Rise of Flight field mods.

[Dagger 21]

Just read this on the Rise of Flight news page.

 

Field Modifications

Dear Pilots,

 

Today we would like to show you some surprise items coming to ROF that you will be able to experience on your computer soon. It's fun to work with such an enthusiastic team because they always put in extra hours and sometimes this extra effort is spent researching new technologies or ideas and surprise breakthroughs are the result.

 

One such idea is the creation of WWI Gunsights! Since the creation of the British S.E.5a, many of you have asked us to create an "Aldis" sight for it. We never ignored this idea and we knew that we would be able to do it at some point in the future. For instance, attachments points for this sight have been installed on the aircraft since its first release. Amazingly, the future arrived sooner than we thought and soon you will have the opportunity to add the Aldis to your plane. This simple idea, combined with an interesting engineering solution, allowed WWI pilots to have a more accurate aim. We tried not only to reproduce the look of the instrument, but also accurately convey how it works.

 

 

Certain German planes will also have a special gunsight available to help them aim. It will be available in two versions, for day and night use. The day sight will be equipped with an additional filter that allows the reticule to be seen even in bright light. The in-game execution of this filter will be simulated in the project very realistically.

 

 

After finishing principle work on these sights, we decided to expand the work and adopt an idea that was first requested on the forum. Some of the guys decided to put in extra time to make even more equipment available and for many more aircraft in ROF. As a result, we will offer you additional purchasing options on our website to equip your favorite aircraft with what we are calling “Field Modifications”. Current ROF policy is to provide airplanes in a factory fresh state. This means new aircraft come to the front with equipment options our research has told us equipped these planes as default. As has been pointed out to us on the forum and from widely available data regarding the history of aviation technology of the First World War, we know that many aircraft were fine-tuned by mechanics and additional equipment was added to front-line aircraft. Talented individuals created many small improvements that made piloting early combat planes much easier. These changes were adopted based on hard won experience and often at the cost of a pilot’s life. But even more lives were saved with the help of these modifications and they helped bring glory to victorious to pilots who were able to use these enhancements in combat. The most common modifications in the field was the installation of additional devices such as altimeters, temperature sensors, clocks, compasses, fuel level indicators and lamps for night lighting – some of these items were even taken from downed enemy aircraft and were installed on friendly machines. Sometimes these were trophies, passing from one pilot to another or items purchased from mechanics or traded for with other squadrons. For instance, German fighter aircraft often used RAF gunsights. Our Field Modification program gives an opportunity to experience a similar system by outfitting different planes with their respective Field Mod kits.

 

 

You will soon be able to buy these filed modifications in our store. They were created for each aircraft individually, based on already installed equipment and therefore will have different prices. For some aircraft in the package there will be up to nine items and for some only a single item. The cost of the most expensive field modification for one aircraft is currently $5.00 and the lowest is just $1.00.

 

We will also offer Field Mod bundles so you can outfit many planes at a time for a reduced overall cost.

 

You can choose which devices to install on your aircraft before each mission in the hangar. You can install all modifications for an aircraft or combinations of them. The exceptions are gunsights, some planes were able to use a couple different gunsights, but you can use only one gunsight at a time.

 

 

We hope that such attention to detail will please you. If this idea proves to be popular with our community, we can develop some more cool stuff in this direction and in the future we may be able to offer you different options for modifying weapon load outs for aircraft including some rare options. An example of this could be an additional machine gun on a top wing for several planes, or rear-view mirrors or cutting out sections of the upper wing to improve visibility and many other unique engineering solutions invented during the First World War.

 

Good luck in your flights and keep watching our News blog for more news!

[Gr.Viper 131]

The cost of the most expensive field modification for one aircraft is currently $5.00 and the lowest is just $1.00.

Eh?

[+Stary 2,426]

Oh!

 

When they will start selling blasters..?

[Gr.Viper 131]

After service revolvers and ammo, I presume.

[+Stary 2,426]

with such sights I wonder how they managed to loose the war...

 

Purely offline player, so no use for me anyway. Two crossed wires do just fine

[FalconC45 157]

Reflective gunsites on a WW1 Fighter? WTF???!! Seriously??! RRRIGHT.

 

Falcon

 

PS. Thought ROF was ultra realistic sim, guess not.

[Eagle114th 537]

The next thing they probably will do is adding gatling cannons and AIM-9M to WW I fighters.

 

 

 

Eagle out...

Edited April 8, 2011 by Eagle114th

[Gr.Viper 131]

Guys, WW1 was the time when variable pitch blades, remote-controlled drones, high altitude equipment and a ton of other stuff were first tested. Junkers got a full-metal armored attack plane shipped and even managed to get his steel prototypes airborne. The French stuffed a 37mm cannon through a fighter engine, the Brits and the Germans toyed with 20mm automatic. The sights pictured could have also been used, but most likely were one-in-a-million rare and useless for the rotary planes which were spewing oil from the engine.

[themightysrc 5]

I can almost understand selling planes individually - a constant revenue stream. But this seems absolutely bizarre. Why do I get the feeling that they're milking the business model to a ridiculous degree with pay-for add-ons like this?

[Gr.Viper 131]

At least you can use those. Wait for them to take a page from Valve's handbook and start selling scarves and gloves for pilots.

[JediMaster 451]

The difference here is that these things only benefit those who pay for them. The planes are only flyable by those who buy, but if you don't you will still see them added to your game as AI and increase the immersion.

That said, none of this is crucial. You may feel like plane X was very important to simulating a battle in Nov 1917, but an Aldis sight isn't, it's just a nice extra. I suppose the reason they're charging is this was more difficult to add than a day of work for 1 guy.

 

So, if you don't want to buy them, you don't have to. You can enjoy the game fine without it.

[+Stary 2,426]

I still have to find free evening to learn bombing with DFV C.V...

 

IIRC once I heard about the possibility of making WW2 title based on ROF engine (but I think that was before 777 got involved) so maaaaybe this is a testing platform for modelling reflective sights?

 

Frankly, I'd love that 37mm Spad variant, or metal Junkers D.I (?) Gr.Viper mentioned

 

...or a full-metal attack plane with 37mm cannon and reflective sight... oh, wait, wrong war.

[Gr.Viper 131]

Junkers J.I if we're talking attack plane with steel load-bearing armour. Although Junkers D.I was the first full-metal fighter.

There was also Albatros J.I made of wood, but with armor plating in vital areas. Most remarkably one of its experimental variants carried a down-sideways firing 20mm auto cannon on a slightly flexible mount. AC-130 has a long lineage.

[+Stary 2,426]

right, D.I I had in my mind, didn't know about Alba J.I, thanks

[Lexx_Luthor 57]

 

Mod selling is a good idea. I didn't think of it, at least not like this.

 

But since I do offline play, and never do any DRM games, I'll pass on this.

 

If TK was doing payware planes, he probably would have done a MiG-21 by now. But then again, the excellent for their time and equally excellent today Mirage Factory MiG cockpits might cut into that, so... I suppose this WW1 sim is not modupable with planes or the kind of stuff they are field modding for sale here. Hey if they can cover A LOT of equipment and stuff, through the WW1 years, more success to them!

 

Just not into online stuff myself though. Too bad for me.

[+Stary 2,426]

I remember when they started selling individual planes, all the ado that went online, me including... now, two years later I must admitt I was wrong. This is not the worst of ideas, I started buying payware addons, ROF bundles (which is nice idea BTW) included, and I like the freedom of choice -I have for example no interest in late 1917-1918 planes right now (apart from Snipe), but early ones, sure, why not and for ROF it gave them funds to do the soo needed work after release -currently it's hardly the same as it was out of the box. Everyone's happy, right?

 

But buying purely online-orientated what seems to be very historically limited modifications I have no need for, sorry.

 

 

On the other hand, no, 1C guys won't have my single penny anymore in a long time for what they did to Cliffs of Depression Dover, those

[JediMaster 451]

Well, TK's poll indicated he basically is going to switch to planes instead of full-fledged expansions now so people can pick and choose what they want.

[+Stary 2,426]

Well, TK is a different story, he can count on my support anytime