Gen IV

[II/JG17_HerrMurf]

So, what are your expectations and how much are you gonna pay?

 

I am, of course, talking about Il2 Gen IV. Let’s call it ten years hence. What do you anticipate from such a game? What do you want in said game? What technologies will have advanced in gaming by then?

 

The development of our current game will peak in perhaps eight years or so before it begins getting dated, both hardware and graphics wise. A new engine will be a must. I’m thinking we’ll be on Window’s 14'ish and DirectX 16 or 17. Virtual Reality will be the norm in many aspects of business and gaming by then. Will VR be true HD – 4K’ish and 120 fps? Global high speed connections will need to be the norm to drive it for Co-op and large MP fields.

 

Will games be photorealistic and hard to distinguish from actual reality? Will anyone make a commercially viable full motion simulator? Does the future of flight simming demand a combined arms approach to be successful in the NextGen simulators? Perhaps not infantry but air, ground, and sailing vehicles.

 

The world is yours but what will the costs be and what would sell? What would you invest your time and money in from a gamers perspective? Remember there is a difference between what you want, what you NEED and what can be developed within a developer’s budget. And lordy, what will be the developers budget and what are you going to pay for that Gen IV game?

 

The jump in sim pricing caught a few off guard this time but I feel I’ve completely gotten my money’s worth. I’m already waiting to toss money at the next theater of the current game. Even my wife thinks I’ve got my money’s worth on this one and that’s saying something. Will prices have to double for a Gen IV game? I’m thinking it’ll probably be at least a 50% jump and I’m OK with that.

 

Just dreaming a bit here………………………

[BeastyBaiter]

I'd say look at the past to give an idea. What did we have 10 years ago? Answer: IL2:PF and LOMAC running on something around 1200x800 resolution on a 19" screen. Judging by that, I think 4k will be the norm with something above that being high end. Monitors probably won't be any bigger due to desk/wall space issues. VR will be more common but still not standard due to price and nausea with many users. In terms of what the games themselves will provide, better graphics, better physics and better damage modeling of course. AI and missions probably won't change any though since those go up and down in quality title to title. Full motion is never going to be common. Ignoring the price of such systems, where would most players even put such a thing? With all that said, I don't think that generation is so far off. BoS is already looking dated due to the low texture resolution and low poly cockpits. I suspect that your GenIV IL2 is more likely to be a core code update to our current IL2 line similar to how DCS is making the jump to DX11 and already shifted to 64bit. I'd wager the real pinch will come with the release of BoM. It will be painfully obvious to everyone that DX9 and 32bit has no place in a DX12 64bit world and so the next expansion would also entail an update to the digital nature engine. It might even make it's way to RoF, assuming it's still being supported at that point.

[Finkeren]

I don't really know what to expect from a sim 10 years from now, but I'd propably be willing to pay over 100 Yuan per plane.

[SCG_Space_Ghost]

An Me262 for every man, woman and child. FalkeEins for President, 2025! 

 

But on a serious note...

• VR will be the norm (I disagree with Hrothgar's assessment that cost/accessibility will be off putting)
• Multi-core support and scalability
• 64bit standard for applications 
• Gigabit internet for the majority of the world's developed nations

 

Multi-core support/scalability and a 64bit standard would do a lot to drive the capabilities of gaming applications forward.

[Feathered_IV]

When I saw "Il-2 Gen IV" in the original post, I thought I'd missed the news somewhere and my first thought was Luthier was back. This time with the 1946 source code.