Why Not?

by Jim "Twitch" Tittle

Article Type: Comment
Article Date: May 09, 2002

Why Not?

Why not? I have pondered that question for over a decade. Flight sims of the past have had many innovative features collectively. Any one that had them all would be expensive and complex. Some had great map features but poor terrain. Others had great flight models but a lousy map. You get the idea.

The Formulas

Every producer of a combat software title will tell you how they use past experience and consumer input to put together a title with the latest hardware technology—using features with extensive testing of play. I know some developers and producers actually read fan site message boards, but they’re a minority. When we see finished products one may have great graphics to drool over but a poor campaign mode or few vehicles to operate. Another ends up with several levels of flight or vehicle modeling that is really good yet the graphics are average.

You are not alone

Outside of flight sims we see RTS titles with many great attributes but they may crash a lot. Some are graphically beautiful with stinking game play. Complexity is good since it allows you to grow with the title and have a challenge for a long time. Poor execution of instructional material is bad. Cheezy manuals with bare basic “get going” info with an impossible-to-read, complete .PDF manual is bad when you can’t get one complete page in legible size on your screen. So you plod along getting killed as you self teach your way to competence with the title…if you have the patience.

One of the biggest lies is the “minimum” and “suggested” system requirements with, sometimes “ideal” listed as well. We usually find “minimum” barely runs at all and makes the experience bad with hesitations or crashes. “Suggested” is really a minimum that sort of runs okay. And “ideal” is the true basic that runs halfway decent. If you’re lucky enough to have a system beyond the published "suggested specs" it runs really well. Fortunately, I see fewer titles with “minimum” requirements listed and more realistic suggestions these days.

Today there should be no excuse for “average” graphics with today's powerful video cards becoming cheaper and even being included in mid-priced machines. A 32MB video card is basic and can display about anything the artists want to do. If you, as more and more gamers do, have a 64MB card, you’re able to run anything they over-do in their studio with expensive developer hardware. RAM, once as expensive as flawless diamonds, is now dirt cheap and soon to be prizes in cereal boxes, no doubt. Powerhouse CPUs are also relatively inexpensive these days. I just wish publishers and developers would refrain from saying a game will run on a modest machine if it really cannot—especially at a time when most folks have more power and are willing to explore it.

What we want

Programs need to be big to portray a good-looking game and complex features. So? Hard drives are cheap too. 20 gigabytes are relatively standard with over 100 Gig affordable. So what if a title takes three or even four CDs worth to work and lay down 3 Gigs on the H.D.? CD replicating is cheaper than ever today too. At a net cost of about $0.60 for a single 4-color CD face packaged in a jewel box and about another $0.30 cents for a brief manual any one can produce a title. Yes, there are varying ways to package. But even a full blown, 3-disc title packaged with a big manual, produced in quantity is no more than $5.

The real cost is in the development, which can take years depending on the company, its budget and the producer’s dedication to quality. Retail will be from $30 to $60. If you wait a bit all these prices will plummet after the initial surge on the retail shelves spends itself.

What We Get…

What we get

But all of this is background knowledge for us consumers only. The proof of a good product is its following after release. A stinker title burns out fast and is in the bargain bin in three months. A well-received title will go for six months or a year with decent sales and a word-of-mouth following that keeps people playing for a couple of years.

In good combat flight sims the average has been five long years between good ones. After the initial interest a huge base of modders get to work and make add-ons that keep things fresh and different for those additional years.

Many titles would live longer if they had features or tools included for the user to modify it. Even later official download utilities are welcome. Plus, we would pay for upgrades and add-ons. Usually the teams produce one or two patches to rectify things that didn’t work all that well once the masses complained. Do we need a larger base of unforgiving beta testers? If we are lucky there is an unsupported utility released to modify something the users wished they could do. This is understandable since the team is soon at work on another title. The companies do need to make money and new titles are the way.

The underlying gripes most people have stated on forum boards are about bugs and for things that should have been included in the first place and shouldn’t be left for mod makers to do.

What We Want…

In combat flight sims it is a simple formula. Build scalable flight models so neophytes or experienced users are satisfied. A number of different planes to fly is important. Twelve is nice. Some ancient sims even had many more. The graphics must be excellent. There’s no excuse for average visuals on the plane or the ground. A detailed, zoom-able map with many landmarks should be included. There should be single mission and a dynamic campaign with detailed debriefs. Rank and medal increments is a given. Changing to aircraft sub-models, armament should be included. Custom paint options are an easy thing to include. With today’s excellent audio boards it has to have good, healthy sounds. And files in easy-to-mod format are a must. Lots of folks have lamented about not having a mission recorder.

A hallmark in combat sims

I may have missed a couple of things, but you get the picture. Some may read this as “all they want is everything.” To this we must answer “yes.” We are willing to pay for a complete, bug-free combat sim with lots of often repeated features. I’ve maintained $80 is not too much for something with all these features. Why must a title retail for only $30 when you get what you pay for? A quick and dirty title hits the shelves, makes a little money, is soon forgotten and the magic formula continues. We hear the resounding, “XYZ Company has abandoned the title,” all to often. Warranted or not, it’s the perception of the public.

After seeing Activision’s Star Trek Armada II’s infinitely detailed debrief containing more info than is even necessary in an air, land or sea combat sim I have, I know it can be done. You got three kills on that last mission. In the fury of combat you can’t remember if one of those was an Oscar or a Zero. That brings you up to eight kills now. But why no aggregate breakdown of things? Why can’t we have a flight log of exactly what types of planes were shot down when and where each accumulates through your tour of duty?

It is no wonder the stand-alone game systems are popular. They have a zillion titles catering to almost everyone and popular titles are reincarnated with sequels regularly. There is no reason PC and Mac users shouldn’t be able to have good, comprehensive combat titles. Yes, why not Mac. It is not that big of a sweat to make a data CD capable of running on either platform. If it is so, then why not a limited run for Mac users? At least some companies have released separate titles for PC and the stand-alone systems.

More money should be spent in multiple feature development and less in marketing. Ads are hype. Every magazine in print and online gets copies of titles to review and news from previews is the norm so folks get some idea of what the title is about. Buying prime real estate locations at retail point of sale is superfluous. If we have read news about a title, seen previews and reviews of the final product, plus downloaded a demo, what more needs to be spent? A glossy magazine ad just hypes things up. Just because IL-2 Sturmovik is on an end cap at Comp USA means nothing to the consumer that made the trip to the store to seek it out in the first place. “Geeks in Space” placed in a more prime locale is not going to produce many impulse buys to justify the cost of real estate. Geez, promote buy-online for a lower price and let UPS deliver it for about the same price as before factoring in the little shipping amount. Leave a supply on retail shelves for the casual buyer to browse through.

Another Ingredient

As titles do become more complex, due to larger graphic and sound files, there exists a probability for disc errors. After many years in the CD replication industry I can state that it is possible to replicate discs with variations in quality that affect the consumers’ experience. Any number of things alone or in combination can contribute to things we call “bugs.” The mastering process is vital and must be done in a sterile environment to produce the glass master and finally the metal stamper that discs are molded from. Inconsistencies here can produce subtle problems not picked up in the same way by different end-user machines.

If the metal stamper is allowed to run to past 25-30,000 injections, flaws can occur. Thickness consistency of the CD is important to proper reading of data on your machine as is the reflective, metalized layer. Manufacturing equipment varies as well as the competency of personnel operating it. Yes, bad discs are produced that you should return to the retailer. Something as peculiar as the brand of disc drive can affect things. A Sanyo may read any disc it ingests scratches and all. A Samsung may be pickier and stutter or crash the program from a minor blemish. This is why people with machines with other specs quite similar have different results. And, believe it or not, I have seen occasions where a burned copy made from a replicated disc on a PC works better than the factory-made one!? One disc will work in a laptop and not a desktop.

But this is simply a diversion from our topic to inform you of a sideline from which problems can occur. There are bugs in consumer-released titles. No one wants to admit it but then patches are quietly made available for download. Why? There are no newly added features, new missions, or enhancements. We would all rather wait for a bug-free product instead of buying it during the traditional Christmas release period and having frustrations.

I believe titles could be longer lived if companies had at least a part-time effort in producing add-ons. Not “Killer Aliens 2” but added missions or levels or enhanced feature to “Killer Aliens 1.” When “Killer Aliens 2” is finished it could integrate into “Killer Aliens 1” for a huge experience. The same with combat sims. Part 2 should be better than Part 1, not just different, yet the same. More features should be added. Look at business software. When did a new title ever come out that did not have new, better features? Yet the new rendition works with files from older ones. Occasionally this happens in games and sims, but not often and it is usually due to the clever work of modders importing compatible files by trial and error.

So…

We have bugs and games/sims without all the features we demand. Some producers do try to create the best they can under the constraints they have, like time deadlines and budget constraints. Others turn out anything for a buck.

Some of the earliest combat flight sims had desirable features so there’s no excuse for not updating and incorporating them or feigning ignorance. This theorem applies equally to all land, sea and air combat sims/games. People are willing to pay more to get more. Folks that can afford and have a taste for a Mercedes do not buy Hyundais after driving an economy car for many years. The sad part is that there is rarely a Mercedes to buy at all. Would you want to hear, “Sorry, bud. We’re outta Mercedes for five years but we got dis swell Yugo, cheap!”

We want more and are wiling to pay. Is that so difficult to understand?




 Printer Friendly