MeerCaT

I own the Steam version of ToH but I would quite like to install and run ToH outside of the Steam file structure and entirely disassociated from Steam. Is there anyway of using the CD key for a version of ToH installed through Stream to activate a non-steam version? (And is it even possible to download the game without going through the purchase process?) I know that the DCS series (Eagle Dynamics) make their game installation files freely downloadable from their website, but to activate it (and be able to run the game) you must purchase a CD key. Does/could/would such a purchase structure be applied to ToH at all? This makes it possible for owners of the Steam version to then revert to the non-Steam version (after they have reaslised the error of their ways:)) without having to purchase a second copy of the game.

Similar to Bug #29226 in the community tracker, I have noticed another bridge with this issue (ambient traffic drives through the ramp and directly into the water, as if the bridge does not exist): Grid ref: 282 373 (Seattle) There may or may not be more instances of this, and they may or may not already be known about so appologies if this is old news - there only seems to be one ticket about one specific bridge at the moment.

Before I go jumping around waving my arms in the air over in the 'Troubleshooting' forum, I thought I would first ask for some thoughts on the following: Here we are flying around in our <insert generic medium class heli here>, all nice and stable after the 1.04 patch, when we notice that we've been so busy admiring the lovely trees and shiny landscape that we've drifted a little high. Eager to get back down low enough to be able to count the grass we dump the collective full down (it's ok we're carrying enough foward speed to avoid getting caught up in a vortex ring, which isn't modelled in the sim anyway - I believe). It doesn't take long to bleed off that unwanted altitude in this big heavy medium heli so after barley a second or two of 'free fall' we ever-so-gently squeeze the collective back up again. But lo, what's this?! The torque needles are going bonkers crazy! Now the heli wants to yaw right, so we begin pushing on the left pedal to counter. Great we have the yaw neutralised, and a bit more collective we've got altitude stablised, but the bird is drifting right - probably just leftover momentum after that little impromptu dance in the sky we just had to do. No problem, cyclic left bit...a bit more...no back a bit...there we've got the craft stablised is a fairly controlled hover. Torque needles are still going crazy though and to maintain stable flight/hover we've having to hold a bank of 20-30 degrees left. Whoa!!!!!!! Feels like the pedal cables just snapped or something because now the heli is stuck in an accelerating right-hand yaw and full left pedal is doing nothing. The aircraft then enters an unstoppable spinning cycle with the nose gyrating up and down in a surely impossible motion before we lower the collective to end this nightmare in a rather uncomfortable and unelegant collapse to the ground. So just to recap (in a way that I could have explained to begin with if I didn't have so much free time to kill), in a medium class helicopter ('Firefly' I think was the exact model/livery - in case it makes any difference) after having reduced the collective to full-down during flight, it then seems near impossible to ever get the collective back up again without ultimately losing control of the aircraft - possibly due to some deliberately (and correctly?) modelled damage physics to the helicopter, or possibly due to a small but potent bug in the flight model number crunching.

After having experienced a simliar issue as the original poster (at the very same point in the same mission), I have had a very simple idea that could help avoid such issues without the appplication having to do any clever or 'heavy lifting' work. Instead of initiating the auto-save instantly (at whatever event is used to trigger the auto-save), implement a short (5 seconds?) delay with simple user message indicating the count down. ("Auto saving in 5 seconds", "...4", "...3", "...2", "...1", "Auto-saving complete.") If you wanted, you could get a little bit clever about it an allow the user to "(Press '<key>' to defer saving, or '<key>' to cancel)". That way all the really clever decision making is left to the user and the computer is free to use all those precious clock cycles on rendering graphics, calculating flight dynamics and running those trojan viruses you 'picked up' from that website your mother would disapprove of.

Anyone else find the HDR lighting effect to be a little...agressive? I dare say the HDR implementation is very deeply buried in, and/or tightly bound to, the core game 'engine' and not easily configurable or changed in any way, but just wondered if anyone else shares my view?

An interesting thought I had a while ago: Have the time trials been re-worked at all, or the times adjusted since the modification to the flight dynamics? And perhaps should they be?

I have exactly the piece of advice that no new-commer wants to hear and all experienced people will give (in various guises): TIME. There's a reason that real life pilots refer to their experience in terms of "hours flying". It is all about clocking up time with your bottom in that seat and that seat up in the air. I currently have 57 'hours played' in this game according to Steam. Now that of course isn't 57 hours solid flying, due to game/mission loading time, menu navigation time, time spent walking around on foot in the game etc. however I have played many hours in 'offline' mode and since Steam only seems to log 'hours played' while in 'online' mode, I'm going to go ahead and round it up to 60 hours flight time (at least). Now 60 hours doesn't make me any expert. Hell, it doesn't even make me any good! And it probably doesn't even qualify me to give any advise to others about how to fly in this game - so it's just as well I don't intend to! :-) Sure all of us with 20-30 or more hours in this game could sit here and reel off streams of in depth 'tactical' tips and know-how on keeping your inputs small and frequent, and how to manage your collective and pedals and relationship between all the controls and bla bla bla ... until you're not even sure which way is up anymore! But no, I believe there is nothing...NOTHING, more important or beneficial in the learning process for this than my bum-to-seat-seat-to-air philosophy. Just sit there in your 'floating' seat for as long as you can possibly bear it. No really, just try getting in a heli, put it in the air and stay there (I don't mean hovering in one spot - although, of course, that's a good thing to try occassionally while you're there). It doesn't matter what you're doing up there as long as you are clocking up masses of time being there. "How does this help me learn how to land without chipping a tooth each time?" I hear you ponder (or is that just the echoes of your footsteps I'm hearing as you stroll off in dejected boredom after the second paragraph?) Trust me, if you spend 30, 60, 120 hours up there, just having fun and enjoying the experience of being there, then I GUARANTEE you will not fail to learn. No amount of talk is going to build up your muscle memory and your mind's sub-conscious understanding of how the heli will react to all manner of inputs and situations. Until you're subconscious mind is doing a great deal of the work you're not going to enjoy the take offs and landings ... and hovering is just a pipe dream!

Just a couple of quickies, reagarding the Free Flight mode: 1 - Is it possible to refuel at all? (Sure we can simply go "Back to selection" and then re-enter with a shiny new, fully-fuelled bird, but that's not as immersive or interesting) 2 - On the map screen unter the "Notes" section there is reference made to primary and secondary missions. Are there really missions in Free Flight mode? If so, how do we go about finding and/or 'triggering' them? Thanks

I suggest this be stomped on before somebody trips over it and grazes their knee!... See Grid Ref: 099 134 - Seattle