FastCargo

Did we have a MAX file of the B-29 in work somewhere? FC

More than fitting... http://www.usatoday.com/story/todayinthesky/2015/04/17/star-wars-dreamliner-will-feature-likeness-of-r2-d2/25923671/ FC

Oh come on guys...I posted about this already. If such a mod is created, make a patch that can be distributed. The patch looks for a legitimate, unaltered game file, then alters it. The patch does the rewriting, and the game files (even altered ones) are not distributed. That way the mod can be used, but still requires an unaltered, stock game to exist. FC

Bingo. Read these: www.spacedaily.com/news/oped-05zy.html www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition30/tryanny.html In the latter article, it's shown that a Space Shuttle external tank has more fuel mass fraction than a soda can. In other words, a ET has to be more efficient and effective at carrying fuel than a soda can. If that doesn't tell just how much engineering goes into an orbital rocket... FC

I'll believe it when I see it. FC

Here's the thing...did enough of us buy to offset his cost of development? Everyone realizes SF:NA was rushed out of the door. My suspicion is that the money was running out. TK even remarks about maxing out his CC's at the time. Sure, sales of SF:NA and DLC hopefully were enough to get out of the hole...but remember he did have a new terrain engine, new Avionics code, along with several new 3d assets. I wouldn't be surprised if all the additional sales simply got him to the break even point. Now, lets look at it from the business point of view. You've just put in all this time and money, and you might have made your money back, but had to stretch yourself thin to get there. For the future, you have to patch up the code you put out, try to keep any new bugs from appearing, and hopefully make some money with DLC, as well as look toward the future. What you see is disheartening...a dumbbell effect is forming. Air combat sims are either very arcade, or very hi fidelity, with very little in the middle...and mobile is rising. The advantage of mobile are the following: 1) Very low cost of entry...the Unity engine is licensed for $800. And that engine is cross platform compatible....one build can be ported to several platforms. 2) Very low bar of entry for a usable game. You're not trying to model everything you are trying to do on the PC in features, AI, UI, etc. 3) Reuse of most of your existing assets (terrain, 3d models, effects) and simpler 3d assets. 4) No or very little piracy issues...the game is already free. Yes, you charge for additional aircraft, but only if the player wants to buy. Coming to those conclusions, does anyone honestly think a small developer wouldn't consider a move to mobile? No modding to try to accommodate, no or little piracy to worry about pulling away revenue. Max reuse of assets. Iterative builds...reaching an audience in the millions verses the thousands. It could be as simple as Julheim says...he got tired of dealing with the same stuff. Now he's in mobile, and yea, there's stuff to deal with, but it's different stuff. For us, this is a hobby. For TK, this is a business. Sometimes...they don't agree. FC

FC

Well, and there are rumors (unconfirmed) that some development money comes from other parts of the company. I don't know how much of that (if any) is true. Also, the company could be taking the long view, eating short term losses for long term gain. This wouldn't be new...Toyota is rumored to have taken huge hits in the initial generations of the Prius, but obviously has turned it around as development costs came down and sales went up. FC

I don't know if I would consider DCS 'successful' in the traditional sense. The question is always the same: 'Do you make enough money in revenue to offset the cost of development?' It isn't enough just to have number of sales...you still have to make enough revenue in total to stay in business. I question if DCS in totality has been able to do that. When you look at how much detail goes into each release, not including those that want to upgrade to the AFM level, I can't really just imagine how much it costs. And how many potential DCS projects that were announced have simply vanished like smoke. I want DCS to succeed...I've bought several of their products. I still question the long term viability of the current revenue model. When one of the largest companies on the planet decides the hardcore flight sim world isn't profitable enough to remain in, that should say something. FC

I was wondering how that worked. Okay, Fireball FGA.1...sounds better. Of course, now I have to redo all the ini's...:). FC

April 1946 - The T-54 begins low rate production. This is one of the Soviet Union's first tanks with a 100mm gun, considerably superior to their T-34 and T-44. November 1945-1946 - Bulgaria transitions to a communist government under Georgi Dimitrov and the Fatherland Front. November 1946 - Romania transitions to a communist government under elections led by the Bloc of Democratic Parties. There are suspicions of election irregularities (later confirmed post Cold War). January 1947 - Poland parliamentary elections result in the Polish Worker's Party and their allies winning 80% of the vote. The British and American governments protested the poll for its blatant violations of the Yalta and Potsdam accords. March 1947 - As a result of various developments in the post WWII world, including the Greek Civil War, and deteriorating relations with the Soviet Union, President Truman announced what would become known as the Truman Doctrine. This started with direct economic and military support to the Greek and Turkish governments. This later was expanded with the Marshall Plan and formation of NATO. February 1948 - The culmination of several developments results in the Communist Party taking over the government of Czechoslovakia. This spurs the resumption of selective service in the US. The crisis also causes a reevaluation of current West European military levels. The comparisons are grim...approximately 10 combined divisions of western forces verses over 30 Soviet divisions. June 1948 - After a few months of harassment of surface traffic, the Soviet Union completely cuts all land and water transportation to Berlin, resulting in the start of the Berlin Airlift. Only about 22,000 strong Allied forces existed in Berlin, with about 1.5 million Soviet troops in the Soviet sector that surrounds Berlin at the time. At the same time, the Malayan Communist Party (later the Malayan Races Liberation Army), begins a series of attacks in what became known as the Malayan Emergency. This was a conflict characterized by jungle warfare, defoliant use, and irregular troops. All of these developments highlighted the need for a aircraft that could offset the numbers of tanks and troops between the east and west. What was needed was a long duration, close support aircraft that could stay on station for a long time before needing refueling, but be able to deliver devastating firepower in point attacks. The Chief Of The Air Staff, Sir Arthur Tedder, recommended to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Sir Bernard Montgomery to bring in Sir Arthur Coningham from retirement to outline requirements for such an aircraft. Though Montgomery had clashed with both men on occasion during the war and afterward, he also recognized the value in close joint operations. Sir Arthur Coningham, having recently been a passenger on an airliner that had survived a catastrophic engine failure soon after takeoff from Lisbon, immediately settled on a requirement that the aircraft had to have multiple engines for redundancy. In addition, identification and precision of targeting was essential. This encouraged the idea that the aircraft needed to be slower, rather than faster, to increase time for targeting and weapons employment. Because of this lack of speed, and a low altitude requirement to aid in identification, the aircraft had to be designed to increase its survivability. Armor was encouraged, along with redundant flight controls for elevator and rudder. Engines were recommended to be up high on the fuselage, but close together to minimize asymmetry in case of a failure of one. This precluded using prop driven engines due to the space needed for the prop disc. Proposals were sent out to several companies, with a couple of requirements to include minimum time and cost of development to meet the requirements. Gloster was already in the process of upgrading the Meteor to the F8 standard, and was aided by the 'modular' construction of the aircraft, allowing various changes to the design without having to totally 'clean sheet' the aircraft. The resulting proposal was radical, with the engines moved from the wings to the upper rear fuselage. The tail was split into two smaller vertical surfaces, and the surface of the horizontal tail was increased to move them out of the way of the engine exhaust. This had the notable side benefit of masking the intakes and exhaust from the ground, decreasing their vulnerability. The engine nacelles were decreased in length since the wing structure no longer had to be incorporated into them. The fuselage was shortened to reduce the aft CG tendency. The wings added a plug in place of where the engines used to be, and lengthed to incorporate wing fuel tanks. This resulted in increased lift and additional hardpoints. Additional flaps were incorporated to increase short field performance. The loss in top speed performance was considered acceptable because of the focus on tactical air support. An outgrowth of the centerline external fuel tank resulted in the concept of a multi-mission conformal shape. Along with the external fuel tank shared with the Meteor F8, a new pod was designed. Gloster, working closely with Martin-Baker who were license building the Hispano 20mm, eventually adapted the Hispano cannon that was in the nose of the Meteor F8 into a pod the same size and shape as the external fuel tank on the Meteor F8. This allowed the new aircraft to put eight 20mm cannons on the centerline of the aircraft...a huge amount of firepower in a small aircraft with no 'harmonizing' of the guns needed. Overall, this resulted in an aircraft that was significantly heavier and slower than its Meteor counterpart. Even with the addition of more flaps, the takeoff and landing rolls for typical combat were longer than the Meteor. But these were considered acceptable tradeoffs for the projected tripling of bombload, doubling of rockets and gun firepower that could be carried for an increased duration time. Also, the fuel had to be burned out of the tail first to make sure the CG wasn't put out of the aft limit after weapons were dropped and fuel was burned out of the wing tanks. One drawback of the new design was increased difficulty in bailout due to the engine location. Various solutions were proposed, but until the ejection seat was developed, manual bailout was considered very high risk. The first Meteor F8 flight was serial VT150 on 12 Oct 1948. The first delivery to active service was 2 Aug 1949. The new aircraft derivative was far enough from the Meteor F8 design to warrant a new name - The Fireball GF8. The Fireball's first flight, serial VW314, was 12 May 1949, with its first delivery on 4 Feb 1950. Current textures are based on Kulbit80's Meteor textures, with additional work by dtmdragon. Still a WIP. FC

Our car...well, not really. We've test driven one several times... Our actual vehicles are pretty mundane... FC

No. The best way to compete is not to compete if you can help it. Yes, Steam is the largest distribution service. But it's not the only one. GOG.com for instance is big in the gaming world. And frankly, fits quite close to the TW series of approaching DRM...as in none. Having the TW series on GOG would give it far more exposure than it currently has. And GOG could take over hosting and distribution duties, in exchange for a cut of course. If TK decides to shut down the PC part of the store...I can't see why he wouldn't go this way...it wouldn't (I don't think), cost him anything. Second, don't do the same genre as everyone else...if you can fill an area that isn't being filled, so much the better. For instance, don't bother with WWII...god and everyone has done it to death. TK was smart in starting with the Vietnam war era aircraft. No one is focusing on that theatre and era of air combat. Heck, even now, no one is making any sort of serious incursion. Up until recently, I would have also said the Korean Air War is an area ripe for a sim. It still can be...a F-86 and a MiG-15 does not a KAW sim make. The biggest issue with DCS is it's schizophrenic. It's trying to be all things to all people, diluting the entire brand. Yes, it has fantastic aircraft...what little that exist. The only full scenario/theatre is the same one that first came out with the original Lock-On....over a DECADE ago. Right now, except for that particular theatre, DCS remains a combat aircraft simulator, not an aircraft combat simulator. FC

Okay, first, use capital letters only when you want to emphasize a point, otherwise you look like a 5 year old who can't control the volume of his voice. Second, go into your SF2 game, find the Options, then Controls screen. Reassign your controls. If this doesn't work, there are other options that are pretty simple. Others have encountered this before...usually it involves using a mod built for one patch level that doesn't match the current patch level. Third, this is not the section of the website for these kind of issues. Moving... FC

Hey, I like that! What mods? (and is there a better single player option other than the tutorial?) FC

I thought it was SC:Conviction that was considered the worst of the SC series (other than the PSP version). From what I read, they got rid of several stealth elements to make it more accessible...which sounds like it defeats the point of the SC series... FC

I was catching up with my incredible backlog. Splinter Cell:Double Agent Brothers In Arms:Earned In Blood Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter (Both GR:AW and BIA:EIB have reminded me how much I detest checkpoints...give me a save anywhere option. I'm old, dammit!) Homeworld 1 and 2, plus both remastered versions. Homeworld 2 and Homeworld 2 Remastered are essentially the same game. I even played Homeworld 2(original-not the packaged classic version included in the remaster) just to make sure the gameplay is identical. Homeworld and Homeworld Remastered are a bit different from each other gameplay wise (and obviously graphics wise!). To me, for the campaign, the differences are not enough to take away from the improvements in the overall graphics, UI, etc. Homeworld Remastered simply looks stunning and plays well enough in campaign mode. I still wish the remastered versions had time compression... Alien:Isolation - Unlike another recent Alien franchise game (ahem...), A:I so far has nailed it. And I'm making sure I wear my brown pants... Setting up scenarios in X-Wing Alliance. We use the setup as a fund raiser (be a X-Wing Pilot for a dollar donation!)...works great. Of course, I laugh when kids ask if this is a new Star Wars game.... FC

In my youth, I took a few shotgun shells, taped a small metal marble to the base, touching the primer pin. Then threw it in the air in the middle of the road and ran like hell. Roman Candle fights. Electrical silliness...ever put a wire in a slot of an electrical outlet, another wire in the other slot, then tried to complete the circuit with a "D" cell battery? Yeah, don't do that. FC

In my last PM to TK, I relayed the information about the Facebook page with links to the pirated PC games. He thanked me for it, but also relayed that it was another reason they were happy not to be working on PC these days. Now, that pretty much is the wording he used. Based on the rearranging of the ThirdWire page, it appears that the focus is now exclusively on mobile. Obviously, he isn't working on PC right now or at least in the near future. As for the long term future...who knows. What does this mean for the SF community? First, it means for at least the near term, the complaint about the constant flow of patches is probably moot. Any mods you make now will probably continue to work for a few years. Second, it also means there probably isn't a major change to the engine coming from TK for a while, if ever. So, don't whine here if there is something the engine doesn't do that you want it to...whining here will not change anything at ThirdWire. Now, as far as policy regarding the manipulation of the game engine by people other than ThirdWire (ie hacking). From past correspondence with TK about the issue, he seems to have no problem with it, obviously cautioning that future 'patches' could break previous mods. But let's make a few things clear. First, this specifically means that the engine is NOT open source. If there are modifications performed, those modified files will not be distributed here. If you want to create a 'patch' that modifies an end user's legitimately purchased game, it must be understood by all parties that there is no warranties implied by anyone and that it is very, VERY clear what those patches do. Second, the ThirdWire series is NOT considered abandonware. Period. The links to purchase the games still exist on the TW site and still are functional. Do not be the person that attempts to distribute core files on the mistaken belief that the game is abandonware. Even if those links go away in the future, it is not to be assumed that the PC game has been abandoned, especially if ThirdWire still exists as an gaming company. In short, don't be stupid...it just creates more paperwork. FC

I actually tried this a few patches ago. I couldn't get it to work much beyond about 50 feet off the water. There seemed to be a hard limit. Too bad...I was thinking about a 'Crimson Skies' type mod using zeps as aircraft carriers. FC

GOG.com is now selling this. Obviously, DRM free. May have to pick this one up. FC

"To fly west, my friend, is the one final check we all must take." - Author Unknown Always wanted to sit down with him for a beer and swap flying stories about the Deuce, F-5, and Beale AFB. I regret not ever getting the chance. He was a rarity even in the flying world...a U-2 pilot. He got to see the Earth from a viewpoint 99.99% of us never will. You have earned your rest, sir. FC

Interesting. FC

Well, no science is perfect...:). FC

Min and MaxExtentPosition represent the 'corners' of a box that encompass the part of the aircraft you are defining. It primarily serves as a 'hitbox' with a secondary function of a radar size definition...the bigger the box, the bigger the radar signature of that part. CollisionPoints on the other hand definite a line or 'plane' of a part that is used to determine collisions with the ground or objects. So vertical stab may only need two points to make a 'line', where as a wing might require several points to make a 'plane'. Neither one really have anything to do with the actual LOD shape, but there is a MAX addon that can make a list of Min/MaxExtents. In addition, LODviewer now provides that same functionality. FC