9 replies to this topic

[Gandalfrockman]

I Just started getting into war thunder, and quickly realized that they face pretty much all the same issues as MWO, but unlike MWO have found very solid solutions to these problems.

MWO has been ripping off WoT for a while now, maybe its time they ripped off war thunder instead. Note to Devs:War Thunder has been stealing players from WoT for a while now,...and they dont even have tanks yet.

A quick comparison follows

Arcade vs Simulation audiences: Hardcore vs casual is completely the wrong attitude to take, It is an FPS trope and doesn't translate to simulation games. War thunder recognizes this and addresses it with a three tier system Arcade/Historical/Full Realism. A three tiered system is overkill for mechwarrior, but having an arcade and a simulation queue (simulation featuring collsion and no 3pv) seems very reasonable.

Performance/Optimization/Netcode: Warthunder looks beautiful, and runs great. I'm not sure how they are nailing it so thoroughly on this front but they are, at least part of it seems to be a complete unwillingness to compromise the visual fidelity of their product in order to gaurantee performance. Whereas mechwarrior becomes more and more hideous with each so called "optimization pass"

Matchmaking: Matchmaking parameters are completely different in warthunder but Warthunders matchmaking takes transparency to extremes. What this means is that when you get a bad/onesided matchup, you have enough information to see why. As a result people are not nearly as ticked off about it. In mechwarrior we have NO IDEA whats going on with matchmaking. EVERYTHING is obfuscated.

Art/Presentation: Its clear that they understand that they recognize the value of their material and that people CARE about how its rendered and presented. While I recognize that they are in a different boat since they are dealing with historic material, they have managed to give their product a high end premium feeling, something mechwarrior online seems rabidly opposed to, some of the mechs (particularly recently) seem thrown together and pushed to market without any real attention to the qaulity of the final product.

New player experience: Warthunder uses a series of granular tutorials. First time you fly a bomber it offers you the bombing tutorial. First time you fly a mission with takeoffs and landings you get offered a takeoff / landing tutorial. It starts you with THREE planes all of which are competitive in their tier. Mechwarrior starts you with four of the WORST MECHS EVER. No trial mech even comes close to being competitive with what the opposition will bring, and there is no tutorial. In Warthunder simplification options are made clear to the player (Mouse aim arcade differences) In mechwarrior no explanation is made that you should at some point "Uncripple yourself" by turning off armlock and throttle decay.

Its Beta:
Warthunder is in beta. They are fine with it, and they have realistic goals for their features. MWO is pushing to a launch it cannot possibly be ready for, with completely unrealistic goals for several key features. UI 2.0 is basically Jesus at this point, community warfare is never going to meet the expectations that PGI have set for it. Critics are going to ream MWO, HARD. This will not be a good thing. MWO should just admit that it is still in beta.

Making money:
In Warthunder EVERYTHING is for sale. Seriously, everything. but you know what? They dont advertise it, they just put both prices there, and let you pick. Whats more, $25 will get you the most expensive plane for a given faction, enough in game currency to completely max it out, and still leave you with enough leftover to buy 2-3 more planes. Under their pricing model an atlas would be around $10. I do feel like I have gotten my moneys worth out of MWO, but the prices are so high that it always leaves a bad taste in my mouth, I always feel ripped off. I can justify it because I KNOW I am being ripped off, but everytime I want to buy something in mwo, it takes more and more effort to overcome that feeling. In warthunder
I usually feel like I got a pretty good deal for my money. Another good idea to steal: there is stuff at every pricepoint in warthunder, from 10 point consumables all the way up to 1600 point planes, and it works great.

[Syllogy]

War Thunder is a grind, their flight models are a joke, and they have a definite bias when it comes to aircraft from specific nations.

On top of that, Warthunder seperates everything into "Tiers", which is a terrible system IMHO.

ALSO, they are a major game producer in Russia, and are partnered with a number of "Top Shelf" game companies, from whom they can borrow resources and data.

The comparison between PGI / Gaijin and/or MWO / War Thunder is null.

FURTHERMORE, assuming that the developers don't play other games from other developers is a pretty erroneous assumption. Whether on a professional level or a personal one, it is a safe bet that every employee at PGI plays other games.

Edited by Syllogy, 28 August 2013 - 08:11 AM.

[Gandalfrockman]

Syllogy, on 28 August 2013 - 08:05 AM, said:

War Thunder is a grind, their flight models are a joke, and they have a definite bias when it comes to aircraft from specific nations.

On top of that, Warthunder seperates everything into "Tiers", which is a terrible system IMHO.

ALSO, they are a major game producer in Russia, and are partnered with a number of "Top Shelf" game companies, from whom they can borrow resources and data.

The comparison between PGI / Gaijin and/or MWO / War Thunder is null.

FURTHERMORE, assuming that the developers don't play other games from other developers is a pretty erroneous assumption. Whether on a professional level or a personal one, it is a safe bet that every employee at PGI plays other games.

1.I never suggested they copy warthunders actual balance mechanisms/tier system.

2.I Didn't suggest that PGI/IGP employees do not play other games, have not played warthunder, just that they should pay it special attention in regards to how it resolves certain problems since MWO shares those issues. Ive actually worked in game development before, and trust me, you dont have time to play everything that comes out.

3.A comparison between PGI and gaijin is not entirely relevant in a one to one scenario, but this isnt a one to one comparison the only place where they differences between the two are relevant in my list is in regards to optimization.

4.The quality of their flight model is completely irrelevant.

War thunders grind is pretty minimal in Simulation mode. (It took me and a few friends 6 games to get rank 4 in USSR) If your playing arcade, yeah its grindy as all hell. But frankly I think their arcade mode sucks. The "boosted" arcade flight models are all TERRIBLE.

[CeeKay Boques]

Gandalfrockman, on 28 August 2013 - 08:36 AM, said:

4.The quality of their flight model is completely irrelevant.

This is only true if you aren't in love with airplanes in an airplane game. If you're like, hey cool I'm flying, then yeah, it doesn't matter.

Same with Mechwarrior, if you're just like hey pew pew lazers, its awesome. If you're a sim head, its like... hey...we'll get there... soon...I think...

That said, having played warthunder... its pretty fun, and "sim mode" vs "arcade mode" is not a bad thought... but there aren't enough things to turn on or off in MW to matter.

[Bendak]

I played War Thunder for 2 hours. I un-installed it. As much as I like people flying into me it just didn't feel right flying instead of stomping around firing pew pew layz0rs!

[Captain Katawa]

WT and WoT are a way too much grinding focused. Do not want.
WoT is more like "hey look how long I have spent donating and grinding" instead "look how cool I shoot"
In WT good planes can just ram right through you without taking much damage.
Those game are like MMORPG based on farming only without any gameplay. Getting any mech with upgrades can take a new player a day with a bonus and a week more to master it or get another mechs.

I guess nobody would play WoT/WT if a new layer could get the best tank/plane in his first day since there won't be a power gap between a guy who just started and a person who sent a lot of time so they culdn't say "lol get pwnd n00b i'm da best"

Also there aren't enough players to separate by levels.

Do you know why I droped WT?
Because on level 0 nobody NOBODY AT ALL wanted to lay hardcore mod and I wasn't interested in arcade simulator.

Edited by Captain Katawa, 29 August 2013 - 03:11 PM.

[Angel of Annihilation]

I really liked War Thunder myself though like MWO has gotten things definately got grindy and repetitive after a while, especially if you aren't a good enough pilot to engage in Historical and Full Real modes against a majority of players who are hardcore flight nuts, many with actual pilots training. Game is great though and I definately pop back in there every so often.

Also I actually like the tier progression system and really wish MWO would have had something similar to War Thunder or World of Tanks. I know that one of the things that really keep me interested in WoTs was the journey to get to the better tanks. Sure that journey took me though alot of crappy tanks I hated but every so often you found a real gem in something you throught you would hate. Also you really had to think about where you wanted to end up and how you wanted to get there. Do you take the slow heavier tanks or go with the fast lighter tanks. Do you play heavier tanks early but then transition to another tree with faster tanks later. Do you go for th IS-7 or E-100 each with totally different playstyle. Lastly it forced more diversity into the game.

To me that type of progression was much more interesting than just saving up C-bills to buy whatever you want but oh well.

[Heat Seeking Civet]

I posted in their creative update to do the same thing. War Thunder is everything this game should be, without the giant robots.

[Stoicblitzer]

i like war thunder a lot. it's very polished compared to MWO. it's a grind but all these F2P games are grinds. shorten the grind by paying is the typical model. i felt much better putting $20 into WT than $350 into MWO. $20 buys so much in WT too. you can even convert their "" into their "" which is nice even though it is pretty easy to make money. i wish MWO was more like WT.

the russian planes do seem to be OP, but i am no expert. i only play arcade battles.

[Odanan]

Amazing game!!!

Everything MWO should have been (and maybe never will).