afghanistan is in its first day of Early Access & people are complaining that it's not as polished as maps that have been being patched and de-bugged for years - in some cases a decade or more.

After the tsunami of whingeing that appeared on the map's release, I downloaded & started it with a heavy heart, but I'm pleasantly surprised.

There are some rough bits but on the whole - it looks an interesting map & geographically varied (even the north-east part of the initial release is far from being 'another desert map'), the frame rates are good, bits of the map are beautiful, and at 0m to 50m altitude, and from a couple of thousand m AGL it looks very nice. In between there are a few things to work on - but that's why they repeatedly, all over the forum, all over the download page and all over every social media channel and internet site it's mentioned on, say 'IT'S NOT FINISHED"

If, when they say it's 'finished', you think its's not up to scratch - complain then.

If it takes too long to get to 'finished' complain about that (but please wait at least a week from today)

But for God's sake please stop complaining that the product you consciously bought in the full knowledge that it is unfinished, is unfinished, & do the rest of us a favour by not buying any more early access products.

Please.

We'll all be happier

[Weta43]

These are all the way over in China, never mind the parts of the map that are theoretically more developed.

[Gunfreak]

21 minutes ago, Weta43 said:

I tried to find lots of ways to phrase this that were more polite, but it boils down to - why the F*** do people keep buying early access products - that are clearly labelled as unfinished - then go into emotional meltdowns and paroxysms of forum post rage when they discover the unfinished product they bought is ... unfinished?

All the maps were of poorer quality when released than they are now - ALL OF THEM.

Frame rates on the Mariannas map were so poor when it was released that after trying the day I downloaded I didn't even bother looking at it again for months & until it had been patched a few times. It's a nice map now, but wasn't when released. 

Afghanistan is in its first day of Early Access & people are complaining that it's not as polished as maps that have been being patched and de-bugged for years - in some cases a decade or more.

After the tsunami of whingeing that appeared on the map's release, I downloaded & started it with a heavy heart, but I'm pleasantly surprised.

There are some rough bits but on the whole - it looks an interesting map & geographically varied (even the north-east part of the initial release is far from being 'another desert map'), the frame rates are good, bits of the map are beautiful, and at 0m to 50m altitude, and from a couple of thousand m AGL it looks very nice. In between there are a few things to work on - but that's why they repeatedly, all over the forum, all over the download page and all over every social media channel and internet site it's mentioned on, say 'IT'S NOT FINISHED"

If, when they say it's 'finished', you think its's not up to scratch - complain then.

If it takes too long to get to 'finished' complain about that (but please wait at least a week from today)

But for God's sake please stop complaining that the product you consciously bought in the full knowledge that it is unfinished, is unfinished, & do the rest of us a favour by not buying any more early access products.

Please.

We'll all be happier

Afghanistan was hailed by ED themselves as showcasing the best of EDs map technology. And it looks worse almost all other maps. (And that's just the high detail area) 

The building assets and a few of the new trees etc look good. But on the whole it looks worse then other maps.

South western Afghanistan was also touted as feature complete. And so one would assume the early access parts are for the none finished parts of the map and not south western Afghanistan.

[Weta43]

Quote

You've never run a company if you think you can call your paying customers spoiled rotten whingers as you say.

They probably won't, and neither will I, and as a simple customer & can easily see that the old maxim "the customer is always right"  is a crock and the reality is a lot of customers are entitled whingers - & that a lot of them don't read the product description before buying

[Weta43]

1 minute ago, Gunfreak said:

(...)And so one would assume the early access parts are for the none finished parts of the map and not south western Afghanistan.

One would assume that only if one didn't read any of the notices on the download page:

[Gunfreak]

1 minute ago, Weta43 said:

One would assume that only if one didn't read any of the notices on the download page:

But it's not bugs though. A lot of it is just how DCS engine is. It's exactly the same on Kola and South Atlantic map. 

Low quality textures.  Texture meshes overlapping. And incomplete again can obviously be related to missing parts of the map.

[Guille H. Mono]

46 minutes ago, Weta43 said:

I tried to find lots of ways to phrase this that were more polite, but it boils down to - why the F*** do people keep buying early access products - that are clearly labelled as unfinished - then go into emotional meltdowns and paroxysms of forum post rage when they discover the unfinished product they bought is ... unfinished?

All the maps were of poorer quality when released than they are now - ALL OF THEM.

Frame rates on the Mariannas map were so poor when it was released that after trying the day I downloaded I didn't even bother looking at it again for months & until it had been patched a few times. It's a nice map now, but wasn't when released. 

Afghanistan is in its first day of Early Access & people are complaining that it's not as polished as maps that have been being patched and de-bugged for years - in some cases a decade or more.

After the tsunami of whingeing that appeared on the map's release, I downloaded & started it with a heavy heart, but I'm pleasantly surprised.

There are some rough bits but on the whole - it looks an interesting map & geographically varied (even the north-east part of the initial release is far from being 'another desert map'), the frame rates are good, bits of the map are beautiful, and at 0m to 50m altitude, and from a couple of thousand m AGL it looks very nice. In between there are a few things to work on - but that's why they repeatedly, all over the forum, all over the download page and all over every social media channel and internet site it's mentioned on, say 'IT'S NOT FINISHED"

If, when they say it's 'finished', you think its's not up to scratch - complain then.

If it takes too long to get to 'finished' complain about that (but please wait at least a week from today)

But for God's sake please stop complaining that the product you consciously bought in the full knowledge that it is unfinished, is unfinished, & do the rest of us a favour by not buying any more early access products.

Please.

We'll all be happier

Hey mate, you can come with the EA song and all the screenshots and lectures you want but here are people just expressing a reasonable level of disappointment.

At the end these are personal points of view and part of the feedback the EA process provides for the good of all. If you can not deal with opinions that don't match your own there is a 'praise the map' topic.  

[Weta43]

11 minutes ago, Gunfreak said:

But it's not bugs though. A lot of it is just how DCS engine is. It's exactly the same on Kola and South Atlantic map. 

Low quality textures.  Texture meshes overlapping. And incomplete again can obviously be related to missing parts of the map.

So let me see if I've got it...

You believed from previous experience - & before purchase - that this is how the DCS graphics engine renders maps - & you don't like it...

& you knew - again, before purchase - that this map was unfinished...

but you still find it necessary to complain loudly after purchasing it that the map is unfinished & doesn't render terrain to your satisfaction?

¯\(°_o)/¯

Nope - I don't get it

(& you probably shouldn't have)

[Weta43]

14 minutes ago, Guille H. Mono said:

Hey mate, you can come with the EA song and all the screenshots and lectures you want but here are people just expressing a reasonable level of disappointment.

At the end these are personal points of view and part of the feedback the EA process provides for the good of all. If you can not deal with opinions that don't match your own there is a 'praise the map' topic.  

Isn't what constitutes "A reasonable level of disappointment" the question though?

Is it "reasonable" to buy a green hard, plainly unripe avocado from the the market, then go back to the market the next day demanding your money back because the avocado wasn't ripe when you got it home? 

If you can't find a ripe avocado in the bulk-bin you either don't buy an avocado, or you buy one & wait for it to ripen. Buying it knowing it's not ripe then complaining after the fact that it's not ripe is not expressing a 'reasonable level of disappointment' 

To the extent that there is a 'reasonable level of disappointment' to be felt here, it should be those people who purchased the early access map - that as I showed above it is plainly stated on the website is unfinished and buggy - being disappointed that they let their impatience get the better of them & purchased something that with a little aforethought they would have known they were going to be unhappy with.

Going back to the avocado analogy - if I knowingly buy an unripe avocado for my dinner tonight, the person I should be disappointed with when it's currently inedible is myself, not the supermarket for selling it to me.

As to the second point - I can deal with other people's opinions, but I don't have to agree with them & as you said, this is the place to express them  

(Also - are you actually complaining that I'm killing the complaining vibe in the complaining thread & should take my lack of understanding for complaining to where it doesn't upset people ?)

[Nightstalker]

23 minutes ago, Weta43 said:

So let me see if I've got it...

You believed from previous experience - & before purchase - that this is how the DCS graphics engine renders maps - & you don't like it...

& you knew - again, before purchase - that this map was unfinished...

but you still find it necessary to complain loudly after purchasing it that the map is unfinished & doesn't render terrain to your satisfaction?

¯\(°_o)/¯

Nope - I don't get it

(& you probably shouldn't have)

Maybe you need to go to the first page and first post of the Afghanistan map announcement and actually read what this map was going to release like including extensive performance testing.  You sound like someone who just had his favourite sports team insulted.  These modules are not cheap and customers have every right to complain if they’re not happy.  If you’re happy go fly a plane instead of white knighting on the forums.

[Weta43]

Just now, Nightstalker said:

Maybe you need to go to the first page and first post of the Afghanistan map announcement and actually read what this map was going to release like including extensive performance testing.  You sound like someone who just had his favourite sports team insulted.  These modules are not cheap and customers have every right to complain if they’re not happy.  If you’re happy go fly a plane instead of white knighting on the forums.

 

 

[Ignition]

Very low texture resolution map and low poly mesh, looks terrible.

The google maps textures are not well suited for a game like this.

Edited July 13, 2024 by Ignition

[Guille H. Mono]

There is something that keeps you here trying to make your points instead of enjoying the map.