Suggestion on Hardware requirements!

[JohnRT]

I'm writing this hoping someone will pay attention and think about what I'm suggesting.

I've been playing flight sims since my old Commodore 64, and I really enjoy the hobby. One thing I've noticed, though, especially since Falcon 4, the fastest hardware that exists at the time a game is released is usually far, far below what is required to play the game to its full potential.

When I got Falcon 4, Janes F/A-18, I was in constant upgrade mode spending thousands of dollars to buy the fastest machine I could get my hands on, only to play a choppy, frame rate hog. It took a few years after their release to really get them playable without having to turn the graphics options down to low.

Seeing this pattern in the industry made me not buy the titles when they were released, because I knew I would have choppy frame rates, and so I would just get the product in a jewel case a few years later when the processor speed caught up to the game's full potential. I think that's what's pushed people away from flight sims over the years. Now we have Lomac that can't even run well on my 3 GHz machine with a 9800 card a good portion of the time. I'd be willing to bet it will take at least 4 to 5 years for that CPU hog to play like it was designed.

Anyway, the point of my post, I hope FO doesn't take this direction in programming this game. I know future expectations have to be made as to future CPU growth on what the software can handle at the time of its release. But anybody who's been enjoying this hobby and playing these games knows that the overwhelming majority of flight sims released in the last decade have fallen short of promises and not ran as intended.

I hope the FO team works with a realistic approach to programming this product. When it is released it should be able to run at least 30 frames per second if you own the fastest computer and video card money can buy at the time of said release. Hopefully we won't be dropped another product, like Lomac, Falcon 4, Janes F/A-18 that will take years for the hardware to catch up to the software. To me that's not acceptable, and I don't see why it's been so prevelant in this industry.

That said, the screens look great for this game, the terrain detail amazing. Hopefully you guys will design this product with realistic expectations, not provide us a beautiful work of art and programming, like Lomac for example, that runs below par even on the fastest computers.

Just my thoughts. If anybody else feels the same way post your opinions. We don't need another flight sim that on its release even if you own the best computer and best video card on the planet you can't play acceptably. And I'm sure I'll get some negative feedback for posting my thoughts, but that's expected.

I look forward to seeing this game and hope its a huge success, but made with realistic goals in mind.

[Buckshot]

Hi John, welcome to the forums. I have to say I agree with your sentiments. The big difference between the sims you mention and Fighter Ops, is that in general they were released as a one-off, there was either no plans for further work on those sims, or that work was so conditional that there was a good chance that it would not happen. Therefore the design philosophy behind those sims would be to make them "future-proof" as much as possible, ie design them with hardware 3-4 years in the future in mind, so that the sales remain strong for as long as possible.

The difference between those sims and fighter ops is that we at G2interactive, are here solely because we love flight sims, and this is our sole product and focus. We are not here to release the sim and walk away from it, we are looking at a product that will be overhauled yearly, updated throughout the year. It makes no sense to deliberately target the product to hardware that won't be available until 4 years after release if we are going to upgrade the product in a years time anyhow.

We do have an extremely demanding feature list for this simulation, and it is going to be a challenge to get everything in and have it run on today's hardware, for those who don't have a top of the range system, they may not be able to run everything at 100%, obviously we have no idea until everything is integrated exactly what hardware specs will be required. We are however looking at several areas to ensure that we can do all this on as low a spec system as possible, things like ensuring that the code is as efficient as possible, chosing and improving an efficient graphics engine. We are also looking at other aspects such as the option to use distributed processing, so that the person who has two or more pc's at home, which is becoming extremely common today, can leverage the power of that network, and run different parts of the simulation on different pc's. This will become even more important when we start looking at large online engagements, and we start adding additional modules in for other types of aircraft, helicopters, naval aviation, and even naval and ground warfare.

[JohnRT]

Thanks for the quick reply, Buckshot, and the welcome to the forums. I hope you guys are successful at achieving your goals. Before this product was announced it looked like Lomac was the last realistic flight sim we'd see, and although there are a lot of people happy with the product, it falls into the realm of all the other software I've mentioned that was too far head of its time, and for me not even worth playing in its current state.

Maybe if your team can deliver a product that performs well under technology at the time of its release, is fun to play not only for the hardcore simmer, but the casual sim player as well, gets good press, perhaps more people will be drawn to this genre.

Good luck with the project!

[Seafury]

After skimming this post I would say I have to disagree. I enjoy a game that is make for future hardware, that way I have something to increase when I get something new.

As for Lock On, I currently run it is high/medium and with a better video card upgrade I will do truely high. That is something I am looking forward to in the future.

[jhook]

Hey everyone,
The Beta testers will insure a wide variety of system set-ups will run with "Fighter Ops". I agree with both of you. (and you too Buckshot) LOMAC was released with an advanced series of graphical interfaces that requires mutiple video card input/output. I think that was the way it was made. Falcon 4 was playable from the box with the current system specs available at the time. In fact, Falcon 4 has a chapter that suggests settings for your general rig specifications. :thumb: I have talked about this to Buckshot and others about putting this sort of thing into the FO manual. "Figher Ops" will have a highly scaled terrain which will cost FPS in detail. There's no way around that. But FO will be scalable in itself. Everyone should be able to scale what there rig can or can run in FO. However, thoughs who have a high end rig, will get to run the settings all the way up. (at least as high as you want them) Current technology has arrived at a grand level. LOMAC is now playable with the details set to full. :bounce: The lates video cards (mine is the GF 6800GT) will run LOMAC around 50 FPS with everything turned up.

[galevsky]

It is very interesting.... can you give us more details on the FM ? What will be customized ? Is it independant from easy FM or not ? And an other point I want to focus is how you 'll implement the FM of the F-117, for example ? How it will run for non-natural-stability aircraft ? I think it occurs a problem with this type of aircraft since the electrical commands manage the behaviour of the aircraft, isn't it ?

[jhook]

Sorry everyone,
I had to edit my post as I think evryone missunderstood my meaning. I was discussing the level of difficulty assosiated with peoples abitlity to play the sim. The FM will be adjustable by "play ability". Everyones rig would be adjusted according to the recomended specifications. I am sorry to miss lead anyone here. I am sorry if you missunderstood my posts.

[galevsky]

Ok, it is clear now. Thanks for the clearance. ;)