Dear Pilots,
Thank you!
Before we go any further, we want to say thank you to all our loyal fans that have chosen to support ROF these past two and a half years! Because of that support ROF has grown both technically and numerically since launch. Our product was improved even further last year and the user base continued to grow little by little allowing us to reach our development goals. But we’re not out of the woods yet. As you know, 777 Studios is a small, independent studio and we rely on our supportive community to allow us to continue our work. This year will be no different and as I mentioned in my Holiday note this past November, we will need that same kind of steadfast support in 2012. Just the like the soldiers of the Great War nearly a century ago, we need you - the everyday working man and woman, to provide us the support, the strength we need to fight on in this great ordeal. So dear friends, over the top once again! We can’t do it without you! For flight-simming! For Rise of Flight! Charge…………….!
It is now time to share with you our plans for the remainder of the year. We want to continue to push ROF to new heights and offer you even more interesting content and improvements. Since release in 2009 through 2011 we focused on trying to add new features and other gameplay improvements to Rise of Flight so you could experience a well-rounded and deep combat flight-sim experience. In 2012 we plan to continue that tradition, but this year we want to focus a bit more on adding new content for ROF, both payware and freeware and re-learning some old skills like map-making and object making. What we have planned for this year is pretty exciting. It is my pleasure to share with you now our main goals for 2012 and how the community can help us make them a reality.
Plans
First, we have finally committed to making a new map, namely a Channel Map covering parts of Northern France, Western Belgium and Southern England. This will be incorporated into the Career mode and feature our new 3D ocean technology. This means ships and submarines will be active on this map! This map will be sold as an add-on to ROF. It will feature new towns and cities and costal scenery. Building a new map is a BIG project for us, but we feel this will add immensely to the ROF experience. This will also open up the door to adding the Belgian Air Force as a flyable faction during the Career in the future. Obviously, if this new map project is successful it can open up possibilities for other new maps in the long term.
Secondly, the new map also inspires us to build the technology necessary to support seaplanes! We will initially create two unique seaplanes to fly on this map and they will be sold as separate items in the store apart from the map. We will begin work very soon on the hefty Felixstowe F.2a and the interesting Hansa-Brandenburg W.12 seaplanes. Battling for control of the English Channel will now be possible in ROF. Imagine the possibilities of naval combat with our game engine and the glorious surface to surface and air to surface battles that can result. Work has already begun on providing you with some wartime surface vessels that will be made available with the map.
We also plan to release the Airco DH.4 two-seater after the Halberstadt CL.II. The D.H.4 is a classic Entente craft that was used for bombing and recon throughout the war and it will be very useful in the Career. It flew a wide range of missions including coastal patrol with the RNAS and DH.4s even sunk a U-boat! See the U-Boat picture above and let your imagination take over. The D.H.4 was popular amongst its crews and easy to fly. It was also used extensively by American aircrews in 1918 and many were even built in the U.S.A. Adding the D.H.4 is going to be a winner. Work on the 3D model is already in its early stages.
In addition to new maps and planes, we plan on creating some interesting weapon mods which will be made available for purchase. As a result, we have worked to improve how free-fall and free-flight weapons behave in our engine. For example, bombs fly through the air more realistically now. We will also offer some additional makes of pistols and other personal identifiers to further individualize your aircraft if you so choose.
We also have plans to once again work with our good friend SYN_Vander to create another great scripted campaign for you. Please show your support by purchasing his St. Mihiel Campaign. It really is a wonderful addition to the ROF experience. He did an awesome job and was great learning experience to allow him to make even more cool campaigns in the future.
With the increased focus on content we also hope to work on some new ground objects that will allow mission makers to create some more interesting ground scenery at airfields and on the roads etc. We will first work with some select individuals to establish a procedure making these models and then eventually, assuming all goes well, we can include other members of the community in this modeling effort.
Finally, we know you want us to continue to improve the sim in other ways and we will continue to do that as best we can with the resources we have available. We will try to improve the flight-models of various aircraft and make improvements to the AI and other parts of the sim. Based on what we have been told by the community, we are working to prioritize what we can do for you and balance our schedule and resources to make some of them become a reality in 2012. As always, the community wish-list is long and exhaustive, but we do look at it to see what can be done. A lot of the requested changes cannot be easily done, so it takes time to research each one before spending the resources to complete them.
Pre-Orders
As an independent developer in a niche market, we always need more capital to keep the development train rolling. Many times members of our community have told us that they are willing to pre-order new and exciting content and features to help facilitate more development. Since our plans for 2012 are now under way we need your monetary support today rather than tomorrow. So, we are going to try something different this year that we think you will like. We are now offering the following items for pre-order starting today. If you believe we have kept our past development promises and want to support us, then these pre-order opportunities is a great way to help us. Now available for pre-order in our store are:
Channel Map - $19.99 (reg. $24.99)
Airco D.H.4 - $8.99 (reg. $11.99)
Felixstowe F.2a - $12.99 (reg. $15.99)
Hansa-Brandenburg W.12 - $8.99 (reg. $11.99)
Due to the complex scheduling, contract commitments and our parallel project work environment, the money from your pre-orders made today avoids release issues later. We think our track record of producing what we promise speaks for itself. We hope you agree and will choose to support this plan.
So this is our overall plan for 2012. More content, more planes, more objects, more improvements and more ways to support us, makes this one of the most ambitious years yet for ROF. We hope you will continue to fly with 777 Studios and continue to help us make ROF something even more special. In the spirit of the brave boys and their flying machines who risked it all to win their war, we are risking all we can to win our little war. Come on...let’s go!