Campaign yays and boos

[heinkill]

Fantastic news in the latest update about the attention being given to the single player experience. Very very very heartening, and here are some off the cuff reactions from en empassioned single player advocate.

 

 

Yay

When you begin the Historical campaign you'll be prompted to choose which one of operation's phases you want to start in

 

Sounds like the campaign will have some depth.

 

Boo

 

Your progress to the next phases depends on successful completion of missions in each phase.

 

What is this, Call of Duty? If you don't destroy three bombers out of six because your dumb AI wingmen didnt do their job, you have to redo? If you don't destroy the bridge, you can't go to the next mission? Because in real life, pilots had to keep going back to the same target, add infinitum, until they destroyed it? Please rethink this, and give the pilot the choice of whether they refly, or move ahead if they fail a mission.

 

Yay

 

When you enter a phase you'll be asked to join a regiment. The regiments available vary from phase to phase the way it happened back then during Battle of Stalingrad: some squadrons leave, some come to the front lines, join other units or get renamed. Which regiment you choose defines which side you server with - Soviet Air force or German Luftwaffe. You'll be free to change sides before every mission.

 

Good for replayability. Sounds like the single player mode in CoD where you can jump into any side or any aircraft when you start a mission. Interesting to see how this will work in a campaign context, but very creative.

 

Yay

 

Every regiment has a home base and specific aircraft in service. You can use any plane that your regiment has available. Remember, that a plane's design defines the type of mission you'll be offered to play. If you choose a fighter, ground attack or bomber the gameplay will be different which helps us bring you three different flight-sim experiences. The types of missions that are offered are very diverse and give you the freedom to choose one that suits you best. Some players prefer intense dogfights or ground assaults against armor or massive bombing raids hitting transportation lines or troops.

 

Ahh, ok, that sounds cool

 

Boo

 

Weather is taken into account as well. We've preset certain rules for weather in every phase.

 

Dynamic weather would have been nice, but this is better than the 'no weather' we got in CoD!

 

Yay?

 

Along with you and your AI controlled enemies, a whole bunch of other AI planes will be active in every mission. You may meet friendly or enemy units flying by, scouting, bombing or fighting each other. Both the air and ground will be filled with action and your mission won't be fought by you alone, but with friendly AI crews. Should you engage a hostile recon unit? Will you try to help a pair of friendlies outnumbered by an enemy squad? Can you protect a group of ground assault planes from a sudden attack? It is up to you to decide, but remember - you're on your own mission with its own priorities!

 

This is a very qualified 'yay'. Big Yay if the AI is good, Very Small Yay if the AI is dumb. Nothing destroys immersion more than a bunch of dumb AI getting in your way or bumping into each other in the sky a la War Thunder.

 

And I'd love some more detail on the ground objects and vehicles, and their AI. WIll they be smart or dumb. WIll the ground war be visible or invisible...will the landscape be littered with ground targets eg tanks engaging tanks and vehicle convoys and trains criss crossing the landscape or empty as a Siberian tundra.

 

Yay

 

3) Every time you launch you'll be offered to choose between Online and Offline modes - choose Online to play Online;

 

4) To play Historical campaign and obtain all bonus content we're preparing you need to be connected. The network bandwidth requirements are really low and the amount of sent/received data is minimal. This is how we ensure that the provided experience in Campaign is absolutely original and everyone's progress is fair;

 

It's up to you to choose between Online and Offline modes, however the Historical campaign is only available Online, it is the key component of the initial game and it brings you over 70% of the overall new IL-2 Sturmovik experience.

 

5) The Quick Mission Builder and Custom Single Player Missions are 100% available in offline mode without restrictions of any kind;

 

This setup suits me fine as I do most of my gaming at home, not on the road. I know there are people who hate any forced requirement to be online, because it means they can't play from their EMP proof survivalist bunker, so this will annoy some people.

 

Boo

 

But a big boo depending on how it is implemented. If my mission freezes or drops out or I lose my progress if I lose online connectivity, I will spew huge chunks of online ire. Nothing sheets me more than battling your way to target, getting your kill, nursing your wounded machine/player/tank/kite halfway home and then getting a lag problem or wifi dropout and losing it all.

Edited June 22, 2013 by heinkill

[JG27_Chivas]

Good post, I agree that the completion of the mission should not be the only condition to continue to the next mission.   There are so many factors beyond the players control that it should be the players "option" to continue to the next mission or replay the last mission.   Options can make a huge difference in the players enjoyment of the sim, and therefore its success. 

[Pupo]

 

Boo

 

But a big boo depending on how it is implemented. If my mission freezes or drops out or I lose my progress if I lose online connectivity, I will spew huge chunks of online ire. Nothing sheets me more than battling your way to target, getting your kill, nursing your wounded machine/player/tank/kite halfway home and then getting a lag problem or wifi dropout and losing it all.

 

 

 

 

not that the rest isnt important, but this one seems unlikely. I understood that only a new mission needs to be downloaded. so if they implement it correctly if you loso internet in the middle of the mission, you will not be able to generate the next one, but the one who have played will probably just be uploaded once the mission is over.

 

i mostly agree with all your yays and boos, and i overall YAY the whole thing.

[FlatSpinMan]

About the mission progression thing, Zak posted in the Dev Diary something about it not being how it sounded. He said the idea was 'lost in translation' so perhaps it's not as it first sounded.

[Zak]

Boo

Your progress to the next phases depends on successful completion of missions in each phase.

What is this, Call of Duty? If you don't destroy three bombers out of six because your dumb AI wingmen didnt do their job, you have to redo? If you don't destroy the bridge, you can't go to the next mission? Because in real life, pilots had to keep going back to the same target, add infinitum, until they destroyed it? Please rethink this, and give the pilot the choice of whether they refly, or move ahead if they fail a mission.

As I've already said it doesn't have to be this way. You may run missions one after another and they can be totally independent, so the progress will be determined by overall score.

It's not a linear carrier, not Call of Duty, relax. Details will follow.

 

Boo

But a big boo depending on how it is implemented. If my mission freezes or drops out or I lose my progress if I lose online connectivity, I will spew huge chunks of online ire. Nothing sheets me more than battling your way to target, getting your kill, nursing your wounded machine/player/tank/kite halfway home and then getting a lag problem or wifi dropout and losing it all.

Lag problem shouldn't be an issue as well as freezes - game will require the tiniest net connection for sending and receiving logs, incomparable to data volumes that travel during multiplayer sessions.

[hiro]

Alot of those responses for the boo  is too early too tell. the lag and stuff, well ok, blizzard screwed up D3 and the ever present WOW lag patch and then there's the LOL (leauge) or DOTA lagg and then the BF 3 thing. 

 

but those games servers are dependent on large data transmission and minimal amount of connections (players). crucial data / game information / player stats are streamed  . . . so as more players join (more data, then the crash dam breaks and crash floods the server). 

 

The devs made it sound like the mission isn't streamed, so that won't be a problem. like Il-2 will be light like viewing websites vs heavy mmo / FPS like youtubing. 

 

But gotta try the beta and see if this happens, then make up the conclusions

 

And we all want dynamic weather but the devs got a tight time frame and schedule, so if they don't have it in the first release, maybe  later, or perhaps a we'll have a mission creator that has a time slider that one can change up the weather (later release or even a patch). 

 

 

Zak's got the other answers covered. 

 

And call of duty isn't so bad. the US military likes it, and there's alot of $$, it would be a awesome refreshment if this game was released and alot of people started playing . . . and more got into ww2 combat simming because the devs choose to make a fun game for the masses while keeping to the spirit (and complication) of a sim for us.  

[heinkill]

As I've already said it doesn't have to be this way. You may run missions one after another and they can be totally independent, so the progress will be determined by overall score.It's not a linear carrier, not Call of Duty, relax. Details will follow. Lag problem shouldn't be an issue as well as freezes - game will require the tiniest net connection for sending and receiving logs, incomparable to data volumes that travel during multiplayer sessions.

Glad to hear. Thx