Can I rant here?

[Sky Captain 0]

I realize game makers are only there to make money, but I wish they'd give us SOME quality. It seems the bigger they get, the worse they get...

[Guest Stiglr]

The game developers are in this business in order to make money; it's their job. Period. I don't think it's fair that we blame them for trying to get the most economic return on their products. That's the nature of capitalism. And it's not like the product they are supplying us is absolute crap; and no product is going to please everyone. I think we are very fortunate that the games we do play have been created in such a way that we are able to modify and change them to our own liking.

 

At some point if you are unhappy about what is available in the marketplace you have to do something about it yourself. Either develop your own creations, or pay money to have someone else do it for you. Don't expect a game developer to put his livelihood in jeapardy in order to please a very few customers. That's bad business, and they all have mouths to feed.

I just think that if you really don't like what's available, don't blame TK et. al., go and create your own sims, or modify the ones available. That old saying, "If you want it done right, do it yourself" seems applicable here. Again, I'm thankful that TK has develop a game in which I can, to a certain extent, do it myself.

 

Tank, I'm doing JUST THAT. But that doesn't mean I can't b***ch about the other ones that fail to give me what I want; no matter what their excuse is.

 

Also, you "capitalists" forget one key thing here: no matter what the publishers want to make, WE have to buy it for them to earn their money. If they don't provide what we want, there's no demand. Thus, they don't make their money, and then they listen to what we want, so that we WILL buy their wares. We are not powerless in this. And those of you who are all too willing to settle for the crap they sling at us are the ones most to blame for the fact that the products we're getting aren't better.

 

...and it's a separate point that the developers can't realize the very simple reality that this market (flight simmers) is NOT the thumb twitching market; in size or in any other aspect.

 

Maybe if that light went on, they'd figure out some economics so that they could make a buck off us, and could also turn out better product while they're at it.

[tn_prvteye 36]

Your idea that if we don't buy, they'll make better ones doesn't work. Flight sims aren't cars or durable goods. Do you think that if MS Flight sim suddenly didn't sell that well that Microsoft would make it better? No, they'd just stop making it.

 

We don't buy any more sims, people will just stop making sims. You seem to think that SF and Il-2 are huge business powerhouses. They're not. THERE IS NO MONEY IN MAKING FLIGHT SIMS!!!! Especially hard-core sims. It's a fact of life, not some economic theory.

 

Do you think TK is sitting around thinking "You know those dumb-asses will buy anything, lets put out a sim with crappy FMs!!" No he's probably thinking: "Damn, I wish I had the manpower, time, and money to make the most realisitic sim ever"

[+Zurawski 33]

Your idea that if we don't buy, they'll make better ones doesn't work. Flight sims aren't cars or durable goods. Do you think that if MS Flight sim suddenly didn't sell that well that Microsoft would make it better? No, they'd just stop making it.

 

We don't buy any more sims, people will just stop making sims. You seem to think that SF and Il-2 are huge business powerhouses. They're not. THERE IS NO MONEY IN MAKING FLIGHT SIMS!!!! Especially hard-core sims. It's a fact of life, not some economic theory.

 

Do you think TK is sitting around thinking "You know those dumb-asses will buy anything, lets put out a sim with crappy FMs!!" No he's probably thinking: "Damn, I wish I had the manpower, time, and money to make the most realisitic sim ever"

 

In all honesty this myopic though process is actually one of the flight-sim genres biggest down falls. We tend to see our genre through rose colored glasses, convincing ourselves that the next big sim title will compete with the likes of the EA battlefield series etc... When in reality the typical revenue from even a perceived block buster like IL-2 is but a blip on the pubs net profit record.

 

Frankly it's neither Stiglr’s nor like-minded sim enthusiasts fault for believing consumer driven economic pressure would change a publishers mindset toward simulations... Basic economics theory leads then to believe this is how we the consumers educate/motivate manufacturers/developers about what we are willing to pay for.... Sadly, like you alluded to, software is not a demand driven commodity. The publishers are fiscally smart... they seek out and peruse titles that are proven money makers. Something few simulations has done to date... with the exceptions being the MSCFS and Falcon series... And even they paled in parallel to the other game genres.

 

Fact is... if we stop buying them... they will stop making them. We as a genre are truly nothing more than a pimple on the software entertainments butt... Thankfully we have a handful of small independent developers and a few non-conformist pubs who choose to continue to buck the norm...

 

...Reality is thought... if just one of their projects bomb badly... I fear that will move onto project far less risky and far more profitable too.

Edited November 25, 2006 by Zurawski

[+Dave 2,322]

Valid points all around. Its like a big Catch 22. Seems like we are chasing our tails. We want better, sim companies complain there is no money in it. We tell them, well if you make it like this it will sell. But if you don't, it wont. They release it, it tanks because they did this. And so one and so forth. Seriously what can we do? If we demand more, will they just fold up shop and leave? There is no easy answer to this question. One thing we can agree on though, is that we want a damn good sim.

[+Zurawski 33]

Valid points all around. Its like a big Catch 22. Seems like we are chasing our tails. We want better, sim companies complain there is no money in it. We tell them, well if you make it like this it will sell. But if you don't, it wont. They release it, it tanks because they did this. And so one and so forth. Seriously what can we do? If we demand more, will they just fold up shop and leave? There is no easy answer to this question. One thing we can agree on though, is that we want a damn good sim.

 

Actually... there is a solution... one I've personally held for many years... that few actually agree with. (Big suprise eh?)

 

As I see it, in order for combat flight simulations to survive (read: be lucrative enough for a pub with deep pockets to support)... these sims have to become more lucrative... a hurdle not easily cleared.

 

We continue to demand higher fidelity graphics, physics, sounds... historical accuracy so deep to choke even the most staunch gronard... to include every concievable plane, ship, building, foot soldier etc... YET, we continue to expect to pay the typical 40.00 to 50.00 US dollars for it...

 

IMHO, the only way a publisher would be willing to to commit the kind of capital, marketing and publishing that is typical to top-selling FPS... would be to CHARGE more for the product.

 

The way I figure it... in order for a publisher to take flight sims serious as a investment, would be to produce equivenlent net profit. Concidering the typical number of sim purchases compared to the typical FPS purchase number... I estimate our sims would need to cost 2 to 3 times what we now pay.

 

Obviously my theory is not very popular...

[Guest Stiglr]

Actually... there is a solution... one I've personally held for many years... that few actually agree with. (Big suprise eh?)

 

As I see it, in order for combat flight simulations to survive (read: be lucrative enough for a pub with deep pockets to support)... these sims have to become more lucrative... a hurdle not easily cleared.

 

We continue to demand higher fidelity graphics, physics, sounds... historical accuracy so deep to choke even the most staunch gronard... to include every concievable plane, ship, building, foot soldier etc... YET, we continue to expect to pay the typical 40.00 to 50.00 US dollars for it...

 

IMHO, the only way a publisher would be willing to to commit the kind of capital, marketing and publishing that is typical to top-selling FPS... would be to CHARGE more for the product.

 

The way I figure it... in order for a publisher to take flight sims serious as a investment, would be to produce equivenlent net profit. Concidering the typical number of sim purchases compared to the typical FPS purchase number... I estimate our sims would need to cost 2 to 3 times what we now pay.

 

Obviously my theory is not very popular...

 

There's wisdom in them thar words.

 

If I knew there was ONE sim or maybe two...that had IL-2's great graphics... and Targetware's superior flight modeling... and a well-designed historical system coupled with great online play.... I sure would pay two to three times what we pay for a flight sim these days...because if that title did exist, I would only probably WANT to buy that one or two. So, $100, even $150 for what use I'd get from a sim like that would be well worth it. Sort of like biting the bullet and paying $300 for my Cougar flight stick... even with its warts, it's been worth the high price for the utility.

 

Certainly I realize that this little subgenre in the gaming world is exactly that: a very small, relatively insignificant backwater. But I won't accept that that means we can't get good product. No way.

Edited November 25, 2006 by Stiglr

[+Dave 2,322]

You forgot one thing Stiggy, the modabilty of SF. I like to be able to personalize a sim a little bit. But I would pay 150 bux for it myself.

[+Julhelm 266]

From my point of view, the SF series is probably as close as one can get to the "ultimate sim" right now and in the near future. Why?

 

Well, for starters, no two persons want the exact same thing from a sim. If person A wants a super-hifi F-8 over 'nam sim and one is made, then person B will bitch because he wanted to fly the A-6 or Mig-21. With SF, you can modify it endlessly to satisfy your own personal taste. It completely owns other sims like MSFS and X-Plane in this regard:

 

You do not have to stop at merely building a custom plane; you can take your custom plane, make custom weapons for it and place it in a custom campaign with custom forces on a custom map and take part in an entire custom conflict, provided you have the patience to do so. Me? I'm creating my own near-future world for the game, a world where polar icecaps have melted and I can fly SEAD missions searching out missile boats hiding in a half-sunken downtown LA. Why? Because I can, and because I find it to be fun.

 

So bottom line is that you should all be happy you can tweak this product to your hearts content and have something that's pretty realistic, provided you have the necessary suspension of disbelief. You'll never get that 100% realistic sim, for the simple reason that you can't have 100% realistic flying without actually flying.

[+DanW 32]

Oh dear...

 

Never thought I'd do this but:

 

Flightsims are dead. Well, almost dead. Let's call it life support.

 

Follow this link:

http://static.filefront.com/cgw/1989_12_issue66.pdf

 

Look up the A-10 and M-1 games and find the retail price: 69.99 and 49.99. Quite a bit eh? Now take a newer game like FE: 29.99. Now, given the state of graphics in 1989 versus the state of graphics in 2006, would anyone disagree that the amount of labor needed to make a flight sim today be astronomically higher than in 1989? Also, let's look at the number of player flyable aircraft/tanks in the 1989 games. ONE. How many in IL-2, First Eagles, Jet Thunder, LOMAC, etc, etc? NOT ONE. So take the one flight model, cockpit, shadow, damage model (if the 1989 games even had shadows and damage) and then multiply that times the number of planes in the game. Now lets add high resolution skins, decals, animation, lights etc, etc. Finally, let us QA and debug all that. Oh yeah, remember we are selling for close to half of what we sold for 15 years ago. And trust me, we aren't selling more copies now than in 1989. Let us now do some accounting. I think you get the point. A few people paying 100 bucks for a simulation isn't gonna do near as good as a game selling for 1/3 of that price in stores all over the world.

 

Roughly the same amount of people are buying flight sims today than 15 years ago. The retail price has went down. The development cost has skyrocketed. The numbers don't add up anymore. That's why there are so few. It has jack squat to do with quality, flight models or anything else. The people that make these sims, American, Russian, etc, etc, do it because they love it. If you think anyone is doing this to get rich your seriously mistaken. But in the end, its up to individuals to buy the games (yes, they are games, all of them) if they so chose. If you think that 'holding out' for someone to make the Holy Grail of flight simulation, then you are gonna be waiting a long time. SF/WOV/WOE/FE are all about what you make of them.

[ezlead 42]

Well,I've read everyone's "rants" and now I'll give you my 2 cents.

I've owned a pc since 1990 ,my first was a really old and slow one. One of the first things I did when I got it was to go looking for flight sims.

I found some and for their day they were good. They keep improving everyday.

Now ,I've flown the A-4,A-6 and the F-4.I spent my time in the RAG (Replacement Air Group)learning the aircraft and systems.

Today,I want to do what you might call a Scramble.

We used to say"Kick the tire,Light the fire, brief on guard and first guy in the air is Lead"

I have over 20 Flight sims in the drawer.Some are great,Some are not.

TK's sims are the most realistic to actual flight that I have seen "So Far".

The thing that makes them Great is the way that each person can change them to suit himself.

You can fly them hard or easy,YOUR CHOICE.

The absolute best part to me is,MY CHOICE.

The way they are engineered to be able to change is easier than any other sim I've come across.

TK,You and the people at Third Wire and Combatace are the best!!!

 

"ezlead,Intruder, ball,3 down,26"

[BUFF 8]

The publishers are fiscally smart... they seek out and peruse titles that are proven money makers. Something few simulations has done to date... with the exceptions being the MSCFS and Falcon series...

Not too sure about Falcon, afaik it virtually bankrupted Microprose ...

[+Zurawski 33]

Not too sure about Falcon, afaik it virtually bankrupted Microprose ...

 

 

You may be right... I believe they did eventually "eat it" in the end...

 

However, they were one of the last big efforts to have the flight sim genre compete with the "other" genres of the time...

 

Rememer the big, meaty manual... authenticity endorced by F-16 pilot (His name escapes me)... the Mig-29 add-on... etc.

 

It was quite a big deal back then... marketing to rival the other genres.

[Guest IndioBlack]

Oh dear...

 

Never thought I'd do this but:

 

Flightsims are dead. Well, almost dead. Let's call it life support.

 

Follow this link:

http://static.filefront.com/cgw/1989_12_issue66.pdf

 

Gosh I remember COMPUTER GAMING WORLD. They used to have a dedicated Flight Sim page. They even used to give you Flight Sim tutorials so you could get the best out of the Sims.

Then they gave the Flight Sim page to some guy who admitted he didn't like Flight Sims, and not long after that, he proclaimed Flight Sims were dead. Then the Flight Sim page vanished. Then I stopped buying the magazine.

 

I agree that future of Flight Sims is mod-able Flight Sims, and I believe that's what TK has understood.

When the F-23 came out for the SF series, I suddenly started playing it again. It didn't make TK any more money, but it kept the Sim alive for me. However, for others that didn't have the Sim, they might have bought it for the vast treasure-trove of add-ons that are out there.

 

The other source of Flight Sims is the re-engineering that is being done on older Flight Sims like Rowan's Battle of Britain, which got a super face-lift as Battle of Britain II; and the re-engineered Falcon 4, of course.

I hope more of that is done by enthusiasts, because when M$ forced XP onto us, they destroyed a whole swathe of Flight Sims designed for win 95/98 that we all loved, but now would no longer work. So in a sense, if the Flight Sim is dead, then it was M$ that killed it.

Edited November 28, 2006 by IndioBlack

[BUFF 8]

because when M$ forced XP onto us, they destroyed a whole swathe of Flight Sims designed for win 95/98 that we all loved, but now would no longer work. So in a sense, if the Flight Sim is dead, then it was M$ that killed it.

the good news is that USAF supposedly works well on Vista whereas it didn't on XP.

Maybe others will be the same.

[Guest IndioBlack]

the good news is that USAF supposedly works well on Vista whereas it didn't on XP.

Maybe others will be the same.

 

Cor blimey ! Whatever next ?

Now if iF-22 will work on Vista, then I'm sold.

[+baffmeister 1,205]

From my point of view, the SF series is probably as close as one can get to the "ultimate sim" right now and in the near future. Why?

 

Well, for starters, no two persons want the exact same thing from a sim. If person A wants a super-hifi F-8 over 'nam sim and one is made, then person B will bitch because he wanted to fly the A-6 or Mig-21. With SF, you can modify it endlessly to satisfy your own personal taste. It completely owns other sims like MSFS and X-Plane in this regard:

 

You do not have to stop at merely building a custom plane; you can take your custom plane, make custom weapons for it and place it in a custom campaign with custom forces on a custom map and take part in an entire custom conflict, provided you have the patience to do so. Me? I'm creating my own near-future world for the game, a world where polar icecaps have melted and I can fly SEAD missions searching out missile boats hiding in a half-sunken downtown LA. Why? Because I can, and because I find it to be fun.

 

So bottom line is that you should all be happy you can tweak this product to your hearts content and have something that's pretty realistic, provided you have the necessary suspension of disbelief. You'll never get that 100% realistic sim, for the simple reason that you can't have 100% realistic flying without actually flying.

 

This seems to be a very interesting comment. Following through on this concept, you could , remarkably, buy a copy of Strike Fighters for about $5.00US, spend a couple of evenings learning how the game works, then gut the game of the things you don't like, download StreakEagles F4-B data ini and Fubars MiG-21MF data ini, then partake of [i suspect] quite an accurate version of F4-B and MiG-21MF dogfights. I don't play online but I think this would work. All for $5.00US......AMAZING!

Regarding "Hard Core" flight sims, it might be worth remembering Rowan's Mig Alley. To address the desires of "Hard Core Enthusiasts" they didn't include a simple autopilot, [ Great graphics at the time, don't you think I might want to sit back and enjoy the view once in awhile?] no auto-trim option, [i hate that] and no way to adjust control imputs. [i REALLY hate that] What the cr#p where they thinking. They where basicallly saying, "THIS IS THE WAY IT WAS AND YOU CAN"T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT!" Apparantly, people in large quantities could do something about it, NOT BUY IT! I suspect Rowan spent a huge amount of money developing this game and it was very good in many respect's.

This leads to my third observation. If you want a hard core sim, it will have to be built off a current sim. Thats not all that crazy. Third Wire's flight engine gets good reviews from many pilots. I suspect other ones would be OK as well. [maybe rowans or IL-2's] In this case, a developer may be able to licence the flight engine, develope their own game engine, and develope HiFi FM's for individual aircraft. I'm not into modern weapons that much but I could see some potential for this approach, but would probably be easier for a developer to start in an earlier era. A sim that trys to model many aircraft will always be "lite" but the idea of an expensive flight sim that models 2 aircraft in high fidelity is quite appealing. Think Spitfire vs. ME-109, Zero vs. Wildcat, Sabre vs. MiG-15 etc. Just my $00.02 on an interesting topic. Regards.

[Guest IndioBlack]

To address the desires of "Hard Core Enthusiasts" they didn't include a simple autopilot,

 

The mark of a good flight Sim is the range of options it gives the user to play it his own way.

 

I hate it when a Sim doesn't give you individual control of multiple engines. I'm sure a lot of people who bought the CH Products Quad Throttle feel the same way.

But if a Sim does give that support, like CFS3 and LOMAC, then it also usually gives the ability to control all the engines with one throttle, or a key press, so everyone is happy.

 

It's not that many years ago, you were hard-pressed to find Sims that would support throttles and rudder pedals. If developers and their fans back then had taken the attitude that "not many people bother with rudders"; "or this is a Sim-Lite, so we think people would find it easier to control throttle with the number keys"; then we'd still be back in the stone age.

Edited December 2, 2006 by IndioBlack

[Lexx_Luthor 57]

Baffmesiter::

[F-4 + MiG-21]....the idea of an expensive flight sim that models 2 aircraft in high fidelity is quite appealing.

Two opposing aircraft...spot on.

 

For tactical fighter vs fighter ops, the best example would be F-4 vs MiG-21, both flyable, both equally detailed with equally detailed overall operational environment surrounding each aircraft. The unique thing about these two aircraft is they offer not just different planes, but totally different gameplay or tactics depending on which you fly. These two opposing aircraft are probably the most mass produced jet fighters and the longest developed fighter aircraft in all military aviation history. Both F-4 and MiG-21 cover about 20 years of upgrading, and with complete overlap of time span -- leading to many years of sim upgrades. A sim can offer F-4B and MiG-21F in the initial package, and then offer later versions, with later overall battlefield environments (later SAMS for example) in future addon packs.

[Sky Captain 0]

Now those are the sims that I'm really fans of. Flight sims with a wide variety of planes are nice, but the dedicated, really realistic sims dedicated to 1 or 2 planes are just... Amazink! Things like the Falcon series where you just spend your time learning and getting to feel your virtual plane. A MiG vs. Phantom sim, set in the time period where radar was still being developed (it still is now, but you know what I mean ) and air to air missiles didn't always mean a kill, would be like a dream come true.

 

 

Or maybe a F-104 or Skyhawk sim. Now THAT would be cool.

[Guest Stiglr]

Baffmeister said,

A sim that trys to model many aircraft will always be "lite"

 

You couldn't be more wrong.

 

Just because you model a large planeset doesn't mean you can't make them fairly realistic (all the normal limitations of a PC flight sim considered).

 

TK (and some of the 3rd party modelers, too) use this as an all-purpose cop-out so that this "sim lite" idea is accepted, and anything faulty in the model can just be explained away with a dismissive wave. "Oh, it's sim-lite, what do you expect?" is a real easy explanation for any question that goes to the heart of, "Well, why couldn't you get [X] right?" Or, "why can't you model this BETTER?"

 

Look at Targetware. They have a VERY large planeset, that spans WWI, the between-war era, WWII, Korea (and soon, Vietnam and beyond), and they also have pretty accurate flight models, pretty accurate engine and flight control systems that allow the "personalities" of certain planes come through (the foibles as well as the triumphs), etc.

 

So, going back to some initial points, planes that had autopilot and autotrim can have them in Targetware mods, planes that don't, don't. Planes that require more pilot workload to get performance out of them (or in some cases, to keep you from exploding the engine out from in front of you!), are harder to operate.

 

It's WILL, really. If you want to take the "sim lite" excuse and leave things 'gamish', you can do that. Or, you can soldier on grimly and do the job right.

[+Zurawski 33]

Baffmeister said,

You couldn't be more wrong.

 

Just because you model a large planeset doesn't mean you can't make them fairly realistic (all the normal limitations of a PC flight sim considered).

 

TK (and some of the 3rd party modelers, too) use this as an all-purpose cop-out so that this "sim lite" idea is accepted, and anything faulty in the model can just be explained away with a dismissive wave. "Oh, it's sim-lite, what do you expect?" is a real easy explanation for any question that goes to the heart of, "Well, why couldn't you get [X] right?" Or, "why can't you model this BETTER?"

 

Look at Targetware. They have a VERY large planeset, that spans WWI, the between-war era, WWII, Korea (and soon, Vietnam and beyond), and they also have pretty accurate flight models, pretty accurate engine and flight control systems that allow the "personalities" of certain planes come through (the foibles as well as the triumphs), etc.

 

So, going back to some initial points, planes that had autopilot and autotrim can have them in Targetware mods, planes that don't, don't. Planes that require more pilot workload to get performance out of them (or in some cases, to keep you from exploding the engine out from in front of you!), are harder to operate.

 

It's WILL, really. If you want to take the "sim lite" excuse and leave things 'gamish', you can do that. Or, you can soldier on grimly and do the job right.

 

Stiglr, sometime you crack me up... Do you ever step back from being a Tagetware zealot and listen to yourself?

 

TK / Thirdwires core logic in regards to their stable of simulations is simply "keep it simple". They are designing "games" that they hope are available and accessable to everyone, regardless of their previous experiance with air-combat simulations.

 

A "lite sim" is not a cop-out... it's by definition exactly what the Thirdwire series "is". However, there is a deluge of sim enthusiast who wish it to be otherwise... Doesn't make them bad or wrong... just different.

 

One can pine over what Thirdwire games "could or should" have been... or except the fact their titles lean more toward the game and less toward the simulation side of things.

 

By your logic, if a developer chooses to forgo the switch twiddling flight models that require manifold pressure massaging, they are essetially "not doing the job right"...

 

When in all honesty... what I read from your diatribes is "I want all simulations to be like Targetware". Which is not a cheap shot... I've played with the sim for a while and it was good in it's own right... It's just that the reality is, you can't make every sim exactly like Targetware.

 

Thirdwire sims "are what they are"... there are a number of us who push it beyond base design... which makes is "more that what it was... but somewhere less than Targetware".

 

This is not a bad thing...

 

Aside from a gaggle of hardcore folks like yourself (which has been quickly inflated with the new infusion of the WWI enthusiasts)... There is a large contigent who are happy with the slot that Thirdwire fills.

 

...Thirdwire simulations fill a void somewhere between game and simulation... for folks who like the thrill of the action with non of the cerebral burden.

 

IMHO... Thirdwire has done their "job right".

Edited December 9, 2006 by Zurawski

[BUFF 8]

It's WILL, really. If you want to take the "sim lite" excuse and leave things 'gamish', you can do that. Or, you can soldier on grimly and do the job right.

No, it's intention.

TK has said over & over & again that he has no intention of making the world's most hi-fidelity sims as that's not the market that he's aiming for & that he wasn't aiming to compete with Falcon/LOMAC etc. & obviously not target Ware given that TK doesn't see MP as a priority v TargetWare's online aspect.

It's been several years now & you still don't seem to get this ...

He is making a range of easily accessible fun games that people can get into quickly incl. hopefully a new generation of future flight-simmers.

Those games are based on an engine that is capable of quite a lot & he's been good enough (& shrewd enough) to leave it largely open which allows people to make a lot of changes if they so desire & that's what the community has done.

[Guest IndioBlack]

TK has said over & over & again that he has no intention of making the world's most hi-fidelity sims as that's not the market that he's aiming for & that he wasn't aiming to compete with Falcon/LOMAC etc.

 

Can you tell me where I can find a copy of TK's mission statement, please ?

Not being a privileged member of his inner circle, nor a long serving veteran of sites like this, I do not recall seeing such a mission statement, as you mention above, being made available for public consumption by TK himself.

 

I read a lot of "TK says" on forums, by people who are obviously "in the know", but I'd like to see the original quotes, especially as they seem to have been repeated "over & over". If I don't know what he said, then I run the risk of being trampled on the forums for daring to say something out of line. Like now.

 

You've got to realise that most people "on the fringe", judge a Sim by how it plays for them, not by third-hand excuses from people who may have had contact with the author at some time.

If you disliked a book because it was monumentally boring, you wouldn't change your opinion just because a friend of the author told you that it actually was his intention to create ennui.

 

So you really shouldn't launch into people who feel that TK hasn't tried hard enough to make his games more immersive or realistic, because in their opinion, things that could have been done to improve the game haven't been done.

And quite frankly, I don't believe TK has stood still with his intentions. Otherwise we wouldn't be getting patches that upgrade the Sims with new features, or new Sims that are a little more advanced than before. If he really wants to stay Sim-lite, then that's his decision, but it would be foolish of him in the extreme if he ignored opinions from people in the Sim community just because their point of view is different to his.

 

After all, how lite is Sim-lite ?

[Guest MGonzales]

Can you tell me where I can find a copy of TK's mission statement, please ?

 

I think this is an example of what BUFF is referring to...

 

"Its just not that kind of game..." - TK

 

http://bbs.thirdwire.com/phpBB/viewtopic.p...light=refueling

--

 

 

Mark

Edited December 10, 2006 by MGonzales