Features of the Digital Nature engine

[Ataros]

I have heard that current version of the engine used in RoF has its limitations like use of DX9 only, flat trees rotating to face a player, no bump-mapping on land textures unlike in CloD engine. Also I have read concerns that the engine is not very friendly to online wars like VEF, SEOW or ADW and thus no wars were created for RoF in 1-2 years after its release.

 

Can someone more familiar with graphics/engine technologies share what can be improved and what can not within the timeframe given till release (1 year?). IIRC it was mentioned on RoF forums that it is not financially feasible to re-create a DX10 engine for RoF and it will remain DX9 only. I hope it is changed after this 1C deal.

 

Another question to more frequent RoF players than myself is what engine features they want to be changed in BoS compared to RoF. I personally is looking forward to DX10/11 features, better trees and landscape lighting/shading, C# scripting possibilities for mission makers, etc.

 

It would be a pity to lose some features present in CloD because of moving to RoF engine even if there are other advantages in it (like development cost and time, great FM, GUI, editor, etc.).

Edited December 11, 2012 by Ataros

[15[Span.]/JG51Costa]

Very good questions Sir.

Waiting forward for the answers.

Edited December 11, 2012 by Tte. Costa

[Ribbs]

I'm really hoping they will be able to include the C# scripting abilities into the ROF engine.

[chdt]

Hi all,

 

Yes, it is a pity that the Clod engine is dropped, because on high-end PC's it is georgous, on the contrary to ROF engine, which I find quite dull.

Nevertheless, I will look with interest the further developments, hoping that the new IL-2 will not simply be "IL-2 with ROF engine".

[ACG_Dickie]

More than just C# scripting actually.  One of the chaps from Air Combat Group implemented a new plugin on the server side for "Fighter Command",  that is an RDF system for the RAF to be vectored intercept human and AI formations, and for axis to rendezvous with bomber formations for escort duties, which has been in use on the Storm of War campaign for the past few weeks  (no this is way more advanced than the heavy scripted system on ATAG).  So, this kind of bolt on which makes multiplayer so much more powerful with no expense to the development team should be considered.

 

I'm particularly interested in ground objects and AI formations in multiplayer.  There's no way we can get 100 human bomber pilots to fly together so for the authentic scene we need AI.  I understand AI in MP on ROF is not possible at present though.  Although I am not interested in the eastern front I would support a new series if it were to deliver these kinds of aspects and of course import the Battle of Britain as a goal.

Edited December 11, 2012 by Osprey

[Ataros]

No AI bombers in MP will be a disaster. Please tell me it is not true...

 

Here is an indication of limited number of ground units in MP too ((

 

1) Will IL2 Sturmovik BOS have the same limitations as ROF engine (limited NO of ground units in MP in one mission etc...)?

 

I hope it is possible to overcome these issues till release.

[Fishbreath]

I'm particularly interested in ground objects and AI formations in multiplayer.  There's no way we can get 100 human bomber pilots to fly together so for the authentic scene we need AI.  I understand AI in MP on ROF is not possible at present though.  Although I am not interested in the eastern front I would support a new series if it were to deliver these kinds of aspects and of course import the Battle of Britain as a goal.

 

Both AI air units and ground units are possible in RoF multiplayer. They're not inexpensive in terms of server resources required, but they're more than doable.

[JediMaster]

More than just C# scripting actually.  One of the chaps from Air Combat Group implemented a new plugin on the server side for "Fighter Command",  that is an RDF system for the RAF to be vectored intercept human and AI formations, and for axis to rendezvous with bomber formations for escort duties, which has been in use on the Storm of War campaign for the past few weeks  (no this is way more advanced than the heavy scripted system on ATAG).  So, this kind of bolt on which makes multiplayer so much more powerful with no expense to the development team should be considered.

 

I'm particularly interested in ground objects and AI formations in multiplayer.  There's no way we can get 100 human bomber pilots to fly together so for the authentic scene we need AI.  I understand AI in MP on ROF is not possible at present though.  Although I am not interested in the eastern front I would support a new series if it were to deliver these kinds of aspects and of course import the Battle of Britain as a goal.

 

I don't know, I fly ROF MP with AI planes in it all the time. Of course, I fly coop, I ignore dogfight, so I have no idea what restrictions are there.

[gavagai]

I think it's very hard to say what the digital nature engine is capable of.  Remember that RoF was released in 2009 and was originally optimized for windows XP!

 

Trees?  In RoF they are 2d sprites, but you can collide with them, unlike CoD.  There's no good reason for them to be 2d except to save system resources for other things.

 

AI aircraft are very different in RoF than in CoD.  In RoF the AI use the same flight model as the player, with all of the calculations that implies.  That doesn't make them any smarter  , but you don't see the funky-chicken moves that you see in CoD.  The downside is that AI aircraft are consequently much more CPU taxing than in CoD.  The potential for AI aircraft and ground wars in BoS will depend on how the team approaches this issue, it is not writ in stone.

 

As for graphics, I think Rise of Flight is beautiful already.  I upgraded earlier this year, but one of the best things about the digital nature engine is that it is accommodating of slightly older hardware.  A lot people came to RoF when their new hardware couldn't run CoD adequately, but performed very well with RoF.

[Gun_Jam]

The problem is the DN engine has alot of severe limitations to mission building. Its is VERY easy to get an un-playable mission in a short time with very few objects in there. It has hampered all the mission editors from day one. If you put very much in a mission it becomes un-playable very fast. Now add in the failure crew of IL2:COD and you have a real mess and we lose one of the great WWI sims.

 

Look at IL2:COD and see how bad its doing and go figure why 777 joined them. Makes zero sense and it will kill ROF within the year. Development of ROF will most likely fall off to a trickle as soon as the current projects are done. They are alreay moving most of the leadship crew of ROF over to the new project and that leave ROF hanging in the wind without its leaders. Bad Bad Bad news on the front, Wait and see if this doesnt hold true, check out the team leaders here.... its the ones that used to lead ROF, but no more. Skeleton crew at ROF very soon it will die by the way side.

[102nd-YU-Pirke]

this will be new engine ?

 

http://www.outerra.com/forum/index.php?topic=637.0

[MadTommy]

The problem is the DN engine has alot of severe limitations to mission building. Its is VERY easy to get an un-playable mission in a short time with very few objects in there. It has hampered all the mission editors from day one. If you put very much in a mission it becomes un-playable very fast. Now add in the failure crew of IL2:COD and you have a real mess and we lose one of the great WWI sims.

 

Look at IL2:COD and see how bad its doing and go figure why 777 joined them. Makes zero sense and it will kill ROF within the year. Development of ROF will most likely fall off to a trickle as soon as the current projects are done. They are alreay moving most of the leadship crew of ROF over to the new project and that leave ROF hanging in the wind without its leaders. Bad Bad Bad news on the front, Wait and see if this doesnt hold true, check out the team leaders here.... its the ones that used to lead ROF, but no more. Skeleton crew at ROF very soon it will die by the way side.

 

I love how you portray your guesses and assumptions as some sort of fact.  You only seem to see the potential negatives, you must be a joy to be around. 

 

Wait and see indeed.

[Graawl]

The RoF engine should benefit from the improvements that will be made in BoS. I fail to see why it could'nt.

 

Also, former Maddox developpers are probably well exeprienced and the engine will benefit from this new view.

 

I think the new RoF's Channel map will be a good headstart to what we should expect graphically for Stalingrad !

 

 

Cheers from France ! 

[Revvin]

You are basing your assumptions on the game RoF is now and not the game engine that will power the next IL-2. RoF has evolved massively over its lifetime so there's no need to be negative now, lets wait and see and put our wishes across in a sensible adult manner and not descend into a negative panic.

[Trooper117]

Well said!

[LG1.Farber]

I really hope the next engine to promote IL2 is able do now what we do in Cliffs of Dover! 

 

Ive just been and asked a group which has succesfully ran a server in RoF since its release about the current state of the engine.  The answers were pretty grim.  75 players, 60-70 ground and if you have fewer players, say 35, you can have 8 - 16 AI aircraft.  Apparently its to do with multi-threading and cores.

 

 

 

Currently on clod without dedicated server files on our server (Storm of War) I'd say the confortable max for client performance is more like 90 players, 1200 statics (Some people I know have used 4000) and ground AI, and 50 AI bombers...  Anything less simply will not do.

 

Fingers crossed.

Edited December 11, 2012 by 5JG27Farber

[Krupi]

I really hope the next engine to promote IL2 is able do now what we do in Cliffs of Dover! 

 

Ive just been and asked a group which has succesfully ran a server in RoF since its release about the current state of the engine.  The answers were pretty grim.  75 players, 60-70 ground and if you have fewer players, say 35, you can have 8 - 16 AI aircraft.  Apparently its to do with multi-threading and cores.

 

 

 

Currently on clod without dedicated server files on our server (Storm of War) I'd say the confortable max for client performance is more like 90 players, 1200 statics (Some people I know have used 4000) and ground AI, and 50 AI bombers...  Anything less simply will not do.

 

Fingers crossed.

+1

 

But lets see what they can do!

[AndyJWest]

I can't see any reason why the low object limit in RoF could be anything but CPU/RAM limited, and presumably BoM will have a higher minimum spec than RoF. I'm sure the developers are aware of the need to handle more than RoF currently can - and RoF itself has improved significantly since release. 

[Kling]

Check this youtube link.. It says it the digital nature engine...

I am not sure if its the same...

 

 But it sure looks promising if it is!

Edited December 11, 2012 by Kling

[Sim]

The BoS engine will be still DX9 based (confirmed by Jason in Q&A thread).

Edited December 11, 2012 by Sim

[Kling]

The BoS engine will be still DX9 based (confirmed by Jason in Q&A thread).

Link please... think im too stupid to find it

 

I only find this one

 

Q. Will BOS be based on the Digital Nature engine (777 Studios Technology)?

A. Yes, the Digital Nature engine and associated technologies will be the basis for BOS, but of course work will be done to make it ready for WWII aircraft and other changes to the code will no doubt occur over time. The engine is an ever evolving piece of software.

 

That doesnt say that the engine hasnt gone into a new stage of development..

Edited December 11, 2012 by Kling

[Sim]

Link please... think im too stupid to find it

 

http://forum.il2sturmovik.net/index.php?showtopic=7&page=2&do=findComment&comment=332

 

 

1. It's not a brand new engine. DX9 will be standard at launch.

[gibbage]

Check this youtube link.. It says it the digital nature engine...

I am not sure if its the same...

 

 But it sure looks promising if it is!

 

 

Sorry, but thats Vue7, a rendering system, not a game engine.  The Digital Nature is just part of the tree system in Vue7.  It has nothing to do with games.

Edited December 11, 2012 by gibbage

[Kling]

Sorry, but thats Vue7, a rendering system, not a game engine.  The Digital Nature is just part of the tree system in Vue7.  It has nothing to do with games.

shame

[kestrel79]

RoF runs great on my current PC, and looks great too. Looking forward to having actual AA again...clouds...and you know it's going to be even better than RoF I'm sure it will evolve so some of the shortcomings will be addressed.

 

And a UI! A glorious UI! RoF menus look great. The quick mission maker interface is the easiest to use in a sim imo. Can't wait to see what these design wizards can do in a ww2 art style.

[SYN_Vander]

I really hope the next engine to promote IL2 is able do now what we do in Cliffs of Dover!

 

Ive just been and asked a group which has succesfully ran a server in RoF since its release about the current state of the engine. The answers were pretty grim. 75 players, 60-70 ground and if you have fewer players, say 35, you can have 8 - 16 AI aircraft. Apparently its to do with multi-threading and cores.

 

 

 

Currently on clod without dedicated server files on our server (Storm of War) I'd say the confortable max for client performance is more like 90 players, 1200 statics (Some people I know have used 4000) and ground AI, and 50 AI bombers... Anything less simply will not do.

 

Fingers crossed.

This is basically what we are aiming for missions on our MP server. You could go a little higher on number of players and moveable objects, but we prefer to have a solid MP experience. I should also explain that while we may have 60 AI objects defined in a mission, we spawn extra objects during gameplay as well.

Also, with a server that has cores running on a higher frequency then we have, you should be able to push these limits towards a 100.

The number of static objects can be - of course - much, much higher.

 

I'm looking forward to see what kind of MP changes will be done for BOS!

Edited December 11, 2012 by SYN_Vander

[102nd-YU-Pirke]

 

 

this will be engine of ALL new simulators !!!

Edited December 11, 2012 by Pirke

[76SQN-FatherTed]

I really hope the next engine to promote IL2 is able do now what we do in Cliffs of Dover! 

 

Ive just been and asked a group which has succesfully ran a server in RoF since its release about the current state of the engine.  The answers were pretty grim.  75 players, 60-70 ground and if you have fewer players, say 35, you can have 8 - 16 AI aircraft.  Apparently its to do with multi-threading and cores.

 

 

 

Currently on clod without dedicated server files on our server (Storm of War) I'd say the confortable max for client performance is more like 90 players, 1200 statics (Some people I know have used 4000) and ground AI, and 50 AI bombers...  Anything less simply will not do.

 

Fingers crossed.

This will probably dissolve in to fanboy name-calling, but I have to say that as both games' engines (CloD and RoF) stand at the present I would rather put up with the limitations of the latter than the former for my "next gen" (after IL2) WW2 combat sim.  I know it's all subjective in terms of how things look and what's important in the game - to me the presence of AI doesn't matter as much as being able to see other planes as they get nearer - but I think this is good news.

[1stCL/Falkon]

+1 for preserving some kind of advanced API for 3rd party development and interaction with game -- ideally in the very similar way Il2:Cliffs of Dover currently has -- namely: C# add-in API, C# mission scripting capability (but the programming language can be different, of course)

 

Please, please, please!

 

More than just C# scripting actually.  One of the chaps from Air Combat Group implemented a new plugin on the server side for "Fighter Command", ...

So, this kind of bolt on which makes multiplayer so much more powerful with no expense to the development team should be considered.

 

...

 I personally is looking forward to DX10/11 features, better trees and landscape lighting/shading, C# scripting possibilities for mission makers, etc.

...

 

I'm really hoping they will be able to include the C# scripting abilities into the ROF engine.

[SJ_Butcher]

is this new game running with the same graphic as ROF? for the 2014 I think dx9 will be obsolete

[69th_chuter]

It???

[Mogster]

A couple of years ago people said the view distance in ROF was hard coded, that it was impossible for the dev's to change without making our PC's cry. What happened was a patch out of the blue extending the view distance of planes and all objects to a realistic level with NO performance hit. I think even the most jaded forumites were impressed.

 

The way ROF runs on low end systems is impressive, it runs so well that there're regular posts on the ROF board asking the dev's to push the gfx more. I don't think the dev's get enough credit for optimising the DN engine. It looks good and runs well now, this seems to be the opportunity to push to the next level. The engine belongs to 777 and they can do whatever they want with it, no external pressures from publishers.

[SvAF/F19_Klunk]

Yes please yes please on that one:

 

It would be interesting to create a project of another era, 

the Battle of the Pacific Ocean

,

huge aircraft carriers, hundreds of people performing their work on the deck to ensure your take-off or landing

, night operations P-61, flying boats patrolling coastal territories and rescuing crews from wrecked planes, ....

(Albert Zhiltzov ???

Edited December 12, 2012 by F19_Klunk

[chdt]

 Our programmers are already making plans to use DX11 to create graphics and the possibility of 64-bit systems using large amounts of memory. This course will give us the opportunity to make the next technological step, and even more surprising graphics and depth of physical modeling.

 

This is what I wanted to hear  :-)

[SJ_Butcher]

great news then 

[RedToo]

I have heard that current version of the engine used in RoF has its limitations like use of DX9 only, flat trees rotating to face a player, no bump-mapping on land textures unlike in CloD engine. Also I have read concerns that the engine is not very friendly to online wars like VEF, SEOW or ADW and thus no wars were created for RoF in 1-2 years after its release.

 

Can someone more familiar with graphics/engine technologies share what can be improved and what can not within the timeframe given till release (1 year?). IIRC it was mentioned on RoF forums that it is not financially feasible to re-create a DX10 engine for RoF and it will remain DX9 only. I hope it is changed after this 1C deal.

 

Another question to more frequent RoF players than myself is what engine features they want to be changed in BoS compared to RoF. I personally is looking forward to DX10/11 features, better trees and landscape lighting/shading, C# scripting possibilities for mission makers, etc.

 

It would be a pity to lose some features present in CloD because of moving to RoF engine even if there are other advantages in it (like development cost and time, great FM, GUI, editor, etc.).

Good questions.

 

RedToo.

[II./JG27_Rich]

NO! Not the Battle Of Britain again he says with tears in eyes. North Africa first choice or Russia. Back and forth back and forth over that channel for over a year now. It drives a person nuts.

Edited December 12, 2012 by Richie

[LizLemon]

this will be new engine ?

 

http://www.outerra.com/forum/index.php?topic=637.0

 

No. But this engine does use the same method of atmospheric back scattering as CLOD. 

 

Hopefully 777 will be able to use this same method in bos as it is free code that has been used in several games.

[ShamrockOneFive]

NO! Not the Battle Of Britain again he says with tears in eyes. North Africa first choice or Russia. Back and forth back and forth over that channel for over a year now. It drives a person nuts.

QFT... a lot of theatres have been done to death but North Africa has been soundly missed. I doubt the setting will scare people off... it should be a draw actually. The air combat there was intense, features some of the classics, and the scenery would be totally unique (and those familiar with the geography would note that it's not all just sand and dusty ruins).

Edited December 13, 2012 by IceFire

[Ataros]

DX9

http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/3627/rof2012030423080144.jpg

 

DX10

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-t91ahWKFpGU/T2Z5YOlTMSI/AAAAAAAAAfs/y0RGFkwx01g/s1600/Game+-+Prev+1.jpg

 

More on 1C forums http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showpost.php?p=487701&postcount=22

 

I can only hope BoS takes the best from ClOD and from RoF.