Oh that Rebel!

2008-11-25 20:15:37  playerName  English brigade scrn last nearLouviere N50.29.4 E4.11.58
    "rebel357 telling new players that alt F4 is a function of the game."

I wish i had a report of which ones believed him.

I guess while were looking at reports today I'll share the most common whine in all of PvP.

2008-11-25 20:26:59  playerName German 3.Panzer 3.Kampfgruppe (Armored) playerName mission cell#145 near Gembloux N50.35.36 E4.42.16 origin: Wavre
    "dead in one shot in a 4g...looks like nothing changed at all except making it easier for the allies to kill axis equipment"

Wait a minute... You mean that tanks, in WWII, were sometimes killed by other tanks? WTFZOMG! One shot even! Nope nothing changed. Nothing at all...

2008-11-25 20:49:09  playerName German 3.Panzer 2 Kampfgruppe playerName mission cell#145 near Brussels N50.50.2 E4.20.30 ping:75ms
    "bit unfair to boot all the axis  and allow the allies to remian on the board  or is this a new tactic?"

Yes, we decided that for the sake of our players we'd only boot the red team from now on when the server crashes. Between a few magic spells and some fairy dust the Blue team automagically gets to stay connected and only red team players get booted. We thought this would be fun!

Ok, seriously. That was sarcasm. You need to spell these things out because I think sometimes things don't come across on the internets like they do in real life. really. I mean that.

Did you notice that the interwebs also always capitalize Blue team but never red team. Call Cecil, we need the straight dope here.

2008-11-25 23:05:11  playerName German 16.Infanterie 2.Kampfgruppe playerName mission Ninove mission room (not spawned yet)
    "who's the dumb fucking genius that thought of the idea for all these goddamn fucking popups that are irritating as shit and make me want to log off?  jesus fucking christ this is really fucking annoying."

Oh, that'd probably be me. I'm not really sure what you're talking about though since you apparently have no fucking clue how to make a goddamn comprehensible report. Ahem. Sorry, musta rubbed off on me for a second. I feel dirty.

Nice View

In case you haven't heard, 3840 x 1024 is the new widescreen. Thanks Matrox!

Rat Chat Today

With yours truly. I don;t really have an agenda on this one so I guess we'll wing it. Motor wants me to talk about 1.29. In all honesty I'd rather be testing 1.29, working on the new tutorials system or the new keymappers but the girl does such good work I just can't say no. Tune in if you'd like to put me in your cross hairs. I'll answer any question asked.

Team Speak: 216.6.226.108:9652

Are We In Danger?

We are if you read Wired's Danger Room blog daily like I do. It seems our hallway talk about building an MMO for the Army's recent desire to build an online training world got picked up. There's not much there really but it's nice to see us get a little press.

Link

Remember ing the Fallen

Don't forget guys that we will be wrapping up our 7th anniversary week with a tribute to the Fallen. We'll be holding a cease fire at 2pm and 8pm Central. We've had a lot of fun this week with all of the special events and I hope you'll all join us for a brief moment to remember not only our friends from the community that have passed on but all those who have fought and died. The whole press release at:

Armchair General

Campaign Stats

We've been mulling over the campaigns and some upcoming rule changes in the office as we are wont to do and Bloo put together some nice charts I though I would share. The info from these is readily available at Battleground Tools.

Victories:

Average Campaign Length: All-Time: 36 Days
Moving Average Currently: ~42 Days

All-Time Total: 49
Axis: 29 (60%)
Allied: 19 (39%)
Truce: 1 (2%)
(Percentages rounded)

Last 10 Campaigns (back to 2/21/2007, during which 1.25 was released):
Axis: 3 (30%)
Allied: 6 (60%)
Truce: 1 (10%)

This shows the winners and losers of each of the campaigns and how long they lasted. We use this to cross check with RDP cycle times and what not and of course look for trends. Of course charts can;t ever tell the whole tale as they don;t cover things like morale but they are interesting. Longer campaigns tend to be won by the Axis. Shorter campaigns tend to be won by the Axis. Since ToEs the Allies have had their first real strings of victories. I love pondering these types of numbers. What are your thoughts?

Thanks to Bloo for the data.

WWIIOL Damage Video

This is an oldie but a goodie recently redone with some voice over by our resident croc wrangler, a.k.a. DOC. This video really shows the guts of the sim, showcasing our damage and ballistics. You'll notice no hitpionts or look up tables are used. This, gentlemen, is the real deal. We'll be redoing this with the new graphics engine upgrade and the new models in the near future.

Giga Gophur

It's all about exposure don't you know. I'll be on Giga TV this afternoon (night for you eoros) talking about BE or WWIIOL or whatever you wish to call this massively multi-player online first-person shooter strategy role playing game (MMO, MMOFPS, MMORPG ?) that we all so dearly love to live and breath.

I have no idea what they will ask me. I have no idea what the program format is like to be. I have no idea how to actually watch this from the office in Bedford...

What I do know is that for a small independent game developer and defacto publisher this is huge. I also know that Greni and Hofnarr will be on set to show off the game. Hope you cats can tune in.

Gallery of the Bizzare

Sometimes things just don't go right. A late check-in post data freeze, a QA pass that just didn't think to look in third person, a misplaced multi-texture comment in an art file, any of these can and do happen. And when they do, they are all my fault! Yup. I wear the pants in this family and as you can see, yesterday they fell off. Hehe. Wee, this shit will happen on occasion. Best to laugh. Oh, that's a French infantry man firing his weapon...in another dimension apparently. If you have more photos of this madness I'm collecting them for The Gallery Of the Bizarre.

10k Words PLUS!

Thanks eigenman!

1,28 Video Blog

I'm sure my mother would be so proud.

Radar Video Blog

BEGM: Battleground Europe Game Monitor

Technically this is a cool thing of the day. Even more, for you WWIIOLers it is probably the COOLEST thing of about any day. Oli created a dbase access set and the guys have been hard at work making very cool widgets. God I wish our UI tools were this sweet.

KFS1 says: Guys who have been developing stuff with WireTap are finally starting to release their tools. Apos520 has had one out for a while, Sres has been providing the High Commanders with TOE training tools using it, SLR released a Java-based (cross-platform) one a few days ago, and Xiper has just released his open source BEGM (Battleground Europe Game Monitor)

BEGM: Battleground Europe Game Monitor

.report

Just had to share today's gem of a report. Always so entertaining reading these. FYI I do read ALL of these almost everyday, unless we're in open testing and beta and then I tend to focus on those. Here goes:

2007-09-14 21:36:06  playerNameWitheld   German 8. Zerstörerflottille maniacm mission cell#145 near Dordrecht N51.49.11 E4.38.51
   "silent bombing/straffing should be an exploit"
2007-09-14 21:46:08  playerNameWitheld   German 8. Zerstörerflottille mwhitman mission cell#145 near Dordrecht N51.48.35 E4.38.47
   "WTF MFING PANHARD FIRING THROUGH A FING HILL AT DORD, ALLIED BIASM"
2007-09-14 22:01:34  playerNameWitheld   German brigade scrn last nearDordrecht N51.49.28 E4.39.4
   "rename the game to allied and crs loser idiocy online"

Ahh, Loser Idiocy Online. Now that's catchy! All from the same player; all in a row. I love my job...

Patch Day

Ah glorious patch day. Time was, this was a manic day. Running around screaming "I have the ball!" and hoping that the train is on time. No longer folks. In fact, I'm a bit bored today. We've patched so many times and despite being so small our process has gotten pretty refined and I am honestly, just sitting here, doodling, waiting for the server to get sorted out, which it will no doubt, with no need for hysterics on my part. What a great bunch of guys i get the pleasure of working with. Thanks yo.

1.27 Open Test Vlog

PoTD

Something just isn't right here. Also, note to self, Sheep need AI.

WWIIOL How To: Spiral Climb Kill a Spit in a 109

Very nice tutorial on the classic sucker punch on a Spit. Someone should add this to the Wiki if it isn't already up there. *hint*

INCOMING!

Sweet bombing run from WWIIOL (as if you needed me to tell you where it was from). This is what it's all about. I'm really hoping that some changes to victory conditions and adding enemy planes to the map will make this one of the coolest things ever.

Toto Talks Mortars on the Vlog