Il2 Battle of Stalingrad on Steam

[Grim.Reaper]

Cat's out of the bag.  As many suspected, the devs announced a "starter" version of the game in which the player will get only two planes (The Bf-109 F-4, and the LaGG-3 ser 29) and will have to grind for the rest.  Currently it's slated for the Russian market only with a price of 499 rubles  (~$13).  Hell of a slap in the face to those of us who coughed up $100 for the game yet still have to do the same grind in order to earn the plane mods and skins.

wow....very interesting decisions this developer/publisher is making.

[Nefaro]

Cat's out of the bag.  As many suspected, the devs announced a "starter" version of the game in which the player will get only two planes (The Bf-109 F-4, and the LaGG-3 ser 29) and will have to grind for the rest.  Currently it's slated for the Russian market only with a price of 499 rubles  (~$13).  Hell of a slap in the face to those of us who coughed up $100 for the game yet still have to do the same grind in order to earn the plane mods and skins.

Wow.

They went for a WoT/WT setup, as suspected, yet they're still charging for the base game.  Maybe $13 isn't too bad if you can unlock everything but I suspect the grind will be so extensive that they're just trying to nickle & dime for every extra thing. 

A large part of the reason match-based games like WoT & WT are so successful is their quick multi-player matchmaking systems and only a single central server you need log into.  You can fire them up and get straight into full-size MP matches in no time, with little fuss.  Does BOS even have any central MP system with such ease of use?  Or is it just a small collection of user-created servers with a couple good full ones at cap and the rest being practically empty?

[Toonces]

Great.  Now SimHQ is going to eat up my entire morning!   >:D

[Nefaro]

Great.  Now SimHQ is going to eat up my entire morning!   >:D

??

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

SimHQ's Il-2:BOS forum has been a rage-fest for the last couple of days.  Didn't help when one of the moderators from the official forums came in to complain about the complaining going on and call anyone who complained an idiot for doing so.  That got the blood up in some and he later edited his comments.  Good little soap opera going on if that's your sort of thing.  Sadly, I have to admit I'm enjoying the forum melodramas more than the game at this point.

[jomni]

Wow! Gotta love emotional simmers.

[Nefaro]

Wow! Gotta love emotional simmers.

Mixed with emotional devs, it's a powder keg.

[Jarhead0331]

Wow! Gotta love emotional simmers.

Mixed with emotional devs, it's a powder keg.

Seriously...in this case I don't think it's the emotions of the simmers that is the source of the problem. The developers' public reactions to feedback have been childish and downright bizarre.

[republic]

I don't understand why a metacritic review should affect a Flight Sim.  I can't recall ever basing a purchase decision on Metacritic score.  An educated gamer can see right through trollish reviews or reviewers unreasonably raging. 

I have to say that the entry price of the game is rough.  I can't help but compare it to DCS or even 777's other game Rise of Flight.  You can get in to those for free and check it out, then buy DLC to your hearts content.  Its hard to drop $60 especially because of the weird drama going on.  If they'd just let you buy the game and one airframe for a low price just so people can see for themselves, it may help turn their bad PR tide.

[Nefaro]

I have to say that the entry price of the game is rough.  I can't help but compare it to DCS or even 777's other game Rise of Flight.  You can get in to those for free and check it out, then buy DLC to your hearts content.  Its hard to drop $60 especially because of the weird drama going on.  If they'd just let you buy the game and one airframe for a low price just so people can see for themselves, it may help turn their bad PR tide.

Someone mentioned that they're doing some $18 deal in Russia that gets you 2 planes to start with.  And something about unlockable ones? 

I don't know the details.  Maybe that will only be a deal for Russkies?  It would make the grind more palatable, I'd imagine.

It's also been mentioned that 777 Studios lamented how they lost money on Rise Of Flight.  Well duh.  They expected to make a living on selling somewhat pricey individual aircraft DLC for years after release, with a server login connection required for much of the content.  I love ROF but the marketing was atrocious and scared me away for a long time.  This seems to be a staple of Russian devs - bad marketing.

I've also found that many Russian developers hoping to produce an MMO/Battle Arean style game are pricey by default and expect to ride that ride for a long time.  I hear that's what ROF was originally meant to be and now IL2:BOS has gone down that road even further.  Can't really blame them since the aforementioned 'battle arena' games have made money hand-over-fist and still do so long after release.  But the IL2:BOS guys are going about it the wrong way.  Those others are Free-To-Play (as was ROF, essentially) so they're starting off on the wrong foot to begin with (as Republic mentioned).  If someone is coughing up the $60, or whatever it's going for currently, they're perfectly right to expect the content to be unlocked.

[RyanE]

I didn't think ROF started out free to play.  I thought that only happened a few years ago.  You had to buy a starter pack with 6-7 planes and then add planes one at a time.

[Father Ted]

So how does one go about making money by producing a high-fidelity combat sim?  Genuine question.

[JudgeDredd]

One (or two if allowing fighting on either side) flyable aircraft and a good single player experience (ala dynamic campaign) or perhaps even (god forbid) a solid online arena with a dynamic world.

Add other flyables as and when.

Sounds good in practice. I have ZIP idea on how difficult or easy it is to create a dynamic campaign or have a continuous online arena.

[MengJiao]

So how does one go about making money by producing a high-fidelity combat sim?  Genuine question.

This is the real issue.  I think the really messy non-solution that DCS represents is paradoxically the best hope for the future.  You do
get pretty good aircraft simulations -- and pretty good SAMs and even some okay ships.  And third-party aircraft seem to do okay in the
environment.  Whether much of it makes any real sense is an open question -- BUT -- the mission editor is very good and you can
put together battles that make some sense.

  I don't have much hope for the Bos/Rof model of somehow extracting money from an irate community.  The DCS model of offering a kind of
space where players can deploy their purchases might work better eventually.

[Father Ted]

One (or two if allowing fighting on either side) flyable aircraft and a good single player experience (ala dynamic campaign) or perhaps even (god forbid) a solid online arena with a dynamic world.

Add other flyables as and when.

Sounds good in practice. I have ZIP idea on how difficult or easy it is to create a dynamic campaign or have a continuous online arena.

Do you think one or two flyables at release is enough?  A reason that my squad mates are iffy about BoS is that it only has 10 - we're used to hopping in whatever we want in IL2 46.  And then how do you price it?  Say £40 for a game (any game) is a benchmark these days. So that's £20 a plane - people baulk at BoS "premium" planes for £14.  How about the campaign - how much will people pay for that?

I just don't know where we go with this.