Hello folks,
Today’s update is a small miracle.
By late night Moscow time, as we decided to take some screenshots, we realized that the game’s WIP render stopped working for everyone. Programmers responsible had already gone home hours before. I began writing an apologetic update, and then, somehow, someway, our ingenious junior aircraft programmer managed to get the game working on his machine.
So, I’m very happy to present to you the 109 in combat.
(please note that his version of the 109 has many animations not working, such as landing gear and propeller arc, and has a lot of other system stuff showing. We decided not to mess with his development environment because time is very precious)
On the development front, most of the tasks this week had to do with the cockpit and the sound. The 109 is beginning to sound very mean and very authentic. Our wonderful sound engineer also wrote an incredibly rousing theme for the 109, but I won’t be posting it just yet. The wonderful composer, talented but naïve in the ways of the world, submitted the latest version with a background sound effect of a certain historical leader reading a speech to a rousing roar. We’ll make sure it is removed of course, but this being late Friday night in Moscow, it won’t happen today.
Other than that, the tasks remaining for the 109 are, in that order: finalize and test cockpit procedures; finalize sound; DB 605 engine tuning for medium and high altitudes; finalize manual; overall testing; finalize external animations; finalize damage model visuals; finalize flight performance; create game interface.
The plan will likely change, especially in the smaller sub-tasks that I am not listing for each major step. However, the first two tasks (sound and cockpit) should complete next week, and DB 605 tuning, unless something goes horribly wrong, should take be done, well, so quickly that I cannot even force myself to write out the task duration publicly. And then, ladies and gentlemen, we’ll just need to test this here thing for serious and crash bugs for as long as it takes that to ensure they do not exist.
The biggest task for the coming days for me personally is to finish up the 109 manual. There’s not much work to be done, just write out all cockpit procedures and make sure all the buttons and checklists are correct. Shooting to have the manual finished by, oh, May 10th.
I’ll wrap this up with a couple of beaaautiful diagrams done for the 109 manual by our very talented graphic artist.
The manuals are looking very spiffy. Cannot wait to see them in print!
Have a great weekend!
