DCS: Black Shark, entrevista y vídeos

Los aspectos más destacables de la entrevista son:

- El F/A-18 está entre los posibles aviones que podrían ser añadidos al simulador, pero no es una decisión que vaya a tomarse de forma definitiva y hay otras aeronaves que antes estarán en el simulador.

- El simulador podrá encontrarse en tiendas en los idiomas inglés, francés, alemán, y español (incluyendo el manual completo) en marzo de 2009. El precio será de 39,95€ en España (de la mano de Friendware).

- Se está trabajando en un parche bastante grande para DCS: Black Shark, que se espera esté listo en febrero o marzo dependiendo de cómo vaya el testeo del mismo. También gran parte del equipo trabaja de forma intensa en preparar el A-10 Warthog (lo cual va a excitar a unos cuantos aficionados).

- De las palabras se deduce, aunque no lo ponga expresamente, que el A-10C va a estar presente, es decir, parece confirmarse claramente que vamos a tener un avión con cabina "de cristal" (Actually, we have not said that the Apache would come after the A-10C).

-No se asegura que el AH-64 Apache sea la siguiente aeronave tras el A-10C. Lo que sí se asegura es que habrá aeronaves de ala fija como el F-16C, el Su-27, y el F-15.

- La decisión de inclusión de nuevas aeronaves se decide conjuntamente entre Eagle Dynamics y TFC. Y tiene mucho peso el material e información que se haya podido obtener de cada aeronave para modelarla de forma precisa.

- Se trabaja en dar soporte multiprocesador (uso de dos o más cores) pero ahora la prioridad es dar soporte a las versiones de 64 bits de Windows. Esto es así porque la versión de 32 bits crea unas limitaciones que desean superar. Tampoco es prioritario el soporte de DirectX 10.

- Se desea dar más peso a grupos de apoyo externos debido al reducido número de miembros en Eagle Dynamics, como por ejemplo la creación del terreno de Nevada. El problema es que algunos grupos comienzan de forma entusiasta pero luego su trabajo se va diluyendo y eso genera un importante problema.

- En este sentido, Eagle Dynamics va a publicar la herramienta de modelado de terreno para todo el mundo, de esta forma terceras partes podrán crear escenarios que puedan ser incluidos en el simulador. También se publicarán otras herramientas (esperemos que la creación de aviones sea una de ellas).

- El A-10C estará disponible nueve meses tras la publicación del simulador. Como ha quedado claro que el simulador sale en marzo, 3 + 9 = 12. Si no pasa nada, las próximas navidades las celebraremos en nuestro A-10C. Van a ser unas navidades moviditas, no cabe la menor duda. 

Os dejamos con la entrevista completa.

We had an exlusive interview with TFC Producer Matt Wagner.I hope You find some answers to your questions. How did you first get involved with Eagle Dynamics?After Electronic Arts closed the Baltimore studio that was developing Jane’s Combat Simulation titles, I got a call from my friend Carl Norman at then Strategic Simulations Inc. (SSI). Having been a long time player of the Flanker series and knowing Carl, it was a good fit. After moving to the other side of the country I took on the responsibility for producing Flanker 2.5, Lock On, and IL-2 Forgotten Battles.  My time producing those TFC/Eagle Dynamics products enabled me to build a close relationship with them which then later contributed to me working for them full time.  Have you ever flown a K-50 in real life or any other military fighter?Well, certainly not the Ka-50 as it is a single seat aircraft, but I’ve flown several US military simulators: F/A-18, F-16, F-15 and F-14. Those were very enjoyable and enlightening experiences.  Do you fly Black Shark for fun and join Multiplayer games?Sometimes still for fun, but most often when trying to debug a mission or functionality issue. I do at times fly online (often on the 159th server) but generally I use an alias. I’ve found that when I fly under my own name I spend more time trying to answer questions about why aircraft (fill in the blank) cannot be in the game rather than fly and have a good time.  What equipment do you use? HOTAS, pedals, TIR, TH2G?I generally use a modded CH Pro Throttle “Franken Potato”, a modded TM Cougar “Even Strain” stick, TrackIR 4 (I prefer to use the hat), and standard mouse and keyboard.  For rudder control, I use the X-axis on the throttle mini-stick; I do not use pedals.  What is your personal favorite aircraft?That would probably be the Hornet given its broad array of missions, weapons, carrier operations, and use by so many countries. Now just because it is my personal favorite aircraft does not mean a Hornet in DCS is around the corner. It is possible someday, but there are several other aircraft that would come well before then.  Can you describe the relationship between The Fighter Collection and Eagle Dynamics?Based at Duxford Airfield in the United Kingdom, The Fighter Collection (TFC) is a private company that operates, rebuilds and maintains Europe’s largest collection of airworthy World War II fighters. Run by a professional team of engineers and pilots for both air show and film work, the aircraft fly all over Europe during the summer months to attend air shows from Scandinavia to Italy. TFC organizes the “Flying Legends” Air Show at Duxford, UK, Europe’s premier classic aircraft event.TFC has a wide variety of participations and investments in high technology, equipment manufacturing and software development, which also includes the Eagle Dynamics (ED) software development studio. Based in Moscow, Russia, ED was established in 1991.Eagle Dynamic’s staff is made up of 55 full-time employees, most of who have graduated in applied math and physics. Among them are five doctors of science. The staff includes experienced engineers, managers and artists who have worked in the military, software development and aerospace industries.ED is involved in a variety of software products and services which include combat simulation for the commercial entertainment market which are based upon a line of combat aircraft products the company has developed over the past 15 years.  When will the DCS: Black Shark boxed version be available on store shelves?March 2009 world-wide in English, French, German and Spanish. The price will be $39.99.  What are the next steps of DCS?The two steps we are working on right now is a large patch/update for Black Shark that we hope to release in February or March (depending on how testing goes) and much of the team is now hard at work on DCS: A-10C Warthog.  We know that the A-10C is next and the Apache after that; what is the 4th step. Any fixed winged supersonics?Actually, we have not said that the Apache would come after the A-10C; we only listed that as one of several aircraft that will come later in the DCS module line up. At this time it is too early to know for sure which aircraft will come after the A-10C as it could well change due to unforeseen events. At some point there certainly will be fixed-wing supersonic aircraft and in fact the Su-27, F-16 and Su-25 will all probably be featured in DCS at later dates. Who decides which chopper or fixed-wing will be in the DCS and how?Generally it is the owners of TFC and Eagle Dynamics that make the final determination… not me! The choice of aircraft though is most often narrowed down to existing military projects and what we have DETAILED, open-source information for.  Any multi-core and DX10 plan along the way?Multi-core support will likely be available in DCS at a later point, but right now our bigger focus is on providing full 64-bit support. 32-bit is currently limiting some of our options. As for DX10, we see no persuasive reason to add it at this time. Is Black Shark the first sim ED and TFC published and distributed on their own?Indeed it is and it has been a valuable learning experience for us at the same time. All in all though, it has been a very positive step for us and has allowed us to create a base to work forward from.  How did you decide to add the 3rd party modding groups to the production? How is it working so far?Eagle Dynamics is not a large team in comparison to other developers and the team is also pulled thin and in many directions at once.  As such, we often want to add new features but simply do not have the resources to do so. Talented 3rd party groups have become a valuable resource to allow us to take on those additional tasks.  A good example of that are the many outstanding ground units that were created for Black Shark by 3rd party. With the development of the Nevada terrain by SimMod, we hope to expand the level of cooperation with 3rd party. Working with 3rd party so far has been hit or miss. While on one hand we’ve had some high-quality, timely work; we’ve also had some disappoints where projects started strong but 3rd party lost interest or had other pressing matters to attend to. It seems like you are opening every aspect (External models, terrain, flight model, Cockpit, GUI, terrain) of the DCS to modders. Why and can everyone will be able to mod every aspect of the sim?Gradually we will be releasing these tools and the first one is the terrain tool kit that will be available to everyone.  Once that is done, we’ll move on to the next tool set. We hope this will expand the feature set of DCS and allow 3rd party to use their own creativity to add to the product. I know it’s early but what is the estimated release time of A-10?We hope (not promise) to release DCS: A-10C Warthog nine months after Black Shark goes into world-wide retail.Thank you for your time Matt .