I'm willing to bet that the game didn't get any easier, but he instead got better. Add your everyday paranoia of casualization to that, and it's easy to draw the wrong conclusion. What a tragedy.

Anyway, speaking of this winter, the temperature is just a tad bit too high, air humidity is 9001,44% and there's practically no snow, so everything seems darker than it should. It doesn't feel like a proper winter yet. I'm dreaming of a white Christmas.

I still have the original IL2 installed, a version of Forgotten Battles and also IL246, so I can fly them all back-to-back and compare them and there is no doubt that later versions of IL2 were easier to fly than the original.

That is not saying that it was more or less realistic, just saying that as a piece of software or a "game", that the original IL2 takes more skill to fly, there is no doubt about it. The engines of the aircraft were more fragile, the aircraft stalled easier, the AI was tough, and the aircraft took more damage to down them. It was a lot harder to fly the aircraft and it was harder to get a kill.

When I do launch (very seldom) IL2 today, I promise myself to stop immediately if I notice first signs of addiction. ;)
I can't forget long period of my love affair with this game. So many hours in virtual skies, frustration of family members, strange habits acquired as checking six when driving, lack of energy in the office after long coop night...
And it was really weird in summer when I sent my family to resorts and stayed in the city (never ending chain of projects, vacations always postponed). Back home at 7pm, quick snack, large mug of tea, engine start and --- next time I look at my clock it's 6.30am and it's not Saturday yet. 1 hour nap, cold shower, in office at 8.30am....back home at 7pm, snack, some tea...
Sitting at the meeting looking through the window observing other buildings around and thinking - could I fly through that narrow passage? Ah, there is a break in cloud layer, need to climb there... Looking down when in (real life) flight and trying to recognise ground targets...
While taxing in Hamburg airport I noticed Ju-52 (genuine one, tourist attraction) there. I put immediately imaginery gunsight on the silhouette, considering where to shoot first...
Thank God, HR never learned what a maniac I was :grin:

Dimlee what tag or callsign did you fly under back in the day?

I mostly used the "Jumoschwanz" tag, but pre-IL2(cfs2) I was VF-1 Jumo and other things I can not remember. Whenever I was banned from a specific server sometimes I popped up under a few other tags.

It was always more fun flying as an unknown so that no one was after you as a trophy, and nothing was expected of you, just pure and peaceful killing.

I started as "Lis", but switched quickly to "Dimlee" not later than end of 2002.

Yes, keeping single name was inconvenient in certain situations. When someone started to hate you and chase you after you downed his Bf-109F4 on your I-153 three times in row. Or his Lagg-3 crashed trying to follow your Ju-87 in sharp turns - once and then again and again... :grin:

It is a fact I am starting to lose my memory, maybe it is just part of being over half-a-century old. I always thought I had a pretty good memory though.
Through fate right from the start I ended up flying on servers with hard settings usually, so I may not have flown with many who flew with icons or open cockpit. I have hundreds of tracks saved from about 2003 onwards and if I ever run across one with you on it I will let you know.

The best that is available for the Sturmovik Technika site is what is left on the Internet Archive.
Sturmovik Technika @ Internet Archive: http://web.archive.org/web/200306220....com/technika/


Wheels

<raises hand>
I was dumb enough! :mrgreen:

Wow. GR142 Astro and Pipper. Haven't heard those names in ages. Turnfighting and stallfighting with GR142 Astro and Pipper down in the snow. In a LaGG-3 IT no less. Many, many fights. Got better after a time and lots of deaths. I don't remember the server. JV44 Rall used to drop in quite often as well. I remember the havoc he'd cause. I wonder if it was in MOH_FOX's nightly dogfight server... or some other I flew in nightly while waiting for FOX to start his server.

Skid
AKA MOH_SKID

I think it was Greatergreen server... There were at least 2 of them, one was with ext views and "non flyable" planes.

No, I don't think it was. I'd flown in Greatergreen but I don't remember doing the low furball thing there. I was flying a 109 by then. External views? Non-flyables? I usually did not frequent servers with those settings.