Bomber Crew

[Jarhead0331]

^its not as bad as you think. Just run through the tutorial mission in the manual and then use the training missions as a guide. I learned most of what I needed to know by doing this. I also learned a lot from watching the AI. Remember, the normal state for this sim is for the AI to handle everything for everyone. The crew functions well without the player screwing it up, so you can focus on taking control only at certain times, or to perform certain specific tasks. As you get more comfortable, you can increase your workload.

It's amazing to think that we were able to master these games in high school and college, but struggle with relearning them as adults.

[BanzaiCat]

It's amazing to think that we were able to master these games in high school and college, but struggle with relearning them as adults.

Exactly. And the thing is with me, I worked at Babbage's from 1989-1991. In '89 I didn't have a home computer, so I learned these games by playing them on the store's computer. Since work was on the way home from school I'd often stop in on the way home for a few hours with F-19 or whatever.

I had tried to start an AAR on this very game...holy hell, that was 2014 I did that?  :o

[Pete Dero]

The Mighty 8th is definitely a superior/more realistic game than Bomber Crew. The issue I have with Mighty 8th is it's not intuitive at all. Though, that was utterly par for the course back then in gaming; hell, you needed a keyboard overlay for some games (like F-19 or M-1 Tank Platoon) because they were so complicated. After a while though, you get used to the key controls and don't need to look at the overlay. But, that learning curve keeps me away - I just don't have time to get into that kind of a slog these days. :( I'd like to eventually, though.

Getting Started Tutorial series  :  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMwKq7V0duU&list=PLV6qAKzfD-icnl7cMeIR_ldvH6twjQdtI

(part 3 of 21  !!!)

   



Went to GOG to check it out, only to find out I already own it 

[BanzaiCat]

Yeah, it's an ingrained check for me now to look at both Steam and GOG to be sure I don't already own a game.

Thanks for the vid, I'll check it out eventually.

[Father Ted]

I actually made a  coop mission in  modded IL2 '46 in which a bunch of people could play "Bomber Crew" for real.  With a decent amount of PC power you could concoct a pretty reasonable AI bomber stream to  be part of, and then throw 109s, 190s and flak at it.  It worked quite well, though it had a scripted nature.  This meant there wasn't really a navigator's role as you just had to follow the AI planes.  Also getting the balance between boredom and action was tricky, especially for those not piloting the plane.  Too little action is obviously not good, but on the other hand, the AAA and fighters tended to be overly lethal when you did encounter them.  In the end I think that's why I didn't pursue the project further.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

SDR: how did you get the nose art? Did you create something random, then go in to the file and replace it with something more detailed? Either that or your art skill in that drawing area is amazing.

I just created a random squiggle in-game and then copy-pasted over it with some nose art I found online.  Just hard to get all the edges smoothed out with transparencies when the file is that small.


This is about as clear as I can get it.

[BanzaiCat]

Copy paste, eh? Interesting. It looks like a PNG file you have there. I'll have to play around with it, thanks!

No way I'm trying to draw anything, not in that Godawful paint-like program.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

I drew my own shark's teeth and eye but that's the upper limit of my abilities.

[Philippe]

Apparently you can make the custom file 128x128, which improves things a lot. 

I wonder if you can go larger than that.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Nice!  I'll give that a shot.

In the meantime, I'm a Dam Buster!

[Staggerwing]

^Time to Chastise the Jerries!

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Apparently you can make the custom file 128x128, which improves things a lot. 

I wonder if you can go larger than that.

Going to 128x128 definitely helps smooth out the edges a bit.  Thanks.

[Philippe]

Just tried 256x256, and although it's hard to see the difference, there is a difference.  So these textures seem to be scalable.  I may try loading in something really big, just to see what will happen.

[Philippe]

1024x1024 does not work, so there is an upper limit.

I shrank that texture in half to 512x512, and much to my surprise it worked.

The upper limit is somewhere between 512 and 1024, but I don't think you'll be able to detect much of a difference on the larger settings.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

Fiddled with shrinking down an image to 512x512.  Bit blurry bit that's OK. Thanks for the tip.