Hellshade

I can understand your furstation Broadside, but in the end, it's just a number. It took me awhile to get over it too, until it truly hit me that "Nobody else really cares what % Realism number your screen says is and, if they do care, I shouldn't care that they care because it's supposed to be about me having fun, not me comparing e-peens with the % Realism figure that other people might have 1/2 a planet away." The only number I worry about now is my heart rate. If the Beats Per Minute is way high after a mission, then I must be having fun. Do I agree that some of the realism penalties seem off? Sure. Does it matter as long as I find the sim to be challenging and exciting? Nope. In a way, I wish they'd just get rid of it. Replace it with a choice of "DiD" which presets everything to that standard or "Custom" that lets you choose to fly however you feel is most fun. I think that would get rid of a lot of unnecessary frustration. "Reality" is based very heavily on ones own perception, which can vary considerably from person to person. Hellshade

I think strange things like this just happen sometimes. I swear that all of a sudden the AA has gotten closer in the last two weeks also. I've seen one direct hit and a number of very near misses. It's exciting and fun! I just don't know why it seems to have all of a sudden changed. Maybe it's like the lucky streaks of living when you crash from 10,000 feet on Dead is Dead mode. Sometimes you just get a bunch of a certain thing in a row by chance, making it seem like a change took place when it actually didn't. Hellshade

The tripe is my favorite too. It used to be the SE5a for the easy to fly, stable gun platform factors, but the visibility, manueverability and firepower of the tripe (2 gun version) makes it my preferred Quick Combat a/c of choice. The DR 1 isn't even close in my opinion. Too twitchy and hard to line up a target. Too each their own of course. I know a few folks fell in love with the Spads Boom & Zoom attacks. Me, I could never get it to turn around fast enough. Stalled out constantly too. That's one of the real beauties of OFF though. So many different types of planes to try that everyone is bound to find at least one that fits their dogfighting style. Hellshade

The Spad is too tough for me. I'm looking forward to the new FM the devs are giving it in the next super patch. Lower stall speed, I believe and hopefully a little better turning power. As for me, I love the sopwith Triplane, twin gun version. I hear only 6 of them were every made. Obviously that isn't correct because I've crashed at least 30 of them. Anyways, welcome aboard. You'll find plenty of variety in planes, missions and overall experiences in BHaH. Hellshade

AND complete the plane add-on pack WHILE developing P4 WITHOUT neglecting your families OR missing your daytime job. Just cut out eating and sleeping. That's all we ask. Hellshade

BHaH already has the best single player campaign experience available, IMHO. When you get the time to put your talent and efforts into the MP side of things, I have great confidence that you will come up with an easy to use but amazing and fulfilling on-line MP experience as well. Sorry to say but you folks are a victim of your own success. Once you fixed the hard coded cloud turbulance issue, I'm convinced you can do anything if given enough time. I for one am willing to wait because the results have always been worth it. The fact that you are also working on a plane pak add-on just amazes me. Best $$ I ever spent on a game. Thanks for plugging away. Hellshade

Outstanding works guys. A lot of really great ideas to make gameplay more accessible to those of us who can't fly DiD standard due to time constraints. Very suprised to hear about the scenery and terrain texture updates. I think they already look awesome, so I can't wait to see what you've done with them. New FM for the Spad (hurray!!) and a way to use my pilot in quick combat to test strategies without risking killing him. new DM model sounds interesting too. All in all another superb effort by OBD. Thank you. Hellshade

I had to keep the truth "Forum Friendly". When you play on hardcore DiD mode the pilots starts saying unchristian things about your momma. Hellshade

I already have the inside track. The additional content is all about two new gameplay features! Now, in addition to being in the back of a two seater, you can sit on the ground and play Archie, trying to shoot down the craft flying over your lines! Or you can be a CO and sit in your office and stamp "DENIED" on all of the kill claim forms that come across your desk. Either one, the goal is to get the maximum number of pilots calling you a "Bastard". Early reviews say it's very satisfying in a twisted sort of way. Hellshade

You guys sound just like Blizzard. The best games and updates available, when they are good and damn ready and Not a Moment Sooner! :) Bravo. That's exactly how it should be done too. Hellshade

I have the GTX280, however unless you are running above 1680 x 1050, the GTX260 does nearly as good of a job by all accounts. So unless you have a very large monitor, the 260 is your best buy. The 8800 series is also still a great card and can be had fairly cheap these days I believe. Hellshade

Great videos. My Dad sent me the Dogfight series, season 1 and 2. I'm pretty sure it's season 2 that has the WWI action on it. Beautifully done stuff. Hellshade

Stapme, I am running an Intel i7 920 Quad Core CPU (2.67 Ghz stock) overclocked to 4 Ghz and I have no problems with OFF at all. The fact that your system still crashed even after disabling the other cores points to the fact that something else is the problem. May I suggest a few other things to try. 1. If you have an Nvida video card (like me), uninstall the video drivers completely. Use a driver sweeper program to be sure you got it all. Reboot and then download and install the latest video drivers. Nvidia drivers don't like to be installed over themselves and can cause strange issues. 2. Get a program like RealTemp and monitor your CPU core temps. They might remain low when running regular Windows applications but as soon as you start running intense applications like flight sims, they can overheat fast if your CPU fan isn't properly cooling them. Not sure which CPU you have, but mine rarely climbs above 55 degrees Celcius even under load. If yours pops up much higher, then that could be your problem. 3. Load up another intense 3D game and try running it for 40 minutes or so. If it fails, your problem is most likely systemic in nature. If it doesn't fail, then uninstall OFF and CFS3 completely. Re-install CFS3 and RUN IT to configure the settings first, then install OFF BHaH. That has been known to fix a lot of stability issues for a lot of folks. 4. Last, off the top of my head, press control Alt Del to bring up the task manager and check to see how many applications and services you have running in the background. They may be choking off the RAM you have, not allowing OFF the memory it needs to run properly. Beyond that, let us know the following please: CPU type and speed Amount of RAM Type of Video card and the driver version you are running What version of Windows you are running (XP, Vista, XP 64 bit, Vista 64 Bit, etc) OFF runs very stable for the vast majority of people. I don't know of anyone who hasn't gotten it to work just fine. If it's installed correctly and there aren't any underlying hardware/driver issues, it will give you years of heart pounding WWI excitement. Hellshade

Well if I am reading this right and doing the math, that's going to be a pretty expensive flight sim to equal what OFF BHaH offers in terms of planes. You get 39 aircraft with OFF. You get 4 (now) with RoF. So $7.50 x 35 (add on planes) = $262.50 + $39.95 (for the RoF game itself) equals $302.45 in order to get the same number of planes in RoF that Over Flanders Fields can offer to folks right now for only $29.99. If I had to make the choice starting from having nothing, I think I'd rather buy OFF, TrackIR and some CH Pedals. But that's just me. I can be silly like that sometimes. I'd like to fly in the Great War, not finance it. Hellshade

Worked great for me too with Vista 64. Hellshade

Not sure why you bought OFF specifically for the multiplayer component. I don't think it even MENTIONS multiplayer on the features list. Maybe it does, but OFF BHaH is really focused on the campaign experience. There are some guys workinghard at making MP OFF as easy as possible but it's a work in progress, though from all the other posts I've read besides yours, it seems to be a fun experience. Anyways, no AI is going to make you happy bud. There's another sim that just came out dedicated to on-line MP. I'm sure it'll be exactly what you are looking for. I hear they launched without a hitch...enjoy. Hellshade

BigJim - Sorry to hear you aren't enjoying it as much anymore. As far as the off-line AI is concerned, nobody yet has a product that includes an "AI learning curve" to adjust it's tactics reactively in order to adapt to new situations like a real human pilot would and it will probably be awhile before anyone does. In this case OFF is no worse off than anyone else and from the reviews of most other players, it's in better shape than a lot of the alternatives. But since you're the one who's flying, its your opinion that matters. As for multiplayer, since the Devs fixed the CFS3 hardcoded "cloud turbulance" issue, I have a lot of faith that they will find a way to make MP work with Windows 7. They really are some pretty clever fellows. Until you actually have "7" on your machine, you should be able to continue with OFF MP just fine. As for enemy AI hanging in the air at the top of a steep climb stalled out, that's what they do. There's a point between where forward/upward inertia leaves off and before gravity can actually pull the plane back down where it will hang for a moment, stalled out. Real pilots have had to contend with this too and ramming into them is a result of "target fixation". You want the kill so bad that you don't pull away when you should because you want to make sure that you get enough rounds into the guy that he'll go down. Instead you end up ramming him. May I suggest pumping a few rounds into him while you can and then peeling off to the left or right (depending on how he is going to come down) and then circling around to plug him full of some more holes before he drops far enough to get enough fast air over his wings to regain manuverability. He's basically a sitting duck until he regains enough airspeed to engage in defensive manuevers. Hope you have a better day, Hellshade

Yes, I hear Tampa, Florida is the lighting capital of the world and we are just about 120 miles south of there. UPS is mandatory "flight gear" for us Uncleal. Hellshade

I wish I was a hunter. I try to be shooter. Usually within a few missions I'm just a victim. None the less, I have one hell of a time in the air and that's really what it's all about. Hellshade

Pol, That all sounds good to me. I agree that while we all love to see the cool damage effects, it needs to be balanced with realism to keep the flight sims historical integrity. Wings didn't come off and engines didnt explode every time a plane went down. I'm quite confident that you guys will come up with the perfect balance of visual excitement and realistic combat effects to keep us all hooked. I'm just amazed that no matter how much work OBD puts into a certain area of OFF, if they see a way that it can be improved they are always willing to revisit the issue and see how they can make it better. If only all devs had that philosophy. Thanks to PW a FB for taking the time to mess with those values so we can all see the different damage effects. Your work has been most interesting to follow. I'm glad you are tweak-a-holics. :) Hellshade

That looks amazing PW! Any chance all of those incredible damage effects will be in the final official BHaH Hardcore Damage Model? Hellshade

Obviously his best DiD pilot just died. I've had the same response myself a few times. Hellshade

While I'm not suggesting that you will do it, after the cloud turbulance fix I'm confident that given enough time you guys can do just about anything with OFF. Endless talent, dedication, passion and creativity seems to be the defining traits for you folks and a growing number of us certainly do appreciate it. I'm sure whatever you do end up coming up with for P4 will be just mind blowing. Hellshade

Simply amazing work on those medals. First class details all the way. I shouldn't be suprised by the quality P4 will exhibit, but somehow you guys always find a way to top my already considerably high expectations. You know trying to earn those beautiful medals is going to make a lot of people lose a lot of sleep! I suspect the pride of DiD pilots who earn one of those will be unsurpassed. Stunning work. Hellshade

My video card is suddenly flaking out. In normal Windows 2D mode it runs fine, but whenever I run OFF or Oblivion (the only 3D games I play) it heats up from 54 degrees to 75 degrees or more in just a few minutes and then crashes to desktop. The fan is spinning, but doesn't seem to help. I put a huge box fan right next to the open case but no good there either. I put it back to normal stock speeds but no change. I think I pushed my GTX280 too far. /sigh I'll it out tomorrow and see if a heat sink fell off or something. Hellshade