08.12.2016
Last week was an important one for the project - it was the first week of the new beta version test that includes all the major optimizations tied to the DirectX 11 transition. Our expectations turned out to be true: while FPS in simple scenes (i.e. you're flying alone and there are no other objects around) hasn't changed much, FPS in complex scenes, which were the most problematic from the performance point of view, increased by 2 - 2.5 times. Such complex scenes include dogfights with many planes, taxiing and taking off from crowded airfields with many aircraft and other objects in the scene. This news is really good for us, because now we're confident that the huge resources and effort spent for implementing the newer version of DirectX has paid off in full and brought good results. As Jason said in the TeamSpeak event, we are hopeful the increased performance can allow us to also further improve the visuals over time without a large impact on performance.
01.12.2016
Years ago, the original Sturmovik title motivated the community to produce dozens of wonderful historically based scripted campaigns. There were both official and community Campaign projects. These Campaigns were available on forums, were included in big releases or sold as separate add-ons in various countries. They added a lot to the original Sturmovik experience for all users.
We wanted to revive this tradition for some time now, and, as you may have learned from Battle of Kuban announcement, we planned to offer new historical (scripted) Campaigns simultaneously with its release. However, we later decided to not postpone playing this mode and release the first Campaign as early as this year.
We are proud to announce that today we open the new historical Campaign "Ten Days of Autumn" Pre-Order for IL-2 Sturmovik: Battle of Moscow.
01.12.2016
We'd like to tell you about our plans in the medium term regarding the Fw-190. We'll begin working on the Fw-190 A-5 relatively soon, at the end of winter, and when we do that we’ll have a chance to also correct the existing Fw-190 A-3 flight model, taking all the data we have recently acquired into account.
The aircraft we recreate in our sim flew more than 70 years ago and this is a long time. Aviation historians have written many books on this aircraft in general. However, many original documents were either lost or there is no way to access them in government archives where they are kept. That's why such documents are interesting for us and sometimes are found only after the work on a plane in question is already finished. Such documents are needed to correct flight model after release and sometimes when we use data from those documents they introduce significant changes.
15.11.2016
The work on version 2.005 is finished and we present it to you. It doesn't bring as many changes as the last version did, but it does bring a new, long awaited Collector Plane – the Soviet Yak-1b fighter. Our personal feelings about this plane is that it is a pleasure to fly and it completes a maneuver strictly and precisely, be it a barrel roll or a loop. It is highly maneuverable, handles predictably during all flight phases and doesn't make a pilot life more miserable than it has to be. Its powerful weaponry gives it a kick while the pilot will enjoy the excellent field of view in spite of Soviet plexiglass quality being inferior to German or American materials. A Yak-1b pilot is significantly more protected from small caliber bullets and shell fragments when compared to earlier fighters. And the most important thing is that it is beautiful! :)
15.11.2016
This week we started beta testing of version 2.005 that will bring Yak-1b Series 127 Collector Plane. The testing goes well and we hope that we we'll be able to release the new version (and the Collector Plane to those who pre-purchased it) next week. We'd like to remind you that Yak-1b Series 127 pre-order offer is still in effect, including 25% OFF discount and a unique skin that will be available only to customers who pre-purchased it. The Pre-order offer is valid until the release of this plane, so if you considered getting it please don't postpone your decision.