Tell me what you really really want…..

[Lusekofte]

In reference to the wish list here, I wonder if people are willing to pay for what they ask for. 
According to what people wish, admittedly many wishes is common sense , but many bear signs of a very hyped state of mind when written. 
Are there many of us willing to put the money on table for a high end state of the art sim?  
Do we want a sim demanding latest generation of gpu and cpu? And hold DCS prices + for each plane?

Do we want the developers to include those with older rigs? 
I can afford both new rig and another DCS priced sim, currently I am not motivated to spend that money, this sim might do it. 
Personally I like a very complex DM. 
I care not if clickpits are implemented or not. 
I gladly take [ctrl]+[E] as a startup , I want realistic take offs, and landings, I like wind to be more realistic than what is offered in sims today. I like communication to work. 
But how far can one go in this list until it gets economically a problem? 

[kissTheSky]

I am OK with it NOT being a study sim, I’d rather have the flight and damage models correct than having to remember to switch fuel tanks every so often. 

In game voice chat I see being important for co-op multiplayer, but I’m mostly (if not 100%) single player. 

[Trooper117]

I'll go with whatever they decide to implement I guess... DCS, GB style or a combination.

VOIP, yes, a Hyperlobby style internet gaming lobby might be useful too.

 

[BraveSirRobin]

I want GB over the Pacific.

 I think DCS over the Pacific would be a mistake because it’s too expensive and is already being done by DCS (sort of).

[Lusekofte]

26 minutes ago, BraveSirRobin said:

I want GB over the Pacific.

 I think DCS over the Pacific would be a mistake because it’s too expensive and is already being done by DCS (sort of).

It stretching it far sayingDCS sort of is there. But they are in their own way. 
I think a improved GB style would be best

[BraveSirRobin]

18 minutes ago, Lusekofte said:

It stretching it far sayingDCS sort of is there. But they are in their own way. 
I think a improved GB style would be best

It’s on it’s way as much as DCS has ever been on it’s way to anything.

It will be tough to improve on GB.  GB has a very big head start.  Being just as good as GB at the beginning would be a significant accomplishment.

[Lusekofte]

Yes it would, but I hope for more complexity in dm and communication that really works. 
It would be nice with a general improvement 

[szelljr]

Assetto Corsa 2...

[Bombing35]

I would like to see mid-late war campaigns too. Hellcats, Avengers, Helldivers, and late Wildcats (on CVEs) fighting late Zekes, Judys, Jills, and Myrts.

[Snafu]

1 hour ago, Bombing35 said:

I would like to see mid-late war campaigns too. Hellcats, Avengers, Helldivers, and late Wildcats (on CVEs) fighting late Zekes, Judys, Jills, and Myrts.

I agree, and I'm personally quite interested in the Burma campaign too... and maybe some underexposed Singapore and Dutch East Indies would be nice. We'll see how wide the scope can be made. 

[Sea Serpent]

If MP is to occur on open servers, not some co-op, or locked squadron server, how do you make it so that a couple of guys can join and do their thing (more GB style) without them having to coordinate with everybody else in a realistic carrier strike?  (I have some rough ideas, but they’re rough) So these 2 or 3 day carrier battles where 50 planes go out is cool, but that’s not Great Battles style MP as I know it.  If people want it GB-style, it seems that might favor tactical ground ops better.  Having a couple guys go out to attack the Kido Butai from a carrier just isn’t simulating how it generally worked, not to mention the chaos on the deck.  There has to be some automated and intelligent strike scheduling and deck spotting.   That also might mean waiting around, and impatient people aren’t going to like that.

I don’t know how they manage a carrier deck on DCS open multiplayer servers.  I’ve only experienced carrier ops as part of an entire modern CV air group, on a very “milsim” private server, complete with human marshall, a deck boss, and LSO.  It was pretty chaotic, and pilots and managers alike needed to know their stuff.

 

 

Edited May 29, 2023 by Sea Serpent

[Majakowski]

If other games with limited fidelity are priced at 70 Euros and can still be sustained with sales a fraction of that price, I have no worries that a higher fidelity game can be made and be economically viable given that the far reaching wishes are articulated, digested and readied for implementation at an earliest possible stage thus preventing the need to disassemble an already done but limited product for retrofitting functionalities that once were put aside but suddenly become necessary because of some competition having the bright idea of implementing it.

I mean, why are we loitering here? Certainly not because we look for compromises before we even know what's in the realm of possibilities.

Creating an extensive foundation is a one time effort but one that will pay in the long run. More fidelity will also be easier to handle with a new engine that is made for it from the ground up instead of trying to pull a container ship with a rowboat.

Let the devs decide what is viable, we as customers have a uniform interest and this is to get "the whole package", that is what has been announced, this is what we signed up for, we did not come because Jason promised us mediocrity and compromise that rests solely on a temporary constraint (in terms of hardware cost).

If we wanted another iteration of a certain product on the grounds of "sorry more isn't possible" then we'd already have it. Time to shed the the old mind blockades, this genre is old and mature enough to provide us the maximal experience.

We are not sailing into a virgin sea anymore but are ploughing through a canal between well charted wreckage. All we need to do is take an inexpensive look at the wrecks and logbooks to see what is to be avoided and which course to take and not bother with the details of navigation for we as paying passengers only want to come to our destination.

Looking for compromises before the other side has even taken a definite position on a matter has the ugly consequence of lowering the bar of what is possible to what'd be enough.

[Props]

On 5/29/2023 at 3:35 PM, Sea Serpent said:

If MP is to occur on open servers, not some co-op, or locked squadron server, how do you make it so that a couple of guys can join and do their thing (more GB style) without them having to coordinate with everybody else in a realistic carrier strike?  (I have some rough ideas, but they’re rough) So these 2 or 3 day carrier battles where 50 planes go out is cool, but that’s not Great Battles style MP as I know it.  If people want it GB-style, it seems that might favor tactical ground ops better.  Having a couple guys go out to attack the Kido Butai from a carrier just isn’t simulating how it generally worked, not to mention the chaos on the deck.  There has to be some automated and intelligent strike scheduling and deck spotting.   That also might mean waiting around, and impatient people aren’t going to like that.

I don’t know how they manage a carrier deck on DCS open multiplayer servers.  I’ve only experienced carrier ops as part of an entire modern CV air group, on a very “milsim” private server, complete with human marshall, a deck boss, and LSO.  It was pretty chaotic, and pilots and managers alike needed to know their stuff.

 

 

Back in the day in IL2 '46 the Zekes vs Wildcats server handled it reasonably well. They had Midway, Coral Sea, and even the Iwo Jima map had Allied carriers though the Japanese flew from the island. They would use sometimes 2 sometimes 4 carriers, one each for spawn and takeoff and one each for landings (though a lot of guys figured out that you could ditch next to the carrier and still keep your points and kills - a bit of a copout but oh well). The only problem I had was the occasional "bad" flyer who spawned in with his throttle full, would be in a big hurry to takeoff and die, then would rearend you as you got set for takeoff killing both of us! And since I always went for a deck landing I didn't have to worry about the ditchers. 

On those maps I flew solo and with wingmen and always had a blast as there was always enough folks over the enemy for a good furball and good dogfights. And divebombing the peripheral ships was not too difficult as everyone was protecting the Carriers. They did keep the distances a little closer than real life so flying time wasn't too bad, just over the horizon, which for some parts of Coral Sea would've been just about right though IRL the 2 groups didn't know they were that close to each other at that moment. 

[Sea Serpent]

Yeah, I heard that’s how they did it back then, Props, but you wouldn’t really be content to do it that way in 2023 would you?

[BlitzPig_EL]

It's one way to do it that worked.  Not saying it's the be all and end all, but it did work.  Remember, sims have changed a lot since then, but people have not.

The kind of mission you want, I think, would only be possible in COOP, and there is nothing at all wrong with that, in fact I miss the COOP mode of the old IL2 as done with Hyperlobby.  It worked and worked well.  That, coupled with standard multiplayer type gameplay, and a robust single player experience would give us all a way to enjoy this new sim, and pretty much ensure it's success.

[Mysticpuma]

I'd like :

IL2:1946 Pacific scope, Great Battles aircraft visual models (or better), much better damage model (like Clod) with Hydraulic systems being able to be damaged and similar systems, visual effects (smoke, fire, explosions, vapour) having a much higher variety representations than the current BoX model (super thick black smoke). 

Clouds like BoX or DCS with weather systems such as rain, thunder/lightning, waterlogged airstrips and dynamic weather. 

Finally more camera positions in and around the aircraft/ships, pilot models with much greater variety of animations, expressions and de syncing the movements from other aircraft in the flight, so we don't get this:

 

Oh and a possibility to view tracks in a dedicated player that allows rewinding (the usefulness of this I genuinely cannot emphasise enough!) 

Cheers, Mysticpuma 

[wheelsup_cavu]

I would like to have the Player's Pilots head animation slaved to the Player like 1946 did with its v4.11m or v4.12m patch. It was pretty unique to know that the head movement you saw during game play and in the track matched what the Player's keyboard or TrackIR was doing at that moment.

 

Wheels

[Feathered_IV]

Maybe its easier to say what I don't want:

I don't want a game that chokes on itself and runs in slow motion if there are 20 AI aircraft in the air. 

I don't want AI radio chatter that is so crushingly repetitive that I have to quit after 15 minutes of it.

I don't want an AI that uses the same FM as me, at the cost of being bloody useless at everything else.

[dburne]

2 hours ago, Feathered_IV said:

Maybe its easier to say what I don't want:

I don't want a game that chokes on itself and runs in slow motion if there are 20 AI aircraft in the air. 

I don't want AI radio chatter that is so crushingly repetitive that I have to quit after 15 minutes of it.

I don't want an AI that uses the same FM as me, at the cost of being bloody useless at everything else.

 

👍

[Raptor82]

Proper Multi Monitor Support 

[Raptor82]

On 5/30/2023 at 4:59 PM, Props said:

Back in the day in IL2 '46 the Zekes vs Wildcats server handled it reasonably well. They had Midway, Coral Sea, and even the Iwo Jima map had Allied carriers though the Japanese flew from the island. They would use sometimes 2 sometimes 4 carriers, one each for spawn and takeoff and one each for landings (though a lot of guys figured out that you could ditch next to the carrier and still keep your points and kills - a bit of a copout but oh well). The only problem I had was the occasional "bad" flyer who spawned in with his throttle full, would be in a big hurry to takeoff and die, then would rearend you as you got set for takeoff killing both of us! And since I always went for a deck landing I didn't have to worry about the ditchers. 

On those maps I flew solo and with wingmen and always had a blast as there was always enough folks over the enemy for a good furball and good dogfights. And divebombing the peripheral ships was not too difficult as everyone was protecting the Carriers. They did keep the distances a little closer than real life so flying time wasn't too bad, just over the horizon, which for some parts of Coral Sea would've been just about right though IRL the 2 groups didn't know they were that close to each other at that moment. 

Those were good days

[wheelsup_cavu]

12 hours ago, Raptor82 said:

though a lot of guys figured out that you could ditch next to the carrier and still keep your points and kills

Unfortunately the mission builder could not make the Homebase radius smaller than 500 meters and the default setting was a whopping 3000 meters. There needed to be an option for ships that allowed you to make the circle as small as Zero which is what DGen did with the Target objectives circles which forced you to land on the carrier to get the Mission Complete message.

 

Wheels

[Boom]

Honestly, what I really want is a graphic, accurate, nail-biting campaign, that reflects the real actions it's portrayed. With highly detailed ground objects and targets (including ships). One that draws the player into and keeps you on your toes. Missions that can seem daunting, and can make you grip the stick hard in anticipation of things to come. Where losses amongst the AI - both enemy and own side - are true to the period in which it is set.

Wide choice of aircraft, stunning aircraft detail, VR etc are 'nice to have', but not top of my list. IL-2 provides a glut of aircraft choices, MSFS, DCS et al does a wonderful job of detailed aircraft modelling and my TrackIR 5 headset lets me feel I'm actually in the cockpit.

But you can count on one hand those sims over the years that have really mastered the art of the 'campaign'. Which to my mind is what creates the real treasure of the combat sim.

[Mysticpuma]

And while we are discussing graphics, can we have effectively a cinematic mode which is everything on max, possibility of ray tracing, effectively everything maxed out that showcases the fidelity of the Sim? 

While some current computers will struggle to run it, this needs to be built for the future from the start. 

Edited October 26, 2023 by Mysticpuma

[JFM]

I know it’s not going to be a ship simulator but I don’t want to see cookie cutter naval vessels, at least for the major players. For instance, don’t use the same model for Akagi and Hiryu, just because they both had port islands. They were very different ships. Same thing for Kaga and Soryu. Zuikaku and Shokaku you could prob get away with doing that. I’d know the difference between them by which one had the searchlight on the mast, but one model for both would be practical overall as regards those two, and maybe certain Essex-class CVs—although the long and short hulls should be represented. But having a cage-masted West Virginia be used for Nevada and North Carolina? No!

Sure, it’s going to be a lot of work for the devs. What happened in Dayton and Kill Devil Hills was a lot of work, too—but they did it. If you are going to willingly seek and then enter the arena, then be prepared to bring it. 

I know, I concede I may be nitpicking. Cookie cutter ships are just immersion-killing for me. Like cookie-cutter airfields in FC. I fly out of Roucourt or Douai etc and they look nothing like all the photos taken at/of these airfields. 

Also, in CP have the planes fly off the carriers without plunging down to the wave tops. Every takeoff, at least AI, was like that in IL2FB. Yes, it happened IRL, but *every* takeoff? No. It was by far the exception, not the rule.