AE and WitE and WitW

[Yaab]

I guess WITE would be more accessible if it had its own Tracker.

[aspqrz02]

Avalon Hill did it first ... 'The Game' ... just as you describe ...

[;)][:D][:D][;)]

Phil

[crsutton]

This is pretty much all I played for the past 13 years. I like Battlefront's "Combat Mission" as well. Other than that some first person shooters just for grins. But I am on this forum everyday.......Sigh, I really need to find a life..[;)]

[rustysi]

.Sigh, I really need to find a life..

I think you have one. What's wrong with the life here? Although I do get out once in a while.[:D]

[rustysi]

OK, I've read through some more of this post and I have one thing to add. I'm currently trying to track what I believe is something wrong with the way the TRACOM training works, or doesn't. I order to do this I rolled the game back to an old patch (where I believe it worked). Well let me tell you what a pain in the a** that has become.

I guess what I'm trying to say, and something I believe some of us may be overlooking is the constant support this game receives. The changes, updates, and improvements made to a game that is ~7 years old are unheard of in the industry. It has (IMHO) become the jewel that it is because of this support. A great game has become a fantastic game. Again JMHO. Oh, and by the way, I think the community for this game has aided that support effort. No interest, no support.

Maybe the industry should take note?

[oaltinyay]

WitW - 2 hours and it stays in my harddrive since then. I'M open to play it.

WiTE - played the WIR like mad but WiTE never got me, maybe i gre accustomed tot he old İnterface.

[Macclan5]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

It's inevitable that someday there will be a successor to AE, whether done by Matrix or by a dedicated enthusiast with a good idea and with lots of time on his hands, who works out of his basement office. It's just going to happen one of these days. And if that person or group of people has sufficient inspiration to create a game of similar complexity and scope but with enhanced graphics and interface it could be superior to what we're playing now. But AE set a very high bar. What a classic it has become.

Crowd funding... [8D]

I tend to agree.

The trick as you correctly point out is to "not loose the balance and greatness" for the sake of a few "graphical bells an whistles".

Only an amateur hobbyist (or group thereof) will be able to pull this off successfully for what is a small gamer population. Perhaps if Matrix attempted a crowd funding they would be pleasantly surprised.

Its about the only way WITP 3 (or 2 or whatever) will happen.

I intend to try my hand at WITW especially if they introduce a 1940's expansion. I even play a couple of mindless old school D&D games from time to time for some quick point hack and slash (Baldur's Gate etc)

But I will never walk around with my nose in my phone catching Pokemon; that seems to be where the mass market of gamers is.

[Yaab]

Well, imagine if WITE had some human touch, for example a list of Iron Cross/Hero of Soviet union recipients with a short report about their actions i.e a Ju-87 pilot sinking a DD, Soviet artilleryman destroying a tank in close-quarter, some sapper blowing some fortifications. Also, when they die you get a report too. Small morale boost to the unit because the have a hero among them. Or generated stories of leaders and their combat records. Something to make the game a bit more personal.

Right now it feels like red ants fighting black ants.

[Bullwinkle58]

ORIGINAL: Yaab

Well, imagine if WITE had some human touch, for example a list of Iron Cross/Hero of Soviet union recipients with a short report about their actions i.e a Ju-87 pilot sinking a DD, Soviet artilleryman destroying a tank in close-quarter, some sapper blowing some fortifications. Also, when they die you get a report too. Small morale boost to the unit because the have a hero among them. Or generated stories of leaders and their combat records. Something to make the game a bit more personal.

Right now it feels like red ants fighting black ants.

That, plus the use of counters, were the two biggest turn-offs for me when I bought it. As primitive as the animations are in AE, without them it's just text files fighting text files. In AE I know the CO's stats. I know the repair state of famous ships. I see new Japanese planes appear and have to figure out how to fight them.

In WITE 120,000 men died in a battle and I got a screen of tiny stats in a spreadsheet.

I did love the zoomable map though. The rest? No.

[Canoerebel]

More of the same today. Users in the respective forums (Main Page/AAR Page):

WitW: 1/0
WitE: 1/0
AE: 12/10

[Lecivius]

And this is a quiet day [;)]

[HansBolter]

ORIGINAL: oaltinyay


WiTE - played the WIR like mad but WiTE never got me, maybe i gre accustomed tot he old Ýnterface.

I said exactly the same thing!

[Kull]

I've given some thought to the whole issue of, "it's just too complicated and too niche for Matrix to develop WitP2". And the idea of moving the theatre to Europe is equally panned as impossible. Perhaps what's needed here is to break down the problem into smaller chunks - each of which could be marketed as a stand-alone game - with the ultimate goal being to combine each element (but only after each has been released, sold, thoroughly tested and fixed) into one massive uber-game that combines all the new features in one place. How would this work?

1) A game that gets subs and convoys "right". Imagine "Battle of the Atlantic" on the successor WitP2 platform. Basically ignore land combat in it's entirety and focus completely on subs and convoys. There could even be the first testing of the new Naval Combat system via the "Hunt for the Bismark" expansion. Either include Air ASW/Search right at the start, or fold it in as another expansion. Possibly even have your first go at land combat - or at least the amphibious ops - with a "Norway Invasion" expansion.

2) But the right place for the Air War is the new "Battle of Britain", also based on the new WitP2 engine. Again it's a natural, because you can isolate all combat engine development and focus almost entirely on planes and detection and air-to-air and bombing and night ops. The whole shebang. Even ground AA & radar detection so you can work out those bugs separately from all the other ground elements.

3) Now you combine the working subs and air elements into your new Naval-based game, "War in the Mediterranean". The primary focus of this new phase is Task Force ops and individual surface Naval units, and you have the entire Med as your map. Expansions here would include your first test of parachute infantry operations (Crete) and perhaps more amphibious landings followed by limited movement in confined spaces (Italy and Sicily)

4)We leave large scale land combat operations - the bane of WitP-AE - for last, starting with "Desert Fox", the War in North Africa. You still make use of all the lessons learned to date with convoys & air war, but the primary focus is armored ops and supply. You could expand this further with other land campaign expansions in Poland (39) and France (40 and 44).

In a way, this is the reverse of the current gaming company strategy of "release a poor game and then ensure revenue flow via DLCs". Here the "DLCs" come in a steady revenue generating flow right from the start, and only once all the different game elements have been worked out, do you finally move on to the two major releases of "War in Europe" and "War in the Pacific", and ultimately the granddaddy of them all "Global WW2".

This is how you get WitP2.

[wdolson]

The scale of the game is a factor in WitP2 not happening, but any game engine, not matter the scale, is a major project to build from scratch. Starting small would help some, specialty features wouldn't have to be included in the first version, but just designing and coding the core program would be a major project. There is a reason game companies release a bunch of games built on the same engine. It's tough to build a new game engine from scratch.

The biggest stumbling block to moving forward is the willingness and/or availability of people to do the work. Gary Grisgby has made it clear he has zero interest in doing anything as detailed as WitP again. The old AE team has some willingness, but most of us have become busier since AE was released. I don't even have time to play AE let alone design and write code for WitP 2.

Bill

[rustysi]

Nice idea, but I probably won't live that long.[:D] Besides for me I'd be like, "Yeah, I'll wait for the whole thing... if it works".[:D]

I never owned or played 'Uncommon Valor', my attitude was, "nice idea, but I want the whole war".

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: wdolson

The scale of the game is a factor in WitP2 not happening, but any game engine, not matter the scale, is a major project to build from scratch. Starting small would help some, specialty features wouldn't have to be included in the first version, but just designing and coding the core program would be a major project. There is a reason game companies release a bunch of games built on the same engine. It's tough to build a new game engine from scratch.

The biggest stumbling block to moving forward is the willingness and/or availability of people to do the work. Gary Grisgby has made it clear he has zero interest in doing anything as detailed as WitP again. The old AE team has some willingness, but most of us have become busier since AE was released. I don't even have time to play AE let alone design and write code for WitP 2.

Bill

I agree, everything I've heard indicates that the new engine is the real stumbling block. The idea of building it in increments however is that you conceptualize the design elements, how each one interacts with the others, and modularize accordingly. Still not small, but the primary coding for Battle of the Atlantic is for just one element (and not even all of it), while possibly doing some initial light coding for the air and ground, just to make sure that everything flows properly. And that also is why you would want to have low complexity air and land expansions to Game #1, pretty much to ensure that the whole concept works, and also to get paid for working up the extra detail in those two necessary areas.

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: rustysi

Nice idea, but I probably won't live that long.[:D] Besides for me I'd be like, "Yeah, I'll wait for the whole thing... if it works".[:D]

I never owned or played 'Uncommon Valor', my attitude was, "nice idea, but I want the whole war".

Hopefully you would be the exception. This post from obvert is what got me thinking about this sort of development system:

ORIGINAL: obvert

JD McNeil - Slitherine/Matrix MD

"Owning a market like war sims is a bit of a boon. Not only are your audience generally very dedicated, well off and engaged, they generally don't mind paying full price if it means they get exactly what they're after.

"It's kind of a luxury and a necessity of working in a niche," says JD. "If we went down that route of discounting very, very quickly, then you're going to hit saturation. Our job is to maximize revenue for the developers, and if we're not managing the price properly, then they basically end up getting less that they would. They may have sold lots of units, but volume doesn't matter, it's the value that they generate from them. That said, we had a Steam flash sale on Panzer Tactics that sold staggering numbers this weekend."

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2015-07-30-if-im-truthful-i-think-our-player-group-is-obsessive-would-be-a-word

The part in bold is what's most interesting. This is a company that doesn't think of it's customers as "the great unwashed", but people who will pay to get what they want. So as part of this strategy, it would behoove Matrix to be up front about the process and the end goal. I would think many people here would be very happy to see - and financially support - a path forward, clearly enunciated, that will ultimately provide the game we'll never see otherwise.

[wdolson]

ORIGINAL: wdolson

The scale of the game is a factor in WitP2 not happening, but any game engine, not matter the scale, is a major project to build from scratch. Starting small would help some, specialty features wouldn't have to be included in the first version, but just designing and coding the core program would be a major project. There is a reason game companies release a bunch of games built on the same engine. It's tough to build a new game engine from scratch.

The biggest stumbling block to moving forward is the willingness and/or availability of people to do the work. Gary Grisgby has made it clear he has zero interest in doing anything as detailed as WitP again. The old AE team has some willingness, but most of us have become busier since AE was released. I don't even have time to play AE let alone design and write code for WitP 2.

Bill

ORIGINAL: Kull
I agree, everything I've heard indicates that the new engine is the real stumbling block. The idea of building it in increments however is that you conceptualize the design elements, how each one interacts with the others, and modularize accordingly. Still not small, but the primary coding for Battle of the Atlantic is for just one element (and not even all of it), while possibly doing some initial light coding for the air and ground, just to make sure that everything flows properly. And that also is why you would want to have low complexity air and land expansions to Game #1, pretty much to ensure that the whole concept works, and also to get paid for working up the extra detail in those two necessary areas.

If you're starting small with the plan to scale up later, there are a lot of things you need to design in from the start. You may not need to build say the naval system into a war on the eastern front game, but you need to have the basic elements in place and the design fairly well mapped out for when you do expand into naval warfare. Otherwise, you need to rip up a lot of the work you did and rewrite it for the next step in the system.

Games are some of the most complex computer programs out there. Microsoft Word is rather simple compared to something like Grand Theft Auto, or even WitP. And Word is so complex Mictosoft gave up on a plan to rewrite the program from scratch 15 years ago.

Bill

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: wdolson

If you're starting small with the plan to scale up later, there are a lot of things you need to design in from the start. You may not need to build say the naval system into a war on the eastern front game, but you need to have the basic elements in place and the design fairly well mapped out for when you do expand into naval warfare. Otherwise, you need to rip up a lot of the work you did and rewrite it for the next step in the system.

Games are some of the most complex computer programs out there. Microsoft Word is rather simple compared to something like Grand Theft Auto, or even WitP. And Word is so complex Mictosoft gave up on a plan to rewrite the program from scratch 15 years ago.

Bill

As a key guy on the AE team, you would certainly know. But I'm not trying to minimize the difficulty, nor the fact that's it's pretty much inevitable that a modular design will involve a fair amount of rework along the way.

However, a long term revenue stream throughout the total development cycle, will fund levels of inefficiency that normally could not be accommodated. For example:

Battle of Atlantic - At $25 ea, this funds the initial engine development and concepting. The elements themselves - sub warfare and convoys - should be a small enough part of the whole, that the vast mjority of funds goes entirely toward concepting and developing the initial engine.

Expansion 1 (Air) - $12 each to fund the major coding of the air interface. The actual game code is largely search and naval attack, so just a tiny piece of the total.

Expansion 2 (Surface Naval) - Another $12 where you flesh out the code for surface naval engagements

Expansion 3 (Amphibious/Land) - Another $12 and now we've completed a total integration of all elements of the design. Still much more to be done, of course, and if the designers are smart, they will approach this entire exercise as the "entry cost" for building the new engine. Most profits should be reserved for the subsequent games and expansions. Because if you do this part right, "people will come....they will most definitely come"

The next game is primarily focused on the Air War, and it is very likely that the designers will have to rework some of the concepts from Game #1, Expansion #1. But that's OK, because at $25 a pop the funding will be there to do that.

[Rising-Sun]

That Command: Modern Air/Naval Operations would be a good start with the map setup. Get a permission from Microsoft to use that map. The rest of it, transfer all the data over.

Adding those 3D arts would be nice. Only thing I didn't like what they did to War in the East (Germans and Russian), don't really see any actions. So some of us want to see the actions on the battlefield. Get the feel what it is like during the engagement.

If you get the project going, I am sure some out there included us will help funding it. Only problems is getting all those people that can be trusted and dependable on the project. It will take time though, but once you finish it, you guys would earn something unique and much more.