CM Normandy screenshot released

[Geordie]

Well Im through with the BF forums for a while. Steve seems to make things up as he goes along now, apparently he doesnt pander to marketing to produce his games and they are fantastic.

Blah, puts me off buying the Brit module for SF too.

 

[Michael Dorosh]

Ew. That was ugly.

Steve: Contrary to GSX's paranoia, the games we make aren't driven by marketing opportunities.

And this:

Steve: Well, this is the usual "thanks" that we've come to expect from our loyal fans. Whatever we give you it isn't good enough

 

[Peek]

It's hard to see who they are trying to impress with that screenshot. Do they think a bunch of hardcore grogs are going to see that image and go "Oooooooh a Tiger, I gotta get me that game."? I'd have been much more impressed if they'd posted an image of the QB UI.

 

[Michael Dorosh]

It's hard to see who they are trying to impress with that screenshot. Do they think a bunch of hardcore grogs are going to see that image and go "Oooooooh a Tiger, I gotta get me that game."? I'd have been much more impressed if they'd posted an image of the QB UI.

But they don't need to impress the grogs; they know that grogs will either buy the game anyway, because they buy every tactical game to come down the pike because of the subject matter, or pass on it until they've played the demo or read the reviews- not because of the screenshots.

The screenshots are to reel in the other demographics; the TOW fans, the Call of Duty players who now know what D-Day was and play in Real Time and have spare money to throw around. They're the ones with spare cash and time, part of the wider net BFC is casting.

 

[Mustang2.0]

...they really have no idea how to handle themselves online...

I haven't been around BFC very long so my question is, why do they do that?
Why can they not just reply with a polite "excellent questions, we are still working on it, hope you like it..."
It's getting to the point where I really believe they are posting while drunk or there is some serious internal/personal stress that is driving them crazy.

 

[Geordie]

They do it becuase theyve gotten used to doing it I suppose. I am amazed that I managed to get Steve, Moon and Kwazydog all to comment about my comments abouit the Tiger. And Im paranoid? Hmm, I think it may be them thats paranoid about this, I think MD may be right, Im beginning to suspect that they dont have a clue about the Normandy game yet other than some early vehicle modelling, and of course, they had to model that Tiger first.

Sadlt their cunning ploy to carry out the worlds longest beta test with SF seems to be unravelling. Dont get me wong, I like SF, but contrary to what they said in the beggining, its not harder to do, in actual fact its probably a lot more forgiving as the desert doesnt have so much terrain to model and the forces are so wide apart in capability that you expect to lose as Syrians 99% of the time.

Come Normandy though were facing a different prospect. In infantry and armour tactics the US is facing a more capable force than they weild. Just how are they going to make the campaign winnable for an average player when your facing better forces on the defense. For me it would be fun, but for BF (who dont bend to the market remember) what will they do? A campaign wont be much fun if you can never win mission 2.

 

[dalem]

Wow. Steve is getting a bit defensive again, isn't he? And this sentence absolutely slays me:

Seriously though... it's absolutely childish (and I do choose my words carefully) to judge a game based on a single screenshot, either positively or negatively.

Translation: "We have absolutely no f*cking idea what we are doing here."

I mean does he honestly think that he can put up the first - THE FIRST - visual from what could arguably be called the most anticipated WWII game in the last 5 years and not get a few judgements from it? Might as well have put a picture of his balls up there.

"Geez, are there gonna be balls in the game? Anything else? What about non-testicular features?"

"Screw you! Why would you think the game would focus on my balls, idiot?"

"Well, you put a detailed picture of your balls up as the first teaser. So you got me thinking of a) your balls, and b) Normandy-type things that are, in fact, not your balls. So I asked."

"I like my balls. Moon likes my balls. Kwazydog likes my balls. So up they went."

"Okay, but what kinds of things are we going to be able to do with your balls in the game?"

"Why is everyone still talking about my gosh-darned balls?"

The train wreck keeps grinding on, it seems.

-dale

 

[Michael Dorosh]

Wow. Steve is getting a bit defensive again, isn't he? And this sentence absolutely slays me:



Translation: "We have absolutely no f*cking idea what we are doing here."

I mean does he honestly think that he can put up the first - THE FIRST - visual from what could arguably be called the most anticipated WWII game in the last 5 years and not get a few judgements from it? Might as well have put a picture of his balls up there.

"Geez, are there gonna be balls in the game? Anything else? What about non-testicular features?"

"Screw you! Why would you think the game would focus on my balls, idiot?"

"Well, you put a detailed picture of your balls up as the first teaser. So you got me thinking of a) your balls, and b) Normandy-type things that are, in fact, not your balls. So I asked."

"I like my balls. Moon likes my balls. Kwazydog likes my balls. So up they went."

"Okay, but what kinds of things are we going to be able to do with your balls in the game?"

"Why is everyone still talking about my gosh-darned balls?"

The train wreck keeps grinding on, it seems.

-dale

Don't forget the beta testers also beasting everyone who is not in love with Steve's nutsack.

 

[Geordie]

Will US tanks be able to ghost through hedges as in CMAK or will the Cullins gear be represented?

I was thinking about my own question there and I think this maybe a Normandy fundamental. How does one represent a later Normandy tank and infantry Bocage battle without the Cullins device?

If anything I read on it is correct it was a revelation in dealing with the Bocage and the Germans within it. The Cullins equipped tank would often drive into the Bocage and break through, fire a few phosphorous rounds into the likely MG positions and then support the infantry as they came in to mop uo. Not that it always worked out this way of course, but that was the theory.

If CMN (thats what Im calling CM Normandy from now on) wants to represent this battle revellation then they are going to have to introduce the Cullins. However CMN will have to graphically represent this instead of abstractly, or will they?

 

[thewood]

Mommy, what's a nutsack...Does it know what time it is?

 

[Geordie]

Fascinating proposition.

a) Have a game which is heavily tank-oriented and geared for solo play (Steve says the majority of customers are solo players) in which the player has to take on the role of a nationality (the Americans) which is attacking most of the time with substandard equipment

OR

b) make the same game in which the player takes on the role of the "bad guys", but are defending most of the time

either way, an interesting proposition, UNLESS, you re-invent history and make it like an SS unit on the attack with Tigers.

I think they've painted themselves into a corner before they've even started? And by 'they', I mean Steve, and what will happen is that a few months will go by before we hear an announcement that the "linear" campaign system we've come to hate has been jettisoned from CM: Normandy in favour of something slightly more robust, maybe even a CM: Campaign kind of thing - while the forum for that game is quietly deleted by Moon for reasons never explained...

Another solution would be to go for the real life one, use lots of air and artillery. However, for a game, would you be prepared to wait for 40 mins out of a 60 min scenario while your assets prepare the field?

Solution 2 would be to assume that the air and arty has already done its work and seriously restrics the Nazis to a few vehicles and men. This would be the always already depleted option. Im totally unsure how they could implement that outside of a campaign though.

As for the famous Tiger, they have already said that it wont be in the campaign.

I think they missed a trick here. They should have saved the Tiger for the Brit/CW module, thats what I would have done. Even guys that werent interested in that module would probably buy it for the Tiger alone, then you have something to counter a Tiger to in the shape of the 17Lb equipped Fireflies etc.

I imagine as the time approaches and more information comes out that expectations will change. Im afraid that the more I hear about this game the less Im going to expect from it. Theyve already hinted that the types of vegitation will have to be limited as they dont have a NASA computer....

 

[KG_Jag]

Theyve already hinted that the types of vegitation will have to be limited as they dont have a NASA computer....

I hope that at least they have have the same P-II as when CMBO was released. If the terrain in CMN does not match that in CMBO (excluding winter--which they won't have to do), it does not bode well.

On top of that is the old fortification/trenches/foxholes issue....

 

[dalem]

Don't forget the beta testers also beasting everyone who is not in love with Steve's nutsack.

I tend to ignore anyone's post that has the little "betatester" title. Their opinions are worthless to me even when I just pop in to check a thread every now and then.

And they're harder to make funny. Maybe I could have put a line in about Huntarr drawing a picture of Steve's balls getting yelled at by a Marine. But on the other hand I can't imagine Huntarr even dreaming of anything negative about Steve's balls.

-dale

 

[MKSheppard]

I'll say this for BFC; they've always had some of the best 3d model/texture artists in the business, even the Tiger from CMBO looks pretty good, considering the polygon budget they had back then.

However, I'm really not interested in CM anymore; thanks to Panzer Command -- while the models might not be up to BFC's standard of quality; it's actually much more open; I'm right now working on a Panzer I series mod; which will also include the rare 20mm Spanish conversion used in the Spanish Civil War....

 

[dalem]

I was thinking about my own question there and I think this maybe a Normandy fundamental. How does one represent a later Normandy tank and infantry Bocage battle without the Cullins device?

If anything I read on it is correct it was a revelation in dealing with the Bocage and the Germans within it. The Cullins equipped tank would often drive into the Bocage and break through, fire a few phosphorous rounds into the likely MG positions and then support the infantry as they came in to mop uo. Not that it always worked out this way of course, but that was the theory.

If CMN (thats what Im calling CM Normandy from now on) wants to represent this battle revellation then they are going to have to introduce the Cullins. However CMN will have to graphically represent this instead of abstractly, or will they?

The sources I've read portray clearing the average bocage field as, game-wise fairly boring. As the Allies, you're going to get whole platoons slaughtered at first by a teensy handful of invisible German defenders with a couple of mortars and MGs. Once you have breaching concepts and capabilities available you'd use those to blow/breach holes to crush that same small knot of defenders mainly from the flanks.

All this at ranges of about 50 - to - 100 yards.

And you'd need good-looking graphics of dirt mounds exploding, grass and foliage and trees falling and crumbling and falling around and on advancing tanks. And good-looking graphics of engineers planting bangalores and other charges. And extreme terrain elevation grades (deep ditches right next to steep dikes) with realistic (i.e. no clipping) LOS/LOF. Etc.

Frankly, I don't think they can do it, not with their cute little quasi 1:1 light ballistics simulator.

-dale

 

[McIvan]

That's a big problem isn't it. There's lots and lots of scope for lovely immersive animations at 1:1 scale....but I fear that Battlefront don't have the resources to put them in. Which unfortunately ruins a lot of the potential benefits.

 

[Michael Dorosh]

Wow. Steve is getting a bit defensive again, isn't he?

(snip)

The train wreck keeps grinding on, it seems.

-dale

Just noticed this between him and Adam:

(Adam (to Steve)): I posted this:

Adam: Just was reading over some old posts, mostly about armor penetration and the Russian tank fleet in 1941. I miss Rexford (he died ) and many other posters from the old days. Is CMx2 Normandy going to have as detailed an armor penetration model (with ammo quality and all that) as CMBB & AK? Are those buttercups and daisies?

(Adam (to Steve)): and you thought an appropriate response was this?

Steve: After all this time here on the Forum it's hard for me to imagine that you're as clueless as you appear to be about the armor modeling. Others have already illustrated specifics, but the general difference between CMx1 armor modeling and CMx2 is that CMx1 was quite abstract (i.e. dice rolls) while CMx2's is far more direct. So it has all the detail of CMx1 and far more accountability. Which baffles me as to why you think that Normandy will have LESS detail when clearly that would require us ripping out code which is already in the game and substituting it with something less sophisticated than we did 11 years ago.

(Adam (to Steve)): Thanks for clearing up who has the problem between the two of us.

 

[Redwolf]

The "dice roll" point is exactly where you can see that Steve isn't a programmer.

 

[thewood]

Steve used to brag about the fidelity of the armor model and how they consulted with various experts on it. I have never seen a game developer trash his own product like he does.

 

[mOBIUS]

The "dice roll" point is exactly where you can see that Steve isn't a programmer.

Strange comment on die rolls. Is there no shell dispersion caused by gun wear, heat, air temperature and density, gun droop, shell imperfections or powder consistency? Isn't that as random as a die roll?

Can the players choose to hit any polly they want? I'll choose to fire my Sherman and hit one of the pollys on the gun of the King Tiger and take it out.