Graviteam

WELCOME TO THE FORUM ON GAME "STEEL FURY: FALL BLAU" !!!

List of improvements:

1. Subtitles (we already have that in the western SF release)

2. German crew voices (we already have that in the western SF release)

3. Graphics-smoothing (new renderer)

4. New player controlled tank PzJager1

5. New player controlled tank PzIVF1

6. Training missions now with T34

7. 10 new maps

8. 20 new missions

9. All SF patches (5) are integrated

10. Realistic and animated track repair (the own crew repairs)

11. New, improved and corrected gun sights on all tanks

12. New, corrected and improved animations and poses for the tank crew

13. New animations for PzJager1 added

14. New AI algorithm for planes

15. AI for infantry and tanks was improved

16. Tank tracks were improved

17. Corrected ballistics

18. Damage types were improved

19. Improved vegetation models

20. New divisional units are available in the editor

21. New divisional markers for additional tank units were added and corrected, turret numbering is corrected

22. Compass includes now directional figures for better aiming

23. New and improved 3D cockpit for the Т34

24. The German sight is corrected

25. The menu is improved

26. Various small errors were corrected.

Video
Steel Fury: Fall Blau
http://www.steelfury.info/files/SF-BLAU.avi (22 Mb)

(http://img.rutube.ru/thumbs/76/68/76681b27888b9781a1d65e3029ae4ccc-1-2.jpg) (http://rutube.ru/tracks/1575872.html?v=76681b27888b9781a1d65e3029ae4ccc)

This is great to hear no doubt. Did I understand the tanksim.ru google translation?


I remember at first I thought Khakov 1943 was the next tank sim, but was sad to hear it's RTS. But this is great to hear that SF: Fall Blau isn't the last tank sim and will in fact continue on into 1943.

next tank sim - august 1943 Kharkov.

Best Regards,
Valdimir Zayarniy

Please ensure your games company will be releasing in the West ...

We really need Fall Blau!

Hello there , can you tell me please if FALL BLAU is available , thank you very much  :)

Development of addon Fall Blau has been finished in 2008..
Publication FALL BLAU has been postponed by legal owner (Discus Games company) and till now was not published..

were can we download the FALL BUAU add on here in the uk is there a link we can use?can you put the link on this forum? :-\

TankAce, Fall Blau has never been released by its legal owners Discus games until now.It's highly unlikely that they will release it since the Fall Blau add-on is nearly 2 years old.Unless they combine it with the next tank sim made by Graviteam hopefully by the end of 2010 , early 2011????(Just a hope of mine not a concrete plan)

This is such a shame that it was never released. Any news now?

 From an interview that Validimir Zelevnyi(CEO of Graviteam) made with SIMHQ apparently for their next WWII sim Fall Blau is one of the scenarios they are looking at.However the add-on made by Graviteam and whose rights are in possession of Discus is unlikely to be released.It's gathering dust and forgotten somewhere and my guess is that it would be too late to release it as a paid add-on as it's more than 2 years old.If at least they made the maps available!!!!

I don't see why this is such a big deal :P Half the stuff we already have, plus more. Maybe Kyth, Rends, Stone2009 or some of the other mission genius's can create a Kharkov 1943 campaign? we might have to ask nicely

Dear Graviteam developers,

I am very sorry to see that this addon has not been released...

Could you please consider releasing at least the basic fixes/improvements for the game engine included in the addon, as a patch for Steel Fury?

For example I am thinking about:

14. New AI algorithm for planes

15. AI for infantry and tanks was improved

16. Tank tracks were improved

17. Corrected ballistics

18. Damage types were improved

26. Various small errors were corrected.

I am sure a lot of the Graviteam fans would really appreciate it a lot (me included !!).

Thank you very much for all your work on these great sims !!


Txema

And I would be happy to pay for the additional features...

I don't want to sound like a party poop but I suspect Graviteam's answer will be that the rights to game were sold to Discus 2 years ago and as a result they don't have the game anymore and would nto be allowed to release anything without Discus approval.

this issue was raised over 2 years ago by a guy on the forum and Andrey12345 from Graviteam gave the answer below:

Re: Fall Blau Release Date

« Reply #8 on: January 24, 2009, 11:34:49 PM »

Quote
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Quote from: ArmorEtr on January 20, 2009, 08:38:02 AM

Well as far as what games they have to offer, absolutely yes. The community and games at battlefront.com are much more similar to Steel Fury and the Kharkov 43 RTS game. It seems like a much better fit compared to Lighthouse's mystery/adventure type games.

It's right, but Graviteam does not have rights for sell Steel Fury. The result - game publisher it's a choice of Discus Games, the game producer company.

Here is an idea Frinik,

Fall Blau and as you mention seems to be owned by Discus. What is to stop Graviteam creating another patch with the additions that Txema has outlined.

This would have nothing to do with Discus, as it would be a patch for Steel Fury. Looking at Txema's list they look like script fixes not models or maps, though I could be totally wrong  :)

I doubt this will happen but it is a nice thought.

The problem for Graviteam would be the issue of CopyrightsI think when they sold their rights to Fall Blau to Discus that included everything including new maps, vehicles, improbvemnts to AI and gameplay, ballistics etc.I think their hands would be tied assuming, of course, that Graviteam still has access to the improvments they had made to the game engine.As well, Graviteam no longer owns the rights to Steel Fury either they sold them to Discus in the east and Lighthouse( now bankrupt ) in the West.Thus even if they wanted they would not be able to sell or distribute copies of either Sf or FB.One possible alternative would be for GHraviteam to approach Discus and see fi theyw ould be willing to allow Graviteam to buy back the distribution rights.However this is unlikely to happen for several reasons:

1) Graviteam is short fo cash and what little funds they have they are investing in their new sim Steel Armour Blaze of War and improvements/English verisons of their popular RTS which you guys love playing.

2)Graviteam has a new , improved game engine based on Achtung Panzer(Kharkov Front Roads in Russian version I think) which is not compatible with the game engine they used for SF.

3) Graviteam does not  have its own distribution network thus would be forced to look for another distributor .Who would be interested in purchasing the rights and distributing Fall Blau which is more than 3 years old?

4) Graviteam would be unlikely to invest what little funds they have to improve Fall Blau.For them it's a dead end! They did not even make money with SF.I think they barely broke even.

Your only hope would be for Discus to release the Fall Blau as a freebie hoping to get good publicity or goodwill.Might as well ask for Xmas twice a year....

Sorry but all the scenarios look bleak.

Frinik,

What I was asking for is an unofficial patch for Steel Fury that includes just the basic fixes/improvements for the game engine.

That patch would be released hoping to get just good publicity or goodwill, of course. As murkz says, what is to stop Graviteam to unofficially release it?

It is really a shame that all those basic fixes/improvements for the game engine are never used and lost vainly...


Txema

  I agree entirely with you txema1 But believ me during the last 2 1/2 years Graviteam has been beseeched many times by fans wanting FB to be released and invariably the answer has been we cannot as the own copyrights to FB and the improvements that came with it.I don't think it's ill will just impossibility.If they could have released a patch with the improvements they would have doen so a long tiem ago.In my opinion.

But yes it's a crying shame that fall Blau is  languishing, probably forgotten by Discus gathering dust on a shelf! >:(

Anyone ever contactet Discus?
Maybe they will release it as s free unsupported version...

I don't think anybody has tried.If anybody would be the logical choice to contact them it would be Graviteam.I wonder if Panzerfaust could talk Vlad Zelevnyi CEO of Graviteam into approaching Discus?

Best would be if they could release the whole engine code itself somehow, Like and open source project or an SDK or an editors version etc. So ppl can change themselfs what they want and not. This is still a pretty smal community and it shouldnt be a problem with versions, bad code etc as the few coding ppl can work together so to speak.

But to be honest i think that its possible to change them anyway somehow. It looks like almost all files are open, Its just a matter to find them!

Was Fall Blau to have multiplayer?  I would imagine if Steel Fury or any successor was to have that option, the community would become massive.

I have to agree, with WOT doing so well, our community has more tankers than ever before...So now would seem to be the time to release a mp tank simulation.

I do hope it is Graviteam :)

No as far as I know there was no p,an for MP for Fall Blau nor for Steel Fury.Even know Graviteam is very reluectant to go the MP way for Steel Armour Blaze of War.They have agreed , half heartedly, to eventually release a MP patch but for them SP is what counts.

I don't personally play MP very often and I am content with SP in most games but I agree that MP is a very important selling argument on the Western market.However the Eastern market seems more inclined to go for SP which would explain why Graviteam is so conservative in that resopect.Plus their core fans are more in the East than in the West although this seems ot be changing.

Interesting about west/east differences.  I actually like both a strong SP and MP element as opposed to many other gamers who disregard SP entirely. Saying that, I still like the SP in SF but it could be expanded on, ie a full campaign mode with crew dynamics such as skill/experience/rank/promotions and working up from commanding a single tank in a group to commanding the whole group.  I think SF has the best tank simulation engine as it's the only one I've played that feels like I'm in a big heavy tank, and though as much of a shame that is was cut short by legal issues, there is a good community that has made it 10 times better and still keep developing it.

Yes it's very true.After Panzer Elite SF is the tank sim that offers the best variety of tanks and vehicles, mods, maps, missions, tweaks with new things being introduced all the time.What's interesting is that it took time for that game to catch on in the West but in the last 18 months it's amazing how many have taken interest in it.

Having recently revisited Steel Fury, I did buy it at release in the UK and T34 vs Tiger. TvT has had all of my attention due to the mp element and because of mp I have built up close tanker friends. We even made the MMP mod for it.

SF has drawn me back as there was very little happening in the tank sim world, so I took the time to revisit SF, I am very glad I did.

If SF had mp I/we would have played it from the off.

Even Panzer Elite at 10 years old has mp :)

So yes East and West seem to expect different things from their simulations. The more I play SF, the more I wish my friends were in game with me multi-crewing the tanks, I know we would all love it...

Yes Murkz you are one of the die-hard fans who haven't given up on Tvst and created all the MMPs all the way to MMP7.I have MMP5 and it really makes a difference to the game.Congrats for the work you've done you and your friends! :).Although I think TvsT is pretty much dead except for the MP.It's kind of strange to see TvsT and Sf both created more or less at the same time and released pretty closely to one another and distributed by the same defunct Lighthouse dist.TsvTwas saved from oblivion by the MP while SF was saved by the modding community and also because it offered more variety and especially a very friendly ME and outstanding support from Graviteam who unlike G5 did not disown their product!

Glad to see you on the forum!

I also see that you have started a Graviteam sims thread on the panzer sims forum.

Well here's the problem, as I understood from Vlad over several conversations, Discus and Graviteam are not on very good professional speaking terms. There is much I could tell you about this but I'm not sure if Vlad wants this public knowledge since that information was contained in private conversations. But one thing I can tell you is that while Fall Blau was an  improvement on the original SFK42 thats not the case now, much of what Fall Blau would have brought to the table has already been achived with SFK42 mods. There was no MP planned for Fall Blau that I know of. Some at Graviteam are not totally convinced MP is a viable path because of budget constraints and Graviteams staff size. They feel that MP and the continued support that must be expended to keep it running takes away from supporting/updating other aspects of the SP'er game. If Graviteam was the size of EA or even 1c/Maddox Games I don't think this would even be a serious issue, but for a company Graviteams size it's a major decision. Depending on how it eventually works out one camp or the other is not going to be totally happy.

Here's a little excerpt from a SimHq interview I had the pleasure of doing with Vlad back in June 2009 concerning features of SFK42 vs Fall Blau:

Steel Fury: Fall Blau

Robert: Recently it was announced that the follow on to Steel Fury: Kharkov 1942, Steel Fury: Fall Blau was put on hold even though the simulation is completed. Could you elaborate why this decision was? When can we expect Steel Fury: Fall Blau?

Vladimir: Sorry, but I should defer this question to the producer, Discus Games.

Robert: What would be some of the differences we would notice between Steel Fury: Fall Blau and Steel Fury: Kharkov 1942?

Vladimir: Basic differences include:
• location of the battle action
•new polygons and missions
• new user-controlled techniques for the PanzerJager1, PzIV ausf. F1, T-34 (the production STZ)
• new and improved cockpits to all user-controlled tanks
• caterpillar repair, during game, by order of user or AI

The full interview here:
http://www.simhq.com/_land3/land_135a.html

Cheers

The major one was: AI - improving, all other... well take er polite, but ... forget.

• new and improved cockpits to all user-controlled tanks
• caterpillar repair, during game, by order of user or AI

These two also look interesting :)

SF used to have the automatic track repair pressing the T key I think.But it turned into a bug as your crew would keep reparing the tracks even though they didn't need any...

I think I installed the update as soon as I installed the game, but was there a 3d model of the crew repairing the tracks?  If the basics are there within the program, maybe some smart coders could resurrect the track-fixing option and cure it of the bugs?

They replaced it with the automatic track repair which I think is better.You just wait 3 to 5 miuntes and your tracks are repaired.Thre's an icon in the game settings you need to tick in order to get it working.It's bug-free but ti only works for the player's tank.