PR has no leadership - no clear vision of what PR should be, poor development schedules and worst of all, developers were left to make mod decisions on their own as they saw fit, regardless if it harmonized with anything else. The mish-mash would be jammed into test builds and eventually released to the public with little or no thought to the overall gameflow, strategy, purpose and/or the resulting exploits.

As someone who helped oversee some of the latest changes in v0.85, I can say this is simply not true. Although there has been problems in the past in the dev team, the team is stronger than ever and has overcome some major growing pains over the years. Honestly how many mod teams/projects do you know have been together for 4+ years and are still producing and evolving their mod with major releases every 6 months? Is the dev team perfect? Not even close. Is there still many dedicated individuals working as a team to develope a vision of the "perfect" war sim game FOR ABSOLUTELY FREE? More than ever. I believe there IS a clear vision of the mods direction, and even though the team is highly experimental that doesn't mean that vision gets clouded. Have mistakes been made in the past? Yes. Will mistakes be made in the future? Yes. Does that mean the team is going to stop allowing innovative new ideas and stick rigidly to what we already know can and cannot be done? Sorry, but no.
Development schedules for PR have been by far the fastest for any quality BF2 mod to ever be released, I dont think you can ask for much better than that.

6-man medic squads?

This is nothing new. This has been a possible exploit for years. Honestly I have lead squads of all medics in PR for "silly fun" on every release cycle since v0.4, and nothing much has changed - its always been an effective "tactic". Does that mean that the mod is broken and not fun and the only way to win is with 6man medic squads? No. The argument doesn't even completely make sense since he states that the 6man medic squad is the ultimate tactic, yet headshots are the only way to win. How do you headshot someone at range with ironsites?
Since this thread talks about the PR dev teams weaknesses and flaws and how much we have failed as a group to fulfill the goals of that group, then I think its only right to talk about TF21 and its potential flaws. What I think TF21 as a group is missing, is that your play experience is based entirely on how realistic YOU want to make the game to be. How YOU interact with the other members of your team and if your playing for the immersive experience or if your playing to be the best, NO MATTER WHAT THE COST. From my experience, too often I think TF21 plays with the latter frame of mind - to be the best, no matter what the cost. Of course if you play with this mindset you are bound to find flaws, exploits and a more gamey way to play, all games have this problem, there is no avoiding it. Certain aspects of the mod of course enhance and facilitate or take away your ability to play realistically, but this whining about the medic squads is unfounded. If you play on a small map, expect rushy, spammy tactics - sorry, that is a player behaviour that has been ingrained in peoples minds for a long long time.
PR I think finds its most realistic gameplay in the 4km maps, where careful strategic decisions and sound military tactics give your team a HUGE advantage over gamey/rush tactics. Its no coincidence that the majority of the new maps planned for PR are 4km (no less than eight 4km maps are in the works, many of which will be ready for v0.9). But the PR dev team has no overall strategy or vision so you can ignore all that :roll:

At the heart of this discussion, there are two types of players. Those who want realistic weapons, and those who want a realistic combat experience.

I dont think you can boil down the types of PR players to just two different types. The world is not that black and white and its simplifying the issue. There are thousands of different opinions on what would make PR a better gameplay/mod.

Hardcoded aspects in the BF2 engine prevent both of these occurring simultaneously. You can't copy and paste wiki military stats into PR deviation then expect the gameplay to be anywhere close to real. Why? Because BF2 solders have no mass. They can run, jump, dive, and turn without penalty; just a 1/10th movement of your mouse simulates 220 pounds of solder and his gear.

Agreed.

PR.8 was a radical experiment in using deviation to simulate mass and thus change player behavior; an attempt to sacrifice realistic weapons for realistic combat. While it was successful in that regard, it was released while still in development which shattered any hopes from it being perfected. PR.85 stepped away from that approach, returning to a more run'n gun feel. Combined with a myriad of vehicles, overflowing ammo, and overpowered aircraft, this latest version of PR feels like the BF1942 Desert Combat Mod recreated for BF2. Worse yet, even if it were possible to do both, to have realistic weapons and realistic combat, people wouldn't want it. That brings us to the last point.

Saying .8 deviation was released while still in development is a bit weird... if you go by this standard, then all the deviation changes ever done was released while still in development, including the .85 deviation.
About the deviation, Ill just say this: I've played PR since near the beginning of its development, and its not the deviation that attracted me to the mod, it was the ideal of a realistic combat sim. I've played through all the various incarnations of deviation and I think most of them had their good points and bad points, one thing I can say for sure is that BF2 is just not a good engine for allowing realistic handling of weapons, but that doesnt stop people from trying. I think .8 deviation overall was better than .85 deviation, but that doesnt stop me from enjoying .85.
I think your evaluation of PR .85 is a bit over-the-top exaggeration, there was not huge differences in vehicles in .8 to .85, and saying its now more like desert combat for BF2 is just some kind of dramatic statement - the mod didnt change THAT much from .8 to .85, I think your personal invovolvement with the weapon deviation is causing this emotional response from you without seeing the bigger picture.

Creating a realism mod from the instant-gratification playerbase of BF2 is an effort in futility.

Again I think this goes to just a different perspective. Some people see the glass half full, some people see it half empty. If you take a look at the PR population, you can see tons of players behaving in a really arcade like fashion (yes even on the TG server). But you can also see players using proper tactics and treating it as a more sim-like immersive experience. What kind of experience you want out of the mod is entirely up to you, but you cant deny that PR facilitates the ability to have such an experience. Im sorry that you have lost your ability to put up with the smacktards, but that doesnt mean others have reached that point yet and are still enjoying the mod.

Some of us are looking forward to Operation Flashpoint 2 that despite its fancy graphics, is advertising itself as a brutally realistic combat experience. We figure, why push PR into a realistic direction when that's where OFP2 will start.

Good luck with that one... dont want to drag a different discussion about new games here but everything I've read about OFP: DR indicates it has a bad case of consolitis and COD4 style "realism". We have little to go off of other than the devs promises, which I have a tough time swallowing after hearing some background information on some of their Lead Developers, openly lying about their work experience to make their project appear more credible. If their willing to lie about their work experience, whos to say they wont lie about the features and direction of the game.

Originally Posted by Maruk

Clive Lindop was never involved in the development of Operation Flashpoint (the first one, not this second one that carries the same name) in any way as far as I can tell. I think it's a very legitimate question to ask Eurogamer and Codemasters what work he did in the original Flashpoint team. And what of his work is in the game he apparently created?

He was never part of the Bohemia Interactive team, his name never, ever came to my attention during the whole period that we developed Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis (with myself as the project lead) and from what I gather he only joined Codemasters in October 2005, after we completed our last project with Codemasters; Operation Flashpoint: Elite for Xbox, despite the fact he lists himself in such a way that some people may believe he was “Art Director” for Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis.

I believe it is very sad that Codemasters are not satisfied simply with owning the Operation Flashpoint name and are also trying to copy everything that made it good and replicate it (how creative is that?), but it sounds like they are also trying to behave like they really are the people behind the development of the original classic Operation Flashpoint Cold War Crisis. Weird.

I really like competition, so Operation Flashpoint 2 (or whatever it’s called today) is good additional motivation for us to make a better game, but this type of attitude is completely unacceptable to me.

I would like to repeat some facts: we worked on the first Operation Flashpoint for a very long time (since 1997), we signed the deal with Codemasters in August 2000 and the game launched in June 2001. I believe that speaks for itself. To anyone interested in learning more about the road to Flashpoint, I definitely suggest [url=http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3018/postmortem_bohemia_interactive_.php] our post mortem over at Gamasutra

The OP offered a satirical commentary with a side order of truth. If that's "bashing", I think we've earned it.

Well I think its confusing for some, you say its not meant to be taken too seriously, yet inevitably if someone does not have the same view as you, its going to obviously not be "that funny" or seen as "a side order of truth". Inevitably its going to become a discussion thread, which I hope it can remain without tempers flairing but saying its all in good fun, many people (myself included) just found it a bit too OTT, almost as if you were trolling for negative responses to reinforce your point or get a few laughs at the expense of the community. If that WASNT the intent and you honestly looking for some discussion, then I apologize and hope the others in the thread can reply in a mature way too.