Is CMSF done?

[Sequoia]

So what I’m wondering is will there still be any major features added to CMSF or is it essentially done? I’m not talking about bug fixes or tweaks or even new interface features such as moveable waypoints which would be excellent of course. I’m also not talking about the new armies and vehicles we’ll get in the NATO module. What I’m wondering is, when features have been developed for the Normandy game, will there be any transport of them to CMSF? I know water won’t be one of them but what about things such as, my

favorite, barbed/concertina wire, or doors in high walls or anti tank guns? The way I see it there are four possible answers.

1, No new features of the kind I’m talking about. BFC never planned on constantly adding new features for free to what is now a two year old game. One can get the base game dirt cheap now and it wouldn’t be good business to keep doing so. We could add things to modules as they are paying customers but we have concerns about fragmenting the community as problems arise with having features only available to players with the latest module.

2, Yes there will be new features of the kind I’m talking about available to all in a patch.

Merry Christmas. We didn’t have to do it but since it was done for Normandy all you CMSF guys will get it too.

3, BFC will add new features of the kind I’m talking about but only with those purchasing the new module. We’ll weather the outcry from those who don’t purchase the module because we think we should support those who continue to buy our products.

4, Managing a Game Developers forum is like playing Gin Rummy. You don’t want to show all your cards at once. What we think is possible may not turn out to be possible in a reasonable amount of time. Therefore we keep quiet because it’s better to do so than tell people we’ll be doing something and then endure an outcry when it turns out it can’t be done.

My guess the answer is #4 and even that will be a sufficient bone for me for now, but it would be nice to know if the answer is #1. Oh I’d still buy the NATO module, but I guess I want to hear the bad news now if #1 is the answer.

[MikeyD]

to what is now a two year old game

Play a scenario in CMSF v1.0 (if you have the original CD handy) then play the same scenario in v1.2 (if you've got the Brit module). Its a 'two year old game' that plays nothing like the original product. Its hard to claim the CMSF is becoming dated when it keeps getting updated!

BFC still has another CMSF module coming out. There's no telling what might leak over from the CM:Normandy (or CM:Afghanistan, for that matter). We've already picked up knocked out & abandoned heavy weapons and on-map light mortars. But its really unlikely they'll add a half dozen new command buttons, or anything similar. A month testing and refining those features would be a month not testing and refining CM:Normandy. And the clock is counting down on the arrival of both titles. Brit module took eight months to get out, they're promising NATO inside of... four?

[Battlefront.com]

Our intention is to not have perpetual development on any single Family of games. The primary reason is that it becomes a cumulative distraction and that, in turn, harms overall development. Therefore, the plan has always been that we release the primary game, early on add a few things which we simply didn't have time to put in the initial release, patch it for things which are broken or in other need of improvement, and then stop actively developing for that particular Family. Well, other than the Modules and new code specifically required to support oddities in those Modules.

CM:SF is unique in that we have been adding things constantly over the last 2 years. Some pretty huge things have been introduced, in fact. But that was because the basic game needed the work done and there was no reason to withhold those improvements from you since we only have this one Family of games to support at the moment. In other words, improving the core game was the same as fixing CM:SF, therefore we didn't have any extra work (so to speak). Plus, we obviously felt an obligation to improve the game since its initial state was obviously not where any of us wanted it to be.

Will minor improvements made for one Family cross over to another? I'm sure they will. But I doubt we'll be patching a Family for these things unless there's specific issues with that particular Family that need to be patches. Or put another way... when we feel a Family is "done" we will not patch it any longer, even when other things become available from other Families. The alternative is that we have to actively support a Family for years and years and years... there's just no practical way for us to do that.

We also have no intention of bundling game functionality with game content. Which means the current approach to give everybody the same base game experience, for free, will continue indefinitely.

Will there ever be purchasable upgrades to bring older products up to newer standards? There are no specific plans to do this, however it's not something we've set in stone. We're basically waiting to see if it will be worth our effort to do it. We'll likely take a look at this again after CM: Normandy is out the door.

Steve

[Sixxkiller]

I dont believe BFC will add new major features with each module. The vaunted "TO DO LIST" I dont think has anything to do with the actual modules. Modules are to add forces content and by sheer happenstance, more changes come. The patches (which are free for all customers) mind you, are where all changes happen anyway. The modules just help this come along with a little more cash infusion. Sadly cash doesnt give whats needed most and thats time to put all the things on that "TO DO LIST", as we all know time cant be bought....module or not. Charles and Co also get to eat while at the keyboard and your continued patronage helps defray the cost of the replacement cost of beer spilled on the keyboard.

[Sequoia]

Will minor improvements made for one Family cross over to another? I'm sure they will. But I doubt we'll be patching a Family for these things unless there's specific issues with that particular Family that need to be patches.

Steve

I'm confused. The second and third sentences seem to contradict each other.

[Battlefront.com]

What I mean is that things will trickle in during the process of making Modules, but after the last Module is complete we will consider it "complete" and cease support for it. Very much like CMx1 games. Perpetual lifetime support isn't viable for us.

Steve

[Sequoia]

What I mean is that things will trickle in during the process of making Modules, but after the last Module is complete we will consider it "complete" and cease support for it. Very much like CMx1 games. Perpetual lifetime support isn't viable for us.

Steve

Okay, now I understand.

Will there ever be purchasable upgrades to bring older products up to newer standards? There are no specific plans to do this, however it's not something we've set in stone. We're basically waiting to see if it will be worth our effort to do it. We'll likely take a look at this again after CM: Normandy is out the door.

Steve

I'm glad you haven't ruled it out completely. CMSF has grown on me from a subject I wasn't really interested in at first to a whole new hobby, and with the next modern game not until after at least two WWII titles come out, I'd like to see a "living" modern game i.e. one where new stuff is getting added even if they'll be no new forces. I'd be willing to pay for it and I don't think I'm alone.

[Cpl Steiner]

When CM:Africa Korps came out, it represented the pinacle of the CMx1 engine family of games that began with CM:Beyond Overlord. Even though it was set in North Africa and the Mediterrainean theatre, players were soon modding it so they could play all their favourite Normandy battles again from CM:BO - only this time using a fully matured and debugged version of the engine.

I see the same thing happening in a couple of years time when BFC bring out CM:SF 2 - their proposed modern warfare game set in a temperate environment. People will just mod deserts and palm trees into it so they can return to the middle-eastern theatre of CM:SF but with a fully matured CMx2 engine.

It's win win as far as I can see.

[Thomm]

... and palm trees.

The 3D models cannot be changed, though. Either the game has palm trees from the beginning, or never.

Best regards,

Thomm

[Destraex1]

i agree the modern setting is a really refreshing change from ww2. I would actually like a ww1 game in this engine too.

The game is more complete than most games without adding anything at all.

[GSX]

I would actually like a ww1 game in this engine too.

Depending on setting I dont see much interest in a ww1 game.

1. There would be no US in it, therefore much reduced interest.

2. The battles would be seriously boring on the western front as artillery was the queen of a ww1 battlefield.

Mind you,I'd give anything a go.

[Pandur]

1. why no US? not that i care but they where there, brought a ****load of mustard gas with em, and had their fair share of the slaughter. although they entered late, however they entered rather late in WWII too, so i dont see the problem.

2. when i play CMSF as blue i could say something similar. although it depends on the scenario, its the same for WWI, isnt it?

PS.: id love to see WW1

[ASL Veteran]

WW1 in 1918 would be the only way to have WW1 combat in CM I think. It's much closer to WW2 style combat than 1914. At the beginning of the war it's probably fair to say that the platoon was the smallest maneuver element rather than the squad. Even then squads were rather large with like 20 guys or something and no automatic weapons. 1918 would work fine though.

[MikeyD]

In WWI I believe the U.S. 'only' lost .13% of its population to the war. France lost more than 4%, the Ottoman empire lost 13%, and little Serbia lot 16% of its population. It would be something of a slap in the face to turn a WWI title into a "U.S.-centric" product. Rather like producing an Iraq war game from the Polish perspective. The French still bristle when most of the focus of the first battle of the Marne goes to the relatively few participating British units.

[Sequoia]

While WWI would be interesting to me and some others I doubt there's any interest by Battlefront to do a game of it as there's just not the enough wide spread appeal. Here's what we know so far (at least how I understand it.) We'll get a Normandy series of games, then a Battle of the Bulge series of games which takes the Western Front to the end of the war. Meanwhile a Russian team will be working on the East front. After that BFC returns to modern with CMSF II. My guess is the next WWII project would probably be Tunisia 1943. As far as I know there's no plans to do the Pacific or France 1940 but I can see some team doing those before WWI. So unless a third party has a great desire to do it like we're seeing with the Soviets in Afghanistan, sorry, it'll never happen.

P.S. Mike, a join date of Dec 2007? That can't be right.

[Elmar Bijlsma]

Mike, a join date of Dec 2007? That can't be right.

That's from the forum switch. Beta testers used the new boards earlier then the rest. Our profiles weren't so much imported as dragged kicking and screaming. I had my join date surgically altered to get it to what it should've been, for a while it was Dec 2007 for too.

[Dietrich]

It would be something of a slap in the face to turn a WWI title into a "U.S.-centric" product.

Sad, though, that this sort of 'slap in the face' is not unknown among, well, American movie-and game-makers. Thanks to Hollywood, it seems that, as far as most Americans figure, WW2 began on June 6, 1944.

BFC, however, stands in sharp and respectable contrast to the typical "the toughest battles of World War Two were fought in western Normandy" shtick of most US game companies.

[Battlefront.com]

Yeah, no interest in WW1 from our standpoint. Tactically speaking most of the war didn't involve tactics at CM's scale. Unless one includes running over no-man's land and either getting completely laid waste or mostly laid waste in the process. You'd have to go a couple of levels higher up to get anything interesting IMHO. Plus, I am sure people would be applying "modern" tactics to their 1914 forces as best as possible in order to gain an advantage. Then there's the whole marketing angle... which is about as sharp and pointed as a pancake.

Elmar,

That's from the forum switch. Beta testers used the new boards earlier then the rest. Our profiles weren't so much imported as dragged kicking and screaming.

Oh you got that right!! IIRC it took a couple of days for the import to finish. And even then I think we had to hack some stuff to make it work.

Steve

[Pinetree]

Plus, I am sure people would be applying "modern" tactics to their 1914 forces as best as possible in order to gain an advantage.

The breakout of 1918 would be doable though. A lot of modern-day tactics were devised in that period.

[Boris Balaban]

I use to play a game called Sniper.

It was a WW2 squad level size.

6 to 12 men a side and maybe 1 tank (light) or vehicle in a village or block size in a town.

[Andro]

Will be there a patch 1.2 for the original game with Marines Module, too?

[Sequoia]

Will be there a patch 1.2 for the original game with Marines Module, too?

Yes, from another thread:

Unfortunately we had some overlapping time off scheduled and the patch didn't get done before flights departed, etc. We *thought* it was all complete, but there was a last minute snag with the installer and so we had to hold it up until one of our galavanting staff returns. The good news is that it should be out early next week.

Sorry about that!

Steve