Ryan,
First section of your post exactly reflects the reason I made mine
. This thread is NOT going to be a flame war, or whatever as the other one you are refering to.
The rest of your post is exactly the way I would like to see the discussion go. You are refering to several aspects of the game and it's development, which are imo under the level they should be. Thats progress discussion, and you haven't made a cmparisation to another game. Thats what I want to see. Talking about facts, and not the idea how people experience a game. Thats a whole different discussion.
In terms of my demands on how this thread goes, I can make those demands. Thats the thing of being the admin
Instead of waiting until it derails, I interviene before it does.
Back on topic,
Yes, you can be very critical about the progress, or the game itself. You are entitled to your own point of view, and are able to express that. The points you use as arguments in your last point, are just about all very valid points, and I can't (and will not) disagree on that.
However, you all have had a choice to purchase a BETA version of a game, and should all have the right expectancy about the game. Sure, you an be disapointed with the progress which is understandable, but still, there has never been a concrete date of release for this game. ISI stated from the beginning that the game will NOT go into gold status, before it's finished. Anyone with a bit of pre-knowledge of ISI, and they way they work, could have known that that could never be within those 6 months initially given.
The problem I have with the whole graphics discussion, is that you can't compare 2 different games with each other. As every dot or line on your screen has to be rendered and calculated, there are a lot of factors which can be of influence. So, if the processor is used for other features, it has less time to do graphic renders. How much of the processors is assigned to graphics, and how much to other features, is a choice a platform developer has to make. This automaticly means that, in case you have a lot of other "calcuations" to do, you have less for the graphics. It could be that ISI has valued their graphical impression lower then other platform developers do. In that case, you will never have the same quality. As said in my previous post, you cant compare a single aspect of a game, without looking at it's other features. I know people think that they have the biggest NASA computer to play their games on, and that it has unlimited calcuation powers, but unfortunately thats not true
. Developers have to make choices for that.
That mod thing you are mentioning is indeed a pain in the ass. At least, in the current form it is. There can be multiple reasons for the current way it works, and why ISI has not changed it (yet?). There has been stated before that the whole system will be evaluated later on, and perhaps changed. But for now, it stays. Does this help in getting multiplayer servers full? Nope, it does not. But then again, ISI has no priority in delivering a multiplater game now, as it's still in BETA.
Basicaly, all we can do at this point is waiting. Waiting until the game is released, and hope that they will change those nasty things they have introduced in this game.
Will it be a succes? I can't tell. Not yet at least. If they make some right choices, yes it will be a succes. It surely has the potential to become the best simracing platform out at this moment, but it still needs work, and some right actions.
If they continue to be as stubern as they are now, I fear the succes of rf2 will be less in the beginning, but will be there in the end. It is so much better (in terms of driving) then rf1, and that game was a huge succes as well. I am confident rf2 will be the same somewhere in the future. It is not now, but I a mcertain it will be.