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IL-2 Sturmovik The famous combat flight simulator.

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  #11  
Old 10-06-2010, 01:39 AM
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Azimech Azimech is offline
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I always use the cockpit but in offline play I'm aware that the AI uses Omnivision so I have a disadvantage. Still, WW view has these ugly arrows and instruments and it feels like I'm playing an arcade game. Online I want cockpit only and I even use it if other players use WW. That's my loss, I shoot better with WW.

The tophat switch is usually enough for me but my Track-IR will be attached again in a few days because glancing at the instruments takes a bit much time.

I've always been about cockpits and dashboards. I have an old car with a beautiful dash. Why? Because after the road the dash is the thing you see the most.

In the future there will be more and more reason to use the cockpit as the airplane systems increase in complexity and the standard 6 aren't enough anymore. Manifold pressure, manifold temperature, CHT, RPM, oil pressure, fuel pressure, hydraulics pressure, ammeter, voltmeter, oxygen reserve, navigation, outside temperature, coolant temperature, turbocharger RPM, trim/cooler/flaps indicators and all the warning lights will all have an effect on engine/flight/systems/pilot performance. You can't fly successfully with complex management on without checking your instruments every minute. Switching between WW view and cockpit all the time would be very disorienting I guess.

One thing I dislike in IL2 1946 is the HUD engine overheat warning while flying full real. For the same reasons.

But hey, I'm primarily a gearhead, then a pilot.
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  #12  
Old 10-06-2010, 05:18 AM
IceFire IceFire is offline
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I've flown both and closed cockpit is a totally different experience than with externals available and/or "wonder woman" view enabled. Both are fun, both are challenging, and it's great that we can have our cake and eat it too with these features.
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  #13  
Old 10-06-2010, 07:01 AM
dduff442 dduff442 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Azimech View Post
I always use the cockpit but in offline play I'm aware that the AI uses Omnivision so I have a disadvantage. Still, WW view has these ugly arrows and instruments and it feels like I'm playing an arcade game. Online I want cockpit only and I even use it if other players use WW. That's my loss, I shoot better with WW.

The tophat switch is usually enough for me but my Track-IR will be attached again in a few days because glancing at the instruments takes a bit much time.

I've always been about cockpits and dashboards. I have an old car with a beautiful dash. Why? Because after the road the dash is the thing you see the most.

In the future there will be more and more reason to use the cockpit as the airplane systems increase in complexity and the standard 6 aren't enough anymore. Manifold pressure, manifold temperature, CHT, RPM, oil pressure, fuel pressure, hydraulics pressure, ammeter, voltmeter, oxygen reserve, navigation, outside temperature, coolant temperature, turbocharger RPM, trim/cooler/flaps indicators and all the warning lights will all have an effect on engine/flight/systems/pilot performance. You can't fly successfully with complex management on without checking your instruments every minute. Switching between WW view and cockpit all the time would be very disorienting I guess.

One thing I dislike in IL2 1946 is the HUD engine overheat warning while flying full real. For the same reasons.

But hey, I'm primarily a gearhead, then a pilot.
I like night and instrument flying in Il-2, but somehow my enthusiasm wears off when I'm being shot at. Hopefully SoW will have some innovations -- g-limited or laggy artificial horizons etc. Errors in barometric altimeters will be there anyway given that weather is modeled.

Night flying in Blenheims or Bf-110s could be a real blast. I'm hoping for a 41-43 night campaign as the first expansion myself. Quirky analog electronics prone to odd readings etc. give the tech of the era a totally different feel from the digital world.

dduff
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  #14  
Old 10-06-2010, 07:08 AM
dduff442 dduff442 is offline
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Originally Posted by robtek View Post
No problem, one can decide: game today or rather simulation.
I get very uptight about a new sim campaign -- I train in the new a/c, avoid combat during practice (if you take off in a fighter with 1 wingman, you can 'dogfight' him) etc. It takes me weeks! That's why I enjoy a bit of gaming as well.

I have to say you hear a lot about the free-for-all ext views servers, but nearly all the flyers are at least ok. Without good technique and a bit of skill it's going to be painful flying online. Some of the players are outstanding in all categories, though I'm sure many play with locked cockpits as well.

dduff
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  #15  
Old 10-06-2010, 09:12 AM
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Azimech Azimech is offline
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There probably is a niche for the types like Blackdog and me, who like to keep the aircraft systems harmonized to that narrow line of optimal performance, in a way learning to "feel" the engine what it can and can't do. The first period when complex management reaches it's new level, people without insight or knowledge will be fighting the aircraft much more than fighting others, like it will be with the new g-limits. In time, a few develop intuition and feel what to do, when to do it, without looking at the instruments. Experts on energy tactics and situational awareness will have a new challenge when faced with a flying Montgomery Scott. Those flying engineers won't need the cockpit view as much anymore but I wonder if they really bother about the help of Wonder Woman then. I think there will be a new class of players: full real pilots with a mix of hydraulic fluid and engine oil in their veins.

Personally I jumped with joy when Complex Engine Management was introduced and have never flown without it. Then my joy sank when I saw how limited it was.
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  #16  
Old 10-06-2010, 09:24 AM
zxwings zxwings is offline
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Wonderwoman view as in IL2 is very helpful in flight training and in the understanding of an aircraft's flight process. So it is very useful for offline use of a flight sim.

External views are clearly also necessary components of a flight sim in offline use - for instance, you certainly need the external views when you are studying a recorded tack of an online air combat.

~

Last edited by zxwings; 10-06-2010 at 09:30 AM.
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  #17  
Old 10-06-2010, 09:44 AM
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Azimech Azimech is offline
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I think WW is useful for training only two things: learning to land a Corsair on a carrier and learning the difference in IAS and TAS for every altitude. Understanding the process of flying is done by reading IMHO, and the limited amount of instruments in WW can cause you to learn wrong. For example, it has no slip/ball and vertical speed indicator. Plus altitude is measured above ground level, so you still need the speedbar. But instead of looking at the ground altimeter, one learns it properly by examining the ground first, which falls under situational awareness.

Student pilots don't learn to fly in WW, they start with the Basic Six and LOTS of theory. Then again my father learned me to fly Flight Simulator II back in 1984, which had no external views, no WW and such graphics that flying the instruments was the only way to get it right. WW cannot ever compensate for lack of theory when learning to fly. And you learn quicker with the limited view a cockpit provides, you learn flight patterns.

One error I used to make was to attack in cockpit mode, then switch to F6 when the plane disappeared from direct view. Someone pointed that out. Nowadays I stay in the 'pit and roll/turn my plane so I can keep my eyes on him, and my flying has improved. If I lose him out of my sight, the lesson is that I didn't anticipate his move, or my actions were wrong, or both.

Last edited by Azimech; 10-06-2010 at 10:16 AM.
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  #18  
Old 10-06-2010, 10:53 AM
SEE SEE is offline
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Since having 6DOF (Freetrack) I only use cockpit for both SP and On-line. Prior to that it was always 'open view' so having TrackIR or Freetrack is the enabling factor for me.
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  #19  
Old 10-06-2010, 04:07 PM
JG27CaptStubing JG27CaptStubing is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dduff442 View Post
I like night and instrument flying in Il-2, but somehow my enthusiasm wears off when I'm being shot at. Hopefully SoW will have some innovations -- g-limited or laggy artificial horizons etc. Errors in barometric altimeters will be there anyway given that weather is modeled.

Night flying in Blenheims or Bf-110s could be a real blast. I'm hoping for a 41-43 night campaign as the first expansion myself. Quirky analog electronics prone to odd readings etc. give the tech of the era a totally different feel from the digital world.

dduff

Well 4.10 is supposed to include G limits in IL2. Laggy artificial horizons? Why would you model such a thing? What does it really add to the simulation and the game for that matter? What you have to check your Compass and fix precession errors or a tumbled Gyro? You would have to get current altimeter settings throughout the flight. Sort of a waste of programming effort for a combat sim don't ya think?

Look I understand adding small details can really add to the sim but the type of things that need to be added should be geared more towards playability.

We like the fighting so that's where the focus should be. Much better AI ones that can actually fight and think more like a real person. AI aircraft are pretty horrible in the game right now. They have been improved but they just don't behave like real people.
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  #20  
Old 10-06-2010, 04:28 PM
dduff442 dduff442 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JG27CaptStubing View Post
Well 4.10 is supposed to include G limits in IL2. Laggy artificial horizons? Why would you model such a thing? What does it really add to the simulation and the game for that matter? What you have to check your Compass and fix precession errors or a tumbled Gyro? You would have to get current altimeter settings throughout the flight. Sort of a waste of programming effort for a combat sim don't ya think?

Look I understand adding small details can really add to the sim but the type of things that need to be added should be geared more towards playability.

We like the fighting so that's where the focus should be. Much better AI ones that can actually fight and think more like a real person. AI aircraft are pretty horrible in the game right now. They have been improved but they just don't behave like real people.
I more or less share your enthusiasm regarding attention to AI, but I think that perfect artificial horizons are a little too artificial. Even a single parameter -- a limit on the turn rate for a given instrument -- would be useful and easily done.

Likewise, less-than-perfect altimeters would seem to go hand in hand with dynamic weather. Remember that ground control may be able to tell you the pressure at ground level but they won't be able to tell you exact conditions over the target. This would be a serious concern for, e.g., Mosquito pilots on an Oboe-assisted bomb run when impact with the ground might be a serious concern. A drop of even 50m in the cloud base could also have serious consequences.

This seems trivial to implement once the weather system's already done, IMO. I'd support the idea of making these optional in the difficulty settings.

Night time is potentially a *whole new game* -- a whole new genre in fact. 40s technology is fascinating; it's quaint and baffling at the same time.

Broadly speaking, I'm all for granting CPU-intensive stuff similar priority to GPU-intensive stuff in the sim.

dduff
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