[Les]

The only game I remember seeing a similar sort of feature in was the racing sim rFactor, which can export replays as AVI files.

But at it's renderer's maximum resolution of 800x600, with no anti-aliasing and no extra level of detail used, and using a system that can play the 1920x1080 replay at 60+ fps, the clips take at least ten times longer than real time to be drawn.

I have no idea where in the scale of such things that example fits, but I think you hit the nail on the head when you said "...in essence turning IL2 into an interactive 3D rendering app..." That's effectively what Oleg and team would have to make. And I really doubt that's possible under the circumstances. Maybe someone more knowledgeable could make a comment on its general feasiblility.

I myself wish it were possible, not just for selfish reasons, but so that Oleg and team could license the technology and make money off it.

It's definitely an interesting idea though. And in that realm, I'd like the renderer to also be able to output huge multi-monitor type resolutions which can then be scaled down later by the end user, so you can edit it as something like 2k or 4k footage (or try to anyway) and then export the final result down to something more manageable, for what I imagine would be optimum image quality...

Edit-

Actually, while I'm here,what I'd really like to see is a proper official greenscreen map/s. Which, as I think about it, could in some cases help with some of the issues the original poster raises. In that, you could record the planes and scenery separately with (theoretically at least) higher than normal settings due to less complex elements being present together, then recombine them in an editor that can do greenscreen keying...hmmm, the mind boggles...