First impressions of BoS

Public IL-2 Battle of X (BoX greatest battles series)
1

Well, what can I say, not very impressed. Some of these issues might just be a matter of setting things up, but here goes.

First off, I hate it when I buy what is supposed to be a simulator and I can’t fly the planes that’s included because I have to “unlock” things to be allowed into the cockpit. Perhaps I should just have bought the premium edition, but blah.

Well, I got it set up with the correct resolution, got my joystick working, had to reverse throttle for some reason, but apart from that it was kind of ok. Flew quick missions (Lagg-3 vs 109F), works ok, but I have some serious issues.
The biggest problem is that apparantly the horizon over Stalingrad is a ring of light! Looking down at ground is ok, looking up in the air (as far as the game allows you to look, more on that in a minute) is ok, sun looks good, have a decent effect on what happens when you look straight into it. But the f-ing horizon is brighter then the sun (that was higher up in the mission I flew)! This makes it almost impossible to see the opposition as soon as he’s more then a couple of hundred meters away on the same level.

Second problem is working with TIR, I can only look maybe 60 deg straight up. No problem looking 180 deg to the sides. This also makes it very hard to track an opponent when you’re turning with him. Instead you have a cheat at the inlayed compass (probably possible to hide, but you need it as your neck is apparantly damaged). I also had a laggy feeling with TIR, if going from looking in one direction to moving the head, it hesitated just for a moment, but enough that it irritated me. Don’t get that in other sims, and are not even sure I got it all the time in BoS or just at the end.

What more, I only got zoom in/out to work with the mouse, but I didn’t try all that hard.

It feels like I have a big lag on the trigger, not so much at the start of the press, but after release it keeps firing, admittatly not for long, just enough that it’s impossible for me to squeeze off just a round or two, it’s always a larger burst.

All these things does turn me off, but wether I bother to spend more time on it will depend upon the shining horizon issue. If that is fixable, I might just give it some more time, if not I’m not sure I will bother to keep it installed at all.

2

start by

removing hdr (helps spotting contacts)
and cinematics (remove blur)

then give yourself just some time to get used to it!
i fell clumsy and awkward flying it, but the same i felt with Clod at the beginning and now i fit in it like a glove!

personally i don’t like:
the ground, seems like a cartoon to me
cokpits (but overall not so bad)
CEM and not clikkable cokpit…

i like
graphic effects (smokes and the canopy with all it’s reflexes)
feel of weight and plane inertia
sound and speed feeling

there’s a trick to unlock things by running campaign mission at 2x time with autopilot… It’s childish but that’s it…

try flying with different wether and other times of the day…

PS looking in the sun is terrible… (bouncing targets out of the sun should work well here)
and it’s much more difficult to look back…!

3

I have som similiar issues.

Bad stuff:
[ul][li]Don’t like that you have to fly the campaign to unlock stuff, the campaign is always crap.[/li][li]The Lagg 3 just spins on the ground unless you get a setting right - can not see how this setting is causing the aircraft to just spin though[/li][li]Trim can not be assigned to an axis - why the hell not? [/li][li]Can not use a shift key on my joystick to double up the buttons - don’t think it recognises a mode change either. This seems really poorly thought out when you think that the people that tend to fly these things now have complex HOTAS arrangements.[/li][li]The cockpits look wrong, Cliffs of Dover looks a lot better, and you can not use the mouse to click of hover over anything. With all the instruments in Russian or German I have absolutely no idea what they are or what they are telling me.[/li][li]I have no idea whether my radiators are open or not. Nothing seems to happen except my engine dies after about ten minutes of running.[/li][li]When you start the engine it makes you look at the floor of the cockpit, no idea why. I can not stop looking at the floor until I let go of the button - if I let go of the button too early the engine does not start.[/li][/ul]
Good stuff:
[ul][li]I do like the ground though, the water looks excellent[/li][li]The aircraft are easy to spot an identify[/li][li]The trees can not be flown through anymore. Hit a tree and you crash.[/li][li]I like the flight model, it feels good.[/li][li]I like tha the Bf109 does not have P-51 like visibility - unlike in Cliffs of Dover where they can see everything because they decided not to put the armour plate in.[/li][li]I have cannon on pretty much all of the aircraft! He-111’s go down very quickly as a result![/li][li]Zoom on a slider - something CLoD badly needs![/li][/ul]
The thing that bugs me most is the controls. It’s piss poor in this day and age not to support proper controllers that people have invested in and have been using for some time. It’s all well and good wanting to attract new people with a £20 stick but that shouldn’t be to the detriment of those that have been playing in sims for years.

OD

4

Unlock the extras(planes or skins)
Select a mission in Campaign mode, set as Normal difficulty, start the mission and press A key (autopilot) and 2x time.
Take a break, work, read a book until the mission end.
Repeat more times.

There is a sticky post in 51forum (the first up) with more tricks and settings, only in italian…Google translator can help.

5

If you don’t see advertisement about flaps up or down, gear, throttle % etc. Press H key (hide/show status info)

6

I’m warming up slightly to it after having flown a couple of campaign missions (short ones, starting in air, flying on autopilot 2x speed until meeting enemy, then doing the fighting before letting autopilot bring the plane to the exit point).

I forgot to change the settings before I started so I did it after a couple of missions. The problem is that when trying to exit BoS it gets stuck, nothing happens at all for a very long time, and when I CTRl-Alt-Del to get out, it makes the PC black-screen. I still get noice from pressing buttons etc, but can no longer see anything. Extremely annoying. Had to reboot to get out of it this last time. :mad:

7

Changed to Jimmis settings, and it did make it better. And for some reason it didn’t lock up the last time. :slight_smile:

It doesn’t feel totally like a sim (maybe because I fly on normal settings in campaign), but the flying is pretty decent as is the fighting.
And I have finally unlocked the IL-2, so I have to try some ground attack missions in that one! :smiley:

8

Hi all.
I really like the sim/game. Flight model feels very good from low speed to fast, to very fast.
Some short comings though.

Stall is nice, but I can’t spin the 109F4??? This seems highly unrealistic to me. I would think an aircraft as powerful as the 109 would spin like crazy at high revs, in a left spin.
But perhaps there are some test flights confirming the opposite?
But I do like that rudder must be used to keep the skid/slip ball entered and that one must use a boot full of rudder at high angles of attack/very slow flight with high ATA.

Engine management is a must as the engine will burn out quickly when above 1.3 ATA. I usually limit my power to 1.2 ATA with the occasional increase to 1.3 if needed. But never above 1.3 ATA!
These above setting also apply to the FW190A3.

I also tried the HE111 for a short flight and damaged my Right engine. It finally quit and I found the FM in asymmetric flight REVERSED???
I had to apply rudder into the failed engine to fly straight and stop the roll. This is NOT correct! You always apply rudder towards the operating engine(the one generating thrust).
I will have a go soon again just to verify, since I only flew it a short while this way.

So they have some work to do and perhaps I’ll send them an email with my findings once I’ve tried some more. Please feel free to test the twins on a single engine to confirm the above.

But besides those gripes, I must say the sim has potential.

Edit.1.
HE111. Tried again and the asymmetric flight IS correct. But not very noticeable with the Left engine failed, but much more with the right Engine failed. There shouldn’t be a huge difference. Actually the yaw should be more pronounced with the left engine failed, if both engines have clockwise rotating propellers. I think this is the case. Still the plane will not enter a prolonged spin when forced to(ie, stalled with max power on operating engine). It just rolls over(which is accurate), but will not enter a fully developed spin. It just accelerates and recovers, without any action from the pilot. This is a fantastic characteristic that most manufacturers would envy.

9

•Don’t like that you have to fly the campaign to unlock stuff, the campaign is always crap.

I just ticked a box and it unlocked everything. Got the Premium version though. If you get the Moscow beta you also get to have fun in the I16, die alot in the P40 and go all Italian in a Macchi. (North Africa one day…?)

With the above I also got access to all the planes, so the campaign is actually alright as I swap from fighter to bomber to Jabo as the mood fits. Short on time and just wanting to get into it, I haven’t gone the expert settings route, but to get extra points I do all the take offs and landings. I’ve been slowly getting all the decent skins for the planes which is the only thing I still have to unlock. (I’ve not flown the new campaign though, which is meant to better?)

I didn’t have any graphics issues on my Nvidia GTX780, I also hated the bright bloom effects. It runs bloody fast and smooth offline thankfully for me. I struggle to spot the contacts more in here (snow maps).

Personally I find the sim more of a challenge than CoD but also more gamey too (down to the difficulty levels I’m running and lack of clickable cockpit), but I love the shooting effects in the LA5, smoke trails everywhere make it bloody hard to see the target, cannons ripping through everything and the enemy bombers do a proper job of trying to evade. I’ve had Stukas attacking me and the AAA on the trains are just deadly but fun to blow up. I also love the speed down low. Take off and landing are really tricky (for me!) as I spin it alot and if there’s a cross wind its a nightmare to stay on the runway. I prefer flying the fighters but I’ve really enjoyed the IL2 and PE2 bombing missions but feels like a sitting duck compared, how do those brave bomber lads do it.

The airfields and the small details, like people walking about, flags waving and vehicles driving about all add character. Thumbs up here overall and if it had a decent online campaign, especially with the summer map and EAF lads were flying it, I’d happily fly it alongside SOW each week.

10

Just got BOM!!
I love the MC202 and 109E7! What great deflection shots can be made with the Macchi! Cannons give it a big punch also.

P40 has awesome guns but otherwise a deathtrap if you get into a turn fight.

MIG3 is a nice nimble fighter too. Great addition to the Yak1. Not as nimble however. But fast!

I-16. Well its a turn fighter and I was happy that there is a MG only option for it, as it’s potent with MG only and a killer with the ShVAK’s…

11

I think I am more inclined towards the DCS route than BoS/BoM at the moment. Unfortunately I didn’t get the premium edition as I was’t sure whether I would play it enough, the thing is the unlock system is part of put me off playing it in the first place. I think in this instance I would rather fly Blue than Red. I’d like to fly the IL2 though, and I do like the La-5.

I’ve just found DCS to be better, though it takes some getting used to making sure all the controls are working right and understanding what they all do - and that’s just on the P-51 and F-86. Don’t get me started on the A-10 and the F-15! (Plus it has occulus Rift support built in!)

12

Just buy the LA5 and FW190 when they have a sale for those planes. That will unlock the game.
Problem solved!

I’ll have to take a closer look at DCS. Perhaps I’ll by the P51 and F86. I just didnt like that I had to set up controls for every new plane I get. A real PITA. Unless there’s something I missed?

13

I’ve bought the La-5, but I won’t be buying the Fw190. It’s not unlocked anything though.

DCS you do have to set up each individual aircraft, but there is good reason for this - though I used to have the same issue with it! They all have different systems and ways of doing things, some are made by different developers too - so there can be added differences. However, once they are set up they work realy well.

I have had to work on my CH Control Manager profiles a bit too, as I have learnt a bit more about how some of the controls work.

14

Stuntman and I just flew on a DF server. LW vs VVS. We flew FW190. Final tally: 10 enemy downed against 0 losses. What a night!!
Thanks Stunt for flying strict SOP with good mutual support and Drag tactics.
This is how it should be done!:banana::cool:

15

Was great teamwork and a lot of fun. Recorded all of the kills by Apollo and I, so should be interesting to watch.

I forgot there was an in-game recorder. Remind me next time to start track recording!

16

I’ll try to remember. It would be good if both of us record. Then you can get footage from both cockpits.
Let’s try some more tonight, since it just started getting interesting when they climbed to our altitude. We could have had some nice fights up at 2500-3000m.

What would be nice is having a flight of four! Jimmi, Storm, Sir! We need you and you can do with some practice for the Italian BOS campaign.

17

I don’t think you will be finding me in BoS any time soon. I am really struggling to get any of the control assignments to work. I’m really unimpressed that it does not support HOTAS with multiple axis for controls, it doesn’t allow you to use a shift key for controls, it just seems to have a mind of it’s own. I unassign commands and they don’t unassign, they still interfere. I set my own commands and they don’t do anything. I can not open radiators, I can not tell what any of the controls are doing (other than the stick, rudder and throttle). To me this is worse than Cliffs of Dover ever was. Even DCS is simpler to set up, and that thing is a nightmare. I spawned in tonight and I started in a smashed up plane. I can’t do anything - I didn’t smash it. I then have to wait 15 minutes to be able to fly again. Where’s the fun in that?

Storm of War can not come back quick enough, in my opinion.

18

I completely disagree OD.
It does work and you can also use the Shft and Ctrl keys together with another key. That’s how I start the engine(Ctrl I).
I don’t remember any problems setting up my HOTAS(CH combat stick, throttle quad, pro pedals). I Haven’t used the programmable stuff as I don’t know how that works. But I do use the fully mapped mode in Control manager.

You can’t bind elevator trim to a slider on any aircraft except the 109. But Rad, prop, throttle can easily be assigned to a slider or lever.
I actually have no problems with the elevator trim as I have it easily accessible on my CH stick(thumb button)

I don’t care much for DCS, but in all honesty I haven’t given it a fair chance.

19

I know that it must work, it is for everyone else. What I don’t understand is why it will not work for me. I have tried different approaches, I have tried to work out different CH Control Manager profiles. I have tried different assignements in game, inlcuding having wiped all of the default assignments. Nothing is working. I can not see any changes being made when I press buttons, I get no notification that anything is happening either. So for example trying to open a radiator - I see nothing change in cockpit, I go to external view and still there are no changes - nothing opening or closing.

Since last night if I pull the trigger only one round comes out, I have to press it once for every round that I want to fire, that applies to the cannon too. That is insane - I didn’t even change anything on that, it’s done it itself. I can’t even change my prop-pitch - or if I am I don’t know that I am doing it. I get no signal of any change. I have the bar across the bottom telling me my speed and heading etc, also showing how much ammo I have.

I’ve found it frustrating to the point of considering deleting it. Jimmi has offered to give me a hand setting it up. I’m happy to try as if I Can get it working I would like to be able to join in and fly it. I can see that it has some promise and it offers an alternative while SoW is down, but I do not see it as a replacement by any stretch of the imagination.

There was a rumour on Facebook that 777 Games were looking to take over CLoD too, based on the results I have had so far I sincerely hope that they do not as the TF CLoD is miles ahead of BoS in my opinion. I’d be happier if TF took over BoS and were able to be paid for their work.

I don’t mind something being hard, I enjoy that and I enjoy learning how to fly the new sims…it’s the ridiculousness of the controls not working without good reason (They work in everything else!)

20

Today i had my first flight, a bit of struggling with hotas controls but nothing so hard to pass through, the feeling when airborne is quite nice, the weather affect the flight in a realistic way. Takeoff was hard to do but with some Cappe and Jimmi suggestion become easier as was the landing (i’ve found this not so realistic 'cause i’ve bounced several time on the strip with no noticeable damage) i really hope to fly one day with Macchi 202 or the Fw 190 i really don’t like russian airplanes.
Apollo is there an Italian Bos campaign? It’s wonderful!! Can’t wait! :banana: