Does combat FS3 suck?

[Guest SlimDady]

So far Ive seen people who have problems.. and people who dont find it that great at all???Post here if u dont like it..

[Guest odog]

Well, first of all, Dont have it. Second of all I LOVE CFS2...I agree I have not heard much good about CFS3...Im gonna go ahead and judge 2k4 from CFS3, I know I know, its a different engine and all this and that, but, CFS2 was a preview of 2k2, and a leopard cant change his spots.I hope Im soooo wrong! I would think if it (CFS3) was the bomb, we would already know...looks like I have 60 bucks to blow!So please...something positive, PLEASE!!!odog

[Guest JonP01]

I don't have it either (not due out in Oz for maybe 2 - 3 weeks). But, yes - opinion seems to be that around 80 percent don't like it and 20 percent do. However I have seen a bit of mellowing though from the 80 percent crowd in the last 24 hours. The consensus seems to be that the CFS community can work around the reported problems. But I am personally concerned that there only seems to be one particular Nvidia driver, and one driver only (30.82) that works with this game. Not much use considering most of us have to chronically experiment with drivers because we run more than one game. I know I personally have to run an ASUS 31.40 version in order to run my four existing games without any issues. What is going to happen when the new Nvidia NV30 cards come out that need later drivers to work optimally? Will Nvidia make sure they are "CFS3 certified"? The other issue seems to be with anti-aliasing. Few people seem to have got it working without wierd texture side effects. Other people have no problems.My personal viewpoint is that I will hold off buying the game unless I can convince myself that the many issues thus far have been fixed or at least will be fixed. By whom though I'm not sure.

[Arklight1 140]

>I don't have it either (not due out in Oz for maybe 2 - 3 >weeks). But, yes - opinion seems to be that around 80 >percent don't like it and 20 percent do. However I have seen >a bit of mellowing though from the 80 percent crowd in the >last 24 hours. The consensus seems to be that the CFS >community can work around the reported problems. But I am >personally concerned that there only seems to be one >particular Nvidia driver, and one driver only (30.82) that >works with this game. Not much use considering most of us >have to chronically experiment with drivers because we run >more than one game. I know I personally have to run an ASUS >31.40 version in order to run my four existing games without >any issues. What is going to happen when the new Nvidia NV30 >cards come out that need later drivers to work optimally? >Will Nvidia make sure they are "CFS3 certified"? The other >issue seems to be with anti-aliasing. Few people seem to >have got it working without wierd texture side effects. >Other people have no problems. >>My personal viewpoint is that I will hold off buying the >game unless I can convince myself that the many issues thus >far have been fixed or at least will be fixed. By whom >though I'm not sure. Amen to that.Shane

[Guest EGLD]

I have it, and yes it sucksIt was appalling until XP SP1 was installed. XP SP1 screws up my "show desktop" quicklaunch icon, so didnt want to install it, and even then it just *sucks*Cant really specify one thing, just a whole load of things I dont likeClouds look nice, but to me, the sky just looks the unrealistic blue we have with FS2002. I really thought this would be gone, as it ruins FS2002 for meP4 Northwood 2.8ghz768mb DDR RAMWindows XP Pro SP1Geforce4 Ti4600 128mbSB Extigy

[Guest]

Hi Jon,Don't believe everything you read (of course)... More drivers than just 30.82 work fine with Nvidia cards. I'm running 40.72 on one of my machines and all is well with CFS3 (besides performance - which is a problem on any machine I've thrown it at to at least some extent, nothing new there though for a new sim).For the average user out there, I'd say CFS3 will present large performance problems (For those that would argue: an average machine is still in the 1Ghz or less range with GF2 range graphics). For minimum enjoyment, I'd say an AthlonXP 1800+/P4 1.8 - along with a GF3 or better is bare spec. Sure, it can be run on lower machines, but not very well. Thats fairly high end requirements for average consumers of course... Of which, most in this forum are not BTW.As for gameplay, I wouldn't trust early reports on that either (its been on the shelves for mere hours). It takes time to grow into any sim, to find its nuances and pitfalls: this one will be no different. Right off the bat, it doesn't give the best of impressions in my opinion, but that doesn't really say anything about the actual game. It may be great or it may be bad, its just too early to tell. A few flight does not a simulator make.Take care,Elrond"A musician without the RIAA, is like a fish without a bicycle."

[LAdamson 240]

A few observations:On my system, the sim seems to run smooth and fluid (most of the time). Reminds me more of the fluidness of X-Plane.And like X-Plane, the instruments appear to animate much smoother than FS2002.The planes DON'T look as good as they did in CFS2. I don't like the graphics and paint jobs, near as much as CFS2.Flight dynamics---------- undecided! I see reports of simmers believing the planes to be under-powered, but I havn't yet come to this conclusion without more "flight" time. I've flown in a real P-51D and simulated arial combat in real Marchetti SF260's. Neither aircraft will perform un-limited climbing turns without running out of steam---- quicker than you'd believe, and potential stalls. They don't turn on a dime either! These arn't like an aerobatic Pitt's because I've flown them too!So far---- I don't feel like I've wasted 50 bucks, but at the same time, I'm not truely delighted either!L.AdamsonAthlon 1900XPGeforce3Ti500512DDRram1600*1200*32 res.

[Guest Paul_W]

I do not like it, and I'm surprised by how much it misses the mark (for me personally)--especially when compared to the advances in realism I see coming in from the development screenshots of the IL-2 Forgotten Battles add-on, and the screenshots and videos from LOMAC. Actually, even compared to the year-old graphics of FS 2002 I found the CFS3 terrain graphics to be a step backwards; however, I've now read that the NVidea 30.82 drivers (apparently the last WHQL certified set) are supposed to make a big difference, so I'll install those and see if the graphics improve.From my perspective, though, there's a funny thing going on in the CFS3 community. There's a lot of talk about how "things will improve" and how the third parties can make CFS3 better. Of course that's probably true enough for those who frequent those places and swap information, and who like to install add-ons and replacements, and who know where to download the latest video drivers and how to replace their existing version, and so on.... But this community seems to view CFS3 in isolation; if CFS3 can be "made to be a success" for the enthusiasts, I'm left to wonder about the presumably vast majority of more casual users who will install and probably be bewildered by a product that seems very sub-standard at first glance.To put this another way, when the company at the center of the digital revolution produces an entertainment product that looks the way CFS3 did yesterday on a system like mine (AMD 1700XP, 500 MB, GF3 Ti 200, Win XP Home), it's simply bewildering. It's seems to me that it should simply look and work right for the vast majority of users who are not part of any simulation community.I think a flexible publishing schedule would benefit MS, though my guess is that the annual late October release is as set as some corporate by-law. LOMAC will surely benefit from it's delayed release date (it was originally set for a fall release, but was put back until next spring) in terms of quality, and certainly many in the LOMAC forum prefer to wait longer to receive a properly finished product. My guess is that the CFS3 team ran out of time in this case.

[Guest]

I got it within hours (minutes) of release, so I have had a little time with it. With all the tweaks found so far it is running smooth on my system (low end at best). The garphics are as good as fs2002, maybe better. The planes are very good, inside and out. The FM is good and will get better. The 1% guys are already hard at it with some early Beta releases.The Campaign is great. It is Immersive and most of all FUN! You can do a Campaign as American, British or German. As a Fighter Piolot or Bomber pilot. I have tried the Bombing aspect yet.With the talented community out there this game can only get better,and it is good now. ALL VIEWS are IMHO.With all slider at 3 (middle) and various tweaks applied I am getteing 20 fps avg on my system.p3-733 (no o/c)768 pc133 ram7200 rpm 40g HDGF3 ti500 vid w/41.03 beta driverwinxp sp1

[Guest]

As far as I am concerned it is $75.00 (Canadian) down the drain.Going back to CFS2 and tokk it off the hard disk.

[Steve Cannell 4]

Yes it SUCKS !!!The clouds look great. If you fly just clearing the tree tops it looks great, with the trees, trucks, bridges etc..., but the rest of it looks terrible. Flying in spotview looks absolutly horrible like the plans are pictures pasted over the scenery.Performance isn't very good either.AMD Athlon 1.4Geforce3SteveCYYZ

[Guest]

It's directly proportional to the price of MS Stock.

[Guest JonP01]

Hi Elrond,I have to admit I'm re-considering buying it. There have been more positive posts over at Netwings today from people who should know what they are talking about. It's a bit of a worry that my PC is only a little bit above your "minimum enjoyment" level :-lol But then again when it comes to combat sims I'm more than happy to turn all the sliders down for fluid gameplay. I still have a concern over drivers, as currently I have to use the ASUS 31.40 driver. Any of the 40.xx drivers have caused me problems with Rally Trophy and the ASUS drivers seem to be the only non 40.xx drivers that let me hack the registry to access 960 x 720 resolution (which I use for Rally Trophy).Still what's $100 nowadays? It's just a bit of a bugger that there is no such thing as a software return policy in Oz.I'm still wondering though. Is it possible to get it run at CFS2 performance levels if you turn most of the niceties off and put the sliders towards the left?

[Guest Matt Johnson]

For what it's worth, it runs nice on my K7-700 with plenty of RAM (512MB) and a GeForce 1. Yeah, so, I turned down some of the detail settings (mostly running on 2)... but a) I'm not particularly a combatsim junkie, and :( it runs damned smooth (25fps, with the 29.82 drivers for the GF1).I feel the controls and "gameplay" is much better than CFS2, but that's a subjective view. However, there is a lot more excitement within CFS3 for developers and add-on folks... but the detail will have to wait until AVSIM's review next week. (I'll just drop the hint of "total conversion" and see what ripples that throws out...)Regards,--M