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SOH...Civil Flight Center?

N

Nausicaa

Guest
Ok attention, reading this may give the impression I am somewhat ungrateful. Of course I am not. But I am a firm believer in the positive effects of wiping off some dust sometimes.

So this one crossed my mind today. When looking on the main screen of SOH I see there "SOH-Combat Flight Center".

Yet, when looking at the forums, there is another picture. Greatest activity in the forums: Flight Simulator X, threads at this day: 4,585, posts 67,557. This is followed by.... the Newshawks, threads 2,995, posts 26,870. Third in the line is not a combat flight simulator, but another civil flight sim, FS9, with 2,881 threads and 29,383 posts. Climbing the ladder further down we encounter after a while CFS3 and CFS2 with 1,809 and 2,323 threads. IL2, the only other combat flight simulator which is left on the forum menu, impresses with 124 posts and 758 threads. When looking for other combat flight sims the picture gets "zappenduster" (pitch dark) as we say in Germany: "Blackshark", the stellar nec plus ultra in Helicopter combat flight sims, forum support: zero. IL2 Birds of Prey, first sim ever on console, no forum (or subforum) in sight on the horizon. Storm of War, since a year or more already on SIMHQ, no board of discussion available to share everybodies impatience. BOBII, the moddable Battle of Britan sim with, as some say, the best offline campaign ever done, presence, zero. The brandnew "Rise of Flight", which many argue is the best WW1 sim in FM, damagemodelling and visuals, support equal none. And there are other, older sims I do not even mention.

So the question is: Did SOH wave goodbye to it's own "soul" somewhere in the last years? A slowly climbing member's age with a heavy 50+ average, and a growing preference for Cessna flying over Las Vegas airport seem to point into that direction. Yep, I told you I would wipe some dust, no need to take it badly.

Is it time to attract the youth back here to make some rock n'roll in the house with some of the brandnew stars on the sky of combat sims? Now it's still time to attract the players as their communities are just forming up. Or is it now: SOH....Civil Flight Center?
 
We've always had a FS forum, even back in the heyday of CFS 1. When Microsoft gave up on CFS and with the popularity of FS 2004, we started paying more attention to the Flight Simulator offerings and adding new forums for the FS series. Before that, we did add an IL2 forum due to member demand.

We haven't left the CFS series either. As far as I know we've got the only forum for CFS 1 still going and the only other forum I know of for CFS 2 recently went offline.

If there's enough demand for a forum for a new combat flight, we'll add one for it on a trial basis.
 
civil seems to be a good word
we do try to have civil conversations here
and a level of civility.
As far as forums go
actually we have 4 combat forums
and 3 flight forums (civil)
although most of the (civil) forums
are still mainly combat people
WW1 and WW2 and later airbases, aircraft etc etc
we go where our members go or need us to go,
out of the 4 combat sims there is only one still being made
the others are kept up by our members and are bringing new creations out
or still having fun,
and i guess with a 50+ age group
we should have a bridge forum:173go1:
or scrabble
just an observation
Bingo is at 8 PM every evening
H:icon_lol:
 
Got to thinking about it... I've got this really nice payware Cessna 337 Skymaster that I hardly ever fly.. which way to Vegas? :icon_lol: :ernae:
 
You're absolutely right, that's what happens to ageing combat flight simmers.
Hang up the goggles and helmet, reminisce, and go to Vegas.
Made worse that flight simming is a dying game.
It's understandable; by the time the baby boomers are all dead, real-world air combat will be waged from behind a computer screen, directing hordes of remotely piloted vehicles.
Where's the fun in simulating that? you may as well join up!

Still, you can see everyone's heart is still in the right place: every time I put up some video clips of an obsolete Japanese tubeliner in the FS2004 forum, it goes strangely, eerily, quiet...:kilroy:
 
Henry said:
civil seems to be a good word
we do try to have civil conversations here
and a level of civility.
As far as forums go
actually we have 4 combat forums
and 3 flight forums (civil)
although most of the (civil) forums
are still mainly combat people
WW1 and WW2 and later airbases, aircraft etc etc
we go where our members go or need us to go,
out of the 4 combat sims there is only one still being made
the others are kept up by our members and are bringing new creations out
or still having fun,
and i guess with a 50+ age group
we should have a bridge forum:173go1:
or scrabble
just an observation
Bingo is at 8 PM every evening
H:icon_lol:
Click to expand...


LOL @ 8PM Bingo!!!

And just for the record, I vote for a Scrabble forum :applause:
 
Wing_Z said:
Made worse that flight simming is a dying game.
Click to expand...

Actually it's not...that was the point I was trying to get across. On one hand a we have MS that bails out of the simming genre.....CFS3, now FS X. On the other hand we have a handful of young enthousiastic developpers that have put brilliant and promising sims on the market, often with great risk for their young companies (ROF, BoB:WoV, SoW:BoB). The simming genre has gotten incredibly and promising input recently from various sides. Blackshark, Rise of Flight are just some of them. Yet it's like MS - a company that has turned away from it's fans !! - has bought up SOH's eternal loyalty, given the space and importance this mega corporation gets on this forum...with a civilian flight sim.... while it is like the young, vibrant combat sim developpers don't even exist. When something happens, many will vow their loyalty and undying support for the "threatened niche genre" like it is often said. But what of the easiest support? The space to talk about something? That is why I don't buy into the "we follow our members" argument. It reminds me of the debate what came first, the egg or the chicken. Why is there a majority of members that are in FS09 or FSX? Because the other new sims have no place on SOH. Of course a new community will not exist under this circumstances. Easy to point to the status quo and make it responsible if you haven't done anything to modify it.
In the "old days ", SOH was a vibrant place of exchange in combat flight simming..I remember a time where I couldn't even type that fast, and I would already have 3 replies...for a new combat sim....CFS1, then CFS2, then the incredible and unique support for CFS3, while almost every other forum had declared it a deadborn child. There were already other sites dedicated to the civilian flight sims of MS. It's not like if the support to those was anything special, even back in the days. No, the support for combat flight simming was. SOH was very unique. Now, we get a fresh blow of incredible new combat sims, and SOH is sleeping like Snow White and the seven dwarfs. The vibrant, new, thrilling stuff is happening on the forums that have allowed those new fans and communities to have a place. Why is that?
 
I say we make our own Simulator and make a forum for it!

:d

And... On the kneeboard, an optional Scrabble gameboard which can be brought up, complete with click sounds...

:guinness:
 
Nausicaa said:
it.
we get a fresh blow of incredible new combat sims, and SOH is sleeping like Snow White and the seven dwarfs. The vibrant, new, thrilling stuff is happening on the forums that have allowed those new fans and communities to have a place. Why is that?
Click to expand...
because they do not come here or for that matter want to
look at the IL2 forum
no one, the new x plane forum gets more visitors
we could go to sleep completely and have new forums and no visitors
if you think we are wrong start a forum yourself
and let me eat my words
1 hr 45 mins to bingo
H
 
another thought!:pop4:
cfs1-3 where extremely successful because of open architecture
so many people wanted to learn the hows, the whys
today the only open ones are the (civil) sims
and thats what we do teach and help
darn ill be late for bingo:running:
H
 
We may not be "in touch" with our Combat Simulator origins, but what we have now is great.... We are all aviation enthusiasts here, and we each offer something a little different. We have a few that are really into models, virtual models, scenery making, video making, cars, computers, tinkering, for Panther it's cars, planes, payware, and exotic woman, *some say he's the whole package* and some of us like myself pick up the warbird contingent... We are truly a "community" here... and almost always usually play nice, which is more than I can say for any other forum.... and bless Ickie for keeping this place for us!

-witt

** the older folks are gonna have to explain this bingo thing to me, why are we all playing with the farmer's dog????:ernae:
 
I think Bingo was a bad idea

The game gets cancelled everytime the caller yells B-52! Everybody runs ousude to look!!

Nausicaa... One quick question. Are you volunteering to give up your time to get these various other forums (fora?) going... or just 'observing'?
 
I cheat at Bingo....:jump:

Heading out now...


B-52.. Now that was funny...LOL :applause:
 
Huh? The civil ones are by far not the only open ones. :icon_lol: :monkies:
I think you need an update...!?

..and I had several forums already and was admin there, thanks.

Having a look now there were the future is happening :running: ciao...
 
I have the best of both worlds.....Combat Flight Sim 2 and Flight Sim 2004. I can fly combat in a sim that is extremely open and very modifiable. I can fly civilly in a sim that is extremely open and very modifiable. In some cases, I can fly combat in a plane in CFS2, then switch to FS2004 and fly the same plane over much more interesting scenery just for the fun of flying that plane.

Has SOH/Combatfs.com forgotten its combat flight sim roots? Nope! A year or so ago, there was the server crash that wiped out all the posts and threads and all forums had to start back over from a clean slate. Comparing the stats for CFS2, FS2004 and FSX, it is clear that CFS2 has pretty much the same level of activity as FS2004 and not all that far behind FSX...and that given the fact that CFS2 is nearly 10 years old and in the minds of some, an antiquated and outmoded piece of software. But, I know that CFS2 has had some pretty amazing developments within the last couple of years that make it fresher and better than it has ever been.

OBIO
 
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