Wednesday 13 April 2011

Things you wouldn't see IRL but might in a game

More junk to decorate maintenance areas with. This is more in keeping with Origin's Wing/Strike Commander than a real military tool shed. Just a bit of fun to decorate the place with, screen-shots taken in the game editor.



One feature I wanted to include in the game but might have to shelve was some level of 'pimping ones ride'. It wasn't overly ambitious, just the ability to attach decals earned via achievements or campaign completion to various helicopter parts. Then Apache Air Assault came out on consoles and suddenly it seemed like an old idea. This kind of maintenance tent could be employed to manage upgrades or repairs if we go down that route.

Some in-game shots of these areas...




When trying to plan a sortie, there's always going to be some joker wanting to gate-crash the party tent.


Thanks for that.


No smoking in the tent please sir.

15 comments:

  1. Painting some teeth on my future Apache seems a nice extra :)

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  2. Yes, I'd really like to do that if possible at some future point.

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  3. Can I have the uk HIDAS on mine please.

    Coming along nicely Richard, especially like the rain effect.

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  4. Great ideas, Flex! It gives the briefing totaly new perspective. Love it! Also those "rewards" would be great. I dont know, if You are going to put pilots bodies in the cockpit, but maybe even their helmets can get some extra paintings. :-) It would be great to watch briefing and see the starting apaches in the background. Please...give this apache sim clearance to land on my hardrive soon. :-)

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  5. Oh...one more thing. Following Origins "sims" path is one of the best ideas, Ive seen in the last ten years of simulation. I know these years werent somehow rich in simulations, but still. I loved Strike Commander or Wings of Glory, even Gunship 2000. I dont know if You have it, but some time ago, they released Typhoon or Eurofighter Typhoon...I dont know. Everybody were expecting follower of amazing EF2000 from DID, but it was way too arcadish etc...BUT...the menus were made in very similar spirit. There was the bar, where pilots were talking and drinking, briefing room with officers showing something on the maps...it was very live.

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  6. EF2000 was brilliant. Super efficient code to cram so much into a 3/486 PC.

    Never really got the follow-up with the hanging around in bars, from a gaming perspective not letting players do anything except wait is a bit of a major no no.

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  7. voodo 3dfx for ef2000 patch -kicking ass ....Amazing reflection of clouds and sun in the windows of houses.
    Wow, this game Now it looks great, and the cockpit .... beating the competition by 10 years.Incredible dynamic campaign, and unforgettable bombing.I remember the first review in a newspaper EF2000, it was a jaw-dropping ;)
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pj9CpmTZUqg

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  8. I must admit, I still play sometimes, when I have nostalgic mood. Still very good sim. Here are few pic from that Eurofighter Typhoon. http://www.gamershell.com/pc/eurofighter_typhoon/screenshots.html?id=66345

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  9. Fitting a story around a dynamic campaign would be quite challenging, infact I don't think it's been done before?

    We talked about including a deck of bad guy cards and some sort of quests that would provide challenges other than blowing stuff up.

    Decals should be doable. Maybe we can an Overlay=2?

    Cheers

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  10. I was thinking adding a second overlay, a forced zbuffer patch.

    LB2 mixed in scripted missions which were triggered by campaign conditions (or just random chance). That's what I'm doing but also ambient missions such as the deck of cards.

    The We Care character as well as a series of special operations will be done before the campaign is finished since they use pre-set data that is assembled by the mission genny.

    Red Dead Redemption is a masterful example of mixing sandbox and storyline, oddly it's a game that rated much higher by developers than gamers.

    Everyone expects voice overs for dialogue today which is hard to produce. Two characters I have people for (if still willing).

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  11. IMHO there is no sense wasting time and devote a lot of work for story, voices ,because most people expect just a simulator, and dynamic campaign and nothing more to happiness does not need;) People did not like story and film career in the TOCA series (car simulator) becose desire good realistic car simulator - not movie.
    The same was the case TDU2-hopeless unnecessary story.

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  12. I'm not talking about a running story arc. Just a couple of set-pieces not that much different to the intro flight / tutorial. What I learned is that dynamic is good, but occasionally something different without warning can off-foot a player, keeps you on your toes.

    TDU2 story was dreadful. Some people wrote very unflattering things about the characterisation (some of which I found myself laughing at with the truthfulness, too rude to repeat).

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  13. There's a RL example of a crew applying 'shark teeth' to a Hellfire after destroying a boat. Is like squad trophies.

    Shoot down five aircraft, claim the title "Ace". Accolades have been around since WWI :) Must be a pilot thing.

    CH is actually a study sim. Study means research and code specific to the aircraft, unique avionics and flight model. It's about as study as you can get. There's some base classes that can be re-used for the CH47 but a lot will be coded specially for it.

    The trick is to make sure you can pick this up and play with minimal control inputs but also have the depth that will teach you new skills. AND a campaign that is different every time.

    We're getting there.

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  14. Well, if it comes to voice overs, it's probably about one actor you can forget :/
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13106628

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  15. Oh dear. Mr Cage isn't having a very good time atm :/

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