ASL Veteran

I would love it if he would just come out and say exactly what his issue is so we can all be done with it. He won't say it though because .... well I'll just leave it at that. I think his issue is personal and has nothing to do with business principles or practice.

I'm still waiting to hear about Redwolf Software's big strategy to increase sales and turn BFC into the next Total War franchise. All I've heard from you is what's not working for BFC and predictions of it's imminent demise. You can't run a business by just nitpicking and saying what's wrong. In order to succeed in business you have to identify what's wrong and have a positive plan for turning things around. So if you think BFC is on the verge of collapse why don't you enlighten all of us as to what the proper way to run a software company is? First, why don't you start by specifying precisely what's wrong with BFC. Second, why don't you tell us what your plan to correct those deficiencies are.

If you just have your truppen sit next to the bunker for a minute or two, they will toss grenades or demo charges onto the bunker by themselves. Just don't give them a target order or anything like that and let them take care of it without your intervention.

It sure sounds like he didn't like CMx1 doesn't it?

So why do you think CMBB sold less than CMBO? If it's not because of the demo then what is it? Let's just put some fantasy sales numbers onto the various games CMBO 100,000 units CMBB 50,000 units CMAK 25,000 units Mr Redwolf, owner of Redwolf Software Inc, looks at those numbers and says .... what? This? What is Redwolf Software's strategy for the future after making those three games?

Go through their pockets and look for loose change.

So I guess you would now agree that the CMBB demo was not the only contributing factor to the sales difference between CMBO and CMBB? Perhaps even an insignificant one? Would you care to list some of the other factors that might have contributed to the difference in sales between CMBO and CMBB? While we're at it, perhaps you could explain why the sales of CMAK were less than those of CMBB? I think there is a demo for CMAK but you never mentioned if you felt it was a bad demo or not, so I'm unclear on whether you feel that the demo was a contributing factor with regards to the sales difference between CMAK and CMBO / CMBB.

So in other words, Steve was accurate about his sales figures, but inaccurate about why CMBB sales were half as much as CMBO sales. Except that you are attempting to use sales of CMBO and CMBB to make your point that East Front games = West Front games in popularity. This sort of implies that Steve was misrepresenting his own sales figures doesn't it? I mean, if Steve says that CMBB sales were 50% those of CMBO then why would you try to use the sales figures of CMBO and CMBB to prove that East Front games = West Front games in terms of popularity if you believed Steve's claims to be accurate? It wouldn't make any sense now would it?

and what type of gamer do you think is going to be buying a game by John Tiller? You don't seriously think that gamers who buy John Tiller games are representative of the gaming public do you? I think it's safe to assume that people who like games by John Tiller fit into the 'hardcore' category which Steve has already said had an interest in East Front games. Quoting game sales statistics outside of what BFC has already told you is really pretty pointless don't you think? After all, who is going to know how much BFC has sold? So if BFC said that CMBB sales were 50% of CMBO sales then that means that sales were 50%. All attempts to ferret out information to the contrary is just ignoring the facts - unless of course you think Steve is a liar. I think it's pretty remarkable to blame a 50% drop in sales to a demo ... don't you? Isn't it at least plausible that there might be some other factor involved in the sales drop besides one demo scenario? After all, one would presume that those 50% who bought CMBO but did not buy CMBB were already familiar with the game and their opinion of the demo probably didn't sway their purchase decision one way or the other.

The funny thing about Redwolf's demo argument is that he himself probably invalidates it. I don't know for certain of course, but I'm going to take a guess and say that Redwolf probably bought and played CMBB. He may still play it. Yet, he disliked the demo so much that he compares the demo for CMBB with a toilet. If his demo theory held true, then one would presume that with a demo so bad that it's toilet worthy he wouldn't have bought CMBB. Yet there he is, probably happily playing CMBB for twelve years in spite of the bad demo.

Broadsword, I'm just curious, but why don't you ever make something that is actually covered by the time frames contained within the games themselves?

Except that you aren't comparing Market Garden to Normandy. When you state that Market Garden should have been cancelled in favor of rolling out the Eastern Front you are comparing Market Garden to the Eastern Front. So in general terms, you are comparing the popularity of Western Front themed games to Eastern Front themed games.

AFVs will deflect and intercept incoming bullets that are targeting nearby infantry, whether the vehicle is functioning or not. There used be some issues with this sort of stuff in CMx1 but that's old knowledge.

Excellent catch. Consider your findings to be confirmed and reported.

It looks like maybe you wrote your post in Microsoft Word before pasting it into the typing area for posting threads. You should always preview your post before submitting it when doing it like that because you will often get those wierd font brackets which make your post hard to read. It doesn't happen all the time, but when it does you have to go through and manually delete all the font crap out of your posts. Other than that, welcome to the forum.

I think you had an inherent advantage over most players because you are from Finland. You don't happen to keep a pile of toothpicks and pine cones nearby whenever you are playing Combat Mission do you?

The weapons carried are hard coded by the game so the answer is no.

Perhaps we are even reading the Obituaries now?

The design notes start off by saying "As of this writing" so it must have been changed at some point after the note was added.

I think we've gone way past the front page headlines and we are now reading the last column of the back page.

Or just tell him that the issue has been resolved. Since he doesn't have the game he'll be none the wiser one way or the other.

The biggest performance hits come from map size not truppen quantity. A 4km x 4km map is much bigger than anything that comes with any of the games.

Yes, that's true, but like I said - the ATR was a well known weapon system whose usefulness was known to be questionable at the time the skirts were added to the vehicles. Where is the 'trigger' that caused the Germans to suddenly decide in December of 1942 that it was a useful addition to their tanks? Are there extensive reports by the German army from 1938 or later indicating that something had to be done about the threat of ATRs? What caused the tests to be conducted in the first place? It's pretty safe to assume that the Bazooka would have been a revolutionary development in the balance between infantry and armor - a role the ATR was supposed to be filling. The fact that the Panzershrek and the Panzerfaust were developed shortly after the American Bazooka was encountered is evidence enough that the Bazooka was a revolutionary development in infantry anti tank weaponry. The ATR had been around since 1918 and by the time the skirts were being added the ATR was being phased out in most armies. The addition of skirts to German vehicles corresponds with this Bazooka 'trigger' event. As far as I can tell there is no corresponding 'trigger' event for the ATR other than it was known to have questionable usefulness.

Hitler's involvement could mean anything. After all, they were producing and testing the Stg 44 assault rifle without him even knowing about it.

I believe the campaigns are listed on the Gustav Line page, but off the top of my head for the bundle there is Italian campaign covering the Italian counterattack at Gela German campaign covering the German counterattack at Gela American campaign covering the American attack at Troina German campaign covering the Fallshirmjager battle at Primosole Bridge Polish campaign at Monte Cassino American campaign for the breakout from Anzio German campaign about the counterattack at Salerno There are probably some others but I can't think of them at the moment. The campaigns were made by various different designers.