Yay
When you begin the Historical campaign you'll be prompted to choose which one of operation's phases you want to start in


Sounds like the campaign will have some depth.

Boo

Your progress to the next phases depends on successful completion of missions in each phase.

What is this, Call of Duty? If you don't destroy three bombers out of six because your dumb AI wingmen didnt do their job, you have to redo? If you don't destroy the bridge, you can't go to the next mission? Because in real life, pilots had to keep going back to the same target, add infinitum, until they destroyed it? Rubbish.

Yay

When you enter a phase you'll be asked to join a regiment. The regiments available vary from phase to phase the way it happened back then during Battle of Stalingrad: some squadrons leave, some come to the front lines, join other units or get renamed. Which regiment you choose defines which side you server with - Soviet Air force or German Luftwaffe. You'll be free to change sides before every mission.

Good for replayability. Sounds like the single player mode in CoD where you can jump into any side or any aircraft when you start a mission. Interesting to see how this will work in a campaign context, but very creative.

Yay

Every regiment has a home base and specific aircraft in service. You can use any plane that your regiment has available. Remember, that a plane's design defines the type of mission you'll be offered to play. If you choose a fighter, ground attack or bomber the gameplay will be different which helps us bring you three different flight-sim experiences. The types of missions that are offered are very diverse and give you the freedom to choose one that suits you best. Some players prefer intense dogfights or ground assaults against armor or massive bombing raids hitting transportation lines or troops.

Ahh, ok, that sounds cool

Boo

Weather is taken into account as well. We've preset certain rules for weather in every phase.

Dynamic weather would have been nice, but this is better than the 'no weather' we got in CoD!

Yay?

Along with you and your AI controlled enemies, a whole bunch of other AI planes will be active in every mission. You may meet friendly or enemy units flying by, scouting, bombing or fighting each other. Both the air and ground will be filled with action and your mission won't be fought by you alone, but with friendly AI crews. Should you engage a hostile recon unit? Will you try to help a pair of friendlies outnumbered by an enemy squad? Can you protect a group of ground assault planes from a sudden attack? It is up to you to decide, but remember - you're on your own mission with its own priorities!

This is a very qualified 'yay'. Big Yay if the AI is good, Very Small Yay if the AI is dumb. Nothing destroys immersion more than a bunch of dumb AI getting in your way or bumping into each other in the sky a la War Thunder.

And I'd love some more detail on the ground objects and vehicles, and their AI. WIll they be smart or dumb. WIll the ground war be visible or invisible...will the landscape be littered with ground targets eg tanks engaging tanks and vehicle convoys and trains criss crossing the landscape or empty as a Siberian tundra.

Yay

3) Every time you launch you'll be offered to choose between Online and Offline modes - choose Online to play Online;

4) To play Historical campaign and obtain all bonus content we're preparing you need to be connected. The network bandwidth requirements are really low and the amount of sent/received data is minimal. This is how we ensure that the provided experience in Campaign is absolutely original and everyone's progress is fair;

It's up to you to choose between Online and Offline modes, however the Historical campaign is only available Online, it is the key component of the initial game and it brings you over 70% of the overall new IL-2 Sturmovik experience.

5) The Quick Mission Builder and Custom Single Player Missions are 100% available in offline mode without restrictions of any kind;

This setup suits me fine as I do most of my gaming at home, not on the road. I know there are people who hate any forced requirement to be online, because it means they can't play from their EMP proof survivalist bunker, so this will annoy some people.

Boo

But a big boo depending on how it is implemented. If my mission freezes or drops out or I lose my progress if I lose online connectivity, I will spew huge chunks of online ire. Nothing sheets me more than battling your way to target, getting your kill, nursing your wounded machine/player/tank/kite halfway home and then getting a lag problem or wifi dropout and losing it all.

I read that and was bummed too, but I'm hoping what they mean by "successful completion" means what it means in the Rise of Flight career, i.e. you finish the mission without dying and move on to the next (not that you have to kill X number of targets to move on).

In other words, the next phases of the campaign won't be available to you until you complete the first phase. Still not ideal (why limit people?) but not nearly as terrible as having to fly the same mission over and over until you "win".

Lots of people with same worry as you and I are posting their feelings over in that latest developer thread, hopefully our concerns will prove unwarranted.

Having to complete the mission before moving to the next one is a mistake. Its certainly not historical. Most single missions weren't critical to the success of the war. The "best" option and most historical option is the player's option to move on or not. I really don't care if a player plays historically or not, its all about having options. Options make more players enjoy their experience, and help make the sim a success. If the developer is worried about "stats" then there could be a penalty of sorts. Flyer's success depended on their ability, but ask any WW2 ace, or read their accounts, it also included a whole "shyte" load of Luck aswell.

An impressive yay and boo list HeinKill

Don't see many lists of this sort these days

Good post Heinkill and I'm mostly in agreement with your 'Boos and Yays'

When I first heard that this sim would be based on the BOS my heart sank as the scenario holds very little interest for me personally. Along with that I think it's been done to death ie the original IL2. I'm in the minority I know but I'm still hoping for a decent campaign based Korean war sim with Migs v Sabres etc. One day maybe!

Having said that the last couple of weekly dev diaries for BOS have made me sit up and take notice and I'm now looking forward with interest to see what develops with the sim.

I think it sounds good.

To be honest, my biggest beef is that 777 said they still aren't developing ground troops. I'm ready to see a real ground war going on to add to the immersion instead of scattered static objects.

There should be a lot of ground pounding in this sim with the planes being modeled.

I'm sure we will see plenty of tanks, trucks, cars, trains, artillery, gun emplacements etc. for our ground pounding pleasure.

Yes, but it will be pretty sterile if we don't even get people debussing and legging it for cover when vehicles are attacked (as in the old IL2)
Hope they include this feature.. fingers crossed!

I can't believe, really- I can't believe, that in 2013 developers are STILL creating flight simulations without some sort of dynamic campaign engine.

I can't believe that in 2013 there is only ONE developer left in the entire world who can find funding to build a hardcore prop sim of any kind let alone actually attempt to build it. Don't trash it before you fly it, otherwise this will probably be it.

Jason

You know that until 2013 only 6 in word "six" Sims had a dynamic canpaign...RB3D, EF2000, Longbow 2, F4 and EECH(all before or 2000) and CFS3/OFF-Mod(2002)...
For me, no big surprise...cause the great age of dynamic campaigns were when? Right...more than 10 years ago...

Thx for the tipp from Heinkill, yes BoB has a dynamic campaign also...(theres a gap in my sim career, never flight this one...)
And i looked into my shelf, Tornado (1993) had a dynamic campagn also...
So the counter says 8 now...not pretty much in 20 years of simming...

BoB2 should be added to your list, but that doesnt change your point much, it was a 2005 sim, though much updated, as recently as 2013.

Yes a dynamic campaign would be great, but I like the way BoS is shaping up - at least the devs realise the demand for a good single player experience.

H

RoF's beta campaign is dynamic in that it can never be replayed if you start a new career, replaying the same mission is the same but that hardly defines it as not dynamic.

Dynamic is a broad definition and can be interpreted in many different fashions.

You're making my point for me.

A dynamic campaign isn't some sort of new technology. It was perfectly possible to create dynamic campaigns even given the limitations of computers 10 years ago (or more) and yet, despite all the additional computing power we have today it seems like the single player experience is regressing rather than moving forward.

In my opinion, the reason why Rise of Flight doesn't completely and utterly dominate the WW1 flight sim market is because the single player experience is far superior in Over Flanders Fields...despite the limitations inherent in it being a mod for CFS3, having a horrible UI, and looking like #%&*$# compared to RoF. The underlying reason is because of the dynamic campaign running in the background of CFS3/OFF.

If you're building a flight sim from the ground up, and you KNOW how successful a dynamic campaign can be, why not design your sim to feature something along the lines of CFS3/OFF from the beginning? Players demand this over and over and over on flight sim forums.

I'll admit, I just don't understand the thinking behind the design decision to not follow the well-trodden ground of optimizing the single player experience through a dynamic campaign.

Its because there are people with 'new ideas', and they always 'know best'... (not)
As a mainly offline player I'd love to see more emphasis on that experience, but in all games now it seems to be mainly MP orientated...

Well, OFF is a mod. So in that case, you should compare it to PWCG - which by all accounts that I've heard is pretty outstanding.

Yes it is, I use it a lot!

I suspect having to "complete" the mission will mean surviving as it does in ROF. Reflying after your death is up to you, not being able to continue to the next mission unless you survive is reasonable imo.

I have to sometimes wonder if the people who trash ROF's career mode have actually played it, or rather they're just basing their opinion on what others have told them.