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Review - IL-2: Forgotten Battles
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Quick Mission Builder
 Want
to jump right into a fight in your favorite aircraft type?
This is where you do it. QMB is used to setup a quick and
relatively simple sortie for immediate action. It’s
intuitive and easy to use; all the controls/options are
obvious and straightforward. QMB is also a very useful tool
to easily test new skins, develop tactics against specific
adversary types, and practice just about any FB skill you
need. The only liability is the format of the QMB generated
mission files. They will not work for Multiplay, which is
unfortunate since it would be fun be able to setup quick
easily customizable sorties for multiplayer use.
Full Mission Builder
This powerful utility is used to
build missions for single missions, static branched campaigns,
and cooperative/dogfight multiplayer missions, using it
is not too difficult, but it is not very intuitive either.
You’ll have to refer to the users manual in order to
learn some of the commands, but once the full builder is
mastered, it’s easy to create custom missions. A very
interesting feature of the “Mission Editor” is the ability to use it in either 2D or 3D modes. This
means you can better place ground entities in realistic
tactical positions by viewing it in the 3D mode. The FMB
is just about the most comprehensive mission builder I have
seen in any simulation, yes, it takes a bit more effort
to use, but the results are very well worth that effort.
Graphics
FB’s aircraft graphics are legendary.
They are absolutely stunning, so much so that I created a
few interesting screen shots that I use for Windows wallpapers
on my desktop. The improvements over IL-2 include higher resolution
aircraft ‘skins’. FB’s skins are 1024 x 1024
instead of 512 x 512 (more good news… your old IL-2 512
x 512 skin bitmaps will still work!). The additional detail
this allows is very obvious especially if your hardware will
support running FB at maximum graphics settings. The addition
of custom aircraft and pilot skins is very easy, assuming
you have the skill to create a nice ‘skin’, just
place it in the specific aircraft folder! I especially like
the pilot face skins function, during my multiplayer games
it was absolutely spooky to look at my wingman and see my
brother’s face looking back!
The combat damage graphics are the
best I’ve ever seen. Forgotten Battles ‘hit’
bubble must be very complex. When an aircraft gets hit the
damage displayed appears appropriate, including being able
to see right through a hole blown in the airframe. The ‘standard’
(or poor!) damage graphics files, so obvious in games like Rowans Battle of Britain, are not evident in FB. Here
they are amazingly realistic, and dependent on exactly where
on your aircraft you take a hit. The smoke, fire, and crash
graphics are just as fantastic. The only derogatory comments
I have are the persistency of bullet smoke trails and the
‘Nuclear’ muzzle flashes. I’ve done a whole
lot of shooting, both military and civilian, and I’ve
never seen any smoke trail continuously follow the bullet
all the way to the target. This is unrealistic even on tracers.  The
muzzle flashes are also way too bright. Their intensity is
almost appropriate for nighttime, but in a daytime environment
they should be much more subdued. The real-life 30 MM cannon
on the USAF A-10 is not even as bright as a Light MGs in FB!
The Cockpits are works of art. They’re
historically accurate right down to minor details. They’re
also equipped as military aircraft cockpits should be, no
Cessna stall warning lights and horns, unlike some other recent
WW 2 flight simulations. All the instruments work and the
appropriate flight controls move with your inputs. I did notice
a minor ‘bug’ in some of the new add-on aircraft
like the P-40; the Attitude Indicators do not function in
pitch. A very minor distraction that I am positive will be
fixed as soon as the patch is available.
The terrain, water and weather graphics
are also remarkable. You do need the latest and greatest video
card to realize all the benefits of FB’s improved graphics,
especially the new water effects. The ‘new’ water
looks absolutely real, near photo quality (I think a GF 4
is the minimum for the ‘new’ water to display properly).
The terrain, especially around big cities, is a resource hog
but not so much that it will render unplayable frame rates
if you have your graphics setting appropriate to your hardware.
Terrain features are probably a little on the sparse side,
but I am sure this is intentional to keep the aircraft and
other more important game-play entities at a higher detail
level. The cities, while appearing a little void of humans,
do look pretty darn good. The land/water contrast is very
well done; some appear to be cliffs but there are also beaches
where the surf seems to undulate realistically on the sand.
The weather effects, while not quite up to Microsoft’s
Flight Simulator standards, are a very close second. The
clouds look great, and they are realistic enough to meet the
requirements of a good combat flight simulation.
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