JediMaster

I don't like the Gannet. They wet their nests.

Bucs and Phantoms rock, though!

I meant the US probably has better financing than Sweden, that's all. It doesn't surprise me that the French might undercut that to try and sell their planes, they're the most aggressive at sales in the world, although their Rafale track record would indicate a recent shift in that.

I've also done it many times in LOMAC and Flaming Cliffs. Let me tell you, that's where the A-10s slow speed is a pain! You're in their SAM envelope too long before you can escape as a result, although if you get in close enough you can actually strafe effectively (unlike any USN planes).

Well, it wouldn't surprise me at all actually for this to just pop up with no real warning, including no shots of the terrain or naval vessels beforehand.

So, I don't EXPECT it this month, but I wouldn't be shocked to see it.

I think that counts as "terrain".

Anyway, I've not seen any naval vessels and as mentioned we've barely seen any water at all, they're mostly shot co-alt or from below the planes. So while I'd like to think we'll see it before the end of the year, the dearth of shots of stuff that will have to be done first makes me believe we won't.

What would the Swedes do with flying beercans???

Super Hornets are so much bigger than the F-5 it wouldn't really make sense. Of the 3 picks, the Gripen is closest in size and general capabilities as far as range and such. As the only single-engined plane, it naturally is cheaper because your engine buy is cut in half (including spares) along with other costs.

As for the "modern" MiG-21, that's the F-16. The Gripen is good but has really failed to make significant export success, largely because its US content means anyone who is approved to buy it is also approved to buy the 3 US teen fighters in production and they usually pick them instead as I think we give more favorable financing.

Those responsible for the sacking have themselves been sacked.

In fact, my NF4+ install is still at June 2010 patch or something.

It's a game. It has no more bearing than watching a Packers game on anything in the world. Lighten up.

I'm not saying goodbye to SF2. Thanks to some of the mods like ODS I've still not totally said goodbye to SFP1! Ditto FE Gold, I have tons of planes in there I've just not had the time to convert to FE2.

Oh yeah, I wonder which plane I was thinking of when I typed Jag?

That's just specular-tion.

Marketing with ads and such costs money. Just putting docs up on your own site/forum costs no more than the time to write it, and I can't imagine it would take more than 30 minutes. Unless TK types REALLLLLLLLY slow.

Ah, well even by that yardstick the Sea Harrier would apply, and it had no AB.

It's true that TK doesn't owe us anything. Well, maybe some gratitude for keeping his series as strong as it is, but that's all. As far as that goes, before a purchase is made no company owes any customer anything. Only after the purchase is there an expectation.

However, marketing is more than just "good word of mouth from those who've bought your stuff before". Those screenshots he puts out are a good step, but for years now that's really ALL he's put out. I don't think he should hire a marketing strategist or any such waste of money (although if there are any marketing school students looking for real-world credit maybe he could work with U of Texas on such a thing? No money changes hands, but he gets free work for giving them a bullet point on a resume), but he should put out better stuff. Maybe a set of 3-views of an AI-only plane from an upcoming release, or better yet shots "in action" where combat occurs like he did a little of for Expansion 1 and 2. A little write-up perhaps on the scenario the campaigns will cover? A text description of the terrain if the actual thing isn't ready to be seen? Such things should be built up as release nears, of course, you don't want it all out too far in advance and have nothing for that final couple of months you're running up to release. It seems here like he got the Tomcat 3D model done long before anything else, and the cockpit itself is likely to be one of the last things done as with the new terrain it's something conspicuously absent from screenshots.

A list of flyables would be great, as I'm sure it will have some previous planes in there. With the game operating around Iceland, F-15As are a must, but I don't expect F-16s. F-4s yes, A-7s...any USN plane at sea in the late 70s of course could be in there, but I know he does have a limit on the number of flyables in one title, although I've never bothered to count and see what that is. Is the F-14 going to be the only NEW flyable not in another SF2 title? That certainly seems the case and would be pretty easy to confirm. He could even say that then throw another in at the last minute if he wanted as a pre-release marketing splash. AI-only planes are nice, but don't have the same appeal as a flyable in that way (special bonus! All 3 Backfire variants to fly against, not just 1 or 2!) so you could just list them all at once. It looks like we might be getting two CVNs (Enterprise and Nimitz), but again he could confirm that. An AI Yak Forger would fit well if he bothers with that part of the Soviet navy.

So TK just needs marketing help, but his approach seems to be even when people ASK him about features he super-secret-squirrels it away instead of promoting it. I mean, wasn't he the one who said sales of Exp 1 and 2 weren't what he'd hoped? I can tell ya, there was nothing wrong with the product (as they were the first new content for the SF2 series aside from a couple of things thrown in to the re-releases), and if your product is good and reasonably priced, and you don't have a ton of competition (no doubt there, he's got a corner of the flight sim market to himself, small as it is), the 3rd leg is marketing your product and that's his Achilles heel.

 

Surely not all fighter are even equipped with an afterburner?

 

Of course not, many like the A-4, Jaguar, F-117, and others didn't have one. And, don't call me Shirley.

That's my main beef with most sims that model multiple types. You can't model one plane to ultra fidelity and then half-way it with the others. All planes need to be modeled to the same standard. Look at Il-2...most all planes done according to Soviet sources, which means the Luftwaffe planes are based on captured articles that had who-knows-what problems and time since proper maintenance while the Soviet birds all had "manufacturer" data since after all they were famous for lying to themselves. The result was Soviet planes that performed better than reality with Luftwaffe planes that probably were fairly close to "below average" real performance...meaning they were at a disadvantage often vs those Soviet planes. Perhaps a better gauge would've been Luftwaffe numbers based on testing captured Soviet planes!

Well, that's fine. He doesn't have to post in a thread. He has a FB page, he can post info there. He has tw.com, he can post info on the news page. There are lots of places he COULD post stuff without necessarily subjecting himself to an impromptu Q&A.

Now ED has had a problem with what they call "promises" where they say they're going to do something, change their plans, and claim then that they didn't "promise" them. The problem is simply they usually aren't good at differentiating what they definitely WILL do from what they would LIKE to do, so you get confusion.

I still remember the "A-10 DX11" announcement that was later pulled back. It was like 6-7 months before A-10's release when they said it, so you figure "oh, well this close to release it must be imminent". Instead it turned out it wasn't ready and a good year after the beta/preorder there's no sign it will ever be "patched" in. The Nevada terrain was another early claim that was later made into a DLC that was free "for preorders."

However, you would think it would be relatively simple to just break these things out into "definites" vs "maybes." The way it is now it seems like TK knows little that is "definite" and almost everything is a "maybe", so he stays silent lest someone accuse him of false advertizing.

Things he could tell us now: Terrain info (basic), list of flyables (he has to know which planes that he's including have cockpits ready), list of AI only (he's shown pics that tells you some of what's in there, but not all), list of new ground/sea/static objects that are done (maybe he has some still WIP, he can NOT mention them), whether any changes were made to how the avionics systems works (whether it applies solely to the F-14 or if it will also back-port to existing planes)...

I mean, pics and "trust me it will be good" phrases worked for Steve Jobs, but we're not Applephiles here (well, many of us aren't!) and we'd like to be treated like we have a brain. In fact, I'll go so far as to say I have no problem with TK's products (as limited as they are) but just his marketing/customer interaction. You have a problem, sure, he helps out, but when it comes to the new stuff he's just so tight-lipped. We didn't know ANY of the DLC was specifically coming until it showed up! The campaign customizer was one he could've talked about, for instance. He also could've said "more Hunters, Phantoms, and Skyhawks to be made".

You're saying it's NOT unsafe at any speed?

There's a Mr Nader on line 3 for you...

Everything discussed in this thread so far is irrelevant to me...there's only one thing I care about.

GLOVE VANES.

Will the F-14's glove vanes work if you fly it in the beginning of its service, before they were locked down? This is a MUST, and I notice all the shots so far feature no glove vanes, so are they just late era (late 70s/early 80s) shots, or did TK TOTALLY SCREW US ON THE GLOVE VANES?!?!?!?!

Interesting...check the captions for the pics. All say "AI only" in parentheses EXCEPT...the Backfire C. The B, Badgers, Prowler, etc all say AI only. A faint hope? LOL.

I'll be having fun with that this long weekend!

The STALKER games are great, and I'm sure with mods like the Complete ones I'll be replaying them for years to come. Too bad the best one story-wise was the first as the later ones have lots of improvements but a far weaker story.

Right, as we all know the answer is TAP water.

I would argue that the words that are spoken in Congress do a LOT of harm and I can't stop them.