Dovetail Live

[SamYeager 244]

Noticed this http://www.dovetailgames.com/news/2016/oct/31/dovetail-games-attracts-investment-to-build-a-groundbreaking-new-platform-for-simulation-fans on the Dovetail site. Thoughts?

[arsenal82 120]

windows live number 2?

[Heimi 91]

Sounds like a mixture of something like a selfmade STEAM/Origin distribution platform and a community like AVSIM with forums and file library all-in-one....

[albx 17]

fail

[TheFlightSimGuy 514]

fail

 

Thanks for your contribution! That negative reputation certainly seems well deserved. 

[simmerhead 885]

Very interesting.

 

More control of DLC might create less chaos and mayhem, but some developers might shy away from this as they like to have control of things themselves.

 

Personally I'm all for it if they can support it properly and usability is stellar. Also, I hope they have a plan if they go bust. Simmers might lose all their content and the platform too.

[torium 207]

 

 

Personally I'm all for it if they can support it properly and usability is stellar.

I second that.

Great that Dovetail choose a different direction than the traditional (FSX, P3D, X-plane, etc.).

[chelmo 42]

So when we fire the new flight sim up we can presumably expect to be bombarded with screenshots advertising the new add on fish and rods available.

 

Hmmm.

[albx 17]

Thanks for your contribution! That negative reputation certainly seems well deserved. 

you are welcome... anyway I believe that the DTG Flight sim (if there will be one) will be a big disappointment... not only for me I believe...

[Paraffin 2,197]

Very interesting. I suppose the main incentive for developing this is to bypass Steam's cut of the profits, but there should also be a benefit to end-users in having a platform that's better designed for selling and supporting large amounts of DLC, and (hopefully) a library of free user-developed content.

 

The Steam UI doesn't handle large amounts of DLC very well. No indexing or search, just a flat list. The Steam Workshop for free content is clunky and often difficult to search. Theoretically, DTG could do a better job focusing on their own products here.

 

The potential downside, of course, is the question of DRM and long-term support. Will the new DTG flight sim be available only on this new platform, or on Steam as well? If it's the former, then it may require a degree of faith in DTG that everything we buy going forward will always be available if that platform disappears.

 

Of course it's the same situation with games bought on Steam, but flight sims can be a more major investment over time. That's one reason I buy X-Plane directly instead of the Steam version, and all payware add-ons are bought outside Steam. Steam could disappear tomorrow and I could still fly my sim. It will also be interesting to see how 3rd party developers integrate with this system, and if they can still sell add-ons independently.

[Heimi 91]

 

 

Will the new DTG flight sim be available only on this new platform, or on Steam as well? If it's the former, then it may require a degree of faith in DTG that everything we buy going forward will always be available if that platform disappears.

 

They already said that it will be STEAM only.

Most likely they will do it like all other bigger companies. EA for example sells over Steam but you need their Origin platform as well to play.

So it will be a STEAM and DTG platform combination.

[Paraffin 2,197]

They already said that it will be STEAM only.

Most likely they will do it like all other bigger companies. EA for example sells over Steam but you need their Origin platform as well to play.

So it will be a STEAM and DTG platform combination.

 

Hmmm... some EA games are Origin-only, but another example would be Ubisoft with their dual-layer approach with Steam. That can be annoying but it does work. I guess we'll see soon enough.

[SamYeager 244]

Some may be interested in this job vacancy posting for Dovetail Live:

 

 

 

Java DevOps Engineer

 

Team: Dovetail Live

 

Location: Historic Dockyard, Chatham, Kent, UK

 

At Dovetail Games we are passionate about empowering our people to build beautiful worlds, create breath-taking games and do the best work of their career. We are growing fast, developing our games using cutting edge technology and across multiple platforms, and we have big ambitions to become the Number 1 Simulation Entertainment Company in the World.

 

To help achieve this ambition, we are launching ‘Dovetail Live’ – a programme operating to deliver long term value and insights into the company and its franchises via:

•The acquisition and segmentation of customer data

•The building of engagement and loyalty programmes for customer retention purposes

•Deep analytical understanding of customer behaviours within and around our game franchises

 

The Dovetail Live Engineer will play a key part in ensuring the implementation of the programme vision, working with the Privacy & Security Specialist to maintain integrity of all sensitive data, and work closely with the game development teams creating API's within game experiences.

 

 

 

Key responsibilities:

•Full life cycle DevOps - architect, design, implement, test, continuous integration and maintenance

•Work with Programme Manager and Principal Online Architect to ensure implementation of Dovetail Live programme vision

•Work closely with game development teams to create APIs and toolkits that can be surfaced and used within the game experiences for 2-way data flow

•Work closely with Privacy and Security specialist to ensure utmost integrity of all sensitive data and information and ensure high standards are maintained at all times

•Understand business needs and interpret programme vision to be able to advise on “best fit” solutions that work for all parties

•Work closely with Web Developer to ensure back end data can be surfaced through front end systems in a meaningful and clear way

•Be familiar with all projects already released and in development to be able to create “best-fit” technical solutions that provide access to the online data for individual game teams

•Be closely aware of the technologies and features being implemented in each product to ensure Dovetail Live compliments and supports those in the best way possible

 

Key attributes:

 

Essential experience

•J2EE specialising in Servlets

•High Traffic backend Web Services

•SQL and NoSQL

•OAuth, OIDC (ideally keycloak) Encryption and Security

•Complete System Lifecycle (Design thru Deployment & Maintenance)

•Working in a similar remit in the games/software (or parallel) industry

 

Desirable experience

•A degree in a relevant subject

•Caching and CDN technology

•Ideally Google App Engine or similar Scaling technology

•Google BigQuery

•Tableau or similar visualisation systems

•Container technology & Clusters

•MVC Methods

•Modern frontend tech (Javascript + Angular or similar)

•Broad cloud technology and experience of providers

•Unit, integration, functional and load testing + supporting tech

•Linux and various distros

•Steam, Xbox Live, PSN technical understanding

•Continual Integration

•Source control (Perforce, Git)

•UML

•UE4 or similar game engine

•C++ and ideally, game development

•Working with Wordpress and PHP

 

 

[simmerhead 885]

I see that they mention UE4: https://www.unrealengine.com/what-is-unreal-engine-4

 

!

[SamYeager 244]

I see that they mention UE4: https://www.unrealengine.com/what-is-unreal-engine-4

 

!

Their new train sim will be using Unreal4. I did notice there are some other vacancies such as a graphics artist for flight sim.