WWII Combat Flight Simulators

[Reikson]

I am looking for a good combat flight simulator with multiplayer. I heard that IL-2 was great and had a great online community but that was also a long time ago. (the last game was released in 2004 with the first coming out in 2001 I think) Does anyone know of or play any that have a big community online? Learning curve is not a problem.

[alfaroverall]

Honestly, by what I've heard, flying in WWIIOL is a lot like a flight sim. A lot of people destroy several planes before they even get off the ground.

[SentrySteve]

IL2 on Hyperlobby (i believe is the name) is your best bet. The pros will rape your asshole endlessly, though.

[Drafli]

World War II online sounds like what your looking for. Going from a Battlefield 1942 ace to a bottom of the barrel noob in WWII had me sprouting random wtf's while at work for a week.

I played all weekend awhile back and got no kills whatsofucking ever. My only moment of glory was when my engine got shot and stalled at 10k feet, and using only rudders and flaps pulled out of the 10 sec + dive and put down in a field.

You really need to know energy and have smooth joystick control as it is very easy to lose control of the planes.

[lafayette]

WWIIOL

Its a good in terms of flightsims, plus everything you do effects all those on the ground and the whole war movement in general, in terms of CAS, bombing , fighter escourt, etc makes you feel like your really making a difference.

Player controled AA is a plus too.



Though if you want instant action its not for you, as travel times can be long.
Also the choice of aircraft is limited.


French
Bristol Blenheim MkIV
Douglas DB7
Bell 14a (Airacobra P-39)
Dewoitine D.520
Curtiss Hawk Model 75 (P-36)
Curtiss Hawk Model H-81a2 (P-40)
Curtiss Hawk Model H-87b3 (p-40)
Lockheed P38f


German
Messerschmitt Bf-110C4/B
Heinkel He-111
Junkers Ju 87 (Stuka Dive Bomber)
Junkers Ju 52
Messerschmitt BF109E-4
Messerschmitt BF109F-4
Messerschmitt BF109 G6/U4
Focke-Wulf 190A4


British
Douglas DB7 (Havoc Mk1)
Bristol Blenheim MkIf
Bristol Blenheim MkIV
Hawker Hurricane MkI
Hawker Hurricane MkIIb
Hawker Hurricane MkIIc
Supermarine Spitfire MkI
Supermarine Spitfire MkVb
Supermarine Spitfire MkIXc
C-47 Dakota

[Ymir9]

Man, I'd like to know why there's a good pick of authentic, realistic WW2 flight simulators, but not a single one for WWI. The only thing we've got is that mod of Red Baron 3D, Full Canvas Jacket, and that shit is ancient.

I guess oldschool, slow, wooden airplanes with incendiary machine guns just aren't sexy enough. Even though Red Baron was awesome. There's nothing like going into too steep a dive with your Nimitz and having your wings tear off.

[Dorundain]

Red Baron 3D!

I miss that game.

I waited for it to come out for 2 years, then it finally did, and it was buggy as all hell. A year or two later, they released a patch for it that completely revamped the graphical engine, and it was really fun.

[Haldred]

Fly aces high II is about as realistic as it gets..I fucking crash taking off for about the first 3+ hours on that game. Its pvp all the time, and basically have fun bombing shit. Has over 100 WW2 airplanes including the jet fighter blah blah blah, graphics aren't terrible but it is very realistic.

[DR.NUMBERS]

WWIIOL is not what I would call a real sim. If you're looking for accuracy in flight models, ballistics, controls etc. WWIIOL falls quite short. Many people think it WTFPWNSAUCE because:

1) They don't have a lot of experience with simulators other than arcade types.

2) The community is pretty large with dynamic campaign (which is true but does not a good sim make).

IL2 Sturmovik + FB + PF + '46 would be your best best. Best WWII combat sim to date and has the largest online community by a good margin I reckon (compared with other non-MMOs).

Aces High II has an awesome online community with good special events but as a sim it isn't quite as good, nor were the server/player quality quite as high. Still, it is a lot of fun. In fact, if its still free, I'd get both IL2 + Aces High II.

Man, I'd like to know why there's a good pick of authentic, realistic WW2 flight simulators, but not a single one for WWI. The only thing we've got is that mod of Red Baron 3D, Full Canvas Jacket, and that shit is ancient.

I guess oldschool, slow, wooden airplanes with incendiary machine guns just aren't sexy enough. Even though Red Baron was awesome. There's nothing like going into too steep a dive with your Nimitz and having your wings tear off.

I HIGHLY suggest Over Flanders Fields (OFF). OFF is a mod for Combat Flight Simulator 3 so you'll need to pick that up from your local bargain bin. I'd rate it much higher in authenticity and realism than Full Canvas Jacket just because its engine can do more, better. However it also has very detailed, exact and authentic campaign play which is very nerve-racking and intense (e.g. you get really pissed when your guy, an ace by now, is killed by random flak 3 months before wars end.)

I would say its online community is on par with Full Canvas Jacket's but FCJ's is slowly dying while OFF's is quite new and increasing.

[Snowed]

WWIIOL is DEFINATELY what you need. Just got rid of that game about 2 months ago, so i could get back in to my norm games :)

[Spades Felligan]

IL-2, no monthly subscription needed. Get the gold-pack.

NOTHING beats IL-2.

[Gloomrender]

This probably isn't the best "Sim" ever, but Kuma Games made a simple yet pretty cool little WW2 fighter game called "Dogfights".

[Goty]

I also suggest WW2 Online.

I played IL-2 and it's really a great, great game - but I always had more fun with WW2ol.

I had a bunch of screenshots of some old ops my squad went on back when I played, about two years ago. There just nothing like you and a group of your squadmates, all lined up at one end of the runway; watching all their props start, and everyone taking off and flying miles to our destination. You'll be up high enough to both help avoid notice and to have the initial advantage of height.

Then, reaching your destination - usually the airspace above some contested area of the map, such as a town. You'll swoop down, listening to your squadmates on vent getting hyped and calling out orders. You'll see a nice swarm of enemy planes, and you got yourself a nice, epic air battle - the outcome of which can help turn the tide of the war. The war can be won by either side, and when this happens, the map resets and the battles start again. There's a map on the home page, which is a real time view of the frontlines of the battle, which can give you an indication of who's winning and all that jazz.

I played for about 4 or 5 months or so, and managed to rack up an unbelievable TWO kills - both which were a good portion luck. I've been thinking alot recently about resubbing, since their Battleground Europe update included a streamlined system to allow for a quick jump into the action.

[doma]

WW2Online

[itza]

IL-2 with the expansions is still the best WWII flight sim. WW2ol is great game though too, and unique in it's total war experience, but as just a flight sim it cannot compete with IL-2.

Man, I'd like to know why there's a good pick of authentic, realistic WW2 flight simulators, but not a single one for WWI. The only thing we've got is that mod of Red Baron 3D, Full Canvas Jacket, and that shit is ancient.

I guess oldschool, slow, wooden airplanes with incendiary machine guns just aren't sexy enough. Even though Red Baron was awesome. There's nothing like going into too steep a dive with your Nimitz and having your wings tear off.
I remember when I was playing Warbirds, iEN was testing and released Dawn of Aces, which was WWI flight sim with Warbirds engine. I remember enjoying it a fair deal, but it just didn't pull the subscribers. They seem to still offer the game, now bundled with Warbirds, but the DoA arena seems to be very empty, with just a handful of players at best.

[Pcheez]

Age of Conan.

You will be jumping off cliffs every hour at least to death-travel.

Slap on some wings and pretend you are not taking a nosedive and make "pew pew pew" sounds at a rabbit 1km below.

One cliff you actually plummet for about a minute, best combat flight sim ever.

[Suitepee]

World War 2 Online is supposed to be pretty tough yet realistic.

[Teth]

To my understanding, IL2 is built on a table-based sim model - in other words, the devs collected a bunch of information regarding how the plane was supposed to handle, punched those values in, and there you go. WW2O uses a physics-based system, where they more or less model things like they were historically and (hopefully) the physics engine will make 'em perform appropriately.

Both sides have their pros and cons.

[Beorg]

Try Aces High II. wwww.hitechcreations.com

It's probably the most accurate one there is, though the graphics are horrible. You can fly, tank, gun, bomb--just about anything.

[Bombay1361]

don't listen to half of these people I have played both WWII online and Aces High II. WWII online fighter combat is f'ing trash compared to Aces High II. Everything is perfect with Aces High and it has about 4 times the amount of planes that WWII online has. In WWII online, which is still a great game, the flight combat is just awful mainly because the rudder is fucked up.

[Milo Hobgoblin]

Dude.. play WWII online.

If you play the air game a lot and get good at it. You'll be a fucking hero

I cant tell you how many times some guy in a 110 saved our asses on a tank run by zooming in solo taking out a couple of allies and pulling them off of our assault.

There are some EPIC fucking battles in that game... some nights we'd run 6 hour assaults of towns.. that would turn into 12 hours.. 18 hours. Burning hulks of tanks everywhere. I remeber going to bed one night after a long assault on an allied town.. going to bed after a while.. waking up having breakfast and guys were still fighting for it.

incredibly immersive game.. takes pateinc and real skill but it pays off in spades.

[Bombay1361]

yea well if you do decide to play WWII online after all make sure your computer can haul some ass. Although the graphics look fucking terrible in that game your computer still has to be a really good machine to get good fps in big battles.

[doma]

yea well if you do decide to play WWII online after all make sure your computer can haul some ass. Although the graphics look fucking terrible in that game your computer still has to be a really good machine to get good fps in big battles.

Truth.
I crashed my Messerschmitt Bf 110 right into the ground just as I was diving to take out a C-47 yesterday. I went from 30fps to 1fps due to the ground stuff coming into view.

PS: This was on my old ass laptop. Not my gaming rig ;)