I remember what PR was. It still instills inspiration to this day for myself and I still miss it so. Time and time again it's been stated "
If PR's not your taste, when why don't you stop playing it?" the answer is simple; I'm not a quitter. I don't give up on something that I know has potential. Project Reality has a lot of potential, but I think it has been spending too much time on addressing one thing more than others. There are several issues in PR that's been considered "low-priority" since even v0.7 and v0.75 that still hasn't been addressed to this day.
Another thing to consider is that PR really has it's own "Realism" monopoly. There aren't many true realism mods out there. So players are forced to resort to Project Reality as there simply nothing else out there that comes close. And it goes without saying that PR can get away with certain things in this situation that it wouldn't be able to if it had some serious lateral competition.
I mean think about it. There's AMD vs. Intel processors. There's ATI vs. Nvidia video cards. Then there's PR vs. ... Well nothing. Get the picture?
Additionally, I am convinced that PR will also extend into the future. There's no doubt that PR has some of the most inspiring people that look to teamwork and realism. Even when PR has come to an end with the BF2 engine it's team members will take the concept of PR in mind and move on to a new game such as OPFP2 or Arma 2. Heck, maybe it'll even get it's own engine one day. Who knows?
I want PR to progress into new games and create their own version of reality. Why? Because Project Reality still seems to be the only community out there that truly strives for a purebred realism mod. But how can this be done if the community is practically divided each time a new build/patch is released? Something needs to get fixed here.
[R-DEV]Matrox wrote:Maps will change, items will be added and items will be taken away. The whole point of PR, as has been stated before, is to continually evolve.
I also understand that Project Reality wants to evolve, but even evolution has to be worthwhile and practical. Just changing something for the sake of "a new spin" isn't what I consider positive evolution.
The question is:
A) Is Project Reality evolving because it's necessary for gameplay and to serve the community?
B) Is it evolving in fear that players will lose intrest if they don't have something new to play?
C) Is it evolving because it's necessary for gameplay despite what the masses in the community want?
D) Is it a little bit of all of the above?
I'm under the impression that PR seems to have forgotten it's roots in some cases. Because of the amount of people that play PR is astounding "we can afford to lose a few people" kind of situation isn't what I'm particularly happy with if that's what's being hinted.
I'm hoping that one day that the PR begins a more democratic and opinion based system where they create a poll for what should be implemented into the forums. And the forum community is asked to pick what changes they would like over others solutions in comparison for the next build. I think the PR team would be surprised in some cases on what should be changed and what should be left alone at times.
Let's look back. Does anyone remember v0.75 right? The PR community was erupting with popularity thinking it was going to be flat-out awesome when the v0.8 build came out. Why? Because everyone saw all the changes being made to PR at that time. They thought it was going to be like v0.75 with more content and vehicles. Turns out it wasn't anything like v0.75 with more content. PR had instead made v0.8 nearly a whole new mod because of changes and had upset a fair amount of individuals.
Core of the situation is that players seem to be looking for a standard normalcy in gameplay. That's really it.
[R-DEV]Matrox wrote:I think Warren you need to look into whether PR is still the mod for you, because there seems to be so much constant bitterness from you towards the team.
I'm not an [R-DEV] or [R-CON] or anything like that and for me to start now would be a bit late in my eyes.
But I do have one thing that can even help a developer; a Personal Message mail box. If any of the developers wanted to specifically ask me about what I thought about something I would tell them with my utmost honesty. My mailbox has been around since the v0.6 build and it's still open today. I wish the PR team would be more open about the work being done for the next build instead of concealing it in secrecy to the last second before it's released and wondering why some of the community is upset.
CAS_117 had spoken to me in the past about what I thought about Jet Aircraft and the fixes made. I've spoken to Jaymz as well about several things in the past that's also been put into effect this build. The same door is open to you Matrox. If you wish to speak to me and ask of my opinions I would give you (and any other developer from the team) my time and effort any day of the week. But if no one cares to ask, then nothing shall be done. The door is always open. Feel free to ask anything, even about what can be done to improve Combat Engineers.
After all, I don't see why the main gamers of PR shouldn't be consulted. I've probably played more hours of PR than most developers have been able to. I'm not saying this in anyway to be spiteful, but if the developers are constantly working on the mod, how much time could they have to themselves to actually play it? That's where your gaming community steps in and has a valuable word. It simply comes down to "trust" and that's a major thing that needs improvement.
Sorry if you hate the length, but if you've were able to read it through it you understand where I'm coming from.