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Author Topic: If Only  (Read 8041 times)

krcm1981

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If Only
« on: August 23, 2015, 03:10:20 pm »

Edit- with FSXXI now the flight school standard many things have changed since my days, training is more streamlined and better I would imagine and most of what's below doesn't exist anymore

I cannot say enough good things about this sim. Even in its current stages it blows everything else out of the water(in my professional opinion). Having gone through flight training at Mother Rucker 15 yrs ago we had an early predecessor to what Outerra is. In WOBC(this is before individual AQC tracks) the class had to learn basic mission ops/planning/execution and we had an early early piece of hardware like the Oculus Rift(sucked) and a program similar in function to Outerra but way way less detailed with terrain and mechanics. Anyway everyone in the class had to fly networked with everyone else for a mission. Now remember this was before everyone selected their individual Advanced Airframe(UH-60, AH-64, OH-58D, CH-47, Fixed Wing), but after IERW, Instruments, BCS. Well you should have seen it the mission of course was to be flown in advanced aircraft and we were on a set timeline to execute it. None of us had even ever seen the inside of the 60, the instructors just said go do it. Long story short we spent the whole first day just trying to get all the radios set up and figuring out the 60 cockpit layout and trying to communicate between all the other aircraft so we could start the damn mission) we were split up in twos each pair in their own room) it was a CF if you get my meaning. When on the second day we finally got off the ground with 14 ships trying to fly with the crappy visuals(at night under simulated NVGs) and with the early Oculus-like device it was a mess. Fast forward to 2015, Outerra is out Oculus Rift DK2 is out and the power and immersion is so far out of this world it's hard to explain just how useful it would have been to train with it. I know TitanIM is out there and the Army Aviation Community may very well be using it now. I just wish we had had it during my training. Today the Average Joe has a better program to fly in than I was trained with and its thanks to the programmers of  Outerra. If anyone is sitting on the fence about getting the early version of Outerra and or Oculus I say get it. Even the full motion 60 simulator I would use even towards the end of my career was lacking in visuals as compared with Outerra, sure could have used this engine for the incredible terrain/topography it puts out and the handling of the aircraft modeled. The handling is a tricky thing to explain. A lot of sims are modeled with great accuracy on paper, but everything I've tried just couldn't get the feel of flying/hovering right, you have to balance out the difference because a lot of flying/hovering a helicopter in real life requires feel of the feedback your getting from the helicopter in your hands, feet and butt, and that doesn't translate into a sim at all, so you have to compromise here and there in the airframe mechanics/handling. Outerra has nailed it so close to the mark it is now the bulls eye I measure everything else against. I cannot wait to see the future of Outerra Anteworld with the endless potential it has for all sim fans. Outerra-The Sim World Connected
« Last Edit: August 23, 2015, 03:19:03 pm by krcm1981 »
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U.S. Army CW2 Ret.
153DD UH-60A/L Aviator MedEvac

cameni

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Re: If Only
« Reply #1 on: August 24, 2015, 06:14:07 am »

Quote
A lot of sims are modeled with great accuracy on paper, but everything I've tried just couldn't get the feel of flying/hovering right, you have to balance out the difference because a lot of flying/hovering a helicopter in real life requires feel of the feedback your getting from the helicopter in your hands, feet and butt, and that doesn't translate into a sim at all, so you have to compromise here and there in the airframe mechanics/handling. Outerra has nailed it so close to the mark it is now the bulls eye I measure everything else against.

We should use this in our marketing materials :)

I wonder how much of it is JSBSim and how much is the continuous world visual detail level in OT.
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Acetone

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Re: If Only
« Reply #2 on: August 24, 2015, 07:32:07 am »

I wonder how much of it is JSBSim and how much is the continuous world visual detail level in OT.

Don't forget the stable 40-60fps.
It's amazing how much a smooth framerate improves the feeling of "being here" and (something that some simmers don't realize) gives a better input response. As a result you have the sensation that the aircraft/car/boat reacts more realistically.
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bomber

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Re: If Only
« Reply #3 on: August 25, 2015, 06:32:40 am »

Cameni, i think this is an example of what I've called in other sims 'peaks and troughs'..

At present outerra is managing to keep its development such that the delta between these isn't too great and as such the product doesn't jar the senses.

It's easy however for developers under pressure from the community to give in to their demands and become fixated on one single aspect of the sim improving it constantly and as such creating a peak of excellence of it... But strangely rather than satisfy the customers demands it actually exasperated them into more demands and apart from a few WTG's your feeling of love from your customers is greatly diminished.

Peaks and troughs in development is often disregarded simply because we forget.... We forget that we've all played sims/games in the past with far less features but strangely far more immersive and enjoyable....  We seek for this again but fail to understand why games/sims don't reach the same level of enjoyment or be able to hold us even tho they're more technically advanced.

Games features in the past were more on a par, graphics, game play,  fps, fdm, content....etc and as such our brains could accept this constant level of mediocrity sent from our eyes and fill in the rest with our imagination ... If however a part of the game presentation was amazingly mind blowing then it simply makes the rest look poor and the brain can't handle it, it can't fill in the blanks and instead goes into critic mode...

Anyway this is my opinion....  And a warning to you, don't be afraid of adding less than perfect content.. Don't be inclined to improve something already good over adding something mediocre. As you'll still have to add it latter and it'll still be mediocre however now the delta of peaks/trough will be greater.

Simon
« Last Edit: August 25, 2015, 06:36:45 am by bomber »
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"If anyone ever tells you anything about an aeroplane which is so bloody complicated you can't understand it, take it from me - it's all balls" - R J Mitchell

krcm1981

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Re: If Only
« Reply #4 on: August 27, 2015, 10:46:08 pm »

I agree with bomber, you will gain and loose users throughout development. Right now if I want to run around shooting people up I can go to ARMA, dogfighting DCS, driving trains TS2015, racing Project Cars, etc. etc., When I want to sit back relax and have the most realistic flying experience in a helicopter, enjoying flying on any point of the earth with the Oculus Rift on I come to OT. It's still fairly early in its development and there will be plenty of birth pangs(that's to be expected), Rome wasn't built in a day, so taking time even if it's years and years from now I can see the potential. We just need to get all the game developers out there to see it. One base engine to play train sims, helicopter sims, FPS sims, tank sims, military aviation sims, civil aviation sims, mech warrior sims, racing sims, survival sims, boat sims, construction sims... Everything united under one incredible piece of programming, heck even combined online someday so one person can fly, other players can be racing along roads while others are working the railroad. This is something big and something this big will require a lot of time to get right. I'll be here all along the way.
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