Hellshade

Interview with Oleg at SimHQ. Lots of interesting questions and answers. http://simhq.com/_air13/air_475a.html Hellshade

There's a lot of yelling and screaming when I fly. After my wife leaves the room though, not so much. Just kidding. She does not complain at all but I couldn't pass it up. Hellshade

It looks like the Devs for Wings of Prey are going to be making some serious improvements to their game by building a completely new engine that has a number of capabilities that the original WoP could not handle. Full Mission Editor, Improved Flight and Damage Models, better graphics and it would also seem that it will be able to handle much larger maps. Hmmmm. How large, I wonder? Maybe enough to cover all of France, I hope. And they promise that if you own the original WoP, you'll be able to download and install all of the original content into the new sim so you can still fly your favorite maps, etc. Nice touch. They will evidently be able to debut more information by May or June. Here is the english translation of the story. http://translate.goo...JSnaymcQJBCytvQ Hellshade

For anyone who enjoyed the demo and likes the fact that the DRM has been removed. You will need to download the updates from yuplay to get to version 1.0.3.6 which is where they removed the DRM. http://yuplay.com/st...le=Wings-Prey-9 Obligatory videos 8 Spitfire Mk IIs vs lone Bf 109 E3 (8:21) 1080HD Campaign Ship Attack (1:44) 1080HD STEAM auto downloads the updates if you buy from them but they currently sell it for $29.99. It has been on-sale at STEAM before and may do so again. Hellshade

Yes, there is definately a difference in the sounds. The P51 sounds magnificient! Truly awe inspiring. Let's hope that the sounds in the video were just WIP placeholder sounds until they got the right ones. Hellshade

Gaijin Entertainment makes Wings of Prey. 1C Company makes Cliffs of Dover. I found an interview with Oleg and a WiP movie for CoD. Some of the ground object scenery (tanks, vehicles, buildings) actually look very detailed. http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/02/08/il-2-sturmovik-cliffs-of-dover-interview-we-talk-to-oleg-maddox-and-ilya-shevchenko/ Hellshade

Steam should automatically update you to 1.0.3.6. You'll notice if you start the game it no longer requires you to log in at the begining. It just goes right in. Hellshade

Afraid not sir. Steam is $29.99. However they may have a sale on it again at some point. They had it on sale for as low as $6 once. I'm betting with the DRM removed a lot of people are more interested in trying it out now. I think the Developer is starting to realize that with just a few changes they can sell a lot more copies of it than they did in the past. I read somewhere they will be adding a proper mission editor, which would be a very welcome addition. I played through the campaign which was fun but of course fully scripted so there's limited replayablity there. I got the German campaign add on but never finished it. Mostly I do training missions or the occassional on-line dogfight. Hellshade

Yes, they would say "We're not flying Sopwith Triplanes against Olham anymore. Forget it! Mission cancelled!" Hellshade

It took a year, but the Devs have decided to remove the DRM on-line requirement for Wings of Prey. That gives me high hopes that there will be no such requirement for the sequel they are working on. Still hoping it's the pacific. I'd love to fly the P38 Lightningbolt and the Corsair. http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/3237929/gonew/1/DRM_removed_from_WOP.html#UNREAD Hellshade

I created a Tactics video for Wings of Prey awhile back. Some of the fighters can be pretty nasty with their .20mm cannons and .50 cal MGs, so it's easy to die in a split second up there. Some of these tips might help you guys trying it out for the first time to survive it better. Wings of Prey Tactics (5:02) 1080HD Fully Voiced Hellshade

Here is the link to the Wings of Prey demo download at Fileplanet for any who are interested. http://www.fileplanet.com/208822/200000/fileinfo/Wings-of-Prey--Demo Hellshade

I wonder how many other Pilots would enjoy a DM like this. Perhaps there should be a Poll to gauge the general interest level. Hellshade

I don't even have enough time for all the sims and games I have now...but I'm sure as hell going to be clearing my schedule for at least two in particular when they come out. Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and OFF: Phase 4. Those are my must have, can't live withouts. Other than that, I bounce around between OFF:BH&H, RoF, WoP, Oblivion and Rift. "The Best" is really all about what I'm looking for at the moment. I might get Cliffs of Dover for no other reason to see the Direct X 11 support. WoP II is likely going to be in the Pacific theater so, given how few WWII Pacific Theater flight sims are out there now, it'll simply have to be a must buy for me...especially because that flight sim engine just does such an outstanding job of really making me feel like I'm in the cockpit. Hellshade

Can't say for sure but if they are supporting 128 plane player vs player battles it ought to be pretty good. The planes, cockpit and damage modeling all look excellent in CoD but from what I've seen the terrain looks a little flat and underdeveloped to me. Hopefully I'm wrong about that. Reagrdless, it will sell well just because it's a descendant of IL-2: Sturmovik. Hellshade

There is a greenish tinge to the British countryside maps. No way to change it either, that I know of. Here's campaign video of some work I did in Sicily. Sicily Campaign Fihter Sweep (3:36) 1080HD Hellshade

Olham, WoP used to have just three FM settings - Arcade, Realistic and Simulator. I think it was patch 1.0.3.2 that allowed you customize with great detail how you wanted things to be. Stalls, Torque, G effects, flutter effects, mortal pilots, engine controls, manual trim, real gunnery, real damage effetcs, etc. There are plent of options to make it as realistic or arcadish as you would like. The biggest thing I noticed about flying Wings of Prey was after I had finally mastered closing in on enemy aircraft and then keeping the proper gunnery distance while at 300 to 350 Mph, it made shooting aircraft down in Over Flanders Fields much easier. It feels like I have so much more time to line things up now! The action can get very intense in the WWII flight sims. Split second reaction time means the difference between victory and death. Check out one of my missions and see how intense it can get. 6 v 1 Duel over Dover (4:48) 1080HD Hellshade

CoD is supposed to have a massive campaign and huge (128 player!) on-line battles. Wings of Prey can't match that. On the other hand, WoP is just a tour de force graphically that does an outstanding job of making you feel like you are in the cockpit fighting for your life. The AI is very good too, IMHO. CoD is supposed to be Direct X 10 & 11 enhanced, however from the trailer they released, I personally can't see it. Maybe it will look better than what they showed. CoD also took the step of individually modeling nearly every part of a plane so that it can be damaged, which is quite impressive. If the quality of the graphics on a Direct X 11 capable machine is much better than what the trailer shows, I may have to pick it up. Otherwise, I'm still perfectly happy with WoP and very much looking forward to their WoP II which will hopefuly be in the Pacific. Cliffs of Dover Trailer (1:30) 1080HD Wings of Prey Trailer (2:01) 1080HD http://www.gametrailers.com/video/launch-trailer-wings-of/60350

A victim of your own success sir. Hellshade

If you can do all that HPW - including making cables very, very hard to damage or break - I would be thrilled. More focus on the pilot, the fuel tank and the engine would be fantastic. Wings can be shot off, but only after a very significant amount of damage to them. After all, most of the time it's just ripping a tiny hole in the fabric so there shouldn't be much of a change to the FM. The longer the AI and myself can fly and fight effectively, the more intense the battles will become because it won't just be - 1. damage the EA. 2. Now that they can't manuever, shoot them like fish in a barrel. I'd like to come home with my guns empty, my plane full of holes and perhaps, if I'm lucky and good, a kill claim to file. Hellshade

That would be yet another stand out aspect of the sim, to be sure. Right now, the medals come so quickly and easily that for the most part, nobody notices them. Indeed, if your pilot doesn't have all of his medal boxes fulfilled by the end of 5 or 10 missions, it's odd. Considering how much work is going into revamping the medal system for P4, both graphically and from a historical award perspective, it would be a shame to just give them away as if they have no meaning. I worry about it being too tough for the majority of players but Creaghorn has a valid point that you can easily switch your guns to Strongest to help overcome the difficulty in shooting down enemy planes. God bless OBD for being so willing to at least actively listen to their userbase and consider the ideas brought up. I know in the end they will make the best choices, as always. Hellshade

I would agree with that completely. It would reduce the number of kills players get significantly too. Of course, I can see where others who already have a low % hit rate are going to not want such a DM because they will likely end up shooting down nobody far too often. If most people have a hit % of 15 - 20%, then one must imagine that many of those 100 to 200 rounds that did hit an enemy plane didn't hit meat or metal. I believe Polovoski once told me they tried something like this and everyone felt like they were playing against "flying tanks" because no amount of damage seemed to bring them down. To me, this might actually seem more historically accurate though because pilots in the real war were not coming home with kills on every mission, let alone flights like Olhams 5 triplane kills or my own multi-kill ventures. I think most pilots did come home "empty handed" from most missions or perhaps with one kill. The number of confirmed kills would of course be even fewer. I would say that one benefit that everyone could appreciate out of that situation is that making Ace would indeed be a significant achievement worth bragging about. Also, medals earned would have a greater feeling of accomplishment. You are right that player pilots would live longer and it would reduce the kill count. I think for the majority of players though it might make the sim too frustrating. God bless OBD for having tried and supported multiple DMs in the past, however that got understandably too difficult to continue to support. If HPW were to create such a DM I would love to fly it too. Especially for the thrill of having my plane hit but not immediately cut my ability to manuever by 30 to 70% from a single bullet. On the other hand, I personally would still prefer the AI to be more aggressive especially when there are multiple planes against one. I must have a little Werner Voss in me, where I love the thrill of the fight when surrounded. Hellshade

A Bridge Too Far would have to be my second choice Mike! Good call sir. Hellshade

Most of the questions about OFF:BH&H and HitR have been answered since it came out over a year ago so its not suprising the forum isn't filled with new ones. Especially when a good search through the sticky threads answers most of the on topic questions one might have. As for the AI seemingly 'uninterested', I'd have to say that models real life quite well. If the squadron was on a particular mission and ordered not to deviate, they didn't. Shooting down scouts wasn't as important if there were 2 seater recon flights to go after. The big irony about the air war is it was mostly about protecting the troops on the ground from accurate artillary rounds being directed by 2 seaters. Shooting down a fighter was nice. Shooting down a 2 seater that could direct fire that kills hundreds of your men on the ground was essential. Hellshade

If this is the Alpha build of the all new engine DICE developed for the game, it's going to be a great year for PC Gamers. Street combat starts about 1:49 seconds into the video. http://www.ign.com/v...jectid=14209865