But to get to the point of this post, I think I've got something new you folks might just be interested in, and I notice there's not much new going on in the Air Talk area.
So here I am
Rise Of Flight: The First Great Air War, published by the Russian team at neoqb, has been out for about a month now in North America. Some people love it, some hate it. For the record, I'm one of the ones who loves it.
There's thousands of posts on the subject over at SimHQ if you'd like to check it out, but here's my take:
I think this is going to be THE WW I flight sim for the foreseeable future. Why? Some argue that the single player missions, campaign, and multiplayer areas are mighty thin. True. But the core...the sim's engine...is the most amazing thing I've seen in a long while. I am now disabled, but until 2006 I was a professional pilot, had been for 20 years, and my experience includes over 30 years' worth of flying, including time in a pretty diverse range of machines from gliders through medium turboprop transports, and even a bit of open cockpit biplane stick time.
Flying in ROF is as real as it gets right now, in my opinion. I'm not the only one who feels this way; most of the comments by other 3-D world pilots that I've read concur. It's an elusive thing to describe, but it just FEELS right. Without going into too much rhapsodic detail (and risk being called a mindless fanboy) all I'll say is that this sim is the first thing I've encountered since I had to retire over 3 years ago that makes me feel like a real pilot again. I have flown a bit in IL-2, and a worthy sim it is...but the realism and immersiveness of ROF kinda makes it pale in comparison, at least for my part
Neoqb issued their Mission Statement earlier this month HERE explaining their purpose, and I liked what they had to say. The short version is that they had to balance the release date of what they knew perfectly well was an 'incomplete' project against the strong pressure from the sim community to get it out the door, and they did so once they'd determined it reasonably represented the simulation they envisioned.
The missions: yup, sparse, but they will grow with time, you can't really have an in-depth campaign or extensive single missions when most of the planes that need to be included in them haven't even been built yet in the sim!
Multiplayer: it's got a cumbersome GUI, the chat function is bad, and smooth net coding ain't there yet...but I am convinced all this will shortly be fixed. I've played a bit on the few servers up, and even with the problems it's big fun. Actually, today or tomorrow should see some major improvements as there's a game update due out that addresses lots of these issues.
Online DRM: one of the most controversial aspects of the sim; neoqb requires anyone running the game to be online full time, even when doing single player missions for authentication with their servers as well as keeping track of MP achievements and single player awards. That's a deal-breaker for some folks.
I don't mind it myself. Steam works much the same way, and I've yet to experience a problem starting the game and connecting with their authentication servers. I'm no fan of IP laws, but neoqb didn't go running to any government or legal hired guns, they set up their own system to prevent piracy...and it seems justified; do a Google search on 'rise of flight' and you'll see about a zillion torrent, keygen, and other sites trying like mad to crack the game...and failing.
Flyable aircraft: Originally, there were only two intended for customers, the SPAD 13 and Fokker D.VII, but a few weeks ago, neoqb added two more for goodwill, the Nieuport 28 and Albatros D.Va. Just so there's no confusion, North American and European buyers will have FOUR flayable aircraft included in the purchase price.
Additional aircraft, to be purchased as they're released, are currently priced at $7.62 each. Right now the only plane for sale is the Nieuport 17, and I bought mine within hours of its becoming available...and I'll be doing so for most, if not all of the new planes down the road. Like Steam, once you buy one, it's yours, so you don't have to worry about reinstalling or repurchasing if you replace your PC. BTW, the next ones due shortly are the British SE5-A and Pfalz D3...the videos of the betas are on YouTube and I'm fairly salivating to get my hands on 'em
To me, paying a few bucks extra for additional planes as they're released is trivial, because they're so painstakingly modeled, and their flight and damage models are totally unique. These planes are not crash boxes with different skins slapped on, I can attest.
Now, if you're not inclined to pay extra, no problem, you just won't be able to fly the new planes...but they will be included as AI opponents or objects you can include if you use the mission builder, downloaded to your ROF folder along with new game updates. That's another rather nifty feature of their always-online requirement to my mind; everyone will be on the same page with the most up to date version because every time you fire up the ROF launcher it checks for updates, and there will never be a need to hunt for patches to install. The updates and changes to the game itself are free, incidentally; the only thing I can see neoqb charging for might be additional map/theaters, but I'm convinced that any of these will be well worth a small cost.
I decided to write this today because I've been pretty impressed with TOW as a community of enthusiasts likely to be in line with my own interests, and I'm hoping to share this experience with y'all. Hope I don't sound like I'm proselytizing, but I'm hoping you guys and gals will jump in with me; I love spreading my addictions and would love to have some company! My own clan, the Misfit Force, is a great bunch, but I don't think many of them are interested in much outside of the shoot-em-up world of FPS games...we did come together with Half Life 2 as our main focus, but I like variety, what can I say...lol
Look forward to jousting with you in the skies over France!
[MF] Gunloon
