Game version 4.703 discussion: New Sky, Ju-88-C6, Gotha G.V, H.P.400, Griffons Campaign

[moeburn]

I got no problem with the sun blinding half my vision, that's what the sun does IRL too, but could you make it so the gunsight sun filter is actually useful now?  Cause right now, ze filters, zey do nothing!

[ChicagoChad_VR]

On 3/19/2022 at 9:53 AM, BlitzPig_EL said:

Ever looked directly at the sun in real life?

El - long time no see. The sun is really bad for G2 users, you don't even have to look straight at it. When the sun enters the field of view at any corner, it's so bright you lose sight of aircraft in tight formation. Plus the sun seems to be the same brightness no matter where it is in the sky. Whereas in real life it loses brightness the closer it is to the horizon. If you tried it, you would agree.

[BlitzPig_EL]

Howdy CC,good to see you again.

Yeah, I am not a VR user, for a number of reasons, some cost related, some having to do with my vision issue, and mostly because the number of issues it seems to have leads me to the conclusion that it is very much a technology stuck in it's alpha/beta stage of development.

 

What's the old saying... Never fly the A model of anything.

[coreyhkh]

fantastic update now my only wish is for a more compact version of the hud that is less intrusive.

also with so many large graphic updates whats next to work on for the engine?

[oc2209]

12 hours ago, Dave said:

This whole post is off-topic for this thread. Repost it in a new thread if you like and I will happily explain why most of it is wrong.

 

No, thank you. I know how these types of arguments will go. We'll both find ways to repeat our original statements in ever more convoluted fashion, without really agreeing on anything.

 

Let's just leave with both of us assuming our perspectives are infallible, and never the twain shall meet.

[-332FG-SGTSAUSAGE138]

I also think the sun is too much. i dont mind glare looking at it but it doesn't matter where i look, if its early morning/late afternoon and im facing the direction of the sun the glare covers my screen.

 

[Rapierarch]

On 3/16/2022 at 9:38 AM, IckyATLAS said:

The problem here is how to replicate the light intensity of a star that we perceive with our eyes. In the previous version stars where in a way more realistic or more pointlike but this did not correspond to the feel that one has when looking at the stars in a dark moonless night. Because you cannot augment the intensity of a pixel the only thing you can do is to increase the surface to make it brighter. So yes they may be larger than they should but they convey better the feel of a clear starry sky. It is a matter of compromise.

 

In VR they really look gigantic. MSFS night sky is good. How did they manage it? 

I think it is a scale issue from pancake to VR. They really do not look like stars 

[[APAF]VR_Spartan85]

40 minutes ago, Rapierarch said:

 

In VR they really look gigantic. MSFS night sky is good. How did they manage it? 

I think it is a scale issue from pancake to VR. They really do not look like stars 

Yes.. feel like I’m surrounded by moons in the night sky… 

did my first night bombing mission with PWCG, it was really cool.. but I’d always get distracted by the closest planet.    If the moon was the size of a grape in the night sky.. the stars and planets are the size of peas… 

[IckyATLAS]

There are a lot of visual issues related to VR and I am asking myself if it is possible to have a one fits all solution.

It could well be that VR needs dedicated solutions or game versions. But then there is a problem. VR remains a very niche minority market.

Except for very few games that are really "VR only" there is not much, and those VR only games are pretty simple and have not been 100 million dollar blockbusters.

This means that it is VR technology who must progress and be compatible so that the installed base increases until dedicated high end games are economically attractive.

Flight sim is one of the genre that could gain a lot from VR, but VR is still not mature, complex to set up (hardware and/or software), has some physiological drawbacks and is too cumbersome.

[firdimigdi]

39 minutes ago, IckyATLAS said:

and those VR only games are pretty simple and have not been 100 million dollar blockbusters

 

https://store.steampowered.com/app/546560/HalfLife_Alyx/

 

Yeah, simple games like this that caused over 100000 Valve Indexes (and who knows how many from other brands) to be sold in a single year quarter.

 

Sweeping generalizations are amusing but ultimately serve no purpose.

 

The truth is that IL2 currently offers the best WW2 aircombat experience in VR and some of the best visuals in the genre in VR and definetely the best performance in the genre in VR. The fact that only 3 issues for VR (one of them was not even VR exclusive to start with) have been reported for the latest update (which is amazing considering the scope of the update) and the broad majority of people voicing their opinion about them are mostly in agreement is also true.

 

However, why a handful of people who do not play in VR and have nothing to gain or lose if these 3 issues are addressed keep piping up and offering dubious nuggets of wisdom around the matter is totally beyond my understanding.

 

Edited March 22, 2022 by Firdimigdi
typos

[IckyATLAS]

2 hours ago, Firdimigdi said:

Sweeping generalizations are amusing but ultimately serve no purpose.

You have a point here. I maybe wrong and probably wrong but it is my personal experience. There may be a few blockbusters out there fine, but let's be honest the number of comments I had from people that tried VR systems and had problems (can't stay long, headaches, tiring etc.) are the majority but yes it is in my sample and statistically It may not be relevant. I did try many generations of VR, and was never convinced to make the jump. I fly the DJI Phantom4 Pro with a helmet but you fly 20 minutes max per shot so that's okay.  My son has the Valve Index so I tried It, but sorry not convincing. They may have sold 100'000 but how many are used on a regular basis and how many after some time have been shelved. Not everybody can afford a powerful machine. So I may not be wrong that the game VR market still marginal.

Now as for the future, It is bright. The technology will continue to improve and as I said for Flight Sims only VR can recreate the full immersion. But some technical issues will have to improve. Extremely light headset, no cable, no base stations, zero lag with head motion, field of view lateral and vertical same as the natural one, resolution as good and crisp as with my 4K screen, no visible screendoor effect, no deformation on the out of the central image etc. Yes I know, you will tell me that I am asking for perfection. Maybe but this is what I have today with my 43" full 4K high quality calibrated screen. Once this comes to VR then you have me in because I will get an additional experience that I will not be able to get from my existing system. I refuse to give away visual quality for the VR 3d experience because it ruins my immersion. Do not forget that for many years I flew a lot of different planes and so I compare to real cockpits where I had a true VR flight experience. ? The bar is set very high.

Edited March 22, 2022 by IckyATLAS

[RedeyeStorm]

@IckyATLAS it all depends on your personal preferences. I started with a Oculus Rift and am now using an Index. I can safely say that I only play in VR. All the time. Pancake only games simply lose their appeal very quickly for me no matter how good they are. That high regulation you so enjoy just doesn’t make me ‘be’ there. It still is just a flat surface, a picture no more. In VR I am flying a plane. I can see how high I fly and enjoy the thrill of the ground rushing towards me in a dive etc. You get the picture. It still my opinion and enjoyment. 
 

The remark that VR games are a niche is old and not a very nice one to advocate to abandon or limit VR development. The best VR games can be played both in VR and Pancake. And there will be people that wil disagree with me on that. Il2 is in VR and if there is a problem with it, it should be reported and hopefully acted on by the devs. 

[Youtch]

3 hours ago, IckyATLAS said:

VR remains a very niche minority market.

I would be very curious to know which percentage of IL2 players do VR.

 

I think IL2 is one of the biggest VR community.

[BlitzPig_EL]

I would be surprised if it was more than 2 percent of the total population that actively plays.

[Jade_Monkey]

1 minute ago, BlitzPig_EL said:

I would be surprised if it was more than 2 percent of the total population that actively plays.

 

I think you will be surprised

[Gora_]

3 minutes ago, Youtch said:

I would be very curious to know which percentage of IL2 players do VR.

 

I think IL2 is one of the biggest VR community.

Indeed, but it seems that Devs don't test their patches on VR every time, what is strange for me... But still Il2 is quite ok experience in VR. When they optimize the netcode and get rid of strange spikes, maybe put some more cores of our CPU to work then someday it would be perfect!  

[BlitzPig_EL]

Unfortunately we have no way to confirm our conjectures on the VR population. It would be interesting to know the reality of it.

[firdimigdi]

33 minutes ago, IckyATLAS said:

Extremely light headset, no cable, no base stations, zero lag with head motion, field of view lateral and vertical same as the natural one, resolution as good and crisp as with my 4K screen, no visible screendoor effect, no deformation on the out of the central image etc. Yes I know, you will tell me that I am asking for perfection.

 

HMDs are already under 500gr and getting lighter, many have no base stations, some offer wireless connections, all have no lag with head motion, screendoor for at least two on the consumer market is a thing of the past for about a year now, resolution at max settings is on par with 4K displays. That leaves the issue of lenses on which both FOV and deformation depend (although the latter is corrected via software and depends on the curvature of the lenses). So, all you are asking for is basically the headsets that'll be around in a couple of years if development on them continues at the current rate.

 

As for market share, use percentage and all that stuff, look up the stats online if you are interested, they're compiled and disseminated on several sites out there. Last I checked only on Steam's stats VR usage had gone over 2%, basically doubled from the previous year.

 

33 minutes ago, IckyATLAS said:

Do not forget that for many years I flew a lot of different planes

 

It's impossible to forget that which I do not know.

 

All of the above though is meaningless in the context that brought us here: it's just 3 things that were mentioned (sun glare activating too easily for some HMDs [no one asked to eliminate it, just trigger it when it's closer to the center of your FOV], slightly expanded ju88 head limits so they don't trigger with just looking left and right, and toned down star size), instead we got a series of pointless lectures by people who finally don't even play in VR.

[Noisemaker]

When I can afford to upgrade my rig (hahahahah, right!), I intend to make the jump to VR for this sim alone (including FC).  In the meantime, I'm stuck in 2D.  As such, I have one tiny request regarding the stars (having flown several night missions in a row).  Can we have them twinkle a bit?  They're much too static.

[=SFG=capt_nasties]

am I the only one who has experienced frame rate loss / performance loss in VR?  

[SShrike]

Was there a secretive fix to the pilot fragility modelling? Since the update, I have managed a few ditchings that previously resulted in instant death. Anyone else experienced this potential fix? 

[Ribbon]

1 hour ago, =SFG=capt_nasties said:

am I the only one who has experienced frame rate loss / performance loss in VR?  

+1

[moeburn]

Has there been some change to draw distance?  Never had a problem with buildings completely disappearing until this update.  Just did a bombing run from 5000m where the entire target depot was completely invisible, and I mean invisible until I dropped down to about 3000m.  And it was night and day - zoom out and the buildings vanish, zoom in and they pop in.  I've done dozens of bombing runs from 5000m never once had a problem like that before.  And I'm noticing the same thing happening on ground attack missions - the target buildings pop in and pop out on a REALLY close distance.

 

I had draw distance set to 3x and graphics set to High, I changed them to 4x and Ultra because of this update but the bombing thing is really obvious and hard to explain any other way - targets were always perfectly visible from 5000m before, now they literally do not render and the game only renders the ground texture and the trees until I descend to 3000m 

[oc2209]

2 hours ago, Noisemaker said:

 As such, I have one tiny request regarding the stars (having flown several night missions in a row).  Can we have them twinkle a bit?

 

Ooh, that would be positively dreamy.

 

Every once in a while, I'd also like a shooting star.

 

I'm only half-kidding.

 

1 hour ago, SShrike said:

Was there a secretive fix to the pilot fragility modelling? Since the update, I have managed a few ditchings that previously resulted in instant death. Anyone else experienced this potential fix? 

 

I never had a problem with ditching.

 

I still have the occasional 'nick an enemy plane at high speed with only your propeller = instant pilot kill' though, so I don't believe the physics bugs are gone.

[newbravado]

I would hear about how cramped the 109 cockpit is. It looked roomy to me in the game on my flat screen, so I'll take your word for that.

Then I got VR, oh boy. Now I know what they mean by cramped cockpit. In VR, you are inside that plane, just like a real pilot would see it.

 

There's a bit of re-learning that goes into VR, but it's totally worth it.

The one advantage you have in VR is spatial relationships, that help with aiming.

The biggest disadvantages is checking six, since "six" is really is behind you, and spotting due to aliasing at distance etc.

Still for me it's worth it.

 

[-332FG-Gordon200]

@newbravado Welcome to the VR world. Install this mod (works with mods off) to check your six in VR - 

 

[Yogiflight]

7 hours ago, newbravado said:

It looked roomy to me in the game on my flat screen, so I'll take your word for that.

It looks roomy in 2D, if you fly with minimal zoom. But that is completely unrealistic anyway. You have to zoom in about 2/3, then you have about the view you would have in the real cockpit, just in 2D and the peripheral viewing missing, as your monitor isn't wide enough for that. I always find it funny, that people fly with minmal zoom, to have the best possible FOV and then complain, that the cockpit looks like a concourse.

[Sneaksie]

4.703c patch

• Excessive image posterization when the player is wounded at graphics presets lower than Ultra has been fixed;
• Vignette effect color posterization at graphics presets lower than Ultra and enabled Cinematographic Camera option has been reduced;
• Visible star size has been reduced, especially in VR;
• 'Black hole' artifacts removed from the night sky;
• Light blinding from the sun has been reduced;
• Ju 88 C-6 gaps were fixed;
• Ju 88 C-6 first person view limits increased (the default snapview file has been updated so you might need to delete the current Ju 88 C-6 one and copy the default one from data\luascripts\snapviews\default);
• Ju 88 C-6 crew oxygen masks shouldn't appear and disappear again when flying at a high altitude;
• Havoc and Hawks campaigns were updated to correspond to the new (more accurate) dawn and sunset times.

[BMA_FlyingShark]

Again, thank you for your hard work.

Have a nice day.

 

[RedeyeStorm]

That is customer service!

[Jason_Williams]

Guys,

 

Just a reminder, any time we "improve" the picture, there is a chance performance will decrease some. We do our best to mitigate this, but it is inevitable. We hope this Hotfix will not hurt performance.

 

Jason

[Ribbon]

Thank you for reducing sun blinding!?

Really great and quick response to the feedback?

Edited March 23, 2022 by =VARP=Ribbon

[FTC_horsky]

Sincerely big thank you team!!!!

VR Banding is history!

[Jade_Monkey]

Thanks a lot for the hard work!!

[firdimigdi]

39 minutes ago, Jason_Williams said:

Guys,

 

Just a reminder, any time we "improve" the picture, there is a chance performance will decrease some. We do our best to mitigate this, but it is inevitable. We hope this Hotfix will not hurt performance.

 

Jason

 

Didn't notice any performance hit in a quick 8 vs 8 test over the Rheinland map in broken clouds, if it's there it might be miniscule. And the result is simply amazing in VR! I already loved the new clouds and lighting but now that there's no banding to be seen even on the clouds it's pretty amazing. Congrats to everyone involved.

[Rapierarch]

Jesus you are fast! Thanks!

[Thorne]

Great job team, as always!

[Irishratticus72]

Great, now I want a "Havoc and Hawks" campaign. 

[Daisy_Blossom]

Thank you devs! ❤️

[T24_Martin]

I'm impressed, as always! Your work and continous improvement of this game as well as your focus on this community is outstanding!

 

Thank you for making this sim my favourite game!