Back with IL*2 20y later ! Still dazed and confused...

[gdeschodt]

I bought the original game back in the day 20+ y ago, holy #$$%% !  It was a great sim, if a little light on the help/tutorial then... I recently got a gaming machine again and dived back in...and it's exactly the same (with prettier scenery and more planes)...  The Flight model is and cockpit modeling is magnificent, but I'm even more lost than before even with the options and scenarios and packs, and still no tutorial to speak of.. At least we invented Youtube since ! 

 

I bought The Dover pack (channel and africa) from Steam (apparently a mistake - oops), and could not deflect-shoot a barn door at 10 paces... Still it was fun. Then I tried to make sense of the packs and options and whether they cumulate or not. I REALLY wanted a Typhoon (don't ask, Closterman's "the big show" book made a mark) so I bought the $80 Normandy from the developer, direct, this time...  Except that there is no Normandy anything yet but instead I have a russian map only but no russian missions at all (if I understand this right, Normandy's "almost out" for 2+ years?) but at least I get to fly a Tiffie and I am happy with the rendering of it, exceptional...  Oddly, I can shoot much better in "great battles - normandy" than I can in Battle of britain where I can't hit anything that moves - it's not me, same guy, same day... I'll Kill 2 FW190s in a Typhoon before they get me, acceptable for my skills. 

 

I still have no idea how to find my base, Win11 crashes a LOT on D3D, I seem to have no missions or careers other than the quick ones I make myself - do I have this right ?  I'm cool waiting, just wanna make sure I'm not missing out...  The normandy pack lists all other "packs" but the file structure is empty and the career locked, I imagine that is Ok and the games are not cumulative (pricey, then!)  - Also since I bought Bob on steam I don;t imagine the typhoon will translate on that one ? 

 

Edited January 18, 2022 by gdeschodt

[Jason_Williams]

Slow down bud. It’s really not that confusing. Forget the Dover stuff for just a moment. They are separate products and not compatible. 

 

If you just bought Normandy from our website you bought an Early Access product. Right now that comes with just a few planes including the Typhoon, the remainder are in development. The Normandy map is not released yet. So that means there are no campaigns or careers for it yet. I recommend you buy Battle of Bodenplatte from us here as that map makes more sense for the planes you like until the Normandy map is ready. 
 

And yes all our products merge together to form one big product. It’s all there inside the game client you install. When you purchase you just unlock that content. Very easy to manage.
 

Jason

[76IAP-Black]

@gdeschodt

Welcome on Board, i would recommend to buy Battle of Bodenplatte to make the Normandie Module and planeset more complete for you and to have a nice map to fly on until Normandie is released, this summer.

All other Battle of X are merged into one big install, just buy, activate and have fun to fly 

[kendo]

It can all be a little complicated to get your head around for newcomers.

 

As Jason just said, Cliffs of Dover is a completely different sim, not related to the Great Battles series at all.

 

Normandy is the latest in the Great Battles series, and is still in early access - which means 6 of the 10 planes are released so far with 4 more still to come. The Normandy map and career mode will come in the future as well.

 

You will have some free maps available - Lapino and a few others should be there, all set in Russia.

 

Buying Bodenplatte or any of the other instalments will provide a map and access to the career mode for that battle.

 

And if you go online to one of the servers you will be able to fly on any map used, even if you don't own the module, using any of the planes you have access to.

 

Welcome to the fun!

 

 

Edited January 18, 2022 by kendo

[gdeschodt]

Thank you guys, that helps...  And a quick response too...  To be clear I'm not mad or anything, I'm super happy to be able to fly a tiffie and I could shoot landing and take offs all day and still be fine...  I wanted to double check that indeed both platforms were incompatible, I was curious about the shooting difference (why I'm a god on normandy and blind on Bob), and that I wasn't missing out...  3 votes for boddenplate - cool, I'll get that next (20y ago I was broke - now at least I can afford this ?

 

Should I worry about nav to my base ? I have not been able to do any career yet (unavailable) so I am not sure where to land most of the time, or if it matters !! 

 

I was doghfighting over a lake and man, this sim looks and flies great !!! Wow !   I'm semi shocked that it's still around 21y later, but glad for it !!! Looking forward to careers and real missions. 

Edited January 18, 2022 by gdeschodt

[BOO]

If you buy the various packs (Battle ofs..) it can get pricey. Many have had years to accumulate them. Waiting for a sale is a good option for the older (and IMO better looking) maps and plane sets (Stalingrad, Moscow and Kuban)

[76IAP-Black]

You are Welcome ?

Try out the other moduls too, Stalingrad has the Epic historic location with some nice planes.

 

Kuban the most beautifull map and interesting planes.

 

Moscow the least interesting map but there is the MiG included ☺️

 

Try out the collector planes too, P-40, P-38 and so on 

[BOO]

6 minutes ago, gdeschodt said:

Should I worry about nav to my base ? I have not been able to do any career yet (unavailable) so I am not sure where to land most of the time, or if it matters !! 

 

 

Yes and no - you can opt to have gps enabled which will show your plane on the map. over time you might fine you come to enjoy the challeges of navigating. For those starting out Id recommend looking out for requiem's combat tutorials. 

 

https://www.youtube.com/c/theaircombattutoriallibrary

Edited January 18, 2022 by BOO

[gdeschodt]

I just bought boddenplatte and ooh a Tempest - cool ($200 in IL2 in 3 days) - sadly another mid mission crash on win 11 with Direct 3D... Ugh...  (with everything up to date driver wise).  

[Enceladus828]

57 minutes ago, gdeschodt said:

I was curious about the shooting difference (why I'm a god on normandy and blind on Bob), and that I wasn't missing out.

You may want to post this in the CloD section of the forum here: IL-2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover Blitz + Desert Wings - IL-2 Sturmovik Forum (il2sturmovik.com)

 

It may be that you are hitting the aircraft if you are flying an early Spitfire or Hurricane but a few hits by machine gun bullets won't do the same compared to a few hits by the Hispanos and other cannons carried by aircraft in IL-2 GBs. It could be that the Gun Convergence set is different for both games.

 

As I said if you post that on the CloD section of the forum they can help you out with that.

 

Cheers.

[JimTM]

1 hour ago, gdeschodt said:

Thank you guys, that helps...  And a quick response too...  To be clear I'm not mad or anything, I'm super happy to be able to fly a tiffie and I could shoot landing and take offs all day and still be fine...  I wanted to double check that indeed both platforms were incompatible, I was curious about the shooting difference (why I'm a god on normandy and blind on Bob), and that I wasn't missing out...  3 votes for boddenplate - cool, I'll get that next (20y ago I was broke - now at least I can afford this ?

 

Should I worry about nav to my base ? I have not been able to do any career yet (unavailable) so I am not sure where to land most of the time, or if it matters !! 

 

I was doghfighting over a lake and man, this sim looks and flies great !!! Wow !   I'm semi shocked that it's still around 21y later, but glad for it !!! Looking forward to careers and real missions. 

 

Welcome back!

 

The IL-2 Resources post may help you out if you have questions about the new(er) sim. There are two buying-guide links near the top of the "Game Guides" section. Enjoy!

[354thFG_Drewm3i-VR]

The game you flew 21 years ago eventually culminated into IL-2 1946.

 

After that, 1C Oleg Maddox and his team made Cliffs of Dover which flopped on release (Oleg resigned before release it was so bad). Team Fusion, originally a group of modders, fixed Cliffs and released Tobruk as well after being made an official development team.

 

Great Battles, of which Bodenplatte and Normandy are expansions, began with Battle of Stalingrad in 2013 and was made with the Rise of Flight engine and a merging of 777 studios with what was left of Oleg's 1C team.

 

That's the spark notes version. Each game has its perks, 1946 with content and breadth, Cliffs with in-depth simulation, and GB with a nice balance between accessibility, many sim features, and a great multiplayer community (and also VR). Cliffs is generally much harder than GB (I find gunnery in Cliffs even harder than DCS: the recoil in Cliffs is a bit absurd, but it has the best damage model of any WW2 sim ever made). As I alluded to, there is also DCS WWII (which also has vr) which is something else altogether and a study sim for individual planes that is only just starting to be able to have enough content to form (limited) WWII scenarios.

 

1946 still has an active single player community and BAT is the best modpack: 

 

 

 

Edited January 19, 2022 by -332FG-drewm3i-VR

[ShamrockOneFive]

5 hours ago, gdeschodt said:

I bought the original game back in the day 20+ y ago, holy #$$%% !  It was a great sim, if a little light on the help/tutorial then... I recently got a gaming machine again and dived back in...and it's exactly the same (with prettier scenery and more planes)...  The Flight model is and cockpit modeling is magnificent, but I'm even more lost than before even with the options and scenarios and packs, and still no tutorial to speak of.. At least we invented Youtube since ! 

 

I bought The Dover pack (channel and africa) from Steam (apparently a mistake - oops), and could not deflect-shoot a barn door at 10 paces... Still it was fun. Then I tried to make sense of the packs and options and whether they cumulate or not. I REALLY wanted a Typhoon (don't ask, Closterman's "the big show" book made a mark) so I bought the $80 Normandy from the developer, direct, this time...  Except that there is no Normandy anything yet but instead I have a russian map only but no russian missions at all (if I understand this right, Normandy's "almost out" for 2+ years?) but at least I get to fly a Tiffie and I am happy with the rendering of it, exceptional...  Oddly, I can shoot much better in "great battles - normandy" than I can in Battle of britain where I can't hit anything that moves - it's not me, same guy, same day... I'll Kill 2 FW190s in a Typhoon before they get me, acceptable for my skills. 

 

I still have no idea how to find my base, Win11 crashes a LOT on D3D, I seem to have no missions or careers other than the quick ones I make myself - do I have this right ?  I'm cool waiting, just wanna make sure I'm not missing out...  The normandy pack lists all other "packs" but the file structure is empty and the career locked, I imagine that is Ok and the games are not cumulative (pricey, then!)  - Also since I bought Bob on steam I don;t imagine the typhoon will translate on that one ? 

 

Welcome to the community!

 

There's three generations of IL-2 series out there which can make purchasing a little confusing. The forums you're on right now are for the third and latest generation we know as IL-2 Sturmovik: Great Battles. Battle of Normandy is part of that pack, however, it is a title in Early Access and as you may have gathered from the other responses there's still some content being developed for this.

 

I highly recommend a couple of resources to brush up on the series.

 

1) Air Combat Tutorial Library - Literally hundreds of how-to videos for the IL-2 series as well as general aviation information. https://www.youtube.com/c/TheAirCombatTutorialLibrary

2) The IL-2 Flight School campaigns - There's one for every aircraft so pick the aircraft you want to fly and work your way through the tutorials to learn about it.

3) FSA Combat Flight Simulation Overview - I wrote a guide that provides an overview of combat flight simulation in general. It should help cover the different versions of the IL-2 series as well as other sims out there so you know what to buy and how to get started. https://flightsimassociation.com/guides/virtual-flying/combat-simulation

4) Stormbirds.blog - The self promotion continues... I write a blog with regular updates across as much of the flight sim spectrum as possible. I have news, editorials, reviews, etc. Again it might help you get started so be sure to check out my reviews section for all of the various IL-2 products, aircraft, and campaigns that have been released over the last few years. https://stormbirds.blog/

 

Hope that helps you get going!

[AWC]

On 1/19/2022 at 8:04 AM, gdeschodt said:

Except that there is no Normandy anything yet but instead I have a russian map only but no russian missions at all (if I understand this right, Normandy's "almost out" for 2+ years?) but at least I get to fly a Tiffie and I am happy with the rendering of it, exceptional... 

 

This video answers every question you might have with buying IL-2, brief and to the point.

 

 

Edited January 20, 2022 by Lemsip

[gdeschodt]

Again thanks to all for the help. As an old newbie I was genuinely confused by cliffs/steam and Normandy flying different and not talking to one another.. and the status of said Normandy with planes but no missions ? obvious to you guys but not to me! 
 
i added Boddenplate as you recommended and… wow - it all makes sense now - career, missions etc! The weather too!!  I’ve had a ball doing career missions all evening in my Typhoon and an occasional quick jaunt in a Dora for balance -  Not doing too bad even with my crap Sidewinder !  Honest - most fun I’ve had on a computer in ages ! Great sim ! 

[gdeschodt]

I also improved stability on @^**$ Win11 by killing every running app in the systray. I can generally crash (windows) once every 2 hours now. better. Crashing the plane, not so much ?