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Yes, i realise i've not played it yet and all that, but there are many screen shots and much info to judge on the look and content of the game, if not the actual simualtion and AI yet, anf if im honest its all a little underwhelming!
I picked up and played IL2 apon release about 8yrs ago. It was a seriously impressive sim for the time, the graphics were amazing, the feel excellent,loads of flyable aircraft, the Sim was well a Sim not an arcade game, all told, it did blow me away except it lacked in some vital area's.....
The immersion for a campaign only player like myself was rubbish, no "proper breifings" or de-breifings, no dynamic campaigns, no feel of actually contributing to anything, no feel of being a part of a close team, with losses noticeable etc etc.
It seemed to be quite literly a collection of missions with no purpose than to put you against the enemy for a dog fight. Many will say that is all they want, but many as myself would like to feel the immersion of a "real pilot" on camapign.
Seriously, i was playing WW11 fighter sims back in the early 90's with breif / de-breifings, dynamic campaigns, with a limited number of aircraft, and a choice on what to do, i.e picking enemy targets for the mission etc. I remember a game called "operation overlord" which had it all...IL2 was vastly superiour in its actual simulation of combat, but even being a decade on from 'operation Overlord', still lagged in the immerssion side of things.
So like many on these forums, i've been patiently waiting for what, 6yrs for the coming of the much promised CoD as its now called and from what i've read and seen, im feeling a bit let down already.
Firstly the graphics...i don't understand what alot of you are seeing, im viewing on a 24" IPS monitor through a GTX570 and it looks like an update of IL2 from 8yrs ago!!!, i mean seriously the difference from Pacific fighters to IL2 is much like the difference from CoD to Pacific fighters! an improvement.
Now consider the difference from Silent hunter 1 to silent hunter 5, or the original Shogun TW to the forth coming Shogun TW, to say night and day would be an understatement, more like the difference from the forth coming Shogun TW to Pac-Man!...light years away.
Plenty will say the graphics are not important, but i say this is non-sense, in a simulator, EVERYTHING is important, because you are trying to create a convincing simualtion of a REAL situation...the better the graphics the more convincing the sim.
Next the lack of aircraft....there realy is a shortage of flyable aircraft for a game that has been in development for 6yrs, sure there will probably be more to come, but when? or will they just skip to the next instalment elsewhere?, one of the great things about the IL2 series was there was never a lack of aircraft, including the much liked (by me) naff aircraft, that you really had to work for a kill.
Even ignoring my firt two disapointments, which can be improved / modded with time, the really big disapointment for me is after all this time, it seems the main part where IL2 always lacked has had no time spent on improving it....the campaign and 'Out of Aircraft' experience.
For the life of me, how hard would it have been to have created a few locations as follows: On the airfield (getting into and out off your aircraft) before and after a sorty, a hut (where you have breifings / de-breifings), and / or sitting outside the hut waiting for the alarm (clearly prior to an action), just these three would have gven you some sense of being! especially if other members of your squadron with individual faces were present AND NOT ONCE KILLED!!
And now to the campaign or rather lack of it. Why is it so difficult not to include both a dynamic campaign and static missions, with mission builder for those who like.
I dont buy into those who say a Dynamic campign makes for boring missions....infact quite the opposite, it makes for more realistic missions if the parameters for both sides are accurate. If playing as the Germans, you will be heading out to either bomb or escort the bombers, you will thus already be doing as was done. The RAF will know your are coming and will send an intercept thus you will more than likely see action. If you successfully bomb either airfields or Radar stations, this should effect the enemy's ability to intercept you, for some time and be noticeable.
If playing as the British,you will know the enemy is coming and scramble accordingly,if you have taken serious losses, you will be short of aircraft and crew until you have time to replenish thus forcing a more cautious approach, if your airfield is damaged you might need to vacate to another until repaired, if your on a random patrol and don't encounter the enemy then great!! you live another day, you have a greater feeling of reality, and it makes that much more important the contacts and mis-chances when you do have a contact.
Boring...impossible.
And so to my final issue. With 25 days to go and no sign of a real "in my hands" game to buy from any of the popular stores in GB! Play.com UK has had this game in its pre-order charts for about 6yrs!! and its been in the top 30 most pre-ordered chart for as long as i can remember...now were on the verge of its release and there is no sign of its existance unless you download it, something i hate to do as i like a perminent real game not a cyber one.
Am i going to buy the game...of course i will (when its for sell), there is unfortunately no competitors to the IL2 series, long gone are the day's when Sim's (especially flight Sims) were the FPS games of there time.. a new'er and better one each month come the early 90's....but i still feel a bit disapointed with what we know about the game given i've never waited so long for a game to arrive in all my 26yrs of playing them.
I hope im proved wrong on many accounts when i get hold of the Sim, but i cant think of any Sim / game that has delivered more than was advertised.
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IMHO u should take it well, all share some worries, im not yet concerned about the quality now of the game as i am more concerned about all the franchise of il 2 series form now on. From experience around 1C and community tehy offered teh best humanly possible. The fact is taht maybe teh team could not afford other delays and had to release the game, in my opinion i could say that the battle itself might not have the very best, but it has all the battle of britain had. The only major thing is the limited number of airplanes(not variety but quantity in numberS) but it was a decision made for the specs of the game.Anyway the number of planes will be one of the first things that campaign and mission editors will do, im sure, and all modders and 1c make good job.
For the amount on content again, this is the BASEMENT of the game/progect and for what i see its very good, so to sustain mayeb even betetr a development cycle liek that of IL2 that even now is still supported by team daidalos!Depending on teh success teh game will grow up to a skyscraper and will be awesome( me , personally i would like a mediterranean desert scenario, but most of tehm might be made) furtehrmore there maddox is also interested going over teh 2nd world war and maybe do a korea scenario!
As far as i can tell OLEG and 1C and community want and have the opportunity to make this game( i think that game as a term cant suit this genre) one of the very best not only for experience, realism where possible and fun, but also for refernce as around it tehre are lot of people which you cna talk and LEARN something about that times, the planes and technology. I'm really happy to say that since 2001 my interest and general knowledge about facts and planes have increased around this community! However it all depends on success in market, and 1C deserves it and i will certainly support them on their project, or <<Basement>>
P.S sorry for some errors
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Ah the usual glass is only half full brigade,,, hasn't even seen the game yet and whining already. http://forums.ubi.com/groupee_common...n_rolleyes.gif http://forums.ubi.com/groupee_common...n_rolleyes.gif http://forums.ubi.com/groupee_common...n_rolleyes.gif
So you missed The Collectors Edition package and the normal DVD game?
You missed the VIDEOS and abviously missed the multitude of explanations from Oleg about his thinking for this production http://forums.ubi.com/groupee_common...n_rolleyes.gif
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If you had looked just a little further into the IL2 community, you would have seen that there has been an EXCELLENT, FREE dynamic campaign generator being worked on for years now, and its still being improved.
http://www.lowengrin.com/news.php
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however, its not such a drwback not having dynamic campaign,i would prefer it as a plus.
expecially on the german campaign we will be able to do mission as accurate as possible like we were in the war, his aim tehre is to be very accurate.
Furtehrmore IL COD will be released with some content turned down and with later expansion will they be turned up, all this if im correct for keepeing spec quite more reasonable.
BTW and to showsome examples: do you know that the game will have the dynamic weather? Luthier said taht tehre wil be in the game data and might e usable in teh FMB , is only that its not optimised and will drop fPS to 1 FPS.In addition have soemone seen the little bit older but better looking trees? they tuned tehm down, but tehy have tehm and tehy might make tehm available...
when more expansions come more triggers of content will be activated that didnt made it at first release.
It all depends on success
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I'm not that impressed by the visuals either, especially the high spec systems needed to run it.
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I can't wait for it.
I'll reserve my opinion until I have tested it over many hours.
I suspect that I'll give it the thumbs up in the end purely on teams previous efforts.
Cheers,
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I swear some of you are blind... http://forums.ubi.com/groupee_common...icon_smile.gif
The visuals are a gigantic improvement over IL-2. But it does require you to be a visual person and to look closely. The things that are really impressive visuals wise are the real time self shadowing both internally and externally and the precision to which the lighting is being calculated. IL-2 was a rough approximation while this looks very close to being real... the simulation of diffuse lighting conditions caused by haze and so forth.
It's a much greater leap than from IL-2 Forgotten Battles to Pacific Fighters. That was an appreciated but fairly minor tweaking of what the engine was capable of on the whole. In that case we already had everything visually... but there were some great efforts to round out the visuals (more impressive splashes in the water, better pixel shaded water, slightly higher quality 3D models and default textures, etc.).
Yes the actual content in terms of number of aircraft is going to be less. It's an obvious one. Could have told you that in 2005 or 2006 whenever this was announced. When it arrives and I install it on my computer... I will be asking:
1) Is this a better simulator than IL-2 1946?
2) Is this a better game than IL-2 1946?
3) Does it lay the foundations for a brilliant new series of WWII air combat games?
The last one is an unusual one because normally whatever in the box is what you get plus maybe one expansion later. But we know from experience and from public record that Cliffs of Dover is the first in hopefully a new series of successful releases.
Until we get it... all bets are off http://forums.ubi.com/groupee_common...icon_smile.gif
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I think we are all a bit used to the unrealistic camera filters of Second World War films and the exaggerated specular and bloom or HDR filters of modern games.
I will admit though that the slightly jarring colour palette of the game so far leaves me doubtful. It's so yellow it looks like an unusually bright sunset a lot of the time.