Waiting time

We can only guess the real reason for the next patch delay, be it that bugs are not fixed yet (and if not all of them, don't the developers have anything fixed?), or waiting for the USA release, or something else.

In any case, this delay is bad for the "moral".
Personally I haven't launched the game since the release of the beta patch, waiting to see what this beta patch brings to us, but to no joy. It feels like, being stuck in beta patch is worse than being in a previous release version, as a beta patch means that we're close to fixing problems, thus it's like shouting "wait a minute, game will become better shortly". And this "minute" has taken long :-(

Where is the next patch, we're bored to death...

Amazing detail!

Well, I flew a bit over London and crashed my BF on some buildings and here it was this picture, a random building (maybe a pub?), with a poster on it!

Amazing level of detail!

What I also noticed is that flying (alone) over London, wasn't that bad in terms of performance.
Let's see how it'll work with more planes in the air.

Understanding propellers

Here is an excellent video, that I found in 1C's forum, explaining the use of propellers.

Benchmarking 1.00.14101

OK, here we are back from Easter holidays, checking patch 1.00.14101.

I did some FPS benchmarking, using ingame's system (fps START SHOW) on following video settings:

Video settings

What I got is Average: 55, Maximum: 129, Minimum: 14, which I consider decent especially to pre-patch situation.

My system is following:
Intel i-2500k at 3.6Ghz
ATI HD6850 1GB
8GB ram
Win 7 64bit

Now waiting for new patch, which will hopefully improve situation (actually the minimum FPS is what needs to be fixed).

Il-2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover: Patch 1.00.14072 -ARIL 15

OK, I did spend an hour in this patch and feelings are mixed.
First of all I need to make clear that I'm still setting up the controls and actually I still haven't found the way to do a lot of things.

So, I installed the beta patch and ran the game.
It seems that fps are better and there is much less stuttering, but still, when you're over land you feel like having an old pc. And this comes from me that I just spent 1.000 euros for a new pc, for this game!
So, what do we get here? We spend 1.000 euros for a new pc that can play at max settings any other game (including Crysis 2 and all latest major titles) and we can't play Clod over land even though video settings are not maxed out? That's not good. Not good at all.
Nevertheless, I do hope that developers will rush things and soon we'll be able to play it without problems.

Some other remarks:
- Windmills working...nice :)
- How the heck do we understand that we hit the enemy plane? It seems that you don't see the hits.
- I don't know other people's opinion, but although the graphics from within the cockpit are wonderful, when it comes to external views they are so...medium. They almost feel worse than 1946's ones.

What's the best part?
Some may not agree, but the best part to me is that game is difficult. It's not the game that every fps guy will join and think they can be an ace in a couple of weeks. Simply as that, not all of us will become aces and those who will, will become only after a lot of work and many hours online.



This should be the official hoodie for Clod

Getting back to the beta patch, it is an improvement over past, but still not as good as it must be.
For your info: i-2500k, ati hd6850, 6gb ram.

New patch coming!

Today's update from Ilya was nice :)

First of all he made us feel safer with regards to the mods problem, although his suggested protection is not what we wanted, as it seems that Hyperlobby support may not exist, or be at "our own responsibility".
Something like "if you want to fly in Hyperlobby, then it's your problem to find a solution against cheaters".
Now, considering that Steam is not nearly half as good as Hyperlobby (or at least that what we feel after being there for 10 years...), the question is:
Can Jiri Fojtasek find a solution against cheaters if we use Hyperlobby?
We should consider this as a top priority imho.

Back to the upcoming patch now.

1. Further improvements to framerate in regards to the terrain engine. The improvement promises to be the most drastic yet, but since it’s currently split in half between two different machines we won’t have a more precise idea of the FPS gain until later today or early Friday.
2. SSAO is optional, a checkbox in Video Options.
3. Texture manager split into a separate core, which does wonders for performance on 4+ cores but offers no improvement on two cores.
4. Texture quality slider added to video options.
5. New Steam Lobby feature as an alternative to existing Server search.
6. Improvements to the Quick Mission Builder feature.
7. Large number of various changes in aircraft and cockpits

All of these additions sound like that game is coming to a playable condition and most probably we'll be able to move from this hectic status.
Especially this 4+ cores performance boost is the best news I could hear :)
And, if it proves to be a version that 70%-80% of the users play it without problems, then it'll be a huge success for Ilya and the rest of the developing team!
Let's wait and give the congrats when the time comes!



People protesting, asking for Hyperlobby support



Mods already

When I first noticed that core files are packaged with SFS method, I understood that game is "open" to almost anyone. Back in IL-2, when this method was hacked, it was the last nail to the coffin of online wars, as the already damaged trust between members, after some cheaters' exploits, never recovered.

And what do we get now? Well, community member Kegetys has made some performance improvement mods and offered them to the desparate for a playable game community (check here).
This leads us to many thoughts, such as, why wouldn't the developers offer these tweaks to make the game better playable and what's their plan to "protect" online gaming, since mods are here from beta period already! Actually, is there any real plan to protect online gaming? We'll have to wait and see.

In any case, we do hope that improvement tweaks will be included in next official patch, so all of the community starts to spend their time on the game and not on how to make it playable.

New mod specially made to get Batros back to the game.