Friday 2011-02-04 Dev. update and Discussion

[Freycinet]

New interview out:

http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/02/08/il...ya-shevchenko/

Finally the explanation for the girl in the Spit.... and Oleg prefers the Mediterranean for a sequel!

Man, they could at least have used new screenshots. Anyway, interesting interview.

[JG52Uther]

There was at least one screenshot I had not seen before!
Its great that now we are on the final stretch,information is coming out fast!

[kendo65]

Who would have thought it?

Both the renegade pilot thing and the love interest turn out to be based on reality!?

Could be some interesting missions - "Careful with your joystick, darling"

Wonder if there's a key toggle for that...?

[klem]

Originally Posted by Sutts

Real Spits do tend to bounce a bit unless greased in. I've managed to land without bouncing many times but you've got to make sure your speed is close to a stall at the end of the flare. Any excess speed will get you airborn again.

Personally I think IL2 provides a very realistic touch down experience.

Yes Sutts, I understand it will skip on occasions like that but in IL-2 if you put one wheel down a fraction before the other you are bounced into a sideways lurch that repeats itself in alternate directions until the inevitable pile-up.

I have a friend who regularly flew in the back of a two seat spitfire (you can probably guess which one) and maintained it at the airshows for the owner. I asked him about this. He confirmed that bounces/skips do indeed happen (like your video clip) and I have seen enough of them close up at airshows. When I asked him about one wheel touching before the other he said it would bounce around a little but no, it didn't lurch around but settled fairly quickly.

At the local 2007 airshow a Hurricane crashed during the mock-dogfight. One or two of the landings that followed, just thirty yards in front of me, were a little more shaky than usual but none lurched around like we see in IL-2.

[zapatista]

Originally Posted by kendo65

I don't really think this is a 'problem' - ie something that needs to be 'fixed'

A side-effect of running a monitor with higher resolution is that you get a more realistic experience - in this case distant aircraft are rendered more precisely.

The result, of course, for those who value the competitive gaming experience is that they suffer a disadvantage in being able to spot enemy ac.

For those who value realism over getting a competitive edge there is no problem.

you are incorrect there kendo, but maybe you just didnt put enough thought into what you wrote.

first, when the original il2 came out most monitors were 15' or 17' crt's, using resolutions similar to 1024 x 768, and that is exactly what il2 was designed to display these "distant dots of aircraft" correctly on (being for ex 2 black and 2 grey pixels combined in a 4 pixel dot). the scenery might not have been all that high rez and pretty, but at least you could spot the bogey at 2 km correctly (approximating visibility in real life)

fast forward 10 years and run the same game engine (and dot display method) on a nice 30' lcd at 2560 x 1600, and the scenery might look great but that same 4 pixel dot at the very high resolution is now much harder to find (because these same 4 pixels are MUCH smaller now). hence many people with those large monitors will 1/2 their resolution to 1280 x 800 to play online and be competitive, and suddenly those distant dots have become 2x easier to spot.

additionally, however good lcd's and other flatscreens are now, they still are not as good as the original crt's in displaying sharp clean video (unless you have some high grade professional ips lcd), so trying to find a small moving dot against a background of forest and other landscape is significantly higher now. further, the most distant lod models in the original il2 did not have "3D volume" to them, they were simple flat clumps of grey and black pixels, making them MUCH harder to identify then a real 3 dimensional object in real life at the same distance (when viewed on a less then perfect pc display technology). the end result is that on a modern pc system in il2 you are flying in a myopic mini bubble of SA which is 2/3 smaller then what it should be, compared to the historical visibility real pilots had to deal with in ww2 aircraft. "harder to spot" might be one ignorant persons idea of playing a game online which is "difficult" , but it is not simulating the environment and visibility real pilots had to deal with in ww2 (and after all most of us here are interested in the "simulation" part i presume).

all this has been extensively discuses in the main il2 forums over the years, and oleg is well aware of this problem and has tried to address it for BoB/Sow. as you might have noticed in some of the early video clips we have seen, distant LoD models now have "volume" to them, and these distant aircraft stand out much more as a result. additionally instead of 3 LoD models there are 7 or 8 iirc, so the transition to having pixels represent a distant object is much better

there are major compromises we still have to deal with in pc games in 2010/2011, and one of those in BoB/SoW will be "pretty" versus "realistic distant aircraft spotting distances", and obviously the focus should be on the latter.

in your statement of "....running a monitor with higher resolution is that you get a more realistic experience - in this case distant aircraft are rendered more precisely..." you were incorrect in assuming a prettier landscape and "more precisely rendered" also meant aircraft were more realistically displayed at far distances, which has never been the case in il2 from FB onwards (when oleg reduced the dot sizes, and the earlier uglier big dots were replaced with "prettier ones" which were MUCH harder to spot).

[kendo65]

Ok Zappa. Thanks for the considered reply. i'll look into it a bit more.

But surely the most distant depiction of any aircraft at maximum range will be a single pixel? This is what i understood, and a post earlier today from Oleg ( I think - could've been Luthier?) said as much.

For newer high-res monitors that single pixel will appear smaller on screen and thus be harder to spot. My point was that real-life pilots had to contend with similar issues - and that the max distance depiction of a near-invisible single pixel would be closer to that reality than the larger, more easily visible pixel on say an 800x600 screen?

----

ok, home now, and had another look. Yes - I can see what you're getting at.

Part of the problem too was a bit of sloppy use of language in my original post - as you identified concerning 'rendered more precisely'.

Seems I have made a few assumptions which may not have been correct. Seems the key issue as to whether it is more realistic or not is when the lod-switching is triggered - and I can see that in the move to higher res that could skew the original balance.

Basically, I'm not a competitive online flyer, so it isn't something that has been an issue for me

[GT182]

Must be nice. I see Oleg has bought the Devs the new Thrustmaster Cougar Warthog stick and throttle setup.

Can't see getting it... no rudder pedal connection or support.

[Raven2B]

Originally Posted by Sturm_Williger

Meh, I don't even have an ignore list - I read it all. It can be interesting, it can be laughable, but it's my choice to get worked up about it or not.
I may disagree with something someone says, but I don't have to post a rebuttal. I don't have any real flight experience, gaming programming experience, hell I don't even have some of the books some people clearly have. If the devs take umbrage at some of the stuff people post, it will be all our loss, but I'm sure the moderators are well aware of that.

I do find it hard to comprehend how people can feel cheated or somesuch because planned features aren't going to be in the initial release. I'm sure the devs wanted to have them as much or more because ... after all - THEY'RE the ones who planned to have them in the first place.
WE just have expectations - and why ? Because these same devs were kind enough to interact with their customers and tell us their plans. Now we castigate them when some plans haven't made it to fruition ? Sorry I just don't see the logic.
But this is just my opinion.

]Hell, I remember getting the first IL2 ( pre-FB ). After flying EAW, it was just "WOW!"
And even then - how much better did it get ?
So I can't see the devs working on something new for 5+ years which is going to be rubbish, for all the features that didn't make the final ( initial ) cut. But that's just me using that pesky logic again.
Your opinion may differ. [/QUOTE]

IL-2 (pre-FB) has been out awhile when I bought it. My Microsoft CFS3 has been broke and I have been reviews about IL-2. So I think that maybe I try it...and been hooked... Yes sir.

Been reading a lot WW2 battles but they all are about ground war, but IL-2 has got me interesting about air war and especially about East Fronts air war.

Then comes IL-2 FB and here I am, spending many hours with this great sim, has been upgraded my rig many times ( by bought new components ) etc. etc.

And when look over my shoulder to bookshelf... there are lot a books in air combat and IL-2 games (IL-2, IL-2 FB, 2xIL-2 FB AEP, PF, IL-2 Complete Edition FB+AEP+PF, 2x IL-2 1946 & add-ons: The Last Days, Battle Over Europe, Ostfront and Der Stern Von Afrika).

And yes, I have real life too

[Il2Pongo]

Originally Posted by Luftwaffepilot

Really sad.
Now you wasted a lot of time and money for such a "downfall"

Is there any unexpected good news on this sim?

Yes, great news, the built in dick head detector just passed its open beta