Lol, you think I'M a fanboy? :lol: Why don't you look at my post history compared to yours? I'm not the one gratuitously over-hyping a game. Do you see me dancing a little SoW fanboy jig anywhere? That game's an unknown, still. And why would I feel pain, other than that I experienced from trying to enjoy WoP? :roll: It's just a bit crap...some examples:
a) it's basically impossible to stall even on sim, b) everything I fired at set on fire and crashed immediately every time I got more than a couple of rounds on target, which was frequently because the AI is really stupid c) RIDICULOUS blacking out characteristics, the WoP pilot must only be able to withstand about 2 sustained Gs or something d) the AI is not bound by these limitations, by the looks of it...in fact the AI seems to be even WORSE than that of IL-2, which is a bit embarrassing considering IL-2 is an 8 year old game, roll roll roll roll roll zoom climb, everyone's seen it before e) didn't recognise the rotary 1 axis on my X-45, the only game I've ever seen to have problems finding a control axis from a USB device f) EVERYTHING accelerates too fast, including the player aircraft g) TERRIBLE targeting system on 'realistic' difficulty which doesn't distinguish between ground targets and aircraft and no way to scroll through targets based upon proximity to the player.
I just think it's a bit naff, that's all...they made a nice graphics engine and tacked an oddly functioning bare-bones implementation of an 8 year old flight-sim into it. It's not even much of a technical achievement considering how much time has passed since IL-2's graphics engine was created. It looks a tad better than FSX and runs a lot better, but with a much shorter view distance. Plus, it's got that ridiculous colour pallette that makes everything look like a Quake level.
Good points? It DID look very nice even for a new game. It ran well on full settings on my dad's average second system. The demo doesn't have the full graphics settings unlocked. Haven't tried it on my PC at home yet. Other good points...erm....I'm struggling to think of anything other than that it looked nice. :-?
Top pilots? Who are they, then?

Basically Protos, I think your own posts on the WoP forum say it all, you basically said "how am I going to convince my friends to play this if the highest texture settings aren't unlocked for online play". :roll:
I don't need to run the highest texture settings to want to play IL-2 because the gameplay is fun and challenging enough without them.
Anyway, you say that YOU were instrumental in getting them unlocked so that EVERYONE could enjoy them? I invite anyone to go and read your post of the WoP forums - you were just being unjustifiably rude and angry. There was no altruism in that. Besides, I don't care if that's how you've justified it to yourself because I'm not bothered whether the highest texture settings ARE unlocked on a game that I knew I wasn't going to buy after 10 minutes and stopped playing after an hour. :lol:

Grunch, that was a K.O.

I don't see any "top pilot" flying it or replacing IL-2 with it. Name one.

It's good for fun, but if you want a flight simulator, you're looking at the wrong place.

'Nuff said, can the ladies start behaving like grown ups? Protos' been trolling around for a while with his all-might Wings of Prey, and it's starting to piss some people off.

Wings of Prey is good for action-filled flying, with loads of drama and all that thing. No one who likes realism, unless really drunk, will replace IL-2 with Wings of Prey. It just won't happen. "Top pilots" might play it for fun, but for a decent flight experience? Nope. I won't spend my time looking through the WoP forum to see what the heck you did there, but, here's the thought: as Grunch pointed out, you shouldn't need high textures to convince someone to play a game AT ALL. Maybe, and just maybe, if we were talking about a porn/sex simulator, we'd need decent textures to get a decent vision of the... Ah, nevermind. So, as I was saying, FLIGHT simulators shouldn't need high texture settings to make you play. FLIGHT simulators need decent FLYING to get new players. And this isn't there yet on Birds of Prey. Maybe one day they'll do some fine tuning with all the details that kept simmers away of it. The problem is, even if they get it fixed, it will still have that movie-like look, with all the filters and everything.

The fact is: want fun, balance and good-looking scenario? Go for Wings of Prey. Want realism, decent simulation and realistic atmosphere? Stick with IL-2.

The disappointing thing is, there's a politely-worded post on their forum that demonstrates the difference between the game with the brown-filter and the game retouched in Photoshop and the difference is stunning. The game really would look absolutely fantastic without it. But do you see the developers listening to that poll that requests an option to remove the brownness? Nope.
It's going to become a joke in the future of flightsims, "Do you remember Wings of Prey?" "Yeah, it was more brown than Quake!" :roll:
If Oleg had brought out Wings of Prey himself, I would be more disappointed than I was a few years ago when Oblivion came out, I played it for two hours and realised it wasn't as good as Morrowind despite the hype. For much the same reasons - reducing complexity and enjoyable gameplay in favour of graphics.

TheGrunch, can you copy and post this guy's message here, or at least give us a link? Might be interesting for the folks who actually think it's realistic...

Yeah, sure. Currently the poll requesting the option is up to 41 for, 3 against:
http://forum.yuplay.com/index.php?showtopic=683

Woooah, way better!

If this was properly introduced in-game, I might even consider buying it.

43 against 3 is a pretty big difference.

I dunno, I think somewhere between the two, maybe about 2/3 of the way toward the blue would be more realistic (with my eyes, on my monitor).

Small minds are easily satisfied, me thinks. :-D
but then, who cares. ;-)

That's why I mentioned "properly" there.

This way it's still unrealistic. Thing is, why not be normal and use the same settings as IL-2, anyway? Did they HAVE to make it Holywoodish, in first place? Of course, matter of taste, but still...

So true in both your examples ;)