Developer Diary, Part XXIII

[Zak]

http://riseofflight.com/en/store/weaponmods

 

 

say what you will, i don't like the feeling of my enemy having a pimped flight because he paid more than i did. That rendedered ROF a Offline only game for me.

I never said unlocks can be bought.

[Foobar]

Too much speculation here around, fears and rumors. Same procedure as every time.

 

Just relax and wait what they will offer.

[rolikiraly]

Nice video!

 

I'm also not sure about the levelling/unlock thing. We will probably see details later. One thing i wouldn't like at all is being forced to fly a specific aircraft until i unlock new planes

[Fornixx]

No.

 

No. No. No. None. No.

Sorry, no info about specific achievements as of yet.

 

Yes, the points that allow you to unlock more content are earned in historical campaign only.

 

You can buy them. The thing is I can't tell all details about business model the game will have. I just must admit that it's more affordable than RoF

 

Isn't that what you are saying here?

[JG13_opcode]

Oh my god. They've actually made it Pay-to-Win.

 

You can spend time grinding singleplayer missions just to unlock the rear gunner on your Sturmovik, or you can pay for it.

 

Who knows how much time it'll take to grind it out "for free"? It's in their best financial interests to make the grind unbearably long, so that more folks will get frustrated and just pay for the convenience factor.

 

Ugh, I am not pleased.

 

I don't play singleplayer. The AI is always terrible, and it's not quantitatively fun, in any sense. If there's no human on the other end then I just can't get interested. But now I have to either slog through something I don't want to do at all, or else I get the "privilege" of paying to get better equipment like the headrest removed on the 109.

 

This isn't Call of Duty. Why do we need "level ups" and "perks" and "unlockables"?

 

This is one of those cancerous ideas that spread from developer to developer like a virus. Oh, Battlefield 3 had unlocks and level-ups and it sold a lot of copies! We'd better use the same feature! Except no, players hate those systems.

Edited July 5, 2013 by JG13Doggles

[Jason_Williams]

You cannot pay for the unlockable content. There are not a million unlocks and the few of them that do exist are rooted in reality. We are not offering the same system as ROF and we are not WT or WOWP or anything else. We're doing it our own special way.

 

Jason

[smink1701]

Looking and sounding great.  I am confident that most will be very happy with the final product.  All would be nice but not very realistic.  I hope we can hear some guns soon!

[Streiff]

You cannot pay for the unlockable content. There are not a million unlocks and the few of them that do exist are rooted in reality. We are not offering the same system as ROF and we are not WT or WOWP or anything else. We're doing it our own special way.

 

Jason

 

Thank God.

[71st_AH_Hooves]

I think a lot of you guys are freaking out and its clouding your judgement. That being said, the way I'm understanding this is that the best way to "tell the story" of the battle of stalingrad and how the aircraft evolved is to reward performance with upgrades similar to how it happened in the war. It has to be attached to a gameplay mechanic, so points is the best way to do it.

 

Though not all like to play both single and multiplayer, I like the way that I'm " included" into the story and not just being handed a weapons mod "or whatever upgrade" because "at mission number 3, you get a mod because that's what the mission says." It adds a whole nother layer to fighting through the campaign.

 

These mods aren't going to make or break a player in MP. Its not like you are going to unlock extra magic healing or and lame ass perk like a call of duty game.

 

Heck this might make playing SP more interesting to those that previously hadn't thought of playing it. Ill still ay MP out of the gate too. And trust me no weapons mod will make me any better lol.

[PeterZvan]

However this is beside the point.

Most of us have a time limit to play.

And I personally dont want to waste any on singleplayer campaing. I want all my flying to be in MP enviroment - for me only flying agains human oposition is worth of spending time flying on the computer. Otherwise it will be a long annoying grind trough SP just because I will need one special mod in MP enviroment. And I absolutly hate the grind - a bloody waste of time - I allready see it - come from work, do a SP grind and join the MP servers in the late evening - extending into the night, get up completly tired, go to work... No thank you (WoT bad memory comes back to haunt me immidiatly)

I do get the idea about the unlocks in the campaign and also support it as it makes it more interesting to play (I loved how in original Red Baron you could get a flight lead and than personal plane and skin...) 

However please dont make the unlocks doable only in SP.

Once online wars happen people will deffinitly need the mods for special assignements (gun pods...).

For me I also really dont care if the unlocks that you do in MP wont work for SP campaign so that the gameplay in campaign will not be ruined.

But please give us the option to do it in MP - or force it on global stats on servers and dont force in the global stats off servers.

 

There is of course another option - do MP missions based on your campaign system and unlock the stuff that way (either SP campaign or this MP campaign)

Each day - 6 time slots - your dynamic SP campaign, but fill the slots with MP people or AI (COOP style). And let it run constantly - starts from the begining of the battle to the end and than restarts.

Have a few servers running it in paralel - and you will solve this problem and at the same time have the long desired dynamic MP campaing that many people want (this is what has been disscused in RoF forums for quite some time). For all I care let the servers be run by the community - just generate the missions with  the campaign generator and replace the slots with humans and give them instructions. Cant really be that hard.

 

Last thing - devs please dont take this the wrong way - I very much respect your work and I am sure the the SP campaign will be great and take up a lot of work. It will be brilliant for the hardcore SP simmers and I would never want to force them to do MP to unlock anything. Just please dont force the MP crowd to do something that they dont want / dont have time to do.

[DD_Arthur]

I think a lot of you guys are freaking out and its clouding your judgement. That being said, the way I'm understanding this is that the best way to "tell the story" of the battle of stalingrad and how the aircraft evolved is to reward performance with upgrades similar to how it happened in the war. It has to be attached to a gameplay mechanic, so points is the best way to do it.

 

 

 

"Tell the story"? So this is a flight sim by Dorling-Kindersley?  Can some one give me a historical example of how pilots were "rewarded" with an "upgrade"  or even a monetary reward, lol.?

 

I can't help thinking this is a limiting of options.  Why bother building a well researched ground-attack mission to find some people can't take the correct ordnance because they haven't performed fifty landings or take-offs or they haven't flown through this hoop or that?  I'm pleased that the team want to do things their own way.  I think they have a tremendous amount of vision, talent and a real "can-do" outlook but I still think this approach is a mistake. 

[SYN_Mike77]

I am in complete agreement with hqPeterZvan!

[TJT]

"Tell the story"? So this is a flight sim by Dorling-Kindersley?  Can some one give me a historical example of how pilots were "rewarded" with an "upgrade"  or even a monetary reward, lol.?

 

 

 

Normandie Niemen pilots was rewarded with money for air victorys, so was AVG pilots in China. That's 2 from the top of my head.

More skilled pilots had more say in how their aircraft was equipped in at least Luftwaffe judging from memoirs.

[JtD]

Wasn't it said that the server can decide what options are available, no SP required, at the price of not sending your personal data to the record-everything-there-is-and-calculate-some-obscure-stats server?

 

While I still find the concept hilarious, there's no damage done. Unless you think your particular server/online war needs to be connected to the central database, that is.

[JG13_opcode]

You cannot pay for the unlockable content. There are not a million unlocks and the few of them that do exist are rooted in reality. We are not offering the same system as ROF and we are not WT or WOWP or anything else. We're doing it our own special way.

 

Jason

Zak said that you can pay for the unlocks in this post:

 

 

The question is: will the solo campaign be the only way to unlock mods or planes?

 

If it's the case, then all the peoples like me who don't like to fly solo campaigns will be unable to unlock mods or planes... I don't mind paying for mods or planes, but I do mind being unable to play with.

You can buy them. The thing is I can't tell all details about business model the game will have. I just must admit that it's more affordable than RoF

 

I'm getting some conflicting information here.

[DD_Arthur]

Normandie Niemen pilots was rewarded with money for air victorys, so was AVG pilots in China. That's 2 from the top of my head.

More skilled pilots had more say in how their aircraft was equipped in at least Luftwaffe judging from memoirs.

 

 

Thanks TJT.  Pity Normandie Niemen and Claire Chenault were no-where near Stalingrad.  I'm interested to here what "upgrades" the experten might have received in BoS terms.

 

"Good news, Gunthar!  We've been awarded gun pods to make our G6's even more of a slug!" 

[JG4_Sputnik]

Hmm interesting update!

Nice shots and a very great video, thank you!

 

I like the achievements part, but as the others, I'm also very sceptical about the unlockable content. I'd rather just buy the Sturmovik with rear gunner for a couple of dollars than grinding my way through SP.

 

I just want to be able to choose the plane best suited for a specific job ???

[Rama]

You cannot pay for the unlockable content.

That's the first bad news I read about BoS.

[III/JG53Frankyboy]

"Yes, the points that allow you to unlock more content are earned in historical campaign only."

 

AUTSCH! from somone who only used IL2 offline for COOP missionbuilding and weapontests in the easy editor. In CoD and RoF i tried some missions in singleplayer, but felt almost every time in sleep doing so..........

I 'grew' up in IL2's hightime in COOP onlinewarflying- and almost every pilot i met there and ibtakjed with never flew singleplyercampaigns. I even dont like dogfightservers till today ............

[Jason_Williams]

Doggles,

 

I'm pretty sure Zak was referring to additional planes.

 

Jason

[Pollux]

Opportunity to make a survey on the forum on controversial option object release?

 

for example:

 

    1) For

    2) Against

    3) No opinion

[TJT]

Thanks TJT.  Pity Normandie Niemen and Claire Chenault were no-where near Stalingrad.  I'm interested to here what "upgrades" the experten might have received in BoS terms.

 

"Good news, Gunthar!  We've been awarded gun pods to make our G6's even more of a slug!" 

 

Some pilots did like the additional gunpods, especially for hunting IL-2's. 

[No105_Swoose]

Questions regarding the Historical Campaign as described in the update:  

 

Does a player have to start a campaign at the lowest rank, such as Mladshiy Leitenant for the Soviet VVS, and work his or her way up? 

 

 Or can you start at a higher rank, as in the original IL-2 Sturmovik, to be a flight element or squadron leader to control AI and then your achievements would simply be relative to the first point you started?

[heinkill]

Great video, BAD news about the gameplay system requiring or rewarding points, medals and promotions in order to unlock content.

 

I simply cannot be bothered and dont have time to grind my way to the aircraft, staffel, mission or campaign or mod I need, War Thunder style.

 

I am totally with Mysticpuma and others on this. I don't want to have to earn XP like in an MMO game to earn an upgrade to fly a variant of a plane or get a loadout or just qualify for the next mission.

 

I want instant gratification! Plus, I am an adult with a job (for now...) and can pay for it! If you make me fly for hours just to 'level up' to keep advancing you have lost me. Totally. And more importantly, my money!

 

Pls give lazy but affluent swine like me the chance to buy whatever content we want, with REAL money, even if we can only play it offline or in our own dedicated Lazy Swine Servers, to avoid alienating the hardworking grinders!

 

H

[JG13_opcode]

Doggles,

 

I'm pretty sure Zak was referring to additional planes.

 

Jason

Hmm, okay.

 

So, would it be accurate to say that you can grind for the planes but also pay for them, whereas the mods for the planes will be grind-only?

[Uufflakke]

Like I said before I don't like the whole rewarding, unlocking etc etc situation and it is flight sim unworthy and definately not my cup of tea from what I've read in the update but I noticed something in the included screenshots.

 

Sorry for nitpicking but there seems to be a mapping issue with one of the objects.

A part of the oildrum is used for the lower part of the tree trunk (red rectangle). It only seems to occur at the side parts.

And what is this black gap (green rectangle) supposed to be?

Compared with the boxes the drums looks a bit  low rez also.

 

[JG4_Sputnik]

Hmm, okay.

 

So, would it be accurate to say that you can grind for the planes but also pay for them, whereas the mods for the planes will be grind-only?

 

I think this is it. You buy a specific plane like a "FW190" and then you "level it up" and earn some gunpods and over time your A4 becomes an A8 (if you choose to activate the gunpods).

Actually I like the system, if it only be able in MP aswell... why limit the system to LP?

[Feuerfalke]

I think you maymay be misinterpreting the weapons mods.. Many of the other field mods are things like slip indicators and compasses etc.. You can't buy a supercharged engines. From what I saw most of the weapons mods are things like balloon guns and rockets. Even with some of the gun upgrades that are not balloon guns they do not give you an advantage that will overwrite pilot skill or maksmanship.

 

To be honest, I think the best purpose of the additional weapons is to show why they were not built in on a regular basis.

 

They are okay against large targets or ground-attacks. If you are engaged in a dogfight, you'd be glad if you could just throw the additional weight overboard.

 

So, these Mods are nice for some very special situations, but they are surely not pay-to-win.

[III/JG53Frankyboy]

I think this is it. You buy a specific plane like a "FW190" and then you "level it up" and earn some gunpods and over time your A4 becomes an A8 (if you choose to activate the gunpods).Actually I like the system, if it only be able in MP aswell... why limit the system to LP?

i actually see no sense to have access to a Bf109G-2's (as example) gunpods, droptank, SC250 only when i grind through a singleplayercampaign......if i understood something wrong, i apologize!!

[falstaff]

Another good update. The alarm bells have not rung for me with regard to multi-player, since I prefer single-player...but there are some here whose views I respect and they play multi-player almost exclusively. I hope they get what they want...but not at the expense of diluting the single-player experience .

 

Nice video.

 

Mustang said:

 

The multiplayer and internet will be the core of any flight sim and a modern game .

 

I dont know. I would say a game has to be a good game first, with a good solid scaleable engine, theatre and scenario, before it is either single-player or multi-player.

 

In other words, basics first. Look at how many flight games in the past 10 years have come unstuck trying to do too much, or not enough, on half-baked engines, with quesionable resources/time-scales/management.

[Heywooood]

It means that you'll be able to unlock new planes not buying thaem but playing the game (unlike it's in RoF where you need to purchase every plane). More certainty about the business model will follow

I sure as HELL am not going to argue with this....its GOOD NEWS

 

just because a 'player' wants an upgrade doesn't mean he has to skip dinner and work and go sleepless for 3 days - thats a CHOICE you have...if you feel you have no choice but to do those things for that reason??

you might have a problem with addiction, and not with a computer game developer

Edited July 5, 2013 by Heywooood

[III/JG53Frankyboy]

i found the system of old Il2 where a missiondesigner was able to lock weaponloudouts (at least in COOPs and singleplayermissions) much more helpfull for game or better missionexperience.

So , if there was a fighterbomberattack, only the designated flight had bombs, or, not all 109G-6 ( no plane for BoS ) flew around with Mk108.......

[Requiem]

Thanks for that update, it was nice to hear more sounds in action. Hopefully we won't have the issues of hearing other aircraft at long range in RoF such as the SE5a and Spad. Also looking forward to hearing about the pricing model, as long as its not subscription based I'll be happy.

[LukeFF]

I was wondering that too I happen to like the RoF system. I think it is a great business model. Even paying full price for the planes I will fly the most is not a problem and makes it more feasable to buy planes I will only try when they go on sale.

 

http://riseofflight.com/en/store/weaponmods

 

 

say what you will, i don't like the feeling of my enemy having a pimped flight because he paid more than i did. That rendedered ROF a Offline only game for me.

 

Just because someone has a weapon mod fitted to their plane doesn't make them a better or more effective pilot. Just about all of these mods come with very significant penalties in FM performance. It's hardly pay-to-win. 

Edited July 6, 2013 by LukeFF

[Sokol1]

Normandie Niemen pilots was rewarded with money for air victorys, so was AVG pilots in China. That's 2 from the top of my head.

More skilled pilots had more say in how their aircraft was equipped in at least Luftwaffe judging from memoirs.

 

I am reading the book  "Over Fields of Fire: Flying the Sturmovik in Action on the Eastern Front 1942-45"  about the il-2 pilot Egoruska Anna Alexandrovna, he talk about "(unpaid) bonuses for combat sorties successfully carried out from de Air Force."

 

Sokol1

[II./JG27_Rich]

Hi everyone.

 

  Well to me it looks like it's going to be like IL-2 2001 all over again. In other words....The good old days.  

[Rjel]

Enjoyed the video. I'd like to see some low level flight sometime if possible.

[FlatSpinMan]

All this talk of "grinding" through a campaign is unsupported as yet. We don't know much about the system. As an offliner I'm surprised by it but can see how it could add to the feeling of progress throughout a campaign.

For MP only guys I can see where you're coming from. Early days though - no need to worry yet.

[migmadmarine]

Guys, have a look at the post on page two, they have said that you can buy the mods, like in ROF, or unlock them by playing the campaign. Not that big a problem, I believe. 

[RAF74_Winger]

Guys, have a look at the post on page two, they have said that you can buy the mods, like in ROF, or unlock them by playing the campaign. Not that big a problem, I believe. 

 

But then Jason posted on page 3 that you couldn't buy the mods.

 

I'm as concerned as everyone else about the projected 'progression' model that has been outlined, mainly due to the potential effects on online wars & squadron play - got to CAP location XYZ? Need drop tanks to get there & back with a reasonable time over the combat area, but Bill & George haven't progressed far enough in the single player campaign to get the drop tank - oops.

 

However, as has been said, there's some conflicting information presented in this thread, we need a detailed exposition of how these unlockable items can and cannot be used in online and offline gameplay before getting upset about things.

 

W.

Edited July 6, 2013 by RAF74_Winger