Rumours of my death have been greatly exagerated

[Ptrcam]

http://venturebeat.com/2010/03/12/ga...niacal-gamers/

Flight simming is dead and we didn't notice.

Sorry, for those who aren't bored enough to read the whole article, see para. 6

[Ragtopjohnny]

Then it's pure laziness on the community's part from what I read. We need to "learn" new things all the time, weather it be systems, or what not.

if that's not what we want, go to the arcade style.

Sad when we don't want to "learn" what we use....

John Thuot II
A+/Network+

[tigisfat]

Great post!

That was a good read, and it's sad, but I agree. These are 'the customer is dumb' marketing principles that are true and considered in every entertainment industry. The super hit 'survivor' TV series was based on the US Army's Ranger school because the writer/designer knew that people want to watch suffering.

[Ragtopjohnny]

Survivor????

How the world can you compare that to survival? People playing games if the were Stranded? Come on, I don't think so. One of the STUPIDEST ideas in a loooong time of TV.

"We're stranded on an island, let's play a game to see who gets knocked off the log into the mud first....."

If you want a realistic show to watch, try Southland on TNT Tuesdays at 10pm EST. One of the best cop shows ever.

John Thuot II

[Kapitan]

I totally disagree.
I dont like Sid Meyer´s style nor Civilization.
The game is completely dead boring.
It was popular in the early 90s because computer was a novelty and people enjoyed doing "things" on it, and how clever the PC was to make a sim city. But its so boring the game didnt survive.

quote
One example he gives of the “realism problem” is flight simulators. At first, they were simple and fun. But as they became more realistic, the controls became more complex. Fewer and fewer people could master them. And ultimately, the games became so inaccessible that the genre died out.
unquote

Disagree there as well. I think one of the reasons for the standstill of flightsimulator is it decided to embrace the Virtual Cockpit when graphics and resources were not able to provide a realistic cockpit such as we had in 2D.

The VC atracted youngsters and ignorants of real cockpits who thought this was it. But it quickly tires people because visibility both inside the cockpit and outside is deteriorated with the Virtual Cockpit. Those of us who worship the 2D cockpit are realism maniacs and want to see every little button and switch working, plus manuals, engeneer panels etc.

Virtual cockpit fans dont care much about cockpit realism, they dont want to pay atention to all the gauges and buttons, they think that by getting the 3D feeling of turning the head and looking they are inside a cockpit is enough.They simply fly the plane arcade style, record videos and post them in youtube.

That is not simming and that in the end bores people. A simulator is what the name says, a device that emulates the real thing.
K

[greggerm]

One example he gives of the “realism problem” is flight simulators. At first, they were simple and fun. But as they became more realistic, the controls became more complex. Fewer and fewer people could master them. And ultimately, the games became so inaccessible that the genre died out.

Actually, there is some truth to this statement.

Think back to 10 or 15 years ago... there were flight simulation games all over the place. From WW1 and WW2 era, to Vietnam and modern day era, jets and helicopters... there was a wide swath of games/sims which existed.

Moving forward in time, game/sims like Strike Eagle 3 and Falcon started pushing the envelope of entertainment by adding many realistic elements. Mastering the systems became an important part of the game. Taking another leap, we had LOMAC, which stuck realistic elements all over the place.

As the entertainment games started morphing into simulators, notice how their numbers started to dwindle... there are very few flight oriented games or simulators in active production and/or on the drawing board right now.

Is this because the popularity of this type of title started to wane naturally? ...or was this because the titles became more complex, shunning the average gamer out?

Civilian simulators are a different animal - they've always striven to be as realistic as possible, given the technology... but they always included a way to simplify things, in order to remain accessible. Keep in mind though that FSX was the number one seller in the Microsoft Flight Simulator series. Either Microsoft hit the market at just the right time, or their inclusion of entertaining mission elements in the sim was a boon to their bottom line.

Civil simulators will always benefit from realism, and as such I don't think that portion of the genre will die away.

But looking at the military aviation game/simulation bracket.... (crickets... crickets.... crickets...).... it's a lonely world right now. Not much happening. In fact, some of the only places you can opt to fly is in very pure entertainment titles such as the Battlefield series, where complexity takes a back seat to simplicity and entertainment.

This derth of military aviation titles, which made up the supermajority of simulation games in years past, is probably what Meier is primarily referring to. Now there's a handful of titles at best, and most of them are really only flown by the cult of armchair USAF officers. Contrast that to the "golden years" of long ago when everybody who was anybody had Strike Eagle II and Gunship, and went out for a tank-plinking romp for a few minutes each night.

[theiceman]

I totally disagree.
I dont like Sid Meyer´s style nor Civilization.
The game is completely dead boring.
It was popular in the early 90s because computer was a novelty and people enjoyed doing "things" on it, and how clever the PC was to make a sim city. But its so boring the game didnt survive.

quote
One example he gives of the “realism problem” is flight simulators. At first, they were simple and fun. But as they became more realistic, the controls became more complex. Fewer and fewer people could master them. And ultimately, the games became so inaccessible that the genre died out.
unquote

Disagree there as well. I think one of the reasons for the standstill of flightsimulator is it decided to embrace the Virtual Cockpit when graphics and resources were not able to provide a realistic cockpit such as we had in 2D.

The VC atracted youngsters and ignorants of real cockpits who thought this was it. But it quickly tires people because visibility both inside the cockpit and outside is deteriorated with the Virtual Cockpit. Those of us who worship the 2D cockpit are realism maniacs and want to see every little button and switch working, plus manuals, engeneer panels etc.

Virtual cockpit fans dont care much about cockpit realism, they dont want to pay atention to all the gauges and buttons, they think that by getting the 3D feeling of turning the head and looking they are inside a cockpit is enough.They simply fly the plane arcade style, record videos and post them in youtube.

That is not simming and that in the end bores people. A simulator is what the name says, a device that emulates the real thing.
K

I think that the VC all depends on the product, look at the complex stuff from PMDG, I think their Virtual pits are all pretty functional, I would go as far as to say the 747 and MD11 are as functional as their 2D counterparts.

I am only talking about FS9 as my rig couldnt handle FSx with anything more than the default aircraft, the jetstream PMDG offer is pretty fantastic and that comes with only a 3D pit, I think you would be hard pressed to try and call that product dumbed down in any way,a friend of mine is currently a Captain rated on that particular aircraft said he is very impressed with the amount of detail involved.

Back to the point,I enjoy the VC because it gives me more of a feel for the aircraft, I have no issue with 2D though, but I am not what you would call an arcade type at all, I enjoy learning the systems of complex aircraft that I am not currently rated on, ie the big shiny fast ones!

Ant

[RyanbATC]

I agree with him in general, that the age of the flight simulator is over. Think of how many sweet combat/sim games there were from 95 to 2005... I could probably name off 20 or so once-popular titles (combat/helicopter/jet/civilian etc)

I'd guess the majority of people who want to fly an airplane just want to get up and go. Something like taking the Extra 300 and doing barrel rolls, not programming an FMC or flying a published instrument approach. I've had a lot of friends/coworkers over in the last decade and some were pilots, some not. Mostly they wanted to just get in and fly. They thought it would be boring to fly on an airway between vor's. Combat is fun cause you get to shoot stuff and bomb things. So, really, Microsoft Flight Sim is becoming more realistic, and many people don't have time for the extra learning needed to master IFR/VFR flight.

and lol at kapitan's assumptions/opinions on VC's!!! If anything, the introduction of the VC has increased sales and the number of people who enjoy flight simming. You're waaaay off when you claim I don't care about realism because I fly only VC. Why would you want to stare at a 2d bitmap which doesn't even resemble a full cockpit when you could have it all beautifully modeled in 3d? Half the time 2d panels have the gauges setup differently so you can view the essential ones, which actually makes it less accurate from a flight deck perspective.

[Tim_A]

The VC atracted youngsters and ignorants of real cockpits who thought this was it. But it quickly tires people because visibility both inside the cockpit and outside is deteriorated with the Virtual Cockpit. Those of us who worship the 2D cockpit are realism maniacs and want to see every little button and switch working, plus manuals, engeneer panels etc.

Virtual cockpit fans dont care much about cockpit realism, they dont want to pay atention to all the gauges and buttons, they think that by getting the 3D feeling of turning the head and looking they are inside a cockpit is enough.They simply fly the plane arcade style, record videos and post them in youtube.

Absolutely wrong as far as I'm concerned. I hate 2D cockpits (you would too if you saw how they look on a 3840x1050 screen...). I care 110% about cockpit realism. You are right that I don't want to pay attention to every gauge and button, but that's because I'm flying VFR and looking out the window. My virtual cockpit does not take up 60+% of the screen realestate either. Most of the time it takes up... maybe 10%

Neither do I fly the plane "arcade style". I fly it just as I would in real life - from the cockpit, looking out the window, and glancing at the instruments as I need to.

Oh, I did once record a video, but it happened by accident when I didn't have TrackIR configured right. I did post it to YouTube though (for what it's worth here is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4o-yf90sCw If you manage to watch to the end, you'll realise it's not at all arcady

[pedmond]

I would have to agree I use virtual cockpits for the realism it gives me and the 2-d cockpits for functionality. I'd take a good VC over an good 2-d panel any day.