I apologize if I sounded harsh, but it is my opinion, and a valid one, in my opinion (he-he). It’s just poor marketing. If you completely switch the focus of the game, why not switch the name? Likewise, Invasion 1944 is a bad name, because it limits the possibilities right off the bat.
And that is why FH is a better brand, because it is established, because it makes sense, and because it is broad enough to do virtually anything WW II (imagine Continuation War in Invasion 1944). That said, the FH does not aim itself squarely into realism (it is no vanilla, but no PR or ARMA either, and that, by the way, why Arma engine is not viable, in my opinion), so not to say that realism mod or game should not be developed.
As for developing FH3, no one said it was going to be easy, but if you never start, it’s never going to get done, and I, unlike some, think that it still has potential. One of the core elements of that potential is the brand, and the work already done (see, for instance, what Chad is doing sharing his expertise across games and engines — things are different, but asset recycling (such as code) is one of the fundamental tenets of the development). It would be shame to let the name, and the work in maps and models go to waste.
I appreciate what FH developers has done immensely. If all the development ceased right now, and the game was left as it is, I would still be happy with the quality product that it is, with all its imperfections (although it would probably die, being online game, sooner, rather than later). Developers do do something right if the mod survived for seven years or so, and more if you count the FH1. And the fact that it is the only game I am playing consistently for four years straight, should count for something.
But there are things they could do better. The concerns raised in another topics here do have some footing. Communication is lacking, both in updates, and to responding to the community publicly or privately. We, the community, understand that resources are limited, and for a lot of work FH is simply lacking manpower, unlike PR with its throng of devs which allows them to to work on three different engines and two mini-mods to boot. But FH did not help in many ways to expand that workforce.
I understand their commitment to quality, but there is a lot of heavy lifting and dirty work that can be done, such as helping with forums (Why there are so many support topics in a “General” section?), or those of us with relevant skills could help with such menial tasks such as bug hunting in the code. I cannot speak for everyone, but I had written repeatedly to several developers and forum administrators with offers of any help I could give, and I did not once get a courtesy of even “Get stuffed, we don’t need your stinking help”. I am sure many people would volunteer their time with arduous unrewarding tasks just to free the team to work on the fun stuff, but they seem to have repeatedly ignored that resource.
P. S. Roughbeak, stop repeatedly make it about 762 v. the world. This kind of attitude is precisely why there are many people who avoid playing on 762 altogether, and the mod suffers for it, not solely 762, F|H, WaW or VBIOS communities separately (we’ve already lost Wolf and hslan).
