Show us what you got.

[RazorBlade]

PacMan’s post at Frugals told us that FighterOps will be the most open project there is. Let me quote him so I am not accused for making things up:

“This new project is going to be as open as any other software project has ever been (AFAIK)”

Still I see at several pages on this forum things like “wait and see”. If you combine those two statements then I can only come to the conclusion that G2I has absolutely nothing. No plans, no code, nothing. I mean, if they have something then we would immediately get to know that because they are as open as any software project has ever been. The only thing that is very much in contradiction with this is the statement

“G2Interactive is partnering with GenAvSimulations, a privately owned development corporation that is experienced in high fidelity simulations, to announce a Q4 2004 release of Air Combat Command, Fighter Ops (working title) a new and extensive product that introduces single player, co-op multiplayer and dynamic game play modes that will make it the number-one online / offline combat flight simulation on the planet.”

How can you say that you will release something of the magnitude that is described above before 2005 if you have absolutely nothing at this point, not even a plan?

You might perhaps confuse me with just another critic that has nothing positive to add but then you are very much mistaken. To be honest with you, I might even be prepared to add something positive to this project but before I do that I want to know for myself how big the chance is that the result will see the daylight. For me that is more important then any revenue that might be gained. When the phoenix project was started I was also one of the first to offer my help and I put about 30 – 40 hours in programming a sober website for them. I promised them that I would give them more of my free time when I would notice that the project gains in popularity and that promise still stands.

I am not angry at G2I that OIR failed. I don’t know the details but I can accept it when things work out different then expected. The only thing I did not like was the constant miscommunication with the community. There was only one time in my life that I made a personal attack on somebody on the Internet and that was not when I was accused of being a nazi for not sharing the 1.07 patch, it was not on several other occasions where I was attacked by some members of the community who probably never contributed anything positive. It was when Claude threatened well-respected community members with jail time because of a lack of communication. He apologized for that and I apologized for my attack. I am however very much convinced that this project from G2I will fail if the communication will not improve and therefore my question is: “Show us what you got!”

[Eluzion]

RazorBlade,

First off, welcome to the forums. Glad you made it. :)

If you read Dirks statement, it says "this is going to be". This does not mean that it is this exact second. The announcement for this project was just made a few days ago, and the website was just launched last night. I don't see what the harm is in sitting back and just waiting to see how things turn out? That's all we can ask for and everyone is doing their best. I can't believe I'm the one actually saying this since usually I'm the one pointing out every little wrong thing and looking at the negative side of things but I guess being exposed to what's going on and understand the hardwork people are putting into this, I have become supportive of it.

"How can you say that you will release something of the magnitude that is described above before 2005 if you have absolutely nothing at this point, not even a plan?"

Who are you to say there's absolutely nothing at this point? How would you even know? Again, please just give it some time and information will become avaliable when it can.

Also, the post Dirk made also said "AFAIK". I don't think Dirk might know about CSP or FlighterGear.org. I'm not 100% sure but that's my guess since those games basically have the source code for download. But, I'm not 100% sure myself on all the plans but I really don't think it will be "open" like CSP or FlightGear.org.

I've always respected you and am a huge fan of your website. If it wasn't for your website that I stumbled across one day I would have never known about the SPx series probably, so thank you. :D I do hope, that you understand what I'm trying to say in my post and I also hope you know I have no hard feelings against you. I'm just here to help out with what I can and it gets frustrating sometimes with all these assumptions and false rumors that are made up.

[Juggernaut]

Razorblade,

Here is there plan - right here on this forum:

http://fighterops.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=14


PacMan’s post at Frugals told us that FighterOps will be the most open project there is. Let me quote him so I am not accused for making things up:

got!”

[Maestro]

Juggernaut,

But I think we need to know a bit more of the how in order to really believe in this. I am going to support these guys because I want a good sim that can take over F4; however, I have to admit that I am still, well, skeptical because I have seen no one that is a coder, a representative of GenAv, a screenshot of a product that must be in alpha in by now as it is due to be released in Q4 2004. I have only read what amounts to cheerleading.

I will support them and let bygones be bygones, but I need some info on the how they will do this. Otherwise Lo-Mac will be my only modern jet sim and I really want more than one.

See my questions here: http://www.fighterops.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=56

[RazorBlade]

Eluzion and PacMan,

I include PacMan in my reply as wel because he send me a PM regarding this topic.

It is absolutely not my goal to catch you on comma in something you said. The only thing I hope for is open communication. I don’t mind if the plans are ready in a week or so. I don’t mind if it won’t be an open source project where everybody can do what they please. I think however that if you keep the public in the loop whenever possible (when it does not hurt anybody to tell something) then people will regain confidence.

Let me give an example what I mean: On the G2I website was a clear bold statement that the website would be online at March 2nd. This is of course not an important fact. If it would be online a few hours or a few days later then normally nobody would complain about it except in your case where G2I made countless of such statements that were almost never turned out to be right.

If I would have made such a statement then it would be something like this: “Eluzion is working on the final stages of a brand new website for FighterOps and we expect this website to be online within a few days. We keep you informed about the progress.”

In this example you tell the truth. If somehow you get some problems with getting the website online then a simple extra update of the information will be very satisfying for the public. Nobody will complain if you say something like this: “We are sorry to inform you that the harddisc of the new webserver crashed and therefore it might take a little longer before the new website will be online. We are working on a solution. As soon as we have more info we will post it here.”

In both examples of statements you describe what is going on and you let the public draw their own conclusions when the website will be online. By keeping people in the loop you never have to worry about stressful situations. No last minute rushing to get the website running, get a patch out the door, etc. If something will take longer then expected then you simply give a new update of the current situation and let the public draw their own conclusions. These conclusions from the public will be based on facts that you provide rather then wrong speculation.

I know I behaved badly yesterday by posting the link to the forum at Frugals and I apologies for that. It was not nice to do that. Let me stress again that I am not against the things that G2I is trying to accomplish and in fact I might be prepared to help. The only thing I don’t like until this moment from G2I is the communication. I really hope that whenever possible G2I will keep us informed.

[Juggernaut]

Hi Maestro,

I was just responding to razorblades request to get some information about what the plan is.

I worked on F4 Gold, and I will say that I completely agree with you and others when they say that they want to know the full game-plan. At this point I certainly don't know the fine details of it.

I would hope that since fighter ops will be free of 3rd party interference that Claude would be able to tell us the fine details about what is going on and what is planned and what progress is being made.

Juggernaut


Juggernaut,

But I think we need to know a bit more of the how in order to really believe in this. I am going to support these guys because I want a good sim that can take over F4; however, I have to admit that I am still, well, skeptical because I have seen no one that is a coder, a representative of GenAv, a screenshot of a product that must be in alpha in by now as it is due to be released in Q4 2004. I have only read what amounts to cheerleading.

I will support them and let bygones be bygones, but I need some info on the how they will do this. Otherwise Lo-Mac will be my only modern jet sim and I really want more than one.

See my questions here: http://www.fighterops.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=56

[Juggernaut]

Hi Razorblade,

Nice post.

I agree with your sentiments on good communication.

Juggernaut


Eluzion and PacMan,

I include PacMan in my reply as wel because he send me a PM regarding this topic.

It is absolutely not my goal to catch you on comma in something you said. The only thing I hope for is open communication. I don’t mind if the plans are ready in a week or so. I don’t mind if it won’t be an open source project where everybody can do what they please. I think however that if you keep the public in the loop whenever possible (when it does not hurt anybody to tell something) then people will regain confidence.

Let me give an example what I mean: On the G2I website was a clear bold statement that the website would be online at March 2nd. This is of course not an important fact. If it would be online a few hours or a few days later then normally nobody would complain about it except in your case where G2I made countless of such statements that were almost never turned out to be right.

If I would have made such a statement then it would be something like this: “Eluzion is working on the final stages of a brand new website for FighterOps and we expect this website to be online within a few days. We keep you informed about the progress.”

In this example you tell the truth. If somehow you get some problems with getting the website online then a simple extra update of the information will be very satisfying for the public. Nobody will complain if you say something like this: “We are sorry to inform you that the harddisc of the new webserver crashed and therefore it might take a little longer before the new website will be online. We are working on a solution. As soon as we have more info we will post it here.”

In both examples of statements you describe what is going on and you let the public draw their own conclusions when the website will be online. By keeping people in the loop you never have to worry about stressful situations. No last minute rushing to get the website running, get a patch out the door, etc. If something will take longer then expected then you simply give a new update of the current situation and let the public draw their own conclusions. These conclusions from the public will be based on facts that you provide rather then wrong speculation.

I know I behaved badly yesterday by posting the link to the forum at Frugals and I apologies for that. It was not nice to do that. Let me stress again that I am not against the things that G2I is trying to accomplish and in fact I might be prepared to help. The only thing I don’t like until this moment from G2I is the communication. I really hope that whenever possible G2I will keep us informed.

[Pacman]

Razorblade,

Let me first apologise for the PM I sent you.
I had little to no time to respond as I had some work to do in and around the house.

Now I said that the website wasn't complete yet and that more work would fall in place as it is being created.
And indeed with the plans we have this website wil become the window for the people that want to know what is going on behind the scene.
People will see that there is a betaforum where all of us discuss the materia, try to improve it and discuss future projects.

People will get to see what we are working on, who is working on what and how far his project has developed.
They'll be able to follow this from the "request" up untill the "completed" stage of the project.

If you have anymore questions please feel free to ask them, I will respond to them to the best of my ability.

[RazorBlade]

I can very well understand that not everything is ready at this time but you can of course always give a status report on the current situation. If some parts are not ready to be made public then you can also say that in a status update. You can e.g. say something like: “We have already a rough plan and you can find it on our website but some details are not decided yet. We might be able to give you more details in the coming weeks. As soon as we have more news we will let you know.”

Of course I don’t know if this is the current situation. There might be totally different reasons why G2I does not give us more information. It is e.g. very well possible that other parties want to add things to the plan before it becomes public. Whatever the reason might be, if it does not hurt anybody then why not tell us what is going on? Also some time indication when you expect more news is very much apriciated. Don't give exact date unless you are 100% certain but you can say something like "expect more news within a few weeks but we can't promise anything at this point" The only thing I really get allergic to is dates that are slipping without further information or the statement “soon” when you let people wait for months without getting back to them.

[16 162 Raven]

im not sure how to write this, and as an nda holder with g2i i have to becarefull what i say. the work i have seen from g2i is outstanding and im sorry to see oir lost. at the same time tho, lets give them some time to get things together bofore we start wanting to know everything about everything. im sure the new sim will be great. lets not harp on what we dont know and look forward to what is to come.im sure everybody will be pleased with the outcome.

[Stuntie]

Don't forget people that the project was only announced a couple of days ago. They are probably still sorting out the plans right now.

[Maestro]

im not sure how to write this, and as an nda holder with g2i i have to becarefull what i say. the work i have seen from g2i is outstanding and im sorry to see oir lost. at the same time tho, lets give them some time to get things together bofore we start wanting to know everything about everything. im sure the new sim will be great. lets not harp on what we dont know and look forward to what is to come.im sure everybody will be pleased with the outcome.

Raven,

Have you seen work done on the new project or just OIR? Again, I'll restate that there has to be more than plans done if we are to see even the first step of the project by Q4 2004.

[McHighlander]

Hey Guys...

no more words... let they can concentrate on their tasks and give us a sudden update notification about their successes...

GO GO GO :wink:

[16 162 Raven]

maestro, i have only seen what g2i has done with oir. i havent seen the new stuff yet and i hope that i have the chance to test it as well. im waiting like the rest of you for news. lets just give it time and not try to pressure them to much for info they cant give out. :D

[Katz]

maestro, i have only seen what g2i has done with oir. i havent seen the new stuff yet and i hope that i have the chance to test it as well. im waiting like the rest of you for news. lets just give it time and not try to pressure them to much for info they cant give out. :D

hey Raven its great having you and all the other 16th guys here welcome :D

[16 162 Raven]

katz, we at the 16th support the efforts of g2i. you knew we would be here hun :D

[Katz]

yeah you guys are great :D

[16 162 Raven]

katz, did you get the pm? not sure if its working or if i did it right lol

[Katz]

nope havent gotten a PM here from you sorry

[16 162 Raven]

log into the 16th ts server and ill tell you what i said. not sure what or why it didnt work in pm