sburke

roger that, just looked odd.

5 posts, 5 posts, 11 posts, 14 posts, 18 posts. Did someone just decide over at a community board that a bunch of folks should come over here and push steam again or what?

no, no he can't. Haven't we covered this subject already and where are the battery leads?

Friendly fire right at the start. Ouch.

I don't think anyone treated the OP like dirt. Folks have simply repeated what has been repeated many many times before. BF has said over and over again they aren't interested. We then get told we are old school, BF is gonna fail, they charge too much, countless other customers have found steam to be the greatest thing since sliced bread yada yada yada. If BF thought it would expand their sales and they wouldn't lose control of their product and they could continue to work the way they are comfortable they would probably already be on steam. They are not and it isn't my place to tell them their business, nor is it anyone else's here. It isn't like we haven't had this same discussion oh so many many times here already.

how does that have anything to do with success? If you only measure a products value by the size of the company then have it it. You will be surrounded to the end of your days with mediocrity.

rotflmao. Umm no. They get to see the underworld even better.

disagree with what? You think you can just harangue BF into going to steam? Countless? Really? It is hyperbole like that which makes it so easy for BF to dismiss the suggestion. Again I repeat, if you want to convince them it will take more than a forum post about an observation. Using arguments about bending and breaking to a company that has survived over 15 years in this industry and is growing leaves most of us scratching our heads as to what you are thinking and suspecting you are pretty new to Battlefront. No offense, but 13 posts doesn't exactly do much to alter that suspicion. I don't care if they go to steam or not. It doesn't make a difference to me. If it works for BF great, if they feel it doesn't and like their current business model (which incidentally has seen them grow during a bad economic turn) I am good with that too. What I won't do is try to tell them their business. They know their business and the industry far better than I do.

nah he belongs in jail

That is a user made scenario, you'd have to contact the designer to see if they are interested in updating it. The author I believe is Phantom. By default no, no vehicles from the pack will appear in anything. You could always open the scenario in the editor and assign a couple.

perhaps, perhaps not. Not to be snide, but you don't have skin in the game (nor do I). This isn't just a question for BF of DRM, numbers of sales etc. They HAVE to make the right decision as it is their income and business at stake. They are apparently quite comfortable with their current model so unless you can meet with them and do a presentation to prove what you feel, you will never ever get any traction saying "I think" or "I feel". They won't and can't act on that. Anyone who seriously wants to see BF on Steam, posting here on the forum is pointless. Come up with the numbers and business model argument and contact BF. I doubt they will meet, but you never know. That is the only way they are ever going to reconsider - a serious business proposal not a forum post. PS Frez you may want to remove that game link, unless you want to join us in the ranks of those who have had to stay after school writing 100 times - "I will not post commercial links on the forum."

thanks combatintman, that is exactly the kind of thing I was worried about. That is enough for me.

gotcha, honestly I don't think you can. BF is most likely going to do 1943. Why? Because it is the year they can do with the least amount of effort. They have been pretty clear that the business model has to be sustainable. Therefore rather than jump to a period where they have to do everything from scratch, they will instead cover an era where some of the work is already done. It speeds up the overall process and makes it less expensive in time and resources to do. 1941 would mean a whole host of new stuff. 1943 means only the stuff they haven't already done in RT. Who knows though, maybe they will surprise us all, do the Battle for France and use those German models to do 1941 on Eastern Front.....

Not sure what you mean, BF has already committed to doing the entire eastern front 1941-1945. Steve is after all one of you east front grognards. Patience, they will get there. The sequence is driven partly by what they can get out based on what they have. If they had started in 1941 we probably would not have an eastern front game yet at all. And there are plenty of eastern front grogs who actually are excited about this period. From a financial perspective (a reflection of paying customer interest) I expect the late year western front is more likely to generate cash flow. It has been commented previously on these boards about what period games generally create the best return. CMBO for example sold better than CMBB despite CMBB covering more area, units, time and more features. While BF looks to be on really solid ground after the lean years developing CMx2 I expect they would really like to secure their financial future as quickly as possible, which is in everyone's best interests.

Regardless of what anyone thinks, the only opinions that count are at battlefront and the last very emphatic statement was absolutely not. And it doesn't sound like they really felt like discussing it again. My expectation is you will hear silence from them on this other than possibly Steve coming on like last time and saying no and closing the thread. Google steam at battlefront site if you are really interested in the history of the discussion.

Don't bite the hand that feeds you, say thanks and hope for more.

Says the homeless man. and it is the Shavian House.

best I could do with CMSF. Couldn't just select individual vehicles like we can now. I had done the same earlier with CMBN, looks better.

heh heh and you can always take it a step further.

easy enough to add your name. Funny to look though the list and see who is in it.

This is particularly to those who have served, but by no means limited to them. One of the things that has always bugged me is the name file in CM is somewhere around 600 names for the Americans anyway. I have created a file of the top 5000 most common surnames in the US and it works much better. (Excel made it darn easy) I don't have a whole bunch of guys running around with the same name. I expect I'll likely do that for other nationalities as well. In looking for some other info though I came across the casualty lists for Iraq and Afghanistan. It occurred to me that within some limits (CM only displays 13 characters in name field) I could create a name file made up of those who gave their lives. What bothers me is - would that be insulting or simply strange? I am feeling kind of mixed about it. On the one hand it is a way of maintaining a memory of their sacrifice. On the other it could be considered kind of creepy. Thoughts? This is the site if anyone is interested. http://icasualties.org/Iraq/index.aspx

100% agree. Maybe someday, I haven't given up hope yet.

Okay holding tight on mouse......nothing is happening. Damn thing is probably broke. How many kids do you know communicate with some 70+ other kids in text messages while trying to run a battle? No a real battle, not world of tanks. I understand the point and bow to your far far better knowledge, however answer me honestly- is there any individual in a Bn size force who is going to be getting messages from every unit in the entire Bn with a live feed to see exactly what they are seeing anywhere on the battlefield from any angle repeatedly in slow motion. Hell is there anyone even within a company sized task force who gets as much info as we get already? Just exactly where is the threshold of far far too much information? We already have too little FOW. You commented in another thread about the reaction of your average soldier in combat and the propensity for mistakes. I agree with your comment in that thread about that being such a wonderful part of CM. It is a far cry however from situation updates from every unit you have on the map. Another example, a tank rolls across laterally in front of your men in and out of sight. You are now looking at multiple updates from every one of your units that can see it. Requests like this really need to be thought out as to how they will work in game as it very likely will not be what one is going to expect. Dreday and you are I believe talking about two very different things. Dreday is looking for a data feed on activity as sort of a status alert on what is occurring around the battlefield. See Vinnart's reply above on a previous proposal to at least have a full overview of your units status. I don't think that is quite what Dreday is hoping for. His request seems more an activity alert than a simple status display. You on the other hand are looking to have the editor add flavor to the player to more fully immerse them in the battlefield as if higher command is issuing orders, alerts etc. Seriously I do understand your intent - if you look at Out on a Limb in the MG release, I did exactly that with a touch point. The player hits the position and essentially gets a text radio message on when they might expect the rest of the company to show up. Unfortunately it is a one trick pony, but what the hell I wanted to try it. I also messed around in Venafro trying to make the player's objectives (collecting intel) a bit more variable to allow for replay value and ran into some hard limitations on what you can and can not vary in objective locations etc. It isn't that I wouldn't like to see this sort of thing, I just think there is a line on what we can realistically expect from the engine. You say it is not that difficult to put in scripts for the TAC AI, I would actually defer judgement on that to Charles. My expectation is his answer would be quite different. In essence these would have to be trigger based messages. What is going to trigger that message? One scout in a Tigr hits your trigger and you get "GREEN TWO, CONTACT 2 BMPS, VIC GRID CN123456. ENGAGING. OUT.:". The game is not going to be context sensitive enough to do more than that. The addition of triggers is very very cool and adds a lot of flexibility, but it is still heavily planned flexibility. Even with them I think you will find like I did in Out on a Limb, that it becomes a rather unsatisfying one trick pony. At this point I bow out. I don't want to rain on anyone's parade, just wanted to keep expectations within what CM is going to present for either of the two options.

Exactly. To quote Ken, Attack!!! Sorry about that Bil, sounds like the shrinking of the map was not met with a full reworking.