Anybody else played this game ? I dug up my Saitek X45 while rummaging through the garage last month and this game is probably one of the few that will work over the X45's many many buttons ( the Throttle alone already has 2 HATs, 2 trims, 3 master modes,3 auxiliary toggles, 1 weapons button,1 mouse button, rudder control and of course the throttle )



I forgot how much fun it is to fly a seat-of-the-pants WW2 airframe
( flew the G4M Betty Bomber, the D3A1, and the Zero extensively, though I have flown most of the other airframes as well all in max simulation ) screenshots when I get time to set it up here, the physics and damage system is just second to none ( trumps Microsoft combat flight simulator ) the skins are also mod friendly ( bmp ) and it's voice command through the mic.

what I don't like is that it's lacking in playable japanese aircraft ( only 5 general kinds ) the zero ( A6m Series ) Val Dive Bomber ( D3A1 1937 ) & the Betty Medium Bomber ( G4M3 ) the only plane to carry the type 91s are the unwieldy G4s ( not the val ) the B5M/B5N/B6N where not playable ( sadly )

it does however have an excellent line of US fighters & bombers including one of my personal faves the A20 which is basically a ground attack plane, with speeds rivaling that of most fighters but can't turn for shit


Flying at night is absolutely hard ! even with the "speedbar" ( digital "cheat" that displays speed, heading an altitude without having to use the instrument panel, kinda like a HUD on the lower left side of the screen ) how the aviators of WW2 did it is beyond me, dead reckoning through the night to find a god dam carrier is a daunting task, not to mention ..... the AI flight doesn't turn off their frigin NAV lights and draws flak & fighters like crazy.

The Pearl Harbor Assault Was harder than I taught, it takes a while to get the hang of dive bombing by eyeballing, no smart bombs here and yes I've missed the ships by miles at a 60 degree dive with full dive brakes and bomb/gun sights on the ship going lengthwise ! not to mention the full simulation is a 65 minute fly by dead reckoning the Hawaiian radio chatter affair.

Flying in close formation can be hazardous .....specially with external views turned off



Carrier Landing Training flight ( and I'm doing this without vertex shaders on, imagine it on none laptops ? )


Tailhook's down ......flaps are at 15 % .....forgot to put gears down .....



pretty good game I think.

if it have a Zero i like it...

kiosk... you changing jobs... and this... you arent joining the Air Force right?

i had bought that game before i had a joysick. was hard to play tbh. but i got a Saitek X52 before circuit city around here closed for good. so i snagged my current keyboard, my joy stick and a few other things over the span of 2 months. good deals great stuff.

It's not hard to play, just tweak around with the settings you like, for example, I use a non detailed engine start for my fighter campaign and also I don't have blackout/redout on that already helps a lot, but if it still gets a lil tough take out wind/drag and gyro effect ( specially for single engine planes, gyro effect is a bitch ) I have a few more screens :

Climbing out of a torpedo run from 10 meters above deck trying to climb away before the essex class gunners shifted upwards ( from trying to hit us down on the deck ) , torpedo released at correct angle trying to get away from AA guns


Left Waist Gunner Killed, Top Gunner Killed,Tail Gunner Badly Wounded, Elevators are all but gone, Rudder is GONE, Engine 1 ( left ) is damaged badly, large holes in left wing, fuel tank leak,


did I mention holes in the wing ? :O lost all fuel in the left wing ( thankfully without igniting a fire )

White "mist" is fuel venting into the air, smoke from number 1 engine ( had to reduce number 1 engine's throttle to 75 % and open the radiator cowl )


and don't ask about the zero escorting us .... he took 1 shell from a large caliber AA gun, sliced off the left wing at the root, he attempted to bail but "kamikazed" into the essex


the essex sank finally, after the 3rd flight managed to launch torpedoes ( 2nd flight was mauled by hellcat fighters, yes i selfishly used them as decoy )

kiosk U MEAN BASTARD. just say them to kamikaze into the carrier at water height. problem fixed

nah let em do it them selves, there own fault for being targets XD

why are you landing on the carrier from the bow.....i mean ya the early Essex were able to launch over the stern and land over the bow but they found that useless.....

I was dry humpin the carrier with a low pass, it takes a bit of concentration to make the pass from the stern, flaps out, 12 % throttle, canopy open ( just in case something wrong ) tail hook down, low ball approach, with either a pedal ( rudder ) or aileron correction to gyro spin. I even managed to land it in a simulated gear failure, and I landed it in an inclement weather scenario with the decks heaving sideways by a few degrees.



Anyway, I just finished my flight leader ( Taisho-i ) paint scheme for the Betty G4M type 11 ( Imperial Japanese Army Airforce Naval Attached Flight Leader ) & the Val D3A1 type 3 ( Imperial Japanese Navy Airforce - Kaga Squadron "Vet" paint scheme as flown by Kiyomasa Kato )



Yeh my tail gunner got wacked, that's his canopy shattering, this is why attempting a kamikaze run doesnt always pay off, the amount of machinegun and flak coming at you is just .....incredible ( even when I flew in from 0 meters the gun battery splash to the water almost chokes off the plane, in one case ALL my crew died except the pilot, the copilot was dead too.

very nice, i like the paint schemes

The 3 stripes on the Val denote the carrier it came from in this case the Kaga ( 1 stripe was Akagi, 2 Stripe Was Shokaku ) I'm working on a special A6M zero skin ( GoD mode ! ) based off the 1944/45 Night Raider camo of "Golden Dragon" fame, which was flown by Tetsuzo Iwamoto who had 94 solo kills including 14 in China, personal diary accounts for a total of 202 kills It's a dark grey/black paint scheme ( I'm throwing in a GoD emblem somewhere )

Dang you kiosk. I just dusted off my old joystick and downloaded this. Hope you get on vent so we can fly together.

i'm going to try, I've been playing a bit but single player and skinning here and there. hopefully my ports aint blocked. I should be able to give it a go tonight, I know I can finish off the Zero Skin in about 10 minutes.

Preliminary Skin For The Hikotai ( Flight ) Leader - Shokaku ( Needs Wear & Tear )



Single White Band On The Tail


Hmm Night fighter version ( 1944/45 ) will be in after the weathering effect gets layered in. ( tail number is 03 ) Pilot face needs a lil custom work, and inner flap surface needs some rust or color,

Man, some hard controls on this game.

Yah, I haven't even used some of the specified keys ( such as multiple engine management & manual bombsight input ) just learn the basics ( & remap if possible to your joystick ) I mainly have been doing the bomber campaigns so I have the following mapped to my extra buttons : auto pilot, auto pilot for crew, tail hook, chocks off, canopy, wheel brakes, map, and HAT set to none-snap ( F9 ) it's fun once you learn it, scale the realistic settings down to easy first, then once you get a few flights in, start toggling off a few things. I was doing some snap rolls and snap dives just admiring my photoshoped skin, trying to figure out what to add next .... and ....my wing snapped off WARNING near 700 km/h dives and quick pull up kills you so fast you dont have time to bail !

Yeah I've messed with remapping some of the keys, but i still have to manually up the gears and I'm terrible at level flight. And it really stinks doing the whole like 20 min flight to get to the dogfight on this mission im on, then get popped outta the sky and be lost lol. I am having some fun with it though. Is there really no servers to play online ?

PS, the plane looks sweet.

well, yeh you need to hit the gear key, but the flight can be shortened in 2 ways, 1 is to have a key bind to toggle the time (1/4,1/2,normal,x2,x4,x8) which toggles the speed ( fast forward, and slow mo I have this on adjacent buttons ) I mainly use it on 4x or 2x when I'm going between short waypoints ( like the ones near the target of a mission ) as for longer cruises you can bind the "time skip" key this basically makes your screen blank black and shows a small flight time in minutes on the lower right hand side, it's supposed to be used with autopilot so keep those two keys handy. I take it you are flyin the U.S. planes ? ( my fave is the A20 attacker, much more along the lines of the Mosquito, it's got guns, it has bombs, it's fast enough ) but the SBD is a nice bird and the F4 & F6 are both tough as nails ( I supposed I can mod a skin for you just tell me which bird & possibly what she needs ) and yeh I haven't found any, and the ports are blocked off on my end though so I probably just couldn't detect them.

btw if you aren't used to your plane yet in terms of dogfighting, just set the time speed to 1/2 or 1/4th when you engage and are about to shoot, it gives you more time to familiarize yourself with the "piss angle" of your guns and how much lead you need when the enemy is making a turn or diving/ climbing away. you will get used to it ( we don't have real fighter pilot input such as G force and the abillity to lean forward into the sights without fiddling with keys so the slo mo lets us multi task a bit )

i am starting to like that game...
the bad part is that i dont think i can run it in my PC...
the good part is...
IL-2 Sturmovik: Birds of Prey
Release Date: Sep 15, 2009
for xbox 360...



also Heroes Over Europe look like it will be another nice one (not much of simulator and more like mission based)

The only drawback to a console port over is that you lose a lot of functionality, I was flying the U.S. ( USAAF / USAAC ) A-10 ( USMC D-2 ) and part of the fun is multi engine assesment when you take hits ( for example my Ailerorns where shot out and the plane keeps making a steep portside bank, I applied airbrakes to slow it down, then deployed flaps at 2% to "even out" the lift & help my damaged elevators a bit, then reduced the throttle on the right side to about 82% max power to lose lift on one side while keeping the left side max power with the radiator/cowl armor open, the aircraft evened out, and I managed to limp home with 1 supply ship, 3 AA, and 1 zero in my kill list. ( okinawa mission )

Yeah I'm figuring out more and more. Yeah i've been mostly messing around with the US missions. I dont wanna take up your time with a skin if I dont really get into this game. Im hoping we can get into a server and fly sometime.