Dear 1C Forum Member!
1C Announces Partnership with 777 Studios to create 1C Game Studios and develop IL-2 Sturmovik: Battle of Stalingrad
1C is proud to take the next step in flight-simulation history with 777 Studios, a company and team that has grown to be one of the best flight-simulation developers in the world with its project Rise of Flight (http://riseofflight.com). We look forward to bringing a new era of development and spirit of enjoyment to the combat flight-simulation community together.
Battle of Stalingrad will include both single-player and multi-player scenarios for virtual pilots to enjoy as well as brand new gameplay modes. Initial client release is slated for early 2014 with add-on content and additional features and theatres to follow.
You can read the full announcement on the official website of the game located at Il2sturmovik.net.
Please note that the upcoming title will also have a new forum dedicated entirely to IL-2 Sturmovik: Battle of Stalingrad. We would like to invite to come and visit the new
IL-2 Sturmovik forum (http://forum.il2sturmovik.net), where you will find additional information about the project and will be able to ask questions and chat with the developers.
This is great! RoF will grandually fix up the world of simulations!
I'll buy that for a dollar.
It's really good news to see Oleg's crew team up with 777.
Chances are all the bigger now that this will finally turn out to be a worthy IL-2 sequel with high production values and top notch realism.
Looking forward to the day it gets released!
Quote from: Yskonyn on December 11, 2012, 03:01:06 PM
It's really good news to see Oleg's crew team up with 777.
Chances are all the bigger now that this will finally turn out to be a worthy IL-2 sequel with high production values and top notch realism.
Looking forward to the day it gets released!
Seems like a really good thing. If Oleg and Co. work on the planes and flight models and 777 does the maps, servers and publishing, it should be great.
1C can shout for my money. It's highly unlikely - after that pos I bought from them (admittedly with my eyes open - so I'm not saying I was misled) - that I'll put any money their way again.
I personally think this is great news, both for RoF and BoS. What is also going to be great, though, is the intense fanboy war which will now be waged on the http://forum.il2sturmovik.net/ (ftp://forum.il2sturmovik.net/) new dedicated foums. Grab popcorn and enjoy...
I only hope that BoS doesn't detract from the work being done on Rise of Flight.
Oh man, I can't wait to see what the reaction is over on SimHQ. See you guys in a bit... 8)
Yeah...the discussion over there is about what I expected, although there's not as much whining about BoS not being compatible with CloD as I expected...yet.
didn't Oleg leave 1C a year or two back?
He left - from what I recall.
And - colour me amazed. Just reinstalled it to see what this final patch did and you can fly over London - relatively smoothly - albeit with no action and no other aircraft...but that was nigh impossible before. No "popping" buildings, no stuttering.
It always looked great - trouble was it was even more soulless than IL2...and I don't think anything like that has been touched. So I still doubt it'll be a game worthy of any time...pity - 'cos it does look stunning. You actually can believe you are flying over England in the 1940s.
The stock missions and campaigns in CloD are rubbish, but the 3rd party campaigns are pretty good.
And multiplayer in the current version CloD is pretty awesome as well.
Performance is great now, at least on my system.
And I don't think I've ever seen a WW2 sim with prettier graphics. O_O
BoS not being compatible with CloD is not something to whine over, as far as I am concerned. I do not recall 1C saying that BoS would ever be. Just that BoS would be the sim with all the fixes and be properly done, while CloD was being abandoned.
But I might be wrong.
No less, this is going to result in a pretty big storm on the various forums, I imagine. ;)
Quote from: JudgeDredd on December 11, 2012, 04:18:18 PM
1C can shout for my money. It's highly unlikely - after that pos I bought from them (admittedly with my eyes open - so I'm not saying I was misled) - that I'll put any money their way again.
I skipped CLoD and played RoF so a combo of RoF and a fixed up CLoD-like thing seems perfect.
Overall, I think this is great news.
CoD and RoF are both soul less in my opinion. They are technical marvels in the visual and simulation aspect but they really need a good dynamic campaign that lets you experience the war.
I agree, I'm not sure why dynamic campaigns have been avoided so much. Especially when Minecraft ushered in a new era of dynamic worlds for other games.
With multicore CPU's they could easily simulate the battle on one core while the others are running the simulation. Just make a quad core CPU a requirement.
Modern developers have it opposite from when computer games began. Back then they made the game and waited for the hardware to catch up. Don't hamper the game to fit low end technology, make a game people will want to upgrade to play.
Quote from: republic on July 27, 2013, 08:25:18 AM
I agree, I'm not sure why dynamic campaigns have been avoided so much. Especially when Minecraft ushered in a new era of dynamic worlds for other games.
With multicore CPU's they could easily simulate the battle on one core while the others are running the simulation. Just make a quad core CPU a requirement.
Modern developers have it opposite from when computer games began. Back then they made the game and waited for the hardware to catch up. Don't hamper the game to fit low end technology, make a game people will want to upgrade to play.
This is not as easy as you think, republic.
There are some sims already which use more than 1 core (X-plane 10 comes to mind), but 'just' running the world on one core is not a simple solution to the question.
There are countless of intricate calculations involved, especially in a combat sim with projectiles, armor, atmosphere, gravity, inertia, you name it.
Just claiming that running the campaign on a seperate core is the solution is pretty unfounded imho.
Dynamic campaigns are avoided mostly because they cannot provide the same detailed immersive experience scripted missions can provide. On another note Dynamic campaigns tend to have a multitude of AI problems (as Falcon 4 has shown us) or are pretty boring (as IL-2 Sturmovik: FB showed us) and bland.
The development cost for a dynamic campaign doesn't make it very feasable in relation to what results you get.
The only interesting dynamic campaign people keep on talking about are Falcon's and Battle of Britain.
The former still has some big flaws in its BMS incarnation, while Falcon 4 AF improved on the campaign but lacked in other aspects.
BoB didn't have to worry about any supply and demand , or ground movement in general, so its a much simpler thing.
Case in point being that there really isn't a perfect dynamic campaign in any sim to date.
Perfect is a silly standard.
Have you ever player Falcon 4? I played it when it was new and barely patched. They were very few issues I can recall and the dynamic campaign was spectacular. Anything can happen when a war is going on around you, and I ran into many situations that knocked me off my chair. One time after returning from a mission, I began the landing sequence, bombers flew over my airfield and bombs tore everything up as I aborted my approach. I remember going on "unscheduled" missions near the Chinese border to bomb the airfield DPRK's SU-27s operated from, and blew the crap out of the airfield as they were attempting to scramble aircraft to stop me. That, sir, is what dynamic campaigns are about.
Scripted missions are frankly crap when compared to a well executed dynamic campaign. Dynamic campaigns have been around forever and are not about hardware, they are about a team that is committed to a dynamic and cool experience.
And about IL-2 Stalingrad, they have left their dynamic campaigns behind for good to be replaced (no doubt) by pay per plane content entirely focused on multiplayer. If WoT can pretend to be free and make lots and lots of money- we can too!
Too bad the herd has moved to multiplayer centered games, something will be lost in the process.
Quote from: Swatter on July 27, 2013, 09:18:45 AM
Perfect is a silly standard.
Have you ever player Falcon 4? I played it when it was new and barely patched. They were very few issues I can recall and the dynamic campaign was spectacular. Anything can happen when a war is going on around you, and I ran into many situations that knocked me off my chair. One time after returning from a mission, I began the landing sequence, bombers flew over my airfield and bombs tore everything up as I aborted my approach. I remember going on "unscheduled" missions near the Chinese border to bomb the airfield DPRK's SU-27s operated from, and blew the crap out of the airfield as they were attempting to scramble aircraft to stop me. That, sir, is what dynamic campaigns are about.
Scripted missions are frankly crap when compared to a well executed dynamic campaign. Dynamic campaigns have been around forever and are not about hardware, they are about a team that is committed to a dynamic and cool experience.
Have I? Oh boy! :) I got it on release, yes. Played the heck out of it and still do.
The probable reason you didn't notice the flaws was that a) it was new and pretty groundbreaking and b) it took a while to uncover the issues because the campaign is so massive.
Still, it's a fact that the Dynamic Campaign has some serious issues. Bridges unable to become repaired and halting a ground offensive is one of the more severe ones.
I agree that 'perfect' is a silly standard. It was merely a figure of speech, though. :)
What if they did a combo type thing like Achtung Panzer/Graviteam Tactics or even Wargame: Airland? Have a strategic map that the war is fought in turns with some abstract realism, and let the player jump in to fly sorties. It wouldn't have to be realtime like Falcon.
However...I remember SVGA Harrier's dynamic realtime campaign was actually pretty fun.
Yeah that would be a very interesting solution. SVGA Harrier was pretty cool too! :)
You guys have both pretty much summarized the arguments for and against dynamic campaigns.
For my part, I think dynamic campaigns are essential for the longevity of a sim. As I said in the SimHQ thread, about the only reason that Over Flanders Fields can exist is because RoF completely lacks a meaningful single player experience. In every other way RoF is just a better sim. But the feeling of actually being part of the war in OFF is very appealing and immersive.
The crux of my argument, which was stated above, is that creating a dynamic campaign isn't reinventing the wheel. There are numerous examples of dynamic campaigns: Falcon 4, IL-2, OFF, BoB 2, arguably Strike Fighters series...so programmers don't have to start from scratch. Plenty of examples exist that can be copied to some extent (yes, the programming is from scratch, but conceptually the ideas are well fleshed out).
In my opinion, the decision to forego a DC in Stalingrad is purely money. They know they're likely to sell plenty of product focusing on a RoF model and screw what the SP wants. From a business perspective I suppose that makes sense.
Truly, it seems that hardware finally became capable enough to create really spectacular sims, but now we've forgotten that these things are supposed to be FUN to play.
Quote from: Toonces on July 27, 2013, 03:29:26 PM
Truly, it seems that hardware finally became capable enough to create really spectacular sims, but now we've forgotten that these things are supposed to be FUN to play.
I agree 10,000%. We have more fidelity than I ever dreamed was possible...but often I feel that Aces Over Europe provided a more fun experience...
Strike Fighters is a good example of providing something that 'feels' realistic, but also light enough to get in and out. If there was multiplayer with reliable servers and a little tweaking to smooth out the rough edges....Strike Fighters would be my goto game.
Strike Fighters is so fun, but it falls just short of being my go-to sim. And it's frustrating because the discrepancies are so small, yet they're vital.
For example, you can't command your wingman to attack your primary target. This is crucial. In Falcon 4, you give your flight a "weapons free" command in the vicinity of the primary target and they will self-motivate to attack it. The only way to get your element to attack a specific target is to lock it using visual cues, which I prefer to turn off for realism, and so it's not possible. I end up telling my element to attack ground targets, but then my wingman is essentially useless.
The voice comms are almost useless. You'll get radio calls with no identification, no direction or anything, and they provide no SA. If there was some variation in their actual voices you could tell which comms were from different aircraft but even that is missing.
In the mission planning screen before the flight, I have no idea what supporting flights are doing. The whole briefing is practically useless.
The planning map should have some way of portraying known SAM and AAA and allow for standoff rings so I can plot out a flightpath around the defenses.
And so on. I go back to SF2:Vietnam from time to time and enjoy it for about 3 missions and then I ultimately get so frustrated that I shelve it again. I haven't tried SF2:North Atlantic, so I don't know if any of my perceived discrepancies have been cleared up.
"Over Flanders Fields can exist is because RoF completely lacks a meaningful single player experience. In every other way RoF is just a better sim"
I couldn't agree more x 100
I really enjoyed just flying in RoF, but you really need a campaign experience. There is a campaign, but last time I played every single AI pilot was a carbon copy. That was the ultimate tease. The campaign wrapper was up to snuff, but once you take to the air, you can't forget to make it fun.
I am currently playing Il-2 1946 with DCG. Its been buggy in the past, so I am running no other mods and hoping for a more stable experience.
Quote from: Toonces on July 27, 2013, 05:03:42 PM
And so on. I go back to SF2:Vietnam from time to time and enjoy it for about 3 missions and then I ultimately get so frustrated that I shelve it again. I haven't tried SF2:North Atlantic, so I don't know if any of my perceived discrepancies have been cleared up.
More of the same. I think taking out the visual lock icons is your source of frustration. Keep it on and you will have fun... gamey fun.
I'm afraid TK has given up on the PC though. :(
Quote from: republic on July 27, 2013, 07:15:20 PM
I'm afraid TK has given up on the PC though. :(
True, but at least SF2 just had a July 2013 patch. Visual rendering became quite crisp (or is it just me). :/
So I am going to be the "hater" and say "why could 1C and 777 have done a Korean Air war game?" There really hasn't been a good early jet age sim or mod (yes, I've played both the Korean War stuff for IL-2 and SF) since Mig Alley in 1999 (the year the moon left our orbit because of that horrible explosion).
^ It's hard to find anything to disagree with in that post.
Quote from: Jack Nastyface on July 28, 2013, 12:59:27 AM
So I am going to be the "hater" and say "why could 1C and 777 have done a Korean Air war game?"
I agree completely. There are no modern Korean or early jet age games at all.
I've been thinking for awhile, wouldn't it be neat to make a flight sim with some sort of interesting story. So you start out in flight school in the states before the war flying early jets. You have to pass your navigation tests, and maybe for a navy carrier you have to land on a runway painted out like a carrier. Then you move on to actual carrier qualifications. (All skippable of course)
The great thing about the early jets is how quickly improvements came. Let us start on Vought F7U's so that we are terrified of landing...and then give us F2H Banshee's and F9F Panthers...etc.
Korea would be a great era to give flight sims a soul again. As you complete missions and gain rank, you can start planning your own sorties. Eventually maybe your responsible for an entire Carrier/Airbase.
Give players hard choices. You can take out that ammo dump today, but if you do you can't cover your sector's ground forces. If you take out valuable targets you gain political points, but ground forces suffer without your close air support. You can spend those political points to speed up development of aircraft that maybe didn't make it in time for the war, or gain access to other NATO nations aircraft.
I get worked up thinking about this sort of game, it's been a dream of mine for awhile. :)
Quote from: Jack Nastyface on July 28, 2013, 12:59:27 AM
So I am going to be the "hater" and say "why could 1C and 777 have done a Korean Air war game?" There really hasn't been a good early jet age sim or mod (yes, I've played both the Korean War stuff for IL-2 and SF) since Mig Alley in 1999 (the year the moon left our orbit because of that horrible explosion).
Would love Korean War sim...or Space 1999 for that matter!
Put me in the opposite camp. Gimme more WWII. The idea of a Korean War sim puts me to sleep.
I like them all, I just want to see some sort of dynamic campaign. It doesn't need to be a huge and complicated one, the original Red Baron had a fairly simple dynamic campaign, and it worked well. I do like the idea of a Mig Alley type sim, but I would appreciate almost an era (except maybe futuristic).
Well, when you think about it, we're not really gutted with WW2 sims.
There's IL-2 of course, which is fine for what it is but is starting to show its age compared to modern sims. BOB2 is nice, but limited in scope.
For high-end WW2 sims that's about it. CLoD is limited in scope as well. The various World of iterations are not exactly "sims" although I don't want to get into semantics; still I don't count them in the same league as an IL-2 or BOB2.
Having said that, there is a gaping hole in the Korea to 1990 or so eras. Nobody but Strike Fighters has even dabbled in a Vietnam-era sim, and there is so much interesting stuff going on in the 70's that it's really a shame....all those iconic jets and great matchups.
Cold war stuff is great. You get to fight less deadly BVR rengagements and go in with guns like WW2
but unlike ww2, the planes are fast. I'm not too good at modern BVR engagements.
I try and try at DCS BVR combat but I inevitably go down without ever having a clue where the other guy was.
Part of that is the superiority of the F-15 and the other part is that EVERYONE wants to fly the best hardware so I'm usually in a distinct minority on the OPFOR side. So for every one of us there are 2 or 3 AMRAAM flinging monkeys coming against us.
Early Sparrow's are the most 'fun' BVR combat. You have to ripple launch because one will not track...and it is only BVR for a few moments before your in sidewinder and gun range.
Quote from: jomni on December 12, 2012, 09:28:32 PM
CoD and RoF are both soul less in my opinion. They are technical marvels in the visual and simulation aspect but they really need a good dynamic campaign that lets you experience the war.
I stopped skipping CLOD and quit RoF. CLOD is my current favorite air game. With the mods it's a pretty good game.
When Il-2 Stalingrad comes out, I'll probably switch to that. Strike Fighters was great, but I'm moving on -- probably to DCS whatever eventually.
With the slow pace DCS is getting updates and new modules we will all be either retired or dead before we see a WW2 theatre and sufficient planes in that era. ;)
Quote from: Yskonyn on July 29, 2013, 02:17:36 PM
With the slow pace DCS is getting updates and new modules we will all be either retired or dead before we see a WW2 theatre and sufficient planes in that era. ;)
I guess I actually like the way air sims are going these days. CLOD is a pretty good template: take a limited region and a limited time frame and try to cover it as well as you can. Il-2 Stalingrad seems a reasonable take on that model. I'm not sure how DCS is supposed to work in those terms -- DCS seems both focused (recent stuff in the Black Sea area) and unfocused (all kinds of other things).
Yes, a common complaint.
They have been recycling their stuff from Flanker 2.0 for ages now. Same theatre, just slightly expanded.
With the opening up to 3rd party developers I think some good things may come. The Huey is a proper DCS brand product, for example.
A little useless in the current DCS battlefield, but still.
Once the F/A-18 hits and a working and detailed radar modelling gets introduced into DCS, things might take off big time. Especially when they will have a different (bigger) theater to offer as well.
But as of now, the KA-50 offers a very limited capability platform. You cannot do much more than being a sniper.
The P-51D is a beautifully modelled aircraft, but aside from being fun, pretty useless as a weapons platform in the current DCS battlefield.
The Huey is nice because it is modelled in high fidelity and has multiplayer crew positions. Other than that not very useful. And plain boring on a MP server for multiple sorties.
Combined Arms is a nice gimmick, but far too arcade. The JTAC is broken, so the feature to be able to control and order around land units on the mapview is left, which is a nice feature.
Flaming CLiffs offers a medium fidelity set of aircraft. They fit well in the scope of the DCS battlefield.
A-10C fits well too and is a beautiful sim.
Nevada map is confirmed to being worked on again and more info will follow in the coming weeks.
F/A-18 is confirmed, but no release or timeframe is given.
The various aircraft of Flaming Cliffs will get an upgrade to their flight model en cockpit modelling. SU-25 and A-10A have just been released.
It's a bit of a rag tag lot at the moment. And the cool stuff (read: Naval ops and F/A-18, radar implementation, proper A-A combat) is miles away still.
RUMOUR: A third party might be working on a dynamic campaign system for DCS.
I've missed realistic carrier ops for a long time.
I do wish they would focus on earlier aircraft. It would make it easier for new players to get in, and make multiplayer much more fun. The modern aircraft, especially fighter ops, are more of point and click destruction than getting down and dirty.
Quote from: republic on July 29, 2013, 05:49:21 PM
I've missed realistic carrier ops for a long time.
...slightly off topic...but didja ever play Aces of the Pacific? I LOVED how the Landing Officer would "flag" you into for a trap. Would indeed be nice to replay that memory in a new game.
I can't see me dropping money on this. I mean - come on. The company's last release was farcical - and the way it was dropped to move on to something else was just outright disingenuous to people who had bought the mess. I am aware my system was sub par for it - so I'm not just talking from a graphical perspective.
Unfortunately I gave up on CloD very early because the venom being spat about by supporters and disgruntled owners just made it impossible to get your concerns heard or even find out where the game was heading...last I heard it was a better broken mess than release - that's all I got.
I have no inclination what so ever to return to Russia - and I thought it was called Battle for Moscow?
^ oh - and sorry for the rant - it still hurts they balls'ed CloD up so much after so many years of hoping for a very old Battle of Britain.
Quote from: JudgeDredd on July 30, 2013, 01:35:37 AM
^ oh - and sorry for the rant - it still hurts they balls'ed CloD up so much after so many years of hoping for a very old Battle of Britain.
I thank everyone who ranted about or ever will rant about CLOD. I stayed out of it til it got fixed up and played RoF instead.
Now with Mods CLOD does okay. It's probably the best air sim out there at the moment when its all modded up.
Here's a preview of Battle of Stalingrad (I'm not sure what happened to battle of Moscow, anyway, now its stalingrad and based on
Rof rather than CLOD):
http://www.simhq.com/air-combat/il2-sturmovik-battle-stalingrad-preview.html
Quote from: MengJiao on July 30, 2013, 09:20:09 AM
Here's a preview of Battle of Stalingrad (I'm not sure what happened to battle of Moscow, anyway, now its stalingrad and based on
Rof rather than CLOD):
http://www.simhq.com/air-combat/il2-sturmovik-battle-stalingrad-preview.html
I rather takes Spokesmodel Hope out on a spin, than putting money in that software
... not until if read a shitload of happy community postings over at SimHQ.
are those CLOD mods on Steam?
Quote from: MengJiao on July 30, 2013, 09:20:09 AM
Quote from: JudgeDredd on July 30, 2013, 01:35:37 AM
^ oh - and sorry for the rant - it still hurts they balls'ed CloD up so much after so many years of hoping for a very old Battle of Britain.
I thank everyone who ranted about or ever will rant about CLOD. I stayed out of it til it got fixed up and played RoF instead.
Now with Mods CLOD does okay. It's probably the best air sim out there at the moment when its all modded up.
Here's a preview of Battle of Stalingrad (I'm not sure what happened to battle of Moscow, anyway, now its stalingrad and based on
Rof rather than CLOD):
http://www.simhq.com/air-combat/il2-sturmovik-battle-stalingrad-preview.html
After the last debacle - there's NO WAY I'm taking that video as anywhere NEAR representative of gameplay or graphics.
And as MikeGer said - it would take a shed load of fantastic comments (and not from fanbois) to get me to even consider throwing money their way...
Quote from: MikeGER on July 30, 2013, 09:32:45 AM
Quote from: MengJiao on July 30, 2013, 09:20:09 AM
Here's a preview of Battle of Stalingrad (I'm not sure what happened to battle of Moscow, anyway, now its stalingrad and based on
Rof rather than CLOD):
http://www.simhq.com/air-combat/il2-sturmovik-battle-stalingrad-preview.html
I rather takes Spokesmodel Hope out on a spin, than putting money in that software
... not until if read a shitload of happy community postings over at SimHQ.
are those CLOD mods on Steam?
I'm pretty sure I got them at : http://theairtacticalassaultgroup.com/forum/forum.php?s=57f5fb5c10aed1d80607a76d29e6de1f
I don't recall having much trouble installing them and they work fine with Steam.
THX for the headup :)