Announcing Lock On: Flaming Cliffs 3

[dores893]

A Questionable Idea at Best

 

Re-hashing old code into DCS: World is one thing. Charging for it like it is a new game is entirely different, and, frankly, somewhat shocking. Why would anyone who owns and plays FC2 spend $40 to play essentially the same game in DCS: World?? Sure, there may be some improved graphics and possibly minor systems modifications, but essentially this is the same survey sim we have been playing for years. Charging for it like it's a new game is absurd. I play FC2, have great frame rates, and have a lot of fun. Would I have more fun doing the same thing in DCS: World? I highly doubt it. How about we save our cash for the next high fidelity jet to come to DCS?

 

Also, I'm not convinced that perverting DCS: Word with hop in and go survey jets is a good thing. Imagine a scenario where you are plopping down into your DCS: F-18 to do the proper 5-10 minute startup when all your opponent has to do is throttle up and go. Imagine your flight dynamics and weapons systems are modeled accurately, when your appointment just has to point and shoot. Is this really a blessing? I say leave the survey sims where they belong.

[Dejjvid]

It's 100% up to you if you want to fly with FC3 aircrafts.

 

When DCS:Fighter enters the scene it will eat everything else for breakfast just as the A-10C will outperform the A-10A in every possible way.

[cichlidfan]

When the patch comes out are we gonna have to Download DCSW all over again or is this gonna be a simple patch onto DCSW? I hate downloading this stuff over and over.

 

It is a pretty safe bet, IMHO.

[joey45]

Unless they come out with this patcher type thingie...

[cichlidfan]

Well EU court have juridiction only inside EU and candidates for EU membership. I know that =SE=Sova lives in Montenegro and Montenegro is member candidate so...

 

That would be between the lawyers.

 

I am sure ED expects all of the purchasers of their products to abide by the license. What you do is, of course, entirely up to you.

 

EDIT: Of course, there is also that activation limit thing to keep track of too!

Edited September 4, 2012 by cichlidfan

[cichlidfan]

Unless they come out with this patcher type thingie...

 

They are going to be releasing updates to World, P-51, CA and likely A-10 and BS2 as well, along with FC3. I sincerely doubt they have had time to get the auto patcher working. Especially considering they have had only limited luck with patching manually in the past.

[dores893]

What is ED's Business Model?

 

I also have to say that I am really confused with ED's business model. First a survey sim, then a high fidelity helicopter simulator to prove ED can get military contracts, followed by another high fidelity sim setting the standard in survey sims, followed by a P-51 Mustang (still haven't figured out where that fits in), following by a generic tank sim, and now reinsert the survey sim.

 

I think ED needs to focus on making high fidelity airplanes for military contracts, because that is likely where the money is. Then water it down for the rest of us, and it will still be great. Fuel is expensive and computers are not, so that seems like a huge market area untapped. Hell, the Russian Air Force barely gets any flight hours these days, so I would think they were my biggest costumer. Then there is China and India all flying the same aircraft.

 

Perhaps the issue is that military contracts are difficult to get, or perhaps even unclassified airplanes are few and far between. Or, it could be your marketing folks. Whatever the reason, nickel and diming a small community of mostly US simmers with random products is probably not going to work in the long run. Wags, I want to see ED stick to a long-term business strategy.

[Kuky]

If you love to fly the F-15C FC3 is pretty much like a new game in comparison to FC2. There is large difference in graphics, the cockpit makes world of difference (in graphics department also) and the introduction of AFM for A2A missiles. If you like Russian aircraft, the introduction of AFM for A2A missiles is very welcome and should make difference in how you use your weapons, I would really like if Russian aircraft at least got new external model, but saddly there isn't so this is only disapointing thing to me regarding FC3.

[GGTharos]

There will also be differences to the types of missions you can fly - some of the ME stuff can actually created a more varied mission environment.

[RoaringBones]

There will also be differences to the types of missions you can fly - some of the ME stuff can actually created a more varied mission environment.

I think an auto updater would be great! god forbid when all those years of playing..Il2 didn't have it ugh.

[Pyroflash]

There will also be differences to the types of missions you can fly - some of the ME stuff can actually created a more varied mission environment.

 

Yeah, the new World trigger system combined with the new resource manager should bring some extremely welcome improvements to mission makers.

[Cmdr_Scott]

I want new skins right away! either this: or this

Edited September 5, 2012 by Cmdr_Scott
messed up

[Grimes]

Use the F-15C template that is made available for custom skins. :D

http://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/downloads/misc/f-15c_template/

[element1108]

I want new skins right away! either this: or this

 

+ 1nd

 

Starscream skin would make me fictionally giddy ;)

[Pyroflash]

+ 1nd

 

Starscream skin would make me fictionally giddy ;)

 

You'd have to wait for the F-22A module :D

[Cali]

If you love to fly the F-15C FC3 is pretty much like a new game in comparison to FC2. There is large difference in graphics, the cockpit makes world of difference (in graphics department also) and the introduction of AFM for A2A missiles. If you like Russian aircraft, the introduction of AFM for A2A missiles is very welcome and should make difference in how you use your weapons, I would really like if Russian aircraft at least got new external model, but saddly there isn't so this is only disapointing thing to me regarding FC3.

 

Someone will make a new model for the Russian jets soon enough, so calm down Kuky.

[EtherealN]

I think ED needs to focus on making high fidelity airplanes for military contracts, because that is likely where the money is.

 

This is a myth. You don't make wads of cash developing DTS products - simply because it would (usually at least) be a "cost+" arrangement. This means that you can't make a loss on the product, since the client will pay all costs, but you also have a fixed profit, or "premium", associated with the project.

 

Hell, the Russian Air Force barely gets any flight hours these days

 

Your information here is about 15 years out of date. As stands right now (and has for a while), the Russian economy is expanding quite fast and the government itself has almost no debt at all. The Russian air force has no problems flying. The thing that HAS been a problem is that during the troublesome 90's they had to be careful with their expenses since debt and economy was in a bad situation, which means that while russian technology is now advancing quite well, it has only started seeing effect in actual force deployments. (This is why there is such a large difference between what the russians have developed in systems, and what the "average" air force plane actually has. But this is changing very fast.)

 

Wags, I want to see ED stick to a long-term business strategy.

 

That is exactly what ED is doing. ;)

DCS World sees the codebase finally transitioned into a modular system, something that was intended ever since development of DCS: Black Shark (but turned out harder to do than originally anticipated), where 3rd parties can develop all sorts of fun things for the platform and thus, over time, give us a "complete" combat simulation including not only realistic aircraft but also land unit, strategic and tactical combat, naval combat etcetera etcetera. As always though, things take time. But you can be assured that this has been underway a lot longer than since original announcement, it has always been a plan - just a hard-to-turn-into-reality plan that took a lot of time. :)

[EtherealN]

Regarding EULAs, the EU court did not invalidate them. What they did was rule on a specific clause in them - the no-resale clause common to DD platforms like Steam and Origin. I'll note that ED has, even before the ruling, been helpful in assisting people to transfer their licenses.

 

But there is an important difference between transferring a license, and letting all your friends use your license. It is a one-person license. If you want to give it to your friend, you can. But you cannot purchase one license and then have 8 friends use it simultaneously. That is NOT what the EU court ruled on.

 

And of course, no-one is going to send the MiBs on you if you let a friend try out a game at your house. I let family members try out production versions of the simulators whenever they visit, if they want, and this is fine. But it is NOT fine to pass along my serial number to them so that they can use it at their home - unless I, at that time, discontinue my own use of that license.

[Cmdr_Scott]

You'd have to wait for the F-22A module :D

 

thats the weak/gay M. Bay Starscream... G1 Starscream has dat NULL RAY! also he is epic:doh:

[VAOZoky]

Regarding EULAs, the EU court did not invalidate them. What they did was rule on a specific clause in them - the no-resale clause common to DD platforms like Steam and Origin. I'll note that ED has, even before the ruling, been helpful in assisting people to transfer their licenses.

 

But there is an important difference between transferring a license, and letting all your friends use your license. It is a one-person license. If you want to give it to your friend, you can. But you cannot purchase one license and then have 8 friends use it simultaneously. That is NOT what the EU court ruled on.

 

And of course, no-one is going to send the MiBs on you if you let a friend try out a game at your house. I let family members try out production versions of the simulators whenever they visit, if they want, and this is fine. But it is NOT fine to pass along my serial number to them so that they can use it at their home - unless I, at that time, discontinue my own use of that license.

 

You are completly right. If i sell/gift my licence to someone else i must remove software from my computer.

[Amuro]

If you love to fly the F-15C FC3 is pretty much like a new game in comparison to FC2. There is large difference in graphics, the cockpit makes world of difference (in graphics department also) and the introduction of AFM for A2A missiles.

WOW that is very nice to know. F-15C is pretty much the only plane I bought FC2 for.

[Milene]

Hell, the Russian Air Force barely gets any flight hours these days

 

Ehm no ! We have been intercepting Tupolev Tu-142 Bears more and more lately since the end of the USSR. Russians are hitting the skies again and they are there to stay ;)

[almonds]

 

That is exactly what ED is doing. ;)

DCS World sees the codebase finally transitioned into a modular system, something that was intended ever since development of DCS: Black Shark (but turned out harder to do than originally anticipated), where 3rd parties can develop all sorts of fun things for the platform and thus, over time, give us a "complete" combat simulation including not only realistic aircraft but also land unit, strategic and tactical combat, naval combat etcetera etcetera. As always though, things take time. But you can be assured that this has been underway a lot longer than since original announcement, it has always been a plan - just a hard-to-turn-into-reality plan that took a lot of time. :)

 

So we can expect DCS world to be something like Battlefied, Arma, etc. in the future?

[Pyroflash]

So we can expect DCS world to be something like Battlefied, Arma, etc. in the future?

 

Not really, unless it is some sort of weird ArmA where you have to buy each plane you want to fly, or ship you want to sail :P.

[EtherealN]

I'm not sure about "expect", and of course Battlefield and ARMA are not what is being aimed at, since DCS has an interest in realism. And a lot of this depends on 3rd parties getting involved with certain aspects, but if we look long term (whether this be 2 years or 10 years I don't know) we could see a single system combining flight sim, tank sim, naval sim, and things like good old Harpoon in the same package. (Imagine playing Harpoon or NCB but with humans in control of each aircraft and vessel.)

 

It's one of those cases of the groundwork is getting there, but remains to be seen where the market takes us. But personally I'd absolutely LOVE sitting in a Harpoon-style interface directing a naval force-on-force carrier battle with actual humans (on both sides) flying the planes as well as an other human controlling the OPFOR strategically just like I am. The optimist in me would say that this is only a few years away, but it might also be possible that there simply is no market in there to allow it to happen at all. But imagine something similar to Combined Arms, but for naval vessels, and integrate the resource management system into it, and then throw organized online squadrons into this... It is highly possible within the DCS World system so I am very hopeful about what the future can bring. :)