Hellshade

The next screenie is from a WWI flight sim we all know. I was out on patrol with my squadron when we were engaged by the Hun Menace. An over zelous Nieuport wingman was intent on the kill of a Hun, but did he end up killing me instead? Hit or Miss with the Nieuport Wingman?

Check out the replay and see exactly what happened from three different angles! Hit or Miss Vol 1. 1080HD (0:56) Gratz to those who picked it right! 500 Barmy points, which you can send to OBD along with the full price for P4 and get a copy of the long awaited flight sim once it becomes available to the public. Hellshade

I fired up WoP for some quick action and in one duel against a little 109 "yellow nosed bastard" I came up hard fast behind him and hammered him good. But I was flying too fast in my Spitfire and overshot my target. At about 350Mph we past cockpit to cockpit a little more than 15 feet apart at the closest point. He opened up to try and hit me even before I was past him, but I managed to slide by unharmed. He spiraled in seconds later from the damage I'd done. A bit too close even for my comfort! I flipped through the replay to get some screenshots. So what's a good caption? Both the third and 4th screenshots are taken directly from my cockpit view.

Wings of Prey. I've got a few videos of it on my youtube site. youtube/hellshade68 You can still buy it on steam and sometimes they have sales where the price drops down to around $8. Definately worth such a bargain price.

Great stuff as always. Still never fail to be impressed by the scenery, I must say. German craft look as well cared for as the Allied counterparts you've been showing us. It's all so refined. Couldn't possibly be more than 2 weeks out now. Hellshade

There is, unfortunately, no video replay function in OFF. I can't speak to P4 of course, but I've heard no mention of one yet. Who knows? The Devs may yet suprise us, but to be fair I would be genuinely suprised if that feature were to somehow be added as it would literally have to be completely coded from the ground up and the Devs have added so many other features I'm not sure how or where they would find the time. Hellshade

The single player campaign is pretty fun, but don't expect anything dynamic. I didn't see any silk, but then again my attention was turned to a 4th 109 almost immediately after I flew past this one. I didn't even see him crash. Just heard the explosion when he impacted. He might have jumped but as Olham says, I'm not sure how much good that would have done him. Hellshade

Two more cockpit shots.

Winder was saying how P4 isn't really even a "Phase 4" at all. It's a complete re-write from the ground up of almost every single aspect of the game. I wouldn't be suprised if they didn't drop the "OFF" part and give it a brand new name. Pol was wishing for something shorter anyway so if they were going to re-brand the series, this would be the time to do it. Look for a 1 or 2 word title, would be my bet. Three total at most. Hellshade

Over Flanders Fields: Mortal Thunder

This is very true. They highly likely won't use it. But I think it would be a cool name. Well, since the Devs are obviously going to be putting lots of great new stuff into P4 we could call it: Over Flanders Fields: Legends of the Sky (OFF:LOTS). haha Hellshade

Truly remarkable work. Thank you very much for sharing it sir. Hellshade

That works too. I used "Sons of Icarus" because so many of them also fell from the sky - their wings "melted" - just like their "father" did before them. It sort of ties in the entire "greek tradgey" thing to the entire air war. Our genius got us into the skies, and our arrogance still makes us fall. The "Sons of" part talks about the WWI pilots being the first generation to take flight after Icarus himself did.

OFF: Meat Grinder (OFF:MG) Or for a more classical, philosophical name OFF: Sons of Icarus I can picture the cover as a close up view of a rear gunner and an enemy scout burning as plummets earthward just a bit off in the distance.

Wow. This really is a total, massive overhaul of BH&H. Hard to believe it'll be ready in just 2 weeks.

Over Flanders Fields: Air War Evolution OFF AWE

and then I spotted these two during a single mission. As I recall, I shot one down and the other chased me all the way home to my airfield. I don't recall which one I shot down though.

Here was an exceptionally lucky day for me in a campaign awhile back.

I've never owned a single one of Steve's products, but I can still appreciate the incredible spirit of the man. His passion, genius, and determination to make life better through technology was second to none. May he rest in peace and my sincerest condolences to those family and friends he left behind. We will all miss you in one way or another. Hellshade

Pffft. I get the same effect teaching my teenage daughter how to drive. Wow. My 1,300th post and still not banned. :P Hellshade

How about just "THE WWI Flight Sim"

For those of us who quit playing Worlds of Warcraft we could call it: Over Flanders Fields: Wings of War OFF WoW Hellshade

Hey again Ras, I hope life is treating you well. Glad to see you back. :) Hellshade

I remember reading a few Enemy Ace comics when I was a kid. I LOVED it back then, but rarely could find them. It was so different from all of the other comic book stories too. Hellshade

One area that I think both sims could use some work on is the AI combat. OFFs AI is currently very bloodthristy in that if the AI gets into a fight with you, it pretty much doesn't stop until one of you is destroyed. RoF AI is almost the opposite. I've seen enemy AI make a single pass at friendly AI, take their shots for "King and Country" and then continue on their merry way, having done their part in the war for the day. This would seem more realistic, except there are times when RoF enemy AI never seems to switch over from "patrol mode" into "attack mode". For instance I once attacked a Observation Balloon even though a couple hundred feet above it was a patrol of 5 scouts circling it. I downed the balloon but not a single member of the patrol swooped down to give me hell over it. So I climbed up to the lowest member of the patrol and took some shots at him. That one engaged, but all the rest continued to patrol high above, offering no assistance at all to their wingman. You'd think at least one would come down to help while a few others remained high up. By the time I finished with that scout, I was so low to the ground that I wasn't going to climb all the way back up again to try and grab the others. I flew away with a balloon and plane kill while several apparently otherwise occupied scouts lazily circled overhead. Speaking of the ground, OFF and RoF also seem to be polar opposites currently with how the AI fights when close to the ground. OFF AI flies more conservatively, being slightly easier to kill when low to the earth because they are not quite as aggressive, while RoF AI doesn't seem to give much of a hoot how close to the ground it is. They can often perform all kinds of manuevers that they simply don't have the alititude for. While this can occassionally make for some exciting low altitude combat, it has it's downside too. I've witnessed a fair number of RoF AI crashing their plane into the ground or buildings because they were flying far too aggressively at such low altitudes. Those AI that don't engage in hyper aggressive tactics tend to fall into a near permanent right or left hand circle, making them easy prey if you've got the plane and skill to get a slight lead on them. I know Winder said something about the P4 AI getting much improved, especially flying at low altitudes. This is probably the feature I am looking forward to most in OFF. What I would really love to see is if it were possible, to keep the fights up high...where the enemy AI doesn't resort to long spiraling dives to escape you, bleeding off tremendous altitude and ending up almost on the deck before the real engagement begins. I would imagine that pilots only dove down that low if they were over their own lines, in an effort to escape if they were wounded or outmatched. I certainly wouldn't want to dive down into the range of a hundred enemy small arms weapons just to escape the twin guns of my adversary. I'll probably catch some flak for this but hopefully it'll be taken in the spirit it is ment. I think the best AI of the sims I fly is probably Wings of Prey. I hear Battle of Brittain II is awesome, but I don't have that so I can't compare. Please don't think I mean to say that WoP AI is the best on the market. I'm just saying it appears to be the best of the three sims that I fly, in my personal opinion. In Wings of Prey, the AI fights pretty realistically no matter what altitude and diving isn't their only method to throw off my aim. They are quite fond of barrel rolls, tight turns, split S, etc. I've gotten into several fights where the enemy AI and I were doing a long series of spiraling barrel rolls around each other at close quarters, both slowing down just enough to try and force the other plane into the lead. Of course such things may not have been possible in WWI crates and the recovery of altitude during WWII was a much easier thing to accomplish than during WWI. So that gives the AI programmers a lot more advantage in giving their planes more options in how to respond. At any rate, as long as we were discussing sims strengths and weaknesses in terms of immersion, I figured AI deserved to be a part of the discussion. I can't imagine the quality of the dogfights themselves can't lend or take away considerably from the immersion of the sim depending on how good they are. Hellshade