rec.autos.simulators

Everyone here probably knows the history of Counterstrike, and how it
went from free mod to commercial product, with a new single player
version (CS - Condition Zero) on the way.
After being blown away by the video of the upcoming GPLEA Honda, I'm
amazed that Sierra can't see the parallels between CS and GPL.  The
tracks, cars, hacks (JSJ Shifter, all sounds, GPL Forever's CCM), are
nothing short of amazing.  I couldn't begin to imagine the number of
hours all these great people have dedicated to enhancing GPL - or give
these folks the thanks they deserve.
So GPL has an incredible mod community (like HL/CS), a large and
dedicated online community (OK, not at the level of CS, but still
something significant I'd think).
If Sierra didn't have thier heads up thier (n)ass(car)es, they'd see
the opportunity a re-release, update, etc. of GPL could be.
I've been following the Racesim Central thread about a GPL booth at
the upcoming Goodwood Festival of Speed - basically a bunch of GPL
fanatics doing the marketing job Sierra should have done *years* ago!
Lets hope Sierra lets Papy pay the community back with something,
someday.
Not to slight the great work like the D3D patch - Papy obviously
cares.
But could you imagine GPL with just an update to take better advantage
of D3D, add the improved Papy tire model, and 3D sound?

A man can dream, can't he ;)?

Kendt
GPL Rank - get ready for it - 188.30!  I've been sightseeing...

(n)ass(car)es?  LOL!

You're right on with the parallel in terms of mods, etc., but there is
little arguing that Counterstrike & Half Life had massive online communities
(I ran two dedicaded HL/CS servers for about a year) compared to GPL.  Yes,
GPL has a dedicated community that keeps a 3 year old game current and makes
sure it is still the best sim racing game out there, but the argument
espoused on this newsgroup over and over when the conversation turns to "why
doesn't Sierra do more?" is that GPL wasn't a huge product for them.  The
exact numbers are unknown - it might have been a total bomb financially, it
might have done okay, but it doesn't really matter because it clearly wasn't
a 'smash hit' ala HL/CS or even the NASCAR franchise was for Sierra.

Although I would love to see Sierra toss official support behind GPL or an
add-on pack or GPL2 or whatever and I would pay good money to them for it
(heck, the game already cost me the $45 original price, a $150 VooDoo2 card
back in the day, a $110 wheel which got replaced recently with a $175 Momo
wheel and eventually really led me to get a new computer to run all the fun
new graphics & tracks that have been developed for the game - so it's not
like I won't pay Sierra good money for a new version) I have serious doubts
that the folks at Sierra feel like giving GPL a facelift.  Personally, even
if Sierra never puts another minute of development work into the game, I
will always be thankful for the original product they released.  With the
possible exception of the original Civilization game, I can't think of ANY
game I've played longer than GPL.  3+ years and I still find great joy in
chasing (or being chased) by Hill through Parabolica.

But you're right...a man can dream.  Who knows, maybe Sierra will stun us
someday - but even if they don't, they already created one spectacular
racing sim for which I'm thankful.

-Mark

What everything boils down to is that the GPL community spans 10-20
000 tops where maybe 3-5000 are ***(numbers outrageously
extrapolated from GPLRank)... Not exactly like HL/CS where 30-40 000
are playing online -at any given moment! That's like two orders of
magnitudes difference, at least.

Besides, there's only been one precedent to CS; Team Fortress. Both
blockbuster mods. There really haven't been any other, with lesser
coomunity, mods that I know of that have been getting
(commercial)developer support...

Valve are helping beta test / linux compiling the new version of Day of
Defeat (best half-life mod EVER!!) :)

DoD has about the same sized community as GPL.

DoD is cool! :)

But I am still a CS man - nothing like a Desert Eagle headshot :)

Ash

And a bunch of 1337 n00bie kidz yelling h4x!

JB

Compared to Half-Life, GPL sold probably not 5% of it's total sales.  H-L
was at the top of the selling charts for almost 2+ years.  It still is.

--
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard>
-- http://www.ymenard.8m.com/
-- This announcement is brought to you by the Shimato Dominguez
Corporation - helping America into the New World...

OK - I realize when I hit "send" that the numbers were probably a
little skewed - but take the following things in evidence:

-Gunman Chronicles - an independent mod Sierra snapped up and sold at
retail, this was a far from stellar product.  Sierra is(was?) willing
to do such a thing for an unproven product (banking on the HL numbers,
admittedly).
-Red Baron - way back when didn't Sierra release 2 updates to RB at
retail to take advantage of 3D hardware?  GPL obviously missed
slightly on 3D acceleration when it came out (remember how a
*Rendition* card was *the* card to have for GPL originally? - still
got my Stealth S220 somewhere!).
-The NASCAR popularity argument - I don't fully buy this.  Sure,
Nascar is more popular, but people walking into the stores also knew
what a Nascar game was all about up front - Sierra simply did not
market GPL in any meaningful way to the ideal target audience.  Any
commercials on Speedvision during Legends of Motorsport?  Any during
showings of Grand Prix?  Any stands at historic racing events?  If
they got the word out *what* it was all about, maybe more folks would
have sought it out in the first place.
-The US prejudice about the racing world - This makes me embarrased to
be from the US, but it amazes me how blind some companies can be to
the rest of the world.  Sierra makes a big deal about the popularity
of NASCAR, but then doesn't release N4 in Europe?! (Am I correct here?
- I read something about the release being pulled in the UK).  Well,
hell - how about making something that *would* be popular in Europe?
Aren't you Sierra folks owned by a French company these days anyway?
Tell me names like Stewart, Andretti, etc. aren't well known
overseas...

GPL2 (1972, dawn of turbo era, whatever) isn't the dumbest idea
ever...

Kendt

I quit playing CS because of all the silly ***like that.  Then I

"hear" in the typical Papy Loop race was actually the same thing, only
in a different dialect.

SO.... if ne1 noz where 2 dl z aimbot 4 N4, pls post the URL, k?  

$*&$#%()!!!,
Gerald